SEV Modders Help Searching

musashironinit · Space Emperor Joined: Nov 23, 2014

SEV was a great game. Was a great idea, even if it could have been done better. A lot of stuff has been left out, but still remains one of the best strategy/tactical games ever, with is same turn system game.
But it seems game companies are not willing to do the extra mile that will create a game perfect under both the tactical and the strategical part.
I'm planning a huge mod fow SEV, for now just on the game mechanics. Since we are really talking about a Huge works I'm searching some people willing to help, compiling code lines but also helping with suggested modification. First of all we will modify Planet types. There will be 15 planet types (From different sizes), 4 of them artificials. 9 different athmosphere types. and 7 range of radiation, 7 range of temperature and 7 range of gravity. Colonization now will be more depending on tech level then ever. Also sector size will be doubled, allowing plenty of empty space where ostile fleets can Hide so sensor level will be very important on detecting hidden listening posts. Terraform levels will differ from atmosphere to atmosphere, as they should be in reality. Some automation level will be added. For each planet type you will choose4 what kind of facilities you want and then the sistem will build them and keep them upgraded. And if you choose to add or modify the selected list of facilities, you just modify the list and the ai will make the modifications. A Piracy system will be created, allowing a new mission, system patrol. A system fleet can be created to patrol a system (There will be a formula that will depends on Drive velocity, supplies consumed and other key data. For example, if you keep low on weapon tech research, after discovering an alien race, probably you will be invaded by alien smugglers, and you will need to create more powerful system fleets so those fleets will need more resources. The idea is to make every single aspect more realistic than ever, but also to eliminate some useless actions. If I where emperor of a stellar empire, I would concentrate easily on building facilities on my home planet. But that only until I own a single system. Do you think Palpatine would have wanted to choose what to build on Tatooine? (If you don't know who it is, you don't need to read further)
Planets will be used for population, even if you want to use them for whip building. But Military installation will be separated and treated as ships for the game purpose, so shipyards will work separately. The transport system will work as the pirate system Each system will need a Transport system that will cost as much as the distance from the planets and colonies of the system and the distance from other colonies.
Once we set up a universe with a stable system of formulas, we will focus on a tech map and so on.
So, volunteers needed

VERY VERY IMPORTANT: PLEASE READ THIS

It's not MY MOD. I had some of the Ideas, others Ideas They are on other mods. I don't want People to think they have to WORK for me. I want people to work together if they want a better game.
I WANT TO ORGANIZE ALL THE GOOD IDEAS AND MATERIALS MANY PEOPLE ALREADY DID, GET NEW IDEAS PEOPLE NEVER CONSIDERED BECAUSE THEY HADN'T THE POSSIBILITY TO WORK ALONE ON THOSE, ORGANIZE IT AND TRY TO INSERT IT IN THE GAME, LEAVING IT OPEN TO NEW MODIFICATIONS.

musashironinit · Space Emperor Joined: Nov 23, 2014

I started attacking the files. Planned for now 17 Celestial objects, 5 artificials (an outpost, 2 Spacecolonies, Ringword and Sphereword) and 13 normal, from asteroids, moons, planetoids, small to titanic planets).

Each celestial objects will fall in a special classification between:
7 degrees of Radiation Levels (From 1 being Near Zero Rad to 7 being Deathly Rad), The last one being unchoosable as a starting point fro a race
7 degrees of Temperature Levels (From 1 being near Zero Temp to 7 being Near Plasma Temp), the last one being unchoosable by players
7 degrees of Gravity Levels (From 1 being near Zero Grav to 7 being Near Titanic Grav, not the final name), the last one being unchoosable by players
The colonization and the construction of each singular objects will require a different colonizer especially designed (naturally you will need just to add the colonizer component)
Each class planet, defined by a 3 digit number, will land a special construction dome on the planet allowing workers to start working and do their business. Naturally, until the work is done, they will need supplied resources. Each single colonizer will be discovered after the required fields of knowledge is analyzed and discovered.
For now I think a 7 degrees of Gravity resistance research, 7 Degrees of rad research and 7 of Temperature research. The last ones, like Deathlty Rad Levels or Near Plasma Levels will be allowed for research or resource reasons n but also for military reasons. You may want to install Satellite posts hidden in the hidden Plasma area of another sun for example.
Size and Gravity aren't always related so tightly.
Also there will be 10 different Chemical atmosphere types. I m searching for a way to add a random poisonus effect on some planets so that will limit them.
Thinking also on adding a Biological compatibility and some kind of resource systems to add different resources among the stars. Like Dilithium crystals in star trek or other stuff.
The research system will have a particular importance. Sending Civilian research systems to study celestial objects will give data that could potentially lead to discoveries on field you have researched or you're researching. That system will be related to generic field studies but the effects gained will vary on a random way so that you will not know that studying a certain anomaly will lead to certain effects.
The dome system is being modified. I believe that in the construction of Artificial objects, The initial population and facility space is limited to the space needed to the construction materials and life support, that will keep the workers alive until all is ready. Then there will be living space available as if the atmosphere inside is ready. But the atmosphere in artificial objects can be easily modified, so they Will have a special atmosphere called "Artificial" meaning that it can accommodate any living being. The production time for these stations will depend space yard technologies and on the continue refurbishment of supplies that the workers will need to finish station. Obviously, a delay of more than 2 months will halt and set back the opera, but not destroy the scraps, allowing someone else to occupy it after a few years.
Small to Titanic Planets instead, will have actually habitable domes which provide living space and resources.
All Military facilities will now be considered separately from the civilian facilities. I'm thinking also to add a 10x 100x system on facilities to have them handled in a better way.

That's where I am now. many ideas came from the great modders we have in the space empires community. And I specially hope they would join me in working on this.

For now I'm working just on the planet Atmosphere system.
And the possibilities are endless for now...

In my concept, not only will be important to manage your empire. In some way you will have to invent new combos. Like combining Satellites and sensors for spying, or Upon automation and robotics discovery sending androids on another empires, and so on... Or why not to use robotics building armies to invade in a cheap way other planets? Do you want to be the first to create the Berserk race? Or invest on a mutated race that will invade nearby systems leaving you innocent as a baby? Pr build the Yamato making a leap through sending her on a voyage on the other edge of the galaxy on a peace mission?

marhawkman · Space Emperor Joined: Mar 24, 2008

Perfect is such a lofty goal that it'd take decades...

