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[MOD] Distant Stars - Rebellion Alpha 0.13 Released! [17/06/13]

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[MOD] Distant Stars - Rebellion Alpha 0.13 Released! [17/06/13]

http://distantstars.mmobase.com
from Sins Forums


Feedback of any kind is always welcome. Ideas, balance changes, and bug reporting of any kind is always useful!

Version 1.00 Released!

Make sure to ask for permission before republishing any part of this mod to the public!

Downloads

Rebellion Logo

1.05 + DLC Compatible:

0.12 ALPHA Release:
Full Download:
http://distantstars.mmobase.com/rebellion/Distant_Stars_(R)_ALPHA_0.13_[45189661].7z

Full Download MIRROR:
http://www.moddb.com/downloads/distant-stars-rebellion-alpha-013

MD5: 69486D2FCD3F35E46E6F5EF8C9F1634A

Diplomacy Logo

1.34 Compatible:

1.01 Release:
Full Download:
http://distantstars.mmobase.com/diplomacy/Distant_Stars_(D)_1.01_[45685832].7z

 

Entrenchment Logo

1.051 Compatible:

Beta 0.9951 Release:
Full Download:
http://distantstars.mmobase.com/entrenchment/DS_Entrenchment_Beta_0.9951_[36672852].7z

SoaSE Logo

1.14 - 1.181 Compatible:

Version 1.01:
Full Download:
http://distantstars.mmobase.com/soase/Distant_Stars_v1.01_[453701567].7z

Make sure to ask for permission before republishing any part of this mod to the public!

Multiplayer Games:
We've setup a thread for everyone to organise their multiplayer games in and also setup example times and dates for most people to meet up and start games. These are what we hope to be the main times for people to be around and want to play games together.

The times are:
4pm EST (9pm GMT) Saturdays & Sundays
9pm EST (2am GMT) Saturdays & Sundays

If you want to organise other games please go ahead using the same topic to consolidate all the information in one place and hopefully get more games together within our community. These games are for PvP, PvAI & PvPvAIso come along and we'll get some games going!

Screenshots:
We've setup a thread so you can all post your screenshots to share with us the Distant Stars team and its players. Im sure we're all intrigued to see what kinds of battles and events you've all been having on the mod aswell.

Lore:
We know some of you guys love to role play whilst using Distant Stars, and here's a topic for you guys to post all of your role playing stories, character profiles and anything else you can imagine.

Maps:
Some of you avid map makers out there have produced some great maps but never really had them recognised because they've got lost. Well here's a topic for you to post a link to the download (we can even provide mirrors if necessary) a screenshot or two of the map for us all the preview and if enough people like it we'll even include the map in with the actual mod!

Please visit our website and for more information, change logs, downloads, and to report bugs. Our website can be found here: http://distantstars.mmobase.com

Bug Reporting

If you want to report a bug please use the Bug Report feature on our website:
http://distantstars.mmobase.com/?m=reportabug

Please include as much information as possible, if you have an error log feel free to post it on these forums and we'll take it from there. If you can reproduce the error please include the error log (read below to find out how to enable error logs) and include as much detail on how to reproduce the problem.

To enable logging:
Windows Vista/Windows 7:
C:\Documents and Settings\<Your Windows Username>\Local Settings\Application Data\Ironclad Games\Sins of a Solar Empire\Setting
or
Windows XP:
C:\Documents and settings\<Your Windows Username>\Local Settings\Application Data\Ironclad Games\Sins of a Solar Empire\Setting

Open the user.setting file (using Notepad, Wordpad or any text editor) and scroll down to the bottom 7 lines from the bottom is the line:
LogOutput FALSE
Change FALSE to TRUE
LogOutput TRUE

and from then on any Log files will be saved to the debug folder:
Windows Vista/Windows 7:
C:\Documents and Settings\<Your Windows Username>\Local Settings\Application Data\Ironclad Games\Sins of a Solar Empire\Debug
or
Windows XP:
C:\Documents and settings\<Your Windows Username>\Local Settings\Application Data\Ironclad Games\Sins of a Solar Empire\Debug

If you get these log files to us (you can just paste them in to a forum post) we can hopefully get your issues sorted.

