[mod] [Stellaris] EoS - Without Apparel Patch

[Railgunner2160]

Indeed, that was a pleasant surprise regarding the flavor text. On the plus side I've found the United Nations of Earth, & the Commonwealth of Man in my game. Got a Defensive Pact with the UNE & a few other empires nearby, so if that hostile empire gives me any trouble it's going to be pounced on by three or four other empires!

[Nessa]

So, I had a weird bug where as soon as I recruit troops, the game crashes.   Which means, I wrapped up female clothes and hair.

 

 

 

 

• I converted all the new space elf hair except the stupid... buzz thing. (What the ... was that in there for anyway!? ) I see I don't have shots of every new hairstyle.
• All long hair now has the new elf ear poky stuff going on. (Still prefer my ears though...)
• All slave gear, Sidh/Eilistraee stuff, etc all converted. (Not really pictured.)
• Of course, most clothes have multiple colors.

I now have more clothes with the new slim type than I do for the existing body, so the new elf girls (at least) are coming for sure in the next update. I'll leave guys alone for the next update only. The one following that will have slim guys. (LOVE that new long hair for guys!)

 

Next up are finalizing phenos. (All the phenos you see in the shots are already finalized.) Then I think it's about time for an update!

[Nessa]

Oh yeah, also I have two ideas for new corvettes for the elves. One for torpedo boats, and the other for ... other corvettes. So we'll start seeing actual custom ships show up in updates very soon.

[Nessa]

I'm not going to do it.... (yet ), but I have a strong inclination to name the following person "Fluffy Sunshine" and make her the empress of some xenophobic Elven fallen empire....

 

 

 

 

 

One of the other new phenos, naturally in the second most ridiculous configuration I could think of.

 

 

 

I'm actually considering tossing all the vanilla human phenos that I've converted. I've already tossed one but... I'll let everybody else weigh in on the other two first.

[Princessity]

I'm not going to do it.... (yet ), but I have a strong inclination to name the following person "Fluffy Sunshine" and make her the empress of some xenophobic Elven fallen empire....

 

 

Elf_SunshineCandy.jpg

 

 

 

One of the other new phenos, naturally in the second most ridiculous configuration I could think of.

 

Elf_VeggieXenos.jpg

 

 

I'm actually considering tossing all the vanilla human phenos that I've converted. I've already tossed one but... I'll let everybody else weigh in on the other two first.

 

OOOH! I love Fluffy Sunshine's hair so much! And the earring! Bi-colour hair looks so dooooope! *grabby hands*

 

Oh gosh the new pheno is amazing XD If Fluffy Sunshine is the Empress, this one definitely needs to be an Admiral so that when she's turning your little fleet into space paste you can look into those maniacal green eyes and see your doom reflected in them XD

 

The new outfits are pretty too! <3 Fluffy's absolute cleavage dress with jewellery and Admiral Sugarsweet's negligee look so fancy!

 

 

As for the phenos, I actually liked the one you removed (asian) the most ^^ Maaaaybe it could be touched up a bit and prettied up but I'm for the most part fine with the human faces.

[idonotlikeusernames]

 

Next up are finalizing phenos. (All the phenos you see in the shots are already finalized.) Then I think it's about time for an update!

 I'll leave guys alone for the next update only. The one following that will have slim guys. (LOVE that new long hair for guys!)

 

Aww....so no October surprise for me.

 

How hard is it to do the texture thing for ships anyway? As I think I've finally found the ship style I like for my custom Drow/Dark Elf empires.

A mix of the Klingon and Romulan Starship mods from the nexus but with either the shiny Drow Black or Elven Chrome textures.

[Nessa]

 

OOOH! I love Fluffy Sunshine's hair so much! And the earring! Bi-colour hair looks so dooooope! *grabby hands*

 

Oh gosh the new pheno is amazing XD If Fluffy Sunshine is the Empress, this one definitely needs to be an Admiral so that when she's turning your little fleet into space paste you can look into those maniacal green eyes and see your doom reflected in them XD

 

The new outfits are pretty too! <3 Fluffy's absolute cleavage dress with jewellery and Admiral Sugarsweet's negligee look so fancy!

