I know I see this thread a bit too late, but I only started modding on this game this year, and if more people could make mods like this, it would be great.

Anyway, here's a quick answer:

Does the radiomessage trigger blocked locations due to fighting?
Will locations block by winter, stay blocked for the whole duration of the winter? Or are they blocked by temprature? If I raise the temprature to above freezing for a couple of days, will they become accessable?

Radio message triggers do not work and it's a shame, but last dlc added Unlock location trigger so you can at the very least make radio message unlock a location when listening to it.
Locations blocked by winter in the map pack will only be blocked when temperature is below 0°C (you can change that in Winter config -- Winter effects start at [-1]°C. "Winter started" event only change looters priority (what they prioritise when stealing from the shelter) and items trading value.

I have added some items to the game, but any changes I make in the Localization strings does not show. So I can't get name or description in game.

It's a bug. You can share your mod and let people repack it themselves so the mod works for them too.

Btw, are there anyone with more artistic skills who will make a few icons for me, in the same style as the game has. I can send you a sketch of what I want it to look like. Maybe even a mod illustration as well, if I ask nicely?

I'm not an artist either, I just know my way around Photoshop a bit..

I have also tried to make the End day -button just skip a few hours ahead, but with no luck. Anyone knows if it is possible?

That's an setting in Main config: SkipHoursOnEndDay, default is two meaning it will skip minimum two hours even if there's no day time left.

Oh, and also, is there a way to control where LootGenHome -items appear? It is really annoying when Materials end up in the locked locker and behind the piles of dirt. Makes it kind of hard to build workbench and a shovel.

Not that I'm aware of, no.

This mod is for the people who like the vanilla game, but thinks it is too easy. If you use a mod to carry 100 items in each slot, don't bother with this mod.

Can I join the club? I hate stacking mods too and how popular they are

Just remembered one more thing, the VanishItems, does it make loot dissapear from locations as time goes by? And one last thing, is it possible to activate the Electro trader at Central Square?

VanishItems is the most tricky mechanic to understand in the tools. From what I know, each item has a tag, and when the game makes loot disappear, it does so on the first day possible, and remove all items with that specific tag from all location at once. Kind of brutal when not set up properly.

For example, Timeline_Wood; value 135 means the game will take 130 / wood value (3) = 43 wood gone. Now wood is the only item with the Timeline_Wood tag, but this works with all other tags:
LootGenerator_Med = Bandages + Herbal Meds + Meds; if you put 85, it will remove
85 / (55 (herbal meds) + 45 (bandages)+ 64 (meds)) = 85 / 165 = 0.5 medicinal items, or 1 in one of two locations (on average because if there is only herbal meds left, more items would've be removed to match the VanishItem value). As for the electro trader: No, we can't because the locations files are not in the modding tools (can't respawn or edit npcs).

Originally posted by Kierk:

I know I see this thread a bit too late, but I only started modding on this game this year, and if more people could make mods like this, it would be great.

Anyway, here's a quick answer:

Does the radiomessage trigger blocked locations due to fighting?
Will locations block by winter, stay blocked for the whole duration of the winter? Or are they blocked by temprature? If I raise the temprature to above freezing for a couple of days, will they become accessable?

Radio message triggers do not work and it's a shame, but last dlc added Unlock location trigger so you can at the very least make radio message unlock a location when listening to it.
Locations blocked by winter in the map pack will only be blocked when temperature is below 0°C (you can change that in Winter config -- Winter effects start at [-1]°C. "Winter started" event only change looters priority (what they prioritise when stealing from the shelter) and items trading value.

I have added some items to the game, but any changes I make in the Localization strings does not show. So I can't get name or description in game.

It's a bug. You can share your mod and let people repack it themselves so the mod works for them too.

Btw, are there anyone with more artistic skills who will make a few icons for me, in the same style as the game has. I can send you a sketch of what I want it to look like. Maybe even a mod illustration as well, if I ask nicely?

I'm not an artist either, I just know my way around Photoshop a bit..

