Major Stress Major Stress

[MOD WIP] Star Trek: Sacrifice of Angels 2 (updated 01/10/09)

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[MOD WIP] Star Trek: Sacrifice of Angels 2 (updated 01/10/09)

from Sins Forums

Featured (by a small mention) in the October edition of PC Gamer magazine

Candidate for Mod Database's 2008 Mod of the Year

This is the OLD "Work in Progress" thread for the Star Trek: Sacrifice of Angels 2 mod.

The new WIP topic is here https://forums.sinsofasolarempire.com/342747

The "Release" topic can be found here https://forums.sinsofasolarempire.com/322473


The mod is intended to be a hommage, and tribute to the original Sacrifice of Angels mod for Homeworld. It will use many of the same models, and effects created for that mod by the Trekmods team. Like the original SoA mod SoA2 is set during the Dominion War era of Star Trek. Using both canon, and non-canon units to recreate those battles with Sins "empire building" mechanic added. Like in SoA you can fight battles in SoA2 using hundreds of starships. Sometimes thousands if your computer can handle it ;)

While the mod was not intended as a "Total Conversion". That is exactly what it is winding up being. There is much about the Sins engine, and mechanics that we still need to learn. There are some hard coded stumbling blocks we have to overcome.

The factions will be the Federation, Klingons, Romulan, and the Dominion (with Breen, and Cardassian ally units). The main factions seen in the Dominion War. With a "Surprise" as the Pirate faction.

Factions like the Borg "may" be added in the future. LokiGodofMischief is working on a very good 3rd party Borg add on for SoA 2. It is very possible his add on may be merged with SoA 2 at a much later time.

The current version of SoA 2 is  0.03b   "The Second Dominion War". Look for it here  https://forums.sinsofasolarempire.com/322473

0.03b only works with Sins versions 1.1, 1.11, and 1.12.

All previous versions of SoA 2 are obsolete, and will not be supported, or hosted anymore. All older version downloads will be removed.

We will NOT port SoA 2 over to Entrenchment until after Entrenchment is out of beta, and released. Along with proper forge tool updates.

I am working on the models mostly ALONE so it may take a while for any new ship model updates.

Darkshimmer is the Balancing guru, Code monkey, and Master at arms. We do have other contributers, and the best 3rd party work from the finest artists in the trek mod community to help make SoA 2 the best it can be.

Status of Demo 0.04  "The actors are in place" 

Will update when i have news.

General Changes:

Manshooters Volumetric Explosions mod will be included as of 0.03a

May include Sins Plus (planets), but ill need to see how much that mod needs changing to incorporate into SoA 2.

SoA 2 0.03 and above is now patch 1.1, and better compatable. Sins patches 1.11, and 1.12 only address balancing, and online exploits, and have no effect on the mod.

Ships will have some anti stike craft weaponry.

Ships are still being added and balanced accordingly.

More re-balancing so that one faction is not overpowered over the other.

The Federation:

Faction is complete. Only structures left

The Klingon Empire

Faction is complete. Only structures left.

The Romulan Star Empire:

Faction is complete. Only structures left

The Dominion:

Faction is complete. Still needs balancing work.

Pirates:

They were going to be the Borg, but that idea failed. So we are looking into Random multirace ship spawns.

Planetary Defenders

Basically "Ships of the week" like the Maquis, Sona, Ferrengi, Tammarian battle cruisers and the like.

Balancing:  Darkshimmer has the Federation, Romulan, and Klingon Empire, and Unified Dominion balanced.

Gameplay: We now have a working Cloaking Device! Check the ModDB page for the WIP video. Cloaking will not be fully implemented in the mod until version 0.04

Art: We are working on an LCARS style UI, adding proper icons, and pictures for all of the new units. The UI is going to take a while to do, because of all of the redundancy of the Sins UI. SoA 2 uses 2 sets of UI textures. Instead of the standard 4 textures for buttons, and 2 textures for icons. SoA 2 uses 8 textures for buttons, and 4 textures for icons which IMO is a major waste of resources, because sins loads all these textures at startup. Unfortunetly i dont see any other way to do it. What is kind of cool is that we dont have to use the same HUD for each faction. It is possible to have unique HUDs, but again the perfomance hit, because of the extra drain on resources could be big, and not worth it.

