Please help me get rid of this f*&^ing Torus debris.

[BrianPaone]

I'm not gonna lie. It bothers me. It bothers me to the point that I've finished the Terran plot, I wanna smack down my shiny new station around Earth where it's always been meant to be, but the debris of the Torus Ring depresses me so thoroughly that I don't even want to set the HQ down anywhere. I just wanna give up.

Help me to not do that, please.

Here's what I've done so far:

* Searched high and low for advice on how to remove the debris, which yielded two threads:

http://forum.egosoft.com/viewtopic.php?t=320992 - This APPEARED to have been solved, but the only clue I was given was "As it turns out you can destroy it with a director using find_object destroy_object", and searching for help on using find_object or destroy_object didn't prove fruitful. (It would have been really nice if the poster here had detailed their solution, if one was indeed found.)

http://www.egosoft.com/x2/forum/viewtopic.php?t=368716 - A solution was offered that I tried, but it did not work and the original poster gave no indication that it worked for them, either.

I want to categorically state that I am wholly disinterested in picking up a new hobby. Coding hurts my head and my computer. I don't like doing it. All I want to do is learn how to do this one thing, and frankly, I'll be over the moon regarding this game. It'll be perfect. It just needs this one nattering bit of nonsense removed.

Here's what I have:

* X3 Editor 2
* X-Studio
* Just enough intelligence and patience to learn how to remove Torus debris
* A pair of really nice pants (only one pair, though, and I'm aware they'll be useless here - but they're really nice and deserved a mention)

For the love of all that's holy, please tell me what to do here. If I knew, I'd be doing it, I assure you. Thank you sincerely in advance for any advice that can be given.

[BrianPaone]

I don't see how you guys do this. I've been at this for only a few hours and I'm already ready to torch a convent. I THINK I've found the offending bit, in X3_universe.pck, but hell if I know how to actually edit the damned thing. I've looked at what I believe are the relevant tutorials, but they're all pretty much written from the standpoint of someone who's taken a few classes.

Let's try this: Is there a tutorial out there, video or text, that goes step-by-step through how to actually change an existing sector? If I had that, I think I can do the rest.

[solarahawk]

You're on the right track. I haven't looked at the vanilla Earth sector in ages, but my first guess is that the debris is set there in the map, x3_universe.xml. When you extract the file via X3 Editor, you also need to check the box to uncompress the file (which you may have already.)

The map file is just an XML file, so you can edit it just using a decent text editor, like Notepad++. Each sector is defined in the file, and each sector object, contains a set of XML objects that define the various contents of the sector: gates, stations, claimable ships, debris, etc.

Deciphering these files requires a little bit of research. You should take a look at the master post on manually editing the map file: http://forum.egosoft.com/viewtopic.php?t=34432.

Just some quick pointers:

Object with t=18 are gates. t=6 and t=5 are stations (factories and eq docks, respectively.) I don't recall what the code is for debris or whether it would be different for the Torus debris, but if you work on a process of elimination, you should be able to figure what entries are the debris and delete those lines.

The file is compliant XML, so make sure you know how to read and edit XML without corrupting it. Every <o> object tag must be accompanied by an </o> closing tag, unless the tag is self-closing: i.e. <o blah />

After you edit the map file, start a new game and check to see if Earth sector has changed.

[BrianPaone]

Bless you for answering! Here it's 3am and I've been at this for a while now, so I'll try fresh in the morning (well, later this morning, I guess). It got to the point where I had figured out how to extract a file with X3E2, but forgot again.

I'm gonna get that debris out of there though. One way or the other. It just shouldn't be there. We'd never leave it there. We're humans, dammit - we'd melt it down into ordnance and lob it back at anyone who dared attack us! And then build something twice as nice!

But thank you very much for the reply, and I will perform due diligence by returning after some sleep to report back on success or failure.

[RoverTX]

As mentioned before editing the x_universe file only effects new games, in other words your current save will not be effected and you will have to start over.

Using the mission director, or as kill mentioned in the other thread making the wreck's body file empty, will both work on existing games.

The reason I didn't explain further was that the commands can easily be found in the mission director definition files. Here they are for reference.

Code: Select all

<find_object>  Find other object  

	task boolean  Start action as a separate task?  
	chance expression  Percentage (or weighted if in <do_any>) chance of action being performed (action is skipped if not)  
	comment string  Comment for documentation purposes only  
	name object  Object name  
	group group  Group name  
	multiple boolean  Find multiple objects (requires a group)  
	max expression  Maximum number of objects to find  
	known boolean  Find only objects known to player? - Known to player?  
	visible boolean  Find only objects that are visible to player?  
	nearest boolean  Select result from nearest objects only?  
	enemy boolean  Find objects that are enemy to the find object?  
	neutral boolean  Find objects that are neutral to the find object?  
	friend boolean  Find objects that are friend to the find object?  
	findobject object  Reference object name for enemy/neutral/friend/dockingallowed  
	typename type  Object typename (from types file)  
	class findobjectclass  Class to match - Object class (find)  
	race racemask  Race to match (multiple values may be separated by | symbols) - Race  
	 


	 <position>  Position in space  

		x expression  X coordinate in sector space  
		y expression  Y coordinate in sector space  
		z expression  Z coordinate in sector space  
		object object  Used in preference to coordinates if supplied - Object name  
		exact expression  Distance from specified position - Exact number (takes priority over min/max/profile/scale)  
		min expression  Distance from specified position - Minimum random number (ignored if exact is set)  
		max expression  Distance from specified position - Maximum random number (ignored if exact is set)  
		profile profile  Distance from specified position - Random number profile (ignored if exact is set)  
		scale integer  Distance from specified position - Scale of random number profile (ignored if exact is set)  
		comment string  Comment for documentation purposes only  
		 
		 
	 <sector>  Sector  

		x expression  X coordinate of the specified sector  
		y expression  Y coordinate of the specified sector  
		sector sector  Used in preference to coordinates if supplied - Sector name  
		comment string  Comment for documentation purposes only  
		 
		 
	 <jumps>  Number of jumps (start sector only if node not specified at all)  

		exact expression  Exact number (takes priority over min/max)  
		min expression  Minimum number (ignored if exact is set)  
		max expression  Maximum number (ignored if exact is set)  
		comment string  Comment for documentation purposes only  
		 
		 
	 <distance>  Distance  

		exact expression  Exact number (takes priority over min/max)  
		min expression  Minimum number (ignored if exact is set)  
		max expression  Maximum number (ignored if exact is set)  
		comment string  Comment for documentation purposes only  
 
 
 

Code: Select all

<destroy_object>  Destroy specified object  

	task boolean  Start action as a separate task?  
	chance expression  Percentage (or weighted if in <do_any>) chance of action being performed (action is skipped if not)  
	comment string  Comment for documentation purposes only  
	object object  Object name  
	explosion boolean  Show explosion if in sector?  

[BrianPaone]

I actually ended up giving up on this since I was already so far into it, but it seems I've borked my save beyond all hope, so I may give this another go. Thank you very much for the information!