Problem 1: the game only has 5 colonize abilities(yes it's a bad thing, but I can't change it). If you have more than 5 physical types, then you will have to either make the colonize abilities work on more than one planet type(not sure if that can be done actually), or all planet types past 5 will be uninhabitable.

Problem 2: I'm not sure how you can actually use the Rad/temp/grav values.

note: the game works best with 250 or less systems.

Problem 3: there is no way to prevent a player from starting with a valid combination of type/atmo. So special physical/atmo types don't work well. They CAN be done, but it's awkward.

Problem 4: AFAIK there is no way to restrict colonization based on rad/temp/grav

problem 5: I don't think you can add a resource type.

note: the idea of adding a script that gives you a research bonus for certain things is a cool idea.

problem 6: preventing an atmosphere type from being used at random is extremely difficult... also IIRC domed size is based on phsyical type not atmosphere.

I love your enthusiasm though. Very Happy

musashironinit · Space Emperor Joined: Nov 23, 2014

Well, I hopes to get help.

Yes, those are problems. I would like to see if will be possible to work around them.

You say There are only 5 Physical colony Types . Didn't know for sure. Nothings prevent NASA for sending people on the moon tomorrow. Even Millions. They will of course die immediately. But no one is stopping them to do it. Or to waste resource in an attempt.
The Idea is to find a way to give the Classification Information on the technology and allow people to know what planets they can colonize or what they can't. Still trying to get the best from the game.

Still haven't got to systems. So this will be next issue. For now it's just planets Sizes, types and atmosphere. Are you interested in working on the project?

musashironinit · Space Emperor Joined: Nov 23, 2014

Let's explain better the Idea behind The Physical colony types. There are only 5 states of matter (There are more, but this is a simplified and game playable approximation)

Hypersolid
Solid
Liquid
Gas
Plasma

We don't need Hypersolid in the game, because it behave as solid for the game mechanic, And Plasma is useless as for all the game mechanics those are stars and protostars.

That leaves us with 3 types.
But for the sake of game mechanics, we can say that also colonizing space is different (Building a space colony is another matter. Also That should be taken into account. And also, colonizing asteroids and planetoids would require a different classification for the sake of the game.
That leaves us with 5 Colony types

SPACE
ROCK
LIQUID
GAS
PLANETOIDS

Off course Every planet has a solid center, and off course even a liquid planet can have an atmosphere, which is gas, but that is not the point from the physical situation.

So we will need just 5 colonizer types. Then we can add a series of discoverable tech levels (each for a different atmosphere type, meaning that a Dome in an environment of inert Atmosphere need to be different from one in an acid one. Same stuff for grad,temp and rad. In the ship construction we will add a requirements fro the colony ship that will need a series of devices in the ships for it to be constructed.

Let's have an example here. Let's say you need to colonize an asteroid classified 1 3 1 on the system which is near zero rad low temp (Probably too much near the sun) and near zero gravity. You will have the ASTEROIDS Colonizer needed, To be constructed it will need to have 3 components for the dome: RAD SHIELDING DOME COMP/TEMP INSULATION DOME COMP and GRAVITY CONTROL DOME COMP) These components cannot be build but in a special construction facility. Which means that you can't build them on site, you have to build them o a planet with the rights factories. These components will give ability to the population where they will be placed in a dome and they are required to make the dome habitable. On the dome they become Facilities which can be destroyed. Now the tricks will do the work, since your population on the dome depends on living conditions. If living conditions on the planet are related to the Dome components you build, and they don't match the needs of the environment, your population begin to die very quickly...

And the magic is done...

With that you will have an endless system of physical conditions

Smile

Skyburn · Space Emperor Joined: Mar 12, 2008

musashironinit · Space Emperor Joined: Nov 23, 2014

I saw the mod with the mobile facility and it was interesting, even if added a whole new level of managing necessity. But it was interesting. Many things can be added.With a group big enough I think we can achieve a working alpha in a few months... given that volunteers show up...

marhawkman · Space Emperor Joined: Mar 24, 2008

I said there was only 5 colonization abilities. Example:

musashironinit · Space Emperor Joined: Nov 23, 2014

I would have to go on the code you posted. I think too that my ideas have to be tested. that's why I would like to share the project (and the work) with those willing to join. I Believe that the solution will be in the formula system of the game. We can "trick" the game in having it behave as we intend to. Off course maybe I will discover that some ideas are just too much. But lets home not. For example, even if I'm not focusing on it, the flagship system can be implemented allowing a single ship and a single design to have a starting experience of veteran and a overpowered system (let's say like 3 levels up). Like it would happen if you take the best and brightest and put them on the best ship you can build. But that way too early for that.

The needed component rule for the colonizer is easily solved, because they have the same formula in the crew quarters requirements
For the dome facility, If we modify the death ratio given by the planet and if we give the components we talked about a low in that death ratio, the system would work easily because as soon as those components get destroyed, or if you send the wrong components to a planet, then the population dies completely the next turn. As should people living on a ship without life support...

marhawkman · Space Emperor Joined: Mar 24, 2008

Not so much... see, when you colonize, the colony ship ceases to exist, and all components on it cease to exist. Also, AFAIK the only way to link components present on a ship to planetary population growth is to use a script. As-is, the game cares about one thing when establishing a colony. Do you have the right colonization ability? Trying to rig it to look for more than that isn't simple. The "needed component rule" determines nothing more than whether you can build the ship. It isn't used when colonizing.

Anyways, the premise behind colony modules is that the colony module contains the supplies needed to establish a functional, semi-self sufficient base of operations. So needing to keep a ship in orbit doesn't make as much sense.

musashironinit · Space Emperor Joined: Nov 23, 2014

Always remember that I can have problems to explain myself completely given the translation problem.