 

 

As for the phenos, I actually liked the one you removed (asian) the most ^^ Maaaaybe it could be touched up a bit and prettied up but I'm for the most part fine with the human faces.

 

 

I like Sugarsweet! Good name. I was thinking General Green Tea but Admiral Sugarsweet is much better!

 

Oh dear, yes that "asian" portrait from Paradox. I -really- hated that one.   Most of the phenos I'm tossing are the custom ones I made previously. After Fluffy's (I think that's her name now) portrait was finished I didn't like any of the others I'd done.

 

 

Aww....so no October surprise for me.

 

How hard is it to do the texture thing for ships anyway? As I think I've finally found the ship style I like for my custom Drow/Dark Elf empires.

A mix of the Klingon and Romulan Starship mods from the nexus but with either the shiny Drow Black or Elven Chrome textures.

 

I think there have been enough October surprises all around really.

 

I was thinking for the Drow along those lines in fact. Not directly Klingon, but wings with sort of ominious shapes. I was doodling in Maya (during the Asari stuff) and ended up with a Star Destroyer kind of thing, except smooth. I think that will work out for one of the battleship types. I'm intending to eventually have multiple different ships for each slot. I know I have 4 possible battleship slots. I think... 4 cruisers and maybe even 4 destroyers. (Can't recall at the moment how many slots cruisers and destroyers have.)

For elves I'm thinking very sleek with the same quicksilver shiny look. And um... glowing vines.   The Drow can have vines too but that will be a little different because their ships are blockier and more evil looking.

 

Retexturing isn't too bad though. You just have to deal with Paradox's funky way of doing them. Which is: STUPID. Their normal maps aren't normals (one channel is used for a glow map, and another is simply duplicated), their speculars aren't specular.... it's a real mess. So dumb too! Why not just use standard stuff like everybody else? Normals could be as expected, specular would work like normal, and you'd have a separate glow map texture. So much easier, and you'd get to see what stuff looked like directly in Maya instead of waiting for the stupid game to load it up.  

[Princessity]

 

 

OOOH! I love Fluffy Sunshine's hair so much! And the earring! Bi-colour hair looks so dooooope! *grabby hands*

 

Oh gosh the new pheno is amazing XD If Fluffy Sunshine is the Empress, this one definitely needs to be an Admiral so that when she's turning your little fleet into space paste you can look into those maniacal green eyes and see your doom reflected in them XD

 

The new outfits are pretty too! <3 Fluffy's absolute cleavage dress with jewellery and Admiral Sugarsweet's negligee look so fancy!

 

 

As for the phenos, I actually liked the one you removed (asian) the most ^^ Maaaaybe it could be touched up a bit and prettied up but I'm for the most part fine with the human faces.

 

 

I like Sugarsweet! Good name. I was thinking General Green Tea but Admiral Sugarsweet is much better!

 

Oh dear, yes that "asian" portrait from Paradox. I -really- hated that one.   Most of the phenos I'm tossing are the custom ones I made previously. After Fluffy's (I think that's her name now) portrait was finished I didn't like any of the others I'd done.

 

 

Awww I love General Green Tea! Its great! XD

 

It's decided: my next elven game I'm going to play with a My Little Pony namelist, it will be the best!

 

Oh and speaking of the asian face, is there any chance maybe you could create your own, a prettier one? ^^ I don't know what it is buuuut asian elves always felt right to me. Probably because my first real contact wit h hem was Morrowind and the Dunmer had elements of Eastern cultures all over the place so an empire of elvish space samurai makes perfect sense to me XD

[Nessa]

A My Little Pony thing would be hilarious!!   Especially the they went around killing everything of course.

 

The real trouble with doing anything asian are the eyes. Technically, both Fluffy and Green Tea are asian. (Chinese specifically.) But by the time I smushed the eyes into place and adjusted the nose accordingly.... they came out with only the vaguest hint of Chinese. If only I had an example of how they did eye blinking, I could recreate it. But so far it seems nobody has much of a clue. Either you smush the eyes in your new portrait to fit an existing one, or you forget that blinking won't quite work.  

I think... at some point (likely after some more ships are done), I'm going to have a go at seeing what exactly I can manage with portrait animations. Maybe I just won't have any blinking. Or perhaps blinking isn't as hard as I think. Likely what Paradox has is a base template that they adjust for any new portraits. So adjust for the eyes, then export. If only!!!

