Featured (by a small mention) in the October edition of PC Gamer magazine
Candidate for Mod Database's 2008 Mod of the Year
This is the OLD "Work in Progress" thread for the Star Trek: Sacrifice of Angels 2 mod.
The new WIP topic is here https://forums.sinsofasolarempire.com/342747
The "Release" topic can be found here https://forums.sinsofasolarempire.com/322473
The mod is intended to be a hommage, and tribute to the original Sacrifice of Angels mod for Homeworld. It will use many of the same models, and effects created for that mod by the Trekmods team. Like the original SoA mod SoA2 is set during the Dominion War era of Star Trek. Using both canon, and non-canon units to recreate those battles with Sins "empire building" mechanic added. Like in SoA you can fight battles in SoA2 using hundreds of starships. Sometimes thousands if your computer can handle it While the mod was not intended as a "Total Conversion". That is exactly what it is winding up being. There is much about the Sins engine, and mechanics that we still need to learn. There are some hard coded stumbling blocks we have to overcome.The factions will be the Federation, Klingons, Romulan, and the Dominion (with Breen, and Cardassian ally units). The main factions seen in the Dominion War. With a "Surprise" as the Pirate faction.
Factions like the Borg "may" be added in the future. LokiGodofMischief is working on a very good 3rd party Borg add on for SoA 2. It is very possible his add on may be merged with SoA 2 at a much later time.
The current version of SoA 2 is 0.03b "The Second Dominion War". Look for it here https://forums.sinsofasolarempire.com/322473
0.03b only works with Sins versions 1.1, 1.11, and 1.12.
All previous versions of SoA 2 are obsolete, and will not be supported, or hosted anymore. All older version downloads will be removed.
We will NOT port SoA 2 over to Entrenchment until after Entrenchment is out of beta, and released. Along with proper forge tool updates.
I am working on the models mostly ALONE so it may take a while for any new ship model updates.
Darkshimmer is the Balancing guru, Code monkey, and Master at arms. We do have other contributers, and the best 3rd party work from the finest artists in the trek mod community to help make SoA 2 the best it can be.
Status of Demo 0.04 "The actors are in place"
Will update when i have news.
General Changes:
Manshooters Volumetric Explosions mod will be included as of 0.03a
May include Sins Plus (planets), but ill need to see how much that mod needs changing to incorporate into SoA 2.
SoA 2 0.03 and above is now patch 1.1, and better compatable. Sins patches 1.11, and 1.12 only address balancing, and online exploits, and have no effect on the mod.
Ships will have some anti stike craft weaponry.
Ships are still being added and balanced accordingly.
More re-balancing so that one faction is not overpowered over the other.
The Federation:
Faction is complete. Only structures left
The Klingon Empire
Faction is complete. Only structures left.
The Romulan Star Empire:
The Dominion:
Faction is complete. Still needs balancing work.
Pirates:
They were going to be the Borg, but that idea failed. So we are looking into Random multirace ship spawns.
Planetary Defenders
Basically "Ships of the week" like the Maquis, Sona, Ferrengi, Tammarian battle cruisers and the like.
Balancing: Darkshimmer has the Federation, Romulan, and Klingon Empire, and Unified Dominion balanced.
Gameplay: We now have a working Cloaking Device! Check the ModDB page for the WIP video. Cloaking will not be fully implemented in the mod until version 0.04
Art: We are working on an LCARS style UI, adding proper icons, and pictures for all of the new units. The UI is going to take a while to do, because of all of the redundancy of the Sins UI. SoA 2 uses 2 sets of UI textures. Instead of the standard 4 textures for buttons, and 2 textures for icons. SoA 2 uses 8 textures for buttons, and 4 textures for icons which IMO is a major waste of resources, because sins loads all these textures at startup. Unfortunetly i dont see any other way to do it. What is kind of cool is that we dont have to use the same HUD for each faction. It is possible to have unique HUDs, but again the perfomance hit, because of the extra drain on resources could be big, and not worth it.
In Planning: (No promises, or guarentees, but we will try to add these if possible.)
Troop Transport effects.
Planetary invasion animations
Tractor beams. (need a code monkey for this)
Whatever else we can think of and are capable of doing.
Future Updates:
SoA 2 0.04 is now in planning, and will be focused primarily on Proper research trees, Ability's, and adding proper Structures. More than likely demo 0.04 will be the last demo. After that then the full mod should be ready.
SoA 2 0.05 will be the final spit, and polish of the mod. It will focus mainly on re-balancing if needed. Also final artwork changes will be made here. Which will include some ship model re-builds, and re-texturing.