Here what I think to do. (All to be tested)
The required objects for the ship are just a fake. What will happen is that when you create a colony, the ship is destroyed. But somehow we will link the components (each of them of a certain level).
Now this is the part that needs to be checked.
In the process of creating the colony, we will then link the created colony with 3 factory components (No factory space required) whose levels are the same required to colonize the planet. If those levels don't match, then people will die very fast because living conditions equations will have a very high death ratio. Now it is to be seen if this can be the solution. But I believe the system of the game allow for many tricks if one want to hit a certain goal.

musashironinit · Space Emperor Joined: Nov 23, 2014

What I don't like about Warp 10 classification is that it is clearly earth oriented. Good if you play humans but less interesting when you play let say a Heavy gravity gas giant race. For them the terrestrial have no meaning. I mean only the classification, not the mod in general. Smile

DXM · Space Emperor Joined: Mar 20, 2012

I agree that IF many of the things you mention could be done, it would add a lot to the depth of game play. . . But, I fear your goals may be too lofty. By setting out to do things that might not be possible from the start, you may be setting yourself up for disappointment. By all means, test your theories. . . But don't get your hopes of doing ALL the stuff you're talking about too high.

Oddly enough, I was just thinking about the possibilities of a mod like you're talking about, albeit of a more modest scope. . . I was going to name it after myself, the Digital Xperiment Mod! Laughing

But, in addition to being pretentious, that title might seem a bit misleading. . . Most of what I had hoped to do would not be all that different from what has already been done before. . . But, I'll discuss my ideas later. . .

A lot of things can apparently be done with scripts, but even that has its limits. . . But, more importantly, my experience playing mods that use scripts -like Isopysco's BSG Mod- has shown me that they make things awkward at best. . . The 'auto-close warp points to simulate FTL travel' leads to constant 'lost contact with empire' messages. . . The 'generate wreckage at the site of a space battle' slows the game down. . . Mods that make heavy use of scripts tend to either: a) not work as advertised, b) make the game really slow, c) cause the game to crash unexpectedly, or d) all of the above.

Speaking for myself, I would much rather play a game that has less depth but works, than to play one that has lots of depth but might not work. . . I'm just saying.

Anyway, a few more thoughts from reading your earlier posts. . .

Domed figures are in the PlanetSize.txt data file; I'm not sure there is any way to link them to either physical type or atmosphere type. . . A question I would like answered, though, is: can you really add new sizes? I was reading on the wiki earlier, and it says the only sizes allowed are "Asteroids, Tiny, Small, Medium, Large, Huge". . . Is this correct? Or could one add a 'Titanic' size? Or a 'Micro' size? Knowing that for sure will answer for me how versatile such modding can be. . .

BTW. . . NASA's budget isn't even big enough to build and send another Apollo mission.

I'm not sure I understand what you're saying about "allow people to know what planets they can colonize" - that kind of sounds like you are saying the system doesn't need to work, it just needs to tell players what to do or not do, and rely on the player to follow 'honorary' rules. . .?

Hmm, when I went to school, there were only 3 states of matter. . . I remember folks talking about wanting to call plasma a 4th state, but since plasma is really just ionized gas, everybody else said "what would be the point?"

Liquid planet? I had thought of the idea - as a way to have 'ocean worlds' that wouldn't immediately allow Rock races to establish colonies on them. . . But, it's hard to imagine a real planet hat would have no land at all. . . The closest thing in our solar system would be either a Kuiper belt object composed mostly of water(albeit in the form of ice), or the gas giants with their mantles of liquid metallic hydrogen. . . On ST:VOY, there was a free floating ocean, of course. . . But really, any race that can colonize another terrestrial planet could probably colonize one with water(or another liquid) covering its surface. . .

As for the techs to colonize different atmospheres/gravs/temps/rad-levels, they simply aren't needed. . . If you have a Rock Colony Module, the game will let you colonize any Rock Planet, regardless of the planet's other characteristics. . . And yes, you could make a lot of extra components required to build a colony ship, but that won't; a) stop the player from putting the colony module on another ship type(unless you add to every one of them that they can't have a colony comp), or b) stop the game from letting the Rock/Oxy/LowTemp/LowGrav/LowRad equiped Colonizer from colonizing ANY Rock planet - thus negating the need for the player to research anything but one set of your required comps.

The system you're purposing sounds interesting for anyone who wants a much greater depth of game play. . . But, it also seems too complicated to actually try to do. . . It sounds like you are making more work for yourself than is reasonable. . . But, don't let me discourage you from the attempt, if you've got your heart set on it!

I've had my own ideas for tons of complicated micro-management stuff, that I'd probably like. . . But, apparently, most of the players of the Balance Mod(one of the most popular of all) think that even Emergency Propulsion comps in the stock game are "micromanagement hell". . . Go figure! Laughing

Another question I need answered: can you really build space habitats, or are they dependent on something weird - like the system must have 1 and only 1 star? Seems like I read that years ago, that SE5 treated all constructed planets like it does Ringworlds & Sphereworlds. . .?

Also, I spot another problem: there is no such thing as "special construction" in SE5. . . To the best of my knowledge, the game simply doesn't allow for such things. . . There are certain things, like facilities & units, you can build anywhere. . . And, any spaceyard facility/comp can build any ship/base. . . You can't restrict what can be built by what. . . I wish you could, it would open up a lot of mod possibilities, but alas. . .

I'm pretty sure you can't have facilities/comps required to make a Dome habitable. . . It just is by default. In fact the 'Domed' feature of the game is nothing more than a built-in check to see if the planet atmosphere type matches the majority of the colony's race atmosphere type or not. . . What "living conditions" are you talking about? I'm pretty sure that even on planets that have 'deadly' conditions, the population doesn't die; they just reproduce more slowly. . . The only thing that kills population is attack by enemy ships, plagues and random events like earthquakes/comet strikes. . .

One more note: although the Gravity, Temperature and Radiation figures in no way effect anything in the game, it is off-putting to see a lovely oxygen planet that is supposed to be colder than dry ice. . . Or a tiny planet with crushing gravity. . . And, since these are random figures generated by a formula, you can probably add new formulas to vary the outcome. . . By assigning the low-grav formula to tiny & small planets, the high-grav to large & huge, etc., you can at least make that 'window-dressing' aspect of the game less of an eyesore! Very Happy

I'd be interested to hear what you learn about the work-arounds you're looking for, but marhawkman and others will be much better at helping you there. . . However, if you get far enough to need other stuff, I might could help. . . I spent an awful lot of time over the past few years gathering pictures & models for possible use in future mod(s). . .

musashironinit · Space Emperor Joined: Nov 23, 2014

Wow ... that Is a big post to answer.

