Hello Modders. Today's dev diary will be about modding art, and give a cursory glance at what is possible to do in Stellaris. We will mainly talk about characters and ships in this dev diary. Today we are releasing our Maya exporter, which opens up a whole new world of possibilities for modders. So, provided you have the skills in Maya and Photoshop, you can do anything you want - anything we have done, you can do too!

(more info and links can be found at the end of this post)


For characters, you have two options. The simpler one is static 2d avatars. These are just an image with transparency that is used directly in-game. They don't require Maya or any other fancy tools, and will likely be the initial choice for most modders. Static portraits are not used by the core game, but the functionality is there for the modders. There is an example for this in the games files, where we specify the species, so you just add textures and point to them in the files and you get new species.



All the characters we have created for Stellaris are animated 2D portraits. What we do is we draw characters in Photoshop, and split the images up into separate parts for anything that will be in a different layer, looking something like the picture below. We then create a plane for each asset in Maya, and layer them correctly.





If you want to create an animated character, you have two options. One, you can mod an existing one by modifying an existing character’s texture. This is desirable if you don't want to or can't use Maya for any reason but your Photoshop skills are high. This is a bit limiting of course, since you can only change the look so much within the confines of that character. The animations will of course be the same, so you can't move the eyes etc.
If you want to do this, take an existing texture and add some more colors to the entire texture, and you can see the entire area you have to work with.There is some space outside the edge of the character to work with.

Secondly, if you have some Maya skills, you have more freedom. The level of knowledge required is really not that high. Just creating a few planes, cutting, creating some joints and simple animations. What you do is you create texture similar to ours, then create a few different planes and cut out each area. Build a simple rig, and add some animation.







You can also mod in more clothes, triggering the use of different outfits in different situations. In the game currently we use this for the different leader types such as scientist, admiral etc. We also use this for the rulers, so that if you are a militaristic society, your ruler will wear a military uniform. This has very few limits, and could be used to create some very unique characters.

There is another layer where you can add other things to you characters with the help of triggers. We use it to add the different hairstyles for the humans, but you could just as well add glasses to your characters, or some other visual attribute.

If you are feeling fancy, you could even extend a race to use multiple portraits. So that you insect race has a Queen model for your ruler, a lieutenant for you leaders, and a third model for your pops.

Though all the portraits in the game are shown as 2D, they are technically 3D and there is nothing really stopping you from adding a 3D model (though we have yet to try that ourselves).

If you wish to know exactly how to add new portraits, there is a detailed guide on the wiki:
http://www.stellariswiki.com/Portrait_modding



Moving on to to ships. With the release of our maya exporter, you can now create any model you like and add it to the game. The process is very straightforward. You build your mesh and use maya to export it. There is fairly little to be said simply because most things are theoretically possible to do. If you want ships with like 5 sections you can do that. Vertical ships? Sure. Organic ships? Absolutely.

Stations are also technically ships that don't move, so these are of course modable as well.




You can place any number of locators on the ships. You can, for example, add locators to where on the ship enemies ships will aim, so that they don't all hit the center. You can also add locators for where the guns will be and where the engines are. You can easily add guns to your ship without having visible turrets, which is likely what most modders will do.

With all these new possibilities, I very much look forward to what the community will produce.


If you want to download the exporter right away, go to
https://accounts.paradoxplaza.com/profile/downloads

More details on the exporter can be found on the wiki:
http://www.stellariswiki.com/Maya_exporter

We also started a new sub-forum for the exporter.
https://forum.paradoxplaza.com/forum/index.php?forums/clausewitz-maya-exporter-modding-tool.935/



We have recently worked on support for static galaxies. This will allow users to create a specific galaxy to use for specific scenarios. In this test we have more than 5000 stars, which still renders smoothly. Might have to optimize the game a bit though :)



https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KtYIsjsntFo

Links
Download the Clausewitz Maya Exporter for free (requires a Paradox Account)
Guide on how to make your own portraits for Stellaris
Guide on the Clausewitz Maya Exporer (make your own 3D models for mods)
The official Clausewitz Maya Exporter forum

Hello Modders. Today's dev diary will be about modding art, and give a cursory glance at what is possible to do in Stellaris. We will mainly talk about characters and ships in this dev diary. Today we are releasing our Maya exporter, which opens up a whole new world of possibilities for modders. So, provided you have the skills in Maya and Photoshop, you can do anything you want - anything we have done, you can do too!