The Full SoA 2 1.0 mod will be released "When it is Finished". We are doing this on our own free time. We aren't getting paid to do this. We have no set schedule. We have no time limit. I want this one to be good. So it wont go online until we feel it is ready.
*NOTE: Much about Sins as we are all now realizing is hardcoded. SoA 2 is going to be far from a perfect "trek" mod due to these hardcoded issues. However we will try to do the best we can with workarounds, and compromises to get it as close as possible. Like i said some things wont be perfect. Some things cannot be done at all. Enjoy the mod for what it is, and try not to be too "nit picky".SoA2 will be hosted on Mod Database once it is ready http://www.moddb.com/mods/star-trek-sacrifice-of-angels-2This main header will be updated when i have news to post.
The akira is still the most powerful non quantum using ship using torps. This is mainly due to the number of torpedoes she fires which is reflected by her torp power of 1800!
I noticed she does pack quite a punch. I guess I'm just used to seeing her hold her own one on one if needs be. The extended fire rates leave her rather vulnerable against ships that use phasers or disruptors as their primary weapons. I'm not even sure which way I preferred her, before at times she seemed over powered and now at times under powered. I guess I need to go back to the mod to get a better feel for her lol.
Ok went a round with the Akira as my only warship, and you are absolutely right Shimmer, she's still queen of the torpedoes. I would have to say you did an excellent job on her considering people wanting less torps. With 4 volleys of 4 in short succession she still rules most 1 on 1 engagements. The only problem is if the enemy ship had friends around, her reload time (she one of the 32s?) leaves her vulnerable to ships with better phasers or disruptors. IMO you balanced it out very well, can't have ships from different factions outpowering each other overall, then people want less torps flying around so you have to reduce those while maintaining balance or restoring it somehow... it makes my head hurt just thinking about it and how you would have to go about that because of all the different ways ships can be boosted over another lol.
Dark Shimmer/Major Stress,
MAJOR congrats (no pun intended) on this latest patch/beta! I am glad you have found a work around for the cloak. I have been following (in a non creepy way, I hope) the threads/posts regarding this mod. I am a trekkie (just not the Spock ear, convention going type) and have been keeping my eye on this mod!
I haven't tried to take on the pirate base yet (although Major Stress gave up the suprise on page 56), so I have not "had my own personal wolf 359". Is it possible to keep them as base defense until you hit the maximum threat level for pirates and then pehaps send out a few smaller ones? Maybe a scout type that can be defeated but cause some serious concern to the player(s)??
What would be really cool is if you could program a random event (or at least a variable event that was dependent upon allegences) that if two or more players were allied, then at random times a little "suprise party" might show up on their door steps...
Just some thoughts on a use without putting them fulling into the game but not leaving them out either
I agree with Bob, borg would be fantastic as a maximum threat level, maybee if you could somehow make it to attack all players rather than just one (it attacks the nearest colonized planet maybe). That way everyone might try to kill it.
Just one remark to Major Stress: I played 0.0.2 a lot, and after I got bored with the small amount of planetary types, I merged the Sins Plus mod in. It would be great if you could somehow include it in SoA2, it takes the game to a new level.
I don't know if this has been asked before, but I remember something from a really old post somewhere, that there were plans to include some mod in some other If it would be possible here, well, it could raise the diversity and quality of this mod a great deal.
BTW I checked the code (regarding the Borg and the Cube textures in 0.0.3a3) and found the very thing that I wanted to recommend: to add the Borg as a non-player race, and they would attack randomly like pirates.
Except they sould not be able to be controlled - no bounty, no nothing, they would just choose a random target.
So, when do we get our evil Cubes?
Shimmer and I have pulled our hair out to try and find a way to make the Borg work as pirates without making them look ridiculous, or be too OP. As you can see by the nerfed cube guarding the base a raid with a single standard cube will wipe out a hard, and even an unfair AI faction. We had sphreres diamonds, and a Tac Cubes in the pirate faction. The result of every borg raid was total annihilation for the AI. That just wont work. It hurts the gameplay. Nerfing them to nothing also will not be right. We dont want the retarded voyager instapop borg.
I know some of you wouldnt give a damn if the Borg were OP. You just want them in the mod. I do too belive it, or not. Yea i know i said NO BORG in the past... I LIED. That was our biggest mod secret.
Unfortunetly properly balanced borg indeed WILL break the mod. Even a lowly scout sphere is more than a match for a fleet of 20 ships. Once we get research implemented in the mod you wont be able to build most of the TNG era stuff untill at least tier 3. Some of the elites will require some kind of military research as well. That is all part of the balancing plan.
