Written by Serial Kicked [ Anarkis Federation ]
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| PIRATE GUILD 3 - Dynamic AI and Guild System |
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Artificial Life Plugin for X3: Terran Conflict 2.0 and over - Written by Serial Kicked [ Anarkis Federation ] |
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| Gameplay | ||||
1.1 SummaryPirate Guild is an AL plugin giving life to the Pirate Faction, unlocking several new ways to play the game and allowing the player to work with or against the Pirate Guild. It also features an efficient and dynamic faction AI which is able to respond against threats and launch raids against specific targets. Pirate Bases will now be able to take defensive actions, like buying lasertowers and M6 to protect themselves, or offensive actions like the raid of transport ships, sector invasions, destruction of military assets, and much more. They are also able to target the faction who dealt the most damages to them. The plugin also features a custom communication system allowing the player to talk to PG ships and stations, a news system to keep you posted with the latest pirate related events and various dynamic missions.If you have the Anarkis Defense System plugin installed, Pirate Guild will use it to (very) efficiently defend its pirate bases  Main Features:
1.2 Reputation SystemFirst the hard cold facts : your notoriety to the pirates can be between -1.000.000 and 1.000.000 points. And you can be Foe, Neutral, or Friend to them as follows:+----------------------------------------------------------------------+
| -1.000.000 < Foe < -10.000 < Neutral > +10.000 > Friend > +1.000.000 | +----------------------------------------------------------------------+ If you're under -10K, most pirate ships will spawn red. Between -10K and +10K it seems that they will spawn both blue and red. And over +10K they will mostly spawn blue. Some pirate ships will still spawn or turn red on you no matter what your notoriety is. Also,understand that ships won't magically change their attitude toward you as soon as you change your notoriety, it takes time. This said, the plugin allows you to set your relationship to both the Pirate Guild and the other pirates (those spawned by the game engine): For the standard pirates, it works as explained before. if you choose to set the pirates as friends, your initial notoriety will be set to +20K points, all pirate stations will be blue and all ships/stations will be turned blue ONE time by the plugin. If you set them as foes, your initial notoriety will be set to -20K points, all pirate ships set to red, but relationship to stations won't be affected. If you set neutral, the plugin won't touch the ships or stations. Afterward, in all cases the game engine will handle the job. The Pirate Guild works on a separate level (like the corporations in X3TC). It has its own notoriety system between -1M and +1M. And this notoriety system is used to manage PG ships and all Pirate Bases (anarchy port, and factories are not concerned). Meaning that if you set the Guild as a Foe, all pirate bases will turn red on you and same goes for PG ships. Helping Guild ships, giving money or ships to pirate bases will increase your notoriety, attacking them will (of course) decrease it. Attacking non aligned won't affect your standing toward the guild. According to your standing toward the Guild, expect the following: Guild Member [+1M to 15K - player has to join the guild]
Worst Foe [Special]
1.3 Communication System
1.4 Getting Started
Here's also a couple of advices : 1) You have to understand that this plugin won't change everything in the universe the second it's enabled. It can take up to several hours before the bases can buy enough ships and defenses to become a real threat. But you can be sure that they will. So, if the Guild doesn't like you, you'd better be prepared. 2) Pirate Guild wings can be deadly against most kind of ships. Ships are well equiped and sometimes overtuned. Even a 'small' group of 3 can be a real threat. 3) If you want to see some big battles, i'd suggest to also use the Race Response Fleet plugin from 4) If you piss off the Guild there will be repercussions, and do not hope to destroy a Guild's Stronghold or Fortress with a few M3 or M6 (especially with ADS). Those are now a real threat, especially against a young commercial empire with few capital ships. However you can pay tributes to the guild (and fines) to eventually make peace. 5) Over time, a bounty will appear on the head of some Pirate Guild ships. For a confirmed kill, you'll receive this bounty *and* the usual reward money from this plugin. Same applies to the ships destroying Pirate Guild assets. Such ships will appear in the mission list as soons as your are a member of the Guild. You'll need +15.000 reputation points toward the guild. |
| Communication System | ||
The communication system takes an important place in Pirate Guild's gameplay. Especially if you want to play as a Pirate. Using the ECS hotkey, you are able to communicate with any pirate ship, base or pleasure dome. 2.1 Communication with Pirate Bases
