[WIP] Timelord Race mod (with Regeneration!) 0.1

Overview

• Description
• Contents
• Installation
• In-game guide
• Bug report
• Contact information

Description
Timelord Race mod aims to bring the Doctor Who experience to Starbound by immersing player in the everyday galactic life of a Timelord. While Timelords may look like humans, they have capabilities far greater - they can live eternally, as long as they have the regeneration energy within then. Upon death, they will be reborn into different form and continue living as such.

Contents
What is currently in the mod

• The mod is currently at a very early stage with only one core mechanic implemented - regeneration. This is done to give a taste of what it’s like to have the concept of “more lives” in Starbound and also to kick off the main development.
• Timelords are themselves a selectable race when creating a new character that for now remain to be full copies of humans except for regeneration buff they are given in the beginning of the game.

What is planned further down the road
I want to be very optimistic but the scope of such project is extremely large. There has been previous attempts to bring Doctor who universe to Starbound and so far the most successful was the Whobound which introduced a lot of cosmetic additions.
What I am trying to achieve is to introduce a lot of Timelord mechanics to Starbound to make it a full present race in the game. In the ideal world, this is what is planned further down the road:

• Add Tardis racial ship (of course) which will not necessarily be in “Space” which is its main difference from other ships in the game. It will be more like a separate location where the navigation occurs.
• Add Tardis beam down technology - when you exit your ship as a Timelord, you simply exit the door of the Tardis on the plane (rather than being beamed down)
• Improve the animation of regeneration (to make the moment memorable), along with extra effect like explosion that kicks out all enemies in radius of regeneration, etc.
• Introduce physical change on regeneration - that something, like hairstyles, would change upon dying. With current Starbound modding capabilities it is very difficult (if not impossible) to achieve, although I have some fun ideas about changing hairstyles
• Introduce a peaceful gameplay style with non-offensive weapons which will, for example stun enemies or make them go to sleep to avoid an armed conflict. This is done because Doctor himself (almost) always was pacifist and this is an interesting mechanic that can change the perception of the game.
• Add racial tools/gadgets which allow to neutralize enemies in non-lethal fashion or by using time manipulation - like grenades which freeze time in area or protection fields which stun enemies in radius, sleeping darts, etc.
• Add racial codexes and more lore into the game which would make Timelords part of Starbound universe and which would make sense how they are tied with other races
• Add (this is big) custom intro mission of escaping the Gallifrey during the war time. If you think about it’s very similar to the current intro mission (starts out peacefully, something terrible happens, need to escape, planet is being destroyed)
• Add (blue sky) additional Timelord-specific questline which takes user on different tasks across the galaxy. One side of this is, for example, adding “pacifist” versions of existing missions where instead of fighting and killing, a Timelord will use time travel to prevent a certain disaster to occur or retrieve an artifact prior to someone else. For example, the first mission (Moon facility) will be about preventing infection to spread in the first place and retrieving the crystals peacefully.
• Add (very blue sky) interesting time manipulation techniques which change the perception of Starbound. This remains abstract because this is grand and can be scoped down.

What help is required
If you are looking at that list above and you’re thinking there is something you really want to take on - I will very much appreciate it, in fact, I don’t have enough hands (just mine) to complete this project in a reasonable time. You can easily become part of the project!

One of the most essential parts which I will highly appreciate support on are:

• Regeneration animation - currently this is very easily can be integrated into the existing implementation. I would be very glad if someone would be willing to undertake this task!
• The Lore - because this dictates some of the racial interactions, the codex of Time lords, how the intro mission will play out, whether we want to add additional quest line, etc. This includes (at least) writing down all the codexes which I can put into the game. Shortly, this will decide what the place of Timelords within Starbound universe is and can become the core for every other decision made.
• TARDIS - because this is the place the player spends quite some time at, is very important for building the image of the race. TARDIS is very unique and very different from the regular “spaceship” and I need some help in developing art assets for it and also specific interactions like exiting the door instead of beaming down.

Let me know if you are willing to work on any other feature listed or have suggestions on anything else. Any help will be much appreciated.

Installation:

• First, you will need the race extender mod. Those are simple mods which allow for easier addition of any custom race. The one I used, for example is this fabulous mod and it works fine with the current version. If you are already using one, then you can skip this step.
• Download the mod from the link. You will get a .pak file that you will need to place into your ..\Steam\steamapps\common\Starbound\mods directory.

Please note that currently the mod is under development and I will recommend you to make backups of your existing saves. They are located at ..\Steam\steamapps\common\Starbound\storage directory and you can rename this directory to something like storage_old. When the mod kicks in, the new storage directory will get created. At any point, if you want to go back to your previous saves, rename the new storage to storage_timelord and your storage_old to storage. Other than that, the mod should not cause any conflicts with other existing mods.

In-game guide:
First of all, go ahead and create a new character with Timelord race. Name them how you like!



While playing as a Timelord, you will see a different health bar right above the player. This is your “Regenerative health bar”. When you receive damage, you will see the regen bar being depleted. When it comes to 0, your character will regenerate by playing a short animation and then restoring all regenerative health back.


Timelords have only a limited number of regenerations - 12 and the current status of remaining regenerations is reflected by the status effect right nearby your avatar.



Note that when you have 0 remaining regenerations, if your regen bar reaches 0, the character actually dies. If you are playing casual/survival, your regeneration cycle will be restored, but if you are playing hardcore, then you have died for good.
Hardcore mode is more recommended for full immersion (it is hard to imagine point of having multiple lives in the casual gameplay when you can’t possibly lose all your progress).

So if you are playing Hardcore and you want to restore the regeneration cycle, you can buy a “Regeneration Injector” at Infinity Express for 5000 pixels that will give you 12 regenerations to go about.



Bug report:
Please, if you find any bug/issue, you can write a direct message to me, leave your find in Discussion or write an email to sbtimelord@gmail.com. Thanks!

Contact information:
If you have any suggestions or if you are willing to help with the mod, you can write a direct message to me or to this email: sbtimelord@gmail.com. Any help is very much appreciated!

Finally, if you find that you are enjoying this mod, please write a Review!

Mod Pack Permissions:

You must get the author's consent before including this mod in a compilation.

Mod Assets Permissions:

You must get the author's consent before altering/redistributing any assets included in this mod.