File Description
This is a demo mod of Star Trek: Sacrifice of Angels 2 for Sins of a Solar Empire.
The demo mod features six playable factions, and most of the canon Dominion War era ships from the Star Trek universe.
The mod itself is a continuation of the original Sacrifice of Angels mod for Homeworld. It will use many of the same models, and effects created for that mod. SoA 2 is being developed by the remnants of the old Trekmod's team (the team that developed the original SoA mod). Along with digital Underground, and contributions from the finest artist in the trek mod community.
Understand that this is only a demo. More work needs to be done, and the mod still needs balancing. It is just a taste of things to come.
Screenshots
Readme
Thank you for downloading the Star Trek Sacrifice of Angels 2 demo.
Much hard work went into making this demo mod possible.
However the mod is not complete. There is much more work to be done.
The mod still needs Ships, Structures, Music, Sounds, More Effects,
and Balancing.
Demo 0.02 was intended for the Sins 1.1 patch however that patch is taking too long to arrive. So it is released for the 1.05 version of Sins
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Changes from Soa 2 demo initial release to demo 0.01b
Added proper ship pictures, Avatars, and icons for all of the Mod Factions.
Buffed Dominion Devastator to be able to stand up in a fight better.
Added more weapon hardpoints to Cardassian Galor, and Keldon Class's
Added more weapon hardpoints to the Dominion Devastator Class
Added temporary 3rd party LCAR's Style HUD.
Fixed all english string errors.
Changes from SoA2 demo 0.01b to 0.02
Disabled the Vanilla sins factions from being selectable.
Moved Venture Refit to carrier slot to make room for the Soveriegn (to be added in future update).
Disabled ships going transparant during warp (phase jump).
Added 1st part of a new original SoA 2 LCAR's Style HUD.
1st attempt at balancing mod. Tried to give ships proper stats. Not the best, but better than what it was before.
I tried to balance vs the AI. Human opponents may require different types of balancing.
Added some new weapon effects, and sounds.
Added Klingon K'vort, and Negh'Var
Added Dominion "Enslaver" battleship.
Added Shield meshes to all modded ships.
Removed aft torpedo from Defiant because it was causing targeting issues. She was getting stuck in position and not firing. Buffed dorsal Phasers to compensate. She only used the aft torpedo once in battle anyway vs the Lakota.
Reduced the price of the Defiant to a more reasonable level.
Matched beam weapon durations to thier sound effects durations. This eliminated some sound issues.
Matched beam muzzle effects to beam durations
lowered volume on some sound effects, because they were way too loud in game. Especially when many ships fired at once.
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A message to the fans from Major Stress aka The Stress Puppy
Understand that this a just series of DEMO releases for SoA 2. It is a taste of things to come for the full mod. So enjoy the demos for what they are :) All of these will work their way toward a true release. More new content will be added to each new demo as the mod progresses.
While i do have some assistance with things like sounds, model donations, and effects. I am pretty much working on this project alone as a HOBBY. The majority of the models come from Trekmods older mods. Like the original SoA mod for homeworld, and the Favor the Bold mod for bridge commander. Also some best 3rd party artist generously donated their works, and they are listed in the credits below. The importing of the models, adding new stuff to the mod, and getting it all to work in game i did by myself. So if something minor isnt right try not to be nit picky about it, and be civil if there is something major wrong. This is just a HOBBY for me. Not a full time job. If something major is wrong ill try to fix it asap, and/or tell you how you can fix it.
Try not to PM me, or post about shiplist suggestions. I have a shiplist planned for the full mod. The Federation will be the only faction using strictly canon units. The rest of the factions will be using some non canon units to fill in roles. These units are hand picked by myself, because they make sense, and fit the role they are meant to be in. Some may, or may not be from the TNG era, but will pass as being an older design. I dont want to use non canon units. There are some atrocious looking designs out there. However I only use what i think is the best that is available.
Try not to post or PM me about balancing. I am well aware of the mods lack of balance, and state it here on the readme, and on the forums. We are working on it. In time the mod will be balanced :)
There are things about Sins that are not "trek-ish" like the phase lanes, Cloaking, and the way ships move, or don't move. This is hardcoded in the sins engine, and i have tried many times to disable, remove, and change it, I met with failure each, and every time. We will have to live with some of these hardcoded annoyances. The way i see it is the pro's of the sins engine outweigh the cons. If i can ignore those things, and enjoy what is good about it. You can too.
This is a mod by an old school trekkie that is tired of seeing the Dumbed down, Childish, Cartoon-ish, No thinking involved, and outright poorly made Trek games by big name game makers. This is a mod by a Trek fan for the Trek fans. We had a vision of what a "Trek" game should be like with the original Sacrifice of Angels mod. Hopefully that very same vision passes on to SoA 2.
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Installation: READ THIS! IT IS IMPORTANT!
Remove any previous SoA 2 demo mods if you have them, and install this new one in its place.
You will need Sins of a Solar Empire patched to version 1.05 to run this mod. The mod WILL NOT WORK with the beta 1.09 patch!
