Using the option of running...

[Keeblerdawg89]

OK... So that might not be possible, but I still think it would be neat to add the options of starting on a small planet ("PlanSize -= 1" for say), Average ("PlanSize +=0" or still size 6), Large ("PlanSize +=1" maybe size 7), and Huge ("PlanSize +=2" or size 8).... I've created some amount of stuff within the Racemodifiers.txt and wsRaceDesc.txt ("commented" out in whatever way needed) as I try to find all the tags that would need to be delt with.... The only one I don't remember seeing anywhere is the one that says what the starting planet size is, so maybe that's hard-coded for ALL of them as you said....

Now... What I did for starting mineral richness by trying to add that "Very Rich" choice actually works as far as getting the choice to do what it's supposed to do... But, the description area I described in my last post won't "connect" right, as well as the description in the center which would read "Very Rich" next to a radio button... (forgot to mention that before...) But, chosing that still did it's job... What I did to the swRaceDesc.txt was try to add "\*VRich Very Rich" and "\*RPLANEMV Sets your ...." for the description lines... Then I added the collumn in racemodifiers.txt with the ColumnHeadingsStart=Very Rich , kUnicode=VRich , and the kUnicodD=RPLANEMV with appropriate values for point costs for each race below that like the other collumns.... So... Everything looks right, but I'm still missing something somewhere and have no idea where to look at this point... I figure that if I can get this right, there's a lot more I could do with it...

The next thing to figure out after that is adding totally new techs to what's in the game... Such as not seeing stargates (from MOO2) in it for some reason, or wanting to add a warp interdictor (also from MOO2) just to name a couple of my ideas.... Also... The game can be pretty long, so why have the techs stop at level 50?? Why not see about creating new logical advances that go up to 60 or 70?? ...and I'm not talking about changing the levels of what's already there, either....

These are the kinds of things I've been thinking about, including new tech ideas that I haven't even mentioned, yet....

I'm actually beginning to give the idea of giving up on this whole modding adventure and just play this thing "as is" as long as I don't screw it up in such a way that it quits running...... But I could always re-install it if I do and don't know what I did wrong....

Ever hear of Space Empires 4?? That's a game you could easily do all the kinds of things I'd like to do in MOO3 if it will cooperate with me... It's just that it's a different game, is all.... and I like a challenge such as this is proving to be....

Anyway... Now I'll go back to waiting for some more responses and seeing if I can find what's eluding me...

[ChristopherC]

Keeblerdawg89, many thanks for your recommendation. Interesting if rather finicky possible solution to a MOO3 game crash. I will study it.

999 out of a thousand I have found MS forgiving but there is always that thousandth time!

Live long and prosper!

[ChristopherC]

PS - Space Empires IV

Keeblerdawg89,

I would love to walk into a shop in the UK and buy Space Empires IV but it is only available on the Internet, and from all I have read, I am darned if I will risk buy anything on the Internet! And that is even though I have, of course, anti-viral and Firewall protection.

It is really annoying for us over here in the UK when you cant get a game in a shop. For instance, apparently, GalCiv was available in the shops but the GalCiv enhancement can only now be bought on the Internet! Grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr!

Live long and prosper.

[Anguille2]

GalCiv.

You have to download the patches from internet. However you can order the Expansion (Altarian Prophecy) on a cd-rom. !!!!you need the patch 1.2 to run the expansion (i still have do dl it)

[Keeblerdawg89]

OK.... I don't know what I did with getting the descriptions to work right with what I was doing at the time, but it may have been as little as moving the strings around in different locations within the file... Who knows... (*grumbles at the over-picky file structure*) I tried to add more of my own options to exsiting ones in order to simply have a choice or so extra within what's already there, such as making a higher starting bio-diversity level, but failed... So, racemodifiers will have to take a back seat for a while... I'll revisit that mess later...

Next thing, adding techs to the mix... It seems that the only 2 files I need to mess with are TechTables.txt and wsTechnology.txt... I started with trying to add a larger hull size and a larger facility to be able to make it (setting their levels to 1 for testing purposes). I got it up to a point where I could start a new game and see them both in the tech screen matrix. Then, when I played for just long enough for the research to complete both of them (probably mostly the facility), I got a blue screen with game termination. This termination was bad enough that I could terminate the rest of the programs I had running, but a reboot would fail with another blue screen and MOO3 wouldn't run again unless I reboot first. Considering that I modelled the strings within these 2 files needed to make this tech (of course, with name changes where needed), I see no reason why this shouldn't work... Is there anything I might be missing?? Oh yeah... The hull size seemed to work just fine... I was able to go to the ship design screen and look at it...

