Topic: [0.97a] Perilous Expanse 1.4.0 - Dangerous and Dynamic Exploration (Read 21057 times)

Sundog · « **on:** February 13, 2024, 12:32:22 PM »

Perilous Expanse
(A more challenging alternative to Nomadic Survival)

Change Log and Old Versions (shared with NS)

Compatible with all mods except for Fuel Siphoning and Nomadic Survival (due to overlapping functionality)
Can be added to existing games.
All updates are save-compatible unless stated otherwise.
Integrated with Version Checker
Can NOT be removed from games in which it was already used.
Configurable by editing the OPTIONS.ini file in the mod folder or using LunaLib to edit settings in-game.

In the base game, all you need to easily access the entire map is a single, cheap fuel tanker.
This mod changes that by making resource management and survival an integral part of exploration.

Perilous Expanse makes the sector seem much larger.
Not by increasing distances and travel times, but by making it necessary to find ways to refuel during long expeditions.
It drastically limits how far you can travel without refueling, but it also provides several new ways to obtain fuel.
This makes expeditions to distant stars a matter of careful planning or clever improvisation rather than just bringing more fuel tankers.
Several parts of the map may even seem unreachable until you unlock new abilities, learn new tricks, discover helpful artifacts, or figure out new ways to craft fuel.

Features:

Everything from Nomadic Survival

This mod is essentially an alternate version of Nomadic Survival with different default settings and a few additions.

Survey planets to discover sites where operations can be conducted to exploit or exchange resources.
Siphon fuel from nebulae.
Embark on extended expeditions to collect valuable Anomaly Data.

For a gentler experience that adds to exploration without overhauling it, go with Nomadic Survival instead of this.

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Overhauled Fuel Economy

Maximum travel range is drastically reduced. Not only does traveling through hyperspace require twice as much fuel, but the drive field anomaly cannot be prevented (unlike Nomadic Survival). This means tankers will gradually lose their usefulness the further you travel without interacting with a colony (or stabilizing your drive field in some other way).
While fuel capacity is limited, it is easier to come by. The base-price of fuel is reduced from 25 credits to 10. This makes it cheaper to buy, but also means fewer resources are required to siphon or craft it.
Fuel siphoning is less efficient outside of nebula systems (40% vs 75%). With the default settings you get 10 fuel per unit of supplies in nebula systems, but only 4 fuel in normal systems.
The Auxiliary Fuel Tanks hullmod has been changed. Some ships have extremely poor fuel capacity, making them undesirable for exploration with this mod. The new effect alleviates that by benefiting those ships far more than ships with high fuel capacity. It also costs very few ordnance points, making it an obvious choice for ships with low fuel capacity that you want to bring on expeditions.
The Bulk Transport skill has been changed to only increase fuel capacity up to 25% instead of 50%. This change does not apply if Quality Captains or any other mod that overrides Bulk Transport is used.

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A Few Other Changes

Survey and analyze missions with objectives further than 10 LY from the center of the map now offer additional payment to compensate for increased difficulty and danger.
The "spacer start" is enabled as an option for new games. It's a challenging vanilla feature that is normally hidden.
The accessibility penalty for distance from other colonies has been halved in order to avoid discouraging exploration of distant worlds. To compensate for this, base upkeep costs are increased by 20%.

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Questions and Answers

Why make an alternative version of Nomadic Survival?

I've wanted to turn Starsector's exploration into a more challenging and dynamic experience for a long time. While Nomadic Survival provides most of the features necessary to do that, I stopped short of limiting fuel range because I knew most players would want the new features without the increased difficulty. But that meant it didn't provide the experience I wanted to create, except with a great deal of tweaking. Without limited travel range, the "crafting system" of Nomadic Survival is merely a novelty, instead of being a necessary part of travelling great distances, as it was always intended to be.

Perilous Expanse could have been some sort of settings preset or mod pack, but I thought it would be best to make it a separate mod for several reasons:

While providing many of the same features, both mods have completely different goals and audiences.
Being able to add features and change settings that wouldn't make sense for Nomadic Survival.
Saving settings independently for each mod with LunaLib, preventing saved Nomadic Survival settings from overwriting the Perilous Expanse defaults.

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Can I switch between Perilous Expanse and Nomadic Survival?

Yes. The number of ordnance points used by any ship with Auxiliary Fuel Tanks installed will change, but that should be the only issue.

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Do settings for Nomadic Survival affect this mod?

