5 (simple?) things to make modding better. (Frogboy's Ask)

1.  Modding tools. This does not have to be a full sdk/toolset, I would be happy with a soultion for Visual Studio that loads up the games schemes/xmls, shows incorrect order/typos etc, similar to what modbuddy did for civ5. Or an addon for notepad++, xmlspy etc etc.
2.  Modding Documentation. Comments in the xml/xsd files themselves would do.
3. Offical Support via Steam/Nexus.
4. Have Replace Mod and Append Mod folder's, that is added to the Mod folder when you check "Enable Mods" in game. Both folders should contain a few expamples of "how to".
5. Fix the inconsistancies with modding, for example: Editing GraphicAssets.xml and say adding a new Intro movie or Color pallete. The game will not pick these up from the GC3 Crusade\Mods\My Mod\Gfx folder. We have to place our files in the base games Gfx folder.
6. Mod compatability. The use of Update and Replace in your xml's. I am sure I do not need to explain this more.

@ Gauntlet - 7) Doable now. A few patches back HullType was added to the Prereq Table (I think with the Star COntroll DLC/Patch). Here is a bit of code I added into UCP_Combat (its with a tech):

        <Stats>
            <EffectType>HitPointsCap</EffectType>
            <Scope>Global</Scope>
            <Target>
                <TargetType>Ship</TargetType>
                <ShipHullType>Small</ShipHullType>
            </Target>
            <BonusType>Flat</BonusType>
            <Value>5</Value>
        </Stats>
        <Stats>
            <EffectType>Logistics</EffectType>
            <Scope>Global</Scope>
            <Target>
                <TargetType>Ship</TargetType>
                <ShipHullType>Medium</ShipHullType>
            </Target>
            <BonusType>Flat</BonusType>
            <Value>-1</Value>
        </Stats>

Boy. I need to learn how to access/read things like the pre-req table lol.

Thanks a bunch, I had gone through this with Cari-elf and wasn't able to get it going. This makes my day!

- Better support for modding world generation (resources, nebula size, star distribution, black holes and the like). There is something there but since there is no documentation it's pure trial and error to achive something (and crashes the game quite often, e. g. when I tried to change nebula shape and size). And some things are not accesible via modding.

- Use Artifact powers otherwise. I tried to make a "Aid Military" project by using the Artifact power that gives +500 military production to a shipyard, but to no avail.

this could be something left to the Vortex team, to support Galciv3 the way they support other games with their own mod manager.

Why would Nexus/Vortex bother?

GC mods number incredibly few and most are not updated for Retribution. Unfortunately the modding fruit died on the vine so-to-speak a long, long, time ago.

If SD would like to reinvigorate the modding community, they'll need to pick up the baton and get it rolling in my opinion.

To many twists and turn on that vine, although a select few decided to keep climbing

Broadly speaking, our focus for v3.7 is going to be all QOL both for players and making the data system more robust.p which should help modders.

I agree with you guys re modding, You might have seen my post re Crusade should have been GalCiv IV instead of effectively supporting two games.

in our planning for v3.99 we might merge a ton of non major expansion features back into the base game just so there are fewer permutations (like the civ builder).

It would be cool to be able to simply generate a new ship style from the editor in-game.

So after changing ship templates have a button "save shipstyle as XYZ" which you then could give to your custom races at will

The steam option that is there now does not seem to work for me, or I do something wrong.

However, when modding your own game going via steam to get a new ship style would seem not ideal anyway, so I think easiest would be just to combine templates you want, then save as extra style for further use.

I hope commonwealths get a rework to increase the value of the feature. If we made a commonwealth feedback thread I'm sure many would be happy to share how they could be improved.

I would like to add on a 6:

6. Mod compatability. The use of Update and Replace in your xml's. I am sure I do not need to explain this more

I would like to echo Gauntlet and Horemvore generally but emphasize two items that are key to me (and a third that would be icing on the cake).

1) Documentation: Specifically, documentation about what is possible (particularly what triggers/actions pair with which targets/scopes, etc.) would be helpful. Also documentation for what files are changed in an update.

2) Append/Replace: I'm not sure this is simple... maybe it is. Allow data with duplicate internal names in mods to replace the data with the same internal name. For example, instead of forcing me to mod the MasterTechDefs.xml (replaces the whole thing), let me just modify a single tech via internal name reference.

