[MOD](v0.5.1) FleetControl - easy management of ship groups and more

[w00zla]

Good news everyone ;D

 

I created a mod that should make having multiple ships in the game just more fun!

 

DESCRIPTION:

 

This mod tries to make the management of a ship fleet in Avorion easier and to provide additional features like custom ship orders. 

In the first place, the mod provides an UI window which you can use to:

• assign fleet ships to groups
  
• give orders to complete ship-groups or single ships
  
• configure the look and feel of the UI (group-names, colors etc.)
  
• enable highly customizable HUD display (so you have the info about your ships right at the screen!)
  

 

SCREENSHOTS:

 

Fleet Orders:

 

Fleet Groups:

 

Configuration:

 

HUD Example:

 

 

 

FLEETCONTROL v0.5.1:

 

Commands:

 

/fleetcontrol

Enables/disables the Fleet Control UI (menu item & window).

 

Usage:

/fleetcontrol

/fleetcontrol enable

/fleetcontrol disable

 

/fleetcontrolconfig

Command to change advanced server-configurations used by Fleet Control UI.

 

Usage:

/fleetcontrolconfig updatedelay <NUMBER>

/fleetcontrolconfig enablehud <BOOLEAN>

/fleetcontrolconfig clear <TARGET>

 

Parameters:

<NUMBER> = any positive number or 0

<BOOLEAN> = true or false

<TARGET> = player or server

 

 

INSTALLATION:

Download ZIP for latest release from GitHub and extract it to <Avorion>\data\ directory.

No vanilla script files will be overwritten, so there should be no problem with other mods!

 

Server/Client:

The scripts are server- and client-side.

All files have to be available on the client for multiplayer games!

 

 

HOW TO:

 

 

First use in a galaxy:

(following instructions have to be done once per galaxy and player)

 

To enable the Fleet Control UI for yourself, you must enter following command into chat: 

/fleetcontrol

 

This will create a new menu icon which you can use to show the UI window: 

 

If you want to hide/disable the UI (or remove and uninstall the script), then use: 

/fleetcontrol disable

 

 

Advanced server configuration

These configs will help server admins and curious users to tweak performance values and en-/disable features of the UI.

 

updatedelay:

- defines the delay (in milliseconds) for the update of ship-states etc. in UIs and HUDs of players

- possible values: 0 - 99999999

- default: 750

 

enablehud:

- can be used to disable the display the Fleet Control HUD globally for a server

- possible values: true or false

- default: true

 

 

 

 

Integration of custom orders/other order mods:

The mod does not bring its own version of the default ship orders, instead it calls functions in the vanilla "craftorders.lua" script. 

If you or one of the mods you are using modified this script, this version will also be used by Fleet Control! In most cases there should be no issues with a modified "craftorders.lua", but be aware of potential problems here (please PM me in this case)!

 

Easy integration of additional custom commands added by other mods or yourself is planned for the near future!

 

Known Issues/Limitations:

• Only ships in player's current sector are listed as selectable ships in several places:
  this is due to game engine limitations and cannot be changed at the moment
  (just visit every sector your ships are in, the UI remembers all your ships once seen)
  
• Only states of ships in player's current sector are available:
  this is due to game engine limitations and cannot be changed at the moment
  
• Destruction and sector-change of a ship which is not in player's current sector is not recognized
  this is planned to be improved in the near future (maybe even not possible at the moment)
  
• Selecting order "Escort Me" results in order "Escort Ship":
  currently, its not possible to get the ships (escort) target via script, so the more general order is displayed
  

 

Planned Features/TODOs:

• integration/configuration of other order mods like "Haul Goods" etc.
  
• integration of additional custom orders:
  - order "Escort Chain/Polonaise"
  - order "Collect Loot"
  
• improvements for multiplayer:
  - improved state-handling for out-of-sector ships
  - recognize if ships are controlled by other players
  
• add sounds for actions like "give order" (with config)
  
• notifications for orders and other events (with config)
  
• keyboard-shortcuts for GUI and HUD display
  
• more ship state infos in UI and HUD, like hull, shield, velocity etc.
  
• better HUD alignments based on actual HUD size
  
• warning on improper player jump-distances when escorted by ships (required API requested from koonschi, waiting...)
  
