Mech Update – Sectors & Items

For months I’ve had various elements of the Mech Sector code on my cutting room floor. Of late I got frustrated with the amount of exploit attempts we have had to patch and deal with that I took time away from Corporations (the current new section I’m working on) and completed the changes I wanted to see to the Mech sectors.

Overall I never really saw much point in adding much more content to the mech code till I could ‘display’ the mech sectors in a more tasteful way. The old ‘list format’ was ok, it did the job, but it was hard to follow a combat when there was more than half a dozen mechs in the sector.

So the mech updates and changes got left by the wayside… Till now.

Today marks the release of a new way to View your mechs in the sectors. We have now upgraded the mech pages and created a more entertaining system. It’s been on Dev for just under a week now and so far we’ve seen no issues with it.

Bug Fixes?
First off let me say that there has been no ‘changes’ to the background code other than a few tweaks to try and get rid of a few of the old bugs. I’m not going to state 100% they are fixed, but for instance the one where a mech jumps and still gets whacked from 10 blocks away ‘should’ now be gone. Same as when a mech combat completes hopefully everyone SHOULD now stop firing and move on.

Checking code changes for this type of fix is very difficult and often requires replicating the ‘perfect storm’ which is very hard to do on code that’s constantly moving and controlling multiple mechs. But I’ve done my best to fix the issues.

The New View
All ‘in game’ links for viewing the Sectors will now point to the new view.

IF YOU HAVE THE SECTORS BOOKMARKED – you will need to re-bookmark the new ones.

You can get to it directly FROM HERE

When designing this new system a fair amount of the code used was Ajax, this means that it may be difficult for the Visually Impaired (Vi) players to use / display. Because of this at this point in time I’ve left the older view screens intact. These are there for the Vi.

You will find that at the top of the new view the LINKS to Alpha, Bravo and Charlie are still there and in the Top left is a link for a Full out put (old style) of the Sectors (again there for the Vi) or those that find issue with the new display.

New Mech Items
Because we have a new display system I thought I’d take time to create a few new Weapons and Armour packs. If all goes well and the new change is approved of I will no doubt carry on adding Mech items. (Yes next would be more AI’s)

I have added Four new Mech Weapons. These are Advanced versions, doing more damage but still keeping to the Weapon types and damage types. These are player made.

I have also added four new Armour types. These work in a similar fashion having resistance’s to various weapon types but also carry a new ability : Armour Regeneration. If this armour is used when a mech is IN a sector and OUT of combat it will regenerate its armour back up to maximum capacity over time.

The ticker is set for every 10 seconds and integrates with the other sector tickers. Remember for the armour to regenerate your mech must be IN a sector but NOT in combat. These are player made.

Sector Display Grid
The new display will show the normal list of mechs involved and to the right a Map of the actual sector. It’s updated automatically every 5 seconds feeding off the normal data that you can see displayed on the old style list.

You can Click on a mech name in the list or simply click on a mech on the map on the right to get the last 20 moves of that mech. You don’t need to refresh the screen, once clicked it will track that mech till its removed or you choose another target.

If two mechs meet they will either wave or enter into combat (IF they scan and spot each other as per usual). If its a wave you will see a change in the icon status. If its a combat you will see a red beacon appear. If you want to watch this combat simply click on it.

The change from the old system to the new is that if you want to watch JUST a combat then you can without all the other nefarious data that you likely don’t want to see. It’s much easier now to track your own mechs and those of others.

Lastly….
Just to reiterate apart from a few bug fixes this is STILL the SAME code at the back end. All we have here is a new way to View the mech sectors. So before you go running off to write loads of new bugs please FIRST re-read this post and then the three links below. I’d rather you spent 10 minutes checking facts before I spend two hours chasing ghosts.

Mech Disclaimer
Mech FAQ
Mech Bugs Active

Coop

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