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[MOD WIP] Star Trek: Sacrifice of Angels 2 (updated 01/10/09)

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[MOD WIP] Star Trek: Sacrifice of Angels 2 (updated 01/10/09)

from Sins Forums

Featured (by a small mention) in the October edition of PC Gamer magazine

Candidate for Mod Database's 2008 Mod of the Year

This is the OLD "Work in Progress" thread for the Star Trek: Sacrifice of Angels 2 mod.

The new WIP topic is here https://forums.sinsofasolarempire.com/342747

The "Release" topic can be found here https://forums.sinsofasolarempire.com/322473


The mod is intended to be a hommage, and tribute to the original Sacrifice of Angels mod for Homeworld. It will use many of the same models, and effects created for that mod by the Trekmods team. Like the original SoA mod SoA2 is set during the Dominion War era of Star Trek. Using both canon, and non-canon units to recreate those battles with Sins "empire building" mechanic added. Like in SoA you can fight battles in SoA2 using hundreds of starships. Sometimes thousands if your computer can handle it ;)

While the mod was not intended as a "Total Conversion". That is exactly what it is winding up being. There is much about the Sins engine, and mechanics that we still need to learn. There are some hard coded stumbling blocks we have to overcome.

The factions will be the Federation, Klingons, Romulan, and the Dominion (with Breen, and Cardassian ally units). The main factions seen in the Dominion War. With a "Surprise" as the Pirate faction.

Factions like the Borg "may" be added in the future. LokiGodofMischief is working on a very good 3rd party Borg add on for SoA 2. It is very possible his add on may be merged with SoA 2 at a much later time.

The current version of SoA 2 is  0.03b   "The Second Dominion War". Look for it here  https://forums.sinsofasolarempire.com/322473

0.03b only works with Sins versions 1.1, 1.11, and 1.12.

All previous versions of SoA 2 are obsolete, and will not be supported, or hosted anymore. All older version downloads will be removed.

We will NOT port SoA 2 over to Entrenchment until after Entrenchment is out of beta, and released. Along with proper forge tool updates.

I am working on the models mostly ALONE so it may take a while for any new ship model updates.

Darkshimmer is the Balancing guru, Code monkey, and Master at arms. We do have other contributers, and the best 3rd party work from the finest artists in the trek mod community to help make SoA 2 the best it can be.

Status of Demo 0.04  "The actors are in place" 

Will update when i have news.

General Changes:

Manshooters Volumetric Explosions mod will be included as of 0.03a

May include Sins Plus (planets), but ill need to see how much that mod needs changing to incorporate into SoA 2.

SoA 2 0.03 and above is now patch 1.1, and better compatable. Sins patches 1.11, and 1.12 only address balancing, and online exploits, and have no effect on the mod.

Ships will have some anti stike craft weaponry.

Ships are still being added and balanced accordingly.

More re-balancing so that one faction is not overpowered over the other.

The Federation:

Faction is complete. Only structures left

The Klingon Empire

Faction is complete. Only structures left.

The Romulan Star Empire:

Faction is complete. Only structures left

The Dominion:

Faction is complete. Still needs balancing work.

Pirates:

They were going to be the Borg, but that idea failed. So we are looking into Random multirace ship spawns.

Planetary Defenders

Basically "Ships of the week" like the Maquis, Sona, Ferrengi, Tammarian battle cruisers and the like.

Balancing:  Darkshimmer has the Federation, Romulan, and Klingon Empire, and Unified Dominion balanced.

Gameplay: We now have a working Cloaking Device! Check the ModDB page for the WIP video. Cloaking will not be fully implemented in the mod until version 0.04

Art: We are working on an LCARS style UI, adding proper icons, and pictures for all of the new units. The UI is going to take a while to do, because of all of the redundancy of the Sins UI. SoA 2 uses 2 sets of UI textures. Instead of the standard 4 textures for buttons, and 2 textures for icons. SoA 2 uses 8 textures for buttons, and 4 textures for icons which IMO is a major waste of resources, because sins loads all these textures at startup. Unfortunetly i dont see any other way to do it. What is kind of cool is that we dont have to use the same HUD for each faction. It is possible to have unique HUDs, but again the perfomance hit, because of the extra drain on resources could be big, and not worth it.

