First run through modification thoughts.

[VoidStalker]

Hi folks, so I bought Stellaris (the basic game) and had a few problems, and had a thought on how to fix the game enough for me to be interested enough to give it a play through. My playing time is limited, and my friend has said he won't be buying the game at all, so my remaining interest is going to be playing solo games. That being said, I have so far run into two main problems with the game, and several minor issues.

Minor issues first.
The game doesn't, at least not by default, save game right off the bat, so my actual first game is gone with the wind. I like to replay a game over and over again, and try many different paths and see how things work, but forgot to make sure the game was saved at the beginning, and so couldn't go back and run through from the very start, so goodbye to first game.

Second time running through, I figured out many issues, and restarted over and over again, and had some fun at least. The two things that kinda threw me a curve were the game crashing when I tried to built my first colony ship, and then later on my longest gaming session yet, I finally met another empire, and couldn't figure out how to attack them, and didn't know that until I realised that the battle that started wasn't in their territory at all, but right next to my home system, deep inside my Empire!

As I said, these are the minor issues, and I'll likely have all sorts of help learning how to play the game by the time this thread is done, and that being said, on to the big issues!

Main problems now.
Having played HoI2 DD ARM extensively, and modifying the files quite a bit to tailor what was provided vs what pleased me, I have identified two modifications I need to make the game worth my scarce playing time, and these are the values for starting starbases and the influence thing {the one where you get 2 per month, and is needed for new starbases to be built}.

I have so many things left to discover, let along master, that I don't want to even try the rest of the game without being able to mod these two values, so can anyone tell me where to go into the install files and edit those values into something way more useful? I'm thinking about the starting starbases value of 3 being made 300 instead, and the monthly value of ~2 being at least ~20, so that my painfully dense attempts at playing this game can at least have me well armed and spread out.

If anyone wants some screen shots, or the saved game, i'd be happy to provide them upon request and being told how to do that (It's been a long time). I'm not adverse to writing a "comedy of errors" type of newbie making mistakes AAR, if that is something folks might have the stomach for.

So basically, how do I mod the Stellaris game instal to let me start off with 300 potential starbases, and 20 influence per month?

 

[VoidStalker]

Oh, and how do I get credit for my purchased games, without linking steam (which I long ago kicked off my computers) to my games?

EDIT: Got that figured out!

 

[VoidStalker]

Image posting test

Looks like it is working. Looking at just this one images, how many things would you tell me I am doing wrong? This shows the 'Pirate raid' that took place right as I was trying to start a war with the first alien empire I had met, and that I mistakenly thought was the battle I was fighting, lol...

 

[VoidStalker]

Here is an image of the state of my second games biggest attempt. Obviously, I don't really know how to play the game yet, but hopefully the following screen shots are good to show up areas that I am making my mistakes in.

Note the red ship icon in my empire, and the green ship icon in the enemy empire. I thought, once I sent my 20 ship force to attack the outpost in the enemy system, that the battle that popped up was the one I started, but in reality, my 20 ships were in fact sitting there doing nothing, and the 10 ships attacking the outpost turned out to be pirates that turned up within my space, attacking MY outpost.

Along with all that you see in the galaxy view above, here are the values from the top icons:

Just by taking these images, I have learned some of what my problems are! Anyone care to take a look and point me in the right direction?

 

[VoidStalker]

Well, many views but no responses.
I did get a disagreement, but without a reply I will never know what is up.

I just watched several youtube videos, and also played around with some things, and will be restarting my game again tonight. Am open to advice, and hope to here from some fellow Stellaris players!

 

[Roddo]

Sorry man, I cannot read many of the details of the images because they are too small.

For reference, there's not a right way of doing things in stellaris, you just have to go with the flow and investigate yourself what combinations work best for your playstile.
If you gave us an idea of how you'd like your empire to be we might be able to give you pointers in how to get a best-performing one.

edit:
And about the modding questions, I'm afraid I cannot help with that as I tend to play with vanilla only for the achievements, but I'm sure someone will come out of the woods and give you a hand.