No. Both mods provide the same options, but your settings are saved separately for each mod.

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How do I undo the changes to accessibility and upkeep?

Open "Perilous Expanse/data/config/settings.json" and remove the lines for the settings you don't want this mod to change.

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How do I get rid of the changes to Auxiliary Fuel Tanks?

Delete "Perilous Expanse/data/hullmods/hull_mods.csv"

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Can I undo the Bulk Transport nerf?

No. You'd have to switch to Nomadic Survival to get rid of that.

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Will mods that are integrated with Nomadic Survival also work with Perilous Expanse?

Mostly.
Any additions to the files in "/data/config/nomadic_survival" (such as new operations) will work for both.
Both mods use the exact same code, but they have different IDs, so if a mod checks for one ID it should generally check for both.

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Helldiver · « **Reply #1 on:** February 13, 2024, 02:05:03 PM »

Interesting. I was already using components of Nomadic Survival along with my own changes to fuel capacity, burn speed and so on, and this offers yet more levers to achieve a solid experience, something difficult as it should be - else everyone in the Sector would be plundering the fringes all the time, if it was so easy as it is in vanilla.
Thank you for posting this.

Sundog · « **Reply #2 on:** February 13, 2024, 04:08:51 PM »

Thanks! When You mentioned parts of nomadic survival in its thread it made me curious about how close your changes were to the ones in perilous expanse. What changes did you make to burn speed? I've been sitting on an unreleased mod called "strict burn level limits" for almost two years because I figured no one would want it (all it does is tone down some of the BL bonuses)

Quote from: Helldiver on February 13, 2024, 02:05:03 PM

everyone in the Sector would be plundering the fringes all the time, if it was so easy as it is in vanilla.

Right?

Hashmander · « **Reply #3 on:** February 16, 2024, 08:30:28 AM »

I'm using both this and ruthless sector to make hyperspace a lot more dangerous and it does make a world of difference! I would say fuel economy is still too forgiving with all the ways you can get fuel now + slipstreams being available. You really need to make very wrong decisions to end up without fuel. Have you thought about adding a bit of randomness to slipstreams (e.g risk of consuming extra fuel) or something similar?

Sundog · « **Reply #4 on:** February 16, 2024, 06:37:55 PM »

Quote from: Hashmander on February 16, 2024, 08:30:28 AM

I'm using both this and ruthless sector to make hyperspace a lot more dangerous

Spoiler

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Quote from: Hashmander on February 16, 2024, 08:30:28 AM

I would say fuel economy is still too forgiving with all the ways you can get fuel now + slipstreams being available. You really need to make very wrong decisions to end up without fuel.

Thanks for the feedback! I agree. I almost removed the fuel price reduction before releasing this, but I didn't want to make such a big change without a lot of playtesting. And I don't think that would be enough anyway, since salvage provides so much fuel and the new nav abilities make it possible to travel so efficiently. I'll remove some of the leeway at some point, but it might take a while to get right. I'm probably a bit paranoid about making it too difficult to explore during the early game...

Quote from: Hashmander on February 16, 2024, 08:30:28 AM

Have you thought about adding a bit of randomness to slipstreams (e.g risk of consuming extra fuel) or something similar?

I haven't considered modifying slipstreams, specifically. I'm pretty happy with how they work now. They might be a bit *too* reliable for how much fuel they save, but at least they're temporary and randomized...
If I were to change them somehow (and the more I think about it the more it seems like a good idea), it would be by making them randomize more often than twice per year. That would make them less reliable without removing their usefulness, and wouldn't seem unfair.
Something else that might be good is to prevent the slipstream fuel consumption reduction from applying while Reverse Polarity is used.
Did you have something specific in mind for how a risk of consuming extra fuel might work?

Matheld · « **Reply #5 on:** February 16, 2024, 07:04:17 PM »

I am liking the look of this mod. I'll have to try it out someday!

Always on the lookout for more mods to make the game harder and more interesting to play

(now I just need a mod that makes your colonies start at size 1 or 2 instead of 3..)

Hashmander · « **Reply #6 on:** February 17, 2024, 06:27:32 AM »

Quote from: Sundog on February 16, 2024, 06:37:55 PM

Thanks for the feedback! I agree. I almost removed the fuel price reduction before releasing this, but I didn't want to make such a big change without a lot of playtesting. And I don't think that would be enough anyway, since salvage provides so much fuel and the new nav abilities make it possible to travel so efficiently. I'll remove some of the leeway at some point, but it might take a while to get right. I'm probably a bit paranoid about making it too difficult to explore during the early game...

