Creating The Bronze Age mod

[Sebastián Gómez]

I recently created some building for a future MOD which won't include any of the current civilizations.

One of these buildings is a large Minoan palace which will act as a civic center. So I was wondering what would be the best way to start testing them. Is it possible to test them as a new civ or should I use one of the current civs as starting point and just replace its building meshes with mines? 

These are my first steps into the moding area. I'd appreciate any help.

Edited September 13, 2019 by Basshunter

[Alexandermb]

if want just to test the building as an actor and no need to check yet the template you can just make a new folder of the civ with the actor, otherwise the better would be take the templates of one civilization like the one you are doing and make it properly with the new civ prefix (maybe mino_) and replace the actors on the road.

[Stan`]

  On 20/08/2019 at 4:32 PM, Basshunter said:

These are my first steps into the moding area. I'd appreciate any help.

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We got you buddy

As Alexandermb said you can either hack it or do it properly work by dropping the mesh in binaries/data/your/mod/meshes/yourmesh.dae (Be careful for some reason capital extensions ex DAE do not work)adding an actor file in binaries/data/your/mod/art/actors

If you haven't done so already please look at 

 https://trac.wildfiregames.com/wiki/Modding_Guide

[Sebastián Gómez]

I already tried my buildings as actors in the Scenario Editor.

Now I'd like to give a step further and start creating my new civ so I can try the buildings in a real gameplay. What would be the correct way to achieve this?

Is there any tutorial covering the creation of a new civ? I don't want to feel I'm bothering you guys with questions that probably have already been answered.

Thanks for your time.

Edited August 20, 2019 by Basshunter

[WhiteTreePaladin]

  On 20/08/2019 at 4:58 PM, Stan` said:

(Be careful for some reason capital extensions ex DAE do not work)

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Probably would work on Windows since its filesystem isn't case sensitive. I once made a webpage where some of the image file extensions were uppercase and some were lowercase. Worked fine on Windows, but on Linux it failed to load images with file extensions of mismatched case.

[Stan`]

  On 20/08/2019 at 5:14 PM, Basshunter said:

I already tried my buildings as actors in the Scenario Editor.

Now I'd like to give a step further and start creating my new civ so I can try the buildings in a real gameplay. What would be the correct way to achieve this?

Is there any tutorial covering the creation of a new civ? I don't want to feel I'm bothering you guys with questions that probably have already been answered.

Thanks for your time.

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You are not bothering me at least  I'm glad to see you haven't given up on the game

 The aristeia mod has minoans so you might want to see how it's done otherwise there are some standalone civs in 0admods https://github.com/0ADMods

For your civ you will need a civ.json file that will define a number of things like the name the default replacement entities the civ history etc

That would go in simulation/data/civs/

[Stan`]

  On 20/08/2019 at 5:27 PM, WhiteTreePaladin said:

Probably would work on Windows since its filesystem isn't case sensitive. I once made a webpage where some of the image file extensions were uppercase and some were lowercase. Worked fine on Windows, but on Linux it failed to load images with file extensions of mismatched case.

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Well it doesn't i guess it crashes for some obscure other reasons 

[Sebastián Gómez]

  On 20/08/2019 at 5:27 PM, WhiteTreePaladin said:

Probably would work on Windows since its filesystem isn't case sensitive. I once made a webpage where some of the image file extensions were uppercase and some were lowercase. Worked fine on Windows, but on Linux it failed to load images with file extensions of mismatched case.

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I think It won't. If I remember correctly, the last time I used DAE instead of dae, meshes were not recognized. So I think I'll follow Stan advice.

  On 20/08/2019 at 5:30 PM, Stan` said:

You are not bothering me at least  I'm glad to see you haven't given up on the game

 The aristeia mod has minoans so you might want to see how it's done otherwise there are some standalone civs in 0admods https://github.com/0ADMods

For your civ you will need a civ.json file that will define a number of things like the name the default replacement entities the civ history etc

That would go in simulation/data/civs/

 

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Thanks buddy. Well I kinda gave up on Vanilla. That's why I'm experimenting with my own MOD. 

I'll take a look at Aristeia and also check the standalone civ link.

[Sebastián Gómez]

  On 20/08/2019 at 4:40 PM, Alexandermb said:

otherwise the better would be take the templates of one civilization like the one you are doing and make it properly with the new civ prefix (maybe mino_) and replace the actors on the road.

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  On 20/08/2019 at 5:30 PM, Stan` said:

For your civ you will need a civ.json file that will define a number of things like the name the default replacement entities the civ history etc

That would go in simulation/data/civs/

 

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Hey guys, I successfully managed to create my new civ template!

Now I'm trying to set up my starting buildings and units. I'm using Spartans from the SVN as my reference for folder structure and stuff. However, I noted that there are two XML files for civic center in the structures folder.

Can I ask you why is it and which one should I use as a base template for setting up my starting civic center?

  Reveal hidden contents

 

Edited August 31, 2019 by Basshunter

[Stan`]

Hey as you probably know the game only supports one texture set per mesh, and per actor. In this case @LordGood wanted to have two different ones so he made two actors.

In general one will be fine So any of those is good

[Alexandermb]

  On 20/08/2019 at 9:04 PM, Stan` said:

Hey as you probably know the game only supports one texture set per mesh, and per actor. In this case @LordGood wanted to have two different ones so he made two actors.

In general one will be fine So any of those is good

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I've found what he mention, there are two actors "civic_centre" and "civic_center"  and in the simulation they are called "civil_centre" what would be the proper name for all? thats a TODO for fix.