I'll try to answer to everything. But first, remember I'm new to modding so I started looking at other people mods, trying to look at what they have done in the .txt files and see how they work in play. Let's go by parts:

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I agree that IF many of the things you mention could be done, it would add a lot to the depth of game play. . . But, I fear your goals may be too lofty. By setting out to do things that might not be possible from the start, you may be setting yourself up for disappointment. By all means, test your theories. . . But don't get your hopes of doing ALL the stuff you're talking about too high.

I agree. That could happen. Probably will. But None can be achieved if you don't try. Maybe if we get the best at working at this Malfador will be interested in hearing our Ideas... we can't know doe sure. The sure thing is there is no Game like the one I described capable of doing all the things I described. Or you described. Some of My ideas are pretty much the same all other players have wanted.

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Oddly enough, I was just thinking about the possibilities of a mod like you're talking about, albeit of a more modest scope. . . I was going to name it after myself, the Digital Xperiment Mod! Laughing But, in addition to being pretentious, that title might seem a bit misleading. . . Most of what I had hoped to do would not be all that different from what has already been done before. . . But, I'll discuss my ideas later. . .

Well, I think almost the same

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A lot of things can apparently be done with scripts, but even that has its limits. . . But, more importantly, my experience playing mods that use scripts -like Isopysco's BSG Mod- has shown me that they make things awkward at best. . . The 'auto-close warp points to simulate FTL travel' leads to constant 'lost contact with empire' messages. . . The 'generate wreckage at the site of a space battle' slows the game down. . . Mods that make heavy use of scripts tend to either: a) not work as advertised, b) make the game really slow, c) cause the game to crash unexpectedly, or d) all of the above.

Yes. Some of the problems you reported are familiar to me too. But we don't need all of them actually. And for as much as I know until now everyone had chosen to work alone on His personal mod. What I suggest is that we cooperate to have more people brainstorming the problems. I'm pretty sure many of the problems can be worked with a group of people. I have some talents, some people have others. If we join, we can actually. We will need People to organize in a certain way the data, we will need people to collect and organize and names images to have visual varieties and we will need people capable of joining the tiles and solving the puzzle.
Everyone who has ever tried writing down a mod has to spend hours finding the resources to finish the mod he was working on on (for him) boring works). So maybe a genius in writing down AI scripts just had to waste his time and energies on doing other stuff... An I wrong?

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Speaking for myself, I would much rather play a game that has less depth but works, than to play one that has lots of depth but might not work. . . I'm just saying.

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Domed figures are in the PlanetSize.txt data file; I'm not sure there is any way to link them to either physical type or atmosphere type. . . A question I would like answered, though, is: can you really add new sizes? I was reading on the wiki earlier, and it says the only sizes allowed are "Asteroids, Tiny, Small, Medium, Large, Huge". . . Is this correct? Or could one add a 'Titanic' size? Or a 'Micro' size? Knowing that for sure will answer for me how versatile such modding can be. . .

PlanetSize.txt file has maximum space pot data for both domed and undomed objects. We will simply replace the way the game work with asteroids treating them as planets with no atmosphere. The game allow to do that. Then we will lower to 0 the creation of normal asteroids. So we will have a certain number of asteroids that can actually be inhabited.
That is the part I'm working right now, both trying to write down and organizing in a good way the data as they should be. The size is easily written. Naturally I will have to go down the numbers to get all balanced after all is reorganized, the facility cargo and space ratio, with the population. Also the outpost, the spacecolonies will be treated as planets (Artificial planets where already included in the possibilities. I have to check if you can build a planet in empty space from nowhere. But I suppose we can since there's already a script that allow you to replace a planet with asteroids and asteroids with a planet, so we will need to give that possibility also to a components and all should work fine.

* * Please notice. For the sake of the game, outposts, spacecolonies and colonies, even if they can have a military presence on them, are treated as planets because they are primarily for civilian purpose.

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BTW. . . NASA's budget isn't even big enough to build and send another Apollo mission. I'm not sure I understand what you're saying about "allow people to know what planets they can colonize" - that kind of sounds like you are saying the system doesn't need to work, it just needs to tell players what to do or not do, and rely on the player to follow 'honorary' rules. . .?

Actually, allow players to follow honor rules doesn't work (Unless you play with certain people. The NASA mission was what we call a "Constructio Ad Absurdum".
I meant that Nothing forbids nasa to send right now people on the moon again if they find the money and if they want to. Or on Mars. But since we don't have the technology needed to keep them alive forever and establish a colony, they would probably die after a while...
So my idea for now is: "Ok. you have rock colonization tech and in the game you can colonize all rock words. Good. Now you send the colonizer and you find a rock planet with a dome. Good. But the planet has a classification 5 1 4 (means for now 5 level Radiation which is High Level Radiation, 1 Level Temperature which means near Zero Temperature ans 4 Level Gravity Which means Average Gravity) and another atmosphere (or no atmosphere).
You're playing as Humans, oxigens, With a home initial Planet 4 4 4.
So no problem for the gravity. You already knows this tech. But you don't know High Radiation Shielding or Near Zero Temperature Insulation.
And in the dome you are supposed to build The components to keep the population alive.
You can't, this will means bye bye population and death planet.

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Hmm, when I went to school, there were only 3 states of matter. . . I remember folks talking about wanting to call plasma a 4th state, but since plasma is really just ionized gas, everybody else said "what would be the point?"

