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Gnrl_Grad

Nemisis Mod - improved enemy carrier survivability

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Introducing Nemisis mod! The intention of this mod is to increase the survivability of the enemy carrier in the strategy game and make for a longer more challenging game. If you've ever been disappointed when killing the enemy carrier early on in the game then this mod is for you.

What does this mod do?

1) It makes it almost impossible to kill the enemy carrier early on.

2) If you encounter and battle the enemy carrier during the game and you beat it badly it will retreat back to it's stockpile island, this creates the possibility for multiple carrier battles during the one game, building up to the final kill!

3) You will need to conquer all enemy islands and push the enemy carrier back to it's stockpile island to finally defeat it!

----- FEATURES IN DETAIL -----

Here is a summary of the main features and changes this mod will make to gameplay...

* Enemy carrier will do a full retreat with cutscene to stockpile if damaged too badly

* To kill enemy carrier you need to take all islands or destroy him at his stockpile island

* Enemy carrier has additional armour making him tougher to beat

* Torpedo damage changed making it harder but not impossible to kill enemy carrier outright with torpedos

* Note: It should still be possible but very very hard to kill him outright at any time

* When there are no more enemy islands you will receive sighting report messages to help locate the enemy carrier

* Enemy carrier receives manta reinforcements when defending an island he owns

* Enemy carrier receives additional repair/fuel/unit assists when he retreats to a friendly island

* If enemy carrier runs out of fuel when in battle with player there is chance he will receive a small amount of fuel to keep him going

* Initial warm up timer reduced so enemy carrier will come into play a little bit quicker at start of game

* Enemy strength slider in strategy game menu effects modded armour and some assists

* Enemy island capture time is increased by approx 5%

* Changes to enemy carrier attack pattern

* Chance of critical damage to fuel cells - 50% fuel capacity - requires return to stockpile to repair

* Deckviews mod integrated - additional camera views for carrier press C and X keys to cycle through views, Z to zoom

* Player carrier is now equipped with a scrambler for stealth and evasive maneuvers

https://www.dropbox.com/s/imn4k6tzjern2ox/nemisismod.zip

Known Issues

If you save a game with the mod enabled you can only load and play it with the mod enabled. If you disable the mod and load a game that was saved with the mod enabled it will crash to desktop. Thanks to Species1571 for reporting this.

Note this is not an issue if you want to play a game start to finish with the mod enabled and you can save and load your game as normal with the mod enabled.

Edited by Gnrl_Grad

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Thanks for this - definately will try it out later when i get home.

Just wondering though - by "tougher" do you mean it will retreat faster so we cant kill it easily until its cornered at its stockpile island, or can it take much more damage in a fight?

Guess i will see for myself later - just curious :-)

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Thanks for the comments and thanks Foxhound for posting about it.

Just wondering though - by "tougher" do you mean it will retreat faster so we cant kill it easily until its cornered at its stockpile island, or can it take much more damage in a fight?

The overall strategy game is tougher to beat in this mod because you cannot easily kill off the enemy carrier early in the game. The enemy carrier itself doesn't have more hit points so you can still fight it and damage it just as before but now it retreats from battle if it takes too much damage and will then repair over time and come back into the game. So in a way it is tougher and it makes for a longer game. You can have satisfying battles everytime you encouter the enemy carrier but you will only be able to destroy him at his stockpile island or if he has only one island left. The less islands he has the longer he will hang around in battle too, so early in the game he might retreat a bit quicker but later in the game the battles will get a bit longer. He is also sensitive to his engines getting damaged so if you focus on hitting his engines to stop him dead he will retreat from battle before he loses too much engines. The retreat is done similar to the way the carrier retreats in the campaign mode so you can't simply play cat and mouse chase as it retreats, it is instead better to re-focus on island capture, especially early to mid game, later in the game if you have an idea where his stockpile island is you can focus more on hunting him down for the final kill if you want to.

If we get to tinker with damage/armour/hitpoint settings I will definately have a look at this too but it is already quite a challange as is. I started a game on all normal settings today and it's still on-going, I'm on day 3 in-game time and I've battled him a few times during the game. Sometimes he disappears for a long while and other times he comes back a bit quicker. I have to make sure I capture as many islands as I can when I sending him running because I know he'll be back :) If I adjust the difficulty at the start of the strategy game it would surely make it even tougher so I'd recommend trying on all default island/difficulty settings first.

