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Star Trek Fleet Command - Community Mod

License: GPLv3 Sponsorship

A community mod (patch) for PC and macOS that adds a couple of tweaks to the Star Trek Fleet Command™ game

Downloads / Releases

The STFC Community Mod is available on GitHub.

You can download either the latest official release or any other release, including alpha/beta builds.

Notes:

  • GitHub may require you to log in to see the downloads for pre-releases, and you will need to expand the assets section to see the downloads.

  • There is no difference between the versioned and unversioned zip files. They are simply named this way to allow people to store multiple versions rather than overwriting or having a random number appended by windows.

Configuration

IMPORTANT: Any desired configuration changes should ONLY be made in the community_patch_settings.toml file.

When the game is launched:

  • If the configuration file does not exist, it will be created with default values. It will not have any comments describing these settings.

  • The configuration file is read with any missing settings defaulting to predefined values.

  • The finalized configuration – including any assumed default values – is written to community_patch_runtime.vars.

    NOTE: You should NOT make any changes to this file. This file is constantly rewritten when the game starts, so any modifications to it are never used and will be lost.

If you have any problems with a setting, check for that setting in the .vars file to verify that the parse value of that setting was correctly applied. You may also need to check the community_patch.log file to see if any errors were encountered while parsing the .toml file.

Installation on Windows

NOTE: The Star Trek Fleet Command game itself is located by default at:

  • C:\Games\Star Trek Fleet Command\Star Trek Fleet Command\default\game

Installation of the Community Mod is a manual process for Windows (or Wine).

  1. Download the stfc-community-mod.zip file from your chosen GitHub release and extract the version.dll file.

  2. Open the game folder in Explorer. The default folder for the game also holds the settings file.

    NOTE: If this folder isn't present, or no log files are created when running the game, see the Problems Under Windows section below.

  3. Move the extracted version.dll file into this folder.

  4. Run the game! If all is well, and one does not already exist, the mod will create community_patch_settings.toml and populate this with the default values.

  5. For first time users of the Community Mod, it recommended to utilise the sample configuration file, which can be saved to the game folder with the name community_patch_settings.toml. This sample file contains additional comments that explain the available settings.

Installation on macOS - macOS 13.5 or later required

NOTE: The Star Trek Fleet Command game itself is located at:

  • ~/Library/Application Support/Star Trek Fleet Command/Games/Star Trek Fleet Command/Star Trek Fleet Command/default/game

You should only need to access this folder if you need to view the community_patch.log file while troubleshooting a problem.

  1. Download the stfc-community-mod-installer.dmg file from your chosen GitHub release.

  2. Open the DMG, then drag and drop the STFC Community Mod to your Applications folder. The STFC Community Mod launcher must be used to start the game to have the mod loaded. If you start the game using the games Launcher, you will NOT have the mod loaded.

  3. Running the launcher for the first time will prompt a warning from macOS because the Community Mod is not signed with an Apple Developer ID certificate.

    "STFC Community Mod" Not Opened

    Apple could not verify “STFC Community Mod” is free of malware that may harm your Mac or compromise your privacy

    Dismiss the warning by clicking Done, then go to System Settings, Privacy & Security and scroll down to the Security section where you can override this behaviour by clicking Open Anyway next to "STFC Community Mod" was blocked to protect your Mac.

  4. Run the game from the launcher!

    Since M82.1, the Star Trek Fleet Command app ships with heightened security and lacks the entitlements to correctly load the Community Mod. As a workaround, the Community Mod launcher will prompt you to re-sign the game if it detects missing entitlements at startup. This process needs to be repeated with every game update.

    If all is well, the mod will create community_patch_settings.toml in the settings folder ~/Library/Preferences/com.stfcmod.startrekpatch.

    Note: By default, macOS hides the ~/Library folder in Finder, so if it isn't visible, see the Problems under macOS section below for tips on opening it.

  5. For first time users of the Community Mod, it recommended to use the sample configuration file, which can be saved to the settings folder with the name community_patch_settings.toml. This sample file contains additional comments that explain the available settings.

Installation on Wine/Linux

NOTE: The Star Trek Fleet Command game itself is located at:

  • ~/Games/star-trek-fleet-command/drive_c/Games/Star Trek Fleet Command/Star Trek Fleet Command/default/game.

The Windows version of the mod, and the game itself, run well under Linux using the Wine compatability layer.

If the game is installed using the Lutris STFC installer, the mod can be installed by following the Windows directions above.

If the game is installed through other launchers or directly in an unmanaged WINEPREFIX, an additional adjustment may be needed for it to load the mod library correctly; see the Problems Under Wine/Linux notes below.

Common Problems

The most common problems getting the DLL to work are:

  1. Not installed in the correct location. This must be game folder where prime.exe also exists.

  2. Windows is blocking the DLL. Right-click the file and select Properties. On the General tab there will be additional text at the bottom:

    This file can from another
computer and might be blocked to
help protect this computer

    To the right of this, there will be a tick box called Unblock. Tick the box and then click OK to unblock the file.

  3. The configuration file has the wrong name (see above)

  4. The configuration file is not being parsed as you expect, which is normal because:

    • Your configuration isn't being parsed
    • The configuration option name is spelt wrong
    • The configuration option name is in the wrong section
    • The configuration option value is not a true or false

    You can verify your configuration by looking at community_patch_runtime.vars and/or the log file community_patch.log.

Problems under Windows

On Windows, sometimes the game is installed in a user's profile folder instead of the default location. This happens when the STFC installer finds more than one user attempted to install it, or if the current user doesn't have admin rights.

If this is the case, to find the correct game location for the version.dll file, do the following:

  1. Open Task Manager while the game is running (press Ctrl-Alt-Delete)
  2. Right-click prime.exe and select 'Expand'
  3. Right-click Star Trek Fleet Command and select 'Open file location'

An Explorer window will open, and you can check for prime.exe to verify this is the correct folder.

IMPORTANT: The version.dll file should NOT be placed within the official STFC launcher's folder as this will prevent the launcher from working and the ability to update the game.

Problems under macOS

macOS hides the Library folder in Finder by default. There are several ways to open it:

  • Hold the ⌥ Option key (or Alt on a PC keyboard) in Finder and click the Go to menu item and then click the Library folder item

    or

  • Press ⌘ Command+⇧ Shift+G in the Finder for the Goto box and type in ~/Library

    or

  • Use Terminal and type: open ~/Library

The Community Launcher shows the version of Star Trek Fleet Command that was detected under the current user. If this shows as -1, then the recommended course of action is to uninstall and reinstall Star Trek Fleet Command whcih can be done without needing to reinstall the Community Mod launcher.

Problems under Wine/Linux

To use the Windows version of the mod under Wine, the wine DLL override setting for version.dll must be set to n,b or it will not be loaded.

When using the Lutris STFC installer (which is recommended), this override will have already been set by the installer within the runner configuration.

Otherwise, it can be set in the winecfg.exe Libraries tab or by setting the WINEDLLOVERRIDES enviroment variable to version.dll=n,b before launching the game.

If the game folder does not exist in the default location mentioned under Installation on Wine/Linux, it may exist under:

  • drive_c/Games/Star Trek Fleet Command/Star Trek Fleet Command/default/game

NOTE: This is a relative path that starts at the wine environment (WINEPREFIX).