Plasma acts differently, as physicist discovered, so differently that they are calling it another matter state. Remember that we live in contact of only 3 state matters so it's really difficult to see and imagine all the others. But we need a game that can allow also a bit of imagination and creativity: So if you search for the Level 7 tech on Temperature, able to sustain Near Plasma Temp, maybe you can use it to hide a Probe satellite near the sun, where enemy ship can't go... Or hide a listening post in a Death Radiation Level nebulae Cloud. Some of the ideas I was thinking... Still early but promising

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Liquid planet? I had thought of the idea - as a way to have 'ocean worlds' that wouldn't immediately allow Rock races to establish colonies on them. . . But, it's hard to imagine a real planet hat would have no land at all. . . The closest thing in our solar system would be either a Kuiper belt object composed mostly of water(albeit in the form of ice), or the gas giants with their mantles of liquid metallic hydrogen. . . On ST:VOY, there was a free floating ocean, of course. . . But really, any race that can colonize another terrestrial planet could probably colonize one with water(or another liquid) covering its surface. . .

Actually Liquid Words Aren't just ocean words. They literally are made of Liquid and no solid surfaces on the planet. An Ice word is a solid word. An ocean word is just a word with no continents, but still allow people to colonize little islands and then build, so they can be colonized if you have the equipment. You know, Colonizing a word with water is not a big problem. If you send a Floating dome that can withstand corrosion. But the water can be different, acid or even liquid metal (There's an Hypotesys on that) Not talking of a lava planet here, talking on a really liquid boiling metal. Oceans on venus are acid made. What id the hole planet if covered with them? You would have to study a tech to allow the dome to withstand the situation: Every word is different. Every planet is different...

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As for the techs to colonize different atmospheres/gravs/temps/rad-levels, they simply aren't needed. . . If you have a Rock Colony Module, the game will let you colonize any Rock Planet, regardless of the planet's other characteristics. . . And yes, you could make a lot of extra components required to build a colony ship, but that won't; a) stop the player from putting the colony module on another ship type(unless you add to every one of them that they can't have a colony comp), or b) stop the game from letting the Rock/Oxy/LowTemp/LowGrav/LowRad equiped Colonizer from colonizing ANY Rock planet - thus negating the need for the player to research anything but one set of your required comps.

I believe I already answered to that

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The system you're purposing sounds interesting for anyone who wants a much greater depth of game play. . . But, it also seems too complicated to actually try to do. . . It sounds like you are making more work for yourself than is reasonable. . . But, don't let me discourage you from the attempt, if you've got your heart set on it!

I think everything news seems complicated. I think it will not be easy. But I also think that you would find it interesting on playing it. And much more challenging. Yes, I like also the original Version of Space empires V, but... That's a big but. If every time You play it gets different, that would be a big + on the game. I wouldn't get tired on playing a game like that.
It would be more challenging but also more interesting.

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I've had my own ideas for tons of complicated micro-management stuff, that I'd probably like. . . But, apparently, most of the players of the Balance Mod(one of the most popular of all) think that even Emergency Propulsion comps in the stock game are "micromanagement hell". . . Go figure! Laughing

Balance mod focus on Balancing stuff already in it. We must focus on adding all the stuff we can in the game, adding weapon damage types, even some theorized ones. After we have everything in place, they are welcome to rebalance all to have a better plays experience

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Another question I need answered: can you really build space habitats, or are they dependent on something weird - like the system must have 1 and only 1 star? Seems like I read that years ago, that SE5 treated all constructed planets like it does Ringworlds & Sphereworlds. . .?

I believe the system having just one stars was alredy solved. I played a mod with many double and triple systems. Must remember what mod. Maybe realistic mod. Which also doubled the size of sectors.

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Also, I spot another problem: there is no such thing as "special construction" in SE5. . . To the best of my knowledge, the game simply doesn't allow for such things. . . There are certain things, like facilities & units, you can build anywhere. . . And, any spaceyard facility/comp can build any ship/base. . . You can't restrict what can be built by what. . . I wish you could, it would open up a lot of mod possibilities, but alas. . .

Also this has already been solved on a mod I played. Anyway I plan to remove completely the Space Yards system with a different one but Still I don't know how. Unless people join very fast I will focus only on the Planet/size/Type/atmosphere types for now

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I'm pretty sure you can't have facilities/comps required to make a Dome habitable. . . It just is by default. In fact the 'Domed' feature of the game is nothing more than a built-in check to see if the planet atmosphere type matches the majority of the colony's race atmosphere type or not. . . What "living conditions" are you talking about? I'm pretty sure that even on planets that have 'deadly' conditions, the population doesn't die; they just reproduce more slowly. . . The only thing that kills population is attack by enemy ships, plagues and random events like earthquakes/comet strikes. . .

The reproduction is managed by a simple formula. If you modify it you can have the required effects.

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One more note: although the Gravity, Temperature and Radiation figures in no way effect anything in the game, it is off-putting to see a lovely oxygen planet that is supposed to be colder than dry ice. . . Or a tiny planet with crushing gravity. . . And, since these are random figures generated by a formula, you can probably add new formulas to vary the outcome. . . By assigning the low-grav formula to tiny & small planets, the high-grav to large & huge, etc., you can at least make that 'window-dressing' aspect of the game less of an eyesore! Very Happy

I'm studiing that right now. I found maybe even a way to add rad and temp in the game.

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I'd be interested to hear what you learn about the work-arounds you're looking for, but marhawkman and others will be much better at helping you there. . . However, if you get far enough to need other stuff, I might could help. . . I spent an awful lot of time over the past few years gathering pictures & models for possible use in future mod(s). . .

Well, that sounds interesting. Did you already ordered all the data gathered? Are they already formatted and rightly named in a way they can easily be checked and modified if needed? You are interested in modeling Only? Or would you like also to get your hands on the Ship construction Parts? The one in the game where you're allowed to add or remove components from a ship

musashironinit · Space Emperor Joined: Nov 23, 2014

Wow ... that Is a big post to answer.

I'll try to answer to everything. But first, remember I'm new to modding so I started looking at other people mods, trying to look at what they have done in the .txt files and see how they work in play. Let's go by parts:

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I agree that IF many of the things you mention could be done, it would add a lot to the depth of game play. . . But, I fear your goals may be too lofty. By setting out to do things that might not be possible from the start, you may be setting yourself up for disappointment. By all means, test your theories. . . But don't get your hopes of doing ALL the stuff you're talking about too high.