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@Gnrl_grad - sounds great! As I have never had multiple battles before with the carrier (in strategy game) - does it also restock its lost Mantas/walruses/drones (if it lost any in the first fight)?

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I'm pretty sure I have destroyed it's mantas only to have him send some fresh ones at me later in the game. I haven't really monitored it but as far as I know this restocking and repairing behavior is already in there by default.

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Starteda new game. Made some bad choices early on for which islands to take so the enemy carrier has a lead on me (started with just under half islands owned by both sides).

Eventually encountered the carrier and it stayed and fought for awhile damaging me - then i hurt it enough to trigger its escape

It uses the "warp speed" escape? Caught me off guard there when i saw the animation kick in.

Liking it so far - it really makes a difference to the strategy game as he gets away to repair and come back again.

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Glad you're liking it, I'm on day 6 in-game time now and he has about 7 islands left but I have them all separated now and I have his stockpile island in my sights so I should hopefully be close to winning. Will try to finish him off later tonight if I get a chance. :)

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Not bad, but he warps away too fast sometimes.

IE: He had me dead to rights but I got a few hits on his engins and that triggered the warp.

Yet my final battle was a very lacking; I had already taken his stockpile and found him at his last island. I did allot of damage to him befor he ran and then I took the last island. I then spent about 30 min warping around looking for him (because he lost his ability to attack an island and set off the alarm) and when I found him, he was still badly damaged and out of fuel and just took a few more shots to kill.

Maby have it cheat just a little and have him auto resupply (but not auto heal) every few min after you take all the islands? Give us a better boss battle.

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Thanks for the feedback, I agree he does retreat too early sometimes and I'm going to adjust this so he stays around in battle a bit longer. It is set to stay around longer as he loses more islands so he can deal more damage if the player is winning the overall game but it looks like the effect is a little too subtle at the moment. I also have an idea to strengthen his engines which is usually the main target, especially as he moves away from you - I'm thinking of giving him a random chance of some minor assistance with engine repair if his engines take too much damage. I'll have to experiment with that because I don't want to make him too overpowered or impossible to beat in battle. I just need to finish my current game before I experiment with new changes.

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OK v2.0

* Improved enemy carrier armour making it a LOT tougher - recommend using heavy weapons to do damage!

* Added message when enemy carrier retreats

* When there are no more enemy islands at the end of the game you will receive sighting report messages to help locate the enemy carrier

* other minor adjustments

If you want a serious opponent this version should deliver. Not only will the enemy carrier retreat if you beat him badly but he is now much tougher than before so he should give you a good run for your money.

Most of his hull has been retro-fitted with new and improved deflective armour which means you'll need to use weapons that dish out more damage like the main carrier gun, rockets and plasma etc. Defense deck guns and lighter weapons have less chance of penetrating this new armour.

How it Works Spoiler - The armour is actually simulated using repair code but in-game it does seem like he has better armour.

In relation to Tontows problem searching blindly for the carrier at the end of the game I've added an aid to help locate the enemy carrier at the end of the game so you don't have to rely on him attacking an island to locate him. The message will let you know what island he is near but bear in mind he could be en-route so you may still have to travel the routes around the island to locate him. Just bring up the map to get the latest sighting report.

Edit-> V2.1

Some quick changes...

* Added well done speech and music when carrier retreats

* And some minor damage tweaks

https://www.dropbox.com/s/imn4k6tzjern2ox/nemisismod.zip

Edited by Gnrl_Grad

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Would updating this mod require a restart of the game or can I continue my saved game (strategy)?

**Edit ** - meaning .. if i continued a saved game, would i see these new changes ?

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You should be able to continue a saved game using the new version without any problem. And the new changes would be in effect.

Edited by Gnrl_Grad

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This is fantastic! Thanks so much for improving the strategy game so much!

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You're welcome.

I plan on starting another game myself later today. In my last game the enemy carrier escaped on the first battle by damaging me and sailing away normally, so I repaired engines and gave chase - my typical hunt and kill tactic. But when I took him on again in the second battle he actually destroyed me! I think I underestimated his new strength, next game I'll be a bit more cautious and make sure I'm well equipped to take him on. :)

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How can you tell if the mod is active?

