I've been getting annoyed by my mage charging into the melee to cast spells like Web or Fireball that say in the descriptions as well as my D&D books that their range is "visual range of caster" or longer. So I modified the ranges using the "Team BG IE MOD Tools" on most such spells to conform to longer D&D ranges. Some increase with levels as described in my old player handbook. I call it a "Long Range spells mod". Now my mages can stay at the edge of the screen and cast their movement hampering spells and big area effect spells without me worryign that they are going to charge unexpectedly.

Would anybody else be interested in such a mod? Unfortunetly, I don't know how to make it WeiDU compadible yet, as I haven't really read the instructions for WeiDU. It'll probably be at least a month before it's ready as I have to learn to turn the modified .SPL files in my overide folder into a WeiDU installer from scratch. If nobody would be interested, I won't bother and just keep it to myself. On the other hadn, putting the .SPL files into a ZIP archive will only take 5 minutes for me to do however, if posting them in that manner would be acceptable.

You can always submit (http://www.sorcerers.net/Info/Submissions/index.php) them to SP for everyone to use...

I can convert those files for you to complete WeiDU format in 5 minutes, if you would like. You can then just include a readme or similar information before submitting it to Sorcerer's Place.

The archive is ready, but NOT in WeiDU format. It's just a ZIP file with two folders, one containing the cleric spells and one containing the mage spells.

As this is my first mod, I should ask some questions before submitting. Especially since I plan to learn to make an updated WeiDU compadible version as soon as I have time to learn how.

Should I submit it now, which would be an archive with a bunch of .SPL files and a text file giving instructions to copy them into the override folder, or wait?

I just realized that I may not have used the best basis for my mod. Rather than a stock SoA install, I have installed Throne of Bhaal, the official patch, Baldurdash, and ease-of-use. I used Infinity Explorer to extract the relivant .SPL files, and Team BG's spell editor to change the ranges.

Would that limit it to Throne of Bhaal only, or should SoA players be able to use it? I don't see why not, but I'm at best a 1st level IE modder.

Is there anything else I should know?

EDIT: I just looked at the sumission page, and it says I should have had WinRAR make a .RAR instead of a .ZIP. OOps. Easily corrected. I usually assume to go with .ZIP when in doubt as it's been the standard much longer, and is more compadible. Oh well, I hadn't actually uploaded yet, so no harm.

Well, if you plan on making a WeiDU version soon, you might as well wait with the submission until then. WeiDU's always preferrable to overrides. As for RAR vs. ZIP, for such small files it really makes little difference. Either is OK.

The archive is ready, but NOT in WeiDU format. It's just a ZIP file with two folders, one containing the cleric spells and one containing the mage spells.

Sorry for the bad news, but if the whole package contains no information (and installation method) on the names, descriptions and other text properties of your items and spells, it's 100% sure that all players who install the mod will have incorrect, irrelevant texts. This is because your ITM and SPL files contain nothing about your item and spell names & descriptions, they are totally lost when you publish a mod in this format.

You should either use IAP/TBG format, or release it in a WeiDU package, as Tal suggested. The latter one is a better solution, even if it requires you to learn basics of WeiDU installers.

I also suggest you to check the thread "How game texts are stored" in the present SP forum, there is an introduction there (it gives elementary knowledge about dialog.tlk which you will need for WeiDU-based modding too).

Sorry for the bad news, but if the whole package contains no information (and installation method) on the names, descriptions and other text properties of your items and spells, it's 100% sure that all players who install the mod will have incorrect, irrelevant texts. This is because your ITM and SPL files contain nothing about your item and spell names & descriptions, they are totally lost when you publish a mod in this format.


I didn't bother editing the game texts. All the spells I changed either had a range of "visual range of caster" or had an incorrect range in the .spl file when compared to the description. Since there appears to be a limitation on the IE engine for spell ranges, my changes only really affect spells that are less than visual range that shouldn't be. Web was one of them, being JUST under visual range, so my mage would walk a bit to the front lines and get attacked when trying to cast web. It wasn't as useful as I expected. I had originally thought that farsight would overcome this, but it doesn't. It's still useful for spells that have less than their stated ranges.

As for learning WeiDU, I can't do it this weekend as my mother has begged and guilted me to "come back home" to help her clean up the porch and get it ready for summer. As well as some other annual spring yardwork such as cleaning the garauge. To think I naively thought I was done with all that when I moved out. So the choice is to upload the .SPL files with instructions to "drop them in your override folder" or wait until I have enough free time to learn WeiDU basics.

If the descriptions aren't changed (indeed, I should've read your initial post more carefully), WeiDU can't really offer too much bonus here. Of course, WeiDU fanatics would (or will) start disproving this, but it's a fact that if these SPL files are simply copied to Override before any WeiDU-based mods are installed (i.e. in the phase "non-WeidU mods" are installed), they will work properly. Uninstallation: player makes a backup of his or her Override folder before installing non-WeiDU mods anyway, so it's not a problem.

Nonetheless, if it's just SPL files, it's very easy to make a WeiDU-based installer (for example, 1-3 minutes for me). Or by simply using a software called TP2 Code Generator. However, it's nice that you want to make it on your own by learning WeiDU-based modding basics. That's the best way, especially for a small mod such as this (in case of bigger mods, it's more efficient -- i.e. less hours of monotonous work for you -- to combine manual solutions with TP2 Code Generator or WeiDU's "--automate" switch).