[MOD] Distant Stars - Rebellion Alpha 0.13 Released! [17/06/13]

Published on January 5, 2009 By Nacey In Sins Modding

Article Link

Feedback of any kind is always welcome. Ideas, balance changes, and bug reporting of any kind is always useful!

Version 1.00 Released!

Make sure to ask for permission before republishing any part of this mod to the public!

Downloads

Rebellion Logo

1.05 + DLC Compatible:

0.12 ALPHA Release:
Full Download:
http://distantstars.mmobase.com/rebellion/Distant_Stars_(R)_ALPHA_0.13_[45189661].7z

Full Download MIRROR:
http://www.moddb.com/downloads/distant-stars-rebellion-alpha-013

MD5: 69486D2FCD3F35E46E6F5EF8C9F1634A

Diplomacy Logo

1.34 Compatible:

1.01 Release:
Full Download:
http://distantstars.mmobase.com/diplomacy/Distant_Stars_(D)_1.01_[45685832].7z

1.051 Compatible:

Beta 0.9951 Release:
Full Download:
http://distantstars.mmobase.com/entrenchment/DS_Entrenchment_Beta_0.9951_[36672852].7z

1.14 - 1.181 Compatible:

Version 1.01:
Full Download:
http://distantstars.mmobase.com/soase/Distant_Stars_v1.01_[453701567].7z

Make sure to ask for permission before republishing any part of this mod to the public!

Multiplayer Games:
We've setup a thread for everyone to organise their multiplayer games in and also setup example times and dates for most people to meet up and start games. These are what we hope to be the main times for people to be around and want to play games together.

The times are:
4pm EST (9pm GMT) Saturdays & Sundays
9pm EST (2am GMT) Saturdays & Sundays

If you want to organise other games please go ahead using the same topic to consolidate all the information in one place and hopefully get more games together within our community. These games are for PvP, PvAI & PvPvAIso come along and we'll get some games going!

Screenshots:
We've setup a thread so you can all post your screenshots to share with us the Distant Stars team and its players. Im sure we're all intrigued to see what kinds of battles and events you've all been having on the mod aswell.

Lore:
We know some of you guys love to role play whilst using Distant Stars, and here's a topic for you guys to post all of your role playing stories, character profiles and anything else you can imagine.

Maps:
Some of you avid map makers out there have produced some great maps but never really had them recognised because they've got lost. Well here's a topic for you to post a link to the download (we can even provide mirrors if necessary) a screenshot or two of the map for us all the preview and if enough people like it we'll even include the map in with the actual mod!

Please visit our website and for more information, change logs, downloads, and to report bugs. Our website can be found here: http://distantstars.mmobase.com

Bug Reporting

If you want to report a bug please use the Bug Report feature on our website:
http://distantstars.mmobase.com/?m=reportabug

Please include as much information as possible, if you have an error log feel free to post it on these forums and we'll take it from there. If you can reproduce the error please include the error log (read below to find out how to enable error logs) and include as much detail on how to reproduce the problem.

To enable logging:
Windows Vista/Windows 7:
C:\Documents and Settings\<Your Windows Username>\Local Settings\Application Data\Ironclad Games\Sins of a Solar Empire\Setting
or
Windows XP:
C:\Documents and settings\<Your Windows Username>\Local Settings\Application Data\Ironclad Games\Sins of a Solar Empire\Setting

Open the user.setting file (using Notepad, Wordpad or any text editor) and scroll down to the bottom 7 lines from the bottom is the line:
LogOutput FALSE
Change FALSE to TRUE
LogOutput TRUE

and from then on any Log files will be saved to the debug folder:
Windows Vista/Windows 7:
C:\Documents and Settings\<Your Windows Username>\Local Settings\Application Data\Ironclad Games\Sins of a Solar Empire\Debug
or
Windows XP:
C:\Documents and settings\<Your Windows Username>\Local Settings\Application Data\Ironclad Games\Sins of a Solar Empire\Debug

If you get these log files to us (you can just paste them in to a forum post) we can hopefully get your issues sorted.

Frequently Asked Questions

All files are compressed using 7Zip to shrink the download filesize. To extract these files you must use WinRAR or 7Zip.
Any Patches should overwrite the original install directory, either by extracting over the original folder, or cut/copy & pasting over the existing file/folder structure.

1) My game keeps crashing, is there anything I can do to stop it?
i) Are you running the game on maximum (highest) settings? if so, lower them to High or Medium, there is a known issue with the game using up too much memory, there is nothing we can do about this, also no matter how powerful your pc is, it is affected by this issue no matter the pc it is not above this crashing issue, it is a game problem not a hardware one, so quite simply lower your settings. If you still have an issue with crashing see point two.
ii) Give us as detailed information as possible about the crash, what was happening at the time of the crash, what races, ships, abilities were involved. If you can supply a Debug Log (see above for more information about logging) and post a bug report on our website.

