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[AV] Mechanoid orbital traders

This mod is about acquiring mechs from sources other than gestation. Namely trading (orbital or not), drop pods, questrewards & ancient dangers loot. While giving the player full control about which of those features are active.

All base rimworld and biotech DLC mechanoids (excluding Apocrition and War Urchin) are supported. Modded Mechs can be allowed in the mod settings.
Once the mech is purchased, it joins your colony, but is uncontrolled and must be linked to a new overseer (mechanitor).



The marketprice for each mechtype is calculated by the game based on the following:

• bandwidth cost
  
• weight class
  
• type of work (combat or labour)
  
• mech age (brand-new or hijacked)
  
• additional cost for mechbosses
  
• additional modifiers from this mods settings

So if another mod changes the bandwidth costs, this will be reflected in the price.
This price is also different from the price the game uses for raid calculation, so the (mech) raid strength and colony wealth remain exactly the same.

While this mod started out as a supply trader for my other (currently unreleased) mechanoid-based mod, I thought this mechanic was versatile enough to share as a completely separate thing.


All of the following features can be toggled on or off. Make sure to check the modsettings!

• sells brand-new mechanoids
  
• sells small amounts of mechanitor supplies that rarely contain mechboss chips
  
• acts as a supplier for my (currently unreleased) mechanoid-based mod

• has small amounts of silver
  
• sells hijacked mechanoids
  
• a mixture of exotic trader, combat supplier and slave trader with small amounts of items, but a wide range of goods

• might sell basic hijacked mechanoids
  
• just keep in mind that you need a mechanitor to control that mechanoid

• Added mechs as possible loot from hermetic crates

• Added mechs as possible quest rewards

This mod does not touch much code of the base game and therefore shouldn't be able to break another mod.
The only thing that could break is if another mod completely changes how existing mechs or pricing works.

This mod should be loaded after biotech and harmony.
Hijacked mechs also need an active mechanoid faction to work properly (the vanilla one, not a modded one).


If activated in the modsettings, all modded mechs found (which are not driven by limtied power cells) will be added as tradeables. This requires a game restart to take effect.
If you find any mechanoid (from other mods) that should not be tradeable (because they don't work as a controllable mech), write it in the comments, so I can blacklist that mech.
Bossmechs require their own balance and tracking, currently the bosses of these mods are tracked:

• AlphaMechs
  
• Kraltech

This mod does not touch much code of the base game and therefore should be safe to remove from or add to an ongoing safe.
If you are adding this mod to a safe without a mechanoid faction check the "simplify hijacked mechs" option in the settings. They will not work without that faction.
Removing this mod will result in one-time errors on the next loading of your safe (just like any content adding mod).
But just to be clear: ALWAYS back up your safes before adding or removing any mod to an ongoing run.

Because it's no fun. I did have a working version that would let the player sell mechs, but it was just annoying.
This mod doesn't actually sell mechs to the player, it just fakes it.
In reality, you buy a crate that spawns the mech as soon as it appears on the map.
This also gives me (und you!) the freedom to change the marketprice of that said crate without disrupting vanilla raid difficulty calculations.

An apocrition was not designed to be used by a player. A base game apocrition would just be a pikemen in the hands of the player, with skills which just won't work.

As this mod already generates tradeoption for every modded mechanoid (if you allow for it in the mod-settings), your mod is probably included.
Should there be boss-mechs which this mod does not recognize, write it in the comments.
If you want more tradeable items from other mods for the orbital traders, I might add them if the theme fits. Just write it in the comments.

Please write your feedback in the comments and bugreports in the pinned discussion, but keep in mind I am just a human with the lazy trait and might go on I-dont-want-to-play-or-mod-rimworld mental breaks for months. If I slack off, most other modders can easily change/add/remove mechanoid for trade with simple XML.

Intended, use a different mod if you want to have easier access to boss-chips.


Me, myself and I.
The tradeship on the preview artwork is made by AI.
Special thanks to the official rimworld discords modding-channel, the people running it and its precious search function.
Without this awesome community this mod would not exist.