New Faction Colors Possible?

[Swizzle]

Is there a way to change faction colors in a custom faction? I tried to change the colors in the pcx files of the faction and all of the custom factions ended up a blue gray. I want to be able to distinguish the new factions but I need to know how to change their color first!

[Jasonian]

Try messing with the numbers near the bottom of system.txt

[Greg Foertsch FIRAXIS]

Swizzle,
In SMAC this was done programaticly, but in SMACX we made this much easier to change. So if you have SMACX you are in luck. There should be 4 color boxes at the bottom left of the faction page (I believe that it is page 1). You can change them easily in any basic paint program by picking other colors from the 256 color pallete and filling those boxes.

Greg Foertsch
Lead Artist SMACX
FIRAXIS GAMES

[Travathian]

Do you mean in the faction editor?

So I can make Yang into the frilly pink color like I always wanted to?

[Greg Foertsch FIRAXIS]

No, you can just open it in any paint program such as MSPaint. Open say, Gaians.pcx and fill in the apropriate boxes with colors from the palette. In SMACX we retro fit the original 7 factions so that they would work this way too. So if you have SMACX you can go into that hive.pcx and make yang's colors pink without using the faction editor.

Greg Foertsch
Lead Artist SMACX
FIRAXIS GAMES

[Travathian]

Any other changes from SMAC to SMACX you might enlighten us concerning creating mods and graphics/sounds.

[RGE]

In SMAC I could alter the faction colours by editing the palette.pcx file, but one colour still eludes me - the border colour for the bases on the world map, which seems to be the same colour as the symbols in the unit flags. For Spartans this colour is light-beige, and for everyone else it's black.

I would really like the Spartans to have black as well, because on the world map those light-beige 'borders' show more than the actual faction colour, and it looks really bad when not all of the sides are equipped with these borders (which happens on maps that are larger than "small"). Naturally I would have to switch the faction colour of the Spartans, and I figure something bronze-like would do well. Is there a way to change this colour in SMAC? Or would I have to alter the main palette to use black instead of that light-beige colour? Assuming that colour isn't being used for anything else.

[Cybergod]

Thank you for visiting this forum Greg Foertsch! I didn't realise that Firaxis still cared...

But what do you do about SMAC? I do not have AX. Do you just change pallete.pcx or is there something else?

Also - this is one huge problem for me when creating SMAC custom factions - whenever I make a substitute faction for the Spartans, that is inserting a completely new custom faction (with its own graphics etc), their colour on the map is completely black! I cannot distinguish their base size (the number is blaked out unless there is no unit in the base) nor see their bases on the minimap because they are so dark (unless they are on a high elevation). How do you fix this?

[SMIFFGIG]

Thank you for visiting this forum Greg Foertsch! I didn't realise that Firaxis still cared...

No! Cybergod Firaxis dont still care, Greg Foertsch's post was over 2 years ago and that was his last
Try checking the dates of posts in future

[gwillybj]

Yes: For SMAC it's in PALETTE.PCX

Cybergod asked:

But what do you do about SMAC? I do not have AX. Do you just change pallete.pcx or is there something else?

Also - this is one huge problem for me when creating SMAC custom factions - whenever I make a substitute faction for the Spartans... How do you fix this?

First, I have never, ever been able to edit the SMAC .pcx files successfully with MSPaint. If anyone else has, I salute you (and would you mind telling me how?). After trying several other programs, unsuccessfully, I now use Paint Shop Pro, and have a .pal file (palette.pal) which I created from the original palette.pcx before ever changing anything.

To be able to freely interchange factions in the Spartan's position, I changed some of the entries in the Player Colors chart in the upper right corner of PALETTE.PCX as noted below.

The colors in that chart, from top to bottom, are:
1) first is the flag,
2) second is the flag's trim and the text inside,
3) third is the base text on the main map,
4) fourth I've not been able to identify,
5) fifth (bottom) is the boundary lines on the main map. This color is filtered to the value in #BOUNDARYPERCENTS at the end of SYSTEM.TXT (see below).

For the Spartans (top to bottom): 055, 069, 065, 055, 055.
055 is black. 069 is dark grey. 065 is medium grey.
The flags are now dark grey with black markings. The borders are very slightly lighter than the original. The base text is the medium grey.
My vision is failing irreparably, and I could barely see the original border color against the terrain.

I changed the Peacekeepers from that odd greyish-bluish-purple to a darker, richer purple (to distinguish better from Hive Blue and University White): 251, 055, 243, 055, 243.
251 is the full purple. 243 is the bright pink.
The flags are now purple with black markings. The borders are the filtered pink. The base text is pink, which tends to glow a little, so I'm thinking of changing it, but I haven't settled on a color yet (the full purple is too dark).

I did edit SYSTEM.TXT slightly. Be extremely careful with SYSTEM.TXT! Do not delete any lines! I looked it over very carefully before I made the changes, and, IMVHO, recommend not changing anything except these two sections, and then only if really necessary. If the file does not have exactly the correct number of lines, the program will not run properly, if at all!

#VEHICLECOLORING
95, ALIEN RED--NOT REALLY USED.
142, GAIAN GREEN
250, LABYRINTH BLUE
62, ARCHON WHITE
241, MORGAN YELLOW
70, SPARTAN BLACK
219, CONCLAVIST ORANGE
251, KEEPER PURPLE

(Keeper Purple was 227)

and

#BOUNDARYPERCENTS
0, ALIEN PLAYER...NOT USED
50, GAIAN GREEN
60, LABYRINTH BLUE
50, ARCHON WHITE
50, MORGAN YELLOW
60, SPARTAN BLACK
50, CONCLAVIST ORANGE
50, KEEPER PURPLE

(Keeper Purple was 70)
(Notice the old faction names: Labyrinth, Archon, Conclavist? Don't change them!)

You can go completely psychedelic for all the factions if you want to
Be sure to keep a copy of the original PALETTE.PCX, just in case things get too weird