Hi,
Since this week end I'll have some spare time to kill, I thought I'd give it a try and create a custom map of the Galaxy following the Star Trek canon as much as possible. This requires mainly two things:

1) Gather accurate information of where each race (the home-planet) is supposed to be with respect to Earth
2) Modify the game accordingly

The thing is, that I can easily do the research myself (I have the TNG+Voyager DVDs & Wikipedia+Memory Alpha wiki are just a click away). However, I need some help with the 2nd part

The only relevant & moddable files of the game seem to be located in the \Resources\Data folder. I ain't really sure how to proceed

Any help is appreciated!

As far as I know, there's no way to make a map at the moment. All the moddable game files are in the Data folder as you correctly identified, (I wouldn't recommend manually editing them though, you really should do it in the editor because Mike is converting the human readable files to computer-readable databases instead) but since the game creates a random map for every game, it hasn't been programmed - yet - to make this moddable.

Making preset maps has been something that has been discussed for a long time, so I imagine Mike has got plans for this. Sorry to put a damper on your own plans for the time being.

It's true what Moe says but there is something you can do, more info you can find here: viewtopic.php?f=13&t=1984

For begining you should draw map on the piece of paper like Outreamer did.

If you want to make a canon map these websites are useful, if you aren't already aware of them. http://www.stdimension.org/int/Cartography/
http://www.ucip.org/science/newmaps/

Hi,
thanks for the help (sites, advice etc)! Too bad that I won't be able to do it yet but I will gather the info the put the project on hold until it is feasible. By the way, have you heard from this guy outremer84 again? (because his last post is back on March...) If he has made any progress, etc? It would be stupid for me to start from scratch if we can work together.

Also, that map is quite nice but it's upside-down !

Finally, I was thinking of making different versions of the map, depending on the size of the galaxy the players are allowed by the game to use. Which means:

* In the smallest possible map I will put the Empires (Federation, Klingon etc) and a few of the most notable minor races

* In the medium version of the map I will put the Empires (Federation, Klingon etc) and many of the minor races

* In the largest possible map I will put the Empires (Federation, Klingon etc) and all the minor races

guess not. he hasn't been here since march this year..

I can help you, i'v got geoff madels maps in 4000x4000 size in other words maps with every star system mentioned in Star Trek though you will have to wait for couple of weeks.

OK, lets work together!

Anyway, there's no rush, as we can't implement it right now...