The Orion Nebula

Orange Mod, the GoodMap Mods and the Moo1Map Mod can be found here:

http://masteroforion2.blogspot.com/2006 ... -mods.html

Orange Mod, the GoodMap Mods and the Moo1Map Mod can be found here:

http://masteroforion2.blogspot.com/2006 ... -mods.html

I'm glad someone is laying some ground work for map-generation mods. Good work, Siron.

I'm writing this within 3 minutes of reading your blog post, and without having tried it out...after giving it a go, I might change my mind.

But...I have a comment that I'd like to throw it out there for discussion.

It seems to me that the mods could cater to uni-aquatic type races. As discussed in another thread to a small degree, the risk of finding mothing but rocky planets is one that comes with the territory. Players don't look at it that way usually, but instead seem to look at it as a "bad map" when they have no wet worlds. Meanwhile players that take lithovore are less impacted, though they admittedly have to pay a high price for it (10 picks...ow!). Uni and aqua players sometimes want to ask for a restart on a map that a litho player is perfectly happy with...a map is not worthy of playing out unless it caters to the picks that they made a conscious decision to choose. The mods seem to lean toward providing a "custom" map that uni and aquatic races crave.

Just my own thoughts. Admittedly I'm somewhat biased, but I feel the need to speak up whenever I see something that further pushes the advantage toward high pop races.

I would be interested in seeing a "GoodMap2" mod that did not change the chances for planet types. Changing the odds for planet sizes, though, would probably be a good thing.

Again, after I try the mods, I might change my mind about some of this. I do appreciate the work you are putting into stuff like this, even if it does not sound like it.

-Gusset

Orange this very good idea.At last end barren planets.Aqua rules.

Thanks for your feedback.

@ your doubts, Gusset:

First of all: When you alter the map statistics you will also alter the strength of several racepicks. There is no way to avoid this. For most players that’s no big issue since they simply adapt. But even if you just play one specific race your analysis is IMO a bit one-sided.

Let us look at the most popular picks separately. Especially some (dis)advantages caused by the orange map mod:

Unification
+: There are more planets to settle.
-: No unguarded UltraRiches

Democracy
+: Less outposts at start are needed which favors especially a tech race.
-: Sometimes several good planets around which can’t be settled by a tech race early on.

Tolerant
+: More food planets
-: No longer any UltraRich which hurts especially a tolerant race since it can exploit these planets early on.
-: Better climate means that pop multiplier are less important

Aquatic
+: More often wet climate improves the pop multiplier.
+: Also more food (though it is not that important for this pick than for tolerant or subterranean races.)
-: More often gaias on the map, which means that the aquatic pick is more often a poor choice since tolerant and sub races are “defacto aqua” in this case.

Subterranean
+: More food planets
-: Better climate means that pop multiplier are less important.

Lithovore
+: Better climate means that the above mentioned pop multiplier picks are less important.
-: The point you emphasized: Other picks have less trouble with food.

When I thought about this mod, I had in mind that I prefer with most races orange star systems. The only exception is Uni Tolerant where I hope for some UltraRiches in other systems since these planets accelerate the expansion. So I think UniAqua is improved since the gap to UniTol should be smaller. Intentionally. I think there is no doubt that UniTol is still overpowered in our current 1.4 nowh maps. And I simply prefer to “carve” aquas this way then the popular but boring Tol ban which also “carves” UniAqua. (Actually I prefer 1.4games with whs since there is a significant risk to play a slower teching tolerant.)

The point you emphasized is IMO not of this importance for aquatic races. I can even barely remember that I had a significant food problem with aquatic (in contrast to UniTol or UniSub). When there is really crap around this race can still decide to blitz (without soil) and it can pump out some BBs before food really hurts. Food might be IMO more helpful for UniSubs. Of course, I think that UniAqua has more often maps where it can have a “normal expansion”. But I doubt that additional food/planets accelerate that much compared to the good maps in 1.4. BTW, there is a nice idea to reduce the “additional planets problem”: Cab, Alex, Budee and Fut played a pre 4way with BlackHoles. There should be still enough to settle now...even with black holes.

When I am in the mood to play a lith race I even think that I would prefer to play it in an orange galaxy. The reasons are listed above. I think the good chance to find a large swamp, arid, terran or gaia helps demo lith a lot. I had also quite good results in Inver’s mod with my demo lith sci1 race. Gusset, I doubt that you currently consider lith in (unbanned) 1.4 games as strong, i.e. with uni tol available. I think in orange I would try it.

Of course, all the above-mentioned points are actually difficult to evaluate. Play testing is necessary. Unfortunately, I had no time and no luck to try a game recently. The other Lith players SkyBandit and Cabman tried several times lith in orange. Maybe they can add impressions.

“ I would be interested in seeing a "GoodMap2" mod that did not change the chances for planet types. Changing the odds for planet sizes, though, would probably be a good thing.”

So far, I don’t know how to influence the size class of a planet, i.e. I can’t increase the probability for medium/large/huge planets. But I could improve the max pop values of small and tiny planets directly. Actually, I have already done so in DCb4. I increased tiny and small gaia from 5/10 to 6/12 iirc but didn’t touch the climate multipliers. But keep in mind that this would favor uni tol when you don’t exclude UltraRich planets.

I have updated the Map Mods. They are compatible with b23 now.

It seems that the site you uploaded it to is no longer available.

It seems that the site you uploaded it to is no longer available.

It is known; been that way for a while. PM me and I can e-mail the files to you.