Yeah, starbase rules throw multiple errors.

Hey guys, was wondering if it's possible to make the player setup page show more pictures? 
I want to show at least 4, though I'd prefer 8 if possible 

You can hack it to do multiples of three. Eight would not be fun though...

If nothing else it's pretty well set up in my mod, Star Wars Interregnum. Sins of the Fallen and a few others probably use the same trick IIRC.

Correct, you only display 3 pictures but you can have the pictures tall enough to display 6 or even 9. For eight you would just have the last picture be blank or maybe a static picture for you mod.

If you go this route then you'll need to modify wherever the large picture is displayed in game to account for the extra height so you effectively hide the additional picture(s). I think myfist had an example of a 6 player picture set at one time in the forums. Mine displays up to 9 pictures with the full mod loaded.

Ok, you guys mind if I take a look at the way you did it and adapt it to my mod?

Not at all.

Do note that you likely will have to mod the UI on the diplomacy screens, since the pictures of the "second" race will show up on these screens. Most of it is covered with the Vanilla UI but not all.

Hey, any one know if you can make Starbase upgrades mutually exclusive? So if you say buy upgrade #1, you then can't buy upgrade #2 and vice versa?

I doubt it can be done on a per Star Base basis. All you could do is make it a mutually exclusive research that would effect all Star Bases.

Unless of course, your said Starbase can only have one upgrade in the first place. But I assume you thought of that already.

If it had no abilities, you could use an ability to do a unique upgrade that locked out another option by disabling abilities.

Aside from using the upgrade limit, that's the only thing you can do without limiting it research side.  You can do more than just one upgrade though, you can add them behind multiple levels of another upgrade, like weapons, with their own string/icon entry tacked onto the end of the file.  One could conceivably have multiple mutually exclusive upgrades, so long as there weren't enough points available to run up more than one full upgrade path.

Ok, guess I'll just have to limit points and do things that way then.

Actually, I suppose you could just make two separate Starbase construction abilities, one with upgrade A, the other with upgrade B. The player would have to choose at build time which of the two upgrades to be available.

Might want to make sure the AI is okay with that though.

Anyone have an experience making a new intro cinematic? I know some mods do it, and I have a pretty good idea of how to do it. What I'm not sure on is what resolution should I make the video in. Sins minimum resolution is 1024x768, but it seems Youtube has videos of the Rebellion intro in a higher resolution than that.

Greetings again.

Have another question again.  I haven't seen it before, though I assume some mods have it, but I got the idea from a basic mechanic in planets.  ( Civilian versus Industrial specialization. )  After looking at the game info files, I can't see anything that would give me an idea of how to do it, so decided to come here.

Is there a way to lock down research if you pursue other research?  An example of what I mean...

Hull 1 >>> Hull 2 >>> Hull 3

Shield 1 >>> Shield 2 >>> Shield 3

You can get Hull 1 and Shield 1, but if you go Shield 2 you can't research Hull 2 or vice versa.

Yes.  You need to use a legacy function put into Rebellion for when factions were chosen in game.

In the prerequisites, there is a RequiredFactionNameID "" you can set to require the starting faction to research Hull 2 and Shield 2, and then have them both change the faction ID to something else.

Prerequisites
    NumResearchPrerequisites 0
    RequiredFactionNameID ""
    RequiredCompletedResearchSubjects 0

researchBoolModifiers 1
researchModifier
    modifierType "SetFaction"
    factionNameID "IDS_PLAYERFACTIONNAME_NEUTRAL"

If you want to get more complicated than a single either or, it will require more imagination, and a great deal of planning, but for what you listed, it's simplistic.

That's... a lot easier than I was expecting.  Thank you Psychoak.

Though your response brought me around to my next question.  

Can you give me an example of how I'd do something besides a basic either/or?  Or is it just make sure that the custom factions are all different and make sure everything lines up correctly?

Take your example, and branch it out, you want to pick between better shields and hull, but you also want to pick between better antimatter regen and movement speed, and better weapon range and damage.

You have three sets of decisions, but only one faction ID.  Once you pick one of them, you're no longer the starting faction and can't pick any of the others.

You have to make a tree, one branch point at a time.  You have to add a set of keys to the research list, and make the unlocked research require not the faction, but the particular key research, in order to be used.  Your keys are going to have to be unlocked in a specific order though, each stage changing the faction to the ID the next stage needs to be researched, which throws a real monkey wrench into the design of your research tree. 

For simplicity, you can put a set of research keys off by themselves, simple unlocks that open up the rest of the research field.  But the AI can be pretty special ed about research, so this has the potential to work quite poorly for everyone but the player.

It's not easy. And you seem to have anticipated the problem.

The only way to do "multiple" exclusive research branches is to have a different faction ID for every single possible combination of choices. And as psychoak says, you have to make the choices in a particular order and probably with several redundant research choices after the first one.

In short, using this for anything more than one choice quickly becomes a real pain to do, and I would not recommend doing so unless it was absolutely vital for whatever it is you're trying to achieve.

It would be a lot better to just make set categories and have the player choose once, and have that choice unlock multiple things. So perhaps give the player the option of either offense, defense, or speed, and have the faction IDs unlock multiple new researchs that improve those attributes.

Been tinkering a bit with the idea I asked about last night, and it's lead me to something else I want to ask about.

In the research menu, there's six tabs at the left hand side.  Offence, defence, civilian, diplomacy, fleet, and artifacts.  Is there a way to add more tabs there, or is the six hard coded in?

They are hard coded in. Also, you can't add more sections to diplomacy or defence.

So the only way to get more research in would be to make the trees more tightly packed I'm assuming?

Or is it possible to create research that does different things at different levels?  Think of the way Starbase weapon upgrades work for the Vasari.  One adds those beam thing, two adds the missiles, three adds the extra damage.  Same slot, but three different effects.

You can't?  Strange, with the sections being a counted entry in the player files, I would have thought you could increase/decrease.

Regardless, you can change the size of the blocks.  So you have the entire defense page to fill up.  ResearchScreenData in the player files, play with numbers to expand the size of the blocks.

This might just be a problem on my end, but is the Gamergate website not working for anyone else? everytime i try and load it, i just get a white screen.

I thought so too, but it won't work.

The max row size in a block is 10 IIRC, so yes you can make the diplomacy and defence trees still hold quite a bit of research.

It was not a free site, so it may no longer be available. 

Aw thats kinda what i was thinking actually, but i wasnt sure, hence why i asked!