A new Modding challenge! Now on to Part 2!

[Phoenix-D]

That's actually fairly easy. Just attach this to your engine:

Ability 1 Type := Weapon Delivery Type Damage Received Modifier Percent
Ability 1 Description := Reduces damage from (weapon type) by 90%
Ability 1 Scope := Space Object
Ability 1 Range Formula := 0
Ability 1 Amount 1 Formula := -90
Ability 1 Amount 2 Formula := "Energy Beam"

and change "Energy Beam" to the delivery type of your new weapon. You may need to make a new delivery type to prevent it from affecting other weapons, and I'm not sure if this affects shields/armor or just internals.

EDIT: fixed sign typo.

[President_Elect_Shang]

@ SJ: I thought of the shield idea but there are many reasons why it wouldn’t work.
@ Phoenix-D: That’s close but not there yet. Can it be worked if (1) I give those weapons the AI tag 02? And (2) can I reverse it so that instead of reducing the damage by 90% it increases the damage by 1000%. Not as easy as you first thought?

[Phoenix-D]

PES, that is applied to the *engines*, not the weapon. So you multiply your weapon damage by 10 and it works out the same.

Say it does 100 damage default. You make that 1000.

That 1000 hits a ship with an engine, gets down-rated to 100. When it hits a ship -without- an engine, it does full damage.

No AI tags needed.

[Fyron]

Might need to give the damage type 10% damage to shields too, depending on just how the ability you are giving the engine applies to shield hits.

[President_Elect_Shang]

That still won’t work Phoenix-D. I think what you are missing is what is going to happen to all the non-engine components that are hit. They will sustain 100 pts of damage. The idea is that damage will only be 10 pts as long as a single engine survives. In other words let’s say I have a ship with two engines, two cargo bays, and a bridge.
Outer Hall:
Engine, Cargo Bay, Cargo Bay
Inner Hull:
Engine, Bridge

Our first missile comes in and hits the engine (if we are lucky since it is random) we now have this:
Outer Hall:
<Destroyed>, Cargo Bay, Cargo Bay
Inner Hull:
Engine, Bridge

Now what happens when our second missile hits? Right 100 pts of damage is scored taking out our two Cargo Bays (10 pts each) leaving 80 pts of damage transferred to the Inner Hull (100-20=80) which in turn is reduced by our Engine to 8 pts (80*90%=72 and 80-72=8) of damage on our single engine.

The damage to anything should be (in the case of missiles) 10 pts including shields. Any item on a ship which lacks an interdiction field (created by an undamaged engine) and a shield, and is hit by a missile will receive the damage of the missile times 10. Follow? In sequence:

1) Apply damage all shields at normal rate
2) Does unit have Interdiction Field? YES = damage armor normal: NO = Damage armor *10.
3) Does unit have Interdiction Field? YES = damage outer hull components normal: NO = damage outer hull components *10.
4) Does unit have Interdiction Field? YES = damage inner hull normal: NO = damage inner hull *10
5) Unit is dead!

Just in case that is confusing remember that an engine in the Inner hull will cause steps 2 and 3 to be yes. The question is “Does unit have Interdiction Field?” Don’t confuse that with does it have a field in this hull area. Tough yet?

[Phoenix-D]

No, actually they won't. That ability applies to the entire ship as long as the component carrying it is up.

So: 100 damage hit, engines survive: 10 points of damage applied.
100 damage hit, engines do NOT survive: 100 points of damage applied.

[President_Elect_Shang]

Not working, the ship is taking 100 pts of damage engines or not.

[Suicide Junkie]

PD gave an example of a 100 damage weapon.
You're talking a 10 damage weapon.
Either way, the weapon does ten times more damage when there is an engine vs when there is no engine. (provided that it is implemented correctly)

In addition, that damage modifier PD mentioned applies to the whole ship, not just the engines. It dosen't require shields though.


---

Ok, this is significantly different from what it sounded like you were suggesting in the first post.

You will need to combine my suggestion and PD's suggestion.
Step 1:
- Give engines the "reduce damage by 90%" ability.

Step 2:
- Give shields a high grade shield type (non-interdicting)
- Damage to this shield type is normal.

Step 3:
- Give engines a token amount of low grade shield type (interdicting)
- Damage to this shield type is 10x.


Thus:
When shield types are mixed, the lowest grade (as defined by order in shieldandarmortypes.txt) is used. (Unfortunately. We should be able to mix phased & normal on the same ship and get two separate shield layers IMO)

If you have engines, damage is reduced by 10x, but the shields take 10x damage, which works out to normal damage.
Internals get the 10x reduction, with no multiplier in the damagetypes.txt, for 1/10th normal damage.

If you don't have engines, damage is not reduced, and shield damage is not multiplied. Everything is normal.


PS:
If the ability dosen't seem to be working, check the stock usage and make sure you're duplicating it correctly.

[President_Elect_Shang]

The Weapon Delivery Type Damage Received Modifier Percent is not working. I tried it at 90 and 10 and 0 and each time the weapon did 100 points of damage. I can live with 100 pts of damage if the ability was working. It isn’t!

[Phoenix-D]

If the ability is working it shouldn't matter -what- the amount of damage is. I'll check into it.