Sigma NPC Races announced

posted on May 28th, 2010, 5:39 am

It's getting closer... Soon enough Sigma will be ready for it's first public release. Until then I feel it is a good time to show some of the exciting features that will show up.

A major goal since the inception of Sigma has been the inclusion of NPC Factions, Wildlife, and all sorts of doodads to color up maps. Space certainly is big, but these races don't fight in the void of deep space. Tons of celestial terrain and creatures inhabit the battlefield and bring life to all the maps.

So then, let's take a look at what creatures and horrors inhabit the space of the Sintar Cluster:

The Jesmissic
The first NPC race players may encounter on maps are the Jesmissic, a mysterious race made infamous for their massive use of fighter craft. Be sure to bring tons of flak to the fight, battleships will be torn up by the onslaught of swarming craft.

Swarming with fighter craft, the Jesmissic test out their latest technology in orbit of a star.

The Arkoids
Next up are the Arkoids, officially labeled as the Sintar Cluster's official cockroach. These hyper evolved bacteria multiply at an alarming rate and if provoked will swarm and attack virtually anything on map, even their own kind.


Say hello to the Arkoids, Sigma's resident Cockroaches.

Hoggers
Hoggers, or more commonly called "Hogs," are docile, gentle, and completely harmless creatures. Unfortunately, they'll swarm around the map's resource zones and make it impossible to mine. If players want to get resources they'll have to play pest control and exterminate these annoying beasts.

They may look ugly, but Hogs are totally harmless... until they hog all your resources.

Xilthu
An ultra aggressive celestial super virus of some sort, the Xilthu are giant mineral based creatures with limited intelligence but tons of raging hostility. While not technically living, they display common behavior patterns of most viruses by spreading around the map at alarming rates and exterminating everything that is not them.


The Xilthu will stop at nothing to make sure every last one of your pathetic ships is dust.

But wait, there's more...

In addition to the main NPC Races, there are other spacial beings you may encounter.

Spiralfos Colony

Massive collections of space worms and coral-like organisms, Spiralfos generate bright lights and make it difficult for visual and scanning equipment to operate when nearbye. Parking a pair of scouts inside a Spiralfos colony can effectively hide them from enemies until they decide to explore the area.

Parking a fleet in a Spiralfos colony will hide them from enemy sight.

Ursanoids

These harmless creatures simply wander around the map and feed off of asteroids. They really are nothing more then eye candy and company for your lonely miners.

A happy little family of Ursanoids travel the sector in search of a new home.

Deep Space Spooks

In space.... weird shit happens. These phantom disks of doom send a chilling jolt down your spine when they start swarming by the hundreds over your screen and then simply vanish without a trace. Sensors can't pick them up, it's impossible to hit them with weapons, and whatever they are is completely unknown.

All alone in the dead of night, freaky stuff happens.

This is only a small sample of the NPC races and other wildlife that will show up in Sigma. Stay tuned for more revelations.

For more information on NPC Factions, check out the Faction Detail section of our forums.

posted on May 28th, 2010, 5:42 am

Wow man!  I'm really impressed by all of the cool work you've done to make NPC stuff!

posted on May 28th, 2010, 8:55 am

very creative woork looking forward to smash them

posted on May 28th, 2010, 9:07 am

an NPC race like the Xilthu i have my concerns about, it would be like adding an npc player into an 8 player mp match from what you described in the description to that race. the jury is still out on that one, the others are all ok though. should add some random ferengi vessels just crossing the map from no other reason, couple of non-aligned trade ships from various smaller empires buying out old federation, klingon and romulan vessels minus cloaking devices, the suliban, tholians, nausiccans and a station where like on star wars EAW, you go near a stationary shipyard or research port, you get access after a short time to that facilitiy as long as you got a ship nearby, hire out mercenaries and their ships just as a distraction, npc controlled of course but your money used, send em to a location and they just do all the work that otherwsie you couldnt do. a couple of 8472 ships crossing by hopefully their end destination isnt in someones base, or even starting in someones base. seems alright if FO team like it.

i would like to see asteroids floating through as well or random anomalies every so often and no one after the other.

so far so good i would say, i wonder how small this 3.13 mini-mod is? lol.

posted on May 28th, 2010, 9:29 am

@Canny

Hehe, this is not an add-on for FO, it's a total conversion set in a different universe

More info here: Star Trek Armada II: Fleet Operations - Announcing Sigma

posted on May 28th, 2010, 9:32 am

nice . good luck with that.

posted on May 28th, 2010, 12:35 pm

I'm going to have a TUN of fun playing this!   Thank you for all your hard work.

posted on May 28th, 2010, 12:50 pm

"In space.... weird shit happens."
Truer words where newer spoken 
Hope to see the 1st release soon.

posted on May 28th, 2010, 1:52 pm

Nice, would an additional race be able to be arranged? I'm working on it, but it is rather slow.

