Thanks for the laugh, but if it ever becomes true that you can't generate enough revenue to run the website or maintain the game, I will be first in line to pay for a new version, or a subscription, or whatever it takes to keep the game going. @AndrewGarrison
@WildWiryClam Thanks. It can fit any number of "bombs" because they're not actually bombs, they're cannon shells with near-zero muzzle velocity that act like bombs. You can add 200 Cleavers and 200 Interceptors to any build, but because that would add 400 Bodies it would require a lot of physics calculations and kill performance.
@Trijets And there's nothing wrong with that.... There's no rule stating that everyone must have a certain amount of creativity or that they must express it in a certain way.
@Trijets Well, that's the reward you get for going your own way. You get to bring something new into the world instead of just copying what other people have done.
@Mustangflyer Sure, but I think you shouldn't have to ask other people if they think something is a good idea. Just build whatever you feel like building.
I don't know much about autism, but looking at your bio, and the post above, the one thing that stands out to me is how much you define yourself by your fears -- death, disease, the end of the world, war, being eaten alive (???), etc. Analyse your fears rationally and you'll realise that they're way overstated. Everyone dies. You can either waste your life worrying about it, or accept that it's going to happen, no matter what, and use your time to do things that move you closer to happiness.
Second, not to trivialise depression, but I've seen good nutrition and exercise "cure" many people who firmly believed they were depressed. Try it, it can't hurt. Progressive exercise, where you meet ever-increasing goals week by week, puts you in the habit of winning and changes your mindset to one that's used to success, which leads to success. Give it a serious try, and I'm willing to bet that in three to six months your depression and anxiety will be gone.
Thanks, @Belloaka. Yes, flight handling is very important to me. I find it very disappointing when I download a build that looks good, but doesn't function well.
Nice, but you probably want to add some visual appeal if you want people to notice it. To do that, create a body as a separate build, out of zero-mass and zero-drag parts. Then save that as a subassembly, import that into this build, attach it, and move it into place.
Thanks, @Treadmill103. As George Washington used to say, "You only live twice: once when you are born, and once when you bomb the crap out of the enemy."
@TifftheCat I just looked it up, and now I get it. I don't watch TV and deliberately avoid pop culture, so it's very unlikely I'll get a pop-culture reference of any kind... especially something that's related to advertising. Anyway, I'm glad you had fun with my build.
@AndrewGarrison You don't have a problem with moderators talking to customers like they're cattle? "Carry on being arrogant and you'll be banned." If that's an actual rule, please update the site rules.
@TTHHSSSS Yes, there is a bit of lag sometimes when you release a "bomb". Maybe it's because the relevant assets are only instantiated when you fire the cannon, instead of being pre-loaded when the level loads. Just a guess, and there's nothing I can do about that, anyway.
@AndrewGarrison Referring to someone as "kid" (when they are in fact a youngster) is a bannable offence now? You might want to tell your mod to rein it in a bit.
@ChisP Re: details (I'm assuming you mean decals, because this build has a lot of details), the answer is:
Taste
Part count
When the shape is beautiful by virtue of being as smooth and well-put-together as my builds are, covering it up in decals would be just idiotic. I actually added some "U S AIR FORCE" text and roundels to this build, but they looked ugly to me, so I took them off.
The bombs are implemented using a cannon. The reason for this is that adding bombs to a build increases the number of Bodies in the build, causing increased physics calculations and therefore lag. This is why, without exception, builds that contain a lot of rotators/bombs/pistons/missiles/detachers fly like absolute turkeys (and their creators hide behind claims that this is "realistic"). See this graph of CPU usage. The plateau in the middle shows the elevated CPU usage while flying around in a build by another user with a lot of rotators and bombs; the lower values to either side are during flying one of my builds with a roughly equal number of parts.
This is also the reason every moving part on this build, with the exception of the rear landing gear, is made out of control surfaces rather than fuselage blocks attached to rotators or pistons. And that kind of attention to the details that actually matter, in turn, is the reason my builds can release a bomb from further away and hit targets with greater precision than anyone else's.
@BillyBobBang380 For a howitzer that can hit targets 100 miles away, there wouldn't be much point if you couldn't follow the shells. If you watch the video linked in the description, you can see orbit camera views of the shells in flight and hitting their targets. To view the camera, select Custom Camera 1.
Can we also have it so that the predictor always shows regardless of whether we're in air-to-air mode or air-to-ground? I like bombing ground targets in air-to-air mode because air-to-ground mode adds a lot of reticles to the HUD when there are a lot of targets close together, which obscures the actual target.
Another small tweak which would be immensely helpful would be to be able to set the font size of the developer console and DebugExpression readouts. On high-res displays like mine, the font's too small to be comfortable (and I have above-average vision).
One last small request, can the DebugExpression readouts have a black background and be slightly offset from the left of the display, so that they're readable on high-res monitors and not obscured by the game UI?