I agree. That could happen. Probably will. But None can be achieved if you don't try. Maybe if we get the best at working at this Malfador will be interested in hearing our Ideas... we can't know for sure. The sure thing is there is no Game like the one I described capable of doing all the things I described. Or you described. Some of My ideas are pretty much the same all other players have wanted.

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Oddly enough, I was just thinking about the possibilities of a mod like you're talking about, albeit of a more modest scope. . . I was going to name it after myself, the Digital Xperiment Mod! Laughing But, in addition to being pretentious, that title might seem a bit misleading. . . Most of what I had hoped to do would not be all that different from what has already been done before. . . But, I'll discuss my ideas later. . .

Well, I think almost the same

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A lot of things can apparently be done with scripts, but even that has its limits. . . But, more importantly, my experience playing mods that use scripts -like Isopysco's BSG Mod- has shown me that they make things awkward at best. . . The 'auto-close warp points to simulate FTL travel' leads to constant 'lost contact with empire' messages. . . The 'generate wreckage at the site of a space battle' slows the game down. . . Mods that make heavy use of scripts tend to either: a) not work as advertised, b) make the game really slow, c) cause the game to crash unexpectedly, or d) all of the above.

Yes. Some of the problems you reported are familiar to me too. But we don't need all of them actually. And for as much as I know until now everyone had chosen to work alone on His personal mod. What I suggest is that we cooperate to have more people brainstorming the problems. I'm pretty sure many of the problems can be worked with a group of people. I have some talents, some people have others. If we join, we can actually. We will need People to organize in a certain way the data, we will need people to collect and organize and names images to have visual varieties and we will need people capable of joining the tiles and solving the puzzle.
Everyone who has ever tried writing down a mod has to spend hours finding the resources to finish the mod he was working on on (for him) boring works). So maybe a genius in writing down AI scripts just had to waste his time and energies on doing other stuff... An I wrong?

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Speaking for myself, I would much rather play a game that has less depth but works, than to play one that has lots of depth but might not work. . . I'm just saying.

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Domed figures are in the PlanetSize.txt data file; I'm not sure there is any way to link them to either physical type or atmosphere type. . . A question I would like answered, though, is: can you really add new sizes? I was reading on the wiki earlier, and it says the only sizes allowed are "Asteroids, Tiny, Small, Medium, Large, Huge". . . Is this correct? Or could one add a 'Titanic' size? Or a 'Micro' size? Knowing that for sure will answer for me how versatile such modding can be. . .

PlanetSize.txt file has maximum space pot data for both domed and undomed objects. We will simply replace the way the game work with asteroids treating them as planets with no atmosphere. The game allow to do that. Then we will lower to 0 the creation of normal asteroids. So we will have a certain number of asteroids that can actually be inhabited.
That is the part I'm working right now, both trying to write down and organizing in a good way the data as they should be. The size is easily written. Naturally I will have to go down the numbers to get all balanced after all is reorganized, the facility cargo and space ratio, with the population. Also the outpost, the spacecolonies will be treated as planets (Artificial planets where already included in the possibilities. I have to check if you can build a planet in empty space from nowhere. But I suppose we can since there's already a script that allow you to replace a planet with asteroids and asteroids with a planet, so we will need to give that possibility also to a components and all should work fine.

* * Please notice. For the sake of the game, outposts, spacecolonies and colonies, even if they can have a military presence on them, are treated as planets because they are primarily for civilian purpose.

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BTW. . . NASA's budget isn't even big enough to build and send another Apollo mission. I'm not sure I understand what you're saying about "allow people to know what planets they can colonize" - that kind of sounds like you are saying the system doesn't need to work, it just needs to tell players what to do or not do, and rely on the player to follow 'honorary' rules. . .?

Actually, allow players to follow honor rules doesn't work (Unless you play with certain people. The NASA mission was what we call a "Constructio Ad Absurdum".
I meant that Nothing forbids nasa to send right now people on the moon again if they find the money and if they want to. Or on Mars. But since we don't have the technology needed to keep them alive forever and establish a colony, they would probably die after a while...
So my idea for now is: "Ok. you have rock colonization tech and in the game you can colonize all rock words. Good. Now you send the colonizer and you find a rock planet with a dome. Good. But the planet has a classification 5 1 4 (means for now 5 level Radiation which is High Level Radiation, 1 Level Temperature which means near Zero Temperature ans 4 Level Gravity Which means Average Gravity) and another atmosphere (or no atmosphere).
You're playing as Humans, oxigens, With a home initial Planet 4 4 4.
So no problem for the gravity. You already knows this tech. But you don't know High Radiation Shielding or Near Zero Temperature Insulation.
And in the dome you are supposed to build The components to keep the population alive.
You can't, this will means bye bye population and death planet.

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Hmm, when I went to school, there were only 3 states of matter. . . I remember folks talking about wanting to call plasma a 4th state, but since plasma is really just ionized gas, everybody else said "what would be the point?"

Plasma acts differently, as physicist discovered, so differently that they are calling it another matter state. Remember that we live in contact of only 3 state matters so it's really difficult to see and imagine all the others. But we need a game that can allow also a bit of imagination and creativity: So if you search for the Level 7 tech on Temperature, able to sustain Near Plasma Temp, maybe you can use it to hide a Probe satellite near the sun, where enemy ship can't go... Or hide a listening post in a Death Radiation Level nebulae Cloud. Some of the ideas I was thinking... Still early but promising

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Liquid planet? I had thought of the idea - as a way to have 'ocean worlds' that wouldn't immediately allow Rock races to establish colonies on them. . . But, it's hard to imagine a real planet hat would have no land at all. . . The closest thing in our solar system would be either a Kuiper belt object composed mostly of water(albeit in the form of ice), or the gas giants with their mantles of liquid metallic hydrogen. . . On ST:VOY, there was a free floating ocean, of course. . . But really, any race that can colonize another terrestrial planet could probably colonize one with water(or another liquid) covering its surface. . .

Actually Liquid Words Aren't just ocean words. They literally are made of Liquid and no solid surfaces on the planet. An Ice word is a solid word. An ocean word is just a word with no continents, but still allow people to colonize little islands and then build, so they can be colonized if you have the equipment. You know, Colonizing a word with water is not a big problem. If you send a Floating dome that can withstand corrosion. But the water can be different, acid or even liquid metal (There's an Hypotesys on that) Not talking of a lava planet here, talking on a really liquid boiling metal. Oceans on venus are acid made. What id the hole planet if covered with them? You would have to study a tech to allow the dome to withstand the situation: Every word is different. Every planet is different...