In Planning: (No promises, or guarentees, but we will try to add these if possible.)

Troop Transport effects.

Planetary invasion animations

Tractor beams. (need a code monkey for this)

Whatever else we can think of and are capable of doing.

Future Updates:

SoA 2 0.04 is now in planning, and will be focused primarily on Proper research trees, Ability's, and adding proper Structures. More than likely demo 0.04 will be the last demo. After that then the full mod should be ready.

SoA 2 0.05 will be the final spit, and polish of the mod. It will focus mainly on re-balancing if needed. Also final artwork changes will be made here. Which will include some ship model re-builds, and re-texturing.

The Full SoA 2 1.0 mod will be released "When it is Finished". We are doing this on our own free time. We aren't getting paid to do this. We have no set schedule. We have no time limit. I want this one to be good. So it wont go online until we feel it is ready.

*NOTE: Much about Sins as we are all now realizing is hardcoded. SoA 2 is going to be far from a perfect "trek" mod due to these hardcoded issues. However we will try to do the best we can with workarounds, and compromises to get it as close as possible. Like i said some things wont be perfect. Some things cannot be done at all. Enjoy the mod for what it is, and try not to be too "nit picky".

SoA2 will be hosted on Mod Database once it is ready http://www.moddb.com/mods/star-trek-sacrifice-of-angels-2

This main header will be updated when i have news to post.





modding
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Reply #676 from Sins Forums Top
Really looking forward to your first release! I think the concept of hero units sounds good but you may run into the same issue of lots of federation material and not much for the other races.

I think the concept of using the hull of one ship, or mixing it up may be more of a way you can maximize the none canon ships. I think if it is non-canon then relate it to the other ship directly. In other-words maybe add non canon elements to canon hulls etc?

Great work!
Reply #677 from Sins Forums Top
I deffinitly like the idea of have the same ships surving different perposes. My only concern would be recognizing them as different when playing. I wouldnt wanna select a carrier thinking its a heavy cruiser and accidentally get it blown to bits. In general though i think its a GREAT idea. However, i think the galaxy class is best left as strictly a capital. Since the Fed has way to many ships i think as many as possible should be used. But with the other factions making different versions of a ship is probably about the best idea possible for this mod.
Elemental: Reforged
Reply #678 from Sins Forums Top
Oh and BTW. Birth of the Federation would be an EXCELENT resoures. I bought it back when if first came out. And recently torrented it again to play it some more. Its easily available if you search isohunt. If start a game with a specific faction, then left click and go to the science screen, then select the data base button. It will have a place that lists ALL the ships that that faction can get with shilds and armorment details. I can check when i get home just wich classes each faction has and post them incase its worth your time. Porbably wont be, cause you probably already know all the ships that would be in it but... for the record i can go snooping.
Reply #679 from Sins Forums Top
Why can't you ask for help Major Stress? I think alot of epople are willing to help you skin and code!
Reply #681 from Sins Forums Top
The canon Federation ships that are in Deep Space Nine are the Excelsior, Galaxy, Defiant, Miranda, Steamrunner, Nebula, Akira, Intrepid, Centuar, Danube and Peragrine.
Reply #682 from Sins Forums Top
Great Job Man!  :CONGRAT: 

I like the idea of multiple roles for one ship, but I wouldnt do that with the Fed.'s cause they have plenty of diff. ship designs and classes. But it certainly soubnds like somthing a smaller empire would do like the cardies.

As for canon/non-canon ships, well it depends... I have plenty of books and materials that would have placed the Sovie in the dominion war line up, as well as that being implyed in Nemesis and Insurrection that the Enterprize E was a combatant in the war, though you never saw any Sovies in DS9. Or the Valdore for the Rommies which didnt make any apperances as far as I know, but was obviously in active service. It must have had to do with what the show could afford to place into the scenes. So I think its all how you look at it. Personally I would put in any ship class that was active during the war, regardless of whether or not it made it into the shows CG scenes. Just my opinion though...

