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Author Topic: Request for modders: add empty systems  (Read 1657 times)

Wyvern

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Request for modders: add empty systems
« on: January 28, 2019, 04:08:48 PM »

One thing I've noticed as I add more faction mods: the core sector expands.  You have to go farther start exploring.  You have to go farther to find pirate and pather bases, and you often end up with a bizarre tangle where one faction's systems are under pirate threat from a base that's completely on the far side of the core.

In vanilla, not only is the core sector relatively small, it also has three (that I can think of offhand) partially-handcrafted uninhabited systems: Duzahk, Penelope's Star, and Nia Tahl.  It would be nice if some faction mods would follow suit, mixing a spare empty system in with their faction's systems.
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Harmful Mechanic

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Re: Request for modders: add empty systems
« Reply #1 on: January 28, 2019, 05:04:42 PM »

Now that I've reworked my Sigma systems, I'm thinking I might add one or two empties in spots I previously claimed for those, but I think a big problem with this is that it's polite to leave room for newer modders to add worlds close to the core. So you'd have to pick good spots but not *too* good, or you'd have to set them up to generate in semi-random locations.

Another option is to have a toggle for your extra empty systems, which is easy enough to rig up.
« Last Edit: January 28, 2019, 05:06:16 PM by Soren »
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Wyvern

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Re: Request for modders: add empty systems
« Reply #2 on: January 29, 2019, 12:10:09 PM »

Hm.  That is... a fair objection.

Maybe the right thing to do is for me to make a mod that builds a few fully-procgen systems deliberately-close to the core worlds?  Might be tricky to get that right; I've seen an occasional issue with overlapping star systems in the DME procgen and it does get very confusing if stars are too close to each other.  (...Note to self: run a few games with -just- DME enabled and see if I can replicate that; I expect having an example of a seed with problems would be useful for trying to fix them.)
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Harmful Mechanic

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Re: Request for modders: add empty systems
« Reply #3 on: January 29, 2019, 03:47:27 PM »

You could also build a mod that places empty systems in locations used by common mods if those mods aren't enabled. Have your system generation scripts do a simple check to see if X mod is enabled or not - if it is, don't spawn those empty systems, if no, populate the starmap with semi- or wholly-procgen empty systems in those locations.
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