[Nessa]

For an example of what I would just love, this. I'd probably do all the elves (including guys) in that sort of style if I could manage it.  

[Princessity]

For an example of what I would just love, this. I'd probably do all the elves (including guys) in that sort of style if I could manage it. 

 

Yes! It looks perfect. And you're right, now that I put them side by side, it's actually pretty close to Fluffy Sunshine! (yups, it's that face's name now and forever)

 

Honestly even after putting together 64 portraits I still have no idea how they function XD I may have to get Maya one of those days and learn it just so I can understand the mechanics behind portraits better. Right now I'm pretty much restricted to faces that face precisely the right angle and have roughly similar eyes-to-chin proportions. Turns out not a lot of artists accounted for someone turning their stuff into Stellaris portraits! I'm scandalised that they didn't have the foresight!

 

Or I could learn to draw stuff myself but I'm utterly talentless and that's effoooooooort!

[Nessa]

I tried that style for Fluffy (). I didn't get the nose right though even before I started smushing.   It's ... also a lot of work, and then when I try and squish it together into the proper position.....  UGH.

 

Aside from all this drawing mess, I did think of something else: use Skyrim! I could find some pose, and then just snapshot various people from Skyrim. (Modded of course. Not vanilla DEAR GOD WHAT IS THAT THING faces... ) That would probably work and might even look better than vanilla Paradox stuff.

But.... yeah. EFFOOOOOORT!

 

I've got 6 phenos for girls so far. One of the vanilla humans I think looks like a man, but maybe I'm just too close to it right now. I'll release it, if everybody hates it, I'll be only too happy to ZONK IT.

 

***

 

Well drats, I found out what was causing the army CTD issue: my 1440p UI Overhaul mod! ARGH!!! Now I have to use stupid small windows....  (Because the author can't manage to recreate it.... which means: no fixy!) That and I can't figure out the error myself. Something about not being able to find something for a fleet window.  

 

 

[Princessity]

Oh! I'm happy you found the issue but awww... yah... it's the reason I've been avoiding UI mods myself. I mean once Paradox calms down with the patches and expansions a bit I may start using them but otherwise it's probably the part of the game that's the most vulnerable to breaking between updates.

 

And I actually had a similar idea to your Slyrim thing! I was thinking about using Daz Poser or something to render new faces but... then I looked more into it and after realising how expensive it would be to buy all the assets needed to create enough interesting and distinct looking phenos I spun around on my mental heel and ran away XD

 

Besides... meh I think I actually like the hand-drawn look of Stellaris portraits. 3D renders would probably clash a bit with the rest.

 

Also I don't know how this happens but every new solution I come up with to make things easier for myself ends up being more complicated and involved than what I was doing already XD

[Nessa]

Also I don't know how this happens but every new solution I come up with to make things easier for myself ends up being more complicated and involved than what I was doing already XD

 

If you ever do find out how that happens, would you tell me? I have the same stupid problem!!

 

OK, I just migrated the new slim elves into my current game. I'll do some testing while playing (the best kind) and if nothing pops up, I'll probably update tomorrow.

 

I do have some issues...

 

• I may have gone a bit too far with the skin tones. I'll remind everybody to give me opinions after the update.
• Not super thrilled with the vanilla phenos converted to elfy.
• More clothes are being used in special places, which means nothing is in order when picking an outfit for your leader. Likely this isn't a super big issue given... your leader will revert to leader clothes no matter what you pick anyway.

Drow aren't done yet. But making Drow is unbelievably simple. The annoying part will be messing with the clothing selectors as usual.

[Nessa]

UPDATE

• Again, let me know what you think of the skin tones. I got tired of doing it by the time I got to the new phenotype 6.   And... I think I overdid the colors a bit on the others. Might tone things down a bit when I get a moment.
• Look out for any clothing oddities. I think I caught them all but one never knows...
• I haven't converted all the hair over to ruler (meaning tiara) versions quite yet.

I may hold off on switching the guys for a bit. I'm anxious to get moving on the ships. We'll see what gets done first.