I might have given feedback a bit too soon. It is a lot harder to go out there once you start getting a bigger fleet and I did end up running out of fuel a couple of times because I didn't account for the anomaly lol. Now I do really have to buy disposable tankers to make it to the farthest systems. If anything, for an even more hardcore config I would halve the price reduction on fuel.

As for slipstreams, I love the idea for reverse polarity and more randomized streams, otherwise I agree, it's too easy to get around once you get some topography going.

Sundog · « **Reply #7 on:** February 18, 2024, 02:39:32 PM »

Quote from: Matheld on February 16, 2024, 07:04:17 PM

I am liking the look of this mod. I'll have to try it out someday!

Thanks! Hope you like it when/if you do!

Quote from: Hashmander on February 17, 2024, 06:27:32 AM

I might have given feedback a bit too soon. It is a lot harder to go out there once you start getting a bigger fleet and I did end up running out of fuel a couple of times because I didn't account for the anomaly lol.

Heh, I'm glad to hear you ran out of fuel! (sorry)
Did you manage to save any of your ships? Mind telling me the story of what happened?

I *almost* got stranded recently. I had just enough fuel to get back to my home in Askonia, but I was in a rush to prepare for a colony crisis, so I used hyperdrive without considering its extra 50% fuel consumption. After that I didn't have enough to reach any of the core worlds without finding more fuel, but I was still in a hurry. Thankfully a black hole was nearby, so I used it (and the last of my fuel) to create a slipsurge. That got me close enough to Yma to drift to the star. Both colonies in Yma were hostile toward me, so I had to raid them to get enough fuel to make it to Askonia. It was pretty tense!

Quote from: Hashmander on February 17, 2024, 06:27:32 AM

As for slipstreams, I love the idea for reverse polarity and more randomized streams, otherwise I agree, it's too easy to get around once you get some topography going.

Yeah, the topography abilities are crazy strong, which I think is great. It makes hyperspace travel more varied and helps balance out the increase in fuel consumption as the player's fleet grows.

Hashmander · « **Reply #8 on:** February 19, 2024, 05:21:20 AM »

Quote from: Sundog on February 18, 2024, 02:39:32 PM

Heh, I'm glad to hear you ran out of fuel! (sorry)
Did you manage to save any of your ships? Mind telling me the story of what happened?

I had to scuttle all my tankers, and a cruiser, and siphon all through my supplies to get just enough fuel to dock at a system next door. 10/10 would do it again. Mind this is a save where I didn't have hyperdrive or max topography yet.

On another save, I found out that the topography item is extremely useful to get to far systems so I end up not selling it now. My only problem right now with this + nexerelin is that other factions end up colonizing the systems I want since it takes so much longer to figure out the logistics and scout systems for colonization. My scout-to-fuel ratio is like 4 systems before I have to go back to the core worlds. Before this mod, I would have been able to scout 15+ systems instead.

Perhaps another suggestion is to give more bonuses to exploration ships like the Apogee so they can survive out there for longer. Maybe the hullmod adds another protected fuel tier where it halves the drive anomaly rate? I find that there's still not enough incentive to use pure exploration ships like those.

Gilgamesh · « **Reply #9 on:** February 19, 2024, 08:53:39 AM »

Quote from: Hashmander on February 19, 2024, 05:21:20 AM

On another save, I found out that the topography item is extremely useful to get to far systems so I end up not selling it now. My only problem right now with this + nexerelin is that other factions end up colonizing the systems I want since it takes so much longer to figure out the logistics and scout systems for colonization. My scout-to-fuel ratio is like 4 systems before I have to go back to the core worlds. Before this mod, I would have been able to scout 15+ systems instead.

You might already know about this, but if you go into the mod settings for nexerelin(with LunaLib), within the "Fleets and battles" tab, there are two settings you may find useful.
"Colony expedition interval" and "Colony expedition only after player colony"
This helped me balance nexerelin fraction colonization for my playstyle, since I like to explore and do allot of other things before I establish my first colony.

Sundog · « **Reply #10 on:** February 19, 2024, 09:01:24 AM »

Quote from: Hashmander on February 19, 2024, 05:21:20 AM

I had to scuttle all my tankers, and a cruiser, and siphon all through my supplies to get just enough fuel to dock at a system next door. 10/10 would do it again. Mind this is a save where I didn't have hyperdrive or max topography yet.

