Shipedit

[LordJerle]

Anyone know where to get the Shipedit utility? Just getting back into the game, and the mod sites I used to use back in the day are all defunct, and the only links I can find for it are broken.

[ShadowDragon_79]

I'd be interested, too...
I tried a bit to edit the specs-file with notepad, but it seems pretty sensitive to changes :( . ( The only thing that worked reliably was a mesh-change. )

Actually, that does seem strange to me, since I clearly remember editing SFC2's specs-file the same way, and that was a lot more stable ( though I later on managed to get it to crash there, too... ) .
Is this problem generally known for SFC 1 , or is that somehow related to the steam-release ?


[EDIT]
Mostly I was trying to copy ships to make variants with changed weapon-loadout... Only one of them worked, and even that only once :( .
Back when I modded SFC2, this worked rather well...
[/edit]

[MtZuul]

The specs file can be edited in MS Office Excel and similar software, since the file is just a spreadsheet in txt form. In SFC 1, as long as you don't add or delete ships, you can edit just about anything without major issues. Just remember to save it back as a .txt file.

However using Shipedit is so much easier than messing with Excel. I've been browsing the net hoping to find it, but I could only find the editor for SFC 2 and SFC OP :(

But If you really want the editor let me know, I might still have a copy buried somewhere in my hard drive.

[ShadowDragon_79]

Originally posted by MtZuul:

In SFC 1, as long as you don't add or delete ships,

So that was my problem then - I *did* add new ship-versions... Would that work with the editor?

[MtZuul]

Unfortunately not even the editor can add ships. For whatever reason SFC 1 won't accept additional ships in the sfbspc13.txt file.

[ShadowDragon_79]

Ah ok, thanks for the info :) . From what I remember, SFC2 did... Well, so either I'll have to search the old disc, or simply replace ships.

As for the editor - well, the most interesting lines ( or rather columns ) are self-explanatory, I was just fearing they would somehow be linked to some of the later columns which seem somewhat kryptic, and I hoped the editor would take care of such linked entries and thus solve some problems... If it doesn't, I don't really need it, thanks :) .

[MtZuul]

Indeed, SFC2 and SFC OP both support adding ships with no issues, too bad it's not the case with the first game.

Judging from my observations, the game ignores anything after the "End" column. Those other columns seem to be leftovers from whatever calculations and functions the devs used to come up with the ships' BPVs (I suspect they might have used a spreadsheet software like Excel to create the original file).

Glad I could help :)

[ShadowDragon_79]

Originally posted by MtZuul:

Judging from my observations, the game ignores anything after the "End" column.

Well, that's of course obvious... I edited in notepad, and initially simply copied a whole line directly after the last ship, but certainly before that line. I really wouldn't have thought that process to be a problem, so again thanks for the hint (about not adding ships) . :)

Originally posted by MtZuul:

Those other columns seem to be leftovers from whatever calculations and functions the devs used to come up with the ships' BPVs (I suspect they might have used a spreadsheet software like Excel to create the original file).

Yep, so it seems... more interestinly, the bpvdata.ini in the same folder seems to contain the values they assigned to the different systems - although I'll have to think a bit more about how they added it up, the values in that file are WAY too high. :/




And two hints from what I just learned through experimenting :

#1 - Don't increase weapon per mount above 4, or else the game will crash when you try to fire them.

#2 - NEVER, EVER change the column with the designations ( F-CA and the likes ) , i.e. the third column ( if I counted correctly ) .
If you do make changes there, the same will happen as if you added a ship, i.e. the game will crash on mission-start ( at least if the ship with the change is in the mission, didn't test without )... :(

Originally posted by MtZuul:

Glad I could help :)

You certainly did :) .

Now I can finally switch most of those immersion-breaking missiles to photons (except for some older ships), and create more DN- and BB-diversity for the lategame :) .


Started with replacing the R-K9R with a KCN+... but kept the old designation, and now it works. Will make some for the other species, too, of course. Also, one of the Fed-Destroyers now has 5 photons instead of 2Phot/3Missile.
Both work fine so far ( although the KCN+ could use a new UI and hasn't gotten a powerplant-upgrade yet - I guess the latter could lead to the "Excelsior-syndrome" ;o) ...
And, of course, never mention Tuesdays ;) ) .

[ShadowDragon_79]

Oh, and a pic of a retexture I recently made :

K10R-retexture

[ShadowDragon_79]

So, most Federation-ships have the missiles switched to torps now. :)

The damage Scotty had done to the KCN+ has also been repaired - I guess it's best NOT to ask the Tal'shiar how he got past them... ;o)



Sadly, I also bumped into the time-limit for the campaign ( didn't join special groups this time ) .
So it's propably really time to reinstall SFC2 from the old disc... Did campaigns have a time-limit there, too?
( never got that far, partly because I broke that game, too, by modding too much )

I do admit that it makes sense story-wise ( your character ages or gets promoted to desk-jobs ) , but I'd really prefer to be able to continue further.


