I've created a testing server that is running the civilian portion of the code. Currently the planes are limited to the default YSF civilian planes.
You start with a diamond eclipse and the little piper archer at rank 0. As you complete missions, you will unlock further aircraft.
To find where to pick passengers up from type /destinations into chat.
When you are at the loading point, type /load into chat to load the passengers onto your aircraft. It'll say in chat where to deliver them, and the reward. Then off you go. When you get there, it will auto unload when you're close (and slow enough), and give you your reward.
The one 'bug' so far is that you need to go the terminal to load and unload passengers.... You can't dump them on the runway.
The server is now linked to PHNL metar, so the weather and time in game matches IRL (more or less. wind and visibility anyway)
I've attached a chart for the map, with bearings to various nav points, and waypoints. The other option is using skyvector.com, they're not far off the YSF map.
https://home.skipper-iwb.co.uk/ysflight is the current stats site, but it's very basic at the moment.
You may have spotted this on the discord, but I'm currently developing a server mod I'm calling YSRP (YS Roleplay).
The aim is to add in a load of additional functionality into the game, and build some mechanics for role playing into YS.
Currently, the idea is this:
Airlines:
Airlines will start with a small plane, like a small Cessna 172, taking maybe 2 passengers at once.
They'll make money (¥$ - which will be equal to rank) by delivering passengers from one airport to another. The more passengers, the bigger the distance between airports, the more money. After they've built up enough money/rank, they'll unlock additional aircraft, with larger passenger capacity, faster, etc.
Ganja gang:
Smugglin.
Starting off in a small (probably a cessna too) plane, the aim is to move....product, from one end of the map to the other. The more delivered, the more ¥$, the bigger the aircraft... you get the picture.
If they're intercepted, I'm not sure whether to rank down, or they just lose the time and product and have to go back to their start point. Probably the latter, the ranking up is easy, down is difficult.
Coastguard/DEA:
To stop that kind of behaviour. Aircraft capability to follow the ganja gang's aircraft capability scale.
DEA rank up on stopping the smugglers, but rank down on killing the gang if they're not smuggling product.
Considerations
Levelling should be consistent across the classes.
It should be obvious to each pilot what aircraft they can and cannot fly. (to this end, the YSRP proxy server has a custom aircraft list sender, that only forwards on the aircraft that person is entitled to, ranking down is hard here, as you cannot remove and aircraft from a clients list once they've synched. But I can stop them from joining in that plane)
Any commands in game should be memorable, and easy to type. so /money or /rank for getting the users current level. /load to load the product/passengers at the airport, /unload to unload them at the destination.
Map should cater to all classes. So there should be some long distance routes with nice airports for the airlines, and small dirt strips for the smugglers.
There should be some limit on the DEA, to prevent them just camping the smuggling pickups and drop offs, maybe SAM and AAA around the pick up and drop offs, with insane health and 0 hit box to prevent DEA from just clearing them out, and multiple pick up and drop off zones.
Also, for the smugglers the rewards should scale with the number of DEA on the server. So if they're just flying alone, the rewards are minimal, but with a couple of cops flying about, it gets significantly better.
Current status:
It's not all fantasy and wishful thinking! I've got a prototype! Not all the functionality is there yet, but it's a start!
Currently I've got a proxy running that works a bit like the old YSPS (without the odd wind effect). The aircraft list sent to a client is controlled by the proxy. I've got positions etc of aircraft, flying times, interception of chat messages for the commands, and a rank system set up.
My todo list is to separate the ranks out for each class, put in the actions for each class, so create the passenger lists and smuggling jobs, and implement the actions to load and unload in the correct places. (rectangle regions aren't passed through the server commands, annoyingly - so will have to be done with the coordinates of those spaces).
Create the aircraft for each class,
Captain_Ahab is helping me with the aircraft, I think they're working on the smugglers and DEA aircraft and progression. If anyone fancies helping out, we need a map and the airliners progression aircraft.
For the smugglers, it's looking currently like:
PA-18 Super Cub at Rank 1 -> DHC-2 Beaver at Rank 2, -> AN-2 Colt at Rank 3 -> DHC-6 Twin Otter at Rank 4 (?) -> DC-3 at Rank 5, or maybe a DC-6. Not sure at that top rank yet.
So I'm thinking for airlines, a similar progression, maybe:
Cessna 172 at Rank 1, Beechcraft King Air at rank 2 -> Honda Jet or similar at rank 3 -> small Embraer ERJ type jet at Rank 4 -> Airbus A319 at Rank 5, or maybe scale bigger, and put the Embraer at Rank 3, A319 at 4, and a 777 size at Rank 5.
In terms of the rank/ money, I'm thinking:
- Rank 1: 0-Y$10,000 - which would equate to about 15-30 minutes of flying maybe
- Rank 2: Y$10,000-$50,000 - which would be maybe an hour?
- Rank 3: Y$50,000-Y$200,000 - Maybe a few hours
- Rank 4 Y$200,000-Y$500,000 - Up into the 5h mark maybe
- Rank 5 Y$500,000+ for over 5h of flying time.
