Mad Scientist Mod
v2.5 Entrenchment Edition
ModDB Page
Support Email: madscientistmod@hotmail.com
New Technology Count: 94
New Plantary Ability Count: 30
MODS INCLUDED
1) Sins Plus v1.3 by Uzii (Modified)
2) Volumetric Explosions & Damage Effects ver. 1.12
3) Bailknights Graphic Mod v1.1
The mod is now available to modders to use in their own creations. All that I ask is that proper credit is given.
Current changes:
New Opening Theme Song: O' Fortuna: a song that I believe gets the blood pumping without taking away any of the atmosphere of the game.
Retroactive Researching: Reorganized the research benefits to give more sway to those with technological superiority against those of numerical superiority. All technologies that require previous research in the same exact subject have been changed, such as a laser damage tech that requires a previous laser damage tech. The game orignally gave the same bonus to both techs, usually 5%, and even though the second tech cost more to research, you still only squeezed out the same damage increase of the cheeper tech. For example
Tech 1: 5% damage increase
Tech 2: 5% damage increase
Tech 3: 5% damage increase
Tech 4: 5% damage increase
What I have changed is that I have made such researches retroactive in that the further you progress in that line the greater the bonus you receave per tech. The formula I used is (current bonus + previous bonus=New current bonus) So lets see that example again with the changes.
Tech 2: (5+5)10% damage increase
Tech 3: (5+10)15% damage increase
Tech 4: (5+15)20% damage increase.
I did this change for not only for weapons but all areas. The techs in which this applys includes: Weapon Damage, Weapon Recharge Rates, Shields, Hulls, Antimatter, Armor, Trade, Resources, Planet Population, Culture, and maybe one or two I can't remember. Note that this make certain aspects of the game you may have not concidered a threat much more powerful, such as enemy culture spread.
Fleet Tree Reorganized: I have reorganized the Fleet Tree to accept additional technologies to be researched. Note that any technologies I place in there will be able to be researched using both the military and civilian research stations.
Defense Techs Moved: While doing the Retroactive Researching protion of the mod I fully realized that civilizations that progressed heavily in the non-combat research fields would basically stand little chance against the military minded civilizations as they would be easily destroyed. In order to help prevent this I have moved the defense technologies from the combat tree to the fleet tree to allow all to research them.
New Techs Added To Military Tree: With the void now in the combat research tree I needed to come up with new technologies to fill it in, and with defenses now in the fleet tree but what else to put in there but more firepower. All races now have added technologes that increase the rate of fire of all their weapons. The bonuses here are also retroactive and if you research one weapon to its fullest, you will be pumping out an impressive 2x the rounds in the time span (100% increase)
Upgradeable Hanger Squads: This change will allow you to upgrade your defense hanger fighters per squad. It will be placed in the fleet tree along with the standard hanger defense tech that unlocks it so it is available for both research fields. Both TEC and Vasari will be able to add a total of 18 fighters to their hangers through research (.5/.5==1.5/1.5==2.5/2.5) x2 squads and because the Advent already had a tech that did this I deleted it and the will be able to add a total of 24 fighters (1/1==2/2==3/3)
Required Weapon Platform Research: Because the Hanger Defense is now available to both research trees, I am going to make the Defense Platforms (Gauss for TEC, Beam for Advent, and Missile for Vasari) a required research within the military tech tree. Note that this will make it so one can no longer build defensive structures without the proper research.
Added Elements from the Sins Plus By Uzii (Modified): I have added certain additional planets from the Sins Plus mod into this one. The following Planets are now included within this mod: Urban--Paradise--Industrial--Toxic--Relic--and Barren. Gas Giants are also now colonizable. Also added population cap research included in Sins Plus for both Gas Giants as well as Barren Planets and Astroids.
Starting Local Militias: The starting Militias will be changed and spawn based on the theme of the starting planet stated above. TEC's on Tec Planets, Advent on theirs, and Vasari on theirs.
Planet Rebalancing: The following displays the method I will be using to rebalance the planets in the game. Hopefully this will allow the planets to become unique without any of them becoming less important then the others. Each planet has 20 points to spend among the 5 fields.
Reorganized Research Techs: With the introduction of the new Defense Research Tree, I will be reorganizing the techs to allow for a more eye appealing layout as well as redefining the trees that certain techs should be in.
Planet Abilities: Every Planet will have an ability available to all races to research along with an additional researchable ability for the race best suite for the planet type. What this means is now instead of only being able to research the planest that your race best represents, you will be able to research abilities for every planet type, but you still recieve an additional researchable ability on your race favored planets.