(more info and links can be found at the end of this post)


For characters, you have two options. The simpler one is static 2d avatars. These are just an image with transparency that is used directly in-game. They don't require Maya or any other fancy tools, and will likely be the initial choice for most modders. Static portraits are not used by the core game, but the functionality is there for the modders. There is an example for this in the games files, where we specify the species, so you just add textures and point to them in the files and you get new species.



All the characters we have created for Stellaris are animated 2D portraits. What we do is we draw characters in Photoshop, and split the images up into separate parts for anything that will be in a different layer, looking something like the picture below. We then create a plane for each asset in Maya, and layer them correctly.





If you want to create an animated character, you have two options. One, you can mod an existing one by modifying an existing character’s texture. This is desirable if you don't want to or can't use Maya for any reason but your Photoshop skills are high. This is a bit limiting of course, since you can only change the look so much within the confines of that character. The animations will of course be the same, so you can't move the eyes etc.
If you want to do this, take an existing texture and add some more colors to the entire texture, and you can see the entire area you have to work with.There is some space outside the edge of the character to work with.

Secondly, if you have some Maya skills, you have more freedom. The level of knowledge required is really not that high. Just creating a few planes, cutting, creating some joints and simple animations. What you do is you create texture similar to ours, then create a few different planes and cut out each area. Build a simple rig, and add some animation.







You can also mod in more clothes, triggering the use of different outfits in different situations. In the game currently we use this for the different leader types such as scientist, admiral etc. We also use this for the rulers, so that if you are a militaristic society, your ruler will wear a military uniform. This has very few limits, and could be used to create some very unique characters.

There is another layer where you can add other things to you characters with the help of triggers. We use it to add the different hairstyles for the humans, but you could just as well add glasses to your characters, or some other visual attribute.

If you are feeling fancy, you could even extend a race to use multiple portraits. So that you insect race has a Queen model for your ruler, a lieutenant for you leaders, and a third model for your pops.

Though all the portraits in the game are shown as 2D, they are technically 3D and there is nothing really stopping you from adding a 3D model (though we have yet to try that ourselves).

If you wish to know exactly how to add new portraits, there is a detailed guide on the wiki:
http://www.stellariswiki.com/Portrait_modding



Moving on to to ships. With the release of our maya exporter, you can now create any model you like and add it to the game. The process is very straightforward. You build your mesh and use maya to export it. There is fairly little to be said simply because most things are theoretically possible to do. If you want ships with like 5 sections you can do that. Vertical ships? Sure. Organic ships? Absolutely.

Stations are also technically ships that don't move, so these are of course modable as well.




You can place any number of locators on the ships. You can, for example, add locators to where on the ship enemies ships will aim, so that they don't all hit the center. You can also add locators for where the guns will be and where the engines are. You can easily add guns to your ship without having visible turrets, which is likely what most modders will do.

With all these new possibilities, I very much look forward to what the community will produce.


If you want to download the exporter right away, go to
https://accounts.paradoxplaza.com/profile/downloads

More details on the exporter can be found on the wiki:
http://www.stellariswiki.com/Maya_exporter

We also started a new sub-forum for the exporter.
https://forum.paradoxplaza.com/forum/index.php?forums/clausewitz-maya-exporter-modding-tool.935/



We have recently worked on support for static galaxies. This will allow users to create a specific galaxy to use for specific scenarios. In this test we have more than 5000 stars, which still renders smoothly. Might have to optimize the game a bit though :)



https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KtYIsjsntFo

Links
Download the Clausewitz Maya Exporter for free (requires a Paradox Account)
Guide on how to make your own portraits for Stellaris
Guide on the Clausewitz Maya Exporer (make your own 3D models for mods)
The official Clausewitz Maya Exporter forum

Hello, earthlings. My name might be unfamiliar to some dev diary readers; I’ve been working on Stellaris for some time now and am in charge of scripting/content design duties for Stellaris while the eminent Goosecreature is away rearing his brood. This week’s dev diary is the first in a two-part series on modding, which you will read, enjoy, and be enlightened by. We’re here to get our hands dirty, so don’t expect any pretty screenshots! Only functional screenshots.

