Fractal Softworks Forum

Starsector => Mods => Modding => Topic started by: Dark.Revenant on February 11, 2015, 01:33:32 PM

Title: Modding Guidelines
Post by: Dark.Revenant on February 11, 2015, 01:33:32 PM

This post is meant to explain numerous observations, most of which are undocumented and discovered through analysis, trial-and-error, or word of mouth.  Feel free to discuss my findings and suggest more things to add.

Terminology
Should – A recommendation.  Not a huge deal if you deviate, but make sure there's a purpose for it.
Shall – A requirement.  You may deviate only if there is a compelling reason for it.

---

Ship Design

• Sprite:
  • Ship volume should remain reasonably close to the average for its size classification.  A sprite with the visual size of a Dominator is visually recognizable as a cruiser, so the ship's classification ought to be "cruiser," to match.
  • The ship sprite should not be excessively large.  It is difficult to play the game with ships that are too large, the AI can choke, balance becomes an issue, effects can become problematic, etc.
  • Empty (full-alpha) borders on the sprite should be avoided.  However, you should leave 1 pixel on each border, to avoid texture filtering issues in some situations.  The extra pixels potentially use more video memory and can cause the AI to have trouble hitting the ship.  You do not have to edit existing sprites, however (unless it's way off), because you will potentially have to re-do the hull file.
• Layout:
  • Weapon slot count shall not be excessively high.  Frigates do not have large slots.  Destroyers have up to one large slot.  Cruisers have up to two large slots.  Capital ships have up to four large slots.  For broadside ships, like the Conquest, only count one broadside (the larger one, if they are different sizes) for this figure.  These figures do not include built-ins, which can be balanced specifically for a particular ship.  Slight deviation is allowed in compelling circumstances, but too much of this is highly frowned upon.
  • Universal slots shall be considered significantly better than mono-type slots.  The potential for optimized or even game-breaking loadouts is much greater when universal slots are used.  Consider universal slots to be an advantage that compensates for some other weakness, such as below-average slot count/size (see the Doom for an example).
  • Weapon arcs should be kept conservative.  It is a significant advantage to have numerous converging weapon arcs; consider using hardpoints instead of turrets if the ship has numerous overlapping frontal arcs.
  • Weapon arcs shall not break the illusion of shape and depth.  A weapon should not be able to shoot "through" a section of the ship it would not reasonably have line of sight to, given the weapon's "3D" position on the sprite.
  • Universal, Synergy, and Composite slots should be used sparingly.  It is more difficult to balance these slots, and ships with these slot types are more difficult to outfit.  The fact that missiles can be put in these slots can lead to a huge alpha-strike build-up.  It helps to treat them as if they are more powerful Missile slots.
  • Hybrid slots should be used carefully.  Ships with hybrid slots are more difficult to outfit, and hybrid slots cannot be downgraded in size.  However, compared to the other mixed types, Hybrid is not as much of an issue.
  • Hidden weapons should be avoided, except on drones and fighters.  These slots tend to have more issues than other types of slots, especially if missiles are mounted on them.