On another save, I found out that the topography item is extremely useful to get to far systems so I end up not selling it now.

Ok, cool. Glad you didn't lose your whole fleet!

Quote from: Hashmander on February 19, 2024, 05:21:20 AM

My only problem right now with this + nexerelin is that other factions end up colonizing the systems I want since it takes so much longer to figure out the logistics and scout systems for colonization. My scout-to-fuel ratio is like 4 systems before I have to go back to the core worlds. Before this mod, I would have been able to scout 15+ systems instead.

Pretty sure Nex provides a few LunaLib options to slow down NPC colonization rate (Gilgamesh beat me to it

). Maybe I should mention that in the mod description, but I think the real problem is that you keep needing to return to the core worlds to refuel. This mod is supposed to make that *less* frequent by providing new ways to get fuel. Sometimes you just get unlucky and don't find enough sources of fuel to keep exploring, but I've tried to make that fairly uncommon. Hmm... One thing that tends to help out a lot later in the game is the ability to cheaply survey gas giants (due to the Surveying Equipment hullmod). Gas giants often have operation sites for getting volatiles and fuel, but I suspect a lot of people skip surveying them. I should probably add something to the tips section about that...

Quote from: Hashmander on February 19, 2024, 05:21:20 AM

Perhaps another suggestion is to give more bonuses to exploration ships like the Apogee so they can survive out there for longer. Maybe the hullmod adds another protected fuel tier where it halves the drive anomaly rate? I find that there's still not enough incentive to use pure exploration ships like those.

I think you might be underestimating the Apogee. If anything, I feel like it's *too* useful. Apogees already have by far the best fuel capacity/consumption ratio of any non-civilian ship, not to mention good combat effectiveness and two built-in hullmods that are great for exploration. I want people to be able to use the ships they want/have to explore, so I think it's important for them to be somewhat normalized (hence the changes to Auxiliary Fuel Tanks)

Matheld · « **Reply #11 on:** February 23, 2024, 10:24:29 AM »

New save so decided to give it a shot and.. well.. I'm not sure what broke.

Spoiler

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Maybe there is some kind of mod conflict or otherwise.. But I've tried 2 different planets and the results have all been the same. Doesn't matter if I have the resources required or not.

Sundog · « **Reply #12 on:** February 23, 2024, 04:38:08 PM »

Thanks for the report and sorry about the trouble! I think you're probably right about a mod conflict. Would you mind giving me your mod list? You can just copy the contents of Starsector/mods/enabled_mods.json, or attach the file itself.

I should get a chance to investigate this in detail soon. In the meantime, could you find the error details by following this guide? The guide is for crashes, but the steps for finding the error details will be the same in this case. The error will appear at the bottom of the log immediately after your get that "NullPointerException: null" message in-game.

Again, thanks for letting me know about this! Hopefully I'll be able to get a patch out tonight!

Matheld · « **Reply #13 on:** February 23, 2024, 04:55:17 PM »

Quote from: Sundog on February 23, 2024, 04:38:08 PM

Thanks for the report and sorry about the trouble! I think you're probably right about a mod conflict. Would you mind giving me your mod list? You can just copy the contents of Starsector/mods/enabled_mods.json, or attach the file itself.

I should get a chance to investigate this in detail soon. In the meantime, could you find the error details by following this guide? The guide is for crashes, but the steps for finding the error details will be the same in this case. The error will appear at the bottom of the log immediately after your get that "NullPointerException: null" message in-game.

Again, thanks for letting me know about this! Hopefully I'll be able to get a patch out tonight!

No trouble really! Everything else seems to work just fine!

As for the error report (didn't know you could actually get whilst the game was running! Good to know!)