 

[rubert]

Starbase base cap is somewhere in defines (common\defines) though I don't know exactly which value it is. Remember that the "cap" is just a soft cap: you just get increased maintenance cost if you go over it. Also it only counts _upgraded_ starbases, not outposts which you build initially to claim the systems.

As for influence, no idea where to change that though with that amount monthly influence you might as well use console cheats to give you influence as you need it.

 

[VoidStalker]

Got my game much modified, and almost ready to hit a new start, but before I do that, I need to move all the old saved games into a different folder. Anyone know where Pdox keeps the save game files?

 

[Eldoran]

Well, many views but no responses.
I did get a disagreement, but without a reply I will never know what is up.

I just watched several youtube videos, and also played around with some things, and will be restarting my game again tonight. Am open to advice, and hope to here from some fellow Stellaris players!

Well guess the problem for many is: we cant help you since you rarely played the game. You elaborate much about how you do things, which is fine, but your farthest progress isnt even the beginning of the game. I have the ffeling the game may be not for your playstyle, but i can be wrong of course.

I dont know where to find these but i would suggest looking in the defines.
Bit changing especially the influence and starbase cao throws off the balance quite a lot. There will be ways to get more influence later in the game and to increase starbase cap.

So i think nobody is answering cause many think its no good idea to mod keyvalues without even playing the game. And your havent even played the starting phase yet.

So my advice play along until at least 2300 and then look into modding again

 

[FriendlyEntropy]

Are you aware of the console commands? It sounds like you want to play around with options before you play a game for real (something I do as well).

Look up the console commands, should be what you're looking for

 

[VoidStalker]

Are you aware of the console commands? It sounds like you want to play around with options before you play a game for real (something I do as well).

Look up the console commands, should be what you're looking for

I am now!

Been sick and not really up to doing anything for several days, but I did do so playing and got 36 years into the game, but my computer is already slowing down...

 

[VoidStalker]

Well guess the problem for many is: we cant help you since you rarely played the game. You elaborate much about how you do things, which is fine, but your farthest progress isnt even the beginning of the game. I have the ffeling the game may be not for your playstyle, but i can be wrong of course.

I dont know where to find these but i would suggest looking in the defines.
Bit changing especially the influence and starbase cao throws off the balance quite a lot. There will be ways to get more influence later in the game and to increase starbase cap.

So i think nobody is answering cause many think its no good idea to mod keyvalues without even playing the game. And your havent even played the starting phase yet.

So my advice play along until at least 2300 and then look into modding again

I have played a bit more, but illness has limited my gaming quite a bit, more screen shots soon.

 

[Fisk]

For the modding bit.
First off, mods go into C:\Users\your_username_here\Documents\Paradox Interactive\Stellaris\mod for windows. Might be a good idea to read up on that here.

Second, for the actual creation of such a mod. At this point, do note that I've never experimented with either of those files. This is all speculation and guesswork. Also note that the changes will apply to the AI as well as yourself.

• Starbase cap is in Stellaris\common\defines\00_defines.txt, at line 1003. It says "STARBASE_CAPACITY_BASE = 3", and you simply change the 3 to however many starbases you want.
• Influence generation is in Stellaris\common\country_types\00_country_types.txt, at line 404. The line's part of the definition for the default country type, which includes player empires. Simply change "influence = 3" to however much you want.

EDIT: Since I'm such a nice guy, I went and made that mod. 300 base starbase cap and 30 base influence per month. Just unzip attached file into that mod folder and select it in the launcher. I didn't test it very much, but it should be perfectly functional. Might be incompatible with loads of things since it overwrites two kind of important files, but it'll do the job until the next patch, at least. Assuming you don't use other mods.

 

[VoidStalker]

For the modding bit.
First off, mods go into C:\Users\your_username_here\Documents\Paradox Interactive\Stellaris\mod for windows. Might be a good idea to read up on that here.

