Hello all, I browsed this forum and didn't see anything that suggested an answer one way or another, so I figured I'd just ask outright: Is there a way to mod a custom race to have two affinities (specifically both the Harmony AND Automaton affinities)? I can't quite wrap my head around the syntax of the data files, so I have no idea where I would really start with that. Also, I'm not sure how you'd resolve the tech tree in that case (I don't want it to have ALL the unique techs from BOTH races...)

It may be possible to give a faction two affinities by adding a second entry in the tag of the faction in the Faction.xml file. However, that strikes me as highly likely to break the game.



However, both the Harmony and Sower affinities are completely defined in the xmls, rather than being hard-coded into the game mechanics, you might be able to define a completely new affinity and add the relevant properties for both affinities and also fix the tech tree. That, however, would be a lot of work.



However, if you are interested in copying only parts of each affinity, the matter may be a lot simpler. What exactly do you want to achieve? I might be able to provide some help.

I basically just want to play as a custom race with both the whole "Annihilate Dust" thing from the Harmony and the industry banking from the Automatons, just for my own cruel curiosity.



As far as the affinities you mentioned, you say they're completely defined in the xml files; I didn't really catch where that is, but perusing through these files makes me feel like I need a roadmap. I did look at that one fellow's custom affinity mod thread, but couldn't wrap my head around the entire enterprise.

I'm pretty sure you can take and merge the two, removing any destructive stuff that breaks the game.

My apologies for taking so long to get back to you. Giving the Automaton's Industry Stacking to the Harmony would not be difficult.

In the EmpireTraitDescriptor.xml, you will find a SimulationObjectDescriptor labeled AffinityAutomaton. Coyping the entries in that one into the AffinityHarmony SimulationObjectDescriptor in the same file should give Industry Stacking abilities to the Harmony. Changing the numbers will adjust how much OverProduction is added to the stack (OverProductionToStackMultiplier) and the interest rate (StackedOverProductionInterestsPerTurn).

If you also want to add some of the Automaton Tech to the Harmony, you'll have to go into the various technology files and change a few of the PathPrerequisites from $(AffinityAutomaton) to ($(AffinityAutomaton) or $(AffinityHarmony)) (I'm not 100% certain about how the parentheses need to be placed for this one.) If you do that, also remember to at a !$(AffinityHarmony) to the technologies that are being replaced.

When you say 'replaced', is that because there's a limit to how many technologies an affinity can have, or because of physical locations on the tech tree conflicting?

The latter, pretty much. If you tell the game to reference both at once, it freaks out and crashes. You could theoretically add them in, but adjusting the actual paths of the tech tree can be a bit bewildering. If you're just starting out, I'd suggest you steer clear of that and just choose the existing techs you like more. One option that's quite a bit easier is if the Automatons have something in their research that you want, you can grab the individual unlock (Say, their unique Industry upgrade) and put that in to an existing Harmony tech.

In my modding attempts, I did actually run into a few instances where I forgot to remove a generic technology in favor of the specific one, or forgot to place a new technology at a different place. The end result was that the tech-tree displayed both technologies in the same spot, and never worked right.