I have also tried to make the End day -button just skip a few hours ahead, but with no luck. Anyone knows if it is possible?

That's an setting in Main config: SkipHoursOnEndDay, default is two meaning it will skip minimum two hours even if there's no day time left.

Oh, and also, is there a way to control where LootGenHome -items appear? It is really annoying when Materials end up in the locked locker and behind the piles of dirt. Makes it kind of hard to build workbench and a shovel.

Not that I'm aware of, no.

This mod is for the people who like the vanilla game, but thinks it is too easy. If you use a mod to carry 100 items in each slot, don't bother with this mod.

Can I join the club? I hate stacking mods too and how popular they are

Just remembered one more thing, the VanishItems, does it make loot dissapear from locations as time goes by? And one last thing, is it possible to activate the Electro trader at Central Square?

VanishItems is the most tricky mechanic to understand in the tools. From what I know, each item has a tag, and when the game makes loot disappear, it does so on the first day possible, and remove all items with that specific tag from all location at once. Kind of brutal when not set up properly.

For example, Timeline_Wood; value 135 means the game will take 130 / wood value (3) = 43 wood gone. Now wood is the only item with the Timeline_Wood tag, but this works with all other tags:
LootGenerator_Med = Bandages + Herbal Meds + Meds; if you put 85, it will remove
85 / (55 (herbal meds) + 45 (bandages)+ 64 (meds)) = 85 / 165 = 0.5 medicinal items, or 1 in one of two locations (on average because if there is only herbal meds left, more items would've be removed to match the VanishItem value). As for the electro trader: No, we can't because the locations files are not in the modding tools (can't respawn or edit npcs).

I have a question. How do "LootGenerator_XXX" function in the game. It seems to generate loot according to the value to create a random effect. But I don't know how.

^First you should know each location has his own loot table (Loot generators config). You can check "Scavenge locations config" to see which map you are changing (e.g. LootGen_Map21 is the airport, LootGenHome_XXX are the starting shelter for each scenario, etc...). Once you got the location, you can edit what will be generated when it is discovered and only then (very important since VanishItems won't remove any item from it as long as it does not appear on the city map).

Let's take the airport for example, you can see there will always be one canned food there, and LootGen_Meds has a value of 80, meaning that instead of adding a few bandages and meds directly, the game will randomly choose from the item pool enough items with a total of 80 or less value. You can see in "Items" that there is only three with the LootGen_Meds" tag: Herbal Meds (value of 55), Bandages (45) and Meds (64). So with only 80, the game will add either one of them since it cannot go above 80 (55+45=100 and is more than 80). If instead you put a value of 100, it will either have one real med OR one bandage and one herbal med.

That's what the tag are for, and each one is tied to a certain type of items:

• Timeline_Materials = Materials (Components)
  
• Timeline_Wood = Wood
  
• Timeline_WoodAndFuel = Wood / Heater Fuel
  
• Timeline_Parts = Parts (Gears)
  
  
• LootGenerator_Survival = Raw Food / Vegetables / Fertilizer / Broken Toy
  
• LootGenerator_Med = Bandages / Herbal Meds / Meds
  
• LootGenerator_Trader = Homegrown Tobbacco / Plants
  
• LootGenerator_TraderBasic = Tobacco / Med Ingredients / Sugar
  
• LootGenerator_Ammo = Ammo / Gunpowder / Shells
  
• LootGenerator_Skarby = Alcohol / Cigarettes / Coffee / Books / Weapons / Broken Items / Jewelry

Some of them are only used with VanishItems (in Scenarios config -- Timelines), which does the exact opposite of Loot generators by removing items from all discovered maps based on their tag.

And I'll just finish by saying that you can use the Container_XXX tags to change where items are spawned, e.g. make items spawn anywhere instead of just locked cabinets.

Yeah thanks. I understand the tags part and they work very well. I even have my own timeline tag for some items I added.