Ship Stats

• Structure:
  • Armor shall not be excessively high.  Fights with ships that have more than twice the armor of an Onslaught are uninteresting at best, badly broken at worst.
  • Mass should represent the ship's size and perceived weight.  Excessively high or low values can cause strangeness and erroneous collision damage calculations.
  • Hull points should represent the visual size of the sprite.  Durable or fragile ships ought to have hull adjusted up or down, respectively, but the baseline for hull is essentially how meaty the ship looks.
• Ordnance:
  • Ordnance points should be sufficient to install a baseline weapon in every slot.  The baseline minimum is 2 OP for small slots, 8 OP for medium slots, and 16 OP for large slots.
  • Ordnance points for military ships should be sufficient to install a standard weapon in every slot and half-way fill vents and capacitors.  The standard is 5 OP for small slots, 10 OP for medium slots, and 20 OP for large slots; 10 OP for frigates, 20 OP for destroyers, 30 OP for cruisers, and 50 OP for capital ships.  The typical standard is to count the slots, add 5/10/20 OP for each of them (depending on size), and then add 15/30/45/75 OP based on hull size, though some ships will differ (particularly battleships, which add more like 115+).
• Crew:
  • Skeleton crew should not be excessively low compared to vanilla ships of the same classification, unless the ship consumes supplies at an accelerated rate or otherwise has a built-in High Maintenance hull mod.  10 crew on a destroyer is probably not okay.
  • Skeleton crew should not be excessively high compared to vanilla ships of the same classification.  1000 crew on a cruiser is not okay, especially since this makes the half-crew-requirement perk way more powerful.
• Logistics:
  • Fleet points shall represent the ship's combat capability.  Fleet points are used for many internal calculations, especially fleet construction and threat assessment.  Vanilla benchmarks include 6+ for high-tier frigates, 11+ for high-tier destroyers, 16+ for high-tier cruisers, and 26+ for high-tier capital ships.
  • Supplies per deployment shall represent the combat prowess of the ship, compared to vanilla ships of the same classification.
  • CR recovery rate should remain close to vanilla ships of the same classification.  Adjust up or down to a reasonable degree if the ship should seem more or less reliable.
  • Supplies per month should be equivalent to supplies per deployment.
• Flux:
  • Frontal shield arcs shall be a multiple of 2.  Otherwise, omni shield conversion will not divide into a whole number.
  • Shield efficiency shall be reasonable.  In vanilla, extremely good shields have efficiency 0.6, average-to-good shields have efficiency 0.8, poor shields have efficiency 1, and terrible shields have efficiency 1.2 or greater.  Take into account flux capacity; a larger capacity makes for stronger shields.
  • Flux capacity should trend toward vanilla ratios.  These are 12.5x dissipation for frigates, 16.67x dissipation for destroyers, 20x dissipation for cruisers, and 25x dissipation for capital ships.  Adjust depending on balance.
  • Shield arc should be a common angle.  Angles used in vanilla include 45, 90, 120, 150, 160, 180, 270, 300, and 360.
• Travel:
  • Burn speed should fall within vanilla limits.  Fighters: burn 9 to burn 11.  Frigates: burn 9 to burn 11.  Destroyers: burn 8 to burn 9.  Cruisers: burn 7 to burn 8.  Capital Ships: burn 6 to burn 7.  Note that burn 11 is exceedingly rare, reserved for only the best and the fastest ships.  The lower end of the burn range for any given ship class, particularly burn speeds below 8, is considered a significant disadvantage.  Many players would rather have a more expensive, weaker fast ship than a cheap, effective, but slow ship.
  • Hyperspace range should be roughly similar to vanilla.  Average ships travel 40-60 light years, efficient ships travel 80-100 light years, and clunkers travel 20-30 light years.  Tankers are exempt.
  • Fuel per light year should follow vanilla guidelines.  Frigates: 1 fuel per light year.  Destroyers: 2 to 3 fuel per light year.  Cruisers: 3 to 5 fuel per light year.  Capital Ships: 10 to 15 fuel per light year.  Significant deviations can cause metagame issues in the campaign.  Tugs are exempt, but should be around 5 fuel per light year per ship towed.
• Description:
  • All ships and skins shall have a description in descriptions.csv or the .skin file.
  • All ship systems shall have a description in descriptions.csv.
  • The first paragraph of the description shall fit in the mouse-over dialog window without being cut off.
• Price and rarity shall not be considered important balancing stats.  If the ship is simply better than other options in anything but a very minor or superficial way, it ought to be changed -- rare or not.  Logistics stats are a better last-ditch balancing tool.
• Extreme weaknesses shall not be used to counteract extreme strengths.  Weaknesses can be worked around or avoided by a player, while the strengths can be ludicrously maximized with the right tools.  Particularly unusual ships also confuse the AI.
• All ships that can be piloted by the player shall have a ship system.

Hull Files

• Bounds:
  • Ship bounds shall represent a polygon.  Non-polygonal shapes (such as an hourglass made from only four points) cause undefined behavior.  Vertices or edges that overlap are allowed only if the edges do not fully cross over each other.
  • Ship bounds should be simplified in shape to avoid unnecessary points.  Collision detection can be slow if there are too many points on the bounds.  See the Aurora hull file for a good, if somewhat overzealous example.
  • Large hollow areas should be carved out of the ship bounds.  See the Paragon hull file for an example.
  • Overall ship bounds should be convex.  Large concave sections can cause AI issues.
• Radius:
  • The center of the collision radius shall be reasonably exact to the ship's center of mass.
  • The collision circle shall encapsulate the entire ship bounds.
  • The entire shield circle shall be encapsulated by the collision circle.
• Weapons:
  • Modular weapon mounts shall be centered on the graphical slot sprite, except where doing so causes awkward visuals or poor overlaps.
  • Built-in weapons with a painted-on sprite shall have an arc of 0 degrees.
  • Weapons of the same size and type shall not overlap.
  • Hardpoints should have an arc of 5 degrees.  For certain ships or situations with widely-spaced hardpoints, larger arcs (such as 10 degrees) may suffice.
  • Weapon overlap shall have larger weapons placed visually higher on the sprite than smaller weapons.  Larger weapons always render on top of smaller weapons.
  • Weapon overlap should be avoided where possible.  However, sometimes this is unavoidable or is visually acceptable due to the ship's "3D" shape.
• Engines:
  • Custom engine styles shall be defined in engine_styles.json.  Defining inline engine styles causes confusion and is hard to support.
  • Engines should be 1 pixel out from the edge of the sprite.  However, some situations exist where a different distance (typically, towards the ship) is desirable.
  • Engine quantity should be minimized.  If multiple thruster trails could be combined without visual issue, do so; engines are computationally expensive.
• Ships should not use TwigLib.  Use it only when there is a good reason to do so, because using it is a lot of extra work, can cause problems, and is hard to support.

