FAQ: A Constant Work in Progress

[Rymafyr]

After having gone through all of the RDN Mod Tools forum, here is a compiled list of commonly asked, and asked, and asked again questions. The purpose of this FAQ is to compile these issues so new members will not have a need to search endlessly through the forums for an answer to their questions. Or worse yet, who don’t even try to find an answer to their questions in the existing forum. Please feel free to add to this list with separate posts but let’s try to keep the questions to those being asked repeatedly. Oh, if you don’t have an answer to the question you post don’t put it here. Sorry to be all gestapo but this is supposed to be an FAQ.

If you don't find an answer to your specific issue, before going further, I suggest, no I demand the following.

1) Read the ‘readme.txt’ file provided by relic with the mod tools and do what it says by following the instructions given to set up your own mod folder and files.

2) Read the Wiki provided by Relic located here: http://www.relic.com/rdn/wiki/RDNWikiHome

a. Yes, you will possibly need to register on the RDN site to gain access
b. Yes, you will possibly have to register again to access the wiki.

3) Use Google to search the forums or do so by hand.

These Questions have been paraphrased and reworded in order to get to the heart of the matter. The answers are to be concise and may give links to other documentation for reference. These questions shall not be tutorial in nature.

Q1) Why does nothing show up in the AE when I start it?
A1) The AE is not finding the files needed. Follow the instructions in the ‘readme.txt’ to extract the Data.sga archive to your mods folder.

Q2) How do I save a map? “The selected file is outside of all known scenario folders.”
A2) Maps are to be saved in this fashion:
Multi player maps go: Dawn of War\My_Mod\Data\Scenarios\MP
Single player maps go: Dawn of War\My_Mod\Data\Scenarios\SP

Q3) Is it possible to pull models out of the game?
A3) No. Some models have been provided by Relic for the mod community to learn from in making their own.

Q4) Why are the minimaps and map icons for the maps I create nothing like the ones for Relics maps?
A4) These images have been modified after the fact. See these threads for more info:
http://forums.relicnews.com/showthread.php?t=49141
http://forums.relicnews.com/showthread.php?t=49756
http://forums.relicnews.com/showthread.php?t=49193

Q5) How do I run the ME?
A5) Use the shortcut provided in the installation. Or type the following in the run command window: "C:\Program Files\THQ\Dawn of War\ModTools\ME\W40KME.exe" -wkdir "C:\Program Files\THQ\Dawn of War\", (assuming a default installation). For further info check this thread:
http://forums.relicnews.com/showthread.php?t=47505

Q6) Why am I unable to install the mod tools despite having patched to 1.1?
A6) You will want to check your registry. This forum describes what to do:
http://forums.relicnews.com/showthread.php?t=47560

Q7) Why are objects not showing up in the map I created? “Not the purple box issue”
A7) The objects have probably been assigned to a player which isn’t in the game. For example: You’ve added a wall assigned to player 3 but it is only a 2 player map. Objects should be assigned to the world.

Q8) Why are objects and troops showing up as purple boxes in the maps I create?
A8) The editor and game are not finding the files needed to display the object and so are using the purple box placeholder. Here’s more info: http://forums.relicnews.com/showthread.php?t=49734

Q9) How can I save with the FX tool?
A9) The FX Tool needs to be saved directly under Dawn of War\<mod_name>\Data\Art\FX\... and not under DataGeneric\.

Q10) Can I make my own models and get them in-game?
A10) Yes. Go here to find out more: http://forums.relicnews.com/showthread.php?t=47989

Q11) Why am I unable to place Texture Stamps on my Detail Textures?
A11) The Detail Texture needs to have an alpha channel which would allow some of the stamping to show through. Go here for more info: http://forums.relicnews.com/showthre...2&page=1&pp=15

Q12) How do I make a Detail map?
A12) Monorail's done up a nice little tutorial here:
http://forums.relicnews.com/showthread.php?t=48769

Q13) Where do I place my Detail Maps, and Decals?
A13) Detail Maps go here: Dawn of War\My_Mod\Art\Scenarios\Textures\Details
Decals go here: Dawn of War\My_Mod\Art\Decals

Q14) When I play my map, Detail Textures and Decals I made show up as purple question marks?
A14) Just like with the Purple box situation in Q#8 above, the engine is not finding your textures or decals. Make sure the Textures are in the right folders for where you are running your map from.