White = Universial, Green = TEC, Blue = Advent, Orange = Vasari
Terran: Population Growth Rate (+33%,66%,100%)///Weapon Range (+50%,100%,150%)
Urban: fighters per squad for structures (+1,2,3)///Fighters per squad for Starbases (+1,2,3)
Paradise: Planet Upgrade Cost (-20%,40%,60%)///Culture Spread (+50%,100%,150%)
Old Naval Base: Weapon Cooldown (+33%,66%,100%)///Shield Restore (+50%,100%,150%)
Forest: Structure Build Rate (+33%,66%,100%)///Hull Restore Rate (+50%.100%,150%)
Desert: Chance to be hit (-10%,20%,30%)///Culture Spread (+50%,100%,150%)
Ice: Speed of enemy ships (-10,20%,30%)///Shield Restore Rate (+50%,100%,150%)
Ocean: Planet Bombing Damage Absorb (+20%,40%,60%)///Energy Weapon Cooldown (+50%,100%,150%)
Relic: Ability Cooldown (+33%,66%,100%)///Antimatter Cost on non-ultimates (-20%,40%,60%)
Savannah: Structure Build Rate (+33%,66%,100%)///Hull Restore Rate (+50%.100%,150%)
Volcanic: Damage for Structures (+33%,66%,100%)///Culture Spread (+50%,100%,150%)
Toxic: Damage for Mines (+33%,66%,100%)///Shield Restore Rate (50%,100%,150%)
Industral: Ship Build Time (-33%,66%,100%)///Hull Restore Rate (+50%.100%,150%)
Barren: Planet Bombing Damage Absorb (+20%,40%,60%)///Speed Increase for Ships and Starbase (50%,100%,150%)
Swamp: Structure Build Rate (+33%,66%,100%)///Weapon Range (+50%,100%,150%)
Five Strike Craft Per Race:
Intercepter: When it comes to the dog fight there is no equal. With unmatched speed and manuverability, Intercepters are by far the best strike craft to clear the way of fighters and provide valuable escort for bomber squadrons. (Real World Representation: Mig series Fighter)
Fighter: While the Intercepter is its greatest threat, the fighter is the greatest threat to bombers. With the ability to severly disrupt any bomber offensive, they provide valuable protection for structures and ships. (Real World Representation: F-series Fighter)
Light Bomber: Because it is classified as a light bomber, do not think that this craft is a pushover. It is in fact the toughest and most heavily armored strike craft available, and it has to be, as its job is to take on anti-strike craft frigates and carriers. (Real World Representation: A-10 Warthog)
Medium Bomber: A heavy cruiser's nemisis. The medium bomber can deliver ordinace that can turn even the heaviest vessels to clouds of debris. Only moderately armored and relitively slow moving, these bombers can fall prey to enemy fighter formations if proper precautions are not taken. (Real World Representation: B-52 Superfortress)
Heavy Bomber: Go big or go home some might say, and these ships definately represent that very idea. While only somewhat effective against most vessels, these strike craft shine when brought up against massive targets like capital ships and structures. (Real World Representaion: B2 Bomber)
Roles for Strike Craft Building Units:
Capital ships: can build all three bomber types, as well as fighters, which make them strong in many areas. They can be powerful in assulting enemy planets and heavy vessels(medium and heavy bombers), can be strong against other fleets with large frigate numbers (light bombers) and can protect their own fleet against bomber raids from other capital ships (Fighters). Their flaw is that fighters only provide a marginal amount of protection against other fighters as well an intercepters. This is where the need for cruiser carriers come in.
Cruiser Carriers: Unlike in vanilla sins, cruiser carriers are now more protectors of their own fleet then an assult force. They can launch powerful attacks against enemy frigates and cruisers (light bomber), can protect against enemy bomber forces (fighter), but are also tasked in the protection of the capital ships bomber forces against the enemy providing needed strike craft to act as escorts(Intercepter). Their flaw is that they are weak against structures as well as heavy vessels. This is where the Capital Ship squadrons come in.
Hanger Defenses: Like Cruiser Carriers, the Hanger Defense also provides the same protection toward the planet it surrounds. Its light bombers can devistate enemy frigates and hult their attacks. Its fighter squadrons can hult the attacks of enemy capital ship bombers against the orbiting structures, and its intercepter squadrons can be used to protect the light bombers against invading forces that are relying on fighter support. Their flaw is they cannot provide a powerful punch against heavy vessels such as capital ships themselves. This is where Star Bases come in.