Weapons

• Description:
  • All modular weapons shall have a description and role classification in descriptions.csv.
  • All weapons with the SHOW_IN_CODEX flag shall have a description and role classification in descriptions.csv.
  • All built-in weapons that appear on a ship that can be piloted by the player shall have a description and role classification in descriptions.csv.
  • The first paragraph of the description shall fit in the mouse-over dialog window without being cut off.
  • Built-in weapons that appear on a ship that can be piloted by the player should have the SHOW_IN_CODEX flag, except in situations where this would not be useful (such as for redundant entries, e.g. mirrored weapons, or utility weapons, e.g. those used for TwigLib).
  • System/utility weapons that don't show up in a visible weapon slot and are not otherwise visible or useful to the player shall not have the SHOW_IN_CODEX flag.
  • Weapon role classifications should be standard.  Standard classifications include Assault, Close Support, Fire Support, Strike, Anti-Fighter, Point Defense, and Special.
• Sprite:
  • Non-built-in weapons shall have a turret and a hardpoint version.  The hardpoint version may be the same sprite as the turret version, just aligned differently.
  • Weapon sprite alignment and barrel locations shall be correct.  Remember, the "origin" of a turret is the exact center of the sprite (50% from the bottom and left), and the "origin" of a hardpoint is a quarter-length up the sprite (25% from the bottom and 50% from the left).
  • Weapon sprites shall not be unusually small or large for their slot size.  Deviating from this causes overlap issues in many cases, and can just look silly.  Built-in weapons are exempt.
  • Empty (full-alpha) borders on the sprite should be avoided, except to enforce correct alignment.  However, you should leave 1 pixel on each border, to avoid texture filtering issues in some situations.  The extra pixels potentially use more video memory.  Do not edit existing sprites, however, because you will have to re-do the alignment and barrel offsets.
• Range:
  • Unusually long-ranged ballistic and energy weapons shall have significant drawbacks.  For example, the Gauss Cannon has a elevated OP cost and is inefficient.
  • Ballistic and energy weapons should fall within vanilla range tolerances.  Small weapons are considered long-range at 700-800 range, medium weapons are long-range at 900-1000 range, and large weapons are long-range at 1100-1200 range.
  • Small missile weapons should not be LRMs.  Exercise extreme caution with small LRMs, because they are far more easily massed than other types of missiles.
• Balance:
  • Price and rarity shall not be considered important balancing stats.  If the weapon is simply better than other options in anything but a very minor or superficial way, it out to be changed -- rare or not.  Ordnance Points are a better last-ditch balancing tool.
  • Armor penetration shall be considered an important stat.  Remember: higher damage per shot (or damage per second for a beam) means it penetrates armor better.
  • Burst damage shall be considered an important stat, especially for small and medium weapon slots that one might find on faster ships.
  • Weapon OP costs shall fall broadly near vanilla levels.  Small weapons: 1 to 9 OP.  Medium weapons: 8 to 15 OP.  Large weapons: 16 to 32 OP.  Exceptions may be made for top-tier weapons that are not usually available for purchase.
  • Extreme weaknesses shall not be used to counteract extreme strengths.  Weaknesses can be worked around or avoided by a player, while the strengths can be ludicrously maximized with the right tools.  The AI is also generally incapable of working around the limitations of weapons.
  • Weapons should use vanilla stats as a baseline.  Significant deviations from vanilla weapons should have a corresponding penalty elsewhere, such as slot size, OP, flux cost, range, and so forth.
• Markets:
  • Weapons shall not have tier above 3 or below 0.  The only exception is if the weapon is not intended to be able to be purchased anywhere (except a custom market, presumably).
  • Weapon tier shall reflect how desirable the weapon is.  A top-tier weapon should be tier 3 while cheap/knock-off/degraded/inferior hardware should be tier 0.
  • Weapon prices should be within the same ballpark as similar size/tier/OP vanilla weapons.

