Modding

A lot of things below are guesstimates, please modify and correct as you explore new possibilities.

Modding
Have you ever been put off by inability to create existing items from existing resources? Like, why not a punt from leathers and slender trunks? Or fishing rod from slender trunk and a cord/rope?

With the patch 3.13 comes the opportunity to mod.

Modding guidelines
Obviously, modding can make game so easy it would become boring. You can make food from rocks or scimitars from branches. But that would take a lot of fun out of the game. Yes, cheating is sometimes good way to make yourself familiar with the game process - trial and error is more often than not frustrating, but main fun comes from following the rules (even the unwritten ones).

So, I'd say, main modding guideline is - be realistic. Obviously, you cannot cook soup from an axe. Well, unless you add some vegetables, maybe some condiments, a couple of pieces of meat, etc, and leave the axe for futher cooking. But that is beside the point, or exactly the point.

Other guideline is - don't be too realistic. The real-life process of creating a flour wouldn't be just grinding grain between stones, and not under rain for sure. Still, any game has some conventions. This is not a strict guideline, you can be as realistic as the game permits, if that is what makes the game exciting for you.

Modding basics
As the game docs say:

"Currently it's possible to mod plants, do-it-yourself items, build-it-yourself constructions and cookery recipes. A modding guide will follow, but while waiting for that a spontaneous exploration of modding possibilities can be started from these files:

diy_*.*             - do-it-yourself items biy_*.*             - build-it-yourself constructions flora_*.*           - plants cookery_*.*         - cookery recipes"

You can add your own diy_additional.txt file (game comes with diy_glossary.txt) and it will be caught up by the game. You can modify game files, but why risk that if you can create your own, and delete them if something goes wrong.

An example
In an additional diy_*.* file (for example diy_mymods.txt) put the following:

[SUBMENU_START:utility article] .Fishing rod. *CARPENTRY* /120/      %30% |-1| {Slender trunk} [remove] {Cord} [remove] {Axe}  {Knife} [SUBMENU_END:utility article] And you will be able to use Make>Utility Articles and Carpentry menus to create your own fishing rod.

Some explanations
[SUBMENU_START:utility article] ... [SUBMENU_END:utility article] These surround a submenu, which you can name, or use existing name. Here name is "utility article" and an option is added to Make>Utility Articles menu. Note, that for now you can only create submenus for Make and Cookery menu. New submenus are defined in menudef_*.* files. You can still use existing menu of Building, though you cannot add new submenus there.

.Fishing rod. It is a direct reference to an item, game mostly recognizes every item by it's name, not by some internal ID. You can put number of items created in parentheses.

*CARPENTRY* This is *parent menu*, *COMMON* being not linked to any skill, but to *Shift-M* Make menu, *CARPENTRY* being linked to new Carpentry skill, *COOKERY* is Cookery, etc.

/120/ This is the time in minutes to create an item. It can also be spelled as /2h/, according to latest release notes.

\120\ Variation of previous - how long would it take item to be ready - i.e. after you finished preparing eat. \16d\ would mean 16 days.

%30% |-1| Confirmed with the game author: %30% is a boost to a skill used. So if your skill level is 42 in this example it's boosted to 42+30 = 72. This is used to have some easy-to-make items easily done even if the skill itself isn't too high.

skill increases rather fast. :148:
 * num| varies between -2 to 2 and it's a factor how fast the used skill increases upon doing this task. |-1| means that the skill is rarely improved, |2| would mean that the task requires high expertise thus the

This is a position of of item's icon (or serie of icons for flora) in a bigsprite.png file.

Ingredients:

{Slender trunk} Item in curved bracket is required for recipe. It can be a direct indication of specific item, like {Cord} or a generalisation like {Tying equipment}

[remove] Action performed to the item. [remove] means, that item is removed by one or number in brackets. (10) [remove] Means that ten items are removed.

It is also possible to remove part of an item: {Leather} #0.5# [remove] This means that 0.5 lbs of leather are removed. Other square brackets modifiers include, but are probably not limited to: [patchwise] This means that #the amount# of {ingredient} is multiplied by selected number of items. [patch:5] in the first line of description means you can make maximum 5 items at a time, [patch] means you can select any number. [boil] [bake] [roast] All of these modifiers indicate requirement for fire (fire/hot stove and pot required, hot stove required, open fire required respectively) to be nearby. [optional] Indicates an optional ingredient. It is not assured whether this actually affects quality of the final product, but probably the amount enclosed in #s is somehow added. [name:%s thingy] This would modify the name of a final item. For example thingy made of {rock} will be "rock thingy" in this example. %s copies the name in curved brackets.

Mods
Cooking mods

Do it yourself mods

Build it yourself mods

Flora mods