For best results run the mod on a CLEAN install of Sins. This includes deleting the "Ironclad Games" folder located in Documents and Settings"your user name"Local SettingsApplication Data. Sins will create a new Ironclad Games folder, and subfolders when it is run. This will ensure no incompatable, old, or "beta" files are in the game. This must be done BEFORE you run sins for the first time after re-installing.
Extract the SoA 2 folder from the rar file into the "Mods" directory of Sins of a Solar Empire
Example for windows XP C:Documents and Settings"your user name"Local SettingsApplication DataIronclad gamesSins of a Solar EmpireMods
You may have to change to show hidden files, and folders in your window options to see the "local settings", and "application data" folders
For Vista users, the Sins Mod folder should be here. C:Users"your user name"AppDataLocalIronclad GamesSins of a Solar EmpireMods
Make sure you DO NOT have an SoA 2 folder inside of an SoA 2 folder, or the mod will crash. It is best to just drag and drop the SoA 2 folder from the rar file into your Sins mods directory.
SoA 2 is only supported on the English version of Sins. However if you use another language version look for the English.STR file in the SoA 2String folder, and rename it to whatever language you are using. Example: German.STR
Run Sins then go into optionsmods. Select "SoA 2" from your selection of mods. Check "run mod at startup", and restart the game to watch the cool opening cinematic :)
Disable the "Ship mesh Highlight Filter" in your options. Having this enabled will cause some wierd lighting effects on some ships. Example the Galaxy class being much brighter than the Venture.
Start a new game as any normal sins game. Chose one of the following factions. Federation, Klingons, Romulans, Cardassians, Dominion, or Breen. Then have fun :)
Another note: The Mod Factions will start with absolutely NOTHING. No shipyards, No ships, No builders. Give it a minute to spawn a builder. Then you will have to construct your own shipyards to build any of the Trek ships. Dont worry your enemys are in the same boat as you are ;)
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This is an Optional Tweak.
You can tweak how bright the ships appear in game, but you will have to do some "modding" yourself. The Sins engine
renders the ships very dark. The ship mesh highlight filter is supposed to compensate for this. However i have
not had any time to tweak the modded ships to use this feature. There is an alternative.
Open the GS_Ship file located in the Pipeline Effect folder.
The line itself is over half way down and looks like this:
float4 GetLightColor(float3 incidence, float3 normal, float4 liteLightColor, float4 darkLightColor)
{
float dot = max(dot(incidence, normal), 0.f);
float lerpPercent = 1.f - clamp(pow(dot, 5.f), 0.f, 1.f); <------ This is the line you are looking for.
float blackThreshold = .65f;
float colorLerpPercent = min(lerpPercent / blackThreshold, 1.f);
Now, its the Float lerpPercent = 1.f that is the magic number. I have mine at .89, yours should be at 1.f (the default setting). When you lower the number, the ships get brighter. Raise the number they get darker...
Now this works for most NVIDIA users. For ATI users you do just the opposite. You RAISE the number, and the ships get brighter. When you lower it they get darker. I would have incorporated this into the mod, but since Ironclad never fixed the Nvidia/ATI bugs it is here as an optional tweak. Use it if you wish to. Just make a backup of the file in case you screw it up.
Thank you Admiral Cobbs for finding this :)
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Known Issues: Being that this is a DEMO there will no doubt be issues. Some are listed below.
Major issues:
The Demo is NOT BALANCED. It is just a demo to show the mods progress so far. We are attempting to give the demo crude balancing, but until we have all the factions ships, and structures imported the mod will not be truly balanced.
Lack of constructor ships, and structures in the beginning of the game: The map files need the mod files added to fix this. We will get to that eventually.
Weapons fire through their own hulls, and some fire at wierd angles: This can not be fixed. The current firing arcs of sins are pretty general, and they are HARDCODED. The Forward, left, right, and back Firing arcs are the only arcs available. There is no way to narrow down, or control the angles at which weapons fire at present. The game will require a complete re-write to change this. Hopefully this will be done in a future expansion.
Cloaking doesnt work yet: I havent been able to make a working cloak yet that allows the ship to move, and phase jump. This also appears to be Hardcoded, but i am trying to find a way to work around this.
Much more that i wont list: Just know i am aware of many problems and i am working hard to fix them.
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Minor issues:
Some Models, and textures seem "low resolution", and "lacking".... Really?? Noooo. You think? :/
As i said the majority of the models were ported over from the original Trekmods Sacrifice of Angels, and Favor the Bold mods. Those models ARE Low Resolution, and for good reason. This mod is expected to use Hundreds of ships on the map at the same time. Sometimes Thousands if your PC can handle it. The Models from the original SoA, and FTB mods fit perfectly into this plan, and you will thank me later when your computer doesnt fry itself when 500+ ships jump into your gravity well with 500+ of your own ships there waiting for them. I am not making this mod for "Computer Elitist". I am making it so that any computer that can run sins can also run the SoA 2 mod with no problems. You want higher resolution ships? Feel free to make them yourself, but dont complain when they wind up breaking the mod, or your battles run at 2 fps.
