I am still playing Sins of a Solar Empire: Rebellion, but I finally got slightly frustrated with the map selections. Therefore I decided to create a few maps in the Galaxy Forge editor myself.
The maps are made with Coop vs AI in mind. So they have sufficient colonizeable planets to get an AI started.
For example, in a few test games where I only watched the AI I noticed that it seems to fall back massively if it does not have 1 Colonizeable Asteroid or Moon in range. A Desert planet, in comparison, did not work well if it tried to colonize it first because it takes to much time.
Install instructions
Navigate to:
C:\Users\%username%\Documents\My Games\Ironclad Games\Sins of a Solar Empire Rebellion
(You should be able to just copy this path into Windows File Explorer - assuming Sins of a Solar Empire Rebellion has been started at least once since its installation.)
Inside you should see a folder called "GalaxyForge". If it does not exist yet, create a new folder and name it "GalaxyForge".
![GalaxyForge Folder]( "GalaxyForge Folder")
Extract the .galaxy files into the "GalaxyForge" folder.
![Files in GalaxyForge Folder]( "Files in GalaxyForge Folder")
And you are done, start Sins of a Solar Empire Rebellion. Start a new game, either Single Player or Multiplayer. Use the "Change Maps" button to switch the map selections until you see Galaxy Forge. Select a map and click "Play".
![GalaxyForge Category]( "GalaxyForge Category")
Included Maps
Buddies (2v2)
A rather basic map, both players start beside each other.
Recommended enabled Victory Options: Capital Victory On, Allied Victory On
Stranded (3v3)
Players start visually near each other. Although you cannot immediately meet up with your team.
Recommended enabled Victory Options: Capital Victory On, Allied Victory On
Double Hourglass (3v3)
A rather basic map, allied players start beside each other.
Recommended enabled Victory Options: Capital Victory On, Allied Victory On
Galactic Rift (3v3)
Not gonna lie, this map idea is based on a certain MOBA... Players start together and each player has a "lane" to the enemy with some possibilities to move between them.
Recommended enabled Victory Options: Capital Victory On, Allied Victory On
Sector Synapse (4v4)
Players start in isolated sectors where you need the Wormhole research to "escape". First, 2 allies will meet up with each other, then all 4 players proceed to the maps center into enemy territory.
Recommended enabled Victory Options: Capital Victory On, Allied Victory On
Notes on this map:
This would probably also work in a 2v2v2v2 setup. So basically like team elimination. I did not test that though.
Also, I had to severely lighten the challenge of meeting up with each other. Originally each 2 players had to move past a pirate base to proceed. But... the AI is being outstandingly dumb with this challenge so I had to scrap it. (Even moving the challenge back a bit did not resolve that.) So now all pirate bases are in the center... sad. Meeting up was honestly more fun before that change.
Notes on map balancing
None of these maps are a "Competitive" version because I am honestly finding these the definition of boring, especially in regard of replaying them. However, I did try to randomize them as balanced as possible, bad luck can still happen though.
Both teams should usually have equal colonizable planets, although their types are mostly randomized.
Other notes
This Map Pack might work without the Forbidden Worlds DLC. I do not think I manually set any of the DLC planets as I randomized most planets and only used Terran and Desert planets as manual definitions sometimes. No guarantee though as I do have the DLC.
In case that you play with a certain AI mod I additionally recommend to enable the Reset Titan levels mod and to deactivate Super Weapons in the game options. At least I personally did not find it fun otherwise.
(Not sure if it is allowed to reference to someone elses content in the description here, so am keeping it vague. You will probably know what I mean if you are using it.)
Changelog
Map Pack v1.03
I noticed a mistake I made with randomization. The type "RandomSpecial" can spawn Dead Asteroid with a low chance. A Dead Asteroid is colonizable so I can't have that on positions where I wanted uncolonizable types to appear. So, the following changes have been made.
Hotfix on Map Buddies: Replaced all "RandomSpecial" planet types with "RandomUncolonizable".
Hotfix on Map Galactic Rift: Replaced all "RandomSpecial" planet types with "RandomUncolonizable".
Hotfix on Map Stranded: Replaced all "RandomSpecial" planet types with "RandomUncolonizable".
Please make sure all players are using the updated maps in Multiplayer!
Map Pack v1.02
Sometimes things just do not work as expected. It looked fine in the Galaxy Forge editor, it really did!
Anyway, the visual glitch still happened on one planet when I played the map today, so here we go again.
Hotfix on Map Sector Synapse: Drastically increased the PhaseLane distance between the central sun and the nearest planets.
Please make sure all players are using the updated maps in Multiplayer!
Map Pack v1.01
Hotfix on Map Sector Synapse: I had to increase the PhaseLane distance between the central sun and the nearest planets. Jumping with large fleets in group move partly resulted in a weird visual glitch where ships would face into the wrong direction before the jump. This should be fixed now.
Hotfix on Map Galactic Rift: Increased the PhaseLane distance between the central sun and the nearest planets. Note: Some planets were a little bit too close as well.
Hotfix on Map Double Hourglass: Increased the PhaseLane distance between the central sun and the nearest planets. Note: Same reason as above.
Please make sure all players are using the updated maps in Multiplayer!
