Just picked up FT and think they are a great set of rules. The other day I
downloaded Space Empires, and after getting FT2 I thought "Wouldn't it be cool
to have a compute version?". I have yet to see a computer space game solely
dedicated to fleet combat like FT.
Why? Mainly because it would be fun. Another thing would be opponents. Imagine
playing with players from all over the world. You could play ladder games,
tournaments, or campaigns.
Computer Full Thrust (CFT) A computer version of FT should remain faithful to
the miniatures game. The simultaneous movement system is perfect for play over
the net. The miniatures rules look like they would translate nicely to the
computer. An interesting thing about a computer version is the ability to
tryout different ship designs.
Ship Editor I wonder why no one has made a program for ship designs. I've seen
the spreadsheets, I figure a computer program would be prefect for designing
ships. Players could design ships then trade them or post them on the net.
What would even be more interesting is to create a program that would allow
you to import custom graphics for a ship design. For example player could
create a front, top, and side view that can be displayed in the program.
Components would be placed on the "Top" view just like the design sheets.
Players could select components from a palette of component types.
CFT Graphics It would be nice to capture that miniatures feel in CFT, but I
don't think it's necessary. A simple overhead view using a hex based map would
work. What would really make it nice would be the ability to create your own
ship icons. For example in Space Empires 3 you can design your own ship styles
or sets. SE3 uses 20 icons, each icon represents a ship type. For example
icon1 would represent a scout ship, icon2 would represent a frigate, icon3
would represent a destroyer, and so on.
AI Always an issue in computer games. Most of the space empire games I've seen
(Stars! and SE) have "battle logic" or "battleplans" that are programmed by
the player. I'm thinking along the same lines except with a little more detail
added. Of course in a game like CFT you wouldn't need these battleplans
because the player is controlling every aspect of the ships operation. You
could develop what I call Battle Drills that could be used to make the
computer play better. In a campaign game you could use these battle drills to
automate combat. A collection of battle drills covering certain situations
would be called a doctrine template. This is the players warfighting
philosophy directly translated into AI form. The idea is to get the computer
to fight as if the player was actually controlling the ships.
Hope I didn't offend anyone by my ideas. If I was qualified to do the coding
on a project like this I would. Unfortunately I'm a newbie programmer so it
will be a while before I'm proficient enough to do CFT. I am thinking about
doing a ship editor as a first time project.
> TJ wrote:
[Snipage]
> Ship Editor
[Snipage]
You better talk to Stuart Ford (smford@execpc.com). He is working on a program
that will serve as a Ship Designer and a Game Editor. With his
program, he intends to play real-time FT games over the net.
> TJ wrote:
Well, Way back in 1980 (High School) I wrote a little fleet combat game. It
used a flat 2D playing field since I couldn't come up with a decent 3D
display. It was an exercise in computer math more than anything else. I have
recently upgraded the program with a windows interface (as a test bed for
interface design.) Although the combat model is fairly simple, the movement
system is similar to FT. The interface supports a massive playing field,
several zoom levels, and view centering. It was originally written as a two
player game, but can now support ten players with 100 ships each. Each player
has a password to prevent his position from being revealed. Naturally, the
games in progress can be saved to disk. (That might make it useful for EMail
games.) Full Thrust players could use the program to track fleet positions
without using the combat model. (The CM is a little off topic for this
message.) All combat would be resolved using dice and paper. The program would
just replace the table and minis (Yea, I know we all love out minis.) The
program is NOT in any state that I can send it to anyone, so please don't
flood me with requests. However, if you have any comments feel free to email
me.
Tom
i tried to get the FT ship creator program but the link was broken I'd really
like a copy of that program...
thanks christopher pratt valen10@flash.net
> Tim Jones wrote:
and had
> 580 FT messages to wade through!
There are
> some solo play robot rules knocking 'bout
On Saturday, January 17, 1998 9:31 PM, TJ [SMTP:redleg7@bigfoot.com] wrote:
This is a bit late due to the fact I've been away 2wks (having a baby) and had
580 FT messages to wade through!
> Ship Editor
Best candidate to what you describe so far
http://netnow.micron.net/~ericski/full.htm
See windows 95 ship creator
> CFT Graphics
Don't know if we really need hex maps. The best candidate to what you describe
so far
http://www.york.ac.uk/~mkh100/newweb/FTMAP.frames.html
Also there was a Java Full Thrust Battle Computer which was pretty good for
tactical planning but not graphics rich, no URL?
> AI
The other approach is robot ships (anyone played xpilot). It would be quite
simple to program a computer to place a ship so that its maximum number of its
weapons can bear and the minimum of the enemies, that would make the robots
hard to beat in a broadside knife fight. There are some solo play robot rules
knocking 'bout
http://ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/pdga6560/ftrobot.html
I like your idea of doctrine templates, they could also be modified for xeno
types.
> Hope I didn't offend anyone by my ideas.
Great people talk about ideas, Average people talk about things, Small people
talk about people.
sincerely
> This is a bit late due to the fact I've been away 2wks (having a baby)
and had
> 580 FT messages to wade through!
Congrats Tim. Did your significant other not have to do most of the work?
(grin). Another member of the GZG fanatical hordes perhaps?
Thomas:)
/************************************************
> Tim.Jones@Smallworld.co.uk wrote:
> This is a bit late due to the fact I've been away 2wks (having a baby)
and had
> 580 FT messages to wade through!
Congratulations Tim!
> > CFT Graphics
If there was a real demand for it, the program could be modified to draw a hex
grid in the same way as it currently draws a rectangular grid (I'm not
convinced that there is enough demand though).
> Also there was a Java Full Thrust Battle Computer which was
I tried this at my previous job, but it didn't seem to work too well on the
b/w Sun I was using (black ships on a black background...) - the only
copy of the URL I have is now over a year old:
http://www.uwm.edu/~cthulhu/ft/index.html
and since I don't really have web access in my current job, I can't check it.
Anyone know if its still around?
[Re A.I.]
> The other approach is robot ships (anyone played xpilot). It
Yeah, some of those bots are *nasty* - or perhaps I'm just not very
good at xpilot :-(