I started a new game and sunk the enemy carrier on the first encounter.

There is no readme file how to install the mod, but I assume the script folder with it content should be placed in the Carrier Command main folder.

Is there anything else I have to do to enable the mod?

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Make a shortcut and in the Target field put the extra stuff: -mod nemisismod

IE: "C:\Program Files (x86)\Bohemia Interactive\Carrier Command Gaea Mission\carrier.exe" -mod nemisismod

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How can you tell if the mod is active?

You need to be running the latest SDK version of the game (1.03.0019) to be able to run mods.

Also, when you unpack, make sure only one folder with the name of the mod is present in the carrier command folder. Sometimes unpacking can end up with another folder with the same name inside the folder. For example the scripts folder should be in Carrier Command Gaea Mission/nemesismod/scripts as opposed to Carrier Command Gaea Mission/nemesismod/nemesismod/scripts

Try installing the Deadly Islands mod, it will be immediately obvious if you have got it set up right.

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Slight bug:

He still had most of the islands but I still was able to kill him,

I eather found him at his stockpile island or hit him with so much damage so fast that he could not trigger a warp.

I was running the combo mod, but it was working perfict up until this point and I made no changes to the nemisis side of the script. --- I actually pasted the deadly islands mod into the nemisis script, so can someone confirm this to make sure I did not overwright anything?

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Most likely you were fighting him at his stockpile island. He doesn't retreat if you fight him at his stockpile island. I've thought of changing it so it's only possible to kill him if his islands are all gone or he has only one left but I'm thinking it's better to leave it as is because it allows the possibility of a less predictable end-game each game. So it is possible that sometimes you might fight him and destroy him at his stockpile island mid-game although it is unlikely to happen early-game unless maybe you have given the enemy very few islands at the start.

I've uploaded a new version...

v2.2

* More damage tweaks

* Armour bonus to enemy carrier when he is defending his stockpile island

* Improved code to play random well done message instead of always playing essi's

* Improved code to make enemy carrier select a random destination island after retreating back to stockpile instead of always travelling back to the same island

* Included readme file with install instructions and changelog

https://www.dropbox.com/s/imn4k6tzjern2ox/nemisismod.zip

Known Issues

If you save a game with the mod enabled you can only load and play it with the mod enabled. If you disable the mod and load a game that was saved with the mod enabled it will crash to desktop. Not sure what is causing this at the moment but it's not an issue if you want to play a game start to finish with the mod enabled. Thanks to Species1571 for reporting this.

Edited by Gnrl_Grad

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Thanks Foxhound.

@Species1571 - I found what is causing the save game problem. The code for the carrier retreat cut scene is taken from the gaea mission campaign script and there is one variable EvaluatingCarrierAttack that is used which is causing the save game incompatibility. It looks like it's purpose is to limit how many times the code in OnCarrierAttacked is executed, perhaps in a frame, I don't know. I did remove it and the game and carrier battle seem to play fine without it but I'm reluctant to keep it removed as it looks like it might be a bit of safety code maybe for the cut scene or to perhaps prevent slowdown or a potential crash, again I don't know. I'm going to leave it in for now as I'm not aware of the potential issues in removing it and I'd prefer to have the game as stable as possible when running the mod. If anyone wants the possibility of changing the mod mid game you can comment out the code that uses that variable.

@Tontow - I did some more carrier test battles and it turns out it actually is possible to defeat him if you hit him hard and fast enough. I hit him with a few torpedoes to do high damage and I did manage to kill him outright. I have adjusted the torpedo damage to lessen the chance of an outright kill but it is still possible because torpedoes are very strong anti-ship weapons and I'm thinking there should always be the possibility of a kill.

v2.3

* Tweaked torpedo damage making it harder but not impossible to kill the enemy carrier with torpedoes

* Put some extra safety in code to (hopefully) prevent a crash I experienced when killing the enemy carrier

Edit: ok new version uploaded again with only one minor addition...

v2.4

* Added message to start of game to set the scene and so it is immediately apparent the mod is running

https://www.dropbox.com/s/imn4k6tzjern2ox/nemisismod.zip

Edited by Gnrl_Grad

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