2) The loading screens and portrait pictures dont appear properly, whats wrong?
i) This is an issue with ATI based graphics cards (rarely affects Nvidia based cards) we're looking in to the issue.

3) Why dont you support converting Distant Stars in to TXT format?
i) Quite simply many things can go wrong with converting your mod to TXT, we cant help you with something you've probably broken yourself.

4) Can I mod Distant Stars for myself?
i) Yes you can however please do not distribute our mod or our mod that you have edited to the public. You must ask for permission to do so, we will regrettably stop distributing our mod to all if users abuse our work.

5) Your mod is in BIN format I can't edit the files, what can I do?
i) You can convert the mod to TXT format however we wont offer any support to versions of the mod that have been converted to TXT.

6) Why is Distant Stars distributed in BIN format?
i) Mods load faster in BIN format and are less likely to have issues in this format.

7) I'm having trouble installing the MOD, do you have any more instructions?
i) Carbon was kind enough to do some more advanced instructions out here.

8) Is there any way to make new maps for Distant Stars using GalaxyForge?
i) Within the Distant Stars Extras folder there is a folder called Galaxy Forge, Copy and Paste this folder (or its contents) over your original Galaxy Forge folder (or its contents) replacing any files if it asks you to. When you start Galaxy Forge next you'll be able to use all of our planets.

Or, the DIY approach (without custom icons):

ii) The GalaxyForge supplied by the devs will still work with our Mod, however to be able to access all of our planetary bonuses, templates, planet types and stars you will need to take our GalaxyScenarioDef.galaxyScenarioDef (found in the GameInfo folder of the mod) and place it in to your GalaxyForge folder, overwriting the original GalaxyScenarioDef.galaxyScenarioDef (if you still wish to make maps for the original game keep a backup of the original file). This will allow you to use all of the Galaxy changes included in our mod.

Note: Any maps made for Distant Stars will not work with other Mods. See #8.2 for DIY instructions for map making or take the appropriate files from Entrenchment, they're cross-client compatible.

Some statistics...

Since August 2009 to February 2011 we have had over...

400,000 Unique visits to the website
12,000GB (12TB) of data transferred from our website

That equates to over 60,000 Unique downloads of the entire mod, excluding the excess of 20,000 Patches downloaded.

Thanks to everyone that has supported us this far and making our mod as popular as it is!

dyMRNwSFh9gw

Comments (Page 484)

7246

AseOfSpadez

on May 15, 2012

Are you guys already balancing the titans and corvettes from the beta for your current mod?

It would be nice to see the "planetary defense laser targeting array thingy" (The thingy that uses the planetary shields model but fires missles instead of making a shield) Anyway, it would be nice to see it do increased damage against titans. Just to introduce another counter against titans steamrolling past your defenses after your fleet's gone.

7247

Stant123

on May 15, 2012

I doubt they're working on it just yet, it's still in Beta and highly subject to change, and there's also the fact that like everyone else, they're wanting to play the game (and not mod right now). Wait at least a couple weeks after the first official release of sins for there to be the possibility of a Rebellion version where you can start suggesting changes. Anything mentioned right now is probably going to be forgotten long before then.

I said I'd have something out during the beta, but that was before it was announced that we had to have Steam... So... No modding Rebellion for me. I know you're all deeply upset, but I had no control over that.

Draakjacht

reply 7244

So the hardest part is probably just figuring out what software to convert files with. Haven't torn open one of these models before. Will be fun.

Don't need to look at / edit anything other then the image file itself. If you already have something that works on tga / dds formats, then you've already got all you need.

7248

-Ue_Carbon

on May 15, 2012

AseOfSpadez

reply 7246

Are you guys already balancing the titans and corvettes from the beta for your current mod?

There has been some talk, but thats just it. After all we are modders, we instantly find things we dont like and discuss how to change it. Nothing is set, and wont be like Stant said for some time. I expect in the weeks following a Rebellion version that just ports over our current changes, but again that me guessing.

Dont expect a proper Rebellion version for some time. A long time. We are busy busy busy people with empires across the globe universe to run.

If we are to keep with the best mods, our release date is.... Jan. 31 2020. Mark your calanders now.

7249

Draakjacht

on May 15, 2012

Yeah, I have the .dds converter and can read .tga. Okay, in that case, I need to go hunt the file. I figured it was pressed into the 3D model itself. I guess they figured to save space by having one sphere and many skins over many spheres.

7250

RHEmpire300

on May 15, 2012

all we need to do is use the moon, dwarf, normal, and huge sized copied from normal urban planets, snap on a terran planet texture, and erase continents just showing urban land, and in the mod I notice there is only one type of terran texture, on the normal game there are 2 textures, so we can use the other terran texture for this one. we solved the problem of the mesh, now to solve the problem of galaxyscenariodef and entity files.

