Forge Welding

[Edymnion]

For those that don't know, forge welding is the process of taking two pieces of metal and heating them together in a forge, then hammering them together into a single solid piece.

Concept: Have premade sections of ships that can be attached to another ship and merged together to become a single entity.

Example: Say I'm big on Star Trek ships. Star Trek ships re-use a lot of the same parts, like nacelles. Nacelles are large and unwieldy to try and do via copy/pasting, as well as having to crank up single player build area large enough to copy the entire thing off to save to a template and then try to juggle it into exactly the right position with the paste. It would be nice to be able to have a blueprint of a nacelle that you could essentially fly over and dock to another ship, and then merge it into the ship so that they become a single entity as if you had built it that way.

Implimentation: Since this will likely require a lot of processing to modify designs, its probably not something to try doing on the fly. Instead, we can use the shipyard Deconstruct to Design function to do it for us.

Two new types of blocks, lets call them Forge Rails and Forge Dockers. They act like normal Basic Rails and Rail Dockers while in astronaut mode. However, when a shipyard is given the Deconstruct to Design command, any entity docked via forge docking gets saved as part of the base ship. The second core, the forge rail, and the forge docker then get deleted from the design. When you next load the design, they are a single entity.

That way we could have pre-made design elements (like hull design elements, bridge modules, systems, or even complicated logic) that we can spawn in, put together, and then run it through the shipyard to forge weld them into a single ship.

 

[aRottenKomquat]

Interesting. That could make for some cool modular designs without relying on multiple entities docked together.

I think the trick would be to allow construction of ships that don't have ship cores. The ship wouldn't be flyable and would need to be forged to a proper ship to become functional, perhaps maneuvered into place by a hypothetical tractor beam turret of some kind.

 

[greatmatt]

wow, i'm impressed. This would help players a lot and allow for insane builds like a scavenger fleet with amorphous ships that dock to each other in a shipyard to become a massive titan. Definetely a feature i would want to see in the game.

 

[Edymnion]

Interesting. That could make for some cool modular designs without relying on multiple entities docked together.

Yup.

How many times have you built the same exact damned salvage array? I mean sure its fairly quick and easy, but how many times have you done it? Be a lot easier to simply take a premade salvage array off the shelf and click it in.

Would work wonders with the new auxiliary power as well. They need to be properly shielded, layered, etc to protect them. Be very nice if you could make that build once for any given size/shape and then snap them in like we did the docked generators (don't know about you guys, but I still have blueprints of various docked generators saved based on how much power they generate that I would plug and play).

Or quick build a carrier by creating a drone rack with rails already in place that you could just snap into place in a row to have entire drone fleets installed as easily as you would snap in a single turret.

 

[Lukwan]

Yes. Merge (regardless of how) would make building so much easier and cut down on the total number of entities used in the game.

Your mechanic is well thought out and seems like a viable means of merging two entities. In particular because there is never a time when there is no core or two cores on a single entity. The only downside I can see is that you need a shipyard and they still need some polish.

 

[Edymnion]

I think the trick would be to allow construction of ships that don't have ship cores. The ship wouldn't be flyable and would need to be forged to a proper ship to become functional, perhaps maneuvered into place by a hypothetical tractor beam turret of some kind.

Well, if we use the shipyard, you can have a core and systems on the piece you're welding on.

Give it enough power and thrusters to fly it over, dock it, then just remove the power/thrusters and tell the shipyard to deconstruct. Deconstruct command removes the second core while its saving.

 

[Malacodor]

I don't see how this would be better that an improved copy-paste system. Why implementing a new system, when there's already one in the game that could do the same, if it where actually usable?

 

[Edymnion]

I don't see how this would be better that an improved copy-paste system. Why implementing a new system, when there's already one in the game that could do the same, if it where actually usable?

Because the copy/paste system we have now relies on advanced build mode parameters being large enough to accommodate them, and most servers won't turn those parameters up high enough to be useful due to the fact someone misclicking and trying to drop a 100x100x100 solid cube can crash said server.