Stellaris is built on the Clausewitz engine, and has had a lot of functionality ported over from our other games. Since we use a random galaxy generated at game start (unless you mod in a static one) we have to approach things a bit differently than you would in a game with a pre-set map of Europe - if you’ve modded a Paradox Development Studio title before you may come across a few surprises, but you should feel right at home soon enough.

General Modding
Like our other games, Stellaris is very mod-able. Take a look in the \Stellaris\common\ folder and you’ll see. It contains mostly everything that determines how the game functions. Edicts, ethics, game rules, army attachments, name lists, country types, planet classes, modifiers, buildings and so on can all be found here. In \Stellaris\common\defines\ you will find a LUA script file that regulates a lot of basic game behaviors and settings, like the base soft cap on the number of core planets ( CORE_SECTOR_PLANET_CAP = 5 ) or the camera field-of-view ( NCamera = { FOV = 35 } ) available for easy tweaking. Most of these values come with fairly informative comments!

Scripted Triggers & Effects, Chained Event Targets
We recently inherited scripted triggers and effects from Hearts of Iron IV! They’re very good. One addition to the scripting language that originated in Stellaris and may or may not find its way to other games in the future is event target chaining. It allows us to chain targets/scopes/saved event targets together in a way not unlike how we do it in localization. For example, what was once written


can now be rendered as the much more digestible


Amazing!

Anomalies
Swiftly moving on to Anomalies, the lifeblood of early game exploration in Stellaris. Incidentally, anomalies are also rather unlike the events found in our other games You can and should make your own! I will show you how.

An anomaly is made up of a minimum of four components; the anomaly category, the anomaly, the event and localization.

1. \Stellaris\common\anomalies\00_anomaly_categories.txt
2. \Stellaris\common\anomalies\00_anomalies.txt
3. \Stellaris\events\00_anomaly_events.txt
4. \Stellaris\localisation\events_l_english.yml

Anomaly categories define what planets are viable for a certain category of anomalies to spawn on. Anomalies refine this selection further and link to specific events. The event that is eventually fired… does stuff. The localization file provides the text for the event and the category window.

I feel that a picture is worth more than a thousand words, so I’m going to show you pictures of words to maximize efficiency. See if you can follow along!

Step 1 - 00_anomaly_categories


Step 2 - 00_anomalies


Step 3 - 00_anomaly_events


Step 4 - events_l_english



And the end result!
Planet Surveyed


Anomaly Researched



That’s all for now, planet-dwellers. Next week, art director Aerie will explain how to get your own art into the game. Exporters! Graphics! Spaceships!


https://forum.paradoxplaza.com/forum/index.php?threads/stellaris-dev-diary-31-modding-scripting-anomalies.923348/

Useful links
Official Website
Stellaris Wiki
Developer Diary Archives
Stellaris Streams archive

Hello, earthlings. My name might be unfamiliar to some dev diary readers; I’ve been working on Stellaris for some time now and am in charge of scripting/content design duties for Stellaris while the eminent Goosecreature is away rearing his brood. This week’s dev diary is the first in a two-part series on modding, which you will read, enjoy, and be enlightened by. We’re here to get our hands dirty, so don’t expect any pretty screenshots! Only functional screenshots.

Stellaris is built on the Clausewitz engine, and has had a lot of functionality ported over from our other games. Since we use a random galaxy generated at game start (unless you mod in a static one) we have to approach things a bit differently than you would in a game with a pre-set map of Europe - if you’ve modded a Paradox Development Studio title before you may come across a few surprises, but you should feel right at home soon enough.

General Modding
Like our other games, Stellaris is very mod-able. Take a look in the \Stellaris\common\ folder and you’ll see. It contains mostly everything that determines how the game functions. Edicts, ethics, game rules, army attachments, name lists, country types, planet classes, modifiers, buildings and so on can all be found here. In \Stellaris\common\defines\ you will find a LUA script file that regulates a lot of basic game behaviors and settings, like the base soft cap on the number of core planets ( CORE_SECTOR_PLANET_CAP = 5 ) or the camera field-of-view ( NCamera = { FOV = 35 } ) available for easy tweaking. Most of these values come with fairly informative comments!

