The Modders Wishlist

from Sins Forums
So, after a great deal of tinkering about with various things, I've noticed a few seemingly small small things that could make a very large difference to the modding community. I am not a genius, nor am I omniscient, so I assume other modders out there have also noticed things that I have not that they would like to see implemented. I've decided to try to make an ongoing list of very basic, simple changes that the mod community would like to see, so that any devs out there who want a brief overview of the sort of trials we are having can have an easy way to check the pulse of the community, so to speak.
Now I know we all just wish we had the ultimate sandbox toy that we could use to create our very own game, but I don't think it is realistic to expect that out of Sins, even given how amazingly accomadating the devs have been thus far. So, I think we should stick to very small things, like new end/trigger conditions in the ability/buffs system, or unlocking certain traits that are 'locked' into certain entity types, stuff like that.
I will do my best to check this thread daily, and keep the information categorized and organized. Not every suggestion is going to end up getting posted, some are inevitably going to be something that I think would be too complicated, or to big a favor to ask. But I am not a expert on these matters, so if you feel like arguing your case with me, feel free to do so, and I will do my best to keep an open mind.
All that having been said, here's a start:


Ability/Buff System:

-A way to tie monetary/resource cost to an ability.

-More end conditions. Stuff like the inverse of present end conditions, like 'firstspawnernolongerhasbuff' could also have 'firstspawnernowhasbuff' to go along with it.

-Similarly, more buff types, basically just a more complete rounding out of our current options. The opposite of some current buff actions, stuff that is present in both percent and specified value forms, etc. A specific concern would be a 'move entity to target location' instantbuffaction. Ideally in inter and intra gravwell flavors.

-All tags that require values (hulldamageexceedsammount, for example) could have both an integer version and a percentage version (hulldamageexceedspercent).

-Unlock research associated buffs so that abilities can apply them as well.

-A few more target constraint tags. An 'IsShipX' type tag would be great, so that you could specifiy a number of specifc ships that could be elligible targets, and then list the name of their entity file underneath... Also, there is an 'IsPsi' constraint, it would be great to have 'IsTech' and 'IsPhase' as well.

-A global buff application method. Similar to how ability files work as a vehicle for the introduction of buffs, but make a global effect option. This would open the door to allowing players to implement their own game mechanics without using up a precious ability slot on their ships.

-A method to exceed the current ability slot limitation, like a 'click for tree' option similar to what the UI uses for unit/building production or captial ship ability management.



AI/Pathfinding:

-A way to change unit pathing behavior without changing entity type; IE 'I want my light frigate to make strafing runs!'

-A way to make passive unit AI ignore a target, but still allow player directed ships to kill it.

-An event editing method of sorts. Some way to introduce pirate raid / rebel attack style instances. Also, a way to edit the target of said events, like real infrastructure raids instead of mindless 'planet crashin.'

-A method of altering fleet formation AI, stuff like max/min distance, engagement ranges, etc.

-A way to assign target priority to unit-role type, or individual units, instead of basing it on damage type

-The ability to define unit combat behavior/pathing on a per-unit/per-fleet basis via the in-game interface. Set things like level of aggression, the current engagement range, formation with respect to other units in a fleet, etc. Ideally these options would be in the form of toggles present in the fleet management sub-window.

-The big one: We want to 'teach' the AI how to use new units. This is a tall order, I know, but I think it is almost necessary in order to create a lasting mod community. It is difficult to find other people to play your mod with, so it is almost impossible for a mod to build up popularity if the single-player AI is non-functional.


Research System:

-A way to define new conditions for tech tier, instead of simply number of associated labs.

-The ability to makes some research paths prevent others from being researched.

Enitity Constraints:

-Allow multiple entity types to gain experience.

-Allow multiple entity types to produce units, and possibly build buildings.

-Break up the build menus to allow entity specific build lists.

-Remove hardcaps on unit types, especially capital ships )IE more than 4 types of cap ship would be nice)

-Removal of the arbitrary lines between entitytypes (e.g remove the half a dozen planetmodule subtypes, and just make a combined planetmodule entitytype so you can pick and choose what you want from all the functions)

-Free up movement controls, like especially whether or not something can 'phase jump,' instead of tying them to entity type.

-Unlock hardcap of 3 weapons per ship.

-The ability to make strikecraft squads that are independant of carriers, or failing that, the ability to make non-strikecraft units operate and build in squads. (Repopulate upon repair?)

-Allow the creation and assignment of a tag which  could theoretically tie other unit attributes to this tag as well, and use it a a designator for ship 'class,' or entity type. To elaborate, a modder could create a file that would list such attributes as movement behavior, targetting behavior, AI build priority, or anything else that is currently hard-coded into entity type, and then allow the modder to refference this file from his new ship entity files, so that the new ship will take upon these defined qualities as if it were a newly created entity type. Of course we would need a way to define targeting conditions to, maybe the addition of an 'is/inst x' style targetting tag at the end of the current frigate/planetmodule/etc/ listing. I don't know. This might get way to complicated. But, it is a wishlist...