 

[Sven_The_Slayer]

I love the idea of being able to load specific components and you are right about copy paste being a bit restrictive. A lot of that can be fixed with a better copy paste system. First of all being able to choose where something pastes from so you don't need so many helper blocks and general optimization to make pasting large components faster.

As for the idea you could probably simplify it to a single block that just docks to itself or uses the regular rail docker to dock to the forge point.

 

[Edymnion]

As for the idea you could probably simplify it to a single block that just docks to itself or uses the regular rail docker to dock to the forge point.

Well, reason I went with a duplicate pair is that it can be literally copy/pasted config with just a different skin. The real work would be in the deconstruct to scan the blueprint for those specific blocks.

If it docked to itself, that would be entirely new block logic. If it was a regular docker or rail and one forge block, then extra logic would be needed in the welding to determine exactly which block it was docked to. I would assume it would be easier to do if we had a "Well there's only 3 forge rails on this thing, its gotta be one of these" than "Oh, there's 127 rail blocks on this thing, go through all of them to figure out which one its actually docked to."

Dunno, might not be an issue or not given how they actually coded it. Haven't seen the base code to know how it would work best.

 

[Malacodor]

Because the copy/paste system we have now relies on advanced build mode parameters being large enough to accommodate them, and most servers won't turn those parameters up high enough to be useful due to the fact someone misclicking and trying to drop a 100x100x100 solid cube can crash said server.

When welding two entities together, the blocks from one entity had to be copied, pasted to the other one and then deleted by the game. That's three costly operations at once, if the entities are big.

I love the idea of being able to load specific components and you are right about copy paste being a bit restrictive. A lot of that can be fixed with a better copy paste system. First of all being able to choose where something pastes from so you don't need so many helper blocks and general optimization to make pasting large components faster.

It should simply be possible to move the selection frame freely in any direction via hotkeys. Also, pasting big parts slows down the game so much partly because of the preview. There's a config setting to disable it, but it can't be done on the fly. Ideally we could have the preview disabled, then move the selection frame into position and finally enable the preview to fine-tune the position. Furthermore, there should be an option to limit the number of chunks placed/pasted per second, then a build area of 100x100x100 would be possible without crashing a server.

 

[Edymnion]

When welding two entities together, the blocks from one entity had to be copied, pasted to the other one and then deleted by the game. That's three costly operations at once, if the entities are big.

Hence where I said:

Since this will likely require a lot of processing to modify designs, its probably not something to try doing on the fly.

Doing it on the deconstruct means both entities are already being save and despawned, so thats not an issue. The only actual processor intensive bit would be actually translating the blocks over.

 

[Malacodor]

Hence where I said

I have overlooked that part. But I'd still rather optimize an existing feature, than implementing a new one, which will most likely be bugged and might take years to get fixed.

 

[Nickizzy]

The second core, the forge rail, and the forge docker then get deleted from the design. When you next load the design, they are a single entity.

What happens to the second core, forge rail, and forge docker? Do they get destroyed and disappear? Do they get replaced with a block? Do they disappear but go into the shipyard inventory?

 

[Edymnion]

What happens to the second core, forge rail, and forge docker? Do they get destroyed and disappear? Do they get replaced with a block? Do they disappear but go into the shipyard inventory?

I'd say they are destroyed/disappear.

Not like anyone is going to begrudge a lousy core and all of two easy to produce/buy blocks.

 

[Sven_The_Slayer]

I would assume it would be easier to do if we had a "Well there's only 3 forge rails on this thing, its gotta be one of these" than "Oh, there's 127 rail blocks on this thing, go through all of them to figure out which one its actually docked to."

I did say you would dock a rail docker to the forge point. That way their wouldn't be 127 rails to sort through, only the forge points and the rail dockers on the other entity. We already have the docker why make another one that is just a copy and paste but it can only dock to the forge point?