• info on current target for states like "Escort" (required API requested from koonschi, waiting...)
  

 

 

Changelog:

 

0.5.1

• fixed bugs and problems with script changes and some strange client behaviour (thx to Shrooblord for feedback)
  
• added clear action to /fleetcontrolconfig command for removing all saved mod values (for troubleshooting purposes)
  

 

0.5

• made the mod compatible with the latest versions of the game (0.18-beta & 0.17.1-stable)
  
• added support for playing random sounds when giving orders (configurable)
  
• added script namespaces, fixed and refactored much infrastructure code
  

 

0.4

• initial public release
  

 

 

Feedback on bugs on suggestions for new features are of course welcome!

[w00zla]

-reserved-

[Fox]

Do i get this right, i can assign multiple of my ships to groups, and then give those groups the known "Vanilla-AI" Orders, like Patrol or Escort, instead of clicking through each individual one?  :o

 

Woow, definetly gonna watch this! Any chance you know the CODEA Software from the X Series? The Fleet Management itself opened a whole new Level of interacting with the enviroment, automated collecting Stuff, assign Scouts for Recon and Patrols protecting the Fleet, define Fire-Orders for bigger Frigates and Destroyers...

Point is, the Game suddenly felt totally different from the "1 Ship with Fighterescort"-Philosophy you'd more or less automatically prefered before for simplicity... i'd expect the same happening here, ppl would go on their playthroughs very different from what they do now with a nice fleet management!!

[w00zla]

Do i get this right, i can assign multiple of my ships to groups, and then give those groups the known "Vanilla-AI" Orders, like Patrol or Escort, instead of clicking through each individual one?  :o

 

Woow, definetly gonna watch this! Any chance you know the CODEA Software from the X Series? The Fleet Management itself opened a whole new Level of interacting with the enviroment, automated collecting Stuff, assign Scouts for Recon and Patrols protecting the Fleet, define Fire-Orders for bigger Frigates and Destroyers...

Point is, the Game suddenly felt totally different from the "1 Ship with Fighterescort"-Philosophy you'd more or less automatically prefered before for simplicity... i'd expect the same happening here, ppl would go on their playthroughs very different from what they do now with a nice fleet management!!

 

yes, and you seem to imagine quite the same possible results as me with this ;) Next stage gonna be the addition of new dedicated orders like "only collect all dropped loot" and the like, so this gets more CODEA like (despite i dont know it since i've not played X for myself ;) )

[Sarok]

THX !!!

[Tampa_Gamer]

Thank you for this mod, I am sure the mechanics will eventually be incorporated into the game, but the in meantime please keep up the great work!

[ZappBrannigan]

I cannot activate the mod since the last update. Do you need something for debugging or do you know about the issue? Thanks for the great work by the way.

[XTails]

Same here: excellent work (i hope ;) ), but with the 0.12 beta enabling the icon results in the message that "Fleetcontrol was enabled" but the icon doesn't show.

[mccorkle]

I tracked the issue down and submitted an issue in github: https://github.com/w00zla/avorion-fleetcontrol/issues/2

 

 

[w00zla]

I tracked the issue down and submitted an issue in github: https://github.com/w00zla/avorion-fleetcontrol/issues/2

 

Thank you very much for this excellent report :D

I am quite busy at the moment due to a new job, but I will try to fix the problem on the weekend, seems not to be a big issue to resolve  ;)

[mccorkle]

Thank you very much for this excellent report :D

I am quite busy at the moment due to a new job, but I will try to fix the problem on the weekend, seems not to be a big issue to resolve  ;)

 

Yeah, no worries!  Its the least I can do to get FleetControl back working.  Let me know when you are ready for more testing.

[plablo]

- order "Collect Loot"

 

yeh boi

 

gonna be good this day

[Vellius]

Getting this when running /fleetcontrol

 

could not execute function 'validateClientVersion' in '"data/scripts/player/flee
tcontrol/manager.lua"':
invalid type 'boolean' at stack position 1, expected 'Uuid'
stack traceback:
        [C]:-1: in function __lt
        data/scripts/player/fleetcontrol/manager.lua:142: in function addShipUIS
cript
        data/scripts/player/fleetcontrol/manager.lua:89: in function initShipUIH
andling
        data/scripts/player/fleetcontrol/manager.lua:68: in function ?
Setting state to invalid.