No trek style research trees yet. We are working on it.
Ships use vanilla sins effects for planet bombing. Ill get to this when i have time.
Misc weapon, sound, and graphic flaws: This is a DEMO. The sounds, weapons. and effects are works in progress.
"Elite" Units use vanilla sins ability's: We are working on appropriate Trek ability's for the "Elite" units.
No appropriate music, and voiceovers for the non federation factions: I couldnt get the music in game in time. I am still working on appropriete sounds, and music for the factions. Play as the Federation to listen to a good Trek soundtrack.
The mod factions use the default Advent Vasari, and Tech voices. I need good voice's to replace these. Preferably from unknown voice actors. I know the vanilla sins voices can be annoying, but try to ignore them for now.
If you have modding experience, and wish to help. PM me on ModDB, or the Sins forums.
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Faction Overview's
In its present state the Federation is the most powerful faction just by its number of ship types to chose from. I didnt include all of the ships i wanted to because i feel they already have more than enough for a demo. There are both "Elite", and Standard ship types. Plus the Defiant which is considered as a "Unique" unit.
The Klingons have all 5 canon ships imported. The Vorcha comes in a standard and an elite unit.
The Romulans have 3 ship types. The Valdore while not canon to the Dominion War was left in to give the rommies at least some variety. The D'Deridex warbird, and Valdore has a standard, and tal shiar "elite" units.
The Cardassians have very weak ships, but i made them cheaper to build, and use less fleet supply. The entire faction uses attrition units. If you play as Cardassian build LOTS of ships. You are going to need them all. The Galor, and Keldon both have Obsidian Order "elite" units.
The Dominion are the 2nd most powerful faction. They only have 3 units in game, but those 3 units are tough. The Devastator Battlecruiser has a standard, and an elite unit commanded by a Founder with Jem hadar Honered elder crew.
The Breen only have ONE ship. However it is a jack of all trades ship that can bomb, use ability's, and fight. This advantage is offset by the ships general weakness. They have no elite units... They dont need them ;)
Beware. The Breen AI WILL swarm you. They only have one cheap, but powerful ship, and they will build many of them. If you face the Breen Do Not let them build up, or else you will be overwhelmed by sheer numbers. The current Breen are playing as they are intended to play.
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A Note on "Elite", and "Unique" units:
This is a replacement of the Sins Capital ship system. Elite, and Unique units are the "hero's" of SoA 2.
They gain levels and use ability's just like the vanilla Sins capitals do. Except some Elites are not true capital ships.
These ships represent legendary captains and crews, or the best units a faction has to offer.
Some Elites have a "Standard" version of the ship which is buildable in the cruiser slots. These are Identical to an Elite unit except they are run of the mill ships with green crews. They gain no experience or levels. They are slightly cheaper to build, and use less fleet cap than an Elite. The main reason they exist is to lessen the usage of Non-Canon units.
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Credits
I printed who made what model on the models "-cl" texture. If the credits i printed are incorrect please contact me to give proper credit where it is due. If no credit is on the texture it is because there was no room to print it.
The Trekmods Team.. in alphabetical order
Charvell: Modeler and texture artist. (retired)
Dasher42: Code monkey elite (retired)
Dolphoenix: Modeler, and Texture artist. SoA/FTB project lead
Howader: Modeler (retired)
Major Stress aka The Stress Puppy: Modeler, Texture artist, Limited scripter, SoA2 project lead.
Redragon: Modeler, and Texture artist (retired)
Shadow: Modeler, and Texture artist (retired)
Thomas the Cat aka Thomas Marrone. Concept, and texture artist
Vorlon: Texture artist
The Digital Underground Team
Darkshimmer: Scripter, Modeler
Darkthunder: Limited texturer, and modeler
Darkdrone: Model and texture artist.
Ghostcat: Resident "Voice of Doom, and general naysayer" :p :D
Stone Dog: Just a guy we like to kick around on WoW, and Warhammer :D
Other artist that contributed to help make SoA 2 possible
Fehdman (Effects)
CaptJono (intro video)
Admiral Cobbs (Effects, Tweaks)
Pneumonic 81 aka Rick Knox (models)
Cleeve (models)
C2Xtreme (models)
SNS (models)
Moonraker (models)
Atrahasis (models)
Eliteforces2 (Models)
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Copyright and Distribution Permissions
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THIS MOD IS NOT MADE, DISTRIBUTED, OR SUPPORTED BY STARDOCK, IRONCLAD GAMES TM, or PARAMOUNT PICTURES.
Copyright notices:
Star Trek, Star Fleet Command, Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, Star Trek: The Next Generation,
Star Trek: Voyager (and the various logo devices used in them) are copyright
Paramount Pictures, as are the characters, related images, and sound from the productions.
Please do not modify the mod files, or the included textures with out seeking the authors opinion, or permission.
Nothing legal here, it is just polite, and shows respect to the artist's who worked hard to make them.
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