Overview
The Step No Man's Sky Guide is for users that would like an enhanced, vanilla feel with something closer to an "install and done" approach. Those who have already modded their game aren't likely to find anything useful here.

The scope of the Guide is to combine desired changes from various mods and our Resource Files. The Resource Files make up a large portion of the Guide and stem from over 200 hours of extended gameplay. The goal of the Guide is to provide gameplay that is still true to the spirit of the game while enhancing aspects that are somewhat (or a lot) lacking. The Guide also favors a more relaxed exploration and gameplay style that was the original game before a great deal of combat and other elements were introduced. As such, adjustments are made toward that end, but never completely removed. This means many annoyances are reduced without completely nullifying any gameplay elements.

Important Links
-> Step Modification Forums
-> Current Changelog
-> Feedback & Bug Reports
-> Facebook

Disclaimer:
The Guide is aimed toward PC players with higher-tier systems. Mid-tier systems can likely run the Guide with some sacrifice to visual quality. However, users with low-end systems may find some performance issues.


Guide Features
Following are more details about what features this Guide provides, whether by mod or our Resource Files:

Optional Files
There are several Optional Files provided that may be used along side the Resource Files:

__StepNMS-Optional-Darker Space.lua
This tweaks CSO's Darker Space parameters to make space even darker while keeping nebulae and storms balanced. Specifically, space color and fog intensity is darken by 80%, nebulae by 30% and nebula clouds by 50% to balance these features. This is optional because the changes deviates more from vanilla vs the CSO mod, alone. However, Step believes these changes provide a truer representation of space. 

_StepNMS-Optional-SensiblePlanetaryCharts.lua
This is a LUA file for the mod Sensible Planetary Charts. This is provided because the original mod no long provides LUA support.


Resource Files
Bases and Buildings

• Increased base and base building radii
• Base item limits and restrictions have been removed for most items
• Most build-able items can now be rotated, scaled, change color, and change material
• Removing most base items will no longer remove attached items (prevents rework)
• Increased the minimum and maximum buildings the ship will scan for
• Unknown buildings and icon range increased
  

Player Movement, Jetpack & Rocket Boots

• The player swims, walks, and runs faster
• Jetpack & Rocket Boots are faster and last longer
• Jetpack has more forward thrust to use it more easily for travel
• Increased "Low G" environment character speeds (e.g., derelict freighters, dead planets)
• Jetpack's drain on Life Support has been reduced
  

Scanners

• Clear binocular view (no vanilla tint)
• Terrain Resource compass and scanner ranges increased
• Binoculars will scan further away, complete the scan faster, and have better close-range scanning
• Mining and Terrain beam distances increased to mine further away
• Survey Scanner and Visual scan will scan further away and complete the scan faster
• Zoom level 1 (L1) increased by 50% of vanilla, L2 by 125% of L1, L3 by 200% of L2, L4 by 750% of L3
• Beacon, Debug Planet, Debug Space, Distress Signal, Observatory, Radio Tower, Ship, Tool, and Waypoint scanners scan further distances
  

Environmental
Land
Biome generation is completely overhauled by the use of Better Planet Generation. Please understand that this is a very large change from the vanilla generations; however, it fixes the problem of biomes being limited in vanilla due to the way Hello Games has them set up. This limitation presents itself after enough gameplay in the form of similar categorized planets starting to look very similar to one another, even though they're all procedurally generated.

The only way to remedy this is to completely rebuild the tables used for generation, allowing each biome to access more of the game's assets. Better Planet Generation accomplishes this in a way that is still true to the vanilla style. Players will experience a far broader range of biome variations, and should rarely, if ever, encounter planets that are identical like vanilla allows.

Step had to make some decisions around water. Essentially, there are two prominent issues. The first is a bug that causes the player to float above the waterline. The second is the foam's visuals suck and is overly bright at night. The "fix" for the player floating is to reduce a wave height setting. This places the player floating in the water, however, it also affects the wave visuals. Step's philosophy on issues such as these haven't changed; a "fix" that causes other issues isn't genuinely a fix, it is a trade-off. Therefore, we've decided to have better water visuals than care about floating above the waterline. As for the foam, most mods simply make edits that remove it at night. However, that's not the goal of this Guide. Therefore, edits have been made to help reduce it's effect rather than removing it. As such, the night color has been reduced by 66% to eliminate the overly bright effect at night.