In Planning: (No promises, or guarentees, but we will try to add these if possible.)

Troop Transport effects.

Planetary invasion animations

Tractor beams. (need a code monkey for this)

Whatever else we can think of and are capable of doing.

Future Updates:

SoA 2 0.04 is now in planning, and will be focused primarily on Proper research trees, Ability's, and adding proper Structures. More than likely demo 0.04 will be the last demo. After that then the full mod should be ready.

SoA 2 0.05 will be the final spit, and polish of the mod. It will focus mainly on re-balancing if needed. Also final artwork changes will be made here. Which will include some ship model re-builds, and re-texturing.

The Full SoA 2 1.0 mod will be released "When it is Finished". We are doing this on our own free time. We aren't getting paid to do this. We have no set schedule. We have no time limit. I want this one to be good. So it wont go online until we feel it is ready.

*NOTE: Much about Sins as we are all now realizing is hardcoded. SoA 2 is going to be far from a perfect "trek" mod due to these hardcoded issues. However we will try to do the best we can with workarounds, and compromises to get it as close as possible. Like i said some things wont be perfect. Some things cannot be done at all. Enjoy the mod for what it is, and try not to be too "nit picky".

SoA2 will be hosted on Mod Database once it is ready http://www.moddb.com/mods/star-trek-sacrifice-of-angels-2

This main header will be updated when i have news to post.





modding
4,107,447 views 1,754 replies
Reply #226 from Sins Forums Top
How is the mod coming along, anyhow. I like news.::eats popcorn::


agreed! Pics too!
Reply #227 from Sins Forums Top
The Code Monkeys are hard at work trying to make things work, and with what little time i have at home this week i am trying to get a ship imported.

If its pics you want here you are.. Though not in game just yet ;) I have finished remapping, and mesh error fixing the SoA2 Sovereign. She still needs a normal, and specular map. I will hardpoint and get her in game asap. I dont want to hear any griping about low resolution. She is mapped to a 2048x1024 texture, and the model is well within Sins Standards as far as poly counts. Yes, this is the "nemesis" refit of the Sovvie, and the nemesis refit firepower is going to be a lvl 6 ability.

Anyways here is the SoA2 Sovereign




When we have news we will post it. Until then be patient, and enjoy Sins :)

Edit: I appreciate all the enthusiasm for the mod, and all of the offers for help. We will strive to make this a quality mod. We have pretty much every area covered. However i can use one, or two more EXPERIENCED modelers. PM myself, or Thomas Marrone with examples of your work if you are interested in modeling for SoA2.
Offworld Trading Company
Reply #229 from Sins Forums Top
Appreciate the response, Major. Always been a fan of Star Trek. It's quite amazing how much has already been accomplished with Sins since it launched, both in this mod and mods in general.
Reply #230 from Sins Forums Top
NICE :CONGRAT:
Reply #231 from Sins Forums Top
Very nice model, and even nicer texturing. Good job!
Reply #232 from Sins Forums Top
On the non-modeling side of the mod, the Federation shell is almost done, all the ships are in, and since the Sovereign is the first "complete" ship we'll be getting into the game, its abilities are for the most part done, as far as what they're going to do. Balancing will come later obviously when we have something to balance it against ;)

One of our guys has also started creating the particle effects we'll need, and he's got some pretty neat looking torpedoes so far ;)
Reply #233 from Sins Forums Top
One of our guys has also started creating the particle effects we'll need, and he's got some pretty neat looking torpedoes so far


I was looking forward to some good photon torpedo effects, the missle effects are "meh" i think in vanilla sins.

I am still plugging away on the Alpha+Beta Quadrent map, had a busy week. I plan on releaseing it as soon as possible for vanilla sins, and then using as a base for a detailed map using the advanced tools and the data from the mod.

Also i got a couple ideas for Klingon Special abilities...
"Ramming Speed!" (??)
"It is a good day to die!" (Last stand kind of ability)
Reply #234 from Sins Forums Top


Courtesy of our weapons guru, Darkshimmer :D

Visible in pic are the standard Federation phasers and pulse phasers. Darkshimmer has told me he has made additional improvements to the look of the weapons effects besides what is shown here. Obviously once we get a Star Trek ship ingame, it will look much better and less out of place :P
Reply #235 from Sins Forums Top
Now we're just teasing them, Dark :)
Reply #236 from Sins Forums Top
Now we're just teasing them, Dark


Of course... how else do we keep up interest in the mod? :P
Reply #237 from Sins Forums Top
By swearing at them in Klingon? ;)
Reply #238 from Sins Forums Top
Ah, I cannot wait to see that Sov in game!