Also, I'd like to know how (if at all) to influence the economy and war-progress in SFC1 .
I do know that it's possible in SFC2, but is it possible in SFC1 ?




[EDIT]
Sorry for triple-posting, I'll stop for now.
[/edit]

[MtZuul]

Originally posted by ShadowDragon_79:

Started with replacing the R-K9R with a KCN+... but kept the old designation, and now it works. Will make some for the other species, too, of course. Also, one of the Fed-Destroyers now has 5 photons instead of 2Phot/3Missile.
Both work fine so far ( although the KCN+ could use a new UI and hasn't gotten a powerplant-upgrade yet - I guess the latter could lead to the "Excelsior-syndrome" ;o) ...

So, most Federation-ships have the missiles switched to torps now. :)

The damage Scotty had done to the KCN+ has also been repaired - I guess it's best NOT to ask the Tal'shiar how he got past them... ;o)

That's quite the edit you managed to do there! The likes of which I haven't seen since the 2000's.

Originally posted by ShadowDragon_79:

Also, I'd like to know how (if at all) to influence the economy and war-progress in SFC1 .
I do know that it's possible in SFC2, but is it possible in SFC1 ?

That's something I haven't explored yet. As far as I know campaings in SFC are very basic, with the juicy parts found in the "Special Forces" missions which are different for each faction/polity/civilization. Beyond that I have no idea how to extend or shorten a campaign, or how to add missions to one.

Also, all this ship editing has me wondering if I should create a guide for ship modding? At least I could make a ship UI list as a reference, and what weapons are compatible with which civs.

[ShadowDragon_79]

Originally posted by MtZuul:

That's quite the edit you managed to do there! The likes of which I haven't seen since the 2000's.

... Eh? *surprised*
Except for the K10R-retexture, I'd have considered it to be rather basic...
( Or was your comment ironical? )

On a sidenote, Klingons are now changed to mostly photons, too
( Mostly, because I left the missiles in for older ships - was surprised that the same cutoff-date as for Federation-ships produced the distribution I wanted, namely more missile-ships for Klingons than for Federation. The only exception here were the Klingon cloaking-frigates to which I also gave photons (with reduced fire-arc), since it made sense both from their usage-profile and the movies )
, and I added a Federation BB+.
The two BB+ are somewhat overpowered, though... The ~600-700 BPV I gave to them seem to be too low, I guess.
Made a list for the BPV-values for the weapons so I can recalculate that better, but haven't done so yet, since I still need to get an overview for how to weigh system-changes.

Originally posted by MtZuul:

Originally posted by ShadowDragon_79:

Also, I'd like to know how (if at all) to influence the economy and war-progress in SFC1 .
I do know that it's possible in SFC2, but is it possible in SFC1 ?

That's something I haven't explored yet. As far as I know campaings in SFC are very basic, with the juicy parts found in the "Special Forces" missions which are different for each faction/polity/civilization. Beyond that I have no idea how to extend or shorten a campaign, or how to add missions to one.

Sometimes it seemed that performing bad in a mission could influence both territory and economy negatively, but I haven't found a way to influence them in a positive way yet...

Originally posted by MtZuul:

Also, all this ship editing has me wondering if I should create a guide for ship modding? At least I could make a ship UI list as a reference, and what weapons are compatible with which civs.

Now that's a topic... I recently got the Federations' photon-UI on a Klingon ship, for one thing. Dunno if that's related to my editing, but I can't imagine how, since I didn't mix Federation and Klingon stuff.
Also note that weapons still are there and functional even if they aren't displayed in the UI - that makes configuring them a bit tricky, though.
But still, a list with how many weapons are supported by which UI might be helpful, I guess.

Also, weapons seem to be usable generally, although the UI might suffer - there even seems to be a Federation UI for Sphere-generators, though I haven't fully tested it's functionality.

