Notifications
Clear all

Discovery Freelancer 4.87 : Conquest


Gunbladelad
(@gunbladelad)
Master Chief Registered
Joined: 7 years ago
Posts: 133
Topic starter  

For those of you who don't keep track of the latest announcements, the newest release of the Discovery mod for Freelancer launched as a beta today at noon, UTC.

 

Note that it is VERY much still highly problematic at this stage, but I'm sure that most of these issues will be solved within the next month or two (hopefully providing a stable experience before Christmas...)

 

Official Announcement (with download links) : http://discoverygc.com/forums/showthread.php?tid=104874

 

Moddb Download link : http://www.moddb.com/mods/discovery-freelancer/downloads/discovery-freelancer-487-conquest

 

 


Quote
Gunbladelad
(@gunbladelad)
Master Chief Registered
Joined: 7 years ago
Posts: 133
Topic starter  

Latest Information & Changelog - taken from the Readme file in the Discovery 4.87 installation itself.

============================================================

Discovery Freelancer 4.87: Episode 15 - Conquest

by Discovery Dev Team and the Discovery Gaming Community

discoverygc.com

============================================================

README CONTENTS

===============

1. The Storyline

2. General Information

3. Discovery 4.87 Credits

4. Special Features

5. Discovery 4.87 Changelog

6. Pre-4.87 Changelog

7. Discovery Servers

8. Copyright

1. THE STORYLINE

=================

It is the year 820 A.S., and with it comes Bretonia's darkest hour. The house Gallia begins their assault on Sirius in earnest by brushing aside the Bretonian Armed Forces and seizing the Leeds system, changing the political landscape of Sirius forever. Governments and regional powers far and wide now seek to respond to the situation, either by launching themselves toward a desperate united front against a seemingly unstoppable enemy, or seeking to use the resulting chaos for their own benefit.

Liberty is in the process of the biggest mobilisation in its history. Rheinland's gambit of blowing the gates in the face of a Libertonian advance has made the leadership of Liberty focus on the greater foe: a great portion of the Liberty Navy fleet is now on the move to Magellan to catch the advancing Royal Navy of Gallia in a pinch. But is the war between Rheinland and Liberty really over, or is the Rheinland Military merely trying to lull the Libertonians into complacency?

Rheinland's plan has definitely brought them a much needed respite. While their overall defence held against any Libertonian incursions, the Munster research facility was lost and the data it held captured. Rheinland is now faced with a prospect of a counter push against a stronger enemy, so that they can regain what they have lost. But even at home troubles multiply: Rheinland's revolutionary movements seized the opportunity before them and struck at a Rheinland whose Military was off fighting at a distant front. The Dresden system has been taken by storm in a show of defiance, and the Rheinland government now has to choose between attempting to solve problems at home first, or committing resources to the pursuit of the stolen Munster base module, before it can disappear deep within Area 21.

Meanwhile in Bretonia a mass exodus takes place: as core planets begin to fall to an enemy far stronger than the previously hostile Kusari Empire, the Bretonian government attempts to evacuate as many people and as much materiel as possible to the newly annexed system of Omega-3. While the Bretonian navy is pushed out of Leeds, the Cambridge fleet pushes into orbit of Planet Sprague, now functioning as the refugee camp of Bretonia. With thousands of civilians and armed forces personnel still trapped on Planet Leeds, the Bretonian government issues an order to all able citizens of the house to assist with the smuggling of these people and the materiel that they guard off of Leeds, under the noses of the patrolling Gallia Royal Navy. But with all the focus on shipping all valuable stocks to the rear there are many opportunities for an enterprising pirate or freedom fighter: the Mollys relocate closer to Omega-3 to hit these transports as a priority, and Corsairs become an even more frequent sighting in the ice clouds of Cambridge. The Bretonians will have to carefully consider how many forces they are committing to the defence of these shipments. Not enough defenders could spell disaster for the refugees on Sprague, but too many may mean that the Royal Navy begins to threaten the seat of power in New London sooner than expected.

