Increasing Max Races per Galaxy

[Carl4243]

Hi guys, i went searching about 6 pages back but couldnt find anything showing me how to do this...

i'm a long time player of Distant Worlds (since the original) not much of a modder though, only done tweeking, and for other games. Could someone be kind enough to walk me threw on how to raise the races cap when creating a game? i want to experiment with like 500 or so races on a 1400 star map... survival of the fittest hardcore mode lol, cant really expand without having to take someone out.

but ya, if someone would walk me threw on how to edit that? i have no experience in modding this game so please be descriptive.


P.S.
i'd like to take this opportunity since i rarely post to say: Igard, i LOVE your STar Trek Mods (i prefer TNG/DS9 era)!! although the Legends new ship images are nice, i just miss my STar Trek Theme so much... it's not the same fun without it... cant wait till you finish up with the conversion for Legends.

[eltharion]

I think a number of races that high would kill the game engine.
However from what I know is a hard-coded value in the game.

Maybe you can add more (by editor) but I do not think this is what you mean.

[Carl4243]

it might kill the game indeed, and i'll just scale it down as needed in "trial and error" to find how many i can squeeze in, but you never know unless you try

Someone apparently did it, i forget where the post is within the 6 page i searched but someone did 32 empires... but didnt explain or give a hint on where to do that.


This only thing i could find related to increasing the amount of races available:

2nd post - tm.asp?m=2796349

[Nedrear]

He meant 32 races in total existence. This got nothing to do with the amount of races in a game at start. It only supports diversity in full nation random games.
The main problem would be the calculation of starting positions. At its best the amount of colonies to start with concerning their technology is less then the races should have. That will crash you. Though I wouldn't use it anyway.

[ehsumrell1]

Hello Carl4243;

In the Legends expansion (ver. 1.7.0.1 & higher), Elliot has eliminated the cap for amount of races. If I
remember correctly the number of shipsets is also now unlimited.

Now though I will say this, even with a 'Super Maxed Out' system from Alienware, there will probably
be some game performance issues the higher the number of races. In addition, here is a bit more
information.

As far as race pictures, I believe the limit to DesignsPictureFamilyIndex value in the race file is 50.
Also the limit to 'DesignNamesIndex' value in the race file maximum is also 50. So you could have more
but you are limited to 50 for both race pictures and ship design names at the present time.
There are also no 'real' limit to the amount of character images one may have. Although remember that
for each character image a smaller thumbnail image is also created behind the scene (for the colony's
Troops & Characters screen). So due to this, memory could become an issue the more you have. A safe
number I feel would be around 500 or so. Hope this shines some light for you! [:)]

BTW, thanks for the acknowledgement of Igard's work with the Star Trek mods. I'm honored to be working
with him now on testing the Star Trek mod update for Legends. This mod will be about the 'Picard Era'
timeline so this should be right up your alley! I've assisted Igard with over 500 characters for the
22 (or more, we'll see when he's finished) races. I don't know how many will be used, but trust me,
Igard is not going to disappoint us. I've probably said too much about this, but excuse me because I've
had quite a bit of his Romulan Ale as of late (Data stole all of mine)!

[Ogaburan]

I would like to increase the number of races per map as well.
I mostly play medium size maps, but i would like it to be much more crowded then it is...

[Carl4243]

Thanks ehsumrell1,  i'm playing Legends right now as mentioned, and i am still only limited to 19 on a 1400 star map... havnt noticed any way to get rid of that max, so either i'm missing an option or it appears it's cap for races wasnt removed as you suggest.  any suggestions on where to check?

I got an I7 920 processor with 12GB of RAM (even though it doesnt seem like it at times) so i would imagine i could pump it up a good deal, perhaps my initial number of 500 was abit high, but i want to put in as many as i can to reach my goal of having to conquer someone to expand rather then colonize to grow.

Thanks for the tidbit of info on the ST mod   cant wait for it to be released!

[Nedrear]

ORIGINAL: Carl4243

... or it appears it's cap for races wasnt removed as you suggest. 

Please read my posts...

He aswell as the poster in the other thread meant the amount of races in the game. This is the pool of 50 that the game can choose their 19 startin races. It can not be extended as of yet.

[Carl4243]

ahhh, darn... is that hardcoded then as you say "not yet" or can it be modded?

[Nedrear]

... if I say unchangeable as of yet it means hardcoded. And I am not willing to creep through the many lines of C to find that part.

[Gray Area]

Sorry to go over an old thread but just to recap what you were discussing Nedrear and folks: the cap on race is 50, including the races already part of the DW packages? So modders have another 19 they can use? But these have to be in addition to the old races - so Race22+?

Excuse if this is already covered please I can't go and hunt through all the old threads.

In the Legends expansion (ver. 1.7.0.1 & higher), Elliot has eliminated the cap for amount of races. If I
remember correctly the number of shipsets is also now unlimited.

Now though I will say this, even with a 'Super Maxed Out' system from Alienware, there will probably
be some game performance issues the higher the number of races. In addition, here is a bit more
information.

As far as race pictures, I believe the limit to DesignsPictureFamilyIndex value in the race file is 50.
Also the limit to 'DesignNamesIndex' value in the race file maximum is also 50. So you could have more
but you are limited to 50 for both race pictures and ship design names at the present time.
There are also no 'real' limit to the amount of character images one may have. Although remember that
for each character image a smaller thumbnail image is also created behind the scene (for the colony's
Troops & Characters screen). So due to this, memory could become an issue the more you have. A safe
number I feel would be around 500 or so. Hope this shines some light for you!

BTW, thanks for the acknowledgement of Igard's work with the Star Trek mods. I'm honored to be working
with him now on testing the Star Trek mod update for Legends. This mod will be about the 'Picard Era'
timeline so this should be right up your alley! I've assisted Igard with over 500 characters for the
22 (or more, we'll see when he's finished) races. I don't know how many will be used, but trust me,
Igard is not going to disappoint us. I've probably said too much about this, but excuse me because I've
had quite a bit of his Romulan Ale as of late (Data stole all of mine)!