Advice/Help on a breen "expansion" mod.

posted on September 24th, 2012, 6:14 pm

Hey all,

My brother and I are tempted to try our hand at modding for the very first time. We have absolutely no idea what we're doing but we are happy to learn and we won't bother you guys too much with questions.

We are, however, curious as to if our Idea is possible and roughly how we would go about it.

I have a huge love for the Breen and would like to see more Breen-i-ness to the Breen avatar for the dominion. All I'm really thinking, to preserve balance, is to change the models used by some, not all, of the Dominion ships to use the Breen cruiser/battleship models instead and possibly rename them to, for example, Breen Cruiser Raider refit, and this would be a reskin of the B-8 war frigate.

Would this be possible and how would one go about it?

We have some more Ideas for ship reskins and a few "new" refits aswell that would require some more work, like a cloaking Breen Battleship instead of the V-13 or something... but they are all still in their infancy, infact the entire mod is still just an idea, but we would like to do it.

Any advice you guys can give would be appreciated, if you need or want more information on ships we would like to change etc. I would be happy to go into more detail.

Thank you kindly,

Thot Pak

posted on September 24th, 2012, 9:55 pm

Well, swapping models is the easiest thing to preserve balance, like you suggested.

To swap the model of the breen avatar ships, you will need to do a few things.

1) put the new model you want, in the SOD folder

2) replace the basename = normalShipName with basename = newShipName (swap the stock model name, like dom_scout, with your new one, breen_scout)

and that would give you the models.

to fine tune, you would need to change the buttons, miniimages, and backgroundimages, which is much more of an involved process.

To change weapon visuals without compromising balance, you would have to adjust more code weapons references, which I would be happy to help with if you get to that point.

And at that point, everything is done, but it takes a little time and effort to get it that far. The best thing to do is to find a good replacement model for every one of the Breen Avatar units, probably ships and stations, and start from there.


A good place to look is http://armada2.filefront.com/ and if you can get the site to work, you should be able to find a dominion war mod that has an entire breen race. You could probably use some, if not most of the models from it.


Hope that helps get you guys started, and feel free to ask for more info.

Oh, and Welcome to the modding Club!

posted on September 25th, 2012, 6:27 pm

What we are hoping to do, nothing to fancy we hope, is to change the following Dominion units;

C-11 Interception Destroyer to the Breen Cruiser - Hunter Refit.
B-8 War Frigate to the Breen Cruiser - Corsair Refit.
These would use the existing Breen Cruiser model*

C-17 Siege Cruiser to the Breen Battleship - Assailer Refit.

And we are hoping to, for the sake of balance, remove the S-7 Defender in favor of a Breen Battleship that has an advanced cloak. at present named the Breen Battleship - Prowler Refit.
These would use the existing Breen Battleship model*

(All names are temporary at present, but if I don't come up with any better ones they will be what we use, although I'm tempted to use the same names used on Star Trek Online and other sources such as miniature models, they all provide a plethora of potentials.)

Would these choices be especially difficult, as I've said, we have no modding experience to speak of... other than changing some lines of text in the Bridge Commander shuttle craft folder, thus making it capable of totalling a space station.

*To differentiate between the different vessels we might, if possible, change the warp nacelle glow of the Refits.


well...

How does that sound so far?

posted on September 25th, 2012, 6:34 pm

Seems, simple enough. Like I said, the first step is to find the models you would want to use. Also, something important. Do you want to simply swap the model so it looks like you want, or do you want to also change its weapons and attributes so that it acts like a breen ship as well?

posted on September 25th, 2012, 7:03 pm

What we mainly want to do is change those vessels to look like Breen ships and, if possible change the weapons-fire to be the appropriate colours, greens/oranges/yellows etc. But we don't want to effect game balance if at all possible, although we are planning on a slight increase to the movement speed of existing Breen ships... I personally find them painfully slow.