Despite the chaos in the south, the newly founded Kusari Republic tends to its own problems, wrecked by years of war and a defiant imperial administration. Contrary to Liberty and Bretonia, the republican government pursues a policy of appeasement with Gallia, seeking greater trade ties to rebuilt its coffers through the resource hungry Gallic state. But while to an outsider the new, non partisan government would seem to have put an end to the struggles between Kusari big business, new troubles are simmering under the surface. Samura executives and rich families are non too happy about their influence eroding away, and they still have more than enough support among the populace to begin stirring up unrest. In response, Kishiro begins to once again work closer together with the greatly rising GMG. Kusari republicans will have their work cut out for them, having not only a political balancing act on their hands, but also the task of rebuilding the economy. They need to tread carefully, as mistakes may once again plunge the House of Kusari into the depths of civil war.

No matter the distance from Gallia, all of Sirius is feeling the effect of the Gallic invasion. Those who see the coming shifts in power, prepare themselves to seize their opportunity from the chaos ahead. Those who are not as farsighted, will be doomed to a desperate defence against these seekers of glory. One thing is for certain: the conquest has only begun.

2. GENERAL INFORMATION

======================

Discovery Freelancer 4.87 is a product of over 8 months of work. As always, describing everything that has been done is next to impossible due to the vast amount of changes, both big and small. However, this readme will provide some information to help you understand the scale of the mod and help you enjoy Discovery 4.87.

Some initial points to consider:

- Discovery uses its own installer since version 4.86, FLMM is no longer neccessary.

- Installing mods ontop of Discovery 4.87 will most likely have unwanted effects. It will also result in not being able to join most 4.87 servers.

- Open SP is always enabled, Campaign SP has been removed for compatibility reasons. Attempts to load campaign save files will result in errors.

- Do not forget to transfer internal equipment (ID and scanner) each time when you buy a new ship.

- ID items present in Discovery act as tractor beams.

- If your large ship gets stuck while undocking from certain space stations, try moving backward and strafing, use thruster, use the /stuck command or log off and on again.

- If you are automatically kicked from multiplayer servers, check your ship loadout for equipment that's no longer mountable on this ship.

- Goto the discoveryfl.com or discoverygc.com forums if you have any questions. Read server rules if you play on multiplayer servers. And, last but not least, enjoy the game!

Discovery 4.87 is the third version of the mod that was developed from the start by the Discovery Development Team, a dedicated group of 3D and 2D artists, coders, designers, writers, and testers.

This version of the mod has been designed primarily to deliver much needed progress to the storyline. Many systems have been changed, some removed and some merged. It was the development team's intent to build on the lore of as many factions in the game as it was possible.

But the storyline is not everything. The dev team has done all in its power to improve the gameplay flow in many systems, and the storyline was driven in such a way as to provide as many opportunities for roleplay as possible, while also not breaking established lore. To further deliver better gameplay, many balance changes have been made (specifically to fighters) in order to improve the flow of PvP fights, so that they can in the end become more interesting and intense than they are right now.

And of course it wouldn't be a Discovery release if we didn't have many new or improved ship models ready for you to discover and enjoy yourself in. Many talented modellers have submitted exceptional work which further enhances the quality of the mod, and will allow for a far more immersive experience.

The economy has been revamped once again, with not only many new commodities being added, but the economy specifically designed to support the needs of base builders. Realistic chains of material harvesting, refining, manufacturing and retailing now exist. There are more than enough trade (or smuggling) opportunities for any hauler out there.

To give a fuller sense of immersion into the dangerous Sirius sector, NPCs throughout the entirety of the mod have been updated to feature better weaponry, but also fewer numbers. No longer will NPCs appear to die in droves, instead small patrols of NPCs will be something to be aware of. Capital worlds will also be properly protected by specially outfitted defenders, to enforce safety in the core worlds.

The integrated Discovery automatic updater will allow for easy, secure and rapid updating with no manual file transfering. Each time the game is launched, it checks with the server if new updates are available. Updates are cumulative (you don't have to download all of them, just the latest one).

If automatic update fails, you can download standalone update packages from our forums ( http://discoverygc.com ). The updater does not restrict offline play, and you will still be able to play single-player or on a local LAN server without an internet connection.

If you prefer online play, you are welcome to join the official Discovery Freelancer RP 24/7 server and a number of other servers running Discovery. Server operators are welcome to run Discovery 4.86 without any restrictions.