I think it's a mistake to have False equivalent to -1 instead of 0. Let's say I want an expression to evaluate to True when AG1 is on and there is a Pitch input. The conventional, expected way of doing this would be:
Activate1 & Pitch
However, this will only return true when pitching down, because pitching up is negative and therefore False. I realise that I can get around this by using abs:
Activate1 & abs(Pitch)
But this means that the correct way is more roundabout and contrary to expectations.
Other parts in SP work according to the zero false, non-zero true principle. Control surfaces and rotators rotate one way or another depending on the sign of the input; pistons move one way or another depending on the sign of the input; beacon lights are on when the input is non-zero and off when zero. To implement FT such that 1 is true and -1 is false goes contrary to SP's own logic.
If backward compatibility is a concern, the number of builds using FT in a way that they would break from this is miniscule. The choice, then, is between letting a handful of builds force every future build to use twisted and inconsistent logic, versus correctness and simplicity going forward. The implications will be far-reaching.
@99807 Well, the four interactions people can have with a build in the context of the website are download, upvote, spotlight, and comment. It makes sense to have those elements together, at the top, next to or right below the images. People shouldn't have to scroll down, on any device, to find the primary interactive elements.
If also catering to desktop users (an oft-ignored but lucrative market, by the way), it helps to have keyboard shortcuts when the available interactions are so few. So that pressing Ctrl+Alt+U would upvote; Ctrl+Alt+D would download; and so on.
User-definable keyboard shortcuts in the game would be even better. I often find myself wishing there were keyboard shortcuts to:
increase/decrease/lock/unlock the time of day;
increase/decrease contrast and saturation (this game desperately needs some cinematic shaders applied to it);
while in the sandbox, hot-reload the aircraft from disk and respawn;
take screenshots (with effects/shaders applied) in the sandbox. This last feature would be very popular with mobile users too, I believe.
Thanks, @Zanedavid
Thanks for the laugh, but if it ever becomes true that you can't generate enough revenue to run the website or maintain the game, I will be first in line to pay for a new version, or a subscription, or whatever it takes to keep the game going. @AndrewGarrison
+2@WildWiryClam Thanks. It can fit any number of "bombs" because they're not actually bombs, they're cannon shells with near-zero muzzle velocity that act like bombs. You can add 200 Cleavers and 200 Interceptors to any build, but because that would add 400 Bodies it would require a lot of physics calculations and kill performance.
@Belloaka Thanks.
Good to have you back, @Mumpsy.
@Trijets And there's nothing wrong with that.... There's no rule stating that everyone must have a certain amount of creativity or that they must express it in a certain way.
Thanks, @99807 @LeafingDragon
Thanks, @ThePilotDude
Thanks, @grizzlitn. I'm well so far, hope you're staying safe as well.
+1@Trijets Well, that's the reward you get for going your own way. You get to bring something new into the world instead of just copying what other people have done.
@Zanedavid That's what actual high-yield nuclear weapons look like.
Thanks, @CRJ900Pilot. Haven't seen you around in a while.
@Mustangflyer Sure, but I think you shouldn't have to ask other people if they think something is a good idea. Just build whatever you feel like building.
+1I don't know much about autism, but looking at your bio, and the post above, the one thing that stands out to me is how much you define yourself by your fears -- death, disease, the end of the world, war, being eaten alive (???), etc. Analyse your fears rationally and you'll realise that they're way overstated. Everyone dies. You can either waste your life worrying about it, or accept that it's going to happen, no matter what, and use your time to do things that move you closer to happiness.
Second, not to trivialise depression, but I've seen good nutrition and exercise "cure" many people who firmly believed they were depressed. Try it, it can't hurt. Progressive exercise, where you meet ever-increasing goals week by week, puts you in the habit of winning and changes your mindset to one that's used to success, which leads to success. Give it a serious try, and I'm willing to bet that in three to six months your depression and anxiety will be gone.
@AerialFighterSnakes If you like the build, why not upvote it?
Thanks, @Belloaka. Yes, flight handling is very important to me. I find it very disappointing when I download a build that looks good, but doesn't function well.
+1Thanks, @AerialFighterSnakes
Nice, but you probably want to add some visual appeal if you want people to notice it. To do that, create a body as a separate build, out of zero-mass and zero-drag parts. Then save that as a subassembly, import that into this build, attach it, and move it into place.
+1Thanks, @FooballLegend
@BuiltBionixInd10 What's "advanced" bomb targeting?
@BuiltBionixInd10 What would you want an AI to do in this build?
Thanks, @Davisplanez
@asteroidbook345 Mini in size, mini in performance.
Mission: take out only the destroyers, without harming the other ships.
@asteroidbook345 Good catch. The entire T-4 looks like a crude copy of the XB-70 anyway.
Thanks, @Treadmill103. As George Washington used to say, "You only live twice: once when you are born, and once when you bomb the crap out of the enemy."
@TifftheCat I just looked it up, and now I get it. I don't watch TV and deliberately avoid pop culture, so it's very unlikely I'll get a pop-culture reference of any kind... especially something that's related to advertising. Anyway, I'm glad you had fun with my build.