We understand it might be difficult to do this without effecting the Puretech avatar aswell, but hopefully there is a way.

posted on September 25th, 2012, 7:10 pm

Actually, it should be possible to do it without affecting puretech at all. There are completely different sets of files for each avatar, making modding both difficult, but one or the other simple.

The best thing to do for you guys would be to make a mod module. What this will do is allow you to activate and deactivate your mod at will. It will also allow you to make simple overwrite modifications to the regular game, without messing up its files. What you do, is go to your fleetops install and make a new folder called 'mods' inside the 'data' folder. Inside of the new 'mods' folder make a folder called 'Breen Expansion.'

Inside of that folder, you will want to make at least three more folders. a 'sod' folder, a 'textures' folder, and an 'odf' folder. In the 'odf' folder, make another new folder called 'system'

This will be the basis for your new mod.

Again, the next step is to find the models you want to use. If they re all already stock to FO, that makes things even easier.

posted on September 25th, 2012, 7:20 pm

We are hoping to use the stock FO breen ships, mainly because they look awesome and because it would be simple and I'm either at work or entertaining a 7 month old... so simple is very much appreciated in my life.

I've made all those folders you suggested, I really appreciate the help btw.

posted on September 25th, 2012, 7:25 pm

No Problem! I'm always happy to help fellow modders.

Alright, so you won't be needing the 'sod' or textures folder, since the models and textures are already ingame.

Now, you will need to go back to the main directory(where you put the 'mods' folder)

here you will need to open odf.fpq with the fpq editor(fpqEdit.exe or something like that)

From here, you will need to extract(copy) all the files you need for your mod. The easy thing is that they will all start with the prefix dom_ but since there are two avatars, some ships will have a Y at the end denoting they belong to one avatar or the other. I"m not sure which is puretech or breen since I don't play or mod dominion much. If you want, you can simply extract all the dominion files and delete the ones you decide you don't need.

Unfortunately, I don't have time atm to give too many detailed instructions, but I will be able to later tonight if someone else doesn't chime in.

posted on September 26th, 2012, 2:16 am

Alright, so the files you are looking for have the prefix dom_ and the suffix Z. To change weapon colors you will also need files with the prefix domW_ and the suffix o. The Z refers to the Breen Tech avatar, and the o refers to weapon ordinance files, which control the visuals of a weapon.

You will need to 'extract' the following files into your mods/odf/system folder:

For the C-11
dom_intercept_destP.odf
dom_intercept_dest.odf
dom_intercept_destr2.odf
through
dom_intercept_destr6.odf

domW_intercept_dest1o.odf
domW_intercept_dest2o.odf
domW_intercept_dest3o.odf
domW_intercept_dest4o.odf
domW_intercept_dest5o.odf
domW_intercept_dest6o.odf

For the B-8
dom_warfrigatePY.odf
and all the dom_warfrigateZ.odf files

All the domW_bomberZ1o.odf files

For the S-7
dom_defender.odf
dom_defenderP.odf
dom_defenderr2.odf
through
dom_defenderr6.odf

domW_defender1o.odf
through
domW_defender61o.odf


For the C-17
dom_siege_cruiserPZ.odf
and all of the dom_siege_cruiserZ.odf files,r1-r6 and Mr1-Mr6
all of the domW_siege_cruiserZ1.odf and domW_siege_cruiserZ2.odf files




Hopefully, that is clear enough. If you get all those copied over the next step is pretty simple.

posted on September 26th, 2012, 6:34 pm

Sorry it takes so long for me to respond, and I don't respond that often... I just have to go to bed so early to be up at "kill me now" o'clock.

So if I don't respond for a while don't take it as I've lost interest, I'm just probably either asleep, at work or playing with the baby... or doing some task on the monumental list left to me by the wife

posted on September 26th, 2012, 8:47 pm

No problem, we all have other stuff to do. Just post back whenever you have the files copied over and I can explain the next step.