In January 2007, Discovery mod was chosen to receive the Simulation Genre Award of ModDB.com's Mod of the Year-2006 contest (MOTY-2006).

Please refer to this Readme, visit Discovery forums at http://discoverygc.com and Discovery Wiki at http://www.discoverygc.com/wiki for more details.

3. DISCOVERY 4.87 CREDITS

=========================

Core development team:

aerelm, Aeternus Doleo, Blodo, Echo 7-7, Friday, Jammi, Jinx, Matt "Cannon" Dean and Xoria.

System, model, ship submissions, infocards and testing:

razr, Bloodlike, Ryummel, Montezuma, Valinor, ProwlerPC, Hades, Dusty Lens, Sovereign, Doom, AngelofMercy, Rodent, Kuraine, Lobster_Lord, KingVaillant, Zelot, Battlesnax, Daedric, Dart, DeathrunningVerminator, Edran Varyn, Gheis, Jansen, Lightning, Pancakes, Seth Karlo, SMI-Great Fox, Andrew, cshake, darthstrike, Hribek, MarvinCZ, FriendlyFire, Ktayn, Mad Hunter and Harmless.

Special thanks for music and voices to:

Greendjohn

Jonathan Cooke

Ophidian

Special thanks for former work on the mod as part of the dev team to:

Alexander "Igiss" Zalessky, Evan "Dab" Sondgerath, Frozen, Linkus, Lohingren, Martin "Mjolnir" Rytir, Silent Assassin, Shemkel, Swallow, Treewyrm

Due to the length of time this mod was in development we are certain that some people have been missed. If you have been missed and wish to be included, please contact Cannon on the discoverygc.com forum.

Additional Content:

- console.dll, mprep.dll, shipfilter.dll, moors.dll, shieldoffine.dll and many hacks by Adoxa

- multicruise.dll and deltadisplay.dll by Motah

- Thanks Gisteron for helping out with Gallic animations.

- FLHook by many people including Crazy, Wodka, FriendlyFire, Motah, Cannon and others.

- a small but important fix by Mad Hunter

FLHook, plugins and DS management software is available from the forge at the-starport.net. The source code is available for most software.

4. SPECIAL FEATURES

===================

* Wide Screen Support: Enable wide screen support by adding the following options to the command line arguments used in the shortcut to start Freelancer. Use -dx to set the Freelancer screen size to the size of the primary monitor or -dHxW where H and W are the height and width in pixels.

* Hud Toogle: Enable disable the HUD by pressing cntl-H

* Hud Color Control: Change the HUD color by pressing cntl-K

* Ship Docking Light Control: Turn on/off ship docking lights by pressing cntl-L. This command is only available in multiplayer mode.

* Alt-Enter to change from full screen to windowed mode.

5. DISCOVERY 4.87 CHANGELOG

===========================

48.70.0.0: (Alpha)

Ships, guns and other objects:

- New Liberty Carrier model by Massdriver

- New Red Hessian shipline by Massdriver

- New Order Bastet model by Massdriver

- New Waran and Ravens Talon models by Massdriver

- New Outcast snubline models by Massdriver

- New LWB snubline models by Massdriver

- Updated Liberty Gunship model by Durandal

- New IMG Heavy transport by AeternusDoleo

- New CTE and BW Gunship modelss by AeternusDoleo

- New Gitano and Collector models by Swallow

- New X-Shuttle model by Swallow.

- New Spatial model by Jinx.

- New Mastodon model by Jinx.

- New BHG Orca Gunboat model by Jinx

- New Rheinland battletransport model by Jinx

- Battlestar is now an stationary model made by Jinx

- New Zoner Gunboat, Carrier & Juggernaut models by Jinx

- New Bretonian carrier prototype model. Not a player ship (yet)

- New Coalition shipline models by Alvin Katz

- New Corsair Assault Transport by Madvillain

- Colonial Kronos reverted to Zephyr

- Order Hathor model reverted to 4.85 version

- Corsair Decurion model replaced with the standard vanilla light fighter model.

- "I see a Tanto and I want it painted red..."

- LOTS of texture fixes.

