Supports the optional Extended Conversation Menu, which allows all mods using it to join their starting conversations in a browsable section, so technically infinite mods can be added by only taking up 1 conversation slot for any npc. Not required. (Feel free to add support for your own mods)
Update v0.3.1: Added support for the above mentioned ECM Menu. No need to update if you don't want to use ECM.
Egosofts idea to bring ventures to X4 was really awesome, but limiting it to unmodded games.... meh. So why not create better ventures for ourselfs is what i thought. Hence i didn't wanna mess with lua in it's current state i've rebuild a far better venture functionallity into the conversation menu.
Nexus Link also with up to date images: https://www.nexusmods.com/x4foundations/mods/244
How do i get ships on their way?
1. Don't dock ships you want to send on ventures, space is fine.
2. Contact one of your station's managers in person or via comms. The menu is is called "Ventures" (you can manage ur ventures via comms from everywhere now)
3. Rename the wingcommander of the fleets that you want to send out according to the Venture slot. So Venture 1 for your first fleet or Venture 3 for your third. You can find the according fleet slots under Fleet Management. (Suborditates you assign must not be renamed! Only the wing commander "flagship" needs to be named according to the venture slot) Also make sure your ships are not docked or in a highway, anywhere in space is fine.
4. Select a mission for the current fleetslot. You can print all the mission info into your logbook and read it. Also the tips!
5. Now you're able to start the mission! But you may want to make sure you have the right shipclass selected and assign some subordinates to increase your chances.
6. Your ships will then be "parked" in the venture sector and return when their venture is over (if they survive). No further use for the sector yet!
Missions, ship classes, difficulty and chances?!?
We have 4 missions for now that require different ships. You can't just send random ships on a mission and expect it will succeed.
The base difficulty for one ship is being shown in mission details.
Once we selected a mission and a ship, we will see the current success chance on the start button.
What does further influence the success chance of a venture?
1. Base mission difficulty (can be adjusted by the player in the config file (ventures\md\ventureconfiguration.xml)
2. Shiptypes. If ships with the right primary class are assigned and they fit the required purpose, they add 5% to the success chance, the secondary class only adds 2% but doesn't have to meet the purpose requirement. If you assign ships that DON'T match the right class (or purpose if primary), then they will reduce the chance by 20% each.
3. The skill of the flagship. The flagship is the ship you named Venture 1... Venture 3. The entire crew's skill is being compared and can add up to 10% to the success chance.
4. Events that happen while the mission is ongoing, more to that later.
You can keep assigning ships and missions and figure out what produces the best chances for your mission. Or you might not care that much about your ship and just take a risk. But... if the mission failes your entire fleet might be destroyed.
Events
Usually things don't always go as planned. So i've added events that can happen while your fleet is underway. You will be notified as soon as an event impacts one of your fleets. There is good and bad events, some may increase your fleets chances, some will reduce them. Some will impact the time your fleet needs or accelerate it!
If a really bad event took place and reduced the chances for your fleet to a low point, you can recall your fleet in the fleet's submenu. They won't get rewards unless they had a lucky event and will come streight back home without losses.
Rewards
Crews risking their lives, there's gotta be some sweet rewards. And there shall be!
Depending on the mission, the outcome and events that might incluence rewards you can gain multiple ships, paintjobs, inventory items, up to very rare modparts or even entire mods installed to your flagships.
Oh, and you can spent some of that newly gained wealth to extend your available fleet slots on the first level! The first additional slot costs 22 million, then things get more expensive!
I always appreciate feedback!
No matter if good or bad, gimmi that feedback! And ideas!
Todo-list:
- Improve content upon feedback!
- export aaaaaaaaaall the god damn text to t-files for multilanguage support (it's gonna take... a while. and i might get suicidal thoughts
)Installation
Backup your savegames first please. I don't expect any issues, but it's always good to be save.
Download the file, extract the ventures folder and move it to your extensions folder (in your game root directory, NOT DOCUMENTS).
In case you don't have one yet, simply create it at the base directory of X4, so for a steam user it would be: Steam\steamapps\common\X4 Foundations\extensions
Deinstallation:
Remove the folder, but make sure you have no ongoing ventures as the ships might be destroyed. There should not be any savegame issues.
Gotcha. 
I believe that's one of the X2 ships, modeled in X2 graphics. I had one of these brought to me by one of the ventures as well. It was a Nostalgia moment for sure! I told a pilot to go to a wharf, re-arm and assigned it as an escort to something. I never heard from that pilot again. haha... 