Modeling Concerns:

-A pipeline effect modifier that I can use to intelligently animate a mesh in the particle system to basically animate turrets.

Misc. Concerns:

-There is currently no method of modifying the culture system. Or at least none that I have found.

-Definable firing arcs would be awesome. Especially if the firing arcs were based around the actual unit hard-point on the .mesh, so we could control firing 'blind spots' and what not.

-Organization. Separating various file-types into folders, perhaps even creating new file-type extensions for some of the entity files. The ability to leave 'comment' tags in a file (PLEASE). It would be nice to have the information within the files more clearly sorted into categories, like start/end tags for weapon data or movement data, etc.


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I'm sure you all have way more to say on this subject then me, so lets fill this thread out and make it a proper resource!


modding
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Reply #3 from Sins Forums Top
First off, thank you for making this thread.

Second, I agree with everything in the OP. If all these things came true I think we would have one of the most flexible-to-mod games ever to be designed.

I'm not sure exactly why you guys decided to tie shipyards to entity types. It pretty much makes adding new shipyards, or adding frigate-size ships with capital ship type leveling and experience impossible. Nearly every moddable RTS on the market defines its build types inside the shipyard file. So if we can't define our own entityTypes, I would appreciate a change in how this works to allow shipyard-specific build lists.

Also related to the shipyard dilemma is the fact that we can only have a maximum of five capital ships. We can't add another page, we can't add another shipyard. We can't even add another page to the regular factory! I have no problem hacking a way around the game's limits by making the ships I want to have leveled abilities the capitalship entity type - that's fine. But I should definitely be able to build more than three - and build them at whatever structure I want, not be restricted to lumping them with the caps just because of the leveling system they use.

I'm really, really hoping this will happen for 1.1. I posted earlier in another thread comparing it to hitting a bunch of invisible walls. Right now, most mods are not at a point where this is an issue: it will be soon, and it has been for DoV. A lot of other things in the OP would be nice, but this needs to be addressed first (with no disrespect to Ditchdigger!)
Reply #4 from Sins Forums Top
Reckon the game needs to be a lot more resilient too. Seems the first thing a modder has to do is basically stop doing various stuff, for no apparent reason, because the game will minidump.
Reply #5 from Sins Forums Top
The big one: We want to 'teach' the AI how to use new units. This is a tall order, I know, but I think it is almost necessary in order to create a lasting mod community. It is difficult to find other people to play your mod with, so it is almost impossible for a mod to build up popularity if the single-player AI is non-functional.
End of quote


The AI is stats based, unless the changes are something crazy (like making the first capital cost 10,000 credits or something), the AI doesn't do anything funky in a mod. There are some limitations of course, like another modder discovered that the AI uses a ratio for capitals to frigates for fleet composition.

Prime example is Uzii's mod - the AI colonizes all those new planets and everything and doesn't ignore them just because they're not the defaults.

A lot of this stuff would be cool, though. I'd love to define my own entity types to bypass some restrictions (like not being able to have strike craft *and* weapons on a defensive structure) ;)
Reply #6 from Sins Forums Top
Hi great idea,

I wrote it in another thread, but a way to modify target priority for each entity type (tell siege frig to go after ship and buidings before the planet)

In one word more control on how Ai uses units / buildings
Reply #7 from Sins Forums Top
My personal requests

Being able to define our own entitytypes - or at the very least removal of the arbitrary lines between entitytypes (e.g remove the half a dozen planetmodule subtypes, and just make a combined planetmodule entitytype so you can pick and choose what you want from all the functions)

Access to the, as the error log puts it, "Enum Value" list, again so we can add more

Access to where ever the culture bonuses are defined

The ability to add intrinsic effects to a specified weapon (e.g. making a weapon bypass shields without research)

The ability to make researches only affect a specific ship, Or failing that the ability to use the research modifiers in buffs (and obviously them then not apply to your empire).

The ability to make researches mutually exclusive


I'm sure I can come up with more but thats if for the moment.
Reply #8 from Sins Forums Top
I would like a pipeline effect modifier that I can use to intelligently animate a mesh in the particle system to basically animate turrets.
Reply #9 from Sins Forums Top
Reckon the game needs to be a lot more resilient too. Seems the first thing a modder has to do is basically stop doing various stuff, for no apparent reason, because the game will minidump.
End of quote


A lot of this is tied to the fact that the game doesn't parse the entity files line by line, it expects certain things to be on certain lines based on their type.
Reply #10 from Sins Forums Top
Alright, there's the first round of updates. I consolidated a lot of stuff, I think some of these concerns can probably be solved all tricky like if we just get some other stuff unlocked.

Keep them coming guys, this is some good stuff.

Also, about the AI player modification, yes, the current AI is amazingly flexible, but if you wish to introduce new game mechanics, it gets really fuzzy really fast. For example, in my mod I have a 'supply' system set up, so that units cannot continuing operating for long unless they are within range of a supply ship. But the AI has no idea that these units are useless on their own, so it will build tons of units that require ammo, and almost no supply ships. A simple 'build one of these for every 5 of x ship' type instruction, plus an 'act like the iconus guardian' would keep them operating effectively.