Q15) Does this mean I have to include copies of my textures, decals, and meshes when I distribute my maps?
A15) Yes! Here is a nice solution to prevent files being overwritten by multiple maps:
http://forums.relicnews.com/showthread.php?t=49621

Q16) When I modify things in the AE and save them I get a P4 Error, why?
A16) Really, don't worry about it. It is something used by Relic in-house which doesn't affect us. However, do check to see the changes were made by opening the lua files you changed. Also make sure they are not 'read only'. Here's the explanation:
http://forums.relicnews.com/showthread.php?t=49045

Q17) Why are units able to shoot through and walk through walls.
A17) You can make troops stop moving through objects by placing impassable areas on the object. For the shooting issue, read the following: http://forums.relicnews.com/showthread.php?t=48158

Q18) Why isn't Win95, 98, and Me supported for the Mod tools?
A18) Simply put, they just are not. If you wanna read some ranting about it:
http://forums.relicnews.com/showthread.php?t=47512

Q19) Why do areas of my map go black or not display while in the ME?
A19) Turn off the sky and fog rendering to see the whole map.
Ctrl K, turns off the sky.
Ctrl F, turns off the fog.

Q20) How do I get rid of these annoying misshappen shadows in my Map?
A20) Adjust the angle of the sun in the terrain properties. Stay away from early moring, noonish, and late night at the far ends.

Q21) I'm completely overwhelmed, where do I start?
A21) How about right here with this FAQ? Better yet, short of doing the work for ya, here's a run through of setting up your mod folders: http://forums.relicnews.com/showthread.php?t=50903

Q22) Umm, the OE, it's scary what am I suppose to do with it? or Umm, the OE, HOLY SHEET!
A22) Yeah, welcome to modding DoW. The Relic Wiki has a good tutorial for the OE, though it's brief it will give you the basics. Here's a thread that may also help:
http://forums.relicnews.com/showthread.php?t=50078

[SvK]

Nice! Answers a few questions I've had. Even back with Impossible Creatures they didn't tell you where you were allowed to save files. Quite annoying.

[Rymafyr]

Thanks SVK,

Still just wanting to help where I can. It's actually amusing to read through the whole forums. However, I doubt I'll do it again.

The rest is up to everyone else. If you see a question being asked that is referenced here, send them here. If you see new questions, which have been answered showing up time and again, just post them here. Hope this helps everyone.

[Lumine]

Maybe we can make a checklist of know things that cause the ME to crash? Here are a few obscure friggin things that helped me out.
Zoom in before saving
Use file structure in all lower-case
...swear in the bug submission thingy, alot...

Well that last one didn't help it stop crashing, but it did invigorate me to try again

btw: hella tight faq, yo

[Elefant]

Nice nice nice. Youve been a great help to many Rym..

[monoRAIL]

Someone sticky this please!

(By the way Elefant - there's no need to put your tutorial in a .rar file - linking directly to the .txt file or just posting the whole thing on the forum would be much easier to read).

[Elefant]

Ive sent the Mini Map Tutorial to DoWHQ to check and validate.
No more downloading . . go here
http://forums.relicnews.com/showthread.php?t=49756
Bad habits die hard eh?

Someone sticky this please!

Sorry I removed all that Mono. Guess we need a sticky on the Ele .

[monoRAIL]

If this post drifts off the front page of the tools forum before it gets made sticky baby Jesus will cry.

[Lumine]

man this is one mighty handy faq.... lets keep it near the top

By the way, is there any more information about making decals as opposed to details? I tried just moving my files to the other directory, but they stretch weird when not at 90 degree angles

[monoRAIL]

Lumine- make sure your decals have a black border in their alpha channel and save them as a .dds format with Alpha (either dxt3 or dxt5 compression).

A good way to see what you should have in the alpha channel is to open the Relic decals and look at their alphas.

