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
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
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
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 & Sundays9pm EST (2am GMT) Saturdays & SundaysIf 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\SettingorWindows 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 FALSEChange FALSE to TRUELogOutput 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 website12,000GB (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!
hmmm... i can not get powerfull pirates to even load with entrenchment it just immediately does a minidump, I have followed instructions and my game is updated.
Think ryat's still updating that, I'm waiting for it too =X
New Post: I tinkered with some of the values in that file you mentioned that could possibly be fore the rings. But, no apparent changes when adding to the values or taking away from them
also, i inverted the colors on the "DS skyboxes" TOO DAMN BRIGHT lol
Try: Sparse, Dense, GrittySparse, GrittyDense, GrittyDump, PuffySparse, PuffyDense, IceSafe
That might be for the clouds and not the rings though. Keep an eye on both just to be sure.
there wasn't a change in the rings for what I altered, did find the values to reduce/raise the amount of asteroids in the fields though
I have everything you pointed out in this post. There are still no changes. First I installed the newest version of the mod, without the patch. No changes. Then I downloaded the three files, replaced the .dds with the .tga in the Textures folder of the mod. No changes. Then I installed the MSGM and ran that on top of Distant Stars. No changes!
What else can I do?
Okay, humor me.
Your directX is up to date and so are your video card drivers?
Your game is up to date and doesn't have any odd issues that you know of?
You installed the mod properly correct? Downloaded it, unzipped it to your desktop, moved it over to the mod folder, enabled it, verified the checksum was correct, then hit apply?
After that put the tga files in the DS texture folder deleting those of the same name but with the dds extension?
Following that, did the same mod set up process with MSGS?
Not sure if you can put a copy of those tga's in the MSGS mod and still have it work properly... Worth a try at least.
Verify that this issue is something that happens with all mods, or just this one?
Steps after that.... I'm going to have to think about it. Ideas anyone
K so, still tinkering with my orbital elevators(I'd love to alter the appearances somehow) anyway, I did finish with the skybox surgery on DS, but I can't seem to find where you guys hid the reflection stuff so everything stops looking asif under a giant flashlight! shield reflections changed through the environment cube data I'm suspecting(gotta see something take a hit first) but I dunno where to look for your flashlight settings
Edit: Kyahh!! Frustrating!! One of the ones I changed has the north and south pole lookin junk and ruin the whole thing...I liked it's color too ;.;
Welcome to the joys of modding.
Enjoy
*jumps on ryat's back and starts biting* Graaaa!!! give me back my innocence!!
Update: Omg! Ryat it's all your fault!! I was up late tinkering and didn't look at the clock and I missed the last bus down town to get to my class!! AHHHH I missed a day!!*starts strangling and shaking Ryat* my perfect attendance is gone!! I won't get credit for anything I submit late~! *hissss*
I'm going to try all these steps and keep you posted. Thanks for the help.
Check. Everything is up to date.
Nope, I just checked Impulse and my game is up to date as well. Trinity is installed, and the game too says Trinity v1.21.
I unzipped the file with Winrar, moved the folder 'Distant Stars (D) 0.99 B3' to Computer\Users\Me\AppData\Local\Ironclad Games\Sins of a Solar Empire\Mods-Diplomacy v1.21
Then I start up the game, select the mod, enable it, apply the changes, wait for a bit so the game can catch up. Then I hit the first problem. Where can I check the checksum I get, is correct? Now it says 29298260.
[73985823].7z
This magical number at the end of every download is the checksum you should have.
Ah, thanks. I'll download the mod again in that case, as my 1-day old download doesn't have the same checksum as the one in game.
It could of been a bad download, that happens. Or a bad unzip, another common problem. Im not sure how your unzipping it but in the more detailed mod installation instructions, the link can be found in the FAQ, taking it in baby stepd does seem to migitate the funky unzipping error that can cause a wrong checksum.
Do know there has been times me and Ryat have had to download the mod 3+ times because of these issues.
Let us know if you get it working or whatnot, we can try to guide you more but your getting to end of the path grasshopper. lol
the MSGM can run on .tga though it will take some effort to switch it back. It's not too terribly hard, just a bit time consuming. Unfortunately I do not have the time to mess with that now.
Yeah, was funny waiting for Ryat to download the MP version 600 times until he actually got a good copy.
Fortunately, it's not necessary right now. If it becomes one, I can do it quickly enough and get copies out to you if you haven't made your own.
1.3 look totally awesome!!!
Its gonna break the mod though...but there is a good side that there are some great ideas there and maybe some new tools modder can use.
Yes it does. Even (hopefully) removing the ability for armor upgrades to effect strike craft. That will help DS a lot with its dangerous strike craft.
@Stant123: I downloaded the mod again, and ran it again. The checksum is correct now. But I still run into the same issues, as I described before.
I removed the .dds files you mentioned, and moved the .tga files mentioned to the right folder.
Now I have a question about the MSGM mod. Should I move the entire mod folder to the mod directory and then run the mod from Sins? Or should I move the files in the Textures folder from the MSGM mod, into the Textures folder from the DS mod?
Running it as a mod, either on top of the list or below DS, doesn't change anything.
you set the MSGM mod in the mods folder along side DS and in the mod enabling list you stick MSGM on top so it overwrites the files with the same names in the DS mod. Basically, what's on top takes highest priority over any files with the same names in the lower folders.
Notes on new update: AAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!! *sob* I have to wait for my dynamic movement and murderous horde of pirates again.....*sniffle*
Okay. Tried that, doesn't change anything either! This is really frustrating. I'm here on this forum filled with people who run this mod without any problems, who have tons of knowlegde than can help me, and still my game refuses to run the mod as it should
Everybody thanks for the help so far. The only other thing I can report, is that this bug also appears in the Star Wars Requiem mod. Planets etc. look as they should, but the portraits are still bugged. Take a look at my posts in that thread to see, this one in particular:
https://forums.sinsofasolarempire.com/406670/page/5/#2968067
I was in the middle of making a compilation mod based on DS when they released the patch.
I have a whole bunch of work ahead of me now.
Anyway, when will you boys get the next DS update out that is 1.3 compliant?
When they get done playing SINS 1.3 first!
Cheap answer.
He got a point though....I will assume it wont be till end of this week at the super earliest.
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