( Well, yes. I added some nonstandard weapons to the BB+'s - for the Romulans that sure makes sense, seeing how espionage-focused they are. And I thought a few sphere-generators as missiledefense for the Federation-BB+ wouldn't hurt, either. Maybe they got it via diplomacy...
And since some BB's in KA (though that are quite old memories) had "assault phasers", I tend to add one or more ph4 to each BB+. Might even add some to the normal klingon BB's, so they're in line with KA... ;) )

[MtZuul]

Originally posted by ShadowDragon_79:

... Eh? *surprised*
Except for the K10R-retexture, I'd have considered it to be rather basic...
( Or was your comment ironical? )

I meant mostly the ship editing itself rather than the retexturing, and the fact that there hasn't been much modding since the early-to-late 2000's... I'm sorry I worded it that way, I was genuinely impressed, and a bit nostalgic too. Besides, as small as it may seem, it could very well be the starting point of much more involved modding.

Originally posted by ShadowDragon_79:

Now that's a topic... I recently got the Federations' photon-UI on a Klingon ship, for one thing. Dunno if that's related to my editing, but I can't imagine how, since I didn't mix Federation and Klingon stuff.

You probably got the federation UI for the photon torpedoes because klingons don't even have an UI for those, so the game defaults to the federation UI.

By the way, a good chap in the Hot and Spicy forums made an utility that can edit the sprites.q3 file these games use for the UI. There you can see that the Federation are the only ones with UI for all weapons (except maybe the ESG or fusion beams, though I've tested them with plasma torpedoes, hellbore cannons and disruptors and those, to my knowledge, work quite well). The others are quite a bit more limited in what weapons can display porperly; but, as you stated, they should still work well if fired using hotkeys or the weapons officer panel. (For example, don't expect the Lyrans, the Hydrans, the Romulans or the Gorn to have a UI for missiles).

[MtZuul]

Well, I've begun a little research into the ship UI's to see which hardpoints they use for their weapons in preparation for the guide.

In the process I discovered that, while the graphics for the Federation's ESG UI are present, ingame it doesn't work; the buttons may light up, but they do nothing and the capacitor is missing.

Also I tested the fusion beam UI for the Federation as well, it works just fine, including the "Suicide Overload" button.

EDIT: https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1403779769
This is the guide I'm working on. I hope you'll find it useful.

[ShadowDragon_79]

Originally posted by MtZuul:

I meant mostly the ship editing itself rather than the retexturing, and the fact that there hasn't been much modding since the early-to-late 2000's... I'm sorry I worded it that way, I was genuinely impressed, and a bit nostalgic too. Besides, as small as it may seem, it could very well be the starting point of much more involved modding.

Well, in that case, thanks. :)

I've been modding a lot of other games so far, though I tend to set my targets too high and then get stuck...
As for SFC 1, I so far only plan to add BB+-variants to the other species, and then propably port all that to SFC2 ( which I have a bit of a hard time at keeping me from switching to directly atm. ) .

Originally posted by MtZuul:

You probably got the federation UI for the photon torpedoes because klingons don't even have an UI for those, so the game defaults to the federation UI.

*ouch* - Right you are, and I really should have thought of it.
Maybe I didn't because I saw the Federation-UI for the ESG before, and then thought that there should UIs for all combinations, if such an unlikely one exists...
And/Or I just forgot that Klingons didn't have *any* photons before my edits.

Originally posted by MtZuul:

Well, I've begun a little research into the ship UI's to see which hardpoints they use for their weapons in preparation for the guide.

In the process I discovered that, while the graphics for the Federation's ESG UI are present, ingame it doesn't work; the buttons may light up, but they do nothing and the capacitor is missing.

Also I tested the fusion beam UI for the Federation as well, it works just fine, including the "Suicide Overload" button.

Interesting :) ...

Originally posted by MtZuul:

EDIT: https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1403779769
This is the guide I'm working on. I hope you'll find it useful.

Thanks :) .
I'll have a look at it soon, but what came to my mind in the meantime was, that a list of the firing arcs combined with a visualization would be helpful, too.
Some are easy to understand ( FA/RA/FX/RX for example ) , while others I'd yet have to get an overview of ( RRR/LLR for example, and I got asigned a klingon CA in a campaign-mission which had some REALLY strange firing-arcs ).

[MtZuul]

Originally posted by ShadowDragon_79:

As for SFC 1, I so far only plan to add BB+-variants to the other species, and then propably port all that to SFC2 ( which I have a bit of a hard time at keeping me from switching to directly atm. ).

I'd love to see those in action once you're done! Hopefully proting them over to SFC2 should be way easier, since ShipEdit 3.0 is still available and can calculate BPVs for you, and you can actually add ships without the game crashing.

Originally posted by ShadowDragon_79:

I'll have a look at it soon, but what came to my mind in the meantime was, that a list of the firing arcs combined with a visualization would be helpful, too.

I'll be adding a firing arc reference picture to the guide today, among other things but, if all goes well, the guide will be mostly finished in the next 2 days.

EDIT: guide updated with a picture of weapon firing arcs.