[Lumine]

Thanks, monorail. I found out that you can save them as .tga and they'll work just as well. Maybe handy info for the non-photoshop people out there

[Rymafyr]

I added two additional questions to the FAQ above.

Since I finished the original post, I still continue to see people asking these same questions over and over. This really wouldn't bother me except the indication is people don't even try to look for an answer before posting one of these asked again questions.

I suppose I'm a little put off because I read through the entirety of the RDN Mod Tools forum, in just a short time, and without any strain to do so. Yet most posts now include a disclaimer like, "I haven't got time to read through all the posts since there is no search feature!" Well, if you've got time to make a map for DoW, you should have time to read the readme.rtf, Wiki, tutorial, and posts in order to have more knowledge to create your map, model or whatever.

I've never been one to toss around the term 'noob' before and I won't; however, I clearly see now why people who tend to use it do so. It's a little aggravating to keep having to give out the same info when it's been done time and time before and is within easy reach of the individual.

Now granted I understand not all failures for say trying to get the ME to start are a result of the same problem. But if someone hasn't even tried to resolve the issue by using solutions to the common problems how can anyone be able to help that individual?

From my perspective, using the example above, the most common reason why the ME doesn't start is because someone isn't using the shortcut provided or is typing the wrong thing in the command line. So when someone exclaims, “I can't get the ME to start!” I assume one of those two possibilities.

Giving information is as good as getting information. If I know someone has tried the above options then we can look at other prospective issues, like operating system, file structure etc. Unfortunately this info is usually never given. For those who have, thank you. For the others...

I personally don't like to see a posting go unanswered. Even if I don't know exactly what the problem is. But come on people, at least look through the first couple of pages of the forums before posting a common question, more likely than not, you'll find your solution.

[monoRAIL]

Hello... Relic...? Please make this thread sticky so I don't have to keep bumping it. Without Rymafyr's hard work in compiling this thread most modders would not have got anywhere!

[Hanna]

Here is my contribution to the FAQ:

(Maybe the whole FAQ should go into the Wiki? Your anger is entirely justified, by the way. Some people just want others to drop whatever they're doing to help them out and it's extremely selfish. It's a problem that many communities from developers' mailing lists to game modding forums have to deal with and many solutions have been suggested from being incredibly harsh to people who don't follow etiquette, to... well, usually it's some variation on being harsh to people who aren't willing to put in a small amount of work to see if their question has already been answered. There *is* Google for searching the forums. It won't pick up on the most recent posts, but it will find anything older than about a day -- whenever the last time the Google bot visited, which is quite often. Using Google will answer most people's questions within minutes. It's a shame that people aren't willing to spend those few minutes to do a search but instead compose a message that will waste everyone else's time.)

SvK, what do you think about the possible stickytude of this thread? Or just the FAQ itself. Or we just keep bumping until the cows come home. Hopefully bumping with new questions and answers for the FAQ. I've heard rumors that people don't read stickies and if they're not even reading the first page of posts, then having this be a sticky is probably not even going to be helpful. Some people just aren't going to accept help unless it comes in the form they want it and that means holding them by the hand and walking them through the process step by step. Sigh. Maybe we could start a consulting firm and charge money to teach people how to mod?

Anyway, with the recent discovery of custom loading screens, I thought I would put together a little FAQ bit on them. Please use it if you like or I can delete it if you think it's inappropriate.

---

Q: How do I make a custom loading screen for my map?

A: Create a thrilling 800 x 600, 1024 x 768, or whatever size you'd like in that ratio 24-bit .tga file (a 32-bit .tga might work as well, but the alpha channel will be ignored) that captures the essence of your map for all to see. Note that the top and bottom 10% (approximately) will be blacked out and the Dawn of War logo will be superimposed in the upper left corner so leave some restful space for it (for instance, don't put your map name in the upper left corner) and don't put anything important in the bottom 10% (approximately). You don't have to include your map name at all, you can put whatever graphic goodness you want, a screenshot, a tactical map (for instance, like the ones in the single-player campaign) or anything out of your wicked imagination. It's entirely optional; if someone doesn't use your custom load screen, it will not effect online play with someone who does. It's purely cosmetic.

