Modding Question?
 

I've been looking at all the mods out...and experimenting with the moding program. With a small discussion of the mod idea with my bud...he was wondering if there is a way to make pre-prepared ship types...ie with all of the components and names for each specific race you want to include. Basically this would reduce the Research to just a time oriented thing...where when u reach a new level of research...you get new ships types/sizes that you can pick from a list to build.

Thanks,

Kana

Re: Modding Question?
 

the only way to do that is to create an empire and load a game with all the tech and design the ships and then save the empire with the ships...

then start another game and load that empire file it will have all the different ships and when they become avail due to research they will show up ( instead of being greyed out )

Re: Modding Question?
 

I think he's talking more about making racial tech areas where someone would just research "Klingon technology 1-100". If so, sure you can do that, but you'd need to duplicate their specific components, since tech requirements for a component are always all required (logical AND, never logical OR). Of course, you can then make them different too, for flavor.

PvK

Re: Modding Question?
 

Seems you are asking if the ships can be forcibly preloaded with components, with no design decisions to be made. This can only be done in a haphazard manner, by adding the abilities to the hull. If you do this, the ships will no longer take partial damage, with random components being destroyed. Any abilities on the hull itself are present until the ship is destroyed. So, some components still need to be addable, but they could just be the armor and shields. This would limit customization of designs, though it would be clunky.

Another (better) way would be to play with the Ship Design ministers enabled. Modify the AI files to get the ship designs you want available for each race, then have a house rule that you can only use the designs that the AI creates for you. This will have the intended effect, but will not be forced by the game mechanics.

Re: Modding Question?
 

Fan of Galactic Civilizations, perchance? http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon12.gif

You could also make "uber-components" that perform all of a ship's functions and take up all of its tonnage, and restrict them to certain hulls by use of mounts (so that if you want a 75kT "scout" with 9 moves and the functional equivalent of a single antiproton beam, you create a huge component with a mount that only works for 75kT ships, and give it 9 movement points, a weapon ability, and all the misc. other stuff you need like supply storage.

Actually, this might not be a bad idea if you want to play an "epic" game with thousands of ships on a side, as reducing each ship class to 1 type of weapon and eliminating partial damage (which are otherwise unfortunate side effects of this idea), as then the combats would be much cleaner (no "oh, now all 600 of my ships fire their 15 anti proton beams each" http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/tongue.gif ), and you don't have to worry about micromanaging repair! http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon10.gif

Re: Modding Question?
 

All worthy ideas...I'll consider them all...More than likely it will be the first option that I'll have to end up doing...But couldn't you just start a game with high tech for the player...and then create all ships with components and then save the empire file? Also as for the research of said "ships/racial tech" couldn't all the components also have additonal tech area requirement levels all tied into the ships construction track...

...I think that came out right...

Oh...no not GC...which was better than MOO3 supposedly...but not as much fun as SE3 or SE4..I had created a Star Fleet Battles mod for SE3 and I wanted to do the same for SE4...more like SFB than Star Trek...so it would be different than the current ST mods...more like the StarFire mod.

Also...is there anyway to use the ship pictures from Star Fleet Command 1, 2 or OP to use for ship pics and portrats? How would one go about doing this...Yes...I will read all of the ship modding essays and such...currently I'm looking on the net for sites that have modded pics...for SFC 1/2.

Well Thanks,

Kana

Re: Modding Question?
 

Ok...New Modding Question...

On Mounts...Are mounts tied in to the ship construction on the tech tree...or can the be attached to specific component or weapons tech levels?

Thanks again,

Kana

Re: Modding Question?
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">They can be restricted to all/any of the above. In the default game, mounts are only tied to hull size.

Slick.

Re: Modding Question?
 

Check out the header info in the CompEnhancement file. It lists all of the optional fields that can be added to mounts.

Re: Modding Question?
 

Well, since this thread is called 'modding question', here's mine http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif

You can make tech areas require several prerequisites, but afaik they only work as "AND".
Isn't it possible to add an "OR" variable, so you need tech A AND tech B OR tech C for a tech D?
I'm asking because I was thinking of creating several research paths you can follow. For example, making point-defense weapons available as soon as missiles are discovered, OR when you reach fighters (both would require different techs, but I don't want the PD to become available only when you reach fighters AND missiles) http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/image...s/confused.gif

edit: I know I could make two different PD weapons, one for fighters and one for missiles but I don't want it that way...
Oh, and is it possible to edit the 'can target' Groups? I wanted one weapon to have some exotic targetting options and it wasn't supported http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon9.gif

[ May 05, 2004, 15:14: Message edited by: ace joh ]