Checking "Known Star Systems" in the game settings overrides any racial naming convention (System Theme) with the actual star name (or constellation name if that setting is also enabled) as each system is discovered by matching the KnownSystemID used for system generation to the Name (or ConstellationName) in DIM_KnownSystems. However, this also bypasses "Maximum Number of Systems" for some reason rather than using 0 as infinite and as my galaxy reaches 1500 systems in FCT_System I would like to limit further generation for the sake of simulation time. I don't believe there's a way to force-limit the galaxy size with known stars, however.
Thus my problem: unchecking "Known Star Systems" to force "Maximum Number of Systems" to be respected reverts to naming newly-discovered systems with the race's System Theme (even if the system was previous generated by another race) rather than the actual star/constellation name connected to the KnownSystemID that the system was generated with. While that behavior is surely intended, I'd like to continue my theme of using each star's real name. Is there a System Theme that uses the correct star/constellation name or will I need to rename more than 1100 systems as I find them to their real names by cross-referencing FCT_RaceSysSurvey, FCT_System, and DIM_KnownSystems?
I've slowly worked the System Theme list and tried some of the most likely suspects (and some longer shots) with no luck so far:
- "No Theme" names newly discovered systems "System #X" where X is the KnownSystemID; DIM_KnownSystems is still in use just not for the correct name
- "Stars (Proper Names)" names newly discovered systems from a list of star names but does so in alphabetical order rather than using the correct name
- "Class Name Only" is a blank theme that delivers systems names as "System #X" again, the same as "No Theme"
- "Name Plus Number" is another blank theme that also delivers systems names as "System #X" just like "No Theme"
- "Stars and Planets" draws from a preset list in alphabetical order as you'd expect from a System Theme
- "Stellar Class" is another preset theme using a small collection of "Stellar <noun>"
In retrospect I can check populated preset lists by using "Select Name" from the System Generation and Display window but the three empty sets were worth a try. Any ideas or am I stuck sorting names out of the database for 1100+ systems?
If you check the help text that appears when you mouse over the number of systems, it states that doesn't apply to Known Stars games.
Known Stars uses the actual stars near Earth - about 65,000 of them. Fixed system games use randomly generated stars and the 'number of systems' is used to define the available system numbers (which are used instead of the known stars list), so for 1000 system, the 'location' of each system is a number in a list from 1-1000, rather than a 3D point in space.
The system themes are almost all created by players, so you can create an add your own. However, as the systems in a random game bear no relationships to known stars, any system theme would just randomly assign real star names to whatever system was generated.