Creating a World - Importing units from another mod

[FootSoldier]

Thanks for your prompt reply, and for all the awesome work you have done.

I am assuming you have converted the STRING.BIN file to TXT)

I have now used an online converter to produce a text file from the bin file export_units.txt.strings.bin. It looks like this:

 K u r d i s h _ A u x i l i a r i e s  K u r d i s h A u x i l i a r i e s  K u r d i s h _ A u x i l i a r i e s _ d e s c r 
K u r d i s h s o l d i e r s m a k e u p a l a r g e n u m b e r o f t h e a u x i l i a r i e s i n T u r k i s h a r m i e s , s o m e t i m e s f i g h t i n g i n m i x e d u n i t s , o t h e r t i m e s i n u n i t s ... etc.

Some other characters show, such as a vertical two headed arrow. No curly brackets display.

Is there a next step?
Will I need to manually edit the resultant eu text file?
- this seems to require removing the many spaces, formatting the file, and removing non-ASCII characters ...
Will the game read the text file if I remove the strings.bin file from the Text folder?

Sorry if I seem obtuse. Though I have played the game since it came out I only unpacked the game files a few months ago. To now all I have done is vary recruitpools in the edb and vary ownership and characteristics of units in the edu with a little editing of the modeldb to avoid silver surfers. I have a very basic knowledge of coding, but can follow instructions. I haven't downloaded any modding tools, including python.

I get all the other stuff involved with importing units.
- I can follow the file paths in the modeldb to place sprite, mesh and texture files in the correct folders
- copy the unit_info.tga and unit.tga into correct folders
- make the recruitpool entries in the edb
- copy the edu entries from target mod to my mod (vanilla M2TW)
- have now imported all 6 new Turk units from Crusades to M2TW main game
- all work and display as they should thanks to also importing the Crusades modeldb and eu.strings.bin files.

Thanks again for all that awesome work you've done with modding and for the help you give to n00bs like myself.

[Gigantus]

It looks like you are trying to edit the STRING.BIN file - that's not going to work. You need a TXT file. The simplest way is to convert and\or edit with the BinEditor. You can either work directly in the STRING.BIN file (open\save) or manually (import\export) after converting to TXT. Check the manual if in doubt.

[FootSoldier]

It looks like you are trying to edit the STRING.BIN file - that's not going to work. You need a TXT file. The simplest way is to convert and\or edit with the BinEditor. You can either work directly in the STRING.BIN file (open\save) or manually (import\export) after converting to TXT. Check the manual if in doubt.

The example I showed was, in fact, a text file. I converted the strings.bin to text with an online converter, and saved it as text, but it kept the .bin formatting, i.e. with a space between each character.

So anyway I did download the bineditor you pointed to. This works a treat. Thank you.

Just for the avoidance of doubt, if I add a unit to the modeldb which has 2 models, one ordinary and one upgrade, then I must increment the modeldb by 2?

[Gigantus]

Increment: correct, every model entry increases the count by one.

[FootSoldier]

More thanks.

Once I've converted the strings.bin file text, as export_buildings.txt will the game read the txt file instead of the strings.bin?
Or, do I need to edit the text, then export it as a strings.bin file, and replace the export_unit.txt.strings.bin file in the text folder.

Sorry if I'm asking obvious questions.

[Gigantus]

The game reads from the STRING.BIN file and there are two ways to get your edits to show:

1. Edit the corresponding TXT file (manually or 'export' with the BinEditor) - that will generate a new STRING.BIN file at game start.
2. Edit the STRING.BIN file ('save' with the BinEditor)

2 has a drawback - you will have no TXT file backup. So when working with the tool first 'export' then 'save' to have both files updated.

[FootSoldier]

Thank you for spelling it out for me. And thank you for all the help and all the work you do for TWC

[Gigantus]

One is glad to be of service

[Mango7]

One is glad to be of service

[Mango7]

service[/URL] [/QUOTE]

I'm trying to import a unit, but I'm having trouble because apparently, I can't find some texture and mesh files for the second armor upgrade anywhere. I followed the paths indicated in the modeldb, but I couldn't find them, and searching in the "data" folder, some of them simply don't exist. So, I was wondering what the correct way to proceed is in these cases. I tried ignoring it or replacing them with the ones already present in the destination mod, but the game crashes on startup. Thanks.

[Gigantus]

It's possible those are default files and thus not included in the mod, in that case you can unpack the game to get access to them but it won't be necessary as the game will always look for files in the packs if they are not present in a mod.