Ok, most of you will probably completely ignore this because it's bitchy and not really that important. It's just a minor thing, very inconsequential, but it's DRIVING ME NUTS right now.
Some of you don't do this. I love you. Thank you so much. But for those that do...
You do not have to replace files in the RAW folder to add new items! At least for most mods.
It needs to be said. Almost every mod I've downloaded has had this. I know, it's easy to do it that way, especially for very big mods that make a lot of changes. You probably have no problem with it yourself, and the majority of mod-users don't care. But the only mods that should be doing this, are the ones that modify items that already exist in the game (if this is your mod, I have no problem)
Maybe I'm alone here, but I'm a mod addict. I like to add as much community-made stuff as possible to games that I play, until they barely run and I find stuff I didn't even know I had put in. As a result, I've merged a lot of mods into my main DF game, and I've gotten pretty decent at organizing them.
In general, if you're creating a new creature (notice that I'm not saying modifying/rebalancing existing ones), it doesn't have to go in one of the existing raws. If you're creating a new body part/template, it doesn't have to go in the existing raws. If you're making new items, entities, plants, reactions, metals, etc., you don't really need to change any of the existing raws. The exception is stone and metal, but only because of ore types - if you want an ore to produce a new type of metal occasionally, that's something you might reasonably want to change.
But other than that, please do go nuts with making new files instead of tagging onto existing ones and releasing the entire stock DF raw folder for just a few changes. Most of the time it's not quite -that- bad, but I've seen it, and it's incredibly aggravating. What's worst is when the two techniques are mixed, where some entirely new creature is put into something like creature_large_tundra, when a creature_large_tundra_extended is also available in the same mod.
There are practical reasons for this you might enjoy too. You don't have to page down through hundreds of other creatures to find yours. You can have other people's mods going at the same time that you make your own. You can insert whatever weird formatting you like into the file, without breaking style with the rest of the file.
What I would suggest for people that make large mods that do affect existing files, is to do two things: Place your changes at the end of the file, and make another file listing which existing entries/files you've edited (and ideally how). That way you don't need to include unedited files with your release, which decreases the size of the file (albeit maybe not by much) and makes things much easier for people to go through and change where they have to.
Once again, sorry for the irritated tone. I am thankful for the opportunity to do any kind of merging with mods. I have great respect for people that do large mod projects, like Dig Deeper and Civilization Forge. I also have respect for the small mods, which are adding a lot of flavor to my game at the moment. Thank you guys. This is just a silly vent that will hopefully remind people that it can be a problem.
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Topic: Raw File Mini-Rant (Read 1102 times)