Thursday 31 December 2020

That Was The Year That Was: Space Year 2020

 Space year 2020: Expectation Versus Reality ...


I had been having considerable trouble getting my AI aircraft to intersect with the correct aiming point for landing rounds on a moving target. This is once again ... maths ... having to take into account shooter velocity in 3D, target velocity, projectile velocity, projectile inherited velocity from shooter and unth being stuff of a general persuasion. What appeared to happen was that the AI was happy to blaze away and surround the target without particularly trying to hit the bit in the middle ... you know, the actual target area ...

It was only after three attempts and scrounging some code that I noticed my dot product of the forward vector (which is a thing honest) was giving lot's of decimal nines whilst my theoretical aiming reticle had considerably less decimal places. Paying more attention to forVecDot seems to be a better idea, though I still feel the aimpoint is being over inherited with velocity in some manner ...

Cue a test dogfight, the first 2 minutes of which are letting the Ai shoot me down, and the rest are me blasting their wings up to depreciate their turning ability and make them easier to catch. The Ai has no particular tactics right now, just to try and turn on to the target and get up close and try not to overshoot if possible. 

 Machine guns go brrrrrr

In other news I fixed the issue of the AI wandering off due to realizing that positive pitch and yaw dot products required negative maneuvering inputs ...

I've also been thinking about adding Ace Combat 7 style hi-G turns, but as a Stall Turn, hit decelerate when turning and maneuverability increases in exchange for massive air resistance and speed loss. Anyway, that would be something for later.

Over Xmas I did a cheap single malt taste test, and here are the results:

Asda Extra Special Speyside *the only one not aged 12 years so not actually that special really* had a big flavour up front with a fairly high alcohol hit but not much on the back end (ooh err missus). 20 quid.

Tesco 12 Year Old Speyside was very smooth, low alcohol hit but warming all the way down. Kind of an easy drinking "session" whisky if ever there was one, but a thin in body compared to more expensive named malts. 23 quid.

Co-Op 12 Year Old was big on flavours coming from oak bourbon casks and had a fairly strong alcohol hit with a lingering finish. 26 quid.

 

So, that was the year that was. The Tokyo Olympics never did happen but it was more due to a sniffle than a bang ...

As soon as the UK announced lockdown and everyone must stay indoors my usually peaceful hiking track on a wet Wednesday was full of bastards that would not normally be there, ruining my usually quiet half-marathon oxygen intake.

So, yeah, Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year you Lurgy Poxxed Koofers.

over 9000 hours in MS Paint for extra festivitinesses ...