All in all I think the devs have done really well, and I really appreciate how much they've helped out the modding community. This thread is basically my thanks to them... Hopefully having this information at hand will make their job a little easier.

Thanks again everybody! =D
Reply #11 from Sins Forums Top
IC support for 3dsMAX, perhaps a guide as to how to effect and export a compliant XSI to pass to the conversion tool (a little bit like the modding supplement does for XSImod, tangents, removing non-quad/tri polys etc)?
Reply #12 from Sins Forums Top
I would like a pipeline effect modifier that I can use to intelligently animate a mesh in the particle system to basically animate turrets.
End of quote


Gosh really? That needs to be fixed really. I thought a strength of Sins was that it was pretty basic to mod and hence can tap into a group of people who aren't coders etc. It needs to be pretty forgiving for that to work though.
Reply #13 from Sins Forums Top
I thought a strength of Sins was that it was pretty basic to mod and hence can tap into a group of people who aren't coders etc.
End of quote


This is exactly the opposite of how it needs to be. I'd rather have an extremely flexible-to-mod game that's relatively complex than one that panders to the lowest-common-denominator and has a bunch of hard-coded stuff, forsaking flexibility for simplicity (often these newbie "coders" overexaggerate their own abilities as well). Sins is somewhere in the middle.
Reply #15 from Sins Forums Top
As Annatar11 said above, access to what ever decides the frig/cruiser to captial ships ratio would be sweet.
Reply #16 from Sins Forums Top
I think currently we are all just shooting for some word from the devs on whether or not AI is going to be touchable at all... Then we can go off of that. Although, I did notice that a fellow was talking about the 'statcounttype' tag, IE: statCountType "FrigateLight"
Apparently tweaking this value can get the AI to treat the entity as something else, at least in terms of fleet composition. Not sure how it effects general strategery. Maybe that will help tide you over...
Reply #17 from Sins Forums Top
adding a few things, remove hard cap on abilities and weapons, especially abilities so that we can create passive abilities (instead of making specific uber buffs that are a pain to figure out)

Ability to direct what an AI attacks (for example pirates being commerce raiders rather than kamikazie planet crashers)

the file structure needs some work, even spliting buffs, abilities, planet modules, frigates etc into folders would clean up big time (and help CVS merge management) this in addition to the entity formats themselves (comments are really needed as well as a lot more flexibility in organization, also proper encapsulation of the values in a type, WEAPON ENDWEAPON would even be preferable, something that can sanely be parsed and exported)
Reply #18 from Sins Forums Top
I would like to see them add in support for modders to be able to have strike craft squadrons be purchased with Credits, metals and crystals and as well anti-matter (which is current in the system). This is the main thing bugging me and of course the weapon limit on ships (3) and the ship construction limits.
Reply #19 from Sins Forums Top
In the hindsight of experience I now realise I was being too specific in my previous requests, there's some basics that need attention 1st:

1) Weapon Fire Arc's

2) Movement controls of any object

3) Free trip to BC to share beers (though non of that labbats shite) with the Devs.  :d

4) Scripting which I guess we'll come to with the expansion. 
Reply #20 from Sins Forums Top
I like a lot of these ideas, especially about the various entity types. We should be able to create our own entity types, IMO. Hopefully at least some of these things will be made reality in the future.
Reply #21 from Sins Forums Top
Awesome, added another round of updates.
About the fighters/bombers thing that Cloud4 brought up:
I'm hoping that if they just tie resource costs to abilities that this will be doable via a workaround.
Glad to see that interest is still going strong... I think we're in for some exciting stuff here now that little ole 1.04 is out of the way, the devs can start expanding their efforts. I'm excited to see what's in store for us.
Reply #22 from Sins Forums Top
to expand upon the fighters, independent fighter squads that act like ships (pretty much necessary for a SW game)

Reply #23 from Sins Forums Top
bah another idea

instead of having simply 'hold position', 'local range', 'gravity well'

the movement options should be split up into engagement range, movement behavior, formations and aggression

so you would have a button for each of these you can cycle through

Aggression: 'hold fire', 'defensive(return fire only, useful for negotiations)', 'aggressive'

Engagement range: 'local range (set in the entity)', 'stay in formation', 'gravity well'

formations: 'capital screen', 'box', 'line', 'sphere', etc

movement: 'hold position', 'face target', 'move to target', 'orbit target', 'make pass at target'

allow these to have defaults that suit each ship best and then let people micro if they want.


Reply #24 from Sins Forums Top
man something we really need, to make it interesting, a in-game ability able, to transform the game world (eg: destroy planets but continue phase lanes, change planets to a difrent type of planet, volcanic, too asteroid, or vice versa)
Reply #25 from Sins Forums Top
Ability to turn on/off phase(yes I know major part of the game blah blah). Allow option for partial fow in grav well(ok I know this isnt going to happen, too much extra work but still a guy can dream :D). Dawn of Victory to be released in two months(what you mean this is just the IC wishlist :( ). The ability to ADD MORE SHIPS and an independent fighter squad.