The Orion Nebula

The code for handling the different galaxy sizes can be altered to adjust the size of map, star sizes and density. You can modify the values at the file offsets below. These are offsets for the orion2v140.exe (subtract 0x40 from the offsets if you want offsets for orion2.exe v 1.31).

NOTE: Take care not to modify the bytes at other offsets nearby as it is game code and will most definately result in a crash.

Which file contains this information? The Orion.exe or one of the .LBX files?

Which file contains this information? The Orion.exe or one of the .LBX files?

Orion.exe

The file offsets are above.

I used your helpful manual to mess around with some Hex Values.

I alternated the Map Editor, that it creates a huge Galaxy with the amount of Stars of a "medium" galaxy. if you choose "medium" as Galaxy Size.

These are the Values i had to edit:



There are some nice advantages:

- Longer distances between the stars, no more nasty 1 turn hopping between the systems anymore, you can react better if someone attacks you.
- Fewer systems to colonize (-> faster games)
- Increased usability for better fuel cell technologies (at least iridium cells are really handy, because many systems are more than 7 parsecs away from each other)

This is how it looks like:



Edit: Corrected the Values, thx to catalyst_kh

Well, as you can see density of the stars can vary significantly in different sectors. One player can get more stars than the other...Can you ensure that stars spread evenly over the whole map?

Of course there can be a difference between the players in the amount of free Planets, but every player has at least 2 Systems to colonize (every home System has at least one 2. System 4 parsecs away). And there are several wormholes spread out in the Galaxy who increase significantly the possibility to expand. I use the Orange Map-Version with mapgen to modify tiny/upoor planets, so there shall usually be at least 2 useful planets in each system. With /Planets=5 there shall be about 10 useful planets for each player at least to colonize.

Furthermore we usually fill up the Galaxy with KI-Players up to 8, so there won't be many unguarded Systems for each Player anyways. The Ki Players reduce the possibility to spread across the galaxy, because they act very aggressive at the early state of the Game. (We don't allow to invade KI Planets, they have to be wiped out like Monster-Guarded Systems for further Expansion)

If you set the Galaxy with 8 Players, the map Generator restarts several times (sometimes the map Generator gnaws for about 30 seconds) until it spits out a Galaxy. I think that it cancels much too unbalanced Galaxies at his own.

I tested this combination some times, and the number of Systems any Player could colonize before he gets near to another Player don't vary much.

I don't think it is more unbalanced than in dense Galaxies.

If you start in a corner in dense galaxies you often have much fewer Systems to colonize than a Player who doesn't start in a Corner.

The best starting point usually is a System about 10 Parsecs away from a corner, where you can grab the Systems further to the middle and then get all Systems in the corner, because there is no other Player there.

I remember the last multiplayer Game in an normal huge Galaxy, where one Player got 14 Systems (starting point in the top middle and there was no further player in the top right corner) and another (starting point bottom left corner) only 5 before he reached the border of other Players.

And if a Player should really start in an empty corner we just restart the Game.

This is what I say, situations with empty sectors will be happening much more frequently, thus it will result in more restarts.

There is a misprint at MadVipers screenshot - 1125FE should be set to B4, not 58, or the galaxy will not stretch vertically.

There is a misprint at MadVipers screenshot - 1125FE should be set to B4, not 58, or the galaxy will not stretch vertically.

Corrected the values, thx!