7251

Stant123

on May 16, 2012

    NumMaterials 1
   Material
       DiffuseTextureFileName "C:\PlanetIndustrial01-cl.dds"
       SelfIlluminationTextureFileName "C:\PlanetIndustrial01-da.dds"
       NormalTextureFileName ""
       DisplacementTextureFileName ""
       TeamColorTextureFileName ""
       Diffuse ffffffff
       Ambient ffffffff
       Specular ffe5e5e5
       Emissive ff000000
       Glossiness 20.000000

Change the texture names, and figure out what works better in game for the Specular, Emissive, and Glossiness, then that basically finishes off the model work.

Working the textures I already went over...

GSD is as simple as adding the name of the planet types into the random planet options, adding in their own sections for individual selection in the planet type count section, adding an entry into the planet item type section to describe what militia can be there at game start... And I believe that's it.

Entity file wise, Reply 7237 basically spells everything out, it just needs to have the info entered into a copied over entity file from either an existing terran or city.

RHEmpire300

reply 7250

in the mod I notice there is only one type of terran texture, on the normal game there are 2 textures

DS for a short time did use both, I put them back in for the 0.8 release, however it appears the changes have since been removed. The GSD still shows remnants of the original planets. DS uses the protoplanet versions instead of the normal versions, and none of those use more then a single texture reference due to the old problem of running out of memory. Same with the alternate textures for the other planets. I suppose that can all be fixed up at some point to re-include the alternate textures since memory isn't as bad of a problem as it used to be.

7252

RHEmpire300

on May 16, 2012

okay stant, just one thing, I try to turn bin files into txt files but my converter closes immediately after I open it without doing anything. I tried EVERYTHING for a converter but they all do the same thing. please troubleshoot.

7253

Ryat

on May 16, 2012

Try harpo99999's tools.

7254

RHEmpire300

on May 16, 2012

link?

7255

RHEmpire300

on May 16, 2012

Stant123

reply 7251

No, you still need individual meshes for each planet type, however, they can be copied over from another planet type and renamed. The only editing needed for the mesh would be the materials section, which is far easier to edit when the file is in text format rather then in BIN and in some sort of modeling program.

    NumMaterials 1
   Material
       DiffuseTextureFileName "C:\PlanetIndustrial01-cl.dds"
       SelfIlluminationTextureFileName "C:\PlanetIndustrial01-da.dds"
       NormalTextureFileName ""
       DisplacementTextureFileName ""
       TeamColorTextureFileName ""
       Diffuse ffffffff
       Ambient ffffffff
       Specular ffe5e5e5
       Emissive ff000000
       Glossiness 20.000000

Change the texture names, and figure out what works better in game for the Specular, Emissive, and Glossiness, then that basically finishes off the model work.

Working the textures I already went over...

GSD is as simple as adding the name of the planet types into the random planet options, adding in their own sections for individual selection in the planet type count section, adding an entry into the planet item type section to describe what militia can be there at game start... And I believe that's it.

Entity file wise, Reply 7237 basically spells everything out, it just needs to have the info entered into a copied over entity file from either an existing terran or city.

Quoting RHEmpire300, reply 7250in the mod I notice there is only one type of terran texture, on the normal game there are 2 textures

DS for a short time did use both, I put them back in for the 0.8 release, however it appears the changes have since been removed. The GSD still shows remnants of the original planets. DS uses the protoplanet versions instead of the normal versions, and none of those use more then a single texture reference due to the old problem of running out of memory. Same with the alternate textures for the other planets. I suppose that can all be fixed up at some point to re-include the alternate textures since memory isn't as bad of a problem as it used to be.

the problem I have is trying to find the 2d texture location.

7256

harpo99999

on May 16, 2012

rhempire the textures ARE in the texture folder of the mod, if no there then possibly the diplomacy OR entrenchment texture folders, and link to my utility thread

harpo

7257

RHEmpire300

on May 16, 2012

how do I open dds files? I cant use gimp and cant afford photoshop.

7258

Lavo_2

on May 16, 2012

You can get a dds plugin for gimp.

7259

Draakjacht

on May 16, 2012

I have a stand alone DDS converter.

7260

-Norbert-

on May 17, 2012

If the dds file has no alpha layer, you can simply open and convert it with IrfanView or you can use the official Nvidia DDS utility or any other converter to change them into something you can work with.

If it does have an alpha layer, I guess GIMP plus DDS plugin is your best (freeware) joice, though that comes with a price by itself. If you want to edit anything other than the alpha layer, you'll have to split the image into it's four layers and work on the red, green, blue and alpha layers seperately and re-compose it after finishing.

Link to a relevant post in the "Modder's "Get-an-Answer" Thread

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