Starbase: Starbases provide the same protection that Hanger Defenses with one notiable difference between them. The starbase can also be strong against the heaviest of vessels, such as capital ships and heavy cruisers, with its ability to build medium bombers. This allows it to provide the final area of protection that hanger defenses lack in.
Error Free: In making the mod error free, I was forced to make Gas Giants uncolonizable, as the research to make them colonizable was causing issues with the game engine and giving me the an error. While many people did not have a problem with, it was causing crashes on some systems, and therefore was decided to remove it.
Planet Abilities now require Starbases: Planet abilities now require starbases in order to access them. Some might think this as restrictive, however, I feel it adds to the depth of the whole entrenchment experience.
New Changes for 2.5:
Dubbled Max Research Levels:Max levels of many of the research will be dubbled in order to further use of the mod into later stages of the game. Along with the Increased Need for Trade described below, it will definately be of use into many more hours of play then usual. Take note that both ship supply and capital ship max will also be effected by this, dubbling the amount of vessels you can have.
Increased Need for Trade and Foundries: There will be an increased need for trade and foundries within the game. No longer can you expect to run a powerful empire on just taxes and extractors alone and still drown yourself in spare credits and resources. No longer will you merely laugh when your full entire fleet gets wiped because you can easily have another ready in mere moments. No longer can you expect to complete all the research in a cupple of hours on a meager handful of world.
Reorganized Pirates: With the increased power given by the added technologies, pirates have become seriously dwarfed by the strength of the empires, but no longer. Pirates vessels themselves will improve as the game moves on, and once again become a feared enemy in the galaxy, or a powerful tool if you have the credits.
Hey guys, sorry for the lack of communications over the last 2 months, but RL decided to kick me in the teeth. Anyhow, I really don't want to go into details. I just wanted everyone to know that I am back in the mod seat.
Okay everyone, got the mod converted over to 1.03, and I also included the additional material I was working on before my disappearance. They are
Reorganized Pirates: With the increased power given by the added technologies, pirates have become seriously dwarfed by the strength of the empires, but no longer. Pirates raids and vessels themselves will improve as the game moves on, and once again become a feared enemy in the galaxy, or a powerful tool if you have the credits.
If there are any issues with this new release then by all means, please let me know
Ordian,
Great job on this mod. It has added more intrest to the game. Like I said I modified your mod a bit on the tech race. Increased hull points on frigates and capital ships and lowered the build times for frigates. Also made it so the terran planets can have between 1-8 resource astroides per gravity well. Just playing around and seeing what would work and what would be absured. Of course that would depend on the map and how many terran panets there are.
If I wanted to create a new capital ship what program would I use to do that? I have an idea for 2 new capitial ships. Also If I wanted to make changes to the civilian research tree how would I do that? What file would I need to modify? I think there is a lot of needed improvements on that part of the research tree.
Once again, you did an oustanding job.
Thanks
JS
I believe you would use 3d studio max to make ship models, but I am really not a modeler so you could probably ask those who have done that with their mods and get a more complete answer.
As for modding the research tree, it is not as simple as me telling you what one or two files you need to modify. The fact is, what files you need to modify/create all depends on what you are trying to accomplish. One example is that if you were going to unlock an ability through research, you would need to create/modify an ability file, and one or more buff files, as well as the ship/structure/planet that recieves that file along with a research file and an edit of the player file to include that research. If it in not an ability then you would need to edit a seperate set of files, so it is based on you goals and why you are editing the file.
It is also good, if not nessary, to know the restrictions that the game places on modding within the research tree. Unfortunatly the sky is not the limit, as there are several things I would like to add to the game, but they are far from possible to do so.
Thanks a lot, I'm downloading it right now! It's one of my favourite mods for Soase out here!
Cheers, LT.
Ok, there might be a bug with firefox and filefont, but is correctred by using IE. Ok, when downloading this mod from firefox, it links properly to filefont but then when you click download now it links to mediafire. So I am wondering is anyone else getting this bug too?
You say its compadible with ent 103, is it compatble with soase 117 ?
awolfhk
awolfhk the op says entrenchment meaning the current versions are for entrenchment only.
there was some versions for 1.1.0-1.12, but they have not been supported for a long while.
harpo
ok thanks, for ent 103 only....
