need some help with my 1st mod

[Johan K]

I saw a little problem in the mod:

#armor full chain mail 18

should be

#armor "full chain mail"

and it's the same for weapons. Use "" or numbers, not both. Although it won't hurt to put numbers afterwards it won't do any good either.

There is a typo in the modding manual for itemslots, the precalculated values at the end are wrong. This is probably what you want.
#itemslots 13446 (= 2 hands, head, body, 2 misc)
But you can leave that command out and give your knight a #mounted command instead which should remove his feet slots too.

[Endoperez]

#selectnation 30
#startscout "Beowulf" 2037
You should use either #startscout "Beowulf" or #startscout 2037. The | in the mod manual means either/or.
#end

#selectmonster 63
#morale 12
#gcost 14
#rcost 23
Res cost is automatically calculated based on the equipment of the unit. Humans have rescost of 1, the rest comes from the equipment. Currently, this doubles Tower Guards' res cost.
#weapon broadsword 8
#armor full chain mail 18
#armor full helmet 21
#armor Shield 2
Remember the quotes if you use the names. You can't use numbers to assign armors, and you shouldn't have both the name and the number for weapons either.
#end



#newmonster 2037
#name Beowulf
Remember quote marks. #name "Beowulf". Also, this isn't his name, but his unit type. Currently, you might have e.g. Arthulf the Beowulf... There's no easy way to make a hero have a non-random name, but you can make a new nametype (see nametype modding) with just one name (Beowulf), and use #nametype to give this unit 2037 that nametype. In that case, the #name of this unit should be "Hero", "Knight of the Beast" or something similar.
#descr "A knight of unequaled physical stature and renown, Beowulf slew the dreaded monster Grendal in a fierce single combat. Near death, poisoned, and without hope for himself, Beowulf cut out the creature's heart and ate it to insure it remained dead. Beowulf immediately began to recover from his wounds, and no longer felt the creature's poison burning his blood. He later swore allegiance to the Knights of Avalon and joined their cause. In return, he was gifted with a magical a weapon and armor."

#copyspr 1340
#ap 15
#mapmove 3
This is very rare ability, but for a hero it probably isn't too much. However, you might want to give him one or more of the survival abilities to ensure that he can use his mapmove 3 in varying terrains.
#hp 27
#prot 10
#size 2
#str 17
#enc 2
#att 15
#def 15
#prec 11
#mr 16
#mor 14
#gcost 25
You can't make the nation start with less money, but you can make Beowulf cost more upkeep by raising his gold cost. Upkeep is 1/15th of the recruitment cost, so currently Beowulf would cost 1.67 pieces of gold per turn. If you raised the #gcost to, say, 120, he'd have upkeep of 8 gp per turn.
#rcost 1
Despite what I said earlier, magical armor rarely have been set resource values. If Beowulf was recruitable, his resource cost would be 1 + the res costs of the magic items - which would probably all be 0. Because he's a hero, this doesn't matter, but if you want to give recruitable units magical weapons/armor you should remember to set their resource costs.

#weapon "sword of sharpness" 74
#armor "shield of valor" 57
#armor "chain mail of displacement" 81
#armor "black steel helmet" 40
Again, leave out the numbers. Magic items that are set to be that unit's weapons or armor don't cause their special effects, so Beowulf wouldn't have Air Shield or glamour. He would, however, benefit from the defense bonus of the chain. Magical weapons stay magical, and able to harm ethereal beings, and e.g. Moon Blades retain their ability to deal double damage to magical beings. Good two-handed swords (if you're going to use the Warlord sprite) to give him would be: Flambeau (dmg x2 vs undead), Moon Blade, Demon Bane (dmg x2 vs demons), Wraith Sword (lifedrain). Flambeau and Demon Bane won't give fire resistance, and Flambeau won't let him cast spells, but they are good weapons. Chain Mail of Displacement is one of the best armors by its stats (even though it won't give glamour), and Black Steel Helmet is good helmet without magical abilities, so both work just fine. You could make him a custom armor, say, "Grendel Skin Armor", if you want to try equipment modding.
#fear 0
#forestsurvival
What about mountainsurvival, wastesurvival?
#maxage 300
#itemslots 13574
The default itemslots a non-modded unit has are those of unmounted human. This would make Beowulf lose his feet slot, despite his graphics not giving him a mount.
#startage 37
#poisonres 100
#goodleader
#heal
#end

[BandarLover]

Foodstamp said:
If we can get Bandarlover going on modding, I am sure we can get you going as well. JK bandar

lol Foodstamp is correct, if they can help me, they can help anyone. Just take a look at my 'Mod Help' thread to see the numerous innane questions I had.

All the modders in this community are gracious in their advice and help to new modders. And as soon as work stops making us work 13 days with one day off, I plan on doing more extensive work on my barbarian mod. Just gonna take some time. You're talking to the right people Xietor.

[BandarLover]

Here is Foodstamps reply when I couldn't save my text file to a DM file. Worked perfectly.


I believe I can help you with this issue.

When you are ready to save your work, you need to click file ----> save as.

This will bring up the save as box showing the directory you intend to save the file in. Here is the part to pay attention to .

Towards the bottom, you will see a field labeled "Save as type:". This field needs to be changed to "all files"

Once you have selected all files. Save your work as filename.dm .

This will save the file as an actual dm file instead of filename.dm.txt like you are doing currently.

I hope this helps!

P.S.- Super Jealous Moment: I never got Johan to give me advise on my mod.

[Sombre]

I am actually really looking forward to you continuing with your mod Bandar. The idea of it is very appealing to me and it fits in well with the NI maps, which lack recruitable animal tribe barbs.

With the new sprite extraction method you should have a much easier time with the graphics too. I'll help as much as I can (as you know I have a lot on the go).

[Xietor]

Thanks for all of the suggestions! I really do appreciate it.
And hopefully I can get this off the ground. My list of credits keeps expanding exponentially.

I did get it into dm file format(thanks to llamabeast), and gave it a try before reading the comments pointing out my numerous errors. It crashed saying the mod had no name.

Maybe it was because of all the other stuff I had wrong, but i am going to work on it, incorporate the suggestions, and try again.

[Endoperez]

Are you sure you had quotes in the #modname line?

[BandarLover]

Sombre said:
I am actually really looking forward to you continuing with your mod Bandar.

I do plan to, soon, possibly, maybe. I want to take a look at Endo's GIMP tutorial for sprite extraction.

Xietor, I for one will be using this mod. I always disliked Man's infantry and any little boost helps in my mind. Plus another hero? I'm sold!