extra random maps pack v3 file

Extra Random Maps Pack is back. The main concept is simple: each player home planet, instead of always spawned at the outer edge of the system, can be spawned at any distance from the star, making for a more random game start condition. While more unfair for competitive multiplayer games, it can give more variety to single player or co-op games against the AI.

The map pack comes in three sets of maps:

Standard: Closely follows the original random maps. The home planets (plus their companion planets), the pirate base, and the wormholes spawn distance range is widened. The number of wormholes is randomized. The original planet ring layouts and planet mix is retained.

Freeform: Even more free rein is given to the random map generator. Also, Multi-Star maps are added for Tiny, Small, Medium and Medium-Large size.

Shattered Core: The inner half of the solar system is composed of uncolonizable planets. Essentially it is like a ring map, but with an inner region for outflanking, raids and mobile fleet action.

Each map set has a variant with neutral colonies and one without neutral colonies (could be useful if you have Minor Factions DLC and do not want to have generic neutral colonies to mix with the minor factions, or if you simply do not like neutral colonies in general). The whole map pack adds up to more than 50 maps.

Compatibility with other mods: The map pack is compatible to mods that do not remove the original planet types. One way to check is to see if the mod has maps inside the Galaxy\ subfolder that replaces the original random maps. If it does not, then the mod still uses the original random maps, and it is 100% certain to be compatible with Standard and Freeform map sets, and very likely compatible with the Shattered Core map set as well.

Instructions:

Option 1 (Recommended): simply copy the .galaxy files to your \Documents\My Games\Ironclad Games\Sins of a Solar Empire Rebellion\GalaxyForge\ folder as usual. The maps will show up in the Galaxy Forge map list.

Option 2: If you wish, you can enable this Map pack as a mod (put it at the bottom of the enabled mods list). The maps will show up in the Small Maps, Medium Maps, and Large Maps menus. This would not work if you are using another mod that also defines galaxy.manifest, and if Ironclad added more maps to the games in the future, using this as a mod would hide them. Therefore, Option 1 is more straight forward in the long run.