Deth McBone’s ‘Galactic Epic’ creation thread

[Deth McBones]

Yeah, I could do that, but then most of my planet types would be wiped out.
I think, but I'll playtest a little bit more, that the AI will be able to do it. the only problem so far has been with widespread interstellar travel. I've seen massive interplanetary battles play out, but I'll up the availability of interstellar space travel to encourage it.

EDIT: And that system is featured in Smoking Mirror's Space Armada quite prominently.

 

[RedAlert]

RedAlert,
I am mostly trying to find systems in the near Sagittarius and Perseus arms.
Since I have no astronomical expertise whatsoever, I'm not sure what you mean by celestial or galactic coordinate systems, but since I'm essentially abandoning scale, I wanted to try and fit a whole galaxy in the last scenario, so some such galactic coordinate system will be used for all of them.
And yes, south in my scenario is towards the galactic center. And yes, I agree that direction is the most important thing. I want systems that are farther away from the galactic center to be 'away' from the player.
I'll update some screenies to show you what I came up with, and any suggestions for famous stars and such will be greatly appreciated.

I should apologize, first of all, because it appears I've had a little terminology confusion: I have fallen into the habit of referring to the Equatorial Coordinate system as 'Celestial', which is not very correct or accurate.

I don't think this is really necessary for you to know, because judging by the position of the stars on your map, I'm almost certain it's based on Galactic coordinates, but here's a summary of those two coordinate systems, for your interest.

The Equatorial Coordinate System, using Earth as the centre point, treats 'up' and 'down' in space as extensions of Earth's north-south axis, and the fundamental plane is an extension of the Earth's equator into space. Stars are coordinated by their location, in degrees, around this plane; and by their location, in degrees, above or below it.

What is very important to understand is that up and down, as extensions of Earth's north-south axis, are completely different directions than the galactic 'up' and 'down', that is, the directions perpendicular to the galactic plane. Therefore, we have the Galactic coordinate system.

The Galactic Coordinate System still treats Earth as the centre point, however, as mentioned, up and down are directions perpendicular to the galactic plane, while the fundamental plane is parallel to the galactic plane. Like in the equatorial coordinate system, stars are coordinated by their location, in degrees, around the fundamental plane, and by their location, in degrees, above or below it.

Sorry for dragging this off topic. I'll stop now!

 

[Deth McBones]

Yes, the Galactic Coordinate System would be the one I'm using, after all I am trying to represent 3D space on a regular Civ map!
As long as we're talking sci-fi, I'm happy.

 

[Deth McBones]

Improvements updated.
One question: should colonies upgrade to level 3 size by generating an atmosphere or increasing the amount of pressure domes?

 

[gimmeadog]

Have you considered using some bonus resources as planets? I mean something where the resource image is the image of the planet (overlaps the image of the terrain), and with so many more resource slots available you could have far more variety of planets (at least visually)

Just a thought

 

[sum_aar_jam]

Improvements updated.
One question: should colonies upgrade to level 3 size by generating an atmosphere or increasing the amount of pressure domes?

Atmosphere because the complete transforming of a world to support human life without the use of domes is the highest technology level for expansion IMO.

 

[JSnider]

Agree .. atmosphere makes better sense (at least to me).

 

[Deth McBones]

Have you considered using some bonus resources as planets? I mean something where the resource image is the image of the planet (overlaps the image of the terrain), and with so many more resource slots available you could have far more variety of planets (at least visually)

Just a thought

Indeed I could try that, but I do not have very many images to use as 'planet resources,' as most of them are being used in the regular terrain. And I need resources to be put on the planet, such as spices on a desert planet, silks on a forest planet, platinum on a rock planet, and so on. I think I have a good spread of planets so far...thanks to the Star Trek and Space Opera mods...

 

[CiaranB123]

Deth, where did you get the terrain from? I thought it was cool and looked but coulldn't find it.

Anyway it sounds great and I am looking forward to play it!