Digits

This is a race of completely unknown origin, known for being mostly fighters, the Digits are a race that is composed of various fighters that people say have an unusual appearence. No one knows what their goal is, or why they are in the galaxy. All that is known is that they often swarm in fighter groups, and that their language has no identifyable form of syntax or grammar needed to translate.

Though recent history has showed that they have been being protective with both of Norin's species of origin (Horovinian and Jerovon species). No one understands this connection, since the Digits behavior is erratic, and that their appearences is rather spotty around space, but very frequent.

Though there has been some rumors that attempts of sharing information with other races have resulted in computer meltdowns due to various code mistranslations as well as data overloads.

---

This I can work on individually and then send you a pack. Though of course I would need some help finding some good models of fighter craft (mostly like today's style of jets or similar).

posted on May 28th, 2010, 3:22 pm

Ahhh, I'd love to have those space creatures in the standard FO Map Making kit

posted on May 28th, 2010, 3:54 pm

Amazing work man, congratulations!  Looks really, really fun 

posted on May 30th, 2010, 1:41 am

@ 1337_64M3R

I might have room for another NPC Race, though I'm not sure if I'd be able to make them off of a proposed mold. Sigma's got a carefully constructed ecosystem and dropping a powerful species into it could disrupt the whole thing if you know what I mean. 

@Phoenix

I suppose I could make these available in the map editor when the time comes. I've heard word from the devs that FO will have space born creatures like the Crystalline Entity and all sorts of NPC races in the future though.

posted on May 30th, 2010, 2:47 am

@ 1337_64M3R

I might have room for another NPC Race, though I'm not sure if I'd be able to make them off of a proposed mold. Sigma's got a carefully constructed ecosystem and dropping a powerful species into it could disrupt the whole thing if you know what I mean. 

Actually, I took careful thought about this. I made sure that their strengths are very, very selective. Their weaknesses are common but is often easy able to be made up if in proper mix.

These are examples of some of their common weapons.

Beams:

Focused Neutron Beam:
These beams are rather unique, with highly variable damage. But the beam is very restricted in range, most Neutron Beams never make it past short range. Also to avoid overheat, it has been found necessary to have very long delays between shots.

Upsilon Wave Beam:
This is a very energy thirsty weapon. Though easy to focus for long range assault, it looses energy intensity rather quickly, thereby causing only minor damage. Most of the vessels that are equipped with even one of these are not meant for heavy combat since they have little energy for any other weapons.

Leron Particle Wave Beam:
These beams have the ability to completely penetrate shields. But half of its energy is lost when it does. Making it that some vessels that are equipped for anti-fighter and anti-destroyer purposes often use this feature.


Pulses:

Ion Pulses:
Mostly either made of Hydrogen or Oxygen based Ionized Particles. These pulses do rather poor damage, but cost nearly no energy to fire. The Digits assigned these weapons to their light fightercraft that often do not have the space for powerful cores.

Alpha Particle Cannons:
Alpha Particles used in these weapons can deal alot of damage, but their damaging properties are short living as they quickly degrade into Beta and Gamma Particles which are rather useless. Most of these weapons are put on heavy assault ships, but they are limited to about a standard range.

Torpedoes:
Heta Pulse Projectiles:
These are rather bulky weapon shells. They do alot of damage, but the guidance systems are easily interfered by ECM as well as other jamming signals making chances of missing quite much larger than of normal projectile weapons.

---

Of course, these are the weapons themselves. They do have fair shielding, but like I said in my previous post. They have poor hull strength.

posted on May 30th, 2010, 5:43 am

@ 1337_64M3R
I suppose we'll see what happens. I for some reason do like the name 'digits' so I'll see if I can throw in another NPC race like that. No guarantees, but I'll consider 

posted on August 27th, 2010, 4:32 am

Hey, need ideas for a cool npc? Here's one my friend and I thought up...well a variant at least

Xiian-hakd-ka

(Yeah it sounds like someone sneezing. Get over it)

These are a group of space borne plasmic entities. They resemble perfect blue, green, and purple balls of plasma. They are docile and curious often coming up to see what your ships are doing while sending a greeting of magnetic radiation. Their language is tough to translate, although simple talking is able to be held between ships and some of their members. However, if you get them mad, or attack them, (They can be killed with magnetic based weapons, or by dispersing the plasma with explosives) They will attack. As they are plasmic in nature they can melt holes in your ship just by touching it...and their control over magnetism lets them jam sensors, screw up your engines, or fizzle out some weapons no problem. Matter melts on contact with them, and most energy doesn't harm them. Plasma either bounces off, or is added and makes them a little bigger. You can hire them as mercenaries by making them bigger...shooting them with plasma that is their same polarity. They are quite loyal, and will protect your base till the bitter end.

How was that? Like them?