Adm Cobbs
Reply #683 from Sins Forums Top
The canon Federation ships that are in Deep Space Nine are the Excelsior, Galaxy, Defiant, Miranda, Steamrunner, Nebula, Akira, Intrepid, Centuar, Danube and Peragrine.
End of quote


You forgot about the Excelsior II (Lakota refit), Sabre, and Curry/Shelly. There were some other frankenstien fleet ships too, but i dont remember which ones right off hand.

I am focusing only on what was seen in the major battles. All of the mentioned above except for the Intrepid were seen in a key battle. Including the Excelsior II (Lakota vs Defiant).

The Intrepid wasnt seen in the show as far as i know except for maybe a pre-war early episode, and it most certainly did not participate in any of the key battles during the war. If it did i would include it in the Dominion War release. The Sovereign, and Ambassador fall under the "not seen" category too. Which is a major disappointment to me, because i spent many hours on both of those ships. Fear not all of the ommited ships will make it in eventually in a future update.

We could make the argument that just because we didnt see a certain ship class doesnt mean it didnt fight. That may be true. Im sure what few Sovereign's, Ambassador's, and Intrepid's that existed at the time were guarding key worlds from Dominion attack, and could not be spared for the battles for DS-9, Chin'toka, and Cardassia Prime. If any of them did the loss would have been catastrophic once they encountered the Breen.

Just because your favorite ship didnt make the release does not mean it wont eventually show up in the future ;)

Reply #684 from Sins Forums Top
The Intrepid wasnt seen in the show as far as i know except for maybe a pre-war early episode, and it most certainly did not participate in any of the key battles during the war.
End of quote


The only Deep Space Nine episode the Intrepid was seen in was episode 7X16 "Inter Arma Enim Silent Leges".
Reply #685 from Sins Forums Top
That's true, Iso, however, it was not a "front line" ship that was seen often in major battles.
Reply #686 from Sins Forums Top
The Jem Hadar Battle Cruiser (U wing) is in. We called it the Devastator for SoA1, and FTB. I am not happy with the results, because the model has 2 problems. It is too low poly, and the textures are too low res. However i need the model so it is in until i can build, or find a better replacement.

Heres a shot of her wrecking a poor Ambassador.


This prolly will be the last update for a while. Work calls.
Reply #687 from Sins Forums Top
The Birth of the Federation ships for each faction are as follows:

Federation:

Oberth Class
Miranda Class
Constellation Class
Defiant Class
Galaxy-X Class
Galaxy Class
Ambassador Class
Nebula Class
Sovereign Class
Edward Class
London Class

Klingons:

B'rel Class Scout
May'Duj Class Destroyer
K'T'Inga Class Cruiser
K'Vort Class Cruiser
Negh'Var Class Strike Cruiser
Vor'Cha Class Battleship
Ll'wl' Class Colony Ship
Charghwl' Class Transport

Romulans:

D'renet Class Scout Ship
D'ridren Class Destroyer
D'dredar Class Cruiser
R'derex Class Cruiser
R'tan Class Strike Cruiser
D'Deridex Class Battleship (Aka, Warbird)
D'retex Class Colony Ship
R'daran Class Transport

Cardassians:

Nerok Class Scout Ship
Netel Class Destroyer
Neterok Class Cruiser
Telok Class Cruiser
Keldon Class Strike Cruiser
Galor Class BattleShip
Ranol Class Colony Ship
Toran Class Transport

Ferengi:

Bronta Class Scout Ship
Ngort Class Destroyer
Tokorn Class Destroyer
Goront Class Cruiser
Ooron Class Strike Cruiser
D'Kora Class BattleShip (Aka, Marauder)
Tomax Class Colony Ship
Glantor Class Transport


Now remember that when this game came out the Paramount only gave them the licence for TNG not DS9 or Voyager. So they could only use ships from TNG. This is why the intrepid and the Dominion and alot of other content is missing. I dont know if this helps for ideas. If you need any other info just pm me.
Reply #689 from Sins Forums Top
The game Star Ter: Legacy is a fine source for information about what kinds of ships there are for the Federation, Klingons, Romulan Star Empire and the Borg ships are there too. You could check this out, if you're interested. And everyone is free to use services like Google to find stuff.