Other changes include:

• Improved water ripples
• Improved and expanded water colors
• Reduced pop-in of terrain
• New cloud generation to prevent columns and make them more flat
  

Space
The asteroid fields have been completely overhauled. Previously, Step was using Clean Space Origins for this; however, an update forced the adoption of a custom solution. Overall the fields will be more sparse vs vanilla. The asteroid orientation has been changed, as well. Players will find smaller asteroids nearer orbital bodies with the larger asteroids starting to appear further out. Keep in mind that each system's generation will still be unique so some systems may have more or fewer asteroids than others.

Other changes include: 

• Lower chances of pirate attacks
• Mined resources are increased by 3x
• Space between planets and asteroid fields is doubled
• Freighter battles (when exiting warp) happen twice as less vs vanilla
  

Gameplay & Miscellaneous
It's all too common for new players to try to take on a planet only to die before they can even find enough resources to survive the first storm! Since players are almost guaranteed to start on a hazardous planet, Step found the default hazard protections severely lacking in good judgement. 

Our logic for the changes to the environmental hazards takes into account that one possesses the technology to travel the stars. Combine that with the significantly high chances of hazardous planets and one would think one would be more properly equipped vs what vanilla provides. Our adjustments are meant to address this inconsistency. However, we've also adjusted the damage rates of most of the hazards to include some variation. Overall, these adjustments will allow players to survive more comfortably in harsher environments:

• All hazard protection times have been doubled from vanilla settings
• Radiation damage rates have been reduced by 4x (radiation is a slow killer)
• Toxic Gas damage rates have been increased by 50% (gas/toxins are a fast killer!)
• Extreme Heat and Extreme Cold damage rates have been halved
  

Other changes include:

• Customized camera shakes (many have been disabled, others reduced)
• Refiners are 20x faster vs vanilla
• Ship interaction range increased from 50u to 500u
• Decreased chances of broken slots on crashed ships
• Reduced flashlight/torch strength to reduce blowout when close to objects
• Moved torch more in front of the player to reduced it lighting the back of the head as easily
  

Ships & Vehicles
A significant bit of testing and tuning went into reworking the ship controls. The goal was to separate the ships a bit more by weight class for all settings vs vanilla, which solely relies on thrusts and brakes as the only differences. The "Normal" weight class was set and used as the median between the Lightweight and Heavyweight classes. The lightweight ships should feel lighter and faster. Likewise on the other side that scale, the heavyweight ships should feel heavier and slower than their normal and lightweight counterparts.

This weight class deviation was already somewhat implemented in vanilla between lightweight and normal ships; however, the heavyweight ships had nearly the same controls as the normal class. What Step has done is taken what the developers executed between lightweight and normal ships and expanded upon it. This was accomplished by adding equivalent negative adjustments to the heavyweight class. All three weight classes should feel more distinct now.

• Land, Boost, Pulse, Space, and Warp speeds are faster
• Narrowed the tracking for Pulse auto-aim.
• Improved the overall landing of ships
• Pulse will exit closer to Space Stations
• Ships can now hover on planets and come to a full-stop and reverse in space
  

The Step Guide Mandate

Step Modding Guides
Step offers complete, stand-alone modding guides for our supported games. These guides are intended to be a complete, 'Step-modded' setup for each of their games. In addition to adding upon the visual and acoustic enhancements of a vanilla game, Step Modding Guides modify aspects of gameplay mechanics and may include mods that add or subtract specific functionality to yield an overall more immersive experience.

Step Guides are about ...

• ... bug fixes and corrections to malfunctioning aspects of the vanilla games.
• ... HD asset replacements in the style of the vanilla game (or as close a representation as possible).
• ... improvements to existing content that increase the consistency of the vanilla game.
• ... interface mods that improve the menus and UI for the PC.
• ... tweaks that improve consistency in gameplay or meet realistic expectations of intended game features.
• ... new content, assets, and effects that are consistent with the game's style and lore, as established by Bethesda's creators
• ... continuity and qualitative consistency of all in-game behaviors and assets (i.e., sounds, textures, models, gameplay, etc.)
  

Step Guides are NOT about ...

• ... sex mods, body replacement mods, or beauty mods that unrealistically affect or digress from the ambiance and style of the vanilla game.
• ... sound replacement mods that digress from the game's vanilla ambience.
• ... texture mods that significantly deviate from the game's original visual style.
• ... mods that are only required for a specific user base (i.e., a mod that fixes UI issues but only for users running at 4K)
  

User Contributions
How YOU Can Help

Step Modifications is always looking for volunteers willing to help out. We need help at many levels from mod suggestions and testing to forums management and release coordination. Please jump over to the Step Community forums and PM any of the staff there ... or just jump into the mix and help out as you are able.