2.2 Communication with the pirate pilots 2.3 Dynamic Mission SystemUnlike most other scripts and plugins, Pirate Guild doesn't offer static / click-me mission that you have to accept to complete. Here, missions are dynamically generated, depending of what the Guild is doing. As an example, when a Pirate Base decides to attack an Argon Military Centaur, a news will be displayed in the News System, and if you're in the same sector as this Pirate Base you'll also receive a broadcast message through ECS. You can decide to kill the Centaur yourself or to let the other members deal with the enemy. If you destroy the Centaur yourself, you'll get a bounty and notoriety points. Same applies with sector invasions or assassination missions. Helping pirates who are under attack will also give you money and reputation. Sometimes you may destroy a guild target without even knowing it (you'll still get the reward, though). Oh, and even if you don't want to join a fight, you may still give it a look. You certainly won't get any reputation bonus, but you'll be still able to collect some crates from the destroyed ships ;)Moreover if you decide to join de Guild, current mission target will blink on your sector map and special missions will be available at your local pirate base. |
| Pirate Guild AI |
Spoiler
Alert
This chapter explains, in details, how the Pirate Guild AI is acting, so reading this may spoil a part of the fun. You have been warned ! 3.1 EconomyUnlike other factions in the game, the Pirate Guild has its own economic system. However, to keep the plugin CPU friendly, calculations have been somewhat simplified. So instead of using real credits, PG uses virtual money. As an example buying a M3 will cost 500 credits to a base, a M4 400, and a lasertower about 1000 credits. The pirate bases will earn money in different ways. When they succesfully raid a trading vessel, the pirates will collect some wares and get a proportional amount of virtual credits. So pirate guild's bases have a strong tendancy to attack transports with a valuable cargo. On top of that, the Guild itself has a bank account used to buy special items (like a M2, or some M7 for the defence of the pirate bases). This account is funded with donations from wealthy pirate bases.The player can also contribute to the Guild's grow by giving ships and money to various Pirate Bases. If you have a lot of money to spend you can aslo deploy news Pirate Guild Outposts. To do so you'll have to dock a TL at a Pirate Shipyard, buy the Pirate Base and build it whenever you want. After a while it will be taken over by the Pirate Guild. Also, as Pirate Bases deals in more wares, you'll see more trading ships going to (and from) pirate bases. 3.2 Pirate BasesIn Pirate Guild each Pirate Base (PB) works on it own. Strategically well placed ones will usually grow bigger when other one may be destroyed and relocated . When the plugin is started or when a new PB is created, the plugin will given this base several ships, money, and new wares. Then, each base will periodically -depending on settings- perform an action. According to its current situation (overal strength / ships / money / target availability + some randomness), it will choose one of the following course of action. Also notice that PB will usually try to focuse on targets owned by the guild's current enemy faction.- Build / Get Ship : Retrieve a ship from nearby shipyard or build ships directly inside the base (cost more) - Attacking a transport ship : Low risk task used to gain some money for the base - Lose a turn : Make some money, lay low this time (usually happens to ruined outposts in enemy zone) - Train Pilots : increases the fightskill of all the fighters owned by the base - Build Defenses : PB with some money will invest in lasertowers and defensive corvettes - Attack a Military Ship : Big PB can do some payback to big ships. - Invade a Sector : Send a bunch of ships to wreck havok in another secteur for a while (gives usually good random money to the PB) - Send Patrol : The PB will send some of its docked ships in patrol duty (fightskill of those ships will increase after docking) - Attack Factory : A rather big wing will be sent to attack an enemy station [optional] In addition to this big and wealthy Pirate Bases may also decide to spend money in building a Pleasure Dome, a station where you can sell your illegal wares for a decent price and play blackjack. They can also to build a M7 that will be used by the Defense Grid (see below). Pirate Bases will dynamically change name according to how well they are currently doing: - Pirate Guild Outpost : Lowest possible, usually raiding transporters to buy new pirate ships and defenses. - Pirate Guild Base : This version has more ships. If ADS is enabled, they are already hard to destroy, at least when the ships are at home. - Pirate Guild Stronghold : Such bases usually have defensive lasertowers or/and even a M6 to protect itself. Big business here that may have a jump beacon nearby. - Pirate Guild Fortress : Very heavily defended base with several M6 and many wings of fighters. They usually have constructed a jump beacon nearby too. 3.3 Defense SystemIn pirate