The LootGenerator_Meds is the biggest issue for me. I never figure out which code stands for airport or ghost house because the manual sheet in that PDF is too old and has two serious mistakes: 1. the codes for ''Abandoned Cottage'' and ''Shelled Cottage'' are mismatched. 2. They say the amount of certain item is counted by value, which is true for ''kosovo item pool'' but most items are defined by numbers.

Back to the topic, in my mod I added item ''Mouse_Dead'', which is meant to make the game more real. It has 1 value and I tagged it into ''LootGenerator_Survival'' so I don't need to put it into every maps manually expect for the shelters. I also make it appear in ''Scrap''. It works great. But when comes to med, weird things happened. In location ''Shelled Cottage'' the LootGenerator_Meds'' equals about 160(Don't remember clear, it's more than 3 values of med and less than 4). When I search the place I sometime found 4 pieces of meds, which containes much more value than expected. When I edited my own ''LootGenerator_BrokenTools'', it doesn't create any random effect at all. I had ''Shovel_Broken'' and ''Hatchet_Broken'' attached and there will always be broken shovel generated even I set the number very high.

Some maps I have examed seems to have 3 units of RawFood. I don't know why devs add it there since ''RawFood'' is already tagged on ''LootGenerator_Survival''. I wonder in this case will rawfood's value still be counted?(According to my experiment it seems it doesn't). In basic location they all have 1 guitar and guitar is tagged as skarby and contained by treasure. I never find any guitar at those locations. Could you explain it a little?

As for the container, water has two container: kitchen and food. Food have container_food but sometimes I still find food in scrap. I wonder the reason.

Originally posted by Kierk:

^First you should know each location has his own loot table (Loot generators config). You can check "Scavenge locations config" to see which map you are changing (e.g. LootGen_Map21 is the airport, LootGenHome_XXX are the starting shelter for each scenario, etc...). Once you got the location, you can edit what will be generated when it is discovered and only then (very important since VanishItems won't remove any item from it as long as it does not appear on the city map).

Let's take the airport for example, you can see there will always be one canned food there, and LootGen_Meds has a value of 80, meaning that instead of adding a few bandages and meds directly, the game will randomly choose from the item pool enough items with a total of 80 or less value. You can see in "Items" that there is only three with the LootGen_Meds" tag: Herbal Meds (value of 55), Bandages (45) and Meds (64). So with only 80, the game will add either one of them since it cannot go above 80 (55+45=100 and is more than 80). If instead you put a value of 100, it will either have one real med OR one bandage and one herbal med.

That's what the tag are for, and each one is tied to a certain type of items:

• Timeline_Materials = Materials (Components)
  
• Timeline_Wood = Wood
  
• Timeline_WoodAndFuel = Wood / Heater Fuel
  
• Timeline_Parts = Parts (Gears)
  
  
• LootGenerator_Survival = Raw Food / Vegetables / Fertilizer / Broken Toy
  
• LootGenerator_Med = Bandages / Herbal Meds / Meds
  
• LootGenerator_Trader = Homegrown Tobbacco / Plants
  
• LootGenerator_TraderBasic = Tobacco / Med Ingredients / Sugar
  
• LootGenerator_Ammo = Ammo / Gunpowder / Shells
  
• LootGenerator_Skarby = Alcohol / Cigarettes / Coffee / Books / Weapons / Broken Items / Jewelry

Some of them are only used with VanishItems (in Scenarios config -- Timelines), which does the exact opposite of Loot generators by removing items from all discovered maps based on their tag.

And I'll just finish by saying that you can use the Container_XXX tags to change where items are spawned, e.g. make items spawn anywhere instead of just locked cabinets.

How to make a certain quest take place on defined day.I have managed to edited a new quest that a militia (bandit looking) coming to ask dweller to help defend a school. The quest will take up 2 days and cause the death of the agreed dweller. After few days a militia and a citizen will come to honor the dead by granting a RPK machine gun. I want this to 100% happen in my new timeline. If better, on exact day. What should I do

1. For your ''LootGenerator_BrokenTools'' to work, maybe you just need to add some Container tags like Container_Scrap to the broken items so they spawn correctly.

