the curve is medium-ish in my opinion, its not gonna be easy, but you wont be bending over backwards to figure it out if you have some computer experiance.

if you enjoy makeing new things happen, like flying your own models in space, then you will prob love modding. then again, if you have a short attention span and get bored easily, modding might not be your thing.

the nice thing about modding is that its pretty easy to understand once you get used to it, but the bad thing is that if you press a wrong key without realising it, nothing will work, which means you retrace your steps a couple times, and possibly go to your backup files and start over.

i recently got my first mod working - by that i mean, solo, with no tutorials - and it took about 2 solid days to get everything working, but wow, i felt like i owned the world when i got to show up in manhatten flying a nomad fighter. modding can get frustrating, but if you get a thrill from admiring your handywork, its defidently rewarding.

I agree tolwyn, I just started... and it's a bit of a puzzle at first, but there are a lot of really good posts and tutorials here that will really help you on you way...

after that it's just great fun.... I was especially proud when I got my own names and infocards (the little stories) working for ships and weapons...

good luck!

thanks guys.
i'm inspired!

kumari "Why can't we all just... get along?"

Hello everyone, i was wondering if i can get a straight forward answer to a simple question, My question is this: How do I start a mod by hand?

I just want to do some basic things for now and later advance to the more advanced things such as creating new systems, i've used flexplorer for system creation before but i've had some unpredictable results as i'm sure you've seen in my earlier postings, it was sugested that i start do some modding by hand but i don't know how to even begin something like that.

thanx for any help i get.

@roganaffa - WHY don't you just read the tutorials here? Why is it we even HAVE tutorials here if these questions get asked over and over. "umm dudes. HOW do i mod. Someone tell me." WTF kind of question is that? You want someone to give you the cliff notes on FL modding? LOL. Go read the tutorial section and you will answer your own question.

Baene

I have been reading the tut's and they all start with modefying an excisting file, how about something totaly new, with out modefying an excisting file, that's what my question comes down to.

@roganaffa: Sorry if I wasn't that clear in the other thread. The fact is that almost everything you'll mod in FL is in a file that already exists. If you're not moding something that exists you're making something new that has the same properties as an already existing file.
Take Baene's area of expertise, ship building. Those are completely new items being added to FL, however he has to understand how the file hierarchy in FL works in order to get them in the game. He follows the same exact entry design as the other ships that were already in FL. So your best bet is to start by looking at files that exist and making modifications to them.
Like I said in the other thread, start with a gun. First modify an existing gun to fire faster/slower/farther, do more damage/less damage, etc. Once you've got a hang of that move on to missiles, where you'll find yourself working with more sections and you'll learn how the different entries interact with one another.
Once you feel confidant of how to mod a gun, make your own gun. Make it buyable at a base, try to take off with it, crash to desktop. Go back and spend 20 minutes staring at your entries in frustration until you figure out that one typo that messed you up, make corrections, take off, crash to desktop. Go back and spend 40 minutes staring at your entries, log on to TLR and spend 2 hours reading through the Newbie Questions threads, spot the missing line, make corrections, take off, fire your weapon and feel good even though it's a crap weapon that you'll just delete after spending 5 hours on it.
Get the point? Takes some time and alot of reading. I held your hand in the other thread because once I'd started I felt it wouldn't be right to stop. But now you're going to have to do what every one else does, read, read, and read some more.
Look at the Newbie Questions threads by AccuShot and Chips. They're easy to spot because the each have over 700 posts. In those you'll find examples of weapons, ships, bases, basically everything you could possibly want to make in FL. As a matter of fact I believe Accushot's first example is how to add a base by hand. Just what you were looking for.

Of course your right kaigogi it's just that ther's so many threads and questions and all different answers for the same question, i just don't how to make heads or tales out that mass of info, not enough info is bad but to much info also has the same effect, guess i'll just have to get a printer and try to print out some all that info, so's i can read it offline in my own time, the last comment from the other person was uncalled for though. cheers

Baene was a bit rude i thought

Edited by - roganaffa on 6/10/2004 9:22:50 PM

heh well i guess i'm just rude then. Your question was broad in it's scope, and aggravating to see for the 1000th time. We all started modding and learned here by asking SPECIFIC questions when we got stuck. Not things like "How do i make a mod from scratch" when all the info you'd ever need is right there.

First, figure out what you want to accomplish, then go to the forums and search for what you want to start. Pick a tutorial that makes a little sense to you, then try it out, using the SDK. I wasn't born to mod, i had to sift through piles of info just like you. I asked my questions when i couldn't find the answer, but i never once asked how do i make a mod from scratch, as that just isn't going to get people to help. Kaegogi is an exceptional person in that he responded to it trying to help you. (Kudos Kaegogi, you're a better man than i).

Seriously, there is a lot of info here, yes, i will agree with you there. BUT you didn't even have any direction when you asked that question. Be SPECIFIC and someone can and most likely will help you. But ask those questions like you did and you'll run into us rude people.

I do wish you luck now, hopefully some of the advice you were given will help you out.

Baene