BTW... If I can get these to work, I'll create files that anyone should be able to splice into the end of their existing files (so they don't lose any of their existing mods) so they can have fun with them, too...

Also, I would like to find a way to get a listing of attribute codes and what they do, such as BioHaEff+=2 means that you get a +2 bonus to bioharvesting.

Ever-looking for ideas............

[bakalov]

For the attribute codes - I saw such list somewhere in the 1.25 patch - someone from QS tried to make such list, but not all of the attributes were described. I think it was somewhere in the spreadsheets. Probably much of the attributes are not used in the game code so it is worthless to modify them .... I think we'll never know everything.

[Keeblerdawg89]

Found that list... modifiers.txt in spreadsheets.mob...

Any ideas for adding techs?? It occured to me today that the reason why the game crashed while testing that largest ship size and shipyard expansion with a tech level setting of 1 probably did it... Er... The tech level setting, anyway... If that's not the case, my second thought on that is maybe only a certain number of technologies is allowed in the game with the way the rest of it was designed... If it's not that, then I'm missing something and have no idea what it is or where to find it... That's what I need some help confirming... Like I said before, I have lots of tech ideas I'd like to add and would be willing to share them with everyone if I can get them to work....

[Vince278]

Originally posted by bakalov
And of course, you are right about MOO3 and the 4X Space strategy genre. I hope we'll live long enough to see something really good ;-)

Have you tried Space Empires IV Gold?

[Keeblerdawg89]

I got SE4 (non-gold), so not yet on the gold version.... When I most wanted to get it, money was too tight for me to even thinking about getting anything new or updated... Now, I haven't tried looking for it, yet, but do feel that SE4 (non-gold) would be quite an improvement for the better modding at the very least... I've done quite a few tricks with my older version, and even know how to get some mods claimed to only work on the gold version to work on this one, although I haven't spent any of the time needed to completed them.

But, anyway.... I'm beginning to see that with the current version of MOO3, and the way it's files work, I'm finding it a bit on the impossible side to do the things I'd like to do... Most importantly of the things I want to do is to add new techs... I'm not talking about any kind of replacements of what's there, but to really add them... So far, every attempt to add even one new tech instead of either changing one or replacing it (so that the total number of techs in the game doesn't change) has made the game crash in most horrible ways within a few turns of game start or by a certain number of turns after researching it (keeping in mind that I'm setting the tech level of them while testing at level 1 or 2 so I can get to them faster).

So... I'm planning on starting a new thread to specifically focus on modding, and not to be like that similar thread that's a Q/A list with answers already there... I want this string to be such that someone like me can put out a question and hope someone knowing will give an answer... Such questions as, I can create a set of options for while starting a new game and going to the customize screen which will work except that the text descriptions from the related ws(...).txt file won't line up and work...

BTW... I like how you can mod SE4 to do ANYTHING you feel like!! You don't even have to match up every single file or picture precisely in order to get it to run right... It uses default files and setting for anything missing... Why can't MOO3 be that easy??? People are going to mod it anyway, so why make the programming so, um, anal?? By doing that kind of thing, and really aiming for a way to do the programming such that only other programmers or even the game's designers can do stuff with it, you're taking out some of the fun...... I'll put it this way... If you're playing a game that you know will top out at, say, level 50 over and over with no chance to change it to level 70 by adding stuff not already in the game; and that you've played it often enough that you know the tech trees like the back of your hand, then wouldn't it start to get boring?? Sure, you could change your race options up a bit and see how you do, but nobody likes creating losing races (or at least I don't). Also, I would've liked to be able to keep all of the existing techs right where they are while adding new ideas instead of having to delete something in order to add something else. That's self-defeating! I could go on and on about the tech tree stuff, but I'll end it here and plan on how to start that new thread in a couple days.... Yeah... I feel like I mostly waisted many hours trying to make MOO3 add just 1 new tech and watching it crash over and over because it can't handle more than whatever number of techs it has now....