Modding my way through...

[Zogu]

Hi! I started looking at the ressources and started imagining a good mod. But I don't know what the possibilities are. INI files are nice, but at the same time they offer only limited possibilities. Is it possible to create new objects that have their own special behavior, and not only "useless" objects or copycats?

Also, I was wondering if it is possible to create a mod with Garthan ships, for instance (instead of human ships). I was studying the possibility of creating a mod named "Garthan Quest", in which a Garthan Carrier must find "lost" fighters and build a small fleet.

Any good reference/guide on WW:SAIS modding?

Thanks.

[Puke]

im confident that both of those can be done, though the first depends on what you mean by copycat.

as im sure you know, creative modding involves taking a game feature and bending it in a way that it wasnt designed for. technically, this is copycatery.

there is a detailed list of what features are available to you, in a text file in each directory. for instance, you could have an event that:

- adds an item to your hold
- takes an item from your hold
- destroys a ship component
- adds a ship to your fleet

im sure there are more, but those are just the ones that i can think of encountering in the game, off the top of my head.

wither an event does one of those things can be contingent upon:

- wither you have a specific item in your hold
- wither you have any iterm with a specific variable
- wither you are frendily or hostile with a specific race

and a ton of other things (i peeked at the file).

so the diplomacy model could be expanded upon with racial rivalries. you could make it so that befriending one race angers another. or make it such that you need to make peace with a race before engaging on a quest, or visiting some planet. or you could need to find a key before opening the stasis cone.

I have no idea how to insert quests like Primordious or the Kawangi, but your Garthan Quest is imminently do-able. When I was dorking around with the demo, I was changing the starting ship type to various things to see what different ship hulls were like, and what their default equipment was.

Those Derilects are pretty cool, although they've got no cargo room and no speed. Heck, I think one of them is even missing engines. In fact, many of the ships have little or no cargo. But REGARDLESS of that, what you ask is simple. Change the starting ship to a Garthan Light Carrier, and write a new briefing for it. then seed a bunch of random events that are like the existing "Found lost pilot" type events, but make them Garthan pilots and Garthan fighters. Since only one event of each type can spawn, be sure to make multiple copies of the event (maybe with differently named fighters).

scoreing will be an issue, so you will want to reballance the scoreing system. Mabe use the Military Mission as a template, and increase the points for fleet size. I cant imagine Garthans hireing space mercinaries or rescuing alien pilots, so either get rid of those events, or change them to combat encounters where you fight the mercinary. That way the only points you get for fleet size, will come from the pilots you rescued.

Since you will be reducing the number of alien races by 1, you may want to mod in a randomly spawned human race, with some ships of their own scattered about. should probably upgrade the basic systems on the military and NPC ships, otherwise they might be a bit of pushovers.

[Shadowcat]

Do you have the original SAIS? If so then check out Exaar's "The Urluquai Crusade" as an example of what could be done, even with the older less-moddable game, to create a mod where you work for the 'bad guys'.

[Shadowcat]

p.s. Guides to Weird Worlds modding

[Zogu]

thanks all for your answers!

by the way, is it possible to "glue" some of the ship systems in place, so that the player cannot remove or replace them? could be interesting in some mods. for instance, you find a ship with very powerful weapons but terrible shields... but you can't replace its systems, so that you have to use it intelligently.

about my question on quests: yes, i was wondering if some kind of an API or scripting language is available for building complicated objects, or objects with "new" behaviors? i have a few ideas...

and one last comment... i was reviewing ships from good old games like "Star Control II". i wonder if it would be possible to implement some of the propulsion systems. for instance, short distance "constant beam" weapons, ships flying in reverse, or ships reacting to firing ammo by recoiling...

oh and by the way, it would be very cool to increase the inertia effects in WW. and to add one major planetary body in the combat screen (to add gravitation effects)... it would justify the creation of an "inertia dampener" ship system... and maybe add "turn rate" and "inertia" as thruster's characteristics (additional to raw speed)...

maybe add asteroids (in small amounts, or in very large amounts) in combat screens, so that ships have to care about mid-space collisions... or use them to hide if they have defensive lasers, a "ram dodge shield" (haha), or very hardy metal plates...

just my daily bunch of not-so-original ideas...

[Zogu]

I just started programming my first WW mod. This is gonna be SO FUN. Prepare to be surprised... by the possibilities!

[Fingers]

You can add a "structural" flag to ship systems to prevent them from being uninstalled. The main weapons of the starship D....... (which you may have found) work this way.

The ship movements are pretty basic, and can't be modified besides changing the turn rate and speed. This might be expanded in the future to add some interaction between ship motion and weapons (such as weapons that throw a ship into a spin, maybe a recoil like you said). The 1.1 patch concentrates on bug fixes but we may well add new features and content in later updates.

The areas of the game with the most freedom in terms of modding are quests and weapons. Both of these systems are also pretty complicated and I haven't had the time to document them very well.

[Zogu]

Thanks for all these very useful insights!

For the ship systems, I'd like to see some additional flexibility:
1. thrusters should have a turn rate modifier (which adds to the ship's default turn rate)
2. shields could distinguish between beam (radiation), projectile (concussion) and missile (explosion)
3. I'd insist with the gravitation effects, which could add a lot of depth in combat

But of course... I know you must be overwhelmed with work and have a 2 miles long "to-do list" already!!!



Right now I'm experimenting with very specific mods and up to now, it's been a breeze. Cheers for the mod system!