The weld points would probably have to be converted to another block when it's welded and the core removed/replaced

 

[Jojomo]

For those that don't know, forge welding is the process of taking two pieces of metal and heating them together in a forge, then hammering them together into a single solid piece.

Concept: Have premade sections of ships that can be attached to another ship and merged together to become a single entity.

Example: Say I'm big on Star Trek ships. Star Trek ships re-use a lot of the same parts, like nacelles. Nacelles are large and unwieldy to try and do via copy/pasting, as well as having to crank up single player build area large enough to copy the entire thing off to save to a template and then try to juggle it into exactly the right position with the paste. It would be nice to be able to have a blueprint of a nacelle that you could essentially fly over and dock to another ship, and then merge it into the ship so that they become a single entity as if you had built it that way.

Implimentation: Since this will likely require a lot of processing to modify designs, its probably not something to try doing on the fly. Instead, we can use the shipyard Deconstruct to Design function to do it for us.

Two new types of blocks, lets call them Forge Rails and Forge Dockers. They act like normal Basic Rails and Rail Dockers while in astronaut mode. However, when a shipyard is given the Deconstruct to Design command, any entity docked via forge docking gets saved as part of the base ship. The second core, the forge rail, and the forge docker then get deleted from the design. When you next load the design, they are a single entity.

That way we could have pre-made design elements (like hull design elements, bridge modules, systems, or even complicated logic) that we can spawn in, put together, and then run it through the shipyard to forge weld them into a single ship.

I made a virtually identical suggestion a week or two ago: Producing ship "components" in factories (anti-modular idea)
(Build a special "ship" around a component core, that can be docked to an existing ship, which completely merges the two and destroys the component core/dock)

People pointed out that templates performed the suggested function (I'm new, I hadn't heard of templates).
The only problem is the horrible copy/paste controls. I like the idea (obviously) but I think it's better to just fix the copy/paste controls.

 

[Lone_Puppy]

I like this idea. How about the Schine guys build an option into advanced build mode to "Fuse" existing docked entities, by toggling on an advanced build option to allow you to click on a docker to signal the game to fuse from that point. Which would theoretically integrate/fuse the docked entity to the entity it is docked to and replace the rail/docker with whatever block is selected in your hotbar.

Would this be a viable option if they could make it?
It saves having to make additional blocks, or anything in game and will give you what you, I and many others are looking for.

They already have create docking in build mode, so this is kinda like an antithesis next step I guess.
[doublepost=1474495782,1474495718][/doublepost]Could also be called an "Integrate" advanced build mode option, instead of "Fuse".

 

[Nickizzy]

I like this idea. How about the Schine guys build an option into advanced build mode to "Fuse" existing docked entities, by toggling on an advanced build option to allow you to click on a docker to signal the game to fuse from that point. Which would theoretically integrate/fuse the docked entity to the entity it is docked to and replace the rail/docker with whatever block is selected in your hotbar.

Would this be a viable option if they could make it?
It saves having to make additional blocks, or anything in game and will give you what you, I and many others are looking for.

They already have create docking in build mode, so this is kinda like an antithesis next step I guess.

The point of doing it in a shipyard is to make it less laggy and less likely to corrupt or anything. Although if that problem isn't to huge I'd definitely go with this.
[doublepost=1474495851,1474495807][/doublepost]Ninjaed so fast I got the wait post error

 

[Madman198237]

I like the basic, first-proposed idea. All you have to do is program the game to, when saving the ship in general (More nomad-friendly that way, even though nomads probably won't need this sort of thing) say, when it sees these blocks on an entity, ANY entity, "These two blocks, and the core, need to disappear, and this becomes one entity".
I mean, the game already keeps track of separate yet docked entities, all you have to do is merge the blocks, dimensions, locations, and chunks of one entity into another (Sarcastic).
This might be difficult. However, it absolutely would be worth the time.

An addendum, though: It would be nice if there was a way to track what was an addition, so that if you want a jack-of-all-trades ship then you can have the shipyard take the original blueprint, break it down, add a different module to the now-replaced merge-block, and boom, ship modified.