Where do I put it? In the X:$DOWDIRECTORY$\W40K\Data\scenarios\mp\loading\ directory. If you don't have a "loading" directory in your "mp" directory, go ahead and make one. The name of the file must be "mapname.tga" (where mapname is the exact name of your map, minus the .sgb extension) which can be confusing as this is the same name as the underpainting layer of your map, so keep them separate.

---

Rymafyr, you're a precious gem in this pile of gravel. I don't know what we'd do without you. Anything we can do to make your life easier and more comfortable -- so you can spend more time working out the mysteries of the development tools -- is time well spent. I am at your service.

Love,

Hanna

[deggy]

Hello... Relic...?

Relic doesn't run these forums even though they are the official Relic forums. Please look to the moderators if you wish to sticky something.

And Rymafyr, you rock! You are far and away the largest and most positive contributor to this tools forum and I want you to know how much we appreciate it! And the heads on the pole? Nice!

Later!
-chris

[Rymafyr]

Thanks everyone,

One thing I've always run into on forums are that those, who have the info, tend not to divulge the info. That's not always the case I know, and I've had to fight the urge sometimes given the repetition of some questions, but I decided to share anything I learned whenever I learned it.

Especially after banging my head against the wall for the first day or two on the whole static mesh thing, it was obvious this wasn't going to be an easy 'row to hoe', as the old farmer would say. I've definately been wrong and always welcome to have that pointed out.

Everyone has contributed in their own way, thanks Hanna for the info above. But people like Tebrey, Beroc, and all the others who were really pushing at moding DoW before the tools were released inspired me a lot. And to see the people from Relic answer questions tirelessly, Totmacher and Deggy come to mind. I can't code, though I am quite the analytical thinker and I have good art skills, though I can't relate to drawing on a computer. This was something I could do.

And by all means everyone: Contribute to this FAQ. No matter how insignificant a problem may seem, post it here so there can be that running sum total of knowledge.

Funny thing is, we'll always have new modders coming on the forums and asking the same questions. Good. I'm still going to do my best to answer those questions. I'm also going to keep plugging away til I come to a fuller understanding of the the toolsets, or at least those I want to use.

Deggy, could you take a look here, if you haven't seen it yet: http://forums.relicnews.com/showthr...7589#post737589

BobtheDespoiler is having an odd occurrance with the ME the root of which seems to be a problematic dll. Though that is solely a guess on my part from the info he provided.
Thanks.

[Edit:] Added another question concerning the OE to the first post.

[Hanna]

Here's a link to monoRAIL's excellent tutorial on how to make detail textures, but the same concept applies to decals with one important difference: decals need to have one pixel (at least) of pure transparent alpha on the edges or you will get weird smearing from them.

http://forums.relicnews.com/showthread.php?t=48769

[Rymafyr]

That's a very good point to post about Hanna, ( as my first couple of decals didn't have that, ahem...) Thanks Svk for stickying the post, I'm sure it will be invaluable.

[GriNGoLoCo]

Hello Rymafyr, and congrats on the great FAQ! Pretty useful.

Hello everyone I might as well ask this here since no one has brought up the topic yet. Does anyone get an error while trying to patch to 1.20? I have the mod tools installed before that, so I guess those are the conflicts. ANybody else have this problem?

greetings!
GRiNGoLoCo

[Kendo]

Yes grin I had the same problem - and the reason for i I discovered it that I had extracted the sga's in the course of my modding attempts.

For some reason the patch takes these sgas as being corrupted and ont let you install the patch. The way to resolve this is to extract the .sgas from the cds cab files again. Or reinstall Dow which is the easier way - though longer.

[Rymafyr]

Other than I didn't know a new patch was available, (Don't play online is why), the solution is rather simple; Don't extract .sga's to your W40k folder for modding purposes. So again, even for making maps, it is actually better to have a mod folder set-up than to worry about moving all the files when a new patch is out.

Granted I double checked my W40k folder to make sure I didn't have any extracted files. I applied the patch without any problem; just so things were consistent and up to date I re-extracted the necessary .sga's to my mod's folder.

If I'd been modding in the W40k folder, oh the number of files I would have to remember to move. Not so many If I were making maps but even remembering to move that one special texture you made could cause a world of hurt.

