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Less Awful Mech Drones

Starbound mod: Less Awful Mech Drones

As you may infer by the name, I am not a fan of mech drone arms. In my opinion, there are far more useful mech arms. One of the worst features of the base game's mech drone arms (the Plasma Drone Mech Arm[starbounder.org] and the Swarm Drone Mech Arm[starbounder.org]) is that they target all non-friendly monsters and NPCs, including critters[starbounder.org], passive monsters, and neutral NPCs such as Deadbeat Scroungers[starbounder.org], Froggs[starbounder.org], and Shadows[starbounder.org]. They cannot be used on planets without eradicating all of these lifeforms.This mod alters the mech drone targeting code so that it will, by default, no longer target non-aggressive monsters and NPCs, rendering mech drones as safe for use planetside as any other mech weapon. Keep in mind that while the drones will no longer target passive creatures and neutral NPCs, their gunfire may still hit those beings accidentally while attacking hostile targets, and if those beings become aggressive as a result, they will be targeted and attacked like any other hostile.

Compatibility

This mod changes only the targeting code for the two base game offensive mech drones, the Plasma Drone Mech Arm and the Swarm Drone Mech Arm. Mech drones added by mods will not be affected by this mod, but a compatibility mod could be made to affect them.In the base game, certain passive monster types, such as the Rustick[starbounder.org], should be targeted by mech drones. These monster types have been added to an allow-list used by the drone arms so that they will be targeted. Passive monster types added by mods will require a compatibility mod to add them to this allow-list.Modders should read the modding guide[github.com] for information on improving the targeting of custom mech arms or adding passive monster types to the targeting allow-list.

Uninstallation

This mod should be safe to install or uninstall as desired.

Collaboration

If you have any questions, bug reports, or ideas for improvement, please contact me via Chucklefish Forums[community.playstarbound.com], Github[github.com], Reddit, or Discord (rl.steam). Steam users may wish to subscribe to my workshop profile for updates on this and my other mods. Also please let me know if you plan to republish this mod elsewhere, so we can maintain open lines of communication to ensure timely updates.

License

Permission to include this mod or parts thereof in derived works, to distribute copies of this mod verbatim, or to distribute modified copies of this mod, is granted unconditionally to Chucklefish LTD. Such permissions are also granted to other parties automatically, provided the following conditions are met:

• Credit is given to the author(s) specified in this mod's _metadata file;
• A link is provided to the Chucklefish Forum page[community.playstarbound.com] or the source repository[github.com] in the accompanying files or documentation of any derived work;
• The names 'Less Awful Mech Drones' and 'rl_lessawfulmechdrones' are not used as the metadata friendlyName and name, respectively, of any derived mod without explicit consent of the author(s); however, the name may be used in verbatim distribution of this mod. For the purposes of this clause, minimal changes to metadata files to allow distribution on Steam shall be considered a verbatim distribution so long as authorship attribution remains.