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View Full Version : Outside the box: Standing Orders save file



Molon Labe
12-22-2008, 12:08 PM
I know this is getting way ahead of where you are in development, but I'd like to throw this idea out there anyway.

I'd like to have the ability to create standing orders and procedures that I can assign to platforms. You'd be able to write these orders either while you're commanding a ship (in-game) or out of game in an editor. It would essentially be in the form of a brief "If X (event), Then Y (crew action)" script. These orders would be saved and could be loaded at any time, or assigned to an AI platform in a scenario editor. Each orders file could be as long or short as the player wants, and you can load as many different files to run as you want (well, within whatever practical access time limits there might be).

Examples of how this would be used could be an automatic periscope sweep of the surface when a sub comes to PD, an Emergency Deep procedure being run if that sweep detects a contact close aboard, a ship firing chaff and minimizing its RCS if ESM detects a missile emitter. Essentially it lets a captain decide how the crew responds to emergencies, increasing response time and decreasing micromanagement (without actually reducing control, since the files are written by the "captains" themselves).

Bubblehead Nuke
12-22-2008, 11:02 PM
Basically you are talking about the crew doing it JOB. We may command the ship, but the crew KNOWS what their jobs are.

I give a HUGE second on this...

Dr.Sid
12-27-2008, 07:04 PM
I've already thought about this. It could be done even in game for simple cases as a 'drill exercise'. Simple non parametrized macro. You would declare drill, make the actions manually, then end the drill and store the actions under some name. But sure, full editor will allow smarter behavior.
I even plan to have some script editor/debugger built into the game, so I see no problem here.