No Comparable Ships Available? – @#ck You!
Tired of seeing that message? Have ships you’d like to test against without having to exit to use Tournament mode? – Well, here’s a way to do it without messing things up too much.
Make a mod folder. (See this tut if you don’t know that yet). Name it Extra Ships, or something like that.
In your new mod folder, create a folder named extra_ships. (this name has to be exact, with the underscore)
Drop any ship files you have (not fleet files), into that folder. If you want comparable ships for a certain faction you’re playing, these ships must be of the same faction. If you don’t already have any ships you can use, you can look on the wormhole to find fleets other players have made. Download and Import those fleets into your game, then export individual ships from there.
Once you have your folder full of ships, enter the game and check the Mods menu. You should see your Extra Ships mod in there.
Load-up your game and test some ships. As long as you added similar ships to your folder, you should now have other designs to test against.
The only down-side to this method is that the extra_ships folder is also used by the pink mercenary faction. You’ll see your designs mixed-in with those ships now.
If you want to turn the mod off, just uncheck it in the Mod menu and these ships won’t be loaded any more.
Ta-da! Easy-peesy.
If you want a short-cut, you can download my extra_ships folder here. It’s already filled with my older ship designs.