[John_Mirra]

Mission editor would crash on start-up after patching the game (something about insufficient memory). Uninstalled and reinstalled the mod tools and got it working again. No idea why, might be related to other peoples problems so posted in case this saves someone the hassle of reinstalling DoW.

[gadom]

another question for the faq:
how could i put mods working together
in fact how i can create a bat and a module file so that i don't need to edit each module?

[Rymafyr]

gadom,

That is an excellent question, (looks at the first post Q&A). I thought I had something from Beroc posted there concerning this, hmmm. Well, time to see if I saved that link or if Google can find the post I'm thinking of.

One thing of particular note will be that I'm sure not all mod's will play well with one another. Mod's may have lot's of trouble when modifications are being made to the four basic races, or I would think. An example would be two mods involving Space Marines where changes affect say the Force Commander. You may not get but one of these mod's effects to work. Speculation, yeah a little; rational, very much so.

Hmmm, can't seem to find the reference I wanted. Let me try to remember...

Ok, basically from what I remember of Beroc's post what you may want to try is to make a new mod and all the files and folders that go along with doing that. This mod (whatever you end up calling it) is just going to be a container for other mod's.

You still install the other mod's you want normally but with this container mod you would modify the .module file to include the others you want together. At the bottom of the module file you would just add the mod's this container mod would also use. Here's what that would look like:

;; List of MODs that this MOD requires to work

;; You want to uncomment the below line and put 'W40k'
;; if you want to require the core data for your mod
RequiredMod.1 = W40k
RequiredMod.2 = mod1
RequiredMod.3 = mod2

And so on where mod1 and mod2 respectively are the names of the mods you are adding to this container mod. I'm pretty sure I'm missing something but try it out.

[Hanna]

The naming of maps and why it is so important for all of us to follow a conventional structure: the same conventional structure.

Map Name (X)
Xp_map_name_author_name.sgb

(Where "X" is the number of starting points, i.e. the number of players)

Towards a Common Map Naming Scheme

Love,

Hanna

[Palii]

The community is going crazy and now getting tired of the lack of tutorials and documentation. Our team decided to write up tutorials on the modding we did so far and that is working. 3 Tutorials are up already, and more will come. Expect tutorials on programming, 3d and in-game implementation.

Tutorials:
http://ageofsquat.com/
Thread:
http://forums.relicnews.com/showthread.php?t=53427

[Rymafyr]

Pali,

Nothing but admiration and respect for getting this to the community. Let everyone know who contributed how much we thank them.

[bandersnatch]

Q3) Is it possible to pull models out of the game?
A3) No. Some models have been provided by Relic for the mod community to learn from in making their own.

where can i find these models to download?

[nuriel_xavier]

when you download the mod tools, search around in the datageneric and data and datasrc folders in the modtools folder

[monoRAIL]

Hanna worked out the font and drop shadow that Relic used for their minimap numbers. I reckon this should go in the FAQ as it's vital info if you want your maps to look good.

The Font:
Tahoma Regular, 9.5pt, auto-leading, 100% height, 100% width. Color: white

The Drop-Shadow
Layer Effect: Drop Shadow, Blend Mode: Normal (Color: black), Angle 135 degrees, Distance: 2px, Spread: 0%, Size 0px; Quality: Contour: um, the diagonal one, nothing fancy, Anti-aliased: no, noise: 0%; Layer Knocks Out Drop Shadow: True (check).

Once again - all credit to Hanna for working this out!

[Hanna]

And for my next trick...

Oh, but first, here is a link to the post where it explains my saga of trying to match Relic's sneaky font and you can download a psd (photoshop file) with the font all done up right on a layer so you can just drag it onto your own custom map icon without having to do any work other than changing the number.

http://forums.relicnews.com/showpost...87&postcount=5

Okay, today I was thinking about fog and skyboxes and how it is sometimes hard to get the right fog value to blend in perfectly with the skyboxes. So, I went through each skybox and used the photoshop eyedropper to get the value of the color of the lower portion of the sky and then theoretically if you just make your fog color the same as that RGB value, your fog will blend in pefectly with the sky as if there were no difference between the two. This assumes that you don't have your fog set so far back that it shows the edge of the sky. Some skyboxes don't extend low enough and you will see a black seam show through. There's nothing you can do about that except to avoid using those skyboxes or have the black seams show through. But generally, you can set the fog back just far enough (not too far) so it covers the back of the skybox and then however far you set it forward is how much fog there will be. Experimenting with the two settings is good, because you can get all sorts of different environments with just the two settings.