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As for the techs to colonize different atmospheres/gravs/temps/rad-levels, they simply aren't needed. . . If you have a Rock Colony Module, the game will let you colonize any Rock Planet, regardless of the planet's other characteristics. . . And yes, you could make a lot of extra components required to build a colony ship, but that won't; a) stop the player from putting the colony module on another ship type(unless you add to every one of them that they can't have a colony comp), or b) stop the game from letting the Rock/Oxy/LowTemp/LowGrav/LowRad equiped Colonizer from colonizing ANY Rock planet - thus negating the need for the player to research anything but one set of your required comps.

I believe I already answered to that

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The system you're purposing sounds interesting for anyone who wants a much greater depth of game play. . . But, it also seems too complicated to actually try to do. . . It sounds like you are making more work for yourself than is reasonable. . . But, don't let me discourage you from the attempt, if you've got your heart set on it!

I think everything news seems complicated. I think it will not be easy. But I also think that you would find it interesting on playing it. And much more challenging. Yes, I like also the original Version of Space empires V, but... That's a big but. If every time You play it gets different, that would be a big + on the game. I wouldn't get tired on playing a game like that.
It would be more challenging but also more interesting.

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I've had my own ideas for tons of complicated micro-management stuff, that I'd probably like. . . But, apparently, most of the players of the Balance Mod(one of the most popular of all) think that even Emergency Propulsion comps in the stock game are "micromanagement hell". . . Go figure! Laughing

Balance mod focus on Balancing stuff already in it. We must focus on adding all the stuff we can in the game, adding weapon damage types, even some theorized ones. After we have everything in place, they are welcome to rebalance all to have a better plays experience

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Another question I need answered: can you really build space habitats, or are they dependent on something weird - like the system must have 1 and only 1 star? Seems like I read that years ago, that SE5 treated all constructed planets like it does Ringworlds & Sphereworlds. . .?

I believe the system having just one stars was alredy solved. I played a mod with many double and triple systems. Must remember what mod. Maybe realistic mod. Which also doubled the size of sectors.

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Also, I spot another problem: there is no such thing as "special construction" in SE5. . . To the best of my knowledge, the game simply doesn't allow for such things. . . There are certain things, like facilities & units, you can build anywhere. . . And, any spaceyard facility/comp can build any ship/base. . . You can't restrict what can be built by what. . . I wish you could, it would open up a lot of mod possibilities, but alas. . .

Also this has already been solved on a mod I played. Anyway I plan to remove completely the Space Yards system with a different one but Still I don't know how. Unless people join very fast I will focus only on the Planet/size/Type/atmosphere types for now

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I'm pretty sure you can't have facilities/comps required to make a Dome habitable. . . It just is by default. In fact the 'Domed' feature of the game is nothing more than a built-in check to see if the planet atmosphere type matches the majority of the colony's race atmosphere type or not. . . What "living conditions" are you talking about? I'm pretty sure that even on planets that have 'deadly' conditions, the population doesn't die; they just reproduce more slowly. . . The only thing that kills population is attack by enemy ships, plagues and random events like earthquakes/comet strikes. . .

The reproduction is managed by a simple formula. If you modify it you can have the required effects.

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One more note: although the Gravity, Temperature and Radiation figures in no way effect anything in the game, it is off-putting to see a lovely oxygen planet that is supposed to be colder than dry ice. . . Or a tiny planet with crushing gravity. . . And, since these are random figures generated by a formula, you can probably add new formulas to vary the outcome. . . By assigning the low-grav formula to tiny & small planets, the high-grav to large & huge, etc., you can at least make that 'window-dressing' aspect of the game less of an eyesore! Very Happy

I'm studiing that right now. I found maybe even a way to add rad and temp in the game.

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I'd be interested to hear what you learn about the work-arounds you're looking for, but marhawkman and others will be much better at helping you there. . . However, if you get far enough to need other stuff, I might could help. . . I spent an awful lot of time over the past few years gathering pictures & models for possible use in future mod(s). . .

Well, that sounds interesting. Did you already ordered all the data gathered? Are they already formatted and rightly named in a way they can easily be checked and modified if needed? You are interested in modeling Only? Or would you like also to get your hands on the Ship construction Parts? The one in the game where you're allowed to add or remove components from a ship

Well. Naturally we would have to narrow down the addons and the ideas not only to what's beauftiful but also to what's doable. We must add diversity but keep the game playable. As I was saying to another player, We can't have too much manual micromanaging. Or else the game will just gets boring. For example, the facilities system can be modified by adding combo facilities. If one is a Real fanatic of redundancy, then It would be useful to add a Resupply/Spaceport/SpaceYars combo facility that you can add and then leave it to the Ministers to add and manage planets while you focus on the big picture.I was the pirates system some days ago from another mod. it's interesting. The workable idea is. If you produce A Police Patrol Station on A System and add components to it, As much components you add as much effects the station will have on the system to counterfight the piracy in that system. So you would not need to have a ships for all the systems to be managed but you will need just a station for each system. Same here for a trading outpost to improve production. Production is the way SEV measure economy in a certain way. So Outpost increase private economy allowing For more productions. Available omòy as special tech only to specific Government types obviously. They will be added as racial prerequisites with zero cost. In single play they will be dependant by personal Honesty while in Multiplayer there's always one that have to check every single player empire data and sees it adds up ...
I talked about the spaceyards system. Still thinking on it little, but Maybe ships should be allowed only on orbit as it should be. Facilities on the ground should probably speed up orbital constructions but not allow certain constructions. Am I wrong?

marhawkman · Space Emperor Joined: Mar 24, 2008

Planet sizes are different from, but related to, stellar object sizes. A small planet is a small stellar object, etc... but what of ringworlds and sphereworlds? Yeah, those are classed as Huge. So you could actually make a bunch of half-sizes that create a more fluid assortment of planet sizes. Thus instead of 5, 10, 15, 20, 25, you could make it (5, 7)tiny, (10, 13)small, (15, 18)medium, (20, 23)large, with 25 or larger as huge.