DynaSector Compatibility

• Weapon mounts that are intended to be mirrored shall have exactly identical arcs and exactly inverted angles.  For example, if one mount has angle 50 degrees and arc 120 degrees, the angle should be -50 or 310 degrees and the arc should be 120 degrees.  Otherwise, the randomizer will not mirror weapon assignments.
• Non-mirrored weapon mounts (such as the middle of three medium ballistic hardpoints, two different pairs of small missile hardpoints, etc.) should have different angles or arcs.  For example, if mirrored pair A has angle 50/-50 degrees and arc 120 degrees, mirrored pair B should have angle 50.01/-50.01 degrees or arc 120.01 degrees.  Otherwise, the randomizer will mistakenly mirror weapon assignments to these slots.

Title: Re: Modding Guidelines
Post by: Thaago on February 11, 2015, 01:41:01 PM

+1. A good set of guidelines. I especially like the emphasis on universal weapon slots: they are very powerful, especially when multiple mods are combined and the player has access to a huge diversity of weapons.

Title: Re: Modding Guidelines
Post by: Alex on February 11, 2015, 01:51:31 PM

Very nice! Lots of useful information in a very concise form.

Quick comment:

Quote

The shield circle shall encapsulate the entire collision circle.

It's the other way around - any part of the shield that's outside the collision circle will not actually be hit.

Title: Re: Modding Guidelines
Post by: Dark.Revenant on February 11, 2015, 01:56:58 PM

Whoops, I always put the shields as slightly higher than collision radius.  The difference was small enough that it was effectively imperceptible.

Title: Re: Modding Guidelines
Post by: Alex on February 11, 2015, 02:05:03 PM

Yeah, it'd probably just look like shots hitting a little further inside the shields, but that already happens a bit anyway due to how far a shot can move within a single frame.

Title: Re: Modding Guidelines
Post by: Wyvern on February 11, 2015, 02:06:38 PM

One thing I'd like to add:

Shield efficiency and flux capacity are complimentary values; if you need to give a ship a huge flux reserve in order to use its weapons (vanilla example: the Conquest battlecruiser), you should probably also increase the shield efficiency number.  A ship with 10,000 flux capacity and .8 efficiency shields can take exactly as much incoming damage as one with 20,000 flux capacity and 1.6 efficiency shields.  The differences are obvious - the second one can fire twice as much before maxing out on soft flux - and subtle - the first one gains twice as much benefit from ordnance points spent on increasing flux capacity, while the second has a harder time recovering from damage it has taken (assuming the same flux dissipation rate).

Title: Re: Modding Guidelines
Post by: Midnight Kitsune on February 11, 2015, 03:09:31 PM

Sticky Request for this awesome thread!

Title: Re: Modding Guidelines
Post by: Protonus on February 11, 2015, 04:17:22 PM

Well, I'm moving away from the Universal slots anyway. They are quite tedious to begin especially when you have to insert ever-confusing set of weapons to it.

I might also be the blame for the existence of the post but I am actually quite happy to see it exist in some way, since new modders can actually have a reference for once.

Thanks for the guidelines, very much.


Question though: What if the Hull points are already in halve in comparison with armor, since Onslaught is bustling with a ton of hull health already, cutting it in half while double armor still remains similarly effective, yes? Of course, the resistance of armor and hull are taken to consideration.

Title: Re: Modding Guidelines
Post by: Dark.Revenant on February 11, 2015, 04:35:35 PM

Quote from: Protonus on February 11, 2015, 04:17:22 PM

Question though: What if the Hull points are already in halve in comparison with armor, since Onslaught is bustling with a ton of hull health already, cutting it in half while double armor still remains similarly effective, yes? Of course, the resistance of armor and hull are taken to consideration.

Not really.  Some weapons are designed to kill armor no matter what (torpedoes, mostly) and beyond that it seems weird for an entire ship to explode just from shooting a small weak point a few times.  Hull really needs to reflect ship size.

Title: Re: Modding Guidelines
Post by: Wyvern on February 11, 2015, 04:51:19 PM

Yeah; the relationship between hull and armor is rather odd and non-linear, unlike the relationship between flux pool and shield efficiency.

Of course, there are always interesting exceptions, like the Rock Fly from Ironclads; there it makes sense for a ship to have absurd armor and very little hull.  But it has absurd amounts of armor, not just double anything else.

Title: Re: Modding Guidelines
Post by: Tartiflette on February 11, 2015, 05:00:21 PM

Reading that it seems that I bended a lot of rules.... But most of the most important ones are weaker on my ships (weapon mounts, hull, armor, flux dissipation, shield strength) witch compensate for the few stronger ones (speed, flux capacity, fuel consumption).

I only regret there is not much about the weapons themselves, since they are often a bad offender to balance too.

Title: Re: Modding Guidelines
Post by: Protonus on February 11, 2015, 06:09:04 PM

I could trim some of the armor just a little bit, other than that, I guess I am at the right track.

Title: Re: Modding Guidelines
Post by: Dark.Revenant on February 11, 2015, 06:09:49 PM

Added weapon rules.  Might add more later.

