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Mister-A
Mister-A
Join Date 07/2010
0

how to?...

ensure that in a game all the planets have the maximum amount of resource asteroids present

July 12, 2010 4:33:14 PM from Sins of a Solar Empire ForumsSins of a Solar Empire Forums

hi.

i have a rather simple question, but first let me explain the motivation behind it. I created a three way map using the galaxy forge tool. 3 perfectly balanced starting positions, all having equal distances to a central planet and equal distances to other planets in the back, creating a sort of mini empire for each player and a single middle-ground planet over which theoretically everyone should fight over. all the phase lanes are pretty much the same (down to less than 0.1 difference between them) and all the planets available to each player are the same. so far a perfectly balanced map. but when i start the actual game, every player gets randomized amounts of resource extractors at each planet, which can really screw up the map, giving an unfair boost to one player over the other. how do i set it so that all the planets have the maximum amount of resource extractors available (get past the randomization)? i remember vaguely this was possible in older versions (i think it was tweaked by some in-game match option, probably resource related option), but it seems that now the only thing available to tweak resource availability in a match is the rate at which they accumulate. any ideas?

thanks.

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Mister-A
InfiniteVoid
Join Date 09/2008
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Reply #1 July 12, 2010 6:45:47 PM
from Sins of a Solar Empire ForumsSins of a Solar Empire Forums

I'm no modder, but I believe you may need to go to each planet's entity file and change the minimum available extractors.

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Mister-A
WHIPperSNAPper2008
Join Date 03/2008
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Reply #2 July 12, 2010 7:19:57 PM
from Sins of a Solar Empire ForumsSins of a Solar Empire Forums

I wish I knew.  From what I can tell it's either hard-coded into the game or something that would require making a mod (to fix the number of mineral rocks at each planet type, resulting in every Ice planet having X-number of crystal rocks, etc.).  It's too bad that Galaxy Forge won't allow mappers to specify how many mineral extractors should be available at each gravity well.  The ability to do so could really add to the strategic aspects of the game (allowing for the creation of important resource-rich planets at certain spots on the map).

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Mister-A
GoaFan77
Join Date 10/2008
+629
Reply #3 July 12, 2010 8:18:35 PM
from Sins of a Solar Empire ForumsSins of a Solar Empire Forums

Yeah, as I assume this is just for your enjoyment or for a LAN party with friends, it is quite easy to make a mod where all the planets have the same number of resource asteroids (its in the first few lines of every planet entity file). Every planet actually has a min and a max total number of asteroids and a min and a max of crystal and metal asteroids. So weather you always want a planet type to have the exact same kind and number of resources every time or just want them to always have the same number (but the proportion of metal to crystal asteroids can differ), you can do that.

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Darvin3
Join Date 12/2008
+177
Reply #4 July 13, 2010 12:23:32 AM
from Sins of a Solar Empire ForumsSins of a Solar Empire Forums

You'd need to mod the game to do this.

We basically have to accept that militia counts, extractor counts, planet bonuses, and artifacts are random.  The z-position of each gravity well is also randomly displaced, but this only becomes an issue if you are creating multistar maps when the stars are in close proximity.

 

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Mister-A
Mister-A
Join Date 07/2010
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Reply #5 July 13, 2010 11:16:52 AM
from Sins of a Solar Empire ForumsSins of a Solar Empire Forums

thanks for the answers. i'll get down to modding the map then?... hopefully i'll figure it out myself relatively fast. if not, i'll just browse the modding part of the forum.

but z positions? so that means that all the trouble of calculating coordinates and lane lengths was in vain?

oh well, as close to a perfectly balanced map as i'll ever get (since i presume that the z position is not editable), so we'll just have to get by with what we have.

oh, and yes, the map was created for me and two friends. we plan to have a week long LAN party and settle some outstanding accounts

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Mister-A
GoaFan77
Join Date 10/2008
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Reply #6 July 13, 2010 2:19:25 PM
from Sins of a Solar Empire ForumsSins of a Solar Empire Forums

Quoting Mister-A,
reply 5
thanks for the answers. i'll get down to modding the map then?... hopefully i'll figure it out myself relatively fast. if not, i'll just browse the modding part of the forum.
 

No, you have to mod the game unfortunately. The map has absolutely no say in the number of resource asteroids, it is the planet types themselves that determine them. So you have to mod them to get a 100% fair game every time. And yes, I think the Z-positions are either random or set to avoid collisions, and you can't edit them either.

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Darvin3
Join Date 12/2008
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Reply #7 July 13, 2010 10:20:56 PM
from Sins of a Solar Empire ForumsSins of a Solar Empire Forums

but z positions? so that means that all the trouble of calculating coordinates and lane lengths was in vain?

Unless you have drastically different Z-offsets, this isn't a big deal at all.  Your careful planning still leaves you perfectly set out in the X/Y axis.  The most important aspects is the angles of these jumps in the X/Y plane.  The ships will align themselves to the Z-slope of the phase lane at the last second, but for the vast majority of slopes this is only a few degrees and not even noticable.   You'll only see the slight variation if you change your camera angle and look closely.

It is a big deal if you're talking about multiple star systems.  Planets within one star system vary by only a little in the z-axis, but different star systems can be very far offset.  If the the two stars are close enough and you connect planets in different systems with phase lanes, this can lead to very large slopes in the phase lanes, which can cause weird behavior.

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Mister-A
Mister-A
Join Date 07/2010
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Reply #8 July 17, 2010 6:10:20 PM
from Sins of a Solar Empire ForumsSins of a Solar Empire Forums

z is gonna be fine. just one big star system with loads of planets.

problem is i think i figured out what files i need to edit (planet"type". entity, right?), but i haven't figured out what to edit in them. it's just one huge jumbled mess in there and there's no mention whatsoever about resource asteroids or resources anywhere. help?

also, should i create another post in the modding section or can this one be moved there, as it would seem to fit there better (just guessing, i'll leave it to a mod to decide).

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