sectors (or other sector with a pirate base inside) you will find Pirate Guild patrol ships. They act very differently from standard patrol ships you can see ingame. In fact, they are looking for pirate ships beeing attacked by ships from other factions (including yours) around them. When such a ship is found, all pirate ships patroling the sector will attack the enemy vessel. When the enemy has been vaporized, they will resume the patrol. If you are a friend to the guild, they will also protect your own ships.In addition to patrol ships, wealthy Pirate Bases will protect themselves by buying lasertowers and M6 corvettes. Major pirate bases will also do some active defense by attacking potential threats. With enough funds the Guild is able to buy a single M2 and several M7 that will be called for help by pirate bases when under attack. Pirates Bases are allowed to build jump beacons nearby so the M7 won't have to travel all the way from the gate to the attacked base. Last but not least, if you have the Anarkis Defense System script installed, a new option will be available in the setup menu which allows you to enable this feature on pirate bases. This is a very effective defense system where the Pirate Base will coordinate its ships to defend itself. 3.4 Guild MothershipThe Guild's Mothership is a Galleon Carrier M1. At first the Galleon will fly from a PB to another in order to recruit pirate fighters. When filled, it will start attacking the "Worst Foe" of the Pirate Guild faction. It will jump in enemy sector and deploy its fighters for a large scale raid. After each sector invasion by the Galleon, the "kill counter" of the targeted race is divided by 2, and the M1 will go away for a while doing repairs and refueling. If the M1 is destroyed all "kill counters" will be reset, and after a while the Guild will buy a new Mothership. This works against the player, too.3.5 Mob Boss and Bounty HuntersWealthy strongholds may build a Mob Boss M6. This special ship patrol in sectors around the Pirate Base and attack transports with good cargo. When attacked by stronger opponments, it may decide to flee. The Mob Boss is also able to ask his homebase for support fighters during fights. The bounty over the mob boss usually increase quickly. The plugin also spawn Bounty Hunters for mosts factions (Argon, Boron, Split, Teladi, Paranid, Terran). Those M6 ships will patrol across the map in look for ships with a bounty on their head (like mob boss, pg ships, or you). |
| Technical Details |
4.1 Installation Details
Note : PG automatically set your game to Modified to enable the Script Engine so you do not need to rename your game character to use Pirate Guild. If you do not want this feature, delete the !init.anarkis.modified.xml file in your script folder. 4.2 Upgrade from previous versionIf your previous version is 1.50 or + (final releases), just unzip in your X3:TC folder and load your game as usual.Follow instructions if any. If you are upgrading from a version prior 1.50 you'll need to do the following if you want to upgrade your savegame:
4.3 Uninstallation Details
4.4 Compatibility NotesThis plugin is compatible with most other scripts and plugins, and any mod as long as pirate owned sectors and pirate bases are supplied by the map. However some scripts related to the pirates are conflicting (like Friendly Pirates and The Marauder Shipyard) and must be removed before installing PG. Scripters and modders may want to read the [5.2] chapter. Previous Pirate Guild versions were designed to work well with the RRF: Race Response Fleets plugin written by LV. This Terran Conflict version has been tested with the new RRF it works fine aswell. You can enable RRF on the pirate faction, too. This plugin is compatible with the main game plot, but it may render some missions against the pirate faction harder if you're not careful enough. It may be advisable to disable the plugin while doing those missions. Mods (that are not including incompatible 3rd party scripts) should work just fine as long as they have at least one pirate base and sector somewhere in the universe. Custom ships (and weapons) will automatically be used by Pirate Guild. |
| Other Details |
5.1 Frequently Asked Questions1. Can I do X3:TC main plots while Pirate Guild is enabled?This plugin is compatible with the main game plot, but it may render some missions against the pirate faction harder if you're not careful enough. It may be advisable to disable the plugin while doing those missions. 2. I am new to this, what is the difference between a script, a mod and a plugin. How do they mix up? A mod is a package that will add new (or change existing) ships, factories it may also alter the world (new map, races, or game starts). Usually you can only have one at a time (however small mods can be used together, check the egoboard ). Scripts are usually providing new services, software, commands or missions to the player. You can have several scripts running at the same time and you can usually use them in mods, too. Plugins are mostly like scripts and same rules apply. 3. PG is a rather big plugin, does all of this really work? As a matter of fact, yes it does .