[Princessity]

Yay! I was just thinking about starting a new game today! Perfect timing XD

 

By the by I can't find Fluffy Sunshine's hairstyle. I guess it's one of those not included yet?

 

As for skin tines, I think they look good! At least as far as ruler creation goes, I haven't gotten to pops yet, I'm trying to decide what my ruler should wear THIS IS IMPORTANT

 

 

 

Oh... and for some reason the topic escaped the Paradox Games subforum when you uploaded the new version... I guess download category needs to be changed to CK2?

[Nessa]

Er... Fluffy's hairstyle is missing?

 

OOOH. You mean the Drow tiara. Ok now is a good time for that question. Previously I had the Drow tiara (the big thing in fluffy's pic) as Drow only. Should I just standardize and have both available for both mods? (Really it would be easier from a logistics standpoint anyway.)

[Nessa]

OK fixed the category. Thanks for the heads up!

[Princessity]

Er... Fluffy's hairstyle is missing?

 

OOOH. You mean the Drow tiara. Ok now is a good time for that question. Previously I had the Drow tiara (the big thing in fluffy's pic) as Drow only. Should I just standardize and have both available for both mods? (Really it would be easier from a logistics standpoint anyway.)

 

Yes please! I love that hairstyle, it looks cute! And I was hoping to replicate Fluffy Sunshine XD

[Nessa]

That's settled then! I'll standardize both mods.

 

Maybe the Drow tiaras can be used for elfy fallens. 

 

Which means... probably another update to this... hopefully today. I'm hoping to get the Drow up to speed today.

And.... now is a great time to have a closer look at who gets assigned what hair while I'm at it. Pirates shouldn't have crowns for instance.

[Princessity]

Actually I don't think pirates... are like ever seen. Even the new pirate space monsters don't seem to have any diplomacy or admirals who could actually feature those clothes. And in case of the event-generated pirates, you may see one of their admirals at most.

 

I'm seriously considering removing pirate clothes in the Asari mod and repurposing them for something more useful, like pops from rebellious factions or something.

 

Oh also... I just noticed, your primitives still have a -3 cost trait which gives them huge amounts of gene modification points to spend ^^ On top of the already powerful trait, 5 gene mod points may be a little bit overboard XD I'd suggest changing the cost to 1 to be in line with vanilla uplifts, or 3 to exclude them from gene-modding altogether.

[Nessa]

Now there's an idea! Rebel scum clothes! Which got me thinking... I believe I mostly use my "rogue" style clothes just for pirates as well. 

 

For rulers, I'm setting ... pirates, science directorates, AI whatevers, and subconscious consensus to have no crowns. Any objections to those? (Maybe I should actually look up what the heck subconscious consensus is first however!)

 

 

[Princessity]

Subconscious Consensus is for the AI rebellion crisis faction. As far as I knooow... it only features synths as leaders so I guess adding special clothes for them is redundant as well.

 

OH WAIT NO! That's "Machine Consciousness" (silly names!) Subconscious Consensus is the advanced form of Direct Democracy (materialist republic)

 

Although that just got me thinking... the game needs prettier robots! What's up with those toaster-heads?

[Nessa]

 

Well that wouldn't be hard to deal with.   I wonder now....  if we could specify synths to use say... a specific set of portraits? Maybe.... make a more AI looking humanoid robots?

 

OOOK, I looked it up. Apparently "subconcious_consensus" is actually the advanced form of stupidity er.. materialist democracy. EDIT: Haha! Yeah, I thought that too at first! EDIT2: Maybe... I should look in game. I think that website isn't accurate!!

 

Speaking of which, why the hell can't I have a religious society that gets religious kicks out of technology advancement!?  Just about every other space sim game I've played has that one.   And really, materialist shouldn't get tech advance bonuses anyway. More like they should get negative stuff because everybody is too busy playing the latest iDevice to actually get anything done!   

[Princessity]

I'm pretty sure it is possible to change the vanilla synth portraits, add randomisation, clothes, even gender dimorphism. Aside from not being selectable as a starting species, they do operate the same once they become available. Synths can even become leaders and if you're a very liberal democracy, even rulers!

 

I want my EDI-bots in Stellaris, goshpoopit! XD I hate the toaster-head robot look!