Thx, seems I overestimated it. I was thinking of SM mode being able to prefabricate an entire galaxy manually and adding races.
You can. It just takes so much time and effort to do it that there isn't really any point. You can't manually place planets one by one, or change the atmospheric information without going through a whole bunch of hoops, but you can create systems and link them to other systems. I forgot about the buttons that let you do that.
Create empire can be used multiple times, and you can set extra ones you create as NPRs. The problem comes up with editing those NPRs to make them like what you want. You can't access the planets or racial information of an NPR just from SM mode, like you can a player race. Making it impossible to fully modify a custom NPR race. You need designer mode for that. I actually may put a suggestion up on the aurora forums to let the SM modify the custom NPR's homeworld, and race data, immediately after creating an NPR but only immediately after the SM spawns them.
Buttons I forgot about, and haven't experimented around much with:
- Near the top of the system information screen is 'delete star' it just deletes the selected star and orbiting bodies, without deleting the entire system. It can't be used on the center star of a system. But all others are fair game. Handy if you have a star orbiting hundreds of billions of kms out from the center of the system that would take years to reach even at hyperspeed, that you just don't wanna have nagging the back of your mind all the time.
System Information> Jump points Tab. In here you can add or remove Jump points from the system.
* Enter/Explore Seems to just change the selected system to the one on the other side of the selected JP.
* Hide WP makes the jump not show up on the galactic map.
* Add JP adds a jump point. Half the time I used this after a ship explores it it got sent into nonexistance and bugged the game. I think you may have to link the point manually after creating it.
* Add / delete Jump Gate Adds or deletes a jump gate instantly.
* Delete JP Should remove the selected JP from existence.
* Sm jump point bearing and distance. Lets you move around where the JP is located in the system.
* SM change jump point destination points a jump gate to a system. Seems to be necessary after creating a new JP.