Offical: First opportunity to make a Fan Made MOD Race

[Unwashed_Pleb]

Ladies and Gentlemen. This is an official first in video gaming history.

I have been wanting to put in a race in this game for some time, i think we all have, and i felt like i was willing to put in the effort to see it through, but i always felt that the race would be, plain and simple, too difficult to code in since we can't tweak the game in that manner, nor make it unique enough with the rules set in the game that are given.

Thanks to a conversation with Mecron the community has the ability to create our OWN race and have it SUPPORTED as a Mod, with system tweak supports that will allow it to be unique.


Here is the rules of the road laid down my Mecron Himself.

This is only for a mod race that has 90% ships sections and textures complete for all classes FIRST

The ships have to be original NOT tweaks of existing ships

This got green lit because My proposal only required a handful of relatively easy strat tweaks...AND the tweaks will NOT be done till your mod is 90% comp.

This added in race is for a silicon based life form, which means that the ship designs will be crystalline and, to a degree, simple, but still require detail to fit on par with the rest of the races.

This project needs the communities support for these areas:

Backstory (limited openings, slots reserved for any Kerberos employee who wishes to assist in this area, anyone else will need to be verified by me)

3d Modeling (recommended three to four people all working together to make sure the whole fleet maintains a standard theme like the rest of them. This is the most important and difficult job of them all. this will also have to deal with turret design as well)

2d modeling (texture design. Since the race is more or less crystalline, it may even have a resemblance to the puppetmaster in look, if different. Regardless, we need someone who has a skilled artistic hand to make these textures and icons for the race. This also includes the four textures needed for the planets. )

The people at Kerberos are willing to do the coding to make the race work with the game.

This is a once in a lifetime opportunity, folks, either we grasp it with all of our might, and make gaming history, or we sit back and do nothing with this golden opportunity.



I will be honest, my only skills in this area is back story design, and organization. I have limited 3d modeling skills and no software in the slightest to even start. 2d skills are terrible. I need the help of the community. If you are willing to help, post here, NO flames please, and absolutely NO "I don't think this will work" posts. The whole idea is to be positive!

[Blazer]

I can't do any of the technical aspects but I would love to help out with the story line and concept design.

[ZedF]

Same here, I'd be good to go on helping with the story and concept, including gameplay and balancing, but can't help with art.

[Blazer]

We want to set up an xfire chat in the near future to run some ideas and divide up the workload? I know there are some modders around here that would relish the chance to make some ship models.

[erdrik]

I am definetly interested but I need to go over my available time and "resources" first. For the time being, since the race is to be silicon in nature, I will just point you at my Gorelon race idea:

Gorelon:

-The Gorelon reproduce asexualy
-All genetic and mental information is stored in each cell that makes up the Gorelon
-Gorelon cells are capable of surviving un-assisted in space, and can (but not always)
--]survive re-entry into a planets atmosphere
-A single cell is enough to reproduce provided there is enough nutrients available
-Offspring grow as small buds at various locations on the parents body
-Offspring are sentient, aware, and shares the memories and experiences of the parent
-Development is 3 - 6 years, at "birth" the Offspring simply falls off due to increased mass
-Parents contibute nothing to the Offspring beyond the shared memories and experiences
-No infrastructure, No tools, they can shape their bodies to perform the need task
-Gorelon reshape their bodies to create their ships. (they are their ships)
-Gorelon ships are slow to move and build, but durable and cheap
-Gorelon can colonise any climate world, even worlds with no atmosphere
-If a Gorelon Ship is destroyed over an uninhabited world, and no hostile ships exist in the system,
--]then the destroyed Gorelon ship will reproduce, creating a new Gorelon colony
-Gorelon ships will Regenerate slowly over time
-Gorelon do not possess Repair and Salvage technology
-Gorelon acheive FTL by:
--]submerging into SubSpace, they 'burrow' through the crystaline nature of subspace
--](they can travel anywhere that doesn't contain a Node Line)
--]slower than other races FTL methods
--]cuases a 'seasickness' in the Gorelon upon exiting SubSpace (reduced movement speed and maneuverability
--]for a short time)

Also an interesting idea for a Gorelon Seige DN:
Seige Storm:
This DN sized Ship will purposefuly explode(destroying itself),
sending 4-6 asteroid sized chunks at a planet.
If the enemy population is killed and the remaining
enemy ships destroyed the planet will be colonized.
A moderate amount of resources will be consumed
in the process.

Please keep in mind that this is ment to be brainstorming ideas I've thrown in.
Unwashed_Pleb indicated that most of the race is already decided, so I don't know how useful these ideas will be.
Feel free to gut out what you need.

[Unwashed_Pleb]

I want to point out that whats more important is the ART side of things, modeling is a must, and thus, people will be notified quicker depending on the importance of the job.

[Boolean]

Oooh, oooh, pick me for backstory!

I have a feeling that most of us artistically challenged folk will be clamoring for a position with story and concept design. What fan wouldn't want such an opportunity? Anyhow, concept design strikes me as something that could be more community based rather than a select few individuals. There are quite a few intelligent and creative individuals on the boards, surely we can put our heads together and come up with a common consensus (with approval of Kerberos, of course) rather than leaving people out in the cold.

[Unwashed_Pleb]

if you want the basics of the race, look at my post in the race debate
if you want i can post it here

[Draven]

Hmm...this should be interesting.

If only someone do make crystaline weapons and effects was needed . Still it will be very neat to see some officially supported stuff.

[Boolean]

Well, looking at what you proposed in that thread, the new race seems extremely weak in the early game. Few colonizable worlds, weak armor, few turrets, etc. That's just asking to be overrun. The only thing that seems to be going for them is a high chance of getting emitters, which although helpful, still leaves them open to a human cruiser rush.

A possible solution? Balance the low amount of colonizable worlds (and by extension colonies) with strong combat skills. I say that the new race has ridiculously high armor from the beginning of the game. High quality ships defending a small empire. They may expand slowly, but their ships put up a tough fight. Extra emphasis can be put on slow expansion by giving low (or no) chances for industrial/bio techs.

[Coyote27]

All I have to say is:

Kerberos,

[Blazer]

THis won't need new weapons, ships, or effects. The only thing that is race specific is the drive tech.

Tarks don't have a weapon unique to them, and hivers don't have a special fire mode on their DNs. We're going to have to make use of the current tech tree with the exception of drive stuff.

[Servercat]

As a thought for a drive tech, how about a reversal/modification of the Hiver system.

This new race had a brushing with the hivers and modified the HIver Farcaster system. It allows them to fling ships instantaneously across the entire map from any homeworld.

The draw back to their system is that the teleportation causes harm and disorientation to Silicoid(for lack of a name:p) physiology, so they must remain completely passive for indeterminate amount of time. (The passive state duration is dictated by the distance of the FarCasting)


Due to this liability, all FarCasted ships are encompassed by a disposable, highly reinforced shell. This shell is incredibly tough, requiring a massive amount of damage to break, but once collapsed leaves the ships completely unable to defend themselves.

Additionally this shell drains planetary resources by percentage, forcing both the Silicoid player to expand and control resources, just in order to maintain his empire. It also gives a pressure on competing players to stop the Silicoid from draining the galaxy dry.

[Unwashed_Pleb]

The drive tech is pretty much decided, it will work and is reasonably balanced. If you have questions, please look at the thread in the race debate

[Unwashed_Pleb]

The idea is as stated, There will be very few new technologies, and none of them will make a huge "OMG" change in the game.

new drive tech, new hull tech, new ammo tech, maybe a new emitter tech

Nothing that will really obtuse the game in any major way