Starship Engagements (cheap SFB knockoff)

[ronalmb]

I took a break from my Pathfinder Kingdom Building extension last night to do something brain numbingly dull. I have a nostalgic love for Starfleet Battles and wanted to see just how much work was required to make a SSD. Well, several (several!) hours later I have the start of something - just to see if it is possible.

16776

Boxes can be clicked to chekov damage that the ship takes.

It doesn't look too bad. I might have to actually pursue this.. but only after I get my kingdom building extension done for pathfinder. I need that for the game I'm running.

[Hector Trelane]

Looks great! That was a fun game

[chillybilly]

I loved that game.

[ronalmb]

I'd love to continue working on this.. it looks a bit time intensive tho and I really am focused on my Kingdom builder extension for pathfinder. BUT, when i am stuck on that and waiting for answers from people more enlightened than I, I can poke at this.

It won't be very automated, but i bet i can develop something that tracks information well enough. The Ship SSDs are time and labor intensive but otherwise easy. The allocation forms would have a little automation but be easier than what i am currently doing ( I think).

I'll poke around at this here and there.. but until kingdom builder is done, it'll be slow.

Messing under the hood of FG is turning out to be a lot of fun!

[DrakosDJ]

I do love SFB and this looks great. The main issue is that each SSD would need a unique sheet (or at least each unique hull class).

There is a lot of potential to automate some of the more tedious tasks like Dammage Allocation and to simplify others like Energy Allocation. There is a game called Federation Commander which is a simplified version of the SFB rules.

[ronalmb]

Yeah definitately wouldn't be automated. I lack the programming experience and inclination to invest that much time in it. BUT, an extension where you just move around counters, click damage boxes and roll 2d6 IS DOABLE - and a lot easier on me to code than my kingdom builder. I'll keep fiddling with it on my off time from Kingdom Builder.

I've played Federation Commander. Liked that to. BUT I own all the SFB stuff and don't own the Fed Comm stuff. So i only have the former's ssds, charts, and rules to work from.

[DrakosDJ]

Yeah, of the two I prefer SFB as well, but I gluten for that level of complexity. I actually like the Babalyon 5 Wars 2nd Ed. rules a lot as well.

[ronalmb]

So, i'm taking a moment from my Kingdom Manager extension to give this some more thought. The way I'd like to do it is that each player is basically a list of ship items with a little bit of data for total BPV. Each ship is an SSD with a tab for energy allocation. The total warp, impulse, etc. values I should be able to count from the ship's undamaged (unchecked) buttons so that your total energy is automated. Players would enter in their energy expenditures in the lines below. Play would just be moving tokens around on a hex map. Weapon fire could be automated a bit if it can count hexes to target. BUT out of the gate, players can count that stuff and look at the tables on the sheet.

It does sound a lot easier than what I'm currently doing. The ONLY annoying pain is placement of the system boxes on the ssd sheets to track damage with small escorts and frigates being way easier than monsters like the C9 and starbases.

[DrakosDJ]

Would you also be able to automate damage allocation? Like the user indicate the total damage (or get it from the die rolls) and the shield facing affected, it rolls the damage and applies it to the ship. Mabey one tab could be the ships damage chart or something.

[ronalmb]

It would probably be beyond my skillset at this time. In a year? If I stick with this, probably. I've learned a lot working on the kingdom tracker.
The primary problem with automated Damage Allocation and Starfleet battles is that sometimes the player gets to to choose where he wish to apply damage (as is the case with 'any weapon') damage results. Probably better to leave it to having a DAC table you can roll off of, see the result in chat and then let the player apply the damage.

[ronalmb]

So, i played around with the User Interface artwork a bit while taking a short break from the Kingdom Builder extension. The PLAYER is simply a list container for ships. I think a library that you drag one or more ships from onto the player container is the way i want to go with this. Each item on the list will be a ship name, the ship type CA, DD, DN, FF, etc, a BPV value, and a link (the little Enterprise silhouettes) to the combined energy allocation sheet and SSD form.