Title: Re: Modding Guidelines
Post by: Protonus on February 11, 2015, 06:29:42 PM

Quote from: Dark.Revenant on February 11, 2015, 01:33:32 PM

Small missile weapons should not be LRMs.  Exercise extreme caution with small LRMs, because they are far easily massed than other types of missiles.

I've seen how this plays out. Just have a few set of small LRMs (while still bearing the same damage) can bring a nasty nightmare for anything that is not a fighter/frigate/destroyer out of said fighter/frigate/destroyer.

Should small LRMs exist, they should go damages below SRMs or simply used for distraction purposes.

Title: Re: Modding Guidelines
Post by: etherealblade on February 11, 2015, 07:49:41 PM

This is very helpful to those who are starting anew as well as veterans.  ;D A common core will help everyone's unique mods mesh well with each other and overall enhance our starsector experience.

Title: Re: Modding Guidelines
Post by: Midnight Kitsune on February 11, 2015, 08:25:16 PM

One thing you might add to this is something about drones

Title: Re: Modding Guidelines
Post by: Protonus on February 11, 2015, 08:36:43 PM

Quote from: Midnight Kitsune on February 11, 2015, 08:25:16 PM

One thing you might add to this is something about drones

I was hoping this category would exist.

As what I can see with the current Oculian Berserks being significantly weak on their own, their drones are simply so intimidating for the AI that they'd actually bother these flies first instead of the hosts that have more bite than the drones' bark (which are simply micro-sized PD weapons that only does damages about killing missiles).

EI and I could use some advice... While she recovers from stress.

Title: Re: Modding Guidelines
Post by: Nicke535 on February 12, 2015, 09:00:59 AM

Quote from: Dark.Revenant on February 11, 2015, 01:33:32 PM

Armor shall not be excessively high.  Fights with ships that have more than twice the armor of an Onslaught are uninteresting at best, badly broken at worst.
Mass will represent the ship's size and perceived weight.  Excessively high or low values can cause strangeness and erroneous collision damage calculations.
Hull points should represent the visual size of the sprite.  Durable or fragile ships ought to have hull adjusted up or down, respectively, but the baseline for hull is essentially how meaty the ship looks.

Well...oops.

Would 9000 armor be considered excessive?Even with 2000 hull?I hope not, reworking the Crystanite would be irritating...

On another note; good list of guidelines! It should help new and experienced modders alike.


*Cough* Even though i will go ahead and break most of the rules *Cough* *Cough*

Title: Re: Modding Guidelines
Post by: Tartiflette on February 12, 2015, 09:37:01 AM

The only things missing are,
Prices and rarity are NOT a meaningful balancing factor for strong ships and weapons, they only encourage grinding.
Extreme weaknesses do NOT compensate extreme strengths because they can always be exploited by a player and not the AI.
This is especially true when said strengths are one of the most important balancing factors: speed, range, shield efficiency, alpha strike damage. Extreme strengths also tend to become ridiculous with skills and hullmods, and reciprocally weaknesses can be compensated.

Title: Re: Modding Guidelines
Post by: HELMUT on February 12, 2015, 10:36:52 AM

Quote from: Tartiflette on February 12, 2015, 09:37:01 AM

Extreme weaknesses do NOT compensate extreme strengths because they can always be exploited by a player and not the AI.
This is especially true when said strengths are one of the most important balancing factors: speed, range, shield efficiency, alpha strike damage. Extreme strengths also tend to become ridiculous with skills and hullmods, and reciprocally weaknesses can be compensated.

+1

People should be extra-careful about going into extremes stats, it's either not balanced or not fun. You can't just crank stat A up to 11 and lower stat B for the balance, it won't work. I played a bunch of mods that tried this and it was... Frustratingly un-fun.

As DR said, you have to get on the same level as the base game. The further from vanilla you are, the trickier it'll get to make it balanced/fun.

Title: Re: Modding Guidelines
Post by: Protonus on February 12, 2015, 09:40:24 PM

Quote from: Dark.Revenant on February 11, 2015, 01:33:32 PM

Ship Design

• The ship sprite will not be excessively large.  It is difficult to play the game with ships that are too large, the AI can choke, balance becomes an issue, effects can become problematic, etc.

"Oh my. The Galactic Empire may not approve of this outfit when they launch their star-fighters in front of those monstrosities."


Well, anyway, there are a lot of huge ships already in the community, also me. Mostly.


"What's the fun in that without those oversized buckets of metal raining upon the battlefield?"

Title: Re: Modding Guidelines
Post by: Lcu on February 12, 2015, 10:37:43 PM

Quote from: Dark.Revenant on February 11, 2015, 01:33:32 PM

Ship Design

• Sprite:
  • Empty (full-alpha) borders on the sprite will be avoided.  The extra pixels potentially use more video memory and can cause the AI to have trouble hitting the ship.  You do not have to edit existing sprites, however (unless it's way off), because you will potentially have to re-do the hull file.

