[ul][li]Always save a backup of your save file. (Unfortunately, I have not found a way to uninstall the mod and have the save file work afterwards. If anyone has a fix for this, let me know.)
[/li][li]Certain stories may have spoilers. (Important if you decide to help with testing. I might be able to make a modified version for testers that omits the story spoilers.)
[/li][li]I’m sure there is more. I’ll add to this post when necessary.[/li][/ul]
Ok. Now on to what this mod actually does and a little backstory.
I’ve fallen for this game. Pun intended. The atmosphere is rich, the stories are intriguing, and the grind, if you die, intolerable. Don’t get me wrong, I don’t mind redoing the odd story here or there. But some of the end game items or stories are too time consuming to redo if I decide to retire, or make a game ending mistake. Sunless Sea already has legacy items and I’ve enjoyed collecting them. But I’m not going to spend hours gathering all the colours for a steam-yacht that I can’t use on every new captain. Cue the Legacies Mod.
New Legacy Items:
[ul][li]Deeds to a Steam-Yacht
[/li][li]The Zong of the Zee
[/li][li]The Fulgent Impeller (added because of a previous post in this sub forum)[/li][/ul]
Possible Future Legacy Items (to be added):
[ul][li]Parabox
[/li][li]The Serpentine
[/li][li]The Memento Mori[/li][/ul]
Each legacy item has a small story written for it, poorly. I think I have most of the bugs worked out as well. This is actually my first mod so I hope there’s not anything I’ve missed.
Comments, feedback, and suggestions are all welcome. edited by baXiaDev on 2/7/2016
How does the mod actually pass on the qualities, do they remain as legacies or are they converted to the normal versions upon starting a new game? I can think of two ways you could potentially work around the save file requiring the mod.
First, if you’re able to edit existing events you could have the death and victory events grant, for example, (current value of Deeds to a Steam-Yacht) x Legacy: Deeds to a Steam-Yacht. Then have an autofire event show up when on a new captain which sets the normal version of the items equal in number to the legacy versions.
Secondly just have a top-level storylet in London with an option to completely remove all mod-made qualities. I’m not sure if Sunless Sea entirely removes qualities from the list in the save when they hit zero, but hopefully that would work. This option would also allow a lot more customization for users. Instead of automatically gaining the legacy the moment the item is in your hands, captains would have to make it back to London to preserve them for future heirs. Then the storylet with the option to wipe qualities would also have options unlocked with each relevant item. For example having the Zong of the Zee would unlock an option to preserve it as a legacy and having its legacy quality would open an option to remove the legacy entirely.
Also in response to the specific items mentioned, would it be possible to add some as an inheritance option rather than an automatic carry-over? The Memento Mori can already be passed on as with any other weapon, so perhaps there is some way to let players choose to pass down an engine. The Zong of the Zee and Deeds could logically be copied, but a unique magic engine such as the Impeller just constantly teleporting to each heir’s home seems silly.
This is my first time doing something like this. I’ll try and answer your questions as best I can.
At the moment, these new items are custom qualities. The deed is still a regular item and its return is handled by a storylet.
I’ve found the autofire conditions for a new game in the personas.json file. I was not able to locate any reference to the original legacy items.
Before I released the mod, I tested a storylet that attempted to remove all the custom qualities. Setting it to 0 still doesn’t remove it from the autosave file. And it crashes. Setting it to null doesn’t work either. If I knew more about programming, I don’t think it would be hard to create a save-file scrubbing program. I removed all references by hand and the game worked as normal.
As for automatically gaining the legacy, each item is handled differently.
After selecting the deed in the original storylet, I’ve added an additional one that adds a legacy quality that another storylet checks for at the beginning of a new game.
Once you retire with The Zong of the Zee, the game already creates a legacy quality named Trophy: An Autographed Copy of the Zong of the Zee. A storylet checks for this in a new game and triggers if you have it.
The Fulgent Impeller has a storylet that needs to be completed in London before you get the legacy quality.
I think the option to change the Warrant of Redemption is still hard-coded into the game. I haven’t found anything to edit those at all. I did find a place to add legacy items to that same screen. But without knowing about the previously mentioned autofire condition, it does me no good.
As for the Impeller teleporting to the new captain, I think I handled this creatively. In London, you have to visit the Brass Embassy - Warranty Annex. I’ll keep this brief as I don’t want to spoil anything (and I’m not sure what the spoil tag is here anyways), but the warranty isn’t for a lifetime—its eternal.
It was a copy and paste from the original post in the Steam community forums. I had to remove tags for color and font in the html. Must have missed the link. edited by baXiaDev on 2/7/2016
Almost any illogic can be overlooked if the story writes around it creatively enough. I’ll just have to get the Impeller yet again and see what you thought up.
Well, I’m no writer by trade. All the stories I had to write are extremely rough draft. Just above placeholder text for the underlying function of the mod. I did try and keep to the lore of FL and SS though.
There’s a save file for testing in the download. If you want, you can test out the story snippets without risking your save game file. You start with the three items I modified and money for a townhouse to retire. It would be great to hear what you think.