Traffic Redistributer

From Elite Wiki
Redspear's analysis of Masslock linked below

This OXZ reduces the duration of mass-lock, (by reducing the frequency of fast traders) to improve game-play.

Overview

Manipulates system traffic to reduce time spent in mass-lock with minimal side-effects.

Station bound traders are often headed in the same direction as the player and as such can contribute to some of the most time consuming and tedious mass-locks in the game. The basic idea here is to alter the probabilities of the various ships appearing to favour the slower ships without excluding any of the faster ones. Slower traders take less time (and/or fuel) to overtake and therefore result in more tolerable mass-locks.

For lots of details & rethinks see the BB thread (with a fulsome analysis of the issue - and many informative tables showing varieties of traffic!).

License

  • Author: Redspear
  • License: CC-BY-NC-SA 4.0
  • Version: 2.0
  • Requires: Oolite v.1.79

Links

Other oxp's with similar effects

Note that Redspear's three oxp's are compatible with each other!

Redspear's summary of his four Masslock OXP's (from the BB)

Power To Engines

Speedboost (150%) when weapons offline
Useful for escaping faster opponents (if they did same then they wouldn't be able to shoot)
Helps reduce duration of masslocks

Masslock Compensator

Speedboost (200%) when masslocked but cancelled by red alert
No benefit for combat
Significant reduction of time spent in masslock

Traffic Redistributer

Adjusts traffic to increase frequency of slower traders (and so that the 'best' courier ships aren't also the most common)
Station bound traffic becomes easier to overtake because it's usually slower
Pirates, hunters and police are unaffected

Masslock Reimagined

Masslock lasts for a fixed duration rather than until scanner is clear
No speed changes to either player or average encountered NPC
Taking fire negates the effect but possible to dodge your way out of a masslock without being the faster ship
Likely to make Masslock Compensators obsolete if it develops as I hope

Gameplay and Balance indicator

Tag-colour-blue.png