For the weapons, some feedback: the phaser color looks a bit too red - it should be more orange. And I guess it's irrelevant until there are ships in there to judge scale, but the pulse phasers look like they could be a little too long.

You may already be on top of this (can't tell from stills) but one of my pet-peeves in Star Trek games is when the phaser blasts last too long - Bridge Commander's phasers, for example, lasted a full two seconds, which resulted in two nearly constant lines between ships (which is ugly), and the sound effect got grating very quickly. If you watch some clips of the DS9 battles, the longest blasts were around 1 second, and most topped out at half a second or less. The first thing I did when I figured out how to mod BC's files was to go in and cut all those phaser durations in half, and it looked much better.
Reply #239 from Sins Forums Top
Those were just test FX we have proper phaser FX ready for import.

Sovereign is in game. However i ran into the same snags with the 3dsmax exporter as i did with Code Herders exporter. So i am going to have to redo it in Softimage. First the DA texture doesnt work so it has no light map. Then it seems the model is being lit up from the opposite side of the light source.

Here the sun is directly behind the camera. The model should be fully lit, but it is in shadow instead.


I used the Kols hardpoints and entity file just to test the model so ignore the autocannons.


You can see a major smoothing error at the saucer rim that i thought i fixed. there are other errors that reappeared after i imported as well. Resetting xform did nothing.

Ive been having some very bad luck with these 3rd party importers so i guess its time to learn softimage. Dev's we need some in depth model importing tutorials.
Reply #241 from Sins Forums Top
I cant wait to see a ST themed UI added.

BTW: If you guys need legit sounds let me know I have an official studio copy of the effect from TOS somewhere...
Reply #242 from Sins Forums Top
I cant wait to see a ST themed UI added.


The sad thing is, each race really has its own theme, but the general UI is pretty much global.. the only things you can really change for individual races (not counting icons and such) are the research sub-group pictures and sub-group backdrops :(
Reply #243 from Sins Forums Top
I am in love.......
Reply #244 from Sins Forums Top
I cant wait to see a ST themed UI added.The sad thing is, each race really has its own theme, but the general UI is pretty much global.. the only things you can really change for individual races (not counting icons and such) are the research sub-group pictures and sub-group backdrops


Maybe in the next update SD/IC will make different UI possible for factions. If enough of us ask for it they may do it.
Reply #245 from Sins Forums Top
:SURPRISED: Can't wait!
Reply #246 from Sins Forums Top
XSI is the way to go, in my opinion. I made the transition a while back from 3DMax and never looked back. Once you get used to the keyboard+mouse controls, you simply fly.

As for smoothing errors, I had major trouble with that too, lighting issues as well. You probably tried this, but in case you haven't, I suggest you check your .mesh files (assuming you converted .xsi files with the conversion tool) for nul tangents. All my smoothing issues went away when I assigned tangents to the model.
Reply #247 from Sins Forums Top
I can't wait for the mod, love your work guys :)

Keep it up :)
Reply #248 from Sins Forums Top
I just got Sins, after looking for a game that would emulate Birth of the Federation, which is an old turn based strategy game which was incredibly awesome. I remember that BotF had alot of extra Romulan and Cardassian ships created to fulfill specific roles, such as planetary bombardment and colonisation, I was wondering, does the team know of BotF and will you try implementing some of the ships/gameplay elements from that game?
It seems to me that Sins would be a perfect fit for BotF, if anyone knows what I am talking about do you have any idea if a diplomacy/intelligence system could be implemented like in BotF, with sabotage/espionage and minor races?

A BotF mod for Sins would be the closest thing to a real BotF2!
Reply #249 from Sins Forums Top
Hey Guys, been following the posts, but haven't seen whether you guys will be adding new faction pictures and trek specific "empire icons" to the game. Any Plans to add these items?
Reply #250 from Sins Forums Top
Those are some of the easiest things to change :P So, I can't imagine why we wouldn't assuming we get the artwork done :P