There are piles of different Romulan, Klingon and Federation ships in Legacy. And it also includes all the Borg ships I've ever seen so far: Pyramid, Sphere, Rectangle, Obelisk, Diamond and the mighty Cube. There's three kinds of all the ships (one in each era) and the Cube has a fourth one, the Tactical Cube (which some refer to as "Assimilation Cube). It has more armor and firepower, but lacks maneuverability and in the game I told you about, it also bears a smaller number of turrets than its weaker counterparts. Although that didn't make it weaker than the others at any level.

EDIT: Sorry, I forgot... Was it so you weren't going to add the Borg? Well, that little bunch of text shouldn't hurt anyone. And it can stay there if you happen to change your mind. Also, if you knew all that, you can still consult it as a reminder.
Reply #690 from Sins Forums Top
Ok, The Breen are now in game (see screenshot on main topic). However i have a new problem. On the random generated maps there are no planetary defenders (havnt tried it yet with fixed premade maps yet).

This may be a good or bad thing depending on point of view. In trek there werent marauding fleets at every world visited. We also are deviating from the standard sins capital ship system. So fodder for leveling isnt really necessary.

I still need to rework the feds, and remove the "not seen" units like the Ambassador, and add some that were like the Galaxy class which will take the Sovereigns place in the mod. Also need to figure out what to do about the Defiant. I dont want it in as an early game unit. Nor do i want to see hundreds of them on the map. I need to find a way to make it a "Unique" ship. The same for the Lakota.

The Breen AI (which is using a vasari AI) Will not build any ships. I am thinking this is because i made a jack of all trades ship and stuck it in a siege frigate slot. Probably a bad idea so ill change it. Non breen will get a nice (to the breen player) "surprise" when the fighting starts :D

I have stated before a few hundred replies back that i will not touch anything from Legacy. I have plenty of "good" non canon ship designs to use. I am using the best of the trek community plus our own stuff. This will all be added in when the time comes.

All but 4 canon models are ready. The factions are done. I still need some sounds and effects made for the Dominion, and its Allied races weapons. I havent started on structures, or civilian ships yet. Nor will i until after the demo release. I still need to make shield meshes for all of the ships, and i need to add nav lights, but that isnt important right now. What is important is that it works so far with few annoying things.
Reply #691 from Sins Forums Top
Has anyone played an Armada II mod called "Fleet Operations"? It had wonderful changes for everyone who didn't like a lot of what Armada II did (almost everyone). That could be a good place to look for ideas. If you still have your Armada II cds, I'd recommend trying it.

Stress, why not make the Defiant a ship requires tier 5 or 6 research, after weapons are done (like quantum torpedoes)? On top of that, make it a capship to limit the number in use. It did, after all, have the power of large capital ships. For carriers, the Federation did have various small craft (Delta flyers and whatnot) that were like fighters. The Romulans had the Scorpion from Nemesis. If you want to make it easy on yourself, you could have the same models for fighters and bombers, but say one has been "modified for x duties with [insert how weapon or craft is different in fighter or bomber role]"
Reply #692 from Sins Forums Top
The Defiant is, at most, a really heavy cruiser that falls just short of a capital ship. It just isn't big enough to be called a capital ship, nor does it have capital ship HP/SP.
Reply #693 from Sins Forums Top
The Defiant is, at most, a really heavy cruiser that falls just short of a capital ship. It just isn't big enough to be called a capital ship, nor does it have capital ship HP/SP.
End of quote

Your point being? If you put a non-capital ship in a capital ship slot the game will not crash, and your family will not die. The result would be a limited number of Defiant-class ships on the map.
Reply #694 from Sins Forums Top
Did he say demo release? (bookmarks thread)
Reply #695 from Sins Forums Top
Wont be anytime soon. Least till after August. Depending on when patch 1.1 comes out. The new patch WILL break the mod. How badly has yet to be determined. Regardless it will need to be fixed before any kind of public release.

