Enabling Tractor Beams & Tethered Magnets

[baobobafet]

What function do ship locking clamps, magnets, claws, harpoons, grapples and tractor beams all have in common?

Some thoughts on games like Braben's original Virus, GTA's magnet tethered from a crane or off a heli and other popular thrust style games that use 'magnets' on tethers to pick things up.

In other terms this might be re-defined similar to the dynamics of a tractor beam. (or could be dressed up to appear as one) In addition to the entertaining piloting challenges of such scenarios, there may be other applications as well.

If an in game item such as a 'magnet'/tractor beam is given connective properties to other specific items in the game, and that property can be turned on or off at will by the player, it may be used to pick up/drop or connect/disconnect to those specific objects in the game.
The ability to retract and extend the length of any cable (or beam) would also be another requirement for such a device.

These target objects or cargo could be larger than what a ship's cargo space can reasonably store - but may weigh far less than what the ship is actually capable of lifting.
Tugs ferrying ships and objects much larger than themselves is not uncommon in the real world.

Perhaps some accommodation should be made for such a feature in Pioneer?

Another use of such a device could be as a method of connecting, docking or landing at arbitrary locations on a larger ship or platform. This could essentially anchor the ship to any 'in game' surface with the correct properties. (similar to ship locking clamps)
Pirate vessels, salvage or rescue operations may not always use standard docking locations or procedures on ships they wish to breach.

Attaching magnetic mines or trackers to other ships might be accomplished using the same function.
Since this property doesn't actually simulate magnetic fields, there is no actual range or magnetic influence - and requires only contact between the said magnet or beam with any tagged items predisposed to connect whenever magnet or beam is turned on.

New shipyard items this might enable:

Traditional Magnetic hoist, grapples and harpoons
Tractor beam - end of beam must touch object to connect
Locking clamps - to anchor a ship to a surface or inpromptu landing pad, or to another ship (or location on a ship)
Robot Claw - articulating pick up device with invisible magnet at center. (To give impression of grasping and holding object)
Magnetic mines
Tracking devices
?

[NeuralKernel]

This could replace the current Cargo Scoop, make collecting cargo by running into it something that all ships can do but make Grapplers/Tractor Beams an optional extra that makes it WAY easier to just grab everything in the area... also a Mass Driver / Pusher Beam (or just an optional mode for the Grappler?) for throwing stored cargo instead of just dropping it, or pushing Rubbish aside to get to the Precious Metal...
This is something I've been wondering about, myself... good to hear I'm not alone! :)

[baobobafet]

Is the fishing good here? ;)

I could see this being used as a mining tool where a ship lowers a magnet or beam down onto or into an area or ocean where there are reported minerals to extract.

Additional thoughts,

Cargo train, a barge (or series of) magnetically attached together, pulled by a large engine

A possible 'in system' scripted mission scenario,
Tow an unmanned cargo barge up to speed, then release it enroute allowing it to coast, occasionally reconnect to make necessary mid course corrections on trajectory or to add acceleration/decelleration as needed.
When disconnected, the tow ship would be free to fly around near the barge escorting it to it's destination.

Any such tow ship would need to be able to overcome the inertia of the greater mass of the barge with it's engines to bring the barge to an appropriately graceful stop at the destination point.

As a scripted mission this could make great places for roll of the dice pirate attacks where the tow ship could fly solo to defend the coasting barge with any weaponry it had at it's disposal.

[baobobafet]

An alternate scripting possibility could include replacing the unmanned barge with a small asteroid. The tug could 'magnetically' harpoon the asteroid and pull it along to put it in some orbit or crash it onto the surface at some target location to later be processed.

..Another fishing spot?

Random asteroid mining vs towing
Special asteroids could be made to spawn if a player were to fly their ship within some radius of a marked asteroid field, this could comprise a very narrow area between Mars and Jupiter. (in Sol's case)
Limitations to reduce overhead might involve, beyond 10x time acceleration, disabling such asteroids from spawning at all whether a player is in this zone or not.
To start, asteroids might appear in various sizes and color/texture visualy indicating value (this can become more sophisticated over time using sensors for more specific minerals etc.).

If a player didn't like the first choice available, another asteroid could spawn once they had left the first one far enough behind. This would require some fine tuning to avoid any pop up effects when traveling at higher speeds.
(hey, slow down, it's an asteroid field ;)
The effect should be that of only an occasional random single asteroid appearing at a time.

Once a player had harpooned their choice asteroid, there could be an automated factory somewhere nearby that the player could ferry the asteroid toward and then anchor it, to receive payment. Existing spaceports could evolve similar asteroid processing options.

[NeuralKernel]

With a tractor system (beam, cable, clamp...) another interesting possibility would be rescues... some poor schmuck runs out of fuel and is falling towards the local star... grab him before he burns up and nudge him up to a stable orbit?
Or serving as "Stage 1" for a courier... boost him up to speed, let him go and he rockets away EVEN FASTER!!! Not much use most of the time but would be helpful in some of those multi-star systems with the destination a few hundred AU away...

[baobobafet]

Rescue EMT Pioneer style ;)

Fleshing out key logic for the tether feature and function, as well as some ideas on expanding it's flexibility.

Visual aspect
Any tether or tractor beam should probably appear graphically as a taught elastic band - between ship and cargo, or cargo and mooring. (this gets around any depiction of loose cables drifting in zero G)


Nuts & Bolts

2 keys to lower & raise tether/beam (also sets the length of any tether used for the harpoon 'join' function.)
1 key to turn on/off magnet or tractor beam on ship. (also detaches harpoon)
1 key for firing rocket propelled harpoon (also join function) - when shot is successful, can tether new item to ship.