16978

So, here's my quandry: Each ship in Starfleet Battles has a different Ship System Display, or SSD unique to it with check boxes to cross off as the vessal takes damage. I know i can make an SSD with working boxes (see post #1).. but each and every SSD is different but still an SSD. I suspect I will need a windowclass for every single ship. That will take time - which is a luxury I have. But can a list container accept objects of different classes? I know that the story sheet can accept many different types of links, so i guess it's possible.

Tips or suggestions?

[damned]

Yes you can define it to accept different windowclass entries.

<acceptdrop>
<class>cas</class>
<class>referencetext</class>
<class>referencetextwide</class>
<field>*</field>
</acceptdrop>

[vodokar]

I've been following this discussion with interest. Please do continue going boldly where no Fantasy Grounds Developer has gone before. :)

[ronalmb]

Yes you can define it to accept different windowclass entries.

<acceptdrop>
<class>cas</class>
<class>referencetext</class>
<class>referencetextwide</class>
<field>*</field>
</acceptdrop>

Is there a way to have it just "accept all links"? There's like a bazillion ships. Sure, the odds are I'll never get a bazillion ship SSDs done, but that accept drop class list is still gonna get pretty long pretty fast.

[damned]

Possibly... but after posting the above Ive found that while it can accept multiple drop types simply it is much harder to tell it which class to use when opening...

[ronalmb]

Hmm.. well, that's a serious hurdle I'll have to jump.

Does anyone know if it is possible to dynamically generate and place checkboxes? What I mean, as an example:

A SSD would have to have a parameters tab. On that tab, I have a line of information, including x and y coordinates, number of boxes, and a grid dimension (say 2x2), and text. Then when that info is entered (say: (x) 15, (y) 15, (boxes) 4, (grid) 2,2 and (text) F HULL ) it would then place 4 check boxes in a 2x2 grid at 15,15 with a label of "F HULL" above it?

I know it's a lot of work.. but can it be done?

[Trenloe]

Does anyone know if it is possible to dynamically generate and place checkboxes?
https://www.fantasygrounds.com/refdoc/windowinstance.xcp#createControl

[Varsuuk]

I took a break from my Pathfinder Kingdom Building extension last night to do something brain numbingly dull. I have a nostalgic love for Starfleet Battles and wanted to see just how much work was required to make a SSD. Well, several (several!) hours later I have the start of something - just to see if it is possible.

16776

Boxes can be clicked to chekov damage that the ship takes.

It doesn't look too bad. I might have to actually pursue this.. but only after I get my kingdom building extension done for pathfinder. I need that for the game I'm running.



WOW ;) I was just thinking of this a few weeks back as maybe the app I wanted to try to make to solidify my "book" Swift knowledge. May it a simple tablet game.

I have the old SPI? Box of it :) Me and my cousin would spend hours in his room playing this when I stayed over on vacations.

(what's an SSD? lol...)

[Varsuuk]

So, i played around with the User Interface artwork a bit while taking a short break from the Kingdom Builder extension. The PLAYER is simply a list container for ships. I think a library that you drag one or more ships from onto the player container is the way i want to go with this. Each item on the list will be a ship name, the ship type CA, DD, DN, FF, etc, a BPV value, and a link (the little Enterprise silhouettes) to the combined energy allocation sheet and SSD form.

16978

So, here's my quandry: Each ship in Starfleet Battles has a different Ship System Display, or SSD unique to it with check boxes to cross off as the vessal takes damage. I know i can make an SSD with working boxes (see post #1).. but each and every SSD is different but still an SSD. I suspect I will need a windowclass for every single ship. That will take time - which is a luxury I have. But can a list container accept objects of different classes? I know that the story sheet can accept many different types of links, so i guess it's possible.

Tips or suggestions?


Right - now I recall.