Updated main header.

New "Elite, Legendary, and Unique Unit" system has been implemented.

Breen bug fixed. They are some bad mofo's

Here is the canon demos shiplist
Federation
Galaxy Class (Standard unit) Venture upgrade = Elite unit
Nebula (Phoenix Variant = standard unit) Weapon pod upgrade = Elite unit
Defiant (Unique unit. Very expensive to build. NO standard counterpart, No cloak yet)
Excelsior II Lakota refit (Unique quantum armed unit. Not as expensive as Defiant)
Steamrunner (Yes, It was seen participating in the major battles)
Akira (may or may not have an elite version)
Sabre
Centaur
Excelsior (standard unit, can bomb)
Miranda (standard cannon fodder unit)

Klingon (No cloaking until i can make it work right)
B'rel
K'vort (Standard and Elite units)
D-7 K't'inga
Vorcha (Standard, and Elite units)
Negh'Var (Unique unit)

Romulan (No cloaking until i can make it work right)
Talon scout (can auto explore. It IS a scout after all)
Science ship (can capture roids)
D'deridex Warbird (Standard, and Tal Shiar planetary siege "elite" versions)

Cardassian
Hideki
Galor (Standard and Obsidian order Elite versions)
Keldon (Standard and Obsidian Order Elite versions)

Dominion
Dominator (Jem Hadar fighter)
Devastator (Jem Hadar Battle Cruiser) (Standard, and Founder commanded Elite's)
Enslaver (Jem Hadar Battleship) (Unique unit, Very Expensive, Very Powerful)

Breen
Breen MWPG (Breen cruiser) No elite units, No need. This ship is a jack of all trades badass. Did i mention they rock? :P

No fighters yet. The Federation was the only faction with canon fighters, and that would not be fair to the other factions if i included them right now. Besides modded ships have problems with fighters spawning in another universe.



Reply #696 from Sins Forums Top
Besides modded ships have problems with fighters spawning in another universe.
End of quote


Had that problem. Make sure your hangar nulls are positioned outside of the mesh and also, if you updated the mesh and the prior version did not have the hangar nulls or had them placed incorrectly, you have to build a new ship - old ones won't work properly and fighters will spawn somewhere in the middle of nowhere even with the updated model.
Reply #697 from Sins Forums Top
Most of the current ships ATM dont even have hanger hardpoints. I didnt plan on adding them. I just didnt remove the strike craft lines from the entitys yet. I plan on having only 1 ship per faction with strike craft capability in the future. The Curry will be the Fed's carrier. The rest will more than likely be non canon units. Good to know about the hanger hardpoints, and updated models. Thanks :)
Reply #698 from Sins Forums Top
Would you like me to make custom race pictures for the Trek races? I've created the custom race pics and character loadscreens that will be in the next version of 7 Deadly Sins.
Reply #699 from Sins Forums Top
Non breen will get a nice (to the breen player) "surprise" when the fighting starts.
End of quote


By "surprise", do you mean the Breen Energy Dissapator?
Reply #700 from Sins Forums Top
Hello,
Would you mind list the source/authors of the models?
I saw you use the BC warbird model, which has aft hull section incorrectly textured. I have fixed the texture mapping in my SFC3 mod. If you want, I can send you the fixed 3ds model.



About the Jem'Hadar BC, I think polygon is not the problem. The most important part of a mod is art design consistency. I guess that Jem'Hadar Battlecruiser is made by Redragon, so I would suggest use Redragon's Dominion Battleship as well.

I'm not sure which Hideki model you used. As far as I know, both Zorg's and Armada2 Hideki model is incorrect and distorted. The correct Hideki top view can be found at Ex-astris-scientia. I also have a fixed hideki model in my mod, if you want to use it. :)