Frequently Asked Questions

All files are compressed using 7Zip to shrink the download filesize. To extract these files you must use WinRAR or 7Zip.
Any Patches should overwrite the original install directory, either by extracting over the original folder, or cut/copy & pasting over the existing file/folder structure.

1) My game keeps crashing, is there anything I can do to stop it?
i) Are you running the game on maximum (highest) settings? if so, lower them to High or Medium, there is a known issue with the game using up too much memory, there is nothing we can do about this, also no matter how powerful your pc is, it is affected by this issue no matter the pc it is not above this crashing issue, it is a game problem not a hardware one, so quite simply lower your settings. If you still have an issue with crashing see point two.
ii) Give us as detailed information as possible about the crash, what was happening at the time of the crash, what races, ships, abilities were involved. If you can supply a Debug Log (see above for more information about logging) and post a bug report on our website.

2) The loading screens and portrait pictures dont appear properly, whats wrong?
i) This is an issue with ATI based graphics cards (rarely affects Nvidia based cards) we're looking in to the issue.

3) Why dont you support converting Distant Stars in to TXT format?
i) Quite simply many things can go wrong with converting your mod to TXT, we cant help you with something you've probably broken yourself.

4) Can I mod Distant Stars for myself?
i) Yes you can however please do not distribute our mod or our mod that you have edited to the public. You must ask for permission to do so, we will regrettably stop distributing our mod to all if users abuse our work.

5) Your mod is in BIN format I can't edit the files, what can I do?
i) You can convert the mod to TXT format however we wont offer any support to versions of the mod that have been converted to TXT.

6) Why is Distant Stars distributed in BIN format?
i) Mods load faster in BIN format and are less likely to have issues in this format.

7) I'm having trouble installing the MOD, do you have any more instructions?
i) Carbon was kind enough to do some more advanced instructions out here.

8) Is there any way to make new maps for Distant Stars using GalaxyForge?
i) Within the Distant Stars Extras folder there is a folder called Galaxy Forge, Copy and Paste this folder (or its contents) over your original Galaxy Forge folder (or its contents) replacing any files if it asks you to. When you start Galaxy Forge next you'll be able to use all of our planets.

Or, the DIY approach (without custom icons):

ii) The GalaxyForge supplied by the devs will still work with our Mod, however to be able to access all of our planetary bonuses, templates, planet types and stars you will need to take our GalaxyScenarioDef.galaxyScenarioDef (found in the GameInfo folder of the mod) and place it in to your GalaxyForge folder, overwriting the original GalaxyScenarioDef.galaxyScenarioDef (if you still wish to make maps for the original game keep a backup of the original file). This will allow you to use all of the Galaxy changes included in our mod.

Note: Any maps made for Distant Stars will not work with other Mods. See #8.2 for DIY instructions for map making or take the appropriate files from Entrenchment, they're cross-client compatible.

Some statistics...

Since August 2009 to February 2011 we have had over...

400,000 Unique visits to the website
12,000GB (12TB) of data transferred from our website

That equates to over 60,000 Unique downloads of the entire mod, excluding the excess of 20,000 Patches downloaded. 

Thanks to everyone that has supported us this far and making our mod as popular as it is!

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modding
15,658,535 views 8,423 replies +31 Loading…
Reply #3876 from Sins Forums Top

1) Patch has been pushed back to January? This is the first I have heard of a date spoken outside of e-mails with Blair Fraser some months back. What's the news concerning this?

End of quote

Quoting Yarlen, reply 167

No word yet on when to expect the next update.  I'm still waiting to get dev team resources for it; so I wouldn't expect anything right now before January.  Odds are that if we do have something before then, we'll put out a beta version first to test things out beforehand.

 

End of Yarlen's quote

Yarlen made it pretty clear. Outside of your emails with Blair, no one has heard from him on these forums in quite a while.

Reply #3877 from Sins Forums Top

thx ZombiesRus5, I was going to pull up that same comment for boshimi336

@Sicarii - Understandable about the realism factor. Much of Sins is unrealistic, like no planetary orbits around the stars (the devs did initially put that in but it caused too many issues) and population that skyrockets extremely fast. As such we mostly focus on the enjoyment of massive fleets smashing into each other rather than the whole empire build.

Object Desktop - Get all of our enhancement utilities in one suite
Reply #3878 from Sins Forums Top

hmm is there any reason to use normal ships besides capital ships and support ships in this mod?