@AndrewGarrison You don't have a problem with moderators talking to customers like they're cattle? "Carry on being arrogant and you'll be banned." If that's an actual rule, please update the site rules.
+3@Obtheplanedestroyer Nice, that's how it's supposed to work.
@TTHHSSSS Yes, there is a bit of lag sometimes when you release a "bomb". Maybe it's because the relevant assets are only instantiated when you fire the cannon, instead of being pre-loaded when the level loads. Just a guess, and there's nothing I can do about that, anyway.
+1@AndrewGarrison Referring to someone as "kid" (when they are in fact a youngster) is a bannable offence now? You might want to tell your mod to rein it in a bit.
@TifftheCat what does that mean? Is it a meme or something?
@WNP78 confuse me? Ah ha ha ha ha. Carry on, kid.
@FCparis Bliss? Ecstasy? Rapture? As Abraham Lincoln said, "What is happiness? Watching your targets explode in your rear view mirror."
Thanks, @TMach5. First take :) My favorite part is near the end, when the plane's flying under the bridge just as the bomb hits the central pylon.
@ChisP No lol
@grizzlitn Sure.
@ChisP Re: details (I'm assuming you mean decals, because this build has a lot of details), the answer is:
The bombs are implemented using a cannon. The reason for this is that adding bombs to a build increases the number of Bodies in the build, causing increased physics calculations and therefore lag. This is why, without exception, builds that contain a lot of rotators/bombs/pistons/missiles/detachers fly like absolute turkeys (and their creators hide behind claims that this is "realistic"). See this graph of CPU usage. The plateau in the middle shows the elevated CPU usage while flying around in a build by another user with a lot of rotators and bombs; the lower values to either side are during flying one of my builds with a roughly equal number of parts.
This is also the reason every moving part on this build, with the exception of the rear landing gear, is made out of control surfaces rather than fuselage blocks attached to rotators or pistons. And that kind of attention to the details that actually matter, in turn, is the reason my builds can release a bomb from further away and hit targets with greater precision than anyone else's.
Hope that answers both your questions. lol
@grizzlitn Sigh I really wish people would focus on the important things. I've built custom landing gear before, you know.
+1Thanks, @ACEPILOT109
@grizzlitn Kidding is for kids... I would've thought the footage of it bombing four ships in a row would be the thing to notice, but what do I know :)
+1@BillyBobBang380 For a howitzer that can hit targets 100 miles away, there wouldn't be much point if you couldn't follow the shells. If you watch the video linked in the description, you can see orbit camera views of the shells in flight and hitting their targets. To view the camera, select Custom Camera 1.
Can we also have it so that the predictor always shows regardless of whether we're in air-to-air mode or air-to-ground? I like bombing ground targets in air-to-air mode because air-to-ground mode adds a lot of reticles to the HUD when there are a lot of targets close together, which obscures the actual target.
Another small tweak which would be immensely helpful would be to be able to set the font size of the developer console and DebugExpression readouts. On high-res displays like mine, the font's too small to be comfortable (and I have above-average vision).
One last small request, can the DebugExpression readouts have a black background and be slightly offset from the left of the display, so that they're readable on high-res monitors and not obscured by the game UI?
+1I think it's a mistake to have False equivalent to -1 instead of 0. Let's say I want an expression to evaluate to True when AG1 is on and there is a Pitch input. The conventional, expected way of doing this would be:
Activate1 & PitchHowever, this will only return true when pitching down, because pitching up is negative and therefore False. I realise that I can get around this by using abs:
Activate1 & abs(Pitch)But this means that the correct way is more roundabout and contrary to expectations.
Other parts in SP work according to the zero false, non-zero true principle. Control surfaces and rotators rotate one way or another depending on the sign of the input; pistons move one way or another depending on the sign of the input; beacon lights are on when the input is non-zero and off when zero. To implement FT such that 1 is true and -1 is false goes contrary to SP's own logic.
If backward compatibility is a concern, the number of builds using FT in a way that they would break from this is miniscule. The choice, then, is between letting a handful of builds force every future build to use twisted and inconsistent logic, versus correctness and simplicity going forward. The implications will be far-reaching.
+3@SpiritusRaptor Not sure what you're saying...?
@99807 Well, the four interactions people can have with a build in the context of the website are download, upvote, spotlight, and comment. It makes sense to have those elements together, at the top, next to or right below the images. People shouldn't have to scroll down, on any device, to find the primary interactive elements.
If also catering to desktop users (an oft-ignored but lucrative market, by the way), it helps to have keyboard shortcuts when the available interactions are so few. So that pressing Ctrl+Alt+U would upvote; Ctrl+Alt+D would download; and so on.
User-definable keyboard shortcuts in the game would be even better. I often find myself wishing there were keyboard shortcuts to:
@SpiritusRaptor This build has 180 moving parts...
@99807 Hmm, I guess the website UI needs a fix...
Thanks, @Belloaka. You just set partCollisionResponse="None" on every part in the build.
Thanks, @Hedero