DIY Planets adds a variety of colony structures and special items which allow the player to manipulate planetary conditions. It is intended to make otherwise marginal colony sites viable, encourage exploration, and serve as a late-game credit sink. It also includes endgame methods for transforming asteroid fields into planets and gas giants into brown dwarf stars – or even constructing your own hypershunts!
How It Works
Once you’ve built a colony on a hazardous planet, a variety of new structures become available depending on its conditions. Most of these can reduce a condition’s hazard rating by half, but cannot permanently remove it. For a complete fix, you’ll need to find a specific Domain-era artifact and install it in the structure. These have been added to vanilla loot tables and can also be found in a special (repeatable) bar quest, where a “scarred spacer” points you to a derelict Eridani-Utopia terraforming rig. Each artifact is single-use.
Industries and their effects:
Constructed on a water world, rocky-ice planet, frozen planet, or cryovolcanic planet, this structure transports water to another planet in the system. Does not require an artifact. Having it in place allows you to build:
Water Capture Infrastructure
Constructed on a desert world, this structure receives water and improves the planet to an arid, jungle, tundra, or terran world (depending on temperature). Does not require an artifact.
Cometary Capture Infrastructure
An alternative approach for desert worlds without a nearby water source, captures water-bearing asteroids to hydrate the planet. Does not require an artifact, but is slower and more expensive than standard water transport/capture infrastructure.
Environmental Agency
Removes pollution at a hefty credit cost. Does not require an artifact.
Integration Corps / Subjugation Corps
Two options for removing a decivilized population. The integration corps is costlier but greatly increases immigration while in effect; the subjugation corps is cheaper and faster but only slightly increases immigration. Neither requires an artifact.
Atmospheric Filter
Removes toxic or dense atmospheres. Requires an “atmospheric mineralizer” to complete.
Atmospheric Pump
Adds an atmosphere to a planet, removing the effects of null or thin atmosphere. Requires an “atmospheric sublimator” to complete.
Stellar Mirror
Removes cold or extreme cold. The latter is costlier and takes longer. Requires a “stellar reflector core” to complete.
Stellar Shade
Removes heat or extreme heat. The latter is costlier and takes longer. Requires a “stellar reflector core” to complete.
Stellar Distributor
Removes poor light. Requires a “stellar reflector core” to complete.
Tectonic Engine
Removes tectonic activity or extreme tectonic activity. The latter is costlier and takes longer. Requires a “tectonic attenuator” to complete.
Cyclonic Regulator
Removes extreme weather. Requires a “weather manipulation core” to complete.
Genepurge Project
Unleashes engineered viruses to remove a planet’s inimical biosphere. Does not require an artifact to complete.
N-Brane Oscillator
Adjusts the local gravitational field. Requires an “n-brane oscillator core” to have any effect.
Climate Sculpting Project
Can only be built on a terran or water world. Adds “mild climate,” further reducing hazard rating. Requires a “terraformer brainprint” to complete.
Lobster Breeding Program
Adds Volturnian lobster to a water world, but reduces relations with the Sindrian Diktat.
Terraforming can also gradually change a planet’s class, with visual updates as appropriate. Once a planet progresses past “desert,” it will generate farmland if none existed, and each step will improve that farmland.
Creating Planets
Once you reach level 12, a new bar quest becomes available. Completing it grants access to the Genesis-class hull, a very expensive and single-use starship which transforms an asteroid field into a new planet. Planets are guaranteed to contain ultrarich deposits of metals and rare metals, and will also contain various amounts of organics and volatiles. Simply interact with an asteroid to use the Genesis.
Creating Brown Dwarf Stars
With an N-Brane Oscillator Core in your inventory, approaching a gas giant gives you a new option. Converting it into a brown dwarf star will increase the heat of all planets in the system by one step, and additionally will improve light levels. This can have an impact on faction relations if there are colonies in the system; colonists will appreciate having cold planets warmed but will hate receiving hazardous levels of heat.
Constructing Hypershunts
Compatibility
This mod is compatible with existing saved games, and even if you’ve already looted the Sector, terraforming equipment can be obtained through a repeatable bar quest. It’s not a good idea to uninstall it if you have any active terraforming structures.
Changelog
In the unlikely event that Alex & crew want to implement any aspect of this mod into vanilla Starsector, they are free to do so.
1. Many players have the Unknown Skies mod installed. I don’t believe your mod supports US planet types, which will make it partially incompatible with many saves in progress.
2. Some players want to be able to terraform any planet and any conditions, whereas others want more “balanced” and realistic options. You may want to have a settings file where certain buildings can be disabled (ex. the gravity adjustment ones) for players that want more realistic terraforming options.
As our mods are fairly similar and will largely be incompatible with each other and compete for players, I would be happy to collaborate with you on developing a single mod. If you’re interested, just let me know. Either way, congratulations on making a very nice mod!
Otherwise, everything seemed to be working correctly and I quickly had an impressive empire of terran planets thanks to your mod. (And before anyone complains about balance issues, I should note that I was testing in DevMode and so construction/terraforming rates were greatly accelerated. It also probably didn’t hurt that I “discovered” dozens of artifacts via the Console Commands mod…)
Anyway, I noticed that the Subjugation Corps industry doesn’t appear to be going away once it’s completed its task. While it successfully removes the decivilized population condition, the industry itself just hangs around stuck in the ‘subjugating’ state. From what I can tell, the timer gets reset when it reaches zero and then just starts counting down again. There’s a fairly easy workaround to the issue – just right-click and remove the industry – but I figured I should let you know anyway. For what it’s worth, the alternative Integration Corps industry removes itself just fine when its work is done. (Although I’m not sure why anyone would use the Integration Corps when the Subjugation Corps seems significantly better – but maybe I was missing something…)
On an unrelated note, I know I said I wasn’t looking at balance issues, but it seems like it’s sometimes too easy to make a terran world. For example, I transformed a barren world into a terran world with just the Atmospheric Pump industry and an atmospheric sublimator. I’m not sure if that was just a side-effect of running in DevMode, but it seems like I should have at least had to add water to it or something…
Regarding your terran world issue – that shouldn’t be happening. Barren worlds are intended to stop at desert until water is added. Which other mods are you running, if any? It’s possible a mod is adding additional barren planet classes and they aren’t being handled correctly.
I’m not on the machine I was using for testing, so I can’t give you an exact list but it was a fairly small list for testing purposes. Basically, I was just using some utility mods (CombatChatter, Console Commands, StarshipLegends, etc.) plus LazyLib and Nexerelin. And I wasn’t running any faction mods or the Unknown Skies mod, so I don’t think anything was adding custom planet types. I’ll double-check that computer later to be sure though…
For what it’s worth, the planet in question was just a simple barren world with sparse ore and no atmosphere. It wasn’t hot/cold, it didn’t have low gravity/high gravity, or any other negative conditions – so once the Atmospheric Pump did its work, all the planet had left was a single condition (the ore). Perhaps the problem is related to the fact that I would have been unable to build any more terraforming industries at that point (since it didn’t need Solar Shades, Solar Mirrors, etc.). Either that or it’s just an odd side-effect of running in DevMode so that construction tasks that should take months or years finish in a day or two.
Edit: Just a quick follow-up, but here’s my exact mod list: Captain’s Log, Combat Chatter, Console Commands, DIYPlanets, LazyLib, Nexerelin, SkilledUp, Starship Legends, and ToggleWeaponGroup. It doesn’t look like any of those mods include a planet_gen_data.csv file, so they shouldn’t be adding any new planet types.
Working on removing it’s Thin Atmosphere to see if that adds Habitable now.