the ultimate modding support suggestion thread

hi all! i was thinking of making a thread with all modding support suggestions, so that we have all in one place.

here you can come with ideas and suggestions regarding the modding section of the game.

some suggestions are possibly possible, while others are ideas that are currently impossible, maybe in GSB2

i´d like to start with some ideas of my own:

hero class hulls
basicly the ability to add a line of code in the hull txt so that you can only have ONE of that hull type in each battle

moddable ship classes
this have been said before. basicly the ability to name a new shipclass like dreadnought, corvette, station… and so on. and be able to make unique modules for these.

moddable bullet effects
the ability to add a new bullet .dds for custom bullets.

feel free to post your own suggestion

Uhm this post says everything what i want so, just one thing, a hero ship not hear well, this is a sci-fi space game, not a medieval game like warcraft, what about a more appropriate term as “Flagship”?

yeah but i was thinking of being able to put it on every ship class including fighters.

so if you were to make a star wars mod, you wold only be able to build one millennium falcon, and if i would make that mod i would make the falcon a fighter. doesnt really fit the disscription “flagship”

but ofcourse the code could do that too.

Just call them Unique Ships for now. Avoids the extra meaning that people attach to the other words.

Instead of Necroing an old thread - i will just post a link.
viewtopic.php?f=25&t=5340&p=35791#p35674

Quick rundown of what i wished for:

• Area Effect Weapons
• Salvos for Missiles and Plasma
• Tractor Beams that can deal damage
• More hull varieties
• Repulsar beam that can push ships away (out of minimum range of your weapons, and maybe deal damage)
• Multiple race restrictions (restrict a weapon so that it is only avaliable to the empire and alliance)
• Ability to stop a modded race having access to the standard weapons (make a new race that does not use the standard weapons)
• Weapon Upgrade system ( a weapon file has multiple versions in upgrade order - this way you do not clutter up the interface with all the varients)

i have another one

multiple race ships
sort of like mercenarys that are avalable to all races.

weapon firing arc
like if you want a weapon to only fire forward or broadside or even backwards. like this:

targeting arc start: 180 targeting arc end: 190

this would allow the weapon to fire between 180 and 190 degrees of the ship.

this would require new set of orders too. like broadside, would make the ship possition with its side towards the ship its targeting.

hope this makes sense

Oh sorry guys i forget to announce this, Praetorian Industries will have private and published version applied to some ships and some weapons, What is that?

Well since Praetorian Ind, is a, well, a industrie or company, it is selling new hulls and modules to other races but they have a secret, The published versions of the modules are not the most powerful or the lastest technology, those are the privated versions, every private hull and module are a little more powerful than the published versions.
If you think it, it’s the perfect plan, when you want to win a war, you need resourses, Praetorian Industries is gaining credits selling the “most newest” technologies, but in secret the companie saves for his own usage the best versions, then, no matter how many weapons, systems or ships buy each race, they never will exceed the power of the Praetorian Ind. Fleet, and at the same time, more they buy, more powerful Praetorian Ind is.

Firing arcs were already suggested in the past but Cliff stated that they would require rewriting the AI behaviour. It’s good to see this suggestion coming back

As already there has been a bunch of much needed features suggested I’ll stick to the one I feel it is most needed to make me happy.

[size=150]Fully explosion customization[/size]

I know you can already mod existing ones, I mostly refer to be able to add new ones. I know their effects depend on the files in particleconfigs but I am unable to add new functional explosions via the explosions folder D:
Maybe I’m doing something wrong but modding the existing explosions of that folder has the desired gratuitous effects =D

Maybe one more hard point type (ie a triangle or octogon) . . Place it over those ships that have the guns already drawn on (ie most rebel ships)

i actually thought of that exact thing some time ago, but i forgot about it ^^

seriusly, even the same shapes

spooky…

If cliffsky do that, he will need to make new “arc range” values

I would second the multiple race restriction and exclusion of base weapons in modded races. I was going to suggest firing arcs myself, but then I thought about how to implement it and realised it would be a major overhaul of the AI. People would have to start getting a lot more specific with their orders too.

as i said when i made this thread: some are suggestions that might be possible and others are at the moment impossible and may be suggestions for the next game.

that said, i have another suggestion:

buff modules
a module that creates a bubble of buffs that the modder decides.

example: a targeting computer for cruisers. this module enhance the tracking speed of all friendly weapons in its range.

the buff module could do other buffs too like a shield boost for ships around it.

this would create opportunities for support cruisers and frigates.

tell me whatya think

Variable to camouflage to set how effective the camouflage is.

So we can create a proper camouflage module that’s worth spending on ships.

custom plasma effect

same thing as the bullet dds, but with super heated plasma!

Yea , i want a dam perfect fited photon torpedo , sigh.

I had a lot of suggestions in the past, but for now i can only remember:

To restric some type modules to a specific slot. Of course, this requires , as the previous sugesstion, maybe 1 or 2 more different type slots. So for example, if u make a ship and wants to place the engines ONLY in the spceific engine slot, thats the way u will never see again a ship with an engine over the bridge spot -.- and this makes the modding more interesting and with more possibilities.

Faced shields - Like in the mitic “Star Trek Starfleet Command II”, shields that can be damaged in front, side or back. This will introduce a new era of game playing, and of course will be one of the hardest additions to make.

More music files at the beginning of the battles, or just a little music file before the main ost. This can be use, for example to introduce some scenarios or make epic introductions -.-

something i think would improve the game a lot its to be able to choose wich weapons to use against each class when u choose the range and priority.

i hate to see my cruisers shooting everything at fighters

Join the club. There’s a rather long line to get in, though.

multiple sound files
when making a bullet weapon for instance and you make it fire really fast, it can be quite dull to hear one sound effect over and over and over… well you ge the point.

something like this

sound = data/sounds/laser_turret_shot3.ogg,data/sounds/laser_turret_shot4.ogg

and then a line that decides whether we want it to play in order or play random

soundplay = 1 (yes, it will play in order) soundplay = 0 (it will play randomly)

Really Really good idea man, that would be something very usefull and it can add more awesomeness to the game