Always start a fresh campaign, if you mod anything?

[EatYerGreens]

Or, to rephrase the question,
1) will meddling with UNITPROD and other files lead to gamesave corruption?
2) If it does, but you exit the game, undo the changes, restart the game and reload a save made before the alterations, will it work properly again?

Case (2) would be for purposes of making experimental changes but using a campaign in progress so that changes to units known to be already present can be seen immediately, without requiring some hours of playtesting to build up the required tech level.

I'm sure I've raised this before but perhaps not in the right place, so I'll try here. I've also seen the same question embedded within threads about other things but it would be better if a clear cut answer could be given in a thread with this title.

I don't think a simple 'yes' or 'no' fully answers the question, either. There are numerous files which can be edited, so I would prefer to see specifics like "editing file X.txt is okay but editing file Y.txt is a no-no".

I'm posting this after just having read the "Hero Creator" thread and it was mentioned how changing DEFAULT_HEROES can lead to corruption (return to startpos but player is the rebels...).

If I've overlooked some modding basics, like you're always supposed to create an extra directory and clone the txt files before altering them, then you are welcome to set me straight.

[EatYerGreens]

I'm still waiting for an answer on this one. Where have all the regular modders gone to?

I have this theory that all the things you might want to edit "on the fly" are, in fact, read only once, when you launch a new campaign game and, thereafter, are read from the savegame file, not the campaign file or the prod files.

My problem is that I'm enjoying my 'test-run' campaign so much that I don't want to risk file corruption by making changes at this time, though there are things I would like to test, just that it takes many turns of play to develop the tech levels required to see the changes I've made in action. Any amount of autoplay might still fail to achieve what I'm looking to do. So, enjoying the gameplay is stopping me making further progress on experimentatal changes, "just in case". ANy advice to the contrary would be most appreciated.

[Aenarion]

I would like to answer to this question, but I'm still a beginner in modding, so I don't wish to guide u to the wrong direction!

[EatYerGreens]

I would like to answer to this question, but I'm still a beginner in modding, so I don't wish to guide u to the wrong direction!

I had to have a quiet chuckle to myself at your skilfully worked non-answer! Reminded me that one needs to be circumspect about dishing out advice or suggestions about modding. Anything one is able to think up, as a 'plausible' answer but hasn't actually tested out for oneself, could badly screw things up for someone else.

Still, it's good to know that there are others out there actually reading this forum, looking for the same answers.

As it happens, I've answered this question for myself. I went ahead with some changes, returned to the campaign gamesave and it loaded okay, with no apparent data corruption.

As for the changes themselves, one data item initially prevented the game loading and I had to make further, incremental changes, as and when internal errors became apparent.

I'm about 90% done on successfully adding a new agent unit but it's not particularly crucial to gameplay and done merely as an exercise in finding out what is required to make it work. I'll start a thread about it, shortly. I'm convinced there used to be a thread about agent creation but when I seached, very few references came up. (I think recent forum servicing caused search to be temporarily disabled though).

I still think that certain fundamental changes will cause severe problems in an ongoing test campaign though. For instance, I changed stats for ships, adding one movement point to all the types (so the long-distance models retained their advantage). I now have second thoughts about this change (coastal range ships given movement allowance of 2 gained access to deep sea areas, before compass discovery, for some reason) but worry that unit properties get stored in gamesaves and a change back to default may trigger erorrs.

So, for now, a qualified, "yes, modding on the fly is possible".

[Suraknar]

Hello,

If memory serves, yes in MTW you had to restart a campaign after any modifications.

It does not lead to Gamesave coruption to do otherise it just may lead to a CDT...since as you have gathered much information is saved in the savegame after being processed (parsed?) from the files one mods...

So its creats incompatibility...

I would suggest strongly to refer to this Guide, it also contains Q&A.

Guide to Modding

Also if you are not getting many answers in questions, please do not take this personally, modding is Interest driven and closelly attached to the latest Hype or Game one plays...its also a question of, as I call it, "frame of mind", every game has different moding approach(Graphics system, file System, Scripting etc), one has to, at times, "forget" how to mod a previous game in order to get in to the moding spirit of a new game...and going back and forth is not as easy, hence the documented Guides and the purpose of Forums such as these.

On top of it, with BI out this is a transitionary perriod, many are actually in the process of both playing and mod testing the new possibilities of BI, I myself, not having BI yet, have to rely much on the already documented threads about learning to Mod RTW... fortunently there is much available...

So I do empathise with your situation here, yet I do suggest any novice Modding groop of MTW, band together, try to answer one another, the modders before you had to discover the game, you only have to discover their threads for answers :)

You guys are the new "experts" on the matter anyways!

EDIT: Ah yes for your dillema, a solution would be to create a backup of your curently modded files alloong with your savegame, that way you can proceid making other changes and learn, and whenever you want to go back to that campaign just reinstall the backed up files. :)

[EatYerGreens]

Many thanks for taking the trouble to reply. You explained something which would not have occurred to me, otherwise. Namely, interest in RTW/BI having drawn the modders of old away from MTW. I own neither of the newer programs and not sure I have any interest in them either. Whilst one might glean subtle clues from reading the threads about it, I should imagine the differences in game architecture would make a fair bit of it inapplicalbe, or inappropriate, to try similar things in the older program.

Incidentally, the Modding Guide thread you linked to is merely a single post, containing an index of a guide Duke John was working on at the time (2004). Not only did he never get around to writing the chapters this was going to provide links to, the links in this post (only two of those) give "404 error" because the URLs are still set to a previous incarnation of the org's forum software and the thread id numbers are no longer valid.

Duke John is still an active member but I suspect he is one of those who was drawn away to the RTW engine.

Like you say, it is down to us 'noobs' to start working things out for ourselves and sharing ideas and solutions. I'm prepared to do this, it's just it wasn't what I originally came to this forum area for. I'll get over it.