So, here is the list of the skyboxes and the RGB values that I picked for fog. (See note at end about the *s.)

City Sky (R: 211, G: 183, B: 142)
Gray Sky (R: 96, G: 94, B: 96)
Green Sky (R: 42, G: 255, B: 0)
Jungle Sky (R: 120, G: 120, B: 0)
MP_SKY_01 (R:185, G: 147, B: 94)*
WH_M02 (R: 187, G: 101, B: 41)
WH_SKY_01 (R: 223, G: 190, B: 112)*
WH_SKY_02 (R: 234, G: 182, B: 112)
WH_SKY_03 (R: 234, G: 182, B: 112)
WH_SKY_03A (R: 172, G: 61, B:11)*
WH_SKY_04 (R: 250, G: 175, B: 66)
WH_SKY_05 (R: 148, G: 149, B: 206)
WH_SKY_06 (R: 137, G: 135, B: 178)
WH_SKY_07 (R: 148, G: 148, B: 206)
WH_SKY_08 (R: 137, G: 43, B: 19)*
WH_SKY_09 (R: 159, G: 70, B: 46)
WH_SKY_10 (R: 129, G: 45, B: 21)
WH_SKY_11 (R: 98, G: 0, B: 0)
WHITE_SKY (R: 247, G: 252, B: 247)
MISSING_SKY (R: 142, G: 125, B: 8)**



* Eyedropper showed several values that all could have been applied but this was what looked best to me.

** 'Scuse me while I puke on this sky.

So, any of the skyboxes that have an asterisk after the RGB value have more than one RGB value that could have been picked (mostly because they were lossy compressed somewhere along the line or they were dithered or just because they're weird) but it is a really small difference (like one number either way) so I just picked a nice one. I added all these to the custom color list in the color picker (Oh how I miss Mac OS X's color picker!) so I can just click on the one I want rather than looking them up on a list and typing in RGB values, but since it's something that's not done very often, it's not really an issue.

Anyway, you can use these color values and be assured a nice smooth transition between fog and skybox.

Don't ever use the MISSING_SKY. Please. I beg of you.

Hope someone finds this helpful.

Love,

Hanna

[Star Wars Kid]

Thanks Hanna!

[edit]

Here is my contribution to the FAQ: (thanks to Hanna for telling me how to do this in the first place)

Q: How do I access the official maps in the Mission Editor?

A: Use Corsix's SGA extractor: Link

Just load up the extractor, select file -> open, select W40kData.sga and hit open, right click on the data folder and select extract. Now go into the mission editor, go to open and look in the "C:/program files/thq/dawn of war/w40k/data/scenarios/mp" folder for whatever map you want to edit.

[monoRAIL]

How to take ingame screenshots without the cursor and minimap and other HUD stuff:

pause the game, line up the shot then:

ctrl+shift+~ (brings up the console)
taskbar_hide (gets rid of the minimap and all that stuff)
message_hide (gets rid of the Pause message)
cursor_hide (gets rid of mouse)

Ctrl+shift+~ to get rid of the console
Printscreen to take the shot.

Ctrl+shift+~
taskbar_show
message_show
cursor_show
Ctrl+shift+~

I can't remember who came up with this, I just found it in the maproom and thought it should be saved in the FAQ somewhere.

[monoRAIL]

Heightmap levels:



Save this image and keep it open in Photoshop when you're painting your heightmaps. You can use the eyedropper tool to grab the correct colors quickly.

[Ghoyst]

Here's my question.

How do we extract sound files for our own use, if it is possible, and how do we implament new sound effects onto new units?