2. There is two ways to generate loot, fixed by item name and random by item tag. That way you can be sure there will be one raw food plus a bunch of other food items (LootGenerator_Survival) for example. They work separately. And be sure to use one or the other at a time (i.e. when UseValueInsteadOfQuantity is true, add only the item tag, and when false, only the item name).

3. Treasure containers are hidden by default, some maps have a quest tied to it which makes it appears (like reading the note in Abandonned Cottage to reveal the broken pistol).

4. It depends on the map I guess. Some containers might be tagged with both scrap and food tags so both can spawn there.

And 5. In Visits config -- VisitGroups you can see all events happening in each timeline (scenario). But instead of adding your event here, you should add it in Scenerios config -- Timelines -- DebugVisits. That way you bypass the point system used to determine who come at the shelter and your event will have priority and always happen. What you want to do is a bit difficult though, I'm not sure how you will manage to kill a character like this.

Originally posted by Kierk:

1. For your ''LootGenerator_BrokenTools'' to work, maybe you just need to add some Container tags like Container_Scrap to the broken items so they spawn correctly.

2. There is two ways to generate loot, fixed by item name and random by item tag. That way you can be sure there will be one raw food plus a bunch of other food items (LootGenerator_Survival) for example. They work separately. And be sure to use one or the other at a time (i.e. when UseValueInsteadOfQuantity is true, add only the item tag, and when false, only the item name).

3. Treasure containers are hidden by default, some maps have a quest tied to it which makes it appears (like reading the note in Abandonned Cottage to reveal the broken pistol).

4. It depends on the map I guess. Some containers might be tagged with both scrap and food tags so both can spawn there.

And 5. In Visits config -- VisitGroups you can see all events happening in each timeline (scenario). But instead of adding your event here, you should add it in Scenerios config -- Timelines -- DebugVisits. That way you bypass the point system used to determine who come at the shelter and your event will have priority and always happen. What you want to do is a bit difficult though, I'm not sure how you will manage to kill a character like this.

Thank you very much for the help. As for the event itself I have done that. HelpSteal visit has terms that can cause HP loss on responding dweller. However it doesn't kill dweller if you set the min and max spontaneously as 100. I set it to 600 and 500 and it finally be lethal. Little sad that the tools has so much limitation. It's like a control panel but the gears are still hiding behind. I had set a bandit temple into dweller set and it did spawn in the shelter. Sadly, I couldn't get access to control him nor let him attack anyone. It's amazing that you learn so well about the mechanism of this game.

^Oh so that's how it works, good to know. Would be nice to add some new events like this to the game. Nice mod btw. You can make the text works by making your mod available without Steam. Then anyone can just download your mod, put it in This War of Mine/Mods folder then repack it with Storyteller.exe to fix the text issue ;-)

And I definitely agree with you on that, the tools are still limited, especially when making new scenarios. Just having access to the locations and spawn new npcs for example would open up a lot of possibilities.

Originally posted by Kierk:

^Oh so that's how it works, good to know. Would be nice to add some new events like this to the game. Nice mod btw. You can make the text works by making your mod available without Steam. Then anyone can just download your mod, put it in This War of Mine/Mods folder then repack it with Storyteller.exe to fix the text issue ;-)

And I definitely agree with you on that, the tools are still limited, especially when making new scenarios. Just having access to the locations and spawn new npcs for example would open up a lot of possibilities.

Thanks. Yet I have uninstalled the game because I think I have reached its limitation. Well, maybe not but I just don't expect myself to bring anything better with it. However I pecked the modification in case for the future access.

If anyone want to make some new scenario then the tools must be smarter and friendlier in ways of editing. I just wrote one new quest and the total workload is horroible and easy to make mistake.

In my view although the game focuses on war-survival but the combat part is great for an ACT genur game. Anyhow I just lay it aside now. Couldn't do much more.