I don't quite understand this rule, can someone provide a deeper explanation? Especially, what is the "full-alpha borders" that was talked about?

Title: Re: Modding Guidelines
Post by: Protonus on February 12, 2015, 10:49:46 PM

He is referring to the png sprites you are using, as you notice them when you start making a size as canvas for your ship.

Those excess spaces should be avoided not only because it can eat up some memory, but it can also be slightly confusing when you have them dealt with on the Ship Editor.

Like this ship for example.
(http://i62.tinypic.com/zoe4pv.jpg)
Notice how close the text are with the ship, this is the good example.

Edit: Minus the excessive weapon mounts, my "friend" wants them that way for some reason.

Title: Re: Modding Guidelines
Post by: celestis on February 19, 2015, 11:26:03 PM

Quote

All ships that can be piloted by the player will have a ship system.

Hmm... Why? WHat's wrong in piloting low-end cheap ship with no system?

Title: Re: Modding Guidelines
Post by: Dark.Revenant on February 19, 2015, 11:26:41 PM

Even the Hound has flares.

Title: Re: Modding Guidelines
Post by: LB on February 25, 2015, 11:13:11 PM

SS+ compatibility: include null checks as necessary to avoid NPE crashes for code interacting with shields, to account for ships that don't have shields or ships using Shield Bypass. I suspect Sundog is not the only person to have stepped on this particular issue; it might just have gone unnoticed elsewhere because Shield Bypass is such a niche option. This might also apply to things other than shields in the API, I didn't look closely.

A guideline on logistics to flight deck ratio would also be useful. It seems to be around 4 logistics per deck, +/- the ship's individual combat utility and survivability.

Title: Re: Modding Guidelines
Post by: Dayshine on March 17, 2015, 11:41:11 AM

Quote from: Dark.Revenant on February 11, 2015, 01:33:32 PM

Ships should not use TwigLib.  Use it only when there is a good reason to do so, because using it is a lot of extra work, can cause problems, and is hard to support.

So, I'm looking at using TwigLib for "Ships" that only exist inside a custom BattleCreation/Encounter setup. I haven't quite got a grip on how TwigLib interfaces with other mods yet, could you clarify in what situations you've seen it cause issues?

Title: Re: Modding Guidelines
Post by: Tartiflette on March 17, 2015, 01:00:55 PM

It's a sound advice rather than a rule set in stone. Twig ships are a lot of extra work, and scripted weapons can react weirdly to it if they don't check for Twig before applying their effect: For example a weapon that move a ship won't work unless it directly hit the parent ship, a weapon that hit all ships in an area might hit all the subships in addition to the parent ship... So don't use it for the sake of it.

Title: Re: Modding Guidelines
Post by: MesoTroniK on March 17, 2015, 03:16:35 PM

I would also like to add to Tartiflette's point by mentioning that Twig Ships will mess with autofire AI especially PD weapons.

Title: Re: Modding Guidelines
Post by: whatdoesthisbuttondo on April 16, 2015, 06:23:33 AM

Thank you, nice resource that probably should be a sticky. One small question though:

Quote from: Dark.Revenant on February 11, 2015, 01:33:32 PM

• Hidden weapons should be avoided, except on drones and fighters.  These slots tend to have more issues than other types of slots, especially if missiles are mounted on them.

Can you elaborate a bit on this one?

I have a ship design that kinda depends on having two hidden, built-in weapon slots (hull-mounted phase lances that are supposed to always come with the ship and cannot be removed).

Having them as standard (non-hidden) slots looks really awkward and out of place on the sprite, so I integrated parts of the phase lance sprite directly into the hull sprite.

So far everything seems to work as intended when using hidden slots, although getting the position right was a bit iffy.

What problems should I be looking out for, specifically with beam weapons?

Title: Re: Modding Guidelines
Post by: Tartiflette on April 16, 2015, 07:42:10 AM

Hidden mount weapons can't be disabled by EMP or battle damage, that makes them stronger than other types of mounts. Also most missiles weapons don't have:
"renderHints":[RENDER_LOADED_MISSILES_UNLESS_HIDDEN],
and loaded missile appear on top of the ship.

It's less a problem for buit-in weapons as you can balance your ship accordingly, but the best would probably be to make a different phase lance for your ship with no sprite assigned, even if it has the same stats, and flag it as "SYSTEM" to prevent it from spawning in markets and cluttering the codex.

Title: Re: Modding Guidelines
Post by: Dark.Revenant on April 16, 2015, 07:54:40 AM

Hidden is fine for built in weapons, but remember they can't be damaged/disabled while using the hidden type.