- Targeting reticle on AI Cruiser and Thresher fixed

- Hitboxes for all capital ships redone. These new ones should be both easier on the server and prevent missiles from being unable to hit them.

- Sarissa model scaled down. It is smaller then the Ranseur now

- Fixed the arc on rear turrets of Eagle & Roc

- Raba model scaled up, and turned into a Salvager-like frigate

- Touketsu is now a civilian light bomber

- Various fighters turned into HF/VHF hybrid

- All medium transports now have a top speed of 160 (Except Raba & Salvager)

- All heavy transports now have a top speed of 150

- All cruisers now have a top speed of 130

- Kusari BC max speed reduced to 120

- changed Geb from BC class to carrier class

- Osiris now has one more heavy slot, added another hardpoint to the model

- Nammu Nomad Gunboat now uses light cruiser turrets

- increased Order recon cruiser cargo hold to allow for mk2 cloaks

- Reverted Hegemon to original cargo capacity (2750)

- Damage shake effects set to trigger at better tresholds.

- Gun classes rearranged: Cl1 Bomber torpedo, Cl2 Bomber gun, Cl3 Gunboat FG, Cl4 Cruiser FG, Cl5 Battleship FG, Cl6 Fighter gun (light), Cl7 Fighter gun (standard), Cl8 Fighter gun (heavy), Cl9 Fighter Codenames, Cl10 Fighter missile

- Turret classes rearranged: Cl1 Fighter turret (light), Cl2 Fighter turret (heavy), Cl3 Bomber Turret, Cl4 Transport Turret, Cl5 Gunboat Turret, Cl6 Cruiser Turret (Heavy), Cl7 Cruiser Turret (Standard), Cl8 Battleship Turret (Heavy), Cl9 Battleship Turret (Standard), Cl10 Battleship Turret (Light)

- New Coalition capital turret models by Alvin Katz

- New house civilian fighter weapons

- 'Experimental' stats for class 8 fighter guns and class 2 fighter turrets in preparation for the fighter weapon overhaul system

- Changed force_ori to true on bomber torpedoes

- Torpedo hardpoint arcs adjusted on all bomber

- Fighter missiles stats overhaul

- Wild weapons added. New class 8 and 9 fighter guns and gunboat turret, cl8 effect by ChillerMiller

- Second gunline for Hellfire Legion added as well as bomber antimatter cannon. Effects by ChillerMiller

- Gunboat primary turrets received a projectile speed reduction

- Defiler added to a particular wreck loadout

- All cap missiles now use ammo (limits: 20 for bs, 30 for cruiser, 40 for gb)

- gb missiles now do hull damage as well as shield damage (so no longer EMP, infocards will need to be edited)

- Various balance adjustments made to snubcrafts

- Removed free ammo upon buying a launcher to prevent an exploit

- Transport turret stats reworked

- Added Pirate and Civilian small transport turrets

- Nomad thruster HP increased to be usable on caps

- Cruiser and BS Razor/Glaive converted into a beam weapon.

- Added "Seeker = Dumb" line to the Hellfire Rocket ammo, this allows autobuy to find it (tip by Ursus).

- Added class 9 guns and class 2 turrets of all weapons that did not yet have them, with the exception of pulse weapons.

- Changes to transport shields: med and heavy shields now don't take energy to recharge, and recharge rates improved

- Cape Wrath base model reduced so it isn't visible from the tradelane

- Experimental DSE hypergate site added to Alberta

- Tweaked tradelane hitbox: This one causes NPCs to not hit the empty center, but focus on one of the segments instead.

- Removed weapons from trade lane loadouts.