Spoiler

121259 [Thread-3] WARN com.fs.starfarer.campaign.rules.oOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO - Problem with command of class data.scripts.starfarer.api.impl.campaign.rulemd.crewReplacer_normadicSurvivalC: null
java.lang.NullPointerException
   at data.scripts.starfarer.api.impl.campaign.rulemd.crewReplacer_normadicSurvivalC. execute(crewReplacer_normadicSurvivalC.java:18)
   at com.fs.starfarer.campaign.rules.oOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO.execute(Unknown Source)
   at com.fs.starfarer.campaign.rules.Object.runScript(Unknown Source)
   at com.fs.starfarer.api.impl.campaign.rulecmd.FireBest.applyRule(FireBest.java:106)
   at com.fs.starfarer.api.impl.campaign.rulecmd.FireBest.execute(FireBest.java:51)
   at com.fs.starfarer.api.impl.campaign.rulecmd.FireBest.fire(FireBest.java:57)
   at com.fs.starfarer.api.impl.campaign.RuleBasedInteractionDialogPluginImpl.fireBes t(RuleBasedInteractionDialogPluginImpl.java:177)
   at com.fs.starfarer.api.impl.campaign.RuleBasedInteractionDialogPluginImpl.optionS elected(RuleBasedInteractionDialogPluginImpl.java:210)
   at com.fs.starfarer.ui.newui.o0Oo$1.super(Unknown Source)
   at com.fs.starfarer.ui.newui.OoOO.actionPerformed(Unknown Source)
   at com.fs.starfarer.ui.o0O0.buttonPressed(Unknown Source)
   at com.fs.starfarer.ui.int.Ò00000(Unknown Source)
   at com.fs.starfarer.ui.int.processInput(Unknown Source)
   at com.fs.starfarer.ui.W.o00000(Unknown Source)
   at com.fs.starfarer.BaseGameState.traverse(Unknown Source)
   at com.fs.state.AppDriver.begin(Unknown Source)
   at com.fs.starfarer.combat.CombatMain.main(Unknown Source)
   at com.fs.starfarer.StarfarerLauncher.super(Unknown Source)
   at com.fs.starfarer.StarfarerLauncher$1.run(Unknown Source)
   at java.lang.Thread.run(Unknown Source)

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Seems to be the CrewReplacer mod interfering?

In either case, and in case it's not, here is the whole enabled_mods.json content.

Spoiler

"pantera_ANewLevel25",
"A_S-F",
"Cryo_but_better",
"aod_vos",
"aotd_vok",
"armaa",
"lw_autosave",
"BSC",
"combatactivators",
"chatter",
"aaacrew_replacer",
"customizablestarsystems",
"fleet_journal",
"fleetsizebydp",
"GrandColonies",
"IndEvo",
"JYD",
"lw_lazylib",
"lunalib",
"MagicLib",
"MoreBarMissions",
"niko_moreCombatTerrainEffects",
"nexerelin",
"JYDR",
"sun_perilous_expanse",
"pay",
"progressiveSMods",
"assortment_of_things",
"RealisticCombat",
"sun_ruthless_sector",
"swp",
"sun_starship_legends",
"supportships",
"tahlan",
"Terraforming & Station Construction",
"uaf",
"US",
"ungp",
"shaderLib"

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Sundog · « **Reply #14 on:** February 23, 2024, 08:35:17 PM »

Ah, thanks! Ok, so you're right. It's an issue with Crew Replacer, but it's interfering in a way that it's kinda supposed to. Alaricdragon and I worked together so that Crew Replacer could override some parts of nomadic survival (and perilous expanse) in order to replace crew when they're involved in planet operations. Crew Replacer seems to be overriding the code for this mod correctly, but failing for some other reason. Possibly due to changes in 0.97, my changes to the nomadic/perilous code, or (most likely imo) because this mod has a different ID from nomadic survival (which I failed to coordinate with alaric about...)

Still not sure what's going wrong, specifically, but I'll reach out to alaricdragon and we'll get to the bottom of it. Unfortunately it's not something I can fix on my end, so my hopes of getting this fixed tonight are pretty unlikely

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Author Topic: [0.97a] Perilous Expanse 1.4.0 - Dangerous and Dynamic Exploration (Read 21057 times)

Sundog

[0.97a] Perilous Expanse 1.4.0 - Dangerous and Dynamic Exploration

Helldiver

Re: Perilous Expanse - Dangerous and Dynamic Exploration

Sundog

Re: Perilous Expanse - Dangerous and Dynamic Exploration

Hashmander

Re: [0.97a] Perilous Expanse 1.4.0 - Dangerous and Dynamic Exploration

Sundog

Re: [0.97a] Perilous Expanse 1.4.0 - Dangerous and Dynamic Exploration

Matheld

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Hashmander

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Sundog

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Hashmander

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Gilgamesh

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Sundog

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Matheld

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Sundog

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Matheld

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Sundog

Re: [0.97a] Perilous Expanse 1.4.0 - Dangerous and Dynamic Exploration