What does this have to do with domed figures? One thing I did in Asteroids mod was to give each of the constructed asteroid belts a special size not used elsewhere. These had higher domed figures than most planet sizes. But that's constructed stuff, and I'm not 100% sure you could get it to work properly with randomly generated planets. It comes down to whether the Systems file uses stellar object size or planet size when generating "any" size objects.

The constructed planets I made were all done using the function that creates ringworlds and sphere worlds. But someone else(Isopsyco?) managed to come up with a way to do it with scripts. The script version looks for specific sets of components that have no inherent uses and if all of them are present it changes a regular asteroid field into a habitable one. It might also destroy the ships used, not sure. It should be adaptable to make other things.

Also The Waters(the ball of water planet) was actually an artificial construct. In the ep they showed that without the forcefield holding it together it'd cease to exist.

Hmm... this reminds me, I was planning to tinker with the universe in Warp 10... well more than I have. This just gave me a few ideas. Very Happy

as for the rad/temp/grav thing... The game has stats for those, but I'm not sure if you can have the reproduction formula check them. that's outside my expertise.

Oh and I don't think that the game lets you set tech availability based on government type.

You have to let players build ships on ground. you can make it cheaper to build in space if you want, but players don't start with ships or starbases, and have to use planets to build them.

musashironinit · Space Emperor Joined: Nov 23, 2014

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Planet sizes are different from, but related to, stellar object sizes.

there are certain things I don't totally get from that statemen. I have to think on that.

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Also The Waters(the ball of water planet) was actually an artificial construct. In the ep they showed that without the forcefield holding it together it'd cease to exist.

Do you mean in real word? Actually it all depends on the gravity of the mass center, which is always solid. And, of course, on the liquid. Water is different from, for example, mercury. And mercury is liquid even in average temp. Or do you mean there's actually in the game a script that do that and forbid liquid planets? Anyway, remember I'm not trying to close the game to imagination. Anomalies should be present. I'm trying to give a different system ...

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Oh and I don't think that the game lets you set tech availability based on government type.

It already does, when you set up racial techs you can setup a very simple racial tech but use it as government tech. We already have temporal, crystalline and organic racial techs...

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You have to let players build ships on ground. you can make it cheaper to build in space if you want, but players don't start with ships or starbases, and have to use planets to build them.

I haven't given my mind to that problem yet so it's all in the "If you build it they will come" field. Let's just say that this will depend on what we can do in the future.

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The game has stats for those, but I'm not sure if you can have the reproduction formula check them. that's outside my expertise.

If the data are in the game, they can be checked as valors. We will see...

Skyburn · Space Emperor Joined: Mar 12, 2008

It's possible to use event scripts to have a dome only protect a certain number of population. SJ made that for GGmod. Whether that script can be changed to check for radiation, etc. will, as Marhawkman said, depend on whether you can check those stats in a script. I don't think you can; I don't see a function that lets you do so. You will have to make separate abilities with AI Tags, and they won't match the flavor text on each planet.

Modding by committee is not typically done. Not trying to discourage you, but I don't think you will find anyone do do part of your mod, Musashironinit.

marhawkman · Space Emperor Joined: Mar 24, 2008

DXM · Space Emperor Joined: Mar 20, 2012

musashironinit · Space Emperor Joined: Nov 23, 2014

But that's a racial trait and there is no way to actually prevent a player from having more than one of those, except to make them expensive. Which can be done. In Warp 10 mod, I made it so there are major traits and minor traits, with the minor traits costing between 5 and 30 points and major traits costing 1000.

I don't mind if people choose this racial trait in their single player Battles even if they have another government type.If they plan to cheat while they are alone at home, that's up to them. In multiplayer, there's a gaming host that check all the empire players data files before the game that can check if those files are right. So The problem does not exist.

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It's possible to use event scripts to have a dome only protect a certain number of population. SJ made that for GGmod. Whether that script can be changed to check for radiation, etc. will, as Marhawkman said, depend on whether you can check those stats in a script. I don't think you can; I don't see a function that lets you do so. You will have to make separate abilities with AI Tags, and they won't match the flavor text on each planet.
Modding by committee is not typically done. Not trying to discourage you, but I don't think you will find anyone do do part of your mod, Musashironinit.

That is something that deserve a separate answer...

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So, for clarification. . . PlanetSize.txt controls the Domed & non-Domed Max Values of planets, correct? And are you saying that I can add new planet entries here, so long as my new entries use one of the existing "Stellar Size" values? Like, I could have "Micro" planets that have "Tiny" as the Stellar Size, or "Titanic" with "Huge" Stellar Size?
Do "Constructed" planets require a "Special Ability ID"?
If you have 'naturally occurring' artificial planets, could you make a script that if they are destroyed they turn into wreckage instead of asteroids? And if 'planet creators' are used on wreckage, they make a random 'artificial' planet?

I believe you got the point. .txt scripts are there to be modified. What I'm checking now is that if they are modified if they works in the right way oy if there are part of the game that need to interact with them in a non known way.

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@musashironinit: Sounds like you want way more complicated Colonization, and more simplistic facilities. . . I'm afraid my desires lie in the opposite direction.

This you got completely wrong. It's not a question about complicate and simplify. The question is to simplify Things you do the same way 1000000 times and get different managing things to do. Try to get this straight. I'm happy to design a new ship. Imagine that you are obliged to do a design ship every time you build one. Would you like it? To do the same identical design when you want to build 10 scout ship in a row? You should have the possibility, for certain constructions, to have them built fast. Also, this came in handy when checking in the scrap facility window (that is a very uneasy window) for what is built on a certain planet and what is not. Too many lines in there, especially if you have troops on the planet.

marhawkman · Space Emperor Joined: Mar 24, 2008

BlueTemplar · Space Emperor Joined: Mar 27, 2007

Original Steam discussion here :
http://steamcommunity.com/app/1690/discussions/0/617320168100878139/

musashironinit · Space Emperor Joined: Nov 23, 2014

Sry guys. I have been rather busy: next week I'm gonna finish the Planet script.