Second, for the actual creation of such a mod. At this point, do note that I've never experimented with either of those files. This is all speculation and guesswork. Also note that the changes will apply to the AI as well as yourself.

• Starbase cap is in Stellaris\common\defines\00_defines.txt, at line 1003. It says "STARBASE_CAPACITY_BASE = 3", and you simply change the 3 to however many starbases you want.
• Influence generation is in Stellaris\common\country_types\00_country_types.txt, at line 404. The line's part of the definition for the default country type, which includes player empires. Simply change "influence = 3" to however much you want.

EDIT: Since I'm such a nice guy, I went and made that mod. 300 base starbase cap and 30 base influence per month. Just unzip attached file into that mod folder and select it in the launcher. I didn't test it very much, but it should be perfectly functional. Might be incompatible with loads of things since it overwrites two kind of important files, but it'll do the job until the next patch, at least. Assuming you don't use other mods.

I already altered my game files directly for several things, and the fellow up thread mentioned the console commands, and it is easier to just add the needed influence that way, rather than have way to much for all the other needs. Thanks for you time and effort sir, it is much appreciated and i'll try to post some screen shots of what my game looks like with the modifications I made.

 

[Zenopath]

you want a custom race build that makes early game easier?

this isn't necessarily "best" build (if there is such a thing), but it is easy build for new player.

1 point into authoritarian ethic
1 point into spiritualist ethic
1 point into military ethic (or xenophile if you prefer diplomacy to war)

civic picks : Exalted Priesthood and Mining Guilds.
race traits - thrifty 2pts, enduring 1pt, deviant -1pt,

remember to go to policies at begining of game and set
"Trade policy" to "consumer benefits"

Make sure every one of your worlds has a temple. When you have a lot of people on your homeworld (not other worlds) build commerce centers there.

The point of doing this is that you will probably go a very long time never needing to build another civilian infrastructure building, and get lots of unity and not have to worry about amenities.

hope that helps some.

 

[VoidStalker]

So I've been playing as much as my health allows, and have so far only gotten into the 30's three times, but I am making progress in learning things about the game, both by playing and modding and console commands. One snag I have hit is that the CC research technology isn't working for me, and I was wondering if it was something that folks might be willing to clue me in on. Here is what I did, note three different attempts to get the command to work, and still no dice!

Anyone know what I am doing wrong here?

 

[Zenopath]

I feel like you should try to play the game as intended? but its your call. Only mod I feel is really worth is Glavius AI mod, but only because it makes the game harder by making enemy AI smarter... that being said, its your game, play how you want. But I have no idea how console commands work, sorry.

 

[VoidStalker]

A lot of folks seem to feel that way, and I guess I can sort of see their point of view, but I've already made a couple dozen attempts at playing without a clue/fun, but now that I have learned what items to mod and how to use the console commands, I'm having a great time and learning allot, and don't see not enjoying my learning time at the moment. To be sure, once I learn what is what, I'll doubtlessly go back and play mostly unmodified/slightly modified versions of the game. My latest attempt is looking good, I still don't know how to manage my planets populations, but due to a fortunate goof in attempt to make the colonies populations grow faster, I actually did the opposite and made them grow slower! So chalk this run through up to a misunderstanding of what exactly the reading of a value of { = 0.5 } and stupidly replacing that with { = -1.00 } and ending up with the slowest build up so far. OTOH, I'm getting to play around in a mostly empty 1,000 star galaxy this time, and that is fun all by itself. I'll never be playing this game in the multiplayer community, as I prefer to be able to play for a bit, then take a nap or binge watch movies, and then start up again, and health wise, I don't see myself ever being able to play 4-6 hours straight, with others fun hanging on my being there.

Anyway, hoping that some kind soul can help me out with why the console command for getting a single, specific technology doesn't seem to be working for me.

 

[Roddo]

Sorry no knowledge about console commands yet, but have you tried checking the wiki?

https://stellaris.paradoxwikis.com/Console_commands

 

[rubert]

You need to use the exact code for the tech as argument. You can find them in common\technology