A Borg attack while your still in TMP era tech is game over. Plain and simple. We will use some borg as defenders just to have them in the mod. but as raiding pirates it is out of the question right now, because even nerfed they are still too OP.
Amen. Nerfing the Borg completely defeats their purpose - to be neigh unstoppable. I'm glad you found a way to get them in there, though.
I wonder - and this may be too scripty for the Sins engine to handle - if there's a way to rig it so that when you max out the military research tree, there's a certain percent chance of triggering a Borg invasion (a single cube). Perhaps by using some elements of the Returning Armada ability code? That way you could be sure that the faction that's attacked would have the resources and technology to potentially fight back. It would also be a good drawback to unlocking that last tasty bit of tech.
Darkshimmer - The balance is much improved this time around! Good work. I like the reduced number of torpedoes flying around...it makes it more of an "event" when they fire, so seeing the torrent of torpedos coming from an Akira is actually intimidating and not lost in the fray. The only rate-of-fire tweak I'd recommend right now is that I noticed on the Galaxy class, it sits there for a while without firing phasers, then fires a ton of blasts in rapid succession. Maybe even that out a little so that it's firing more regularly.
Balance-wise, I'd say that the top-tier cap ships are a bit uber - they're both extremely strong and deal tons of lethal damage. This may be less of an issue if the first cap ship weren't free, but as is a single Romulan Warbird or Sovereign will wipe the floor with a small fleet, and tend to one-shot (or at least one-volley) ships a lot. Maybe tone down their main weapons, but keep them hard to kill - and save the one-shot kills for the special abilities when you roll'em out in .4.
The Major already explained it: "Once we get research implemented in the mod you wont be able to build most of the TNG era stuff untill at least tier 3. Some of the elites will require some kind of military research as well. That is all part of the balancing plan."
Hence no cap ships in the beginning. I guess even a Lakota would need its Quantum Torp research
BTW, Major, is it possible at all to make assimilation work? If you can manage the cloak, this should be also possible, I guess.
Oh, and also, it's almost impossible to live without the phase jumps. You know: after mapping a star system, a special craft (Miranda? Intrepid? Galaxy?) can place a Phase Jump node, and after that, ships can jump directly between other such systems. After all, Warp drives can go anywhere, right? It could be called "Star Mapping", and you can go directly between mapped systems.
https://forums.sinsofasolarempire.com/329130 <--- borg stuff goes here !
"BTW, Major, is it possible at all to make assimilation work? If you can manage the cloak, this should be also possible, I guess."
urm ofc it works its in the 3rd party addon i am working on
Wow. Can't wait to see! Haven't played a nice Borg vs everyone since Major A Payne's Borg Incursion series
Too bad the Transwarp can't be made way faster than normal jump speed. And they having a Phase Jump ability effectively voids my argument about the Star Mapping idea
Borg are scrapped as part of the official SoA 2 mod. Except for the occasional planetary defender.
We tried to make it to where only one cube, or tac cube would spawn in an extreme raid but most of the time it would be like 5 cubes. Any lower and we would get CTD's. The number depends on the severity, bounty, Your fleet size, and how well established your empire is infrastructure wise. On huge maps it will be impossible to spawn just one single cube, because of the random factor. Believe me, We Tried, and we were very disapointed that it couldnt be done.
Any further Borg questions refer them to LokiGodOfMischief. His 3rd party add on has the SoA 2 teams full support, and blessing. I just hope it dont break the game by steamrolling all of the other factions combined J/K
I actually like the borg being separate from this mod, but look forward to Lokis addon!
I am not sure I could bribe the borg to attack the klingons... seems weird
Hey Major Stress and Darkshimmer
I haven't play 0.03a3 long enough to really comment on the Romulans, but so far the balancing seems great! The lowered cost is good. I think that the added time to build and added fleet cost for ships was a good thing. The Lakota variant really feels like a capital ship now. The game so far is absolutely amazing!
I just wanted to ask one question. In 0.03a2 I noticed that the Lakota variant capital ship actually upgraded as it leveled up. Just like in regualr Sins, the Lakota's health, damage, shields etc... increased with each level gained. None of the other federation capital ships did though. Now in demo 0.03a3, the Lakota no longer upgrades. I just wanted to know what happened? and how could it be done so that all of the capital ships upgrade?
Great job guys. The mod is amazing!
It's pretty easy to do this yourself - just go into the game info files and change the amount of shields and hull points you want the ship to increase by for each level. It's impossible to miss.
