Ship Data Format

Each ship is represented with a stand-alone file that has to be located in ships/ in the data files or plugins. Each ship has to be defined in a separate file and has to have a single <ship> base node.

• name (attribute): Ship name, displayed in game and referenced by tech lists.
• points: Fleet point value. In general used by both the fleet spawning code and by player fleets.
• base_type: Specifies the base version of the ship, useful for factional or other situational variants. (For example, a Pirate Hyena would have the “Hyena” base type.)
• GFX: Name of the ship graphic in .webp format. It is looked up at gfx/ship/DIR/NAME, where DIR is the value of GFX up to the first underscore, and NAME is the value of GFX with a special suffix depending on the type of image. The base image will try different common file suffixes if not specified. The comm window graphic will use a suffix of _comm.webp, and the engine glow will use a suffix of _engine.webp. As an example, for a value of GFX="hyena_pirate", the base graphic will be searched at gfx/ship/hyena/hyena_pirate.webp
  • size (attribute): The ship sprite’s resolution in pixels. For example, size=60 refers to a 60x60 graphic.
  • sx and sy (attributes): The number of columns and rows, respectively, in the sprite sheet.
• GUI: The in-flight GUI used when flying this ship.
• sound: Sound effect used when accelerating during flight.
• class: Defines the ship’s AI when flown by escorts and NPCs.
  • display (attribute): Overrides the displayed “class” field in the ship stats screen.
• price: Credits value of the ship in its “dry” state with no outfits.
• time_mod (optional): Time compression factor during normal flight. A value of 1 means the ship will fly in “real time”, <1 speeds up the game and >1 slows down the game.
• trail_generator (unecessary with 3D ships): Creates a particle trail during flight.
  • x, y (attributes): Trail origin coordinates, relative to the ship sprite in a “90 degree” heading.
  • h (attributes): Trail coordinate y-offset, used to modify the origin point on a “perspective” camera.
• fabricator: Flavour text stating the ship’s manufacturer.
• faction (optional): Defines the faction which produces the ship. Currently only used for the fancy gradient backgrounds.
• licence (optional): Licence-type outfit which must be owned to purchase the ship.
• cond (optional): Lua conditional expression to evaluate to see if the player can buy the ship.
• condstr (optional): human-readable interpretation of the Lua conditional expression cond.
• description: Flavour text describing the ship and its capabilities.
• characteristics: Core ship characteristics that are defined as integers.
  • crew: Number of crewmen operating the ship. Used in boarding actions.
  • mass: Tonnage of the ship hull without any cargo or outfits.
  • fuel_consumption: How many units of fuel the ship consumes to make a hyperspace jump.
  • cargo: Capacity for tonnes of cargo.
• slots: List of available outfit slots of the ship.
  • weapon, utility and structure: Defines whether the outfit slot fits under the Weapon, Utility or Structure columns.
    • x, y, and h (attributes) define the origin coordinates of weapon graphics such as projectiles, particles and launched fighters.
    • size (attribute): Defines the largest size of outfit allowed in the slot. Valid values are small, medium and large.
    • prop (attribute): Defines the slot as accepting a particular type of outfit defined by an . XML file in the slots/ directory. The Naev default scenario includes systems, engines, and hull values for Core Systems, Engines, and Hull outfits which must be filled (if they exist) for a ship to be spaceworthy.
      • exclusive=1 (attribute): Restricts the slot to accepting only the outfits defined by the prop field.
      • Inserting an outfit’s name will add it to that outfit slot in the ship’s “stock” configuration. This is useful for selling a ship with prefilled core outfits to ensure its spaceworthiness immediately upon purchase.
• stats (optional): Defines modifiers applied to all characteristics and outfits on the ship.
  • Fields here correspond to those in the characteristics category and the general and specifics categories on equipped outfits.
• tags (optional): Referenced by scripts. Can be used to effect availability of missions, NPC behaviour and other elements.
  • tag: Each tag node represents a binary flag which are accessible as a table with ship.tags()
• health: Supercategory which defines the ship’s intrinsic durability before modifiers from stats and equipped outfits. Note that this node and subnodes are deprecated and will likely be removed in future versions. Use ship stats instead!
  • armour: Armour value.
  • armour_regen: Armour regeneration in MW (MJ per second).
  • shield: Shield value.
  • shield_regen: Shield regeneration in MW (MJ per second).
  • energy: Energy capacity.
  • energy_regen: Energy regeneration in MW (MJ per second).
  • absorb: Reduction to incoming damage.

For a full example of the $\naev$ starter ship ``Llama’’ is shown below, refer to the original file