Would anyone like the definitions?

I've looked a bit around trying to mod a few things. The hardest things to mod appear to be the buffs. There are a LOT of buffs, which do a lot of things, and each of them seems to be hard coded in their own way. Making a new buff means you need to make several files, and get the dependencies correct. I found it very frustrating to look at that and figure out how to work with it.

I also found that special effects(such as for weapons and abilities) in general were very difficult to work with. Each weapon type seems to have its own associated data architecture, and buffs seem to do things their own way. Without really understanding how that works on the inside, I think it'd be too tough for a typical modder to figure out how to make special effects work.

Modding game numbers is EASY. Even if you don't know how to do that advanced stuff, tweaking the game balance is a piece of cake. Large scale tweaking means that you'd have to open a LOT of files to work with, and that can be pretty tedious. Some of the advanced modders have said that they make their own tools to take some of the grind out of sifting the data.

This is exactly why I am requesting that they live up to their advertising. I am completing some complex mods that require a host of files, and getting all the cascading variables correct is frustrating. When 7 Sins 1.3 comes out you will see what can be done, but it takes a long time to figure out if it works like it is worded, and then using trial and error to match modifiers. The worst is when you are using a file or group of called files that they made a mistake in. This can waste days debugging the problem.

Some of the others have been doing the Dev's work for them, so check out WWW Link for a fairly complete list. Unfortunately it does not have much in the way of what combinations are illegal.

Thanks for replying, it shows that there is more than just one modder who would like this information.

This may sound like a stupid question but what exactly are the forge suite tools. I understand that they are for modding but how would they work??

"Ironclad fully endorses the modding of its games for non-profit purposes. The Iron Engine is completely data-driven, has an embedded Lua Scripting Engine with console access, and is supported by the Forge Tool Suite. Modding instructions and the Forge Tool Suite will be provided."

Unfortunately the promise of the full Forge Tool Suite, which they developed to create the game is being delayed again. Supposedly until patch 1.1 rolls out, but since they are working on an Expansion Pack instead of living up to their advertisements, it is unlikely that we will get the full tools for quite some time, if at all. I can guarantee that I will not buy the expansion until I have the tools.

All we have right now is the Beta version of Galaxy Forge. The XSI conversion tool is no longer useful since they started providing the text versions of their files, instead of binary, for which I thank them. So it is not a suite, it is just the one tool.

Galaxy Forge is just for the basic setup of systems (planets, stars, jump lanes, starting ships, etc.). It will not allow any editing of stats for ships, races, research, or anything else that qualifies as modding to most of us.

You can find an excellent guide here that is a must read before using it:
Galaxy Forge Guide

The full suite should have a graphical interface, so that you can easily see all the various parts of what you want to edit. So for example, if I wanted to edit one of the special abilities to create a new version, say a defensive lightening field, then it would show me the original file with all the files that it calls (uses). This way you would be sure to have all the files you need for your new ability. It would also limit each variable to a proper range, so that illegal settings could not be used, preventing crashing. If it was an excellent suite, it would even have pop-up descriptions of each variable, but that is pretty rare in tool suites.

Think of any webpage that you have registered on (like this one) with a combination of scroll boxes with values (e.g. Birthday Year), and text boxes (e.g. Name). It should also have a debugger to check the file for syntax errors.

Personally, I think the best thing for the devs to do would be to release the tools before 1.1. That way modders can get full conversions done sooner and if 1.1 takes forever, the SINS gaming community can be 'held over' with mods until 1.1 or the expansion comes out.

Nobody's working on an expansion. All that's been said is that the game did well enough to merit one, and we have some ideas about what we'd like to put in it. IC has been working on patches and getting stuff ready for the Euro release; there's only so much they can do at once with nine people.

Thank you Kryo for paying attention to us modders.
As you can see, we have been screaming for some help.

DANMAN

"Stardock President and CEO Brad Wardell revealed that an expansion for the game is coming in the reasonably near future. While he couldn't nail down a date for the expansion pack's release, Mr. Wardell did mention that the expansion would include some much-requested features including a "full on campaign" mode as well as new playable factions."
blog.wired.com/games/2008/04/sins-of-a-solar.html
www.shacknews.com
http://ve3d.ign.com/articles/news/37859/Sins-of-a-Solar-Empire-Expansion-Revealed

Sorry you are the last to find this out kryo, I guess frogboy forgot to send out the memo. Ironclad has even released screen shots of new ships. All I am asking for is the text from the game doc that covers this, not the tools. Hopefully this can be sorted out soon, before I have to pursue other avenues.

Edit: Now I am asking for the binary .mesh to text .mesh converter as well.

Thanks for responding!

FourAces,

Canada

power to the modders!  :CONGRAT: 

Blair Fraser: Sins is very mod-able. Within two days of the launch of our first beta we had people adding new ships, changing weapon layouts, modifying galaxy settings and so on - without any help from us. Closer to release we will be issuing our in-house tool suite which will make it even that much easier. Players can already add their own factions, design their own planets, solar systems, ships, technologies, weapons, special abilities, etc. We fully expect that complete conversion mods will be available following release. We have taken care to listen carefully to what modders are requesting to make their creations come to life.

Thanks bandw2!

I would like some new tools as well

I just found an older thread where the DEVs have been asked for this for some time with no response. More Requests

Thanks CanadaMan for helping out, and thanks to Terraziel, Annatar11, and Bink Sayres for asking well before I started.

I understand the reason to go back on the advertised release of the full tool suite (expansion), but to withhold the definitions and variable lists is not acceptable. Please rectify this soon SD/IC.

They really need to step up and give us some additional support, especially the definitions.

DANMAN

The next tool to be released is Particle Forge.

Thanks A lot.

Sweet. Any idea on a timeline?

Can you make a game of, say, Intergalactic Checkers with the engine

in other words, can I completely gut the game and make an entirely new game that likes to display things in 3D, or would I be stuck with the checkers going through phase-lanes to get to their squares?

Thanks Craig! The new tools are great, and the ability swap between binary and text files helps alot!

Helioforge, you are one sick puppy. Although, it is possible to generate a holographic style checkerboard using particles. Playing would be outside the scope of the main code of the game.

How about a nice game of Chess???