 

Line 142...

if shipidx and shipidx > 0 and lastCraft ~= shipidx then

 

Not a pro in Lua but "shipidx > 0" would try to do a integer operation against a UUID which can look like 6545646541-654165-651-6351

 

Removed that check in addShipUIScript and removeShipUIScript and everything is working fine now.

 

[Vellius]

Well.. fixed the mod and just found out that it does not recognize alliance ships... 

 

[Daemon]

Does the icon show for you?

I do not get the error but there is no icon popping up when I enable this.

[PsyberTech]

Hello,

 

Just found this today and it is exactly what I need for my 7 ships.  I followed the instructions on both the dedicated server and on my client.  Both were shut down and restarted after the new files were added.

 

When the /fleetcontrol command is ran, all I get is:

2017-08-12 13-49-25| Unknown command: fleetcontrol

 

I can see other commands in the same folder that I can run, but this fails. 

Any thought would be wonderful.  Many thanks!

 

-Bill Sr.

 

 

 

Is this a dead mod?

[Fox]

...

Is this a dead mod?

[Hammelpilaw]

Edit: Wrong answer.... please forget it  ;D

[Hammelpilaw]

Because w00zla is too busy to fix it, I just tried. With a very small change everything works fine, but I stuck at giving commands to the ships. I could use some modders help to get it working.

The mod invokes vanilla functions from file craftorders.lua (f.e. onEscortMeButtonPressed) for executing commands, this works fine at least. Then the checkCaptain function in craftorders.lua prevents executing the command beacause this is returning a nil value:

 

checkEntityInteractionPermissions(Entity(), AlliancePrivilege.ManageShips)

 

I just do not understand why... maybe anybody can help out or fix it? My current progress is attached to the answer.

 

Ok finally I got it. Getting still a few other errors wich could need some fixing.

fleetcontrol_v04_modified.zip

[Meesmaalt]

Because w00zla is too busy to fix it, I just tried. With a very small change everything works fine, but I stuck at giving commands to the ships. I could use some modders help to get it working.

The mod invokes vanilla functions from file craftorders.lua (f.e. onEscortMeButtonPressed) for executing commands, this works fine at least. Then the checkCaptain function in craftorders.lua prevents executing the command beacause this is returning a nil value:

 

checkEntityInteractionPermissions(Entity(), AlliancePrivilege.ManageShips)

 

I just do not understand why... maybe anybody can help out or fix it? My current progress is attached to the answer.

 

Ok finally I got it. Getting still a few other errors wich could need some fixing.

 

 

Hope you'll get it fixed for new upcoming patch ;)

[Dirtyredz]

theres actually little point to fixing this mod currently, The new patch brings new scripting api, and new fighter interactions.  The best thing to do is wait for the patch and then recode, or make a new mod. Im leaning towards a new mod since from my understand the fighter interactions will change drastacilly, that a good majority of the code might not be necassary at all.

[Hammelpilaw]

theres actually little point to fixing this mod currently, The new patch brings new scripting api, and new fighter interactions.  The best thing to do is wait for the patch and then recode, or make a new mod. Im leaning towards a new mod since from my understand the fighter interactions will change drastacilly, that a good majority of the code might not be necassary at all.

 

It does not mod fighters, it gives you an UI to control your own ships.

[Dirtyredz]

It does not mod fighters, it gives you an UI to control your own ships.

 

Yeah i know that  ;) 

 

 

Koon says that the fighters will now interact differently, which means any exsisting code has the potential to not work and deffinetly wont take full advantage of the new api, and fighters new interactions.

 

if you want to modify the exsisiting code prior to the patch, feel free. Im not stopping anyone, simply suggesting its better to wait.

[Hammelpilaw]

if you want to modify the exsisiting code prior to the patch, feel free. Im not stopping anyone, simply suggesting its better to wait.

 

This could be the right way... however, this last little bug is annoying me  ;D ...and has to be fixed even after the patch. Thanks for the info.

[Hammelpilaw]

At least I could not find any issue in the code... although the GUI crashes sometimes on our server. So this fix is highly experimental. If you find any issue please let me know.

It also overwrites craftorders.lua.

 

Attached file is working for Avorion 0.13 and 0.14. Experimental - use with care!