Where do I start? [DON'T PUT THINGS INTO PAK FILES YOU DIDN'T MAKE YOURSELF!]

[CivBase]

I'm thinking about trying to learn how to mod BZ2.  The problem is, I have absolutely no experience with anything that you guys work with.  I have no modeling programs (and have never modeled), I can't read any form of code that would be used in the game, and the only game I know how to mod is RA2, which is incredibly easy to do.

So where could I start before starting my series of extremely annoying and possibly repetitious questions?

[Steeveeo]

The first thing I did when I learned to mod is to tweak existing weapons into something you like, its how I made my Railgun (base was the Blast), and my Pulse Laser (base was minigun).

In fact, its still how I make almost all of my weapons, I grab a base, like the Splinter, and turn it into something totally exotic, like a firebomb.

[CivBase]

So how do I do this?  Do I need any programs, or is there a file I can just mess with like RA2?

[Angstromicus]

Get the pack explorer from www.bzscrap.com and open data.pak from your bzII install dir. Look up the weapons, which should be under the race names (ISDF, Fury (scion)). Export a file and tell your operating system to open it with a basic text editor (such as Notepad, Word Pad, or Kwrite).

Although, it would help you a lot if you also got my bz2 weapons odf. It should be included in the latest mod log.

[CivBase]

Get the pack explorer from www.bzscrap.com and open data.pak from your bzII install dir.

I'm guessing the file is bz2extract.zip?

[Steeveeo]

I'm guessing the file is bz2extract.zip?

Thats the command line version, good for extracting all the stuff from a pack at once.

If you want individual files, get the one titled Pak Explorer.

[CivBase]

Although, it would help you a lot if you also got my bz2 weapons odf. It should be included in the latest mod log.

Not a clue what this is or where to get it....

I decided to mess with the AT-Stab first, and it's not working very well.
At weapons>isdf>cannons>gatstab I get two more folders, assault and combat.
Within each of these folders is the folowing:
assault - atstab_a.odf gastab_a.odf rocket_a.odf
combat - atstab_c.odf gastab_c.odf rocket_c.odf xstabcar_c.odf xstabgnd_c.odf

Here's my guess:
Assault is for heavy vehicles (two shots at once) and combat is for light vehicles (one shot at a time)
atstab_a/c.odf - The actual weapon effectiveness
gatstab_a/c.odf - No clue
rocket_a/c.odf - What the shot looks and sounds like
xstabcar_c.odf - What happens when the shot hits a vehicle or building
xstabgnd_c.odf - What happens when the shot hits the terraign

So, how close was I?

[Nielk1]

ap{NAME} means American Powerup {Name}
Since BZ1 American is the generic for all races powerups in stock.

g{name}_C and g{name}_A are the actual weapons, one is attached to a crate and they are listed as alternates of each other.

{name} is often the ordinance.

These are subject to be different, in fact, it is very common, but these are the base naming conventions.

[CivBase]

So what do, in this case, atstab, rocket, and the xstabcar/gnd do?

[Angstromicus]

To be honest, I have no idea where the modlog is hosted (at least publicly) :- (.

[Steeveeo]

So what do, in this case, atstab, rocket, and the xstabcar/gnd do?

atstab_<mode> is the ordnance, I dont know why rocket would be in there, but thats another ordnance. Xstabcar/gnd/bld are the ordnance explosion files, if you look in the ordnance ODF, you'll see 3 lines;

xplGround = ""
xplvehicle = ""
xplBuilding = ""

Basically self-explanitory on these entries.

[CivBase]

So, now I have a ton of questions, mainly to do with the 5th 6th and 7th paragraphs of the astab_a file (one at a time ).

ammoCost = 15 - 15 what?  I'm guessing each vehicle has a cirtain number for their ammo cap, but how do I find this?  The folder objects>ISDF>vehicles>ivtank has 15 files.  Which one do I pick?
lifeSpan = 1.5 // 150m - I'm guessing the 150m means that it has no effect after 150 meters in the game, but what does the 1.5 mean?
damageValue(N) = 150 // none // 300
damageValue(L) = 137.5 // light // 275
damageValue(H) = 125 // heavy // 250 - What does the N, L, and H mean?  none light and heavy must be armor grade, but what do the numbers mean?
damageValue(S) = 137.5 // standard // 275
damageValue(D) = 125 // deflection // 250
damageValue(A) = 150 // absorbtion // 300 -  Same with the others.  What does the S, D, and A mean?  I'm guessing standard is without a shield, deflection is with the deflection shield up, and absorbtion is with the obsorbtion shield up.  What do the numbers mean?  And are these scion while the other three were ISDF?
startColor = "0 64 127 64"
finishColor = "200 200 255 0" - What color system is this going off?  CMYK?  I kinda thought a computer game would run on RGB....
textureBlend = "srcalpha invsrcalpha modulatealpha" - Should I even ask?  They all end in alpha... that's got to mean something.  Scr, Inv, and Modulate...... no clue.

[Nielk1]

RBGA is the color system.

[CivBase]

Oh, I see.....
And I just realised that the letters NLHSDA match up with the words.
So, when I finish, how do I attach it as a mod? (preferably not over the actual rules)
For now I'll probably just be editing small things and seeing what changes.

So far, i've just extracted all of the files into a folder on My Docs.

[Steeveeo]

ammoCost = 15 - 15 what?  I'm guessing each vehicle has a cirtain number for their ammo cap, but how do I find this?  The folder objects>ISDF>vehicles>ivtank has 15 files.  Which one do I pick?

Ammocost is basically that, how many ammopoints a single shot takes, this multiplies for salvos.

lifeSpan = 1.5 // 150m - I'm guessing the 150m means that it has no effect after 150 meters in the game, but what does the 1.5 mean?

Lifespan is in seconds, the double slash ("//") is a comment, basically a note on how far the shot will go (shotspeed * lifespan). Comments are not read by BZ2.

damageValue(N) = 150 // none // 300
damageValue(L) = 137.5 // light // 275
damageValue(H) = 125 // heavy // 250 - What does the N, L, and H mean?  none light and heavy must be armor grade, but what do the numbers mean?
damageValue(S) = 137.5 // standard // 275
damageValue(D) = 125 // deflection // 250
damageValue(A) = 150 // absorbtion // 300 -  Same with the others.  What does the S, D, and A mean?  I'm guessing standard is without a shield, deflection is with the deflection shield up, and absorbtion is with the obsorbtion shield up.  What do the numbers mean?  And are these scion while the other three were ISDF?

N, L, H are the armor grades; S, D, A are the shield types (Stasis, Deflection, Absorption). The numbers are how many hitpoints it takes off of that armor type on the target. Tweaking this could make it so a giant shell would only kill assault vehicles and do very little damage to scouts, and other combos.

startColor = "0 64 127 64"
finishColor = "200 200 255 0" - What color system is this going off?  CMYK?  I kinda thought a computer game would run on RGB....

The color system works in RGBA, where the forth value is Alpha, or opacity. Maximum for each field is 255, unless you are working with lights, then the A field can go as high as you want it (the bigger the number, the bigger the flare).

textureBlend = "srcalpha invsrcalpha modulatealpha" - Should I even ask?  They all end in alpha... that's got to mean something.  Scr, Inv, and Modulate...... no clue.

This is how BZ2 will blend the texture data into the environment. The two most common are "srcalpha invsrcalpha modulatealpha," (good for alpha channeled TGAs with color, like smoke effects), and "one one modulate" (which is additive and good for flames, plasma, and the like). Other values are usable, but tricky to get right without consequence.