Advice? Adding new Stellar Ability Types

Fyron · #2 May 6th, 2003, 06:33 PM

Can you post a zip file containing SystemTypes.txt, StellarAbilityTypes.txt, and PlanetSize.txt, so we can see exactly what is causing the error? You are probably calling for a "planet name" in SystemTypes.txt instead of a "planet size". The "planet name and size" are in PlanetType.txt.

Stormwaltz · #3 May 6th, 2003, 06:45 PM

I didn't know how or where to upload files here, so I put the zip on my own webspace. I hope that's okay. You can find it here.

Thanks for the help. ^_^

Fyron · #4 May 6th, 2003, 06:54 PM

You can upload files to the first forum Category on Shrapnel, entitles Scenarios\Mods Uploads or something like that. Make sure to upload files in there in the proper threads. Now to look at your files.

Fyron · #5 May 6th, 2003, 07:12 PM

I know changing the Stellar Ability Types works. I did so in FQM for planets in Ancient quadrants so they have more ruins. I can not see a problem with your files, but SE4 definitely does not like them.

Fyron · #6 May 6th, 2003, 07:21 PM

Well this is weird....

I changed all the asteroid names in PlanetSize.txt to fit with the size. Now, Se4 makes asteroids with pics. But, their type is listed as "None - ", with no size. And they have no name displayed on the system map. Very weird...

I think that it might be a hardcode issue with Asteroid objects. I can not see any difference between what you did and what I did with Ancient Planets in FQM, and those work fine. Send a bug report email to [email protected] along with your modded data files. Hopefully this is a bug that MM can fix for us.

Ok... if you change the names of the types in StellarAbilityTypes.txt to not have the words used as size classes (tiny, small, etc.) in the name, then you get asteroids with appropriate pics, abilities, and everything, except that their Type is listed as "Rock - ". So, this is the best solution I can find at present. Still send in a bug report to MM.

[ May 06, 2003, 18:47: Message edited by: Imperator Fyron ]

Stormwaltz · #7 May 6th, 2003, 07:44 PM

And I thought this would be a simple little tweak to get my moddin' feet wet with. ^_^; Thanks much for the help; I'll send that report.

Fyron · #8 May 6th, 2003, 07:47 PM

Also, Geoschmo has confirmed that specifying a specific asteroid size in SystemTypes.txt with normal StellarAbilityTypes.txt causes the exact same problem we get with your files. This problem gets weirder and weirder...

This should be a simple tweak, but there seems to be some bugs with Asteroids that don't crop up very often (as most people don't mod these files much).

[ May 06, 2003, 18:49: Message edited by: Imperator Fyron ]

geoschmo · #9 May 6th, 2003, 07:57 PM

You can have your various types of asteroids that do different damage in the stellar abilities file if you want. But apparently to get it to work right you have to disaccociate the stellar ability type from the size of the asteroid. Doesn't really do what you wnat, I know, btu that is all we can come up with right now.

We had a similer problem adding new types of planet sizes. Not exactly what you are doing here, but a similer symptom. We were able to work around that eventually. Something might come up for this too after we think about it a while.

Geoschmo