How to mod the game?

[Armchairgeneral20]

Hi! I have three questions:

1. How do I add new buildings (armories, arsenals etc) in a region at the start of a scenario?

2. How do I change the cost of the Virginia Powder Mills event, which is too expensive (for 300 money and 75 War Supply you gain only 2 Powder Mills)?

3. How do I add new structures to an already existing industrialization event?

Thanks in advance for you answers!

[Captain_Orso]

Hi Armchairgeneral20 ... welcome to the...forums?!?! anyway....

*psst* If you don't know it, but we have a very prominent member in the forums named ArmChairGeneral, so... it is kind of odd.

Hi! I have three questions:

Well, good for you!!

Firstly, probably most of your question are already answered in the modding forum: Modding AGE engine games, but lets have a look anyway.

But, if you plan on doing any modding, large or small, you will definitely have to become acquainted with that forum.

1. How do I add new buildings (armories, arsenals etc) in a region at the start of a scenario?

Create a new scenario, by copying and editing a scenario from the database files (you could write it from scratch, but that would be for masochists)--check the aforementioned forum for details--add the additional structure to the city in question.

You could also simply add it per event.

2. How do I change the cost of the Virginia Powder Mills event, which is too expensive (for 300 money and 75 War Supply you gain only 2 Powder Mills)?

I believe you would have to change the event which sets the options up. Probably 'OptionsInd_Feb62.sct' or 'OptionsInd_July61.sct' or both, which are found in '..\CivilWarII\CW2\Events\'. Look for event 'evt_nam_CSA_Virginia_PowderMills_ON'.

3. How do I add new structures to an already existing industrialization event?

You would have to change the event with fires through selecting an option. Simply add the structure being spawned in the wished location.

Thanks in advance for you answers!

Glad to be of help

[Philippe]

Since we're on the subject of modding, I'm going to be taking another look at my ACW flag and music mod over the next few weeks.

I only have the Steam version of the game, which can cause problems because there are often slight differences between the directories of non-Steam Matrix games and the Steam versions.

The path in the Steam version is basically C:\Program Files (x86)\Steam\SteamApps\common\Civil War II\CW2.

The first part of that path (C:\Program Files(x86)) will probably vary depending on which version of Windows you are running, so I always tell people to install my Steam mods to wherever Steam is installed on their systems, and use the first Steam folder as the first folder in the mod. So in the case of the current version of my Steam-only ACW mod that would be Steam\SteamApps\common\Civil War II\CW2.

The problem is that the non-Steam version is probably going to have a slightly different path at the tail end, and the difference will usually be easy to overlook.

Leaving aside the issue of which Matrix games folder the whole thing gets installed into (C:\Matrix Games as opposed to C:\Program Files(x86)\Matrix Games), could someone confirm to me what the last part of the non-Steam path is?

I remember one Matrix - Steam conversion where the difference between the two was as slight as the use of an ampersand instead of the word and. That kind of insidious difference is exactly enough to make a mod not work, and when I eventually release the next version of my mod I would like to release a Steam and non-Steam version (which is what I do with all of my other mods).

[Armchairgeneral20]

Thanks for your reply, Captain_Orso. It was very useful.

Philippe, I think that the best way to mod a game you have on Steam is to copy the said game outside the Steam folder. At least this is what I did.

[Philippe]

Thanks your kind reply.

I wasn't asking how to do it. I was asking what the non-Steam path equivalent is to

C:\Program Files (x86)\Steam\SteamApps\common\Civil War II\CW2.

The Thirty Years War game is a good example of what I'm worried about.

In Steam the game folder's name is Thirty Years' War. In the non-Steam version it's Thirty Years War.

That apostrophe is incredibly easy to overlook, and if it's included in a mod for the non-Steam version, the mod won't work.