Scripted Triggers & Effects, Chained Event Targets
We recently inherited scripted triggers and effects from Hearts of Iron IV! They’re very good. One addition to the scripting language that originated in Stellaris and may or may not find its way to other games in the future is event target chaining. It allows us to chain targets/scopes/saved event targets together in a way not unlike how we do it in localization. For example, what was once written


can now be rendered as the much more digestible


Amazing!

Anomalies
Swiftly moving on to Anomalies, the lifeblood of early game exploration in Stellaris. Incidentally, anomalies are also rather unlike the events found in our other games You can and should make your own! I will show you how.

An anomaly is made up of a minimum of four components; the anomaly category, the anomaly, the event and localization.

1. \Stellaris\common\anomalies\00_anomaly_categories.txt
2. \Stellaris\common\anomalies\00_anomalies.txt
3. \Stellaris\events\00_anomaly_events.txt
4. \Stellaris\localisation\events_l_english.yml

Anomaly categories define what planets are viable for a certain category of anomalies to spawn on. Anomalies refine this selection further and link to specific events. The event that is eventually fired… does stuff. The localization file provides the text for the event and the category window.

I feel that a picture is worth more than a thousand words, so I’m going to show you pictures of words to maximize efficiency. See if you can follow along!

Step 1 - 00_anomaly_categories


Step 2 - 00_anomalies


Step 3 - 00_anomaly_events


Step 4 - events_l_english



And the end result!
Planet Surveyed


Anomaly Researched



That’s all for now, planet-dwellers. Next week, art director Aerie will explain how to get your own art into the game. Exporters! Graphics! Spaceships!


https://forum.paradoxplaza.com/forum/index.php?threads/stellaris-dev-diary-31-modding-scripting-anomalies.923348/

Useful links
Official Website
Stellaris Wiki
Developer Diary Archives
Stellaris Streams archive

Hi folks!

We’re getting close to release and there is not much left to talk about that we haven’t already covered. The only remaining major feature is, I believe, the “Late Game Crises” events, and I really don’t want to spoil them, so bear with me if I’m being slightly vague this time…



Now, last week I talked about how large empires will have to worry about keeping all manner of political Factions in check. This is one of the ways we try to keep the game interesting and challenging past that crucial point when you often tend to lose interest in most strategy games and feel that you’ve already won. It’s not much fun to spend hours of your life mopping up the final resistance just so you’ll get to see that sweet acknowledgement saying “Victory!”. Another way to keep a game interesting is through random occurrences that can upset your plans even at a very late stage. This is where dangerous technologies and late game crises enter the picture.



Some technologies are clearly marked as being “risky”, for example Robot Workers. Now, you might not always risk having your victory snatched out of your grasp, but in this case at least, you really are gambling with the fate of the galaxy. Just researching such a technology is safe; it’s the actual use of it that carries the danger. For example, the more sentient Robot Pops there are in the galaxy, the higher the risk is that they will come to deem organic life unfit to exist and rise up in a well-planned revolt. Unless crushed quickly and with overwhelming force, such a Machine Empire will quickly get out of hand and threaten all the remaining empires in the galaxy. Sentient robots will out-research and outproduce everyone. If the revolt is centered in a powerful rival empire, you’ll need to think carefully about when you want to intervene; a savvy player might time it just right and be able to mop up both the robots and the remnants of the rival empire. Leave it too long, however, and the robots will overwhelm you.



The idea is that you will usually see one of the possible late game crises every time you play, but the chances increase the longer it takes you to win. However, it’s very rare to see more than one in the same game. The different threats vary in nature and behaviour, and can offer opportunities as well as posing an enormous danger to your survival. For example, it might be possible to reverse engineer some really unique technologies from these galactic threats, but the geography of the galaxy might also change in your favor…

That’s it for now my friends! Next week, we’ll change tack completely, and do a two-part, in-depth guide for modders.

Henrik Fåhraeus

Useful links
Official Website
Stellaris Wiki
Developer Diary Archives
Stellaris Streams archive

Hi folks!