[WhiteTreePaladin]

  On 20/08/2019 at 6:42 PM, Basshunter said:

I think It won't. If I remember correctly, the last time I used DAE instead of dae, meshes were not recognized. So I think I'll follow Stan advice.

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If the code is doing an actual case-sensitive string check for the file name, then it wouldn't work on any system without an exact match. If it's a simple file loading, then it should work on Windows even with a case mismatch. If Stan says it doesn't work with mismatched case file extensions, then it's very possibly the former situation. I agree with following Stan's advice though. He's looked at more of the code than I have.

[asterix]

  On 20/08/2019 at 4:32 PM, Basshunter said:

I recently created some building for a future MOD which won't include any of the current civilizations.

One of these buildings is a large Minoan palace which will act as a civic center. So I was wondering what would be the best way to start testing them. Is it possible to test them as a new civ or should I use one of the current civs as starting point and just replace its building meshes with mines? 

These are my first steps into the moding area. I'd appreciate any help.

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Thank you for your interest do not forget to look at this series 

 

[wowgetoffyourcellphone]

  On 20/08/2019 at 9:08 PM, Alexandermb said:

I've found what he mention, there are two actors "civic_centre" and "civic_center"  and in the simulation they are called "civil_centre" what would be the proper name for all? thats a TODO for fix.

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One is the current model, and the other is the original Spartan civic center model. As it is a quite nicely done model, it'd be great if it was kept in the game. Probably best to rename the actor to civic_center_2 or something instead of civic_centre. 

[Sebastián Gómez]

@Stan`

Would you help me please?

I want to prevent the game from showing the default backgrounds at the beginning.

I managed to make my background to appear, but I can't get rid of Vanilla's without getting errors.

  Reveal hidden contents

 

Edited August 31, 2019 by Basshunter

[Stan`]

You need to add a DELETED file like this

https://github.com/0ADMods/millenniumad/tree/master/gui/pregame

Don't forget to add some text in it (will be useful when packaging you mod) usually just the name of the file, it doesn't really matter.

[Sebastián Gómez]

  On 21/08/2019 at 7:06 PM, Stan` said:

You need to add a DELETED file like this

https://github.com/0ADMods/millenniumad/tree/master/gui/pregame

Don't forget to add some text in it (will be useful when packaging you mod) usually just the name of the file, it doesn't really matter.

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Worked like a charm!

Edited August 21, 2019 by Basshunter

[wowgetoffyourcellphone]

  On 21/08/2019 at 7:06 PM, Stan` said:

 

Don't forget to add some text in it (will be useful when packaging you mod) usually just the name of the file, it doesn't really matter.

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I put movie quotes in my empty .DELETED files. Lol

[wackyserious]

  On 21/08/2019 at 9:37 PM, wowgetoffyourcellphone said:

I put movie quotes in my empty .DELETED files. Lol

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Noticed that you did so in commit summaries in github before. I was quite obscured at first, to be honest.

[Sebastián Gómez]

Hey guys.

When creating one of my new civs I noted that whenever the file "achaeans_civil_centre.xml" located in simulation\templates\structures is renamed to "achaeans_civic_center.xml" or "achaeans_cc.xml", the game shows the next error:

I can't figure out which XML or JSON file is requiring this "achaeans_civil_centre.xml". I haven't been able to find that name in any line of the other XMLs or JSONs from this civ.

By the way, the reason why I want to change the name to "achaeans_civic_center.xml" or "achaeans_cc.xml" is to maintain consistency across all my files.

Edited August 22, 2019 by Basshunter

[Stan`]

I'd look at your civ_center template in simulation/templatez

[Nescio]

  On 22/08/2019 at 8:14 PM, Basshunter said:

Hey guys.

When creating one of my new civs I noted that whenever the file "achaeans_civil_centre.xml" located in simulation\templates\structures is renamed to "achaeans_civic_center.xml" or "achaeans_cc.xml", the game shows the next error:

I can't figure out which XML or JSON file is requiring this "achaeans_civil_centre.xml". I haven't been able to find that name in any line of the other XMLs or JSONs from this civ.

By the way, the reason why I want to change the name to "achaeans_civic_center.xml" or "achaeans_cc.xml" is to maintain consistency across all my files.

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The simulation template file name ought to be `{civ}_civil_centre.xml` for all civs; the `{civ}` part is then replaced with the civ code, e.g. `athen_civil_centre.xml`, not `athenians_civil_centre.xml`.

You can give your template another name (`achaeans_cc.xml` or whatever), but then you also need to add a tiny template (`acha_civil_centre.xml` or whatever) to load it:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<Entity parent="structures/achaeans_cc"/>

to ensure the AI, maps, units etc. can handle it.

This is also what I did in my mod ( https://github.com/0abc/0abc-a23/tree/master/simulation/templates/structures ), where I moved templates into individual `{civ}/` folders, to make things more manageable.

[Stan`]

  On 23/08/2019 at 8:14 AM, Nescio said:

This is also what I did in my mod ( https://github.com/0abc/0abc-a23/tree/master/simulation/templates/structures ), where I moved templates into individual `{civ}/` folders, to make things more manageable.

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I wasn't sure it was possible but I think that's nice.

[Nescio]

  On 23/08/2019 at 8:30 AM, Stan` said:

I wasn't sure it was possible but I think that's nice.

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It required moving a lot of files and fixing some paths in the AI files, but nothing complicated.

Having separate {civ} folders becomes more imperative when more content is added; e.g. https://github.com/JustusAvramenko/delenda_est/tree/master/simulation/templates/units : “Sorry, we had to truncate this directory to 1,000 files. 198 entries were omitted from the list.”

[Stan`]

Error message from the game ?