Oh, I gotcha... that makes sense.  

It is possible to swap meshes if a research has been completed.  However, unless the refits are actual hull changes and not just replacement and improvement of internal systems, there's no reason to change meshes for them.

This is not possible due to engine limitations unless the name was part of the texture, in which case it would be the same for every single ship of that class.

There were multiple changes to the Excelsior model for the Lakota refit, as well as other changes to the general design.

Mechanically it's a simple task to put the separate models in game, I think Stress even had the different models Sins ready at one point when planning to have the Lakota a separate elite version.  You get to eat two ships worth ram usage for one though.

Poor bastards?  The Klingons might have something to say about this.

Starbases and defensive structures...

Lakota refit is a lot more than 6 armor points.  The ability does 6 armor, 100% shield regen, and 50% weapon cool down.  The Quantum Torpedoes are also enabled from that research, giving the Excelsior their third weapon type.

The TEC and Vasari starbases have six bleeding meshes.  The primary main mesh, one for each weapon level, one for trade, and then two more for the weapon levels and trade.  The Advent has twelve.

It simply switches out the entire model for a new one based on the requirements.

MeshNameInfoCount is in all ship and structure files, so any ship can be upgraded this way.  It is not currently done though.

I was referring to the Excelsior.

Such a good likeness of the guy...

Another bastard moment.

Looks like, which was obvious when I did it, I made the cruise missile types assimilate capitals as well.

This wasn't exactly intentional, why it didn't register when writing the ability, I don't know.  Maybe added to the patch list, will have to ruminate on it a bit.  In the mean time, anti-strike craft ships smoke them bad, usage recommended.  The anti-assimilation ability will prevent this from occurring, but only if it's in operation during the tail end of the effect.  You need at least two Norways alternating it to be safe.

If the hangars and portable version still present a problem(the additional assimilation capability is upgrade locked so make sure they're functioning before assuming it's prevented) even with significant strike craft and or anti-strike craft ships, let me know what kind of results you're seeing.

All of the counts are in the planet entity files, there is no function for variance within a specific type so if you want more you need to duplicate the files, five terrans, five asteroids, that sort of thing.

Entity counts will add a very small amount to your usage.  The entire directory for the actual entity files is only a few megs even in text format.  It's only that large because of the insane amount of stuff we've added in.

What adds the big numbers are mesh and texture files.  Where the entity directory is 3, the mesh directory is 163 and the textures are breaking 700.

If you add a duplicate version of the same mesh and texture running on a new entity file, you add itty bitty bit.  If you add in a whole new creation, you add a bunch.  Map files, being duplicates of existing assets, will not substantially increase the memory footprint based on their size.  You should be able to add a hell of a lot before getting up to vanilla diplomacy levels where dumping is a problem.

There are no specific "template" files to look at, just the existing body of work.  Crack open the planet file you're trying to duplicate, find the necessary information to edit, and save it as your new planet.  Then go into the GalaxyScenariosDef file and do the same for the required entries, changing counts to match your new additions.

Anything preceded by a count is fuzzy to some degree, every other line in the entity files will be needed with few, error captured exceptions.

OK One last request for now. Ha Ha. As you all know I am trying to make a personal Solo version of SOA2 that will allow me to play the game with the limited amount of time I do thus while impossible I am trying to make it more like a turn based game versus a real time game. One element I wanted to include was currently I find that the Ships Hulls repairing in the field as they do, to be to unrealistic, I can see repairing some damage but when a ship has 1200 hull points and losses 80% of them in a battle I would prefer that the repair time be so ungodly slow that it would be best to send the ship to a repair yard or send a repair ship out to do the work.

Now I know the Shelby has the repair droids ability What I like to know is do all the races have something similair and do all drydocks have repair capability as well if so then I am sure it will be a simple matter of changing the hull regeneration rate on all ships to a level that will slow them down to that ungodly amount.

Also if possible is there a global parameter that would modify all regeneration rates on all ships in the game that of course would be most helpful as it would allow me to leave the original SOA2 ship files alone

Thanks Again

Seems higher to me as it stands I hardly ever need any other facility to repair just jump system and then jump back and usually by then my ships are restored, besides as I said I just prefer the ships could not repair Hull damage without the use of facilities or at the very least a tender like the Shelby which has the necessary skilled workers and materials to do the job.

A Couple minutes to jump two wells back not anymore Ha Ha. more like 30 minutes.

Yeah I'll have to check them out  As far as Shield restoration goes I fine with the way it is I want my battles to take anywhere from a couple minutes to five minutes its just the rest of the game I want to slow down cause I need to document my decisions as I might get a hour to play and then have to put it down for a day or two and by the time I come back I don't remember what I was doing or what my strategy was.

What about their shipyards do they repair I guess if all they have is self repair I'll have to fix that
 

Mmmm Well as I said shield regeneration seems OK to do in the field ought not need facilities for that unless of course it was so how tied to anti-matter usage or something say ships has 2000 shield loses 1000 and it takes .15 anti-matter to restore 1 point shielding might even be cool if ant-matter didn't restore that fast ships would have to go in and fuel up so to speak.

Sounds like the Klingons are just about perfect then probably not much tweaking to do to them. Psychoak can you tell me what is the parameter that sets base Hull Restoration Rates in the game. I know research tiers increase this at every level but if a ships base were zero to begin with would the research have any effect?

PS Would it be easy to make a piece of tech that would be available to all races for repairing and then adding that ability to say the Constructors? Constructors I think make excellent repair and refueling vehicles in my mind.

And found my answer to one of the above question Correct?

HullPointRestoreRate 1.020000

You asking about vanilla sins or a SOA2 guide?