Thargoid Wars
Overview & Download Link
This expansion pack adds four types of encounters with Thargoids. The first is a Thargoid attack on space stations. You choose whether or not to participate in the defense of the station.
The second involves encountering Thargoids when exiting witchspace. The third is a fairly deadly encounter that you may want to have an energy bomb for. These three encounters occur randomly with a fairly low probability. The fourth encounter involves increased efforts on the part of the Thargoids to collect intelligence. The overall premise is that the ongoing war with the Thargoids has intensified with the Thargoids launching attacks more frequently.
The expansion pack also adds a system of rewards from the Intergalactic Navy (pursuant to Naval regulation 18756.23.70A) for your participation in the war with the Thargoids. The reward system is based on the number of encounters you have with the Thargoids. Currently only the encounters that arise from this expansion pack are included. Rewards include credits and a series of medals.
The OXP was written by Commander Wombat. This Updated version features two Bug Fixes, and features improved execution speed.
Download Thargoid Wars v.4.3 Updated to V4.3 on 21th December 2008. (For all Oolite versions)
Download Thargoid Wars v.4.4 Updated to V 4.4 on 24th December 2009. (works only with Oolite 1.73)
A version for future Oolite 1.74+ is already created but will only made available after an official Oolite 1.74 release.
Difficulty Rating
"Medium". The ships appearing in the OXP are within the power-range of the standard set of ships. None the less, Thargoids are tough cookies and (as the name of the OXP implies), you will meet Thargoids more often than you would without this OXP installed. You wouldn't need a full Iron Ass to take them on, but you should have some basic upgrades fitted such as a Beam Laser, fuel injectors, an energy unit and perhaps a shield booster. The OXP will only start to run when you leave Galaxy 1 however, so it is assumed that you have some reasonable kit fitted.
Update Notes
Version 4.5 makes use of the new mission protocol of the future Oolite 1.74. (Unreleased yet but will need at least Oolite 1.74)
Version 4.4 is completely rewritten in JavaScript and works only for Oolite 1.73.
Version 4.3 has an other patch to prevent overwriting a previous mission choice of an other oxp. (This exeption was missed with the 4.1 update)
Version 4.2 This is identical as 4.1 but with reordered script lines for a significant faster execution time.
Version 4.1 and newer has an important code patch added to stop the Mission Clash Bug. A long standing problem with Oolite Missions was that if two missions tried to give the player a briefing at the same time, the player would miss one of them. For example you might be playing the Ionics Missions in Galaxy 2 and Ionics OXP tried to give you a briefing offering you a mission, but Thargoid Wars at the same time decided to scramble you to defend the station against attacking Bugs. As a result you never saw the Ionics briefing, and so although you now have a mission to do for the Ionics Corperation, you are blissfully unaware of this fact as you never saw the message offering you the mission!
This version of Thargoid Wars just adds a cunning code patch (devised by Commander Eric Walch). If another OXP is giving the player a briefing, this version of Thargoid Wars will wait until the player has seen the other briefing before displaying a Thargoid Wars briefing.
It is important that you use this version of Thargoid Wars. As this OXP adds features to Galaxies 2 to 8, there are loads of other Missions that the old version could clash with (Assassins, LoveCats, Ionics, Military, Nova and Thargoid Plans) to name but a few!
If you are an OXP writer, check the Discussion Page. The one line of code you need to add as a condition when you display a Mission Brief is shown there!
Installing and Playing
To play the OXP, unzip the download file. This will create a folder named "ThargWars4". Open this folder and you will see a folder named "thargoid_wars.oxp" and a readme. Move the thargoid_wars.oxp folder to AddOns. As with all OXPs, its the folder ending .oxp that you need to put in Oolite's AddOns folder, otherwise Oolite will not read it.
The new Thargoid related missions will start running the first time you dock at any main station in any Galaxy except Galaxy 1. The OXP is set not to run in Galaxy 1 to avoid a new player being blatted by an attack squad of Thargoid War Ships. Commanders with some basic upgrades fitted should have no difficulty however assisting the Navy with Bug squashing.