3) Line-item Changes: This is probably much more complicated than 2, but making it possible to override specific values within an xml would be awesome. Some of my mods change a single value or a set of related values. For example, I change the MapSizeDefs.xml to slightly increase precursor world percentages for all map sizes. Every update, I have to check to ensure this file hasn't been changed and, if it has, go back through the new file and update it with the single values. This isn't a big deal, but sometimes I forget... it would be nice not to have to remember. If a mod could somehow target a single value, for example by referencing the internal name (e.g., "Tiny") and then the desired tag (e.g., "<PrecursorPlanetPercentOfHabitable>"), this would be immensely helpful.

If anyone here is familiar with XCOM2's mod system, it allows you to specifically undefine things from the core game files so they can be redefined with mods.

Award ships probably...

This is an interesting thing.  What is the syntax for that?

See https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=956935800

Seems they use a .NET Application for modding, but what language the files are in I didn't find out in 5 minutes of searching the web.

Here's something that's holding me back. Custom civ dialogue seems to not often work. I set up a lot of it and it often doesn't appear in game and I don't know why. Also it's hard to test because who knows if the situation necessary for the text will ever happen in a game.

I have a civ that's whole thing is illusion and mind control so their dialogue is not really making offers so much as telling you what they want is already what is and you either accept it or become confused/angry. Without that dialogue the idea doesn't work.

Hey there... Gauntlet's Race Mod at Galactic Civilizations III Nexus - Mods and community

If you download my optional file here... it's a custom flavor text that works. I added virtually every conversation possible from the main flavortext files and tested repeatedly. It might not be 100% perfect (it is hard to field test these conversations) but it is much more thorough than the in-game editor and I spent probably 6 hours testing... 

Point is... makes a good template.

As I have been modding ship design templates, I suggest this ship design templates improvement:

As is there are currently two options for a given weapon type. The enhanced(resource) version, and the cheaper version. However there are often times, especially early in the game, when the enhanced version is not more powerful and thus a waste of resources. So I propose a new option that would be like "BestKinetic" which would equip the highest damage Kinetic weapon rather than being locked to resource or non-resource type. The second available Kinetic weapon has no resource cost and is twice the power of the resource based one from before. This would prevent the AI from producing expensive and sub standard ships after researching a good cheap weapon.

that's a very good idea!  I never thought of that from an AI perspective

About modding.

1. I came up with the super mod idea. That is a great idea, but it was supposed to be with the other mod idea, not instead. In two you could select between the mods under the options menu, but in three all the mods worked together. I would like an option to do both. 

2. When I suggested being able to download races via. Something like steam I didn't think that would replace the ability to download mods in three. In two the multiverse would let you download mods from the main menu. In three steam replaced the multiverse. We should be able to download the stuff we have now, and mods too. 

3. Originally we had a editor in the ultimate edition at least in something like 2.0. I think it got done away with in 2.04. in three through several responses of mine they brought the map editor, but it's not enough we need a scenario editor like we had in two.

4. I miss the example mod we had in two. We need to bring that back. The one that was a working mod. Maybe a couple this time.

5. You need to take the mods that don't work anymore, and make them work again.

6. Modding is supposed to change the mechanics of the game it doesnt. How mods work right now the game is pretty much the same.

FWIW I just found out my earlier post in this thread is moot since we can already save ship styles from within the game (without using steam) when we just rename them.

Someone else linked to the modding guide. Heres a quick example of the syntax. The forum is stripping out newlines so here everywhere there is a space there should be a newline

[Sharpshooter X2SoldierClassTemplate] -NumInForcedDeck=1 -NumInDeck=4 +NumInForcedDeck=0 +NumInDeck=0 [Templar X2SoldierClassTemplate] -BaseAbilityPointsPerPromotion=10 +BaseAbilityPointsPerPromotion=50 [XComGame.X2SoldierClass_DefaultClasses] +SoldierClasses=UniversalSoldier [XComGame.X2ExperienceConfig] -RequiredXp[0]=0 -RequiredXp[1]=1 -RequiredXp[2]=70 -RequiredXp[3]=160 -RequiredXp[4]=305 -RequiredXp[5]=520 -RequiredXp[6]=825 -RequiredXp[7]=1250 +RequiredXp[0]=0 +RequiredXp[1]=1 +RequiredXp[2]=70 +RequiredXp[3]=160 +RequiredXp[4]=305 +RequiredXp[5]=520 +RequiredXp[6]=825 +RequiredXp[7]=1250 +RequiredXp[8]=1800

I would also add an easy way to quickly unpack binary XML files as well (ex: edit .faction files).