 

[Deth McBones]

I used Vadus's excellent space terrain, which he posted way back in '03 here. My terrain is a patchwork of Vadus's original, the Star Trek mod's, and the Space Opera mod's. I thought about including some gfx from the Space Armada mod, but the planets didn't match up, as they had more of a pastel feel.
It's kinda amazing that we all have been using essentially the same terrain since '03...which is SIX YEARS by now...if you want to change that, feel free....

 

[CiaranB123]

Ok thanks

 

[RedAlert]

Has it been a month already?!

Sorry for the delay. I'll see if I can name some of your stars soon.

 

[Deth McBones]

I know, I was just re-visiting this thread earlier today. I have been working on adding the civpedia icons, and creating some ones that were missing. Those, and I can't seem to finish the improvements. I'm indecisive in deciding what constitutes a kind of global improvement and what concepts actually affect a planet and not just a region. I think I'll change up my improvements section here to help me think it through, and to get some feedback. I also just finished some more wonder splashes, but mostly just for some fun.

I am also thinking about releasing this to those lucky few who are really interested as my first pre-beta testing. If somebody could direct me to an free and user-friendly file sharing site, I might just get that up sometime this week.

Its good to know people actually want to see this

EDIT: Red, Don't worry about hurrying or anything to name them, I've been slacking on finishing this lately, so don't think you need to work while I don't.

 

[againsttheflow]

If somebody could direct me to an free and user-friendly file sharing site, I might just get that up sometime this week.

Automic Gamer is what is used for a good portion of the mods around here. I often use Media Fire but that has a max of 100MB files (in their free package..). Also you may consider talking to the guys over at Storm Over Civilization as they will host mods from time to time at their discretion.

 

[CiaranB123]

I can beta-test btw...

 

[Deth McBones]

Okay, for those who wanted to pre-beta, I should be done with a fully playable version this weekend, Friday at the earliest and Sunday at the (hopefully) latest. Version .1 will include:

• Full unit line for all Human civs
• Full tech coverage for first two ages (Generic/Human)
• Skeleton unit line for the other two civs
• Skeleton tech tree for other two civs
• LHs for all Human and Other civs
• Mostly complete terrain
• Mostly complete Civpedia icons
• Skeleton Civpedia entries
• Mostly complete improvement line
• Wonder (Maybe even Era) Splashes
• Complete interface and miscellaneous graphics

This is assuming that my ship line will be completed with some of Flamand's superb units. If not, placeholder units for early Human ships will be assigned.

This version will not include

• Complete civpedia entries
• Finished unit lines for Other civs
• Finished wonder entries and pics
• Guaranteed balanced gameplay
• Completely edited labels.txt
• Edited diplomacy.txt
• Civpedia concepts

After I finish all of the first list, I might get some more screenies, and you guys might get to see some glimpses of what I have planned for future scenarios.

I have Mid-terms this week and next week, so depending on how much I study this release might get postponed.

If you are interested in pre-beta testing, post here or PM me.
I also encourage our ever-present lurkers to sign up so that they can get in on the action. The more the merrier!

End of line...

 

[King Coltrane]

i'm in! (and i feel your pain on midterms...)

 

[CiaranB123]

As I said before so am I!

I have 2 weeks of holiday left so I can fit in loads of time!

 

[Deth McBones]

Alright, the human ship line is complete now. Expect previews soon.

King Coltrane, Ciaran, I will send you the link to the Atomic Gamer file as soon as I have finished it and put it up, probably this weekend.

Tech tree for first two eras is done, but needs arrows. That's going to be a pain.

 

[Philadelphus]

Wow! I just discovered this thread today, and I have to say, this looks great. I've had grandiose plans of doing a mod like this myself, and reading your "lengthy introduction" felt like reading my own thoughts. I especially love the explanations for how you can have 7 different civilizations in the solar system all coming from Earth originally. I'd be happy to help test this thing, if you need any more testers.

By the way, if you need help with arrows for the tech trees, I might be able to provide it. My graphic skills are not great, but cut 'n' paste I can do.