I understand the reason to strengthen capital ships is to make them more viable in huge battles but I feel that the current stats seems overkill.

Crew supply should go back to 16 max on the multiplayer patch. You can actually have 32 capital ships even without supply pacts.

Reply #3879 from Sins Forums Top

Quoting JustAnotherName, reply 3878
hmm is there any reason to use normal ships besides capital ships and support ships in this mod?
End of JustAnotherName's quote

Sure, LRFs and HCs are great for increasing the amount of firepower you have. HCs especially are good because they are tough enough to survive in such an environment where our leviathans exist and rule. LFs are about the only losers in the mod but considering that they are already having issue in normal game that's not to surprising. Best to put them in their own fleet and pull some flanking maneuvers on the other fleets support ships. But then again that is what they were designed to do.

Reply #3880 from Sins Forums Top

News from the big boss.

https://forums.sinsofasolarempire.com/400364

Reply #3881 from Sins Forums Top

hmm is there any reason to use normal ships besides capital ships and support ships in this mod?

I understand the reason to strengthen capital ships is to make them more viable in huge battles but I feel that the current stats seems overkill.
End of quote

 

Sure is. If your not then your losing alot of firepower. Even though Caps are stronger, you have to put their new strength with in the context of the mod. Everything is amplifed. Everything. LRF hit over 2x as hard, HC are 2x as tough, SC are twice as evil, etc etc.

I guarantee you if you had played some of the MP games we had going a while back you see Caps die just as fast as they do in the un modded game.The only Cap that stands out to me as almost OP'ed is the Kol. It doesnt die late game, but Im bias and think that totally acceptable.

 

 

Reply #3882 from Sins Forums Top

Not to mention that the cost of the caps was ramped up as well to make it harder to buy them en masse.  I've not broke down the numbers, but I'm pretty sure you get more firepower and flexibility out of the frigates for the cost compared to a Cap.

Reply #3883 from Sins Forums Top

However, depending on your play style, tactics, and beginning 'planetoid' setup near your home planet AND where you're opponents are, the Capital ships are setup and priced in a way that really does make the game a LOT of fun to play. Thumb sup!

Reply #3884 from Sins Forums Top

Looking forward to the new update from Ironclad/Stardock. Should be very promising.

Reply #3885 from Sins Forums Top

The game still consistantly appears in the Impulse top 5 sellers list, so I think they must feel bad for having neglected it for so long despite Sins probably making up a significant % of their profits.  Still, this is great news.  If they're considering a major engine overhaul, It's a very safe bet they're planning a full expansion in the near-future as well.  Sins is still a cool game, just kind of stale and neglected.  This could give the game a rebirth.

Reply #3886 from Sins Forums Top

:D

Reply #3887 from Sins Forums Top

I want to make a Mass Effect music mod for DS (Im almost done), is that ok? IDK if I need to ask but I thought might as well stay on the safe side. I dont want any angry modders at my door. 

Reply #3888 from Sins Forums Top

If you're making a mod to run on top of DS then that's your baby and need not concern anyone here as it doesn't include any pieces to DS.

If you're changing stuff inside DS, as long as it's for your own personal use (which includes sharing the files here for everyone else to try out and check out your work), then you don't need permission.

If you're changing stuff inside DS and you're publishing the whole thing as your own mod, then yes, you need to ask and get permission.

Reply #3889 from Sins Forums Top

what are the icons on the planets?  I've got some triangles on the sides and one has a target marker.  Is there someplace that explains these?

Reply #3890 from Sins Forums Top

Target marker indicates a military planet. You can select the planet and find the bonus in the bottom right corner with the other buttons.

The triangles are quick references to the size of the planets. They vary slightly based on the type of planet, but the larger a planet, the more triangles. This affects several stats, including pop cap, resource asteroids, and gravity well size, IIRC. I don't remember them all off the top of my head, but you can select a few planets and quickly figure out the system.

If you look up Distant Stars Wiki, I think it goes over the details as to how it works. Stant would be able to correct me on that, if need be.

Reply #3891 from Sins Forums Top

Just wondering, you know the new profile pictures or whatever they're called that were introduced in DS? What is the source material for them, especially the "Thenos Garr" one (you know, my first profile pic on the forums, the one that Thenos Garr in the Lore is based off)? Are they official artwork or did you make them yourselves?