[gadom]

Hi

i've create a thread about ucs range use by team (an another guy made the same things before, but his thread dissapear with him), so that mod could have safe range without fear that other mod will break their stuff down.
for information about ucs file go here:
http://forums.relicnews.com/showthread.php?t=53099

i'm sure that some team don't see it, cos the post climbs down. and will finish in the last page of the forum
so for avoid this and cos i've find no other idea, now if you want to request a range
the only place will be here:
http://amigomodteam.siteburg.com/php...forum.php?f=26

PS: we're still searching foreign language for help community to translate mod.
if someone is interesting the request is at the same place, look to amigomodteam forum
bye and thanks

[Hanna]

Here is a nice tutorial on how to make seamless textures in the Gimp which should easily be translated into use in Photoshop or another paint program that has the tools required in the tutorial.

These, along with the dds exporter (tutorial linked in this faq somewher) will make fantastic detail textures for your maps.

Love,

Hanna

[moenrg]

Hanna how did you get the mini map in 3 kings to not be distorted in the game. I looked at your picture (64x256) and the game does not stretch it to fit 256x256? Whenever I try this it gets stretched by the game engine and distorted. I know I'm missing something.

[Star Wars Kid]

Put a thin black border around your mm/icon.

[moenrg]

Thanks SWK, I knew I was missing some trick, I'll work on this.

[Hanna]

Yipes! I'm sorry Moenrg.

To add to that, you just have to put the border on the sides, not the top and bottom. Cause it's just the sides that bleed, so if you put a border (most people use black, but you could use any color) on just the sides that bleed, it'll still bleed, just it'll bleed the color you want, not the colors off the side of your map.

Good luck. Sorry I missed the question.

Yay for Star Wars Kid!

Love,

Hanna

[Dyselon]

Q: How do we extract the sound files for our own use?
A: .sga to .rat - The first thing you need to do is extract the sound files from the archive. For sfx, you're looking to extract root/W40k/W40kData-Sound-Full.sga, and for speech (probably what you're looking for), you want to extract root/W40k/Locale/<YourLanguage>/W40kData-Sound-Speech.sga. Extract them to root/ModTools/DataGeneric/My_Mod (*).

.rat to .wav - Now you have a bunch of .rat files, but what good do they do you? Unfortunetly, there's no current way to batch convert them to .wav. There is a ghetto way to grab sounds, though.
1. Open the audio editor.
2. Select File->Open Mod Project, and open My_Mod
3. Open Windows' Sound Recorder (Start -> Run -> sndrec32)
4. Find the sound you want to record in the audio editor.
5. Hit the record button in sound recorder.
6. Hit Play in the audio editor.
7. Hit stop in the sound recorder, and save your wav file.

(*) You could have extracted the sound archive anywhere, but into DataGeneric/My_Mod makes it easy to open in the audio editor later, and also won't interfere with any other mod projects you've got going.

Yays.

[Dyselon]

Q: How do we implement new speech onto new units?
A: It's not too tough. These steps assume you have a mod created already, and added to your pipeline.ini, etc.
1. Open the ebp .lua for your new unit.
2. Find or add the line similar to below.

GameData["ui_ext"]["speech_directory"] = "Speech/Races/Space_Marines/Servitor/"

3. Replace the path with the unit you're modelling the speech after. If it's a brand new unit, with brand new speech, then pick a path that you'll remember later.
4. Go to root/ModTools/<YourMod>/Sound/<PathYouCreatedInStep3>
5. Create a directory for each speech event you want to add (moving, selected, etc.) For a complete list of folders you might want to make, extract /root/W40k/Locale/English/W40kData-Sound-Speech.sga and look at the directories in /sound/speech/races/space_marines/force_commander.
6. Place your .wavs into all of the folders you just created. Placing more than one .wav into the folder will just make it randomly choose a sound when that event is triggered.
7. Open the audio editor, then open your mod.
8. Burninate your sounds, and you should be good to go!


Q: How do we implement new sfx onto new units?
A: This one's not horrendous either, but isn't anything like adding speech. This one assumes that you have your mod created, you've already imported a model into the Object Editor and your motion tree is set up.
1. Open the OE and your ebp.
2. Open the Event List rollout, click New, and name your new event. I recommend "sound_something" to stay consistent with Relic.
3. Open the Event Properties rollout. Click <add parameter> and select Sound from the Param drop down.
4. Select Value and type a path where you will later add your sfx.
5. Open the Anims/Motions/Actions rollout, and select the motion you want to add the sound to.
6. Open the Motion Properties rollout, and select your event from the drop down in the events frame. Click add, and save your ebp.

