Ship Modding - Slots

[Noir_CZ]

Hi;
So I fiddled with SS ... wait...really? SS? Anyway.... fiddled with it after reading stuff about modding on here...
And I thought that well... lets be frank I am a bit of a munchkin and I don't like the idea that I spent 7 days on obtaining the Steam Yach only to realize that it lacks in the slots department (yes I am that stupid).
I could not find any info on how to mod that so I did a bit of digging and seems I managed to figure out how to add slots onto a ship. I just killed the crab monster with aft weapon on the starting ship.

Would you people be interested in the step-by-step how to do that? (Though of course it would be At your own risk)

[aardvarkpepper]

By the way, you can see ahead of time what slots are available on a ship if you look in the ship market.

[Redbull102]

A guide would be nice.

[Dr. Bones]

i would love a guide on how to do that! can you also make engines more fuel-effecient?

[Noir_CZ]

Alright then.
Things I used:
Notepad++ downloaded from https://notepad-plus-plus.org/download/v6.7.9.2.html - it makes viewing the safefiles easier. (I have CZ enviroment, will try to guess what the English equivavelnts are.)
Plugins from notepad - JSTool - for viewing JSON files in better format

You could do it with any other text editor, even notepad or something like that. It is just what I used so

1) Download and install (or just unzip the no-install version) of Notepad++
2) Run the Plugin manager from Plugins -> Plugin Manager -> Show Plugin Manager
3) Install the JSTool plugin. It will ask you to restart the Notepad++. As one famous captain says: "Make it so."

(untill the point 4) this will be explanation of what I did)
Now when you run the Notepad++ you can open the json files of Sunless Sea. On Windows they are located usually on your
system_drive\users\"your_user_name"\AppData\LocalLow\Failbetter Games\Sunless Sea\..

First I used the file entities\qualitis.json so when you load it in the Notepad++ it is just a single long line.
Use the menu
Plugins -> JSTool -> Json Viewer
to turn on the side panel to view the JSON tree and then run the
Plugins -> JSTool -> JSFormat
That should format the file from single file to nicely structured. Then in the Json Viewer I looked for "deck" which should give you just one result, If you look for deck, without the " around, it will give you several results. The thing is that most of them are either some event or something (eg node 132) or a weapon (eg node ), You can tell by looking athe value at image and tag. The image will say eg caimpainger2 or the weapon image value will say gun_purple. And the tag is either null or Equipment - Deck. So best bet is to go for "Deck"
The thing I looked for was the node 172, which told me I found Ship Equipment Slot. I made a note of ID for the Deck which was 102966 and then went to look more, this time for the Aft slot. You can find either by looking for Tag called "Ship Equipment Slot" and then cycle through or look right aways for name value "Aft" It pointed me to node 93 and told me that the ID for the Aft slot is 102965 yaaay

4) Run your game, load your safe file, unequip all your weapons (for some reason the game went bonkers with something equipped), save and exit
5) MAKE A COPY OF YOUR SAVE FILE from the folder saves
6) MAKE SURE YOU HAVE A BACKUP OF YOUR SAVE FILE
7) DOUBLE CHECK YOU HAVE YOUR SAFE FILE
8) Open the save file in the Notepad++ and run viewer side panel Plugins -> JSTool -> Json Viewer
9) Try to format the code of your save file with Plugins -> JSTool -> JSFormat
(if you switch between files or so, be sure to use Refresh function from the json tool side panel)
10) Expand the node QualitiesPossessedList : [Array] near the bottom in the side panel, It will give you a number of options, search for 102966, that will make it look for the deck, It will be probably the node 8, the ID value should read 102966. Node 9 should have ID 102964, thats Deck slot. If you stripped both Deck and Bridge of equipment, it should look like on the Picture in the attachments. In the main window you should be around line 22458. Both nodes should be virtually the same, except for the AssociatedQualityID value.
11) Copy the text of one of the nodes so eg. the deck slot (simply, duplicate one of the slots)
, {
"Name" : null,
"EquippedPossession" : null,
"Relationships" : [],
"XP" : 0,
"EffectiveLevelModifier" : 0,
"TargetQuality" : null,
"TargetLevel" : null,
"CompletionMessage" : null,
"Level" : 1,
"AssociatedQuality" : null,
"AssociatedQualityId" : 102966,
"QualityName" : null,
"QualityDescription" : null,
"QualityImage" : null,
"QualityNature" : null,
"QualityCategory" : null,
"QualityAllowedOn" : null,
"Id" : 0
}
in between those two and change the ID from 102966 to 102965 which is changing it from Deck Slot to Aft Slot.
12) Save the file (don't worry, the game should handle the slight formatting change, if not, well you have backup right?)