Galaxy & NPCs:

- Systems rearranged on the universe map

- Berlin/Sigma 13 hole goes *poof*. Chugoku/Sig13 hole goes *poof*

- Moved some jumpholes in Rheinland to prevent trade shortcuts

- Moved some jumpholes in the Omegas to prevent trade shortcuts

- Corrected cargo capacity of the Junker NPC CSVs

- All factions cease to use fighters as traders, use freighters instead

- Battleship Regensburg (Omega 15) sets sail for Omega 3, and ends up near Freistadt

- Resized Munich. System shrunk and reworked

- Moved the two remaining bases from Omega 15 to Saar. Omega 15 decommissioned

- Shrunk lane to Munich in Frankfurt down a bit. No need for it to be that long

- Saar rework: System has BHG presence it out with LWB and Hessians

- Made all trade paths and lane IDs unique by adding their system prefix to their IDs - should make debugging a lot easier

- Added some combat zones and patrol paths to Omega 5 and Omega 47. Hessians versus Sairs, with a side of BHG

- Redesigned Omega 11 to tackle persistent complaints from various sides about it

- Tweaked the systems around Omicron Alpha to add a heavily Outcast influenced system as a buffer between Alpha and the Taus/Gallia

- Mito Shipyard moves into Chugoku. The addon base to Mito splits off and becomes a new base in Honshu. Tau-63 decommissioned

- Omega-56 (Core guard system) becomes Omicron Rho and moves to the Nomad Omicrons

- Omicron Zeta and Mu resized, encounters fixed

- Area 42 relocated to Minnesota due to running out of connectors in Texas

- Various gates in Leeds, Hudson and Bering crippled and inactive. New London and Newcastle gates link together

- Completely reworked Gallia. Sanity checks and resizing done. Significant trimming of weapon platforms and base component counts

- New Cambria and New Anglia deleted permanently

- Merged Tottori and Tau 42. Moved one FA base to Honshu, one Hogosha base to Shikoku

- Moved BS Embrun to Dundee - creates a nice Bretonia versus Gallia (with a slight side of Molly) slaughterzone for shooting capital NPCs... Or players.

- Tweaked Dublin. Edited Poole so it becomes a non-guard system hooked by jumpgate to Cambridge. And a source of Sairs too

- Added Xeno base to Minnesota

- Tweaked the Commsat model so it has the ability to be docked at. Created a "docking ring" using this model, to simulate docking on a planet without using a docking ring (snubs only)

- Reworked MBases so that all bases have the proper factions listed. Should cut back on SPEW errors

- Tau 23 Beryllium field split into 2 mineable subzones

- Riverside becomes a Synthfoods base

- Redeployed Omega 15 as Omega 9, a system inbeween O-11 and O-5. Kills a troublesome trade shortcut

- Redesigned Cassini and removed playercharacter references from the infocards. No more offplane nonsense, just a nonsense factory

- Harmonised NPC difficulty levels and NPC loadouts Siriuswide. No house should be easier then the other now

- Redeclared loadouts for all ships

- Adjusted/fixed encounter templates

- Improved pilot logic so NPCs consume bats/bots quicker

- Reevaluated all station loadouts. Adjusted/created new ones where needed.

- Reevaluated all weapon platform loadouts

- New Player Owned Base platform weapons

- Added 50 new asteroid models for larger scale roidfields.

- Reorganised ship and equipment for sale at all bases.

Economy & Infocards:

- Lots of economy updates by Xoria

- Added new commodity infocards

- Fixed various infocards in Sirius

- More economy updates

- Cleaned up silliness in the ID infocards

- Raw Hydrocarbons added as a new mineable commodity

- Added a tweak to make ship classes identify themselves properly. IE no more buying a "freighter" when buying a battleship

Misc:

- Starter ship changed to Civilian Freighter

- Fixes to Pimpship to prevent lights from disappearing

- Fixes to various Hook plugins

- Added "Ammo Limit" plugin by Adoxa

- Added new intro screens

- Faction restarts added, a total of 85 templates

 

 


ReplyQuote
Gunbladelad
(@gunbladelad)
Master Chief Registered
Joined: 7 years ago
Posts: 133
Topic starter  

First update patch, fixing some of the more serious issues has been released.  I don't have it at this time, but I'll edit in the changelog into this post when I do.


ReplyQuote
Gunbladelad
(@gunbladelad)
Master Chief Registered
Joined: 7 years ago
Posts: 133
Topic starter  

There's been multiple changes and alterations since the last time I posted in this topic - and quite a few of them haven't been popular.

 

As a result, there's one (possibly more) server that have decided to alter the core Mod and change it into their own version.  You can find details of this here - http://www.discoveryptc.net/forums/


ReplyQuote