Whew.

[Master Azrael]

Nice thread and FAQ guys.
I just have one question:
Everytime I try to test a map, ME mimalises and nothing happens. When i then look at the debug window it's saying that the map needs to be resaved although I just did it. I did have starting positions and sp etc and so on. It's quite annoying so please help :argh:

[Star Wars Kid]

The test map function in the mission editor doesn't work if I remember correctly. Just load up DoW and test your map in skirmish mode.

Also make sure you have your map saved in the proper place.

[Master Azrael]

Tried skrimisch mode and that worked. Thanx. Btw you can't cave out of the MOD folder since then ME says target location is out of...

[Hanna]

I've tried to document the process of making a custom map icon and custom minimap.

http://forums.relicnews.com/showpost...95&postcount=2

Love,

Hanna

[jesukrixto]

As stated in the very first post in this thread, questions without answers shouldn't be posted in this thread. This is a FAQ thread...if you post a question and nobody answers, it kind of defeats the purpose of the thread.

Edit: this post, together with all the non-FAQ posts should be deleted from here.

[Danimator]

Can I please just comment on the opening suggestion:

" 1) Read the ‘readme.txt’ file provided by relic with the mod tools and do what it says by following the instructions given to set up your own mod folder and files."

I wonder if you could check out whether there is some flaw/mistake in the readme supplied with the tools by Relic.

I followed their instructions very carefully but ended up with duplicated AI, Art & Attrib folders outside of my main Mod Data folder. These folders contained most of the Lua files needed to make a Mod work with the AI, Art and Attrib folers inside my Data folder holding very little.

After much frustration that my altered Lua files were having no effect I downloaded all the tools again onto my laptop again following the readme file even more carefully - same effect, same folder layout as the sga files were extracted by the Mod packager tool into my by now re-named Mod folder.

Again more frustration as I had no idea what I was doing wrong and why my alterations were having no effect. Please bear in mind that I am a complete newcomer to this and while experienced modders would have noticed the fault straight away, I was simply following instructions as best I could.

Anyway it slowly dawned on me as I read more and more posts that it must be a error in the folder layout and asked Legacy (thanks) to confirm that I needed to alter the folder layout which he confirmed. I merged the duplicated ai, art and attrib folders within the data folder and presto all my mods started to work straight away.

The point is I am still not 100% sure if I made the same mistake twice in unpacking the files or whether there is a fundimental ommission or mistake in the readme instructions. For the sake of all the new modders yet to come can you please check why duplicate files were unpacked in this way. It does say:

"In this browser select the folder you created for your MOD (e.g.C:\Program Files\THQ\Dawn of War\My_Mods\)." for where to extract your files to.

Should it say:

"In this browser select the folder you created for your MOD (e.g.C:\Program Files\THQ\Dawn of War\My_Mods\Data)." ?

If it is my bad then please excuse me but I would appreciate you clearing this up if possible.

Keep up the great posts and thanks in advance.

p.s. Huge apologies if this has been covered before but I have never seen it and have read most of the forum.

[Danimator]

*Bump*

Sorry no-one has commented on this because it could be adversely affecting dozens even hundreds of people.

I have now established by trial and error and with help for a few others that the readme is wrong (or not detailed enough) and that the sga files must be extracted into your:

C:\Program Files\THQ\Dawn of War\My_Mods\Data

and not your

C:\Program Files\THQ\Dawn of War\My_Mods\

folders or any mods you make to your lua files will have no effect whatsoever.

Even after I picked up on where the fault lay and merged the duplicated folders this incorrect extraction of files caused - which got the Lua mods actually working - I still had lots of trouble with the OE which refused to open any EBP files.

Only with much help from Rough Rider did I get the OE working at all.

Is there any way that some-one with contacts with relic can get the readme amended?

Sorry to harp on about this but it needs addressing.