Elite leveling was unintentionally disabled when we removed the ability's. However we left it alone to help with the balancing. The current vanilla research does give some shield, and weapon buffs, but it is still vanilla sins research. We havent had time to mess around with any of that yet. We are still focused on just getting the ships in the mod, and are only concerned about the default pre-buff stats. Once we do get into the research, and ability's the balancing will be adjusted accordingly.
NICE MOD
But ships r way over powered.
It's a demo, not a final product harney. Stress'll get there, his work so far has been fantastic. He was alone for most of it...I think he has one other guy now.
lets discuss this for a moment as this outlook is going to be a concern for alot of people. Due to the Sovereign being in game we have to seperate out the weapons and power differences between the elites differently. However, the sovy and the other ships in there class will eventually get 360 coverage, and all your balance issues you think you have will be solved at the time. The sovy especially has the ability to rapidly fire pulses of phaser shots in a 360 firing arc. Once the fighter movements are unlocked i plan to recreate this as much as possible, and once again i'll have to rebalance some things. Besides most ships don't have the full armor bonuses yet or shield midigations, you didn't think i would really forget that part did you? if so, shame on you!!!!
this is coming in another part of the mod and will help with rebalance issue as needed.
please note a special thanks to loki here for helpping us with alot of 0.03, between his beta testing and borg models, sounds, ideas, and feedback he was certainly an asset in contribution.
yea she's still being tweak'd alittle, i'll look into that more. But i am hoping when they release the fighter movement we were told they are working on releasing i don't want to do too much to it or it will throw off the lateral and aft firing
i'll have to look into that but for a different pirate race
They are??? That's going to be truly awesome if it happens. I've been cuing up moves around enemy ships and then zooming in to watch to get my Trek-style battle visuals, but this sounds much more intersting!
on page 44 of this thread you will see the post!
Well I just tried the updated mod for the first time last night... You guys have done an excellent job with this!!! (Balancing, models, etc)
On a side not, I tried to take out the pirate fleet with half my cap maxed (Federation) on caps ships and normal and couldn't take out that cube!!! I had to actually send an entire fleet to take it out and still lost roughly 20 ships before it went down...
Anyway, great job again!! I'm greatly looking forward to when you guys actually complete this... So far even as it is, it's a blast to play!!!
Awesome mod guys! I just got to play (breifly) the new version...Romulans are looking good, and the new cost, and health structures of the ships look great, but I have two questions at least as it pertains to the federation:
1) I noticed the federation's regular frigates (the mirandas, centaurs, constellations, etc) all require twice as much supply (mirandas 8, centaurs 11...if i recall correctly). While the heavy cruisers (intepid, akira all range around 14-17). Is there a reason why the lesser frigates are taking up so much pop? I was only able to get like 5 ships (including free cap) before i hit the pop wall. Also I noticed the computer didnt really bother to get the smaller frigates in the early stages.
Point is with the lesser frigates requiring so much pop and then being pretty obsolete against a heavy frigate, it just about eliminates any need for variety. Might as well save for all heavy ships if they are going to take up almost as much pop.
Heavy cruisers and cap ships i thought supply seemed much better balanced.
2) Federation torpedo weapons seem much dimished...espcially compared to the phasers. In star trek i always believed photon torpedos were always more powerful or at least as powerful as the phasers. For example, I think the miranda now does 110 phasers with only 25 (or so) damage with torpedos....now I'm not sure if thats per torpedo or per volley.
Same goes for the sovy... quantum torpedo only doing 250-300 compared with 1000 phaser damage. Now if were talking per torpedo that might make more sense, but i didnt have time to check.
Overall seems like a fun mod, i like that the pirates base is no longer a pushover... and i look forward to playing against the romulans. Just seems if we could get the supply kinda at the levels of the previous mod (for the lesser frigates) then i think it would encourage a bigger variety in potential fleets.
Keep up the good work, its amazing you guys are able to do as much as you have!
Sins is real funny about how it deals out damage. While the torpedoes may seem to be nerfed to hell on the info cards, they are more powerful than the numbers say. That is because it applys all of its damage at once on impact instead of how the beam weapons do damage over time. This is why we had trouble in earlier builds with the torps being OP.
The Dominion faction is finished. At least as far as the models, and UI are concerned. They just need to be balanced. When that happens and some more playtesting occurs we will be ready for 0.03b
Soon i wont be online as much as i have been lately. I am moving to a place where there is virually no internet service. Not even wireless. I lived here before last year, and this is job related so i cant say "no". Not unless i want to be homeless of course
During the Internet Blackout times for me Darkhimmer will be in charge of the mod. I trust his judgement, and i think he knows the direction to take SoA 2.
I will look into this, not really sure how i missed that
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