Title: Re: Modding Guidelines
Post by: whatdoesthisbuttondo on April 16, 2015, 03:38:45 PM

Ah thank you. I'll have to walk the extra mile then I guess, invulnerable weapons would be too much of an advantage.

Title: Re: Modding Guidelines
Post by: Harmful Mechanic on April 16, 2015, 03:52:44 PM

Also, I'm not sure if this is still an issue, but installing a weapon with a scripted animation in a hidden slot can sometimes crash the game.

Title: Re: Modding Guidelines
Post by: MesoTroniK on April 16, 2015, 04:20:43 PM

Quote from: Soren on April 16, 2015, 03:52:44 PM

Also, I'm not sure if this is still an issue, but installing a weapon with a scripted animation in a hidden slot can sometimes crash the game.

Is easy to fix, unless the sound is also scripted in which case it is slightly more complicated.

Title: Re: Modding Guidelines
Post by: Alex on April 17, 2015, 02:28:48 PM

Curious, what's the crash? Might be able to fix it up on my end.

Title: Re: Modding Guidelines
Post by: Tartiflette on July 29, 2015, 01:08:01 AM

A new one: Fighters must have all their weapons buit-in or those might appear in the battle loot, even if they have the "SYSTEM" flag.

Also, I think this should be stickied in the modding resources.

Title: Re: Modding Guidelines
Post by: Midnight Kitsune on August 30, 2015, 10:56:38 PM

Quote from: Tartiflette on July 29, 2015, 01:08:01 AM

A new one: Fighters must have all their weapons buit-in or those might appear in the battle loot, even if they have the "SYSTEM" flag.

Also, I think this should be stickied in the modding resources.

An add on to this: Even system weapons can be recovered from fighters if they are scuttled. Or at least the Templar fighter clarents

Title: Re: Modding Guidelines
Post by: Zaphide on February 11, 2016, 07:12:51 PM

There is definitely some good stuff in here, but the section on burn speeds is a little out of date I think.

Also, it would be great to have a bit of consensus on the 'value' of flight decks. I have seen 4 - 6 small mounts equivalents per flight deck but I'm not sure really.

Quote

Warning: this topic has not been posted in for at least 120 days.
Unless you're sure you want to reply, please consider starting a new topic.

I think this could do with a reply rather than starting a new topic... :)

Title: Re: Modding Guidelines
Post by: HELMUT on February 12, 2016, 01:41:47 AM

Quote from: Zaphide on February 11, 2016, 07:12:51 PM

Also, it would be great to have a bit of consensus on the 'value' of flight decks. I have seen 4 - 6 small mounts equivalents per flight deck but I'm not sure really.

I always considered two small mounts as equivalent to one medium, and two medium equivalent to one large, which is equivalent to a single launch bay. Of course, it's not purely mathematical, it depends on the ship, the weapon layout, the stats and other things... But it's roughly that.

By the way, this thread should be sticked on the top. It's too handy to be let disappear in the depth of the modding sub-forum

Title: Re: Modding Guidelines
Post by: Tartiflette on February 12, 2016, 02:09:43 AM

Quote from: HELMUT on February 12, 2016, 01:41:47 AM

By the way, this thread should be sticked on the top. It's too handy to be let disappear in the depth of the modding sub-forum

I second that!

Title: Re: Modding Guidelines
Post by: Zenobious on May 17, 2017, 07:33:48 PM

Now that fighter bays are a weapon mount that takes up OP, is there a recommendation for what amount of OP each should receive, as there is for the other weapon mount sizes? Scrolling through the list of fighter options suggests to me an average value somewhere around 10-12 but I would love to hear other people's opinions.

Title: Re: Modding Guidelines
Post by: Dark.Revenant on May 17, 2017, 07:39:30 PM

0 OP.  I'm serious.

Title: Re: Modding Guidelines
Post by: Alex on May 17, 2017, 07:52:40 PM

In vanilla, carrier OP are balanced around 10 OP per fighter bay.

Title: Re: Modding Guidelines
Post by: Dark.Revenant on May 17, 2017, 07:55:13 PM

Maybe *now*, they are, but in a pre-talon-nerf world...

Title: Re: Modding Guidelines
Post by: Alex on May 17, 2017, 07:56:44 PM

Well, yeah :)

By "balanced", I mean more "carrier OP are calculated using that", not necessarily actually balanced.

I do think that a few fighters are skewing the perception of fighters overall rather heavily, though.

Title: Re: Modding Guidelines
Post by: ambalika on November 30, 2017, 03:07:51 PM

Is there a list, anywhere, of size guidelines for ships? Like appropriate pixels?

