Advice/tips for new modder

[IxianMace]

I've decided to try my hand at modding for Emperor Battle for Dune. Since I know nothing about modding, I'd like some advice from experienced modders about what the best tools for the job are, and how to do things in general. I've got TibEd, and I've been fiddling around with it a little, but it seemed to make the game unstable the first time I actually created a rules.txt and artini.txt for Emperor. So help me out here please, what do I use for modding Emperor Battle for Dune? Does anyone have any useful tips/advice for modding this game in general? ;D

[guusr5644]

first of all DONT! use Tibed its not a good program!!!

use manual editing with wordpad or something like that

[IxianMace]

Why isn't TibEd a good program? If I use wordpad or some other word processing program, it's so tedious and confusing just to look at the text on the screen (I'm talking about rules.txt). :P

[guusr5644]

TibEd is not good if you wanna create new units and new icons

and stuff like that i suggest you sue manual

[Gobalopper]

TibEd is more for the casual user who just wants to change a few things, if you are actually going to create a mod you will probably want to do it by hand.

[IxianMace]

How exactly do I do it by hand? Do I have to go through text files and edit certain items of interest? ???

[Timenn]

Yes, edit the rules.txt. Just view it for a while. And you will discover the concept.

The ArtIni.txt is for all graphical linking to units

[nemafakei]

TibEd is a good program, it just is not very powerful when it comes to E:BfD.

Rules.txt manual editing is very powerful, and using it gives you a far better understanding of how the gmae works - a necessity for modding. There are a few tutorials in...

http://editing.dune2k.com/docs/

[Apollyon]

with every change u make, back it up and try it

if it crashes (happens annoyingly often) restore the backup

[guusr5644]

why backup? i mean when you make the rules in the model folder

if the game crashes or something you can just delete the model

folder cant you?

[IxianMace]

If you delete the Model folder, that would mean that you would lose all your work, if you didn't back it up. :O :P

[guusr5644]

ok ok i get the picture ;D

[TLContaminator]

how do i create a new unit in the rules i add another stats and where i need to i put the name it doesnt work

[IxianMace]

how do i create a new unit in the rules i add another stats and where i need to i put the name it doesnt work

I think you have to fiddle around with the stuff in the artini.txt file as well as the rules.txt file. I'm not sure about that however, I'm only just learning what all the stuff means. :P

[guusr5644]

to give a unit a name first get the text strings.txt extracted...

use duneEx 2 and then go to the house the unit supose to be in

look at the units and you will learn easily just add there your

new unit section name of the rules.txt and then in the:

{here you put the name of your new unit} get it? :)

[Ghosty_Square]

You must also put the name of your unit at the declaration section-and if you want your unit to have a name you also need to edit the strings files.

But hey, nothing is too hard. Just experiment a little until you learn.

[guusr5644]

thats what i sad dont it? and i also explaind how to do it!

[Ghosty_Square]

If you noticed the times, we were posting at about the same time (usually when I 'm online I open multiple windows so it could take me even 10minutes to complete a post).

[Frodo]

wow, that's a long time ghosty. but I suppose if you are running multiple windows it would really cut down your time.

[IxianMace]

Ok I've done it. I now have a general understanding of the rules.txt file. I can edit build times, unit and structure ranges, change bullets, make explosion effects, and change unit and structure stats in general. I'd like to know 3 things before I proceed further:

1. How do I enable the large windtrap for all 3 houses?

2. Is it possible to make snipers that shoot infantry and then the infantry become contaminators? (When I tried that, the snipers turned the enemy infantry into additional snipers!) :O

3. How do you change the names of the structures and units in the game without adding any new ones?

I can not make new textures because I don't have the software to do so. I'm not making any new units, I'm just changing the stats around for the current structures and units in the game, until I'm confident that I understand enough about the inner workings of the game to be more ambitious. Any help from anyone would be much appreciated.

[guusr5644]

this answers are for 1,3 :

1.if you want to enable to three houses just make it 3 times

over 1 for each house ;)

3.to change names you must go to the file: "text strings.txt"

you can use the duneEx2 to open strings and you will find the

file there or if ya want i can give it to ya :)

[IxianMace]

this answers are for 1,3 :

1.if you want to enable to three houses just make it 3 times

over 1 for each house ;)

I don't understand what you mean. ???

[ethan]

ok, i hope this works....

in the art.ini file, go down to the buildings on ATR buildings. when you come to La Windtrap, above it it says

//  NO LONGER USED

//  [ATLaWindtrap]

//  Icon  = "iconsAT_UpgWTrap.tga"

//  IconGrey = "iconsgrey_AT_UpgWTrap.tga"  

//  Xaf = "AT_Upgrdwindtrap"

//  XafConstruction = "construction_AT_upgrdwindtrap_high.xaf"

//  SideBarType = "Buildings"

//  ClipSphere = 70

i am asuming that you delete the // NO LONGER USED

part about it and do the same for all houses.

[guusr5644]

well i quess thats a better idea ;)

[IxianMace]

Thanks for the tips ethan, that partially helped to solve the problem of the large windtrap. I had to edit some stuff in the rules.txt as well as the artini.txt file to get the large windtraps for all 3 houses to work. Now I have another problem with the large windtrap. The icon in the buildings sidebar that represents the large windtrap appears as a square of weird colours. The only one that actually shows up is the harkonnen large windtrap, but when you click on the icon to start building it, or you start building a structure, the icon gets the funny colours again. There is also no tool-tip for the large windtrap when you move your cursor over the structure in the game, and the sidebar icon only shows the price, and not the name. Any way to get the name and the icon in the sidebar for the large windtrap to work? I'd like to get rid of those annoying weird colours. ???