Difference between revisions of "Creating custom classes with minimal impact on the game"
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=== Other Ability decisions === | === Other Ability decisions === | ||
| + | === What Bioware Modules to support === | ||
| + | |||
| + | This decision is up to you, but I have designed my class to support Origins, Awakening, Golems of Amgarrak and Witch Hunt. | ||
| + | |||
| + | === Should you support Community modules === | ||
| + | |||
| + | This is a difficult question to answer; if you're doing this for a custom campaign you are making, and the class doesn't make much sense outside of it, then you don't need to. On the other hand, if you're going to support the official Bioware modules like I did, it might be a good idea to contact module authors to see if you can work with them to make your class work in their stand-alone module; I have contacted one and have attempted to make a mod for his module and I may cotact others to do the same thing. | ||
== Equipment == | == Equipment == | ||
Revision as of 02:36, 18 January 2011
This tutorial will be useful to anyone that wants to create a new class for Dragon Age: Origins or a stand-aone module using the Dragon Age game engine; I will assume that you have installed the toolset successfully and have read through the tutorial Creating modules for Dragon Age. This will contain much of the existing custom class tutorial, but expanded on to include details on creating new abilities and skills, as well as making sure these function properly in Bioware's official Expansion and stand-alone DLC. It may include guidance for creating content specific to the class that will transfer from the base game to official expansion\DLC content as well.
Contents
Designing the new class
There are a number of things that need to be considered when creating a new class for Dragon Age; how does it fit into the existing game lore, what abilities will it have, what races and origins will be able to use it, and are those abilities Stamina-based or Mana-based. New Specializations, which are created in the same manner as classes have to take these factors into consideration as well.
Lore considerations
When