We’re getting close to release and there is not much left to talk about that we haven’t already covered. The only remaining major feature is, I believe, the “Late Game Crises” events, and I really don’t want to spoil them, so bear with me if I’m being slightly vague this time…



Now, last week I talked about how large empires will have to worry about keeping all manner of political Factions in check. This is one of the ways we try to keep the game interesting and challenging past that crucial point when you often tend to lose interest in most strategy games and feel that you’ve already won. It’s not much fun to spend hours of your life mopping up the final resistance just so you’ll get to see that sweet acknowledgement saying “Victory!”. Another way to keep a game interesting is through random occurrences that can upset your plans even at a very late stage. This is where dangerous technologies and late game crises enter the picture.



Some technologies are clearly marked as being “risky”, for example Robot Workers. Now, you might not always risk having your victory snatched out of your grasp, but in this case at least, you really are gambling with the fate of the galaxy. Just researching such a technology is safe; it’s the actual use of it that carries the danger. For example, the more sentient Robot Pops there are in the galaxy, the higher the risk is that they will come to deem organic life unfit to exist and rise up in a well-planned revolt. Unless crushed quickly and with overwhelming force, such a Machine Empire will quickly get out of hand and threaten all the remaining empires in the galaxy. Sentient robots will out-research and outproduce everyone. If the revolt is centered in a powerful rival empire, you’ll need to think carefully about when you want to intervene; a savvy player might time it just right and be able to mop up both the robots and the remnants of the rival empire. Leave it too long, however, and the robots will overwhelm you.



The idea is that you will usually see one of the possible late game crises every time you play, but the chances increase the longer it takes you to win. However, it’s very rare to see more than one in the same game. The different threats vary in nature and behaviour, and can offer opportunities as well as posing an enormous danger to your survival. For example, it might be possible to reverse engineer some really unique technologies from these galactic threats, but the geography of the galaxy might also change in your favor…

That’s it for now my friends! Next week, we’ll change tack completely, and do a two-part, in-depth guide for modders.

Henrik Fåhraeus

Useful links
Official Website
Stellaris Wiki
Developer Diary Archives
Stellaris Streams archive

Countdown to Launch: Stellaris Now Available for Pre-Order
Paradox to Send Fans’ Names into Space to Signal E.T.

Paradox Interactive, a publisher and developer of games that don’t just take up space, today began accepting pre-orders for Stellaris, the forthcoming sci-fi grand strategy game from Paradox Development Studio. Several versions of Stellaris are now available for pre-purchase, including premium editions which include a variety of bonus content. Stellaris challenges players to explore a new universe and establish an empire across the stars, venturing into new territory for Paradox’s traditionally historical games. The game will be released for Windows, Mac, and Linux PCs on May 9, 2016.

Players can pre-order the Stellaris game in the Standard Edition ($39.99), or in the Nova Edition ($49.99), the latter of which includes not only the game but also a 140-minute digital soundtrack, and more. The Galaxy Edition ($69.99) is also available and includes all of the above items, along with an extensive Digital Collector’s Book detailing the art and design of Stellaris, the novel “Stellaris: Infinite Frontiers” on eBook, and an exclusive wallpaper signed by the Stellaris development team.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Huuacl6oqI

In addition, fans who pre-order any edition of Stellaris will have their name sent into lower space by Paradox. A USB drive filled with the names of all pre-order participants will be attached to a weather balloon and launched into the upper stratosphere in an effort to let drive-by extraterrestrials know who among us are the most enthusiastic to explore space and meet new friends. Pre-orders will also be rewarded with a set ofStellaris ringtones from the game’s original soundtrack.

If you pre-order you also get the Creatures of the Void DLC - a cosmetic add on that includes five new alien designs chosen by our community. Watch as the Hydra/Xenomorph, Evil Porcupine, Dinosaur Bird, Shadowy Anthropoid and Fungoid Infected Mammalian spread their grasping appendages across the galaxy.

For details on all pre-order rewards and versions, click here!

Stellaris is the new science fiction strategy game from Paradox Development Studio, the creators of Crusader Kings, Europa Universalis and Hearts of Iron. This will be the first strategy game from PDS that is rooted not in the past, but the future, as you guide a species of your design to power and glory in the depths of space. With randomly created opponents and procedurally generated star systems, no two games can ever play out the same way.

For more information about Stellaris, visit http://www.stellarisgame.com/