Please note: due to the release of the New Creature Framework, this tutorial is semi-redundant. Thanks to Kronos1000, crazypill, sfidanza and everyone else who made adding new creatures possible!

Adding Creatures Tutorial By Kronos1000

Hello and welcome to my tutorial I’ll explain how this works. :?: means a question of course it isn’t in this guide, but they are in other guides. :!: means IMPORTANT these are things you’ll have to keep in mind while you’re creating your Mod.

This font is used as a place for a scripting example

There are no scripts in this guide, but there are some in other guides.

Before you start you must know that this is not a tutorial for people who don’t have experience with the Map Editor and Modding, if you do you won’t have problems using this guide. ;-)

:!: When I say copy it into a new folder you must edit the things I say in the new file, not in the game’s original files :!:

All right, first you need to open the map editor and create a new map, or you can also use an existing map if you want one on your map. Now place a creature on the Map. Select your creature and press ctrl+Space and select the browse button at the shared tab. Create a new folder and copy the file into your new folder.

Note: If you want to use existing textures just skip the next part for those who have textures ready just read on

Now near the top you see Model select browse there. Now copy the file again and put it into a new folder, select your copied file and copy the skeleton and geometry files also in new folders. ll right copy the material file(s) in a new folder and copy the texture file(s) also in a new folder. (How many depends on the Model of the creature you want to use) Now press ok a few times until you’re back in the Editor and go to the Heroes of Might and Magic folder DO NOT CLOSE THE EDITOR!!! go to Editor/H5MMods/Map name/_Model add the textures you already have in this folder as a DDS format, open the data.pak file or a1-dat.pak file this depends on your creature and place all files in the _Model folder where the model of the creature is you want to use copy all the files in there except the files you already have. Now edit them to link to your files. Now place your textures also in the Textures folder (Not in the folder itself, but where the .(Textures).xdb file is)

All right if you skipped the Texture part pick up here again. If you haven’t done it already go to Heroes of Might and Magic V/Editor/H5MMods/Map name/ DON’T CLOSE THE EDITOR!!! Now from the Data or a1-data.pak file you need to copy these files: MapObjects\_(AdvMapObjectLink)\Monsters\…\Monster.xdb, MapObjects\_(AdvMapSharedGroup)\Monsters\Any.xdb and MapObjects\_(AdvMapSharedGroup)\Monsters\Level_x.xdb x = the level you want your moster to be. Now in the first file just give a link to your shared file, in the second one add your shared file to there now your monster should appear if a Random monster of any level is placed and in the third file also link to your shared file there. Now we’ll check out some interesting files, go to the a1-data.pak file and copy GameMechanics/CreatureVisual/Creatures/…/Monster.xdb

Note: You need to edit this file only if you want to edit icons or name bio etc. I don’t provide help on that one.

No go to GameMechanics/Creature/Creatures/…/Monster.xdb This is my favourite file you can edit stats cost spells everything here, just don’t forget to link to the shared and the CreatureVisual file. Now we’re going to deal with a file that most people don’t know of it’s the refTable file! Copy the GameMechanics/refTables/Creatures.xdb file and give your creature a name, for example CREATURE_MAGMA_ELEMENTAL in this file and link that name to the Creature file in the GameMechanics folder this one: /GameMechanics/Creature/Creatures/…/Monster.xdb#xpointer(/Creature) Now when you’re done with this one we’re going to work with a really long file the Types.xml you can find it in the a1p1-data.pak file place it in your map’s folder outside another folder (I mean directly in the Editor/H5MMods/Mapname) Open it with Front Page for example or any other xml editor and search for CREATURE_ for example and you’ll find the list of creatures add the same name as you used in the refTable to this file.

Once you’re done you can edit another file, but it’s not neccicary if you are a scripter you can edit the scripts/common.lua and add the same name as in the refTables and give it a number 117 for example, but you needn’t do this if you never use those numbers. We’re almost done go back to the Editor save and press the reload map button go back to your creatures shared file and go to creature underneath and you’ll see that your creature’s name is in the list now, but now you’re on a place where I’ve been stuck for a long time. The final issue is in the exe file where you need to add the creature to the list so what we need is a Hex editor I use Hex Workshop and a Russian Exe file wich is unprotected this doe not mean the Russian game, because you have the Text.pak of your languege ;) (I’m not sure if I’m allowed to post it, but it requires a NoCD to work if you have another language, that’s what makes me unsure) So if you’ve got it go to offset: 0x4aCB50 and edit the signed byte from 117 to 118 to add one new creature if you want to add more change it to 119 for two new ones 120 for three new ones etc. This is the Total number of creatures in HoF, now do the same at offset 0×495861.

:!:Use the same number or it’ll cause your exe file crash:!:

Congratulations! You finally added a full new Creature without replacing 8-)

Oh and by the way if you want to see my new creature, you can download it here: http://files.filefront.com/Magma+Elementalzip/;8094611;/fileinfo.html

modding_tutorials/adding_creatures.txt · Last modified: 2008/01/20 18:58 by gnoll_mage
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