However - IF a player is already tethering cargo when firing the harpoon, the old cargo and new cargo (or item) become tethered and joined together.
The player's ship at this point becomes untethered to any previous cargo and is free to move on - repeating further such connect processes as desired. To save overhead, only one tether need remain active at a time.

If player fires the harpoon and misses hitting any target at all, the ship will continue tethering any existing cargo as if nothing had happened.

Alternative kill switch
Tethers might be disconnected via laser weapons fire directed at the base of the tethers, opening up the possibility of multiple tether use in game.

--------------
Anchoring asteroids onto moorings.

An alternative method for anchoring cargo/asteroids to moorings.
For zero G purposes, a mooring or magnetic tree (snowflake shape?) would be required. The constant 'magnetic' property on the tips of the structure should comfortably secure any cargo/asteroid attached to it. At least until dislodged by the player using brute force or the ship's competing magnet, harpoon or tractor beam system.

In the same way it should be possible to use the magnet tree to deposit cargo or asteroids there by maneuvering desired cargo/asteroid into contact with such a 'magnetic' tree, so that said cargo/asteroid sticks to it. Then the player can turn off their ship's magnet or tractor beam, leaving the cargo/asteroid attached to the mooring tree.
-------------

Satellite & Auxiliary Landing Pads
For terrain purposes a special pallet (apart from the normal Landing pad) might be ideal for a player to land their ship upon, deposit or pick up cargo. Ultimately a 'temporary' storage pallet for players to retrieve or safely leave cargo items.

Persistence
Allowing certain items persistence on special landing pads merely during the course of a single session of gameplay would be more than adequate. It would also result in original cargo spawning events on any saved game reload.

Local Delivery
Player spawns and uses scoop or magnet to collect all cargo items on any satellite landing pads in and around the city. The more items a player can collect, the more money the player can make. (all items will need to be delivered to the city's 'official' landing pad.)
When done collecting, a player must safely dock with the starport's main base to cash in and should save their progress.

[baobobafet]

Some further thoughts in regards to the mooring tree.

Since a mooring tree is required for larger ships to sometimes actually dock at spacestations, rather than rely on smaller ships to ferry goods between station and the larger ship. Time spent on this resource is not wasted, since it would be used by ships as an auxiliary docking point.
As an alternative to putting proximity triggered magnetic properties at the tips of the docking tree.
(A magnetic like linkage fluctuating on and off to create a soft connection that can be easily broken.)

Another possibility could involve endowing the docking tree with a small amount of gravity, allowing objects to adhere to parts of the structure.

[baobobafet]

Setting tether strength

If using tethers or tractor beams to connect larger cargo items and asteroids to docking trees.
A player should also maintain the ability to remove any such items.
This could be done by insuring that the ship's 'magnet'(or harpoon) is always stronger than any existing tethered mooring connection.

Player created tethers that attach cargo or asteroids to docking trees, could be made slightly less secure via rapidly toggling on
and off their connection properties.

A ship that had moored an item could then choose to re-attach the hoist magnet or harpoon to the cargo item/asteroid and
succeed in gently pulling it away from the mooring tree, allowing the player to reposition or moor their cargo elsewhere.

[shadmar]

5 last commits here will support "fake" tractor functionality throught lua scripts.
https://github.com/ParagonDevelopmentTe ... r/pull/236

You could then just do formationflying and decrase the offset for a tractor beam functionality. You can also use this for formation flying (as it was intended for in paragon) having someone flying at your wing or behind/i front of you.

ship:AIFlyFormation(target,x,y,z)

[baobobafet]

Good contrib Shadmar...

Paraphrased 'A hamster in hand is better than two birds in a bush?' ;)

Compartmentalizing functions, I can see how some aspects of this could be used, without negatively impacting realism.
Could also be used to differentiate tractor beams from tethers and magnetic style hoists in their physics behavior.

ie: Park near a cargo item or asteroid, click on tractor beam (aka formation cmd) and henceforth cargo/asteroid joins formation and will go wherever the player's ship goes.

Maybe some code changes to account for such 'formation flight' with unpowered cargo barges or asteroids also how/if their added mass impacts ship acceleration, fuel consumption.
Ideally breaking such a formation should still allow the direction and inertia of any accelerated cargo/asteroid to be preserved.
Add some animated sprite art to simulate tractor beam/tether between cargo/asteroid and ship.

Two Functions to include if possible to retain 'some' flexibility.
1. Control or dynamic adjustment of the distances(clearance) between players ship and any items flying in formation.
(this could be similar to a tether length adjustment option).
Since formation flight generally involves more than two craft, I could imagine supporting multiple cargo tractor beams per ship at a time :)

2. Some ability to swivel the tractor beam position in order to change the formation type or reposition a cargo item/asteroid relative to the ship. (or allow ship to move relative to any tractored cargo item)

Tractors vs. tether behavior
Tractor beams don't necessarily need to display tether attributes and can appear to cause ship and cargo to move in lock step.
(Probably not as fun as the experience of trying to drag a cargo item or/ asteroid to it's destination via simulating a proper tether)

Faking tethers would be most obvious when simulating it's behavior in gravity environments where any cargo would be swinging and dangling below a player's ship. This would impact the ship's flying ability and require more piloting skills from the player. (Such a dynamic might also be delt with as a separate issue using different code)


'Cashing in' scenario 2
Player arrives at station towing asteroid, hails station comms screen and asks for a cargo scan. The station proceeds to scan the players ship checking for any external cargo items or asteroids. Once the scan is completed a prompt could appear offering the going rate for the misc cargo item or asteroid type & tonnage. If player responds with "Y", the player is credited with the amount or value of the asteroid or cargo item. Once the transaction is completed the cargo item/asteroid may be deleted.