Some bugs may be hard to catch because of its size and the amount of
things to test over and over, but it's still very stable and reported
bugs are usually corrected without (too much) delay. Pirate Guild won't "break"
your
game or your savegames. As soon as you disable to plugin in the AL
Settings, old relations are restored, ships handled by the guild
destroyed and the pirates are dumb again ;) 4. Can I use parts of your plugin in my own script or plugin and can I include it in my Mod ? My X3:R and X3:TC scripts and libraries are now freely available, and can be included in any other non commercial, free, release as long as this documentation and proper credits are included. You can put Pirate Guild in such mod as long as compatibility issues are your concern, not mine. 5. Any chance seeing this plugin beeing signed ? No, scripts that change the gameplay so deeply aren't accepted. 6. Where is the Camouflage Device / Signature Scramble softwere? There is none. There's no clean and efficient way to implement this in X3 to be honest. 7. I have spotted a bug, what should I do ? Report it ! If this is an AI, gameplay, or other non critical bug just give a detailed report about the issue and i will correct it as soon as possible. If you're reporting a game-crash bug you must give the following details: X3:TC version number, Pirate Guild version number, Pirate Guild settings used, complete list of installed of scripts/plugins/mods, enable the debug log and copy a least the last 30 lines of 'My Documents\Egosoft\X3TC\log08513.txt, a basic description of your game (approx game length/amount of factory, plot done or not, anything special to notice). Pointless posts like "It doesn't work!", "It hangs!", "i want a .spk" or non specific complaints about gameplay will be ignored. "Bumping" won't be tolerated. If I ignore your posts there's probably a very good reason why: as a matter of fact translation issues do not belong in this official topic but in your local script&modding board. Rants about the install / uninstall process belongs nowhere (get someone who basically understand how computers work). 8. I want to request a new feature. Please understand that I'm doing this plugin for my own taste, and only for them. If i find that your feature is interesting and compatible with my current libs and coding i may add it. Don't think your suggestion is 'lame' because i ignore it. I have my own agenda, and its priority is higher than any 3rd party request ;) 9. I want to add the X pirate related feature with my new plugin. I usually receive a bunch of PMs and mails from scripters who want to add new features to the pirate faction, so i guess a general answer to this kind of PM belongs here: You're free to add whatever feature you want to the Pirate faction, you do not need my permission to do so and asking won't prevent me from adding the very same feature a few weeks later if I find it useful :p But you should consider PG as a code base for new pirate related features. If you want to start from scratch, that's your choice, but it may be wiser to write it as a plugin for PG so that everyone can use your work without wondering about compatibility issues. If the script is interesting, I'll be very happy to include your work in the official release with the proper credits, of course. 5.2 Compatibility DetailsHere are detailed (and technical) informations related to this plugin. They can be used to ensure compatibility between any script and Pirate Guild.
5.3 LibrariesPirate Guild is using the following libraries :
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| Copyright |
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Written by Serial Kicked This plugin is Open Source. You may use, alter, include this code in any non commercial and free project as long as proper credits are made and this documentation is included in your release. If you want to include PG in your (non commercial and free) mod for X3:TC, notice that compatibility issues are your concern, not mine. |