note: The Forward slot should ID 102968

Let me know if it worked and you managed to add the slots you needed. The second screenshot in attachement is my Steam Yacht from curator with an aft weapon... Now I only have to decide what to do... play vanilla or be an ass and use modded ship... because I like the yacht... but the lack of slots... maybe I will earn some echoes, and then delete them to "pay"

for the upgrade...As a side note under this nodes
QualitiesPossessedList : [Array] -> [0] : [Object] -> EquippedPossession : [Object] -> AssociatedQuality : [Object] -> Enhancements : [Array] you will find numbered nodes, those relate to stats of your ship, Crew, Cargo Hold, Weight, then stat adjustments and Hull, you can usually tell from Associated Quality detail what they are for

One of the ways to make engine more efficient... well not exactly engin but your ship, is to lower the wight of the ship. Will look into the fuel efficiency later today, when I am not at work.

Picture 1 - found the slots on my ship[static01.gog.com]
Steam yacht with the aft weapon[static01.gog.com]

[Noir_CZ]

Opprinnelig skrevet av Deathdealer:

i would love a guide on how to do that! can you also make engines more fuel-effecient?

Fuel efficiency is quality with id 109902, not quite sure how to work with that, because it has "AllowedOn" : "Character", so that would mean you don't tack it on engine, but on your character? Sorry, can't really help in that regard

[Dr. Bones]

Opprinnelig skrevet av Noir_CZ:

Opprinnelig skrevet av Deathdealer:

i would love a guide on how to do that! can you also make engines more fuel-effecient?

Fuel efficiency is quality with id 109902, not quite sure how to work with that, because it has "AllowedOn" : "Character", so that would mean you don't tack it on engine, but on your character? Sorry, can't really help in that regard

interesting..... so could you technically have 120% efficiency if you set your efficiency to 100% and got the engine that adds efficiency? i'm just brainstorming here, i've never actually poked into the code of a game like this before, so i might as well ask someone who has. :P

[Noir_CZ]

Opprinnelig skrevet av Deathdealer:

Opprinnelig skrevet av Noir_CZ:

Fuel efficiency is quality with id 109902, not quite sure how to work with that, because it has "AllowedOn" : "Character", so that would mean you don't tack it on engine, but on your character? Sorry, can't really help in that regard

interesting..... so could you technically have 120% efficiency if you set your efficiency to 100% and got the engine that adds efficiency? i'm just brainstorming here, i've never actually poked into the code of a game like this before, so i might as well ask someone who has. :P

I really have no idea, sorry, it could also mean it is allowed on officers besides engines, which we know is true, because of tireless mechanic. Afraid I can't help in that regard,

[Dr. Bones]

if it's allowed on officers.... oh man, i wonder if you can get such a high effeciency you start gaiining fuel? XD

[Miep]

For those of us who end up here because it's still the top Google result:
This issue changed at some point before December 2017. It's way easier now.

The original poster addresses how to add slots in this post: https://steamcommunity.com/app/304650/discussions/1/451850213950396835/

Scroll to the bottom. It's now an issue of changing a 0 to a 1.

[Dr. Bones]

oh, cool! that's awesome! can you change the cargo amount too?

[Noir_CZ]

Opprinnelig skrevet av Deathdealer:

oh, cool! that's awesome! can you change the cargo amount too?

The easiest way I can think off (since I am still at work) try to search in the save file for the exact number your cargo hold has and try to adjust that number?