Title: Re: Modding Guidelines
Post by: Dark.Revenant on November 30, 2017, 09:31:18 PM

Code

[Ca] Paragon - 73,625
[Ca] Astral - 73,404
[Ca] Onslaught - 65,470
[Ca] Legion - 59,475
[Ca] Prometheus - 57,120
[Ca] Conquest - 53,392
[Ca] Atlas - 49,740
[Ca] Odyssey - 40,722
[Cr] Colossus - 32,322
[Cr] Rampart - 30,446
[Cr] Doom - 29,640
[Cr] Colossus Mk.II - 28,240
[Cr] Colossus Mk.III - 28,224
[Cr] Dominator - 27,122
[Cr] Mora - 26,971
[Cr] Starliner - 25,178
[Cr] Apogee - 24,448
[Cr] Aurora - 23,845
[Cr] Venture - 23,518
[Cr] Heron - 22,940
[Cr] Eagle - 22,541
[Cr] Brilliant - 22,141
[Cr] Gryphon - 20,872
[De] Phaeton - 18,999
[Cr] Falcon - 18,464
[De] Valkyrie - 16,474
[De] Berserker - 16,610
[De] Scintilla - 15,633
[De] Fulgent - 15,438
[De] Gemini - 15,206
[De] Tarsus - 14,288
[De] Nebula - 14,062
[De] Condor - 13,953
[De] Mule - 13,598
[De] Harbinger - 13,454
[De] Medusa - 12,622
[De] Enforcer - 12,342
[De] Bastillon - 12,233
[De] Buffalo - 11,919
[De] Drover - 11,784
[De] Hammerhead - 11,702
[De] Sunder - 10,675
[De] Salvage Rig - 10,174
[De] Buffalo Mk.II - 9,304
[Fr] Dram - 7,676
[Fr] Wayfarer - 7,089
[Fr] Scarab - 6,514
[Fr] Centurion - 6,087
[Fr] Cerberus - 5,946
[Fr] Afflictor - 5,707
[Fr] Lumen - 5,368
[Fr] Monitor - 5,113
[Fr] Shade - 4,790
[Fr] Shepherd - 4,410
[Fr] Brawler - 4,402
[Fr] Mudskipper - 4,118
[Fr] Mudskipper Mk.II - 4,006
[Fr] Lasher - 3,956
[Fr] Vigilance - 3,954
[Fr] Ox - 3,934
[Fr] Glimmer - 3,862
[Fr] Tempest - 3,380
[Fr] Mercury - 3,258
[Fr] Defender - 3,148
[Fr] Hermes - 3,138
[Fr] Wolf - 3,110
[Fr] Kite - 3,052
[Fr] Omen - 3,037
[Fr] Kite (S) - 3,046
[Fr] Hyperion - 2,952
[Fr] Hound - 2,951
[Fr] Warden - 2,861
[Fr] Picket - 2,076
[Fr] Sentry - 1,954
[Fi] Trident - 839
[Fi] Zyphos - 838
[Fi] Khopesh - 828
[Fi] Gladius - 760
[Fi] Longbow - 667
[Fi] Flash - 654
[Fi] Mining Pod - 583
[Fi] Piranha - 579
[Fi] Lux - 566
[Fi] Thunder - 554
[Fi] Warthog - 547
[Fi] Claw - 543
[Fi] Broadsword - 536
[Fi] Dagger - 451
[Fi] Spark - 389
[Fi] Talon - 340
[Dr] Terminator - 234
[Dr] Borer - 188
[Fi] Wasp - 173
[Dr] PD Drone - 92

Title: Re: Modding Guidelines
Post by: Harmful Mechanic on February 16, 2018, 07:50:29 PM

Here's a new one for the list: be careful about built-in weapons on carriers. The competition between weapons and fighter bays for OP is a big part of carrier balance, and the less of it you have to do, the easier it is to produce inherently overpowered or underpowered carriers.

Title: Re: Modding Guidelines
Post by: Jackundor on October 07, 2021, 06:14:55 AM

I have read this Tutorial and Shall follow it in all Starsector modding endeavors i undertake to the best of my abilities

i have however, a question

Quote

Price and rarity shall not be considered important balancing stats.  If the weapon is simply better than other options in anything but a very minor or superficial way, it out to be changed -- rare or not.  Ordnance Points are a better last-ditch balancing tool.

Shall this also apply to modded [REDACTED] weaponry of which only a limited quantity is available? Can you even add [REDACTED] weaponry with mods?

Title: Re: Modding Guidelines
Post by: SafariJohn on October 07, 2021, 07:28:41 AM

"Rare" and "expensive" weapons (Mjolnir, for example) are not in the same category as "limited quantity" weapons like [REDACTED]. Since you can produce the former, at some point their rarity and cost becomes irrelevant.