Great Mod Ordian,
I am getting a MiniDump from researching Insurgency lev4, and it was repeatable. The first 3 levels caused no problems, but when the fourth one completed researching, I immediately had a miniDump. Thought I'd let you know so that you could fix it.
-Rezulin
Thanks Rezulin, I'll take a look into that
i really like your mod ordian
hey oridian,
i have been getting minidumps when i load one of my games. it happens every time.
Ax
@ ax: quick questions.....Was the game you are trying to load orginally started with the 2.5 release of the mod or a previous release? If so, does it just happen on that one game and not others? IF you wish I can give you an email address to send it to so I can have a look at it.
Just some quick response to this otherwise really great mod;
Spelling: "Interceptor", not "Intercepter"
Game issues: Playing on Very High settings (just as with the 7DS Mod) may cause minidumps. (Most likely due to resource overflow.)
AI: I get the feeling (even when playing on Unfair) that the AI does not fully utilize the available researching options. (Seeing low damage and hull/shield levels on AI ships.) I do not know how the AI prioritizes research between the three (four with Fleet logistics) research tiers though.
I am currently balancing out the researching options for the AI. It is not that the AI does not research the new techs, it is that the ai researches at the same level as it always did but there are many more techs for it to sort through so it seems slower then before. I have used the develper program to prove the AI does research the new techs, I just need to kick it in the ass to get it to priorities certain techs over others and make research a bigger part of its gameplan.
reasearch costs seem to be higher, or is it just me?
They do progressively get higher as you move further down the tiers. The main reason behind this is that without reorganizing the cost of research it would have made the first two levels of tier 2 cheaper then the last two of tier 1, which I could not justify considering you get a larger benefit from the tier 2 compaired to 1. So I reconstructed the costs of the research based on this.
Also, I feel that the increased costs add an additional element toward the game. I felt that by the time you got to the final research in the vanilla sins there was more then enough resources flowing in that you really could just research everything without much concern, and so aimed toward even in the late game you were still required to think about what you really wanted instead of putting them all in a queue and not giving it a second thought.
Just wanted to say thank you Ordian for all your hard work, I have played most of the mods for Sins and I have to say I enjoy yours the most, it has the most balance and I always love playing tech heavy with smaller more advanced fleets until late game which makes this mod perfect. I have one request, I looked through this thread and didn't see someone bringing it up but sorry if it has. I was hoping you could add a titan class ship to each race that is unlocked by researching a technology from the top of all three tech trees. Most space games have a Battleship, Mothership, ect that has the garrison capacity of a carrier, the firepower of a destroyer, and the support capability of a utility ship. There are other mods that have done similar things but they don't have the enjoyment factor for me that this does. I am sure you could get plenty of people to give you meshes and to even do the texture work right here on this forum. Anyway thanks again for your excellent work.
i would like to send the game to u. just email me with intru on how to get the data. what is interesting is that the day before it worked fine but now it minidumps at the load screen.
Okay...I might have missed this, but, where do I get the files for use with Galaxy Forge?
Im getting a mini dump, good 4 hours into game. i Just downloaded 2.5 version for 1.03 no previous versions. Ive nearly finished all research just the militia for the tec, and im attacking a terran planet.
First of all, I just wanted to comment that this is a fantastic mod - one of my favorite Sins mods.
Now the feedback part: I love the idea of stronger pirates, it's actually one of my issues with the stock game - I always wished they were more of a threat. Unfortunately I think that maybe they are too strong in MS2.5. They keep destroying my CPU opponent. One minute I'm in a tense game, and the next minute the pirates have burned the CPU homeworld to the ground.
Well you could reduce the strength of the raids your self by editing the Gameplay.gameplayconstants file.
like such:
strengthPerOwnedPlanet .10 -> divide it by 10 strengthPerCargoShip .0025 -> divide it by 10 strengthPerBounty .00003 -> divide it by 10 firstWarningTime 900 normalWarningTime 780 minSendRaidTime 30 maxSendRaidTime 90 raidStrengthThreshold:0 0 raidStrengthThreshold:1 .25 -> divide it by 10 raidStrengthThreshold:2 .45 -> divide it by 10 raidStrengthThreshold:3 .7 -> divide it by 10 raidStrengthThreshold:4 .9 -> divide it by 10
or you could reduce the max supply of the pirates can use for raids
such as
minSupply 1 maxSupply 220
to
minSupply 1 maxSupply 100 or whatever number you want
PS to Ordian: Can you reduce the length of the title of the post so people can work the with the edit.
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