Tweaking the planet art without going all the way to FQM |
In SE3 I could 100% reliably tell the atmosphere of a planet by looking at it.
In SE4 I had to learn a couple of exceptions, then I was good.
But in SE5 there are several cases where a planet with one atmosphere type at one size is indistinguishable from a different atmosphere type at a different size. The worst is Hydrogen and Methane gas giants, where I simply can't tell the difference most of the time, but there are also a couple of Oxygen/Rock planets that are yellow like CO2.
Has anybody else been annoyed enough with this to fix it?
What I'm dreaming of is somebody who has actually tweaked the art files in the main game directory, so regardless which mod you are running you get reliable visual ID on planet atmospheres.
I tried the FQM because it sounded like it might fix this problem, but it also introduces a bunch of strange things like the "infested" system type that blow away my ability to suspend disbelief.
Re: Tweaking the planet art without going all the way to FQM
The colour scheme is:
Blue - Oxygen
Green - Carbon Dioxide
Purple - Methane
Red - Hydrogen
No Colour - None
Re: Tweaking the planet art without going all the way to FQM
Infestations are pretty trivial to mod out...
1) Install Python runtime.
2) Open FQM\Data\scripts\solar_systems.py.
3) Search for "Organic Infestation Systems" (line 854).
4) Either comment out this section by putting # at the start of each line, or delete it.
Run solar_systems.py script to regenerate mode data files, now sans Infestations.
(The hard way would be manually setting the chance values for infestation systems to 0 in QuadrantTypes.txt.)
Of course, I don't see what the problem is.. SE4 had them, and they were ok there. SE5 lost the neat system types added in Gold, and I merely sought to recreate some of them.
You've already got temporal races running around, interstellar psionics, the ability to almost trivially remold the galaxy to your liking, etc. Something as simple as space-borne organisms infecting a system is way, way below the threshold for belief-suspension than these other things...
Re: Tweaking the planet art without going all the way to FQM
Indeed, I wanna go one step further and add "warp nexus" to the list. 
It randomly opens and closes warp points leading from it to other systems. I'd probably give it a graphic effect that makes it look like the entire system is a giant warp point.
Re: Tweaking the planet art without going all the way to FQM
The Balance Mod adds an atmospheric glow to the stock planets that correspond to the atmosphere of the planet. It's version of FQM does not include the system infestations.
Space Empires Depot | SE:V Balance Mod