Finally, what is with the new red Advent woman in Diplomacy? Seriously, no offence to the artist, but I don't think it quite fits in with the others with the CGI look and the, well, impractical, costume. Same goes with some of the Vasari.

Hate to be an arsehole, but you know, that's what fans are for! :P

And what about the Dynamic Movement? (Thought I'd forget to bitch about that, didn't you?);P

 

 

"They're on our left, they're on our right, they're in front of us, and they're behind us. They can't get away this time!"

Reply #3892 from Sins Forums Top

Actually, most of the images were taken from profile packs that we got permission to use, including the insectoid images. We didn't make them, but they are fan made. I always justified the bugs as one of the slave races of the Vasari that were amiable enough to be considered 'valued citizens'.

The computer generated ones were created for us, but I forget by who. Someone help me with that...

There are a few that I've added since that will show up with the next update and I tried to fit the mold.

But yes, your pic was another fan made profile pack that I can not remember the name of.

Reply #3893 from Sins Forums Top

But yes, your pic was another fan made profile pack that I can not remember the name of.
End of quote

Awww... :'(

There goes the chance to see Thenos in full... ;P

Not in that way, just to be clear. I'm as straight as a bendy ruler, I assure you.

 

 

"They're on our left, they're on our right, they're in front of us, and they're behind us. They can't get away this time!"

Reply #3894 from Sins Forums Top

The opening pics were designed by StienerX with my and Carbon's approval

We like the Advent pic to be honest.

Reply #3895 from Sins Forums Top

We like the Advent pic to be honest.
End of quote

Meh, it's your choice. I'm not so sure on it, but I, of course, don't have to use it.

Shame you can't choose a picture for each faction seperately, rather than a set of three.

Reply #3896 from Sins Forums Top

I keep getting a crash about once every 20 minutes with DS diplomacy version .7 and diplomacy 1.011.  I can play long enough that it autosaves but shortly afterward (5 mins, maybe 10) it will crash to desktop.  I have logging enabled but no logs were produced.

Reply #3897 from Sins Forums Top

I keep getting a crash about once every 20 minutes with DS diplomacy version .7 and diplomacy 1.011. I can play long enough that it autosaves but shortly afterward (5 mins, maybe 10) it will crash to desktop. I have logging enabled but no logs were produced.
End of quote

 

Are you playing with max settings?

Reply #3898 from Sins Forums Top


ATTENTION! *KLAXON SIREN* ATTENTION! *KLAXON SIREN* ALL CREWS TO BATTLE STATIONS!! *KLAXON SIREN*

 

 

 

90% chance of DS online game Black Friday night starting between 9-10 CST. (Check your local listings)

 

Here is what is going down.

 

Orions Belt 2.0

3vs3

Im gonna assume it will be 3vsAI(Unfair or harder)

If we have more than 3 then we will either go to 3vs3 or move to Kingdom of Heaven 2.0 for elite comp stop action/FFA

 

The settings will the following:

SLOW EVERYTHING. (Dont like it get over it. Im hosting so :hrmph:   )

Using DS Online 2.0 (aka DS Diplomacy with the MP balance patch. I can post checksum to make sure we all match)

 

See DS MP topic for further discussion/whining. Hope to a horde of people there for some LF horde action!

Reply #3899 from Sins Forums Top

Quoting -Ue_Carbon, reply 3897

I keep getting a crash about once every 20 minutes with DS diplomacy version .7 and diplomacy 1.011. I can play long enough that it autosaves but shortly afterward (5 mins, maybe 10) it will crash to desktop. I have logging enabled but no logs were produced.

 

Are you playing with max settings?
End of -Ue_Carbon's quote

 

Yes, which setting should not be maxed?  I couldn't find anything about that in the readme or installation instructions.

Reply #3900 from Sins Forums Top

Sins can only use up to 2GB of RAM with the current engine, and crashes once it hits that limit.  Even if you have an awesome gaming PC, it's best to turn down the graphic settings if you're playing on large maps.  I'd suggest bumping everything down a couple notches, and see if the crash persists.

 

On the plus side, Stardock claims they're going to release an update in the next few months to fix this.