I was going to document all that, but it's a monumental task and I got side tracked. I can answer specific questions though. The settings for whether a gas giant comes out large or huge is in Globals.yaml, called GAS_GIANT_COMPRESSION_LARGE_CHANCE, and if I'm not mistaken, asteroids use the same parameter to determine the chance of large. The resources are set in TradeableResourceChances.yaml. To set the resources for asteroids you have to add that biome in, matching the format of the other biomes.

Hello Spud,

are you still willing to answer questions regarding the variables of the .yaml files?

I'm specifically interested in the galaxy creation section where the setup is made (ie. size, distance between star systems, etc.)

Like the OP, I'm trying to find any kind of info but there isn't anything online so I've been downloading mods and comparing them in case I reach to any conclusion.
I'd really appreciate it if you could help.

Thanks in advance


EDIT: since it might take some time until you see this message, here are the variables that I'd really like to know what they do:

distributionMethod: LeastDistanceDistribution
civDegreesOfSepparation (is that a typo btw.?)
minSolarDistance
starLaneReach
minBlue(red)Hoops
blue(red)LaneImprovement

Hello hypersot. I'm not on here that much anymore, but I'd be happy to answer your questions. It's too bad the guy who's an expert on galaxy generation, Breckwilhite (who made the extreme galaxy mod) isn't around either.

distributionMethod: I'm not sure exactly what this does, but you should always set it to LeastDistanceDistribution or else the galaxy might not generate properly. As far as I can tell, the other distribution methods were only used in alpha testing of the game. Basically this seems to be referring to a mathematical algorithm for placing stars.

civDegreesOfSepparation: Yes that's a typo. There's more than a few typos in the yamls, but all of the same typos show up in the code, so it is coded properly. WhatIsSol (unofficial patch maker) once cheekily remarked to me about how bad programmers are at spelling :)

Anyway, the degrees of separation determines how far civs are from each other in terms of number of stars you have to pass through. So having 1 star system between you and an AI is one degree of separation. Having 2 is 2 degrees. If your constraint on degrees of separation are too strict, the galaxy will fail to generate, though it will attempt a couple times to re-generate with more relaxed parameters before it does fail. Check the output log if you think this is why the galaxy won't generate, as it shows its attempts to generate using the separation degree there.

minSolarDistance: This is fairly important. Everything in the galaxy is measured in some kind of distance units. For example, Nuclear Drive has a speed of 1, which means it travels 1 distance unit per turn, so you should think of distance as the number of turns it takes using nuclear drive.

If you set the min distance low, you will find stars are allowed to be very close together, but if there aren't enough stars to fill up the whole galaxy .bin, you'll find clusters of close stars but in other parts of the galaxy you will see huge gaps. If the min distance is too high, the galaxy may not generate or may not be able to place as many stars as you specify in the min number of stars for the galaxy. I generally tweak the min distance to get the stars spread out evenly, which depends on how many stars you have and the type/size of the galaxy.

starLaneReach: This is the maximum length a star lane can be. If you set this high, then far away stars will be allowed to link together. If you set this low, then stars will only link up with ones in close proximity. This setting should always be higher than minSolarDistance.

minBlueHoops: Okay this one took me a while to figure out. "Blue" refers to normal star lanes (as opposed to unstable lanes which are "red"). This setting is difficult to describe without drawing it, but imagine you have to place 8 stars in some way. You could place them all in a line. That's 0 "Hoops." You could make 4 of them into a square with a tail of 4 coming off the end (shaped like a 6 kind of), and that's 1 "hoop." You could place them in the shape of an 8, and that's 2 "hoops." So basically it's the number of closed loops. It affects the layout of star lanes.

As far as I can tell, minRedHoops does nothing though.

blue(red)laneImprovement: I don't know what this does. Maybe it gives a bonus to travel speed so you can travel at a different rate across stable vs unstable star lanes. I haven't tested it. It may not do anything at all and be some leftover code from alpha.

The best way to figure this stuff out is to experiment with it. I'll check back here from time to time if you have more questions.

Amazing answer. I can't even describe how much all that helped.
The hoops explanation is perfectly understood.

I will put all the new knowledge to test when I have time.

Funny you mentioned Breckwilhite since it's his mod I'm studying to learn about how to generate galaxies.

In fact, here is my current mod order:
-Your 'Bug Fixes' Mod
-Your 5X Mod (using Very Sparse which I have modified a bit)
-Ultimate Extreme Galaxies
-Very Low Planet Density (also modified a bit)

My goal is to have galaxies where there are many stars either empty or non-colonisable with starlanes that can travel anywhere on the galaxy (that's what Extreme Galaxies mod does).

Again, thanks for both the answer here and on the other thread

Got another question :) Is there a way I could make the AI percieve my score to be lower? I want them to always see me as if I could barely defend myself and they might have a good chance if they attacked, regardless of how good/bad i'm doing in relation

The AI doesn't determine attack target based on score. It depends mostly on your disposition with them, their personality settings, and your military strength. There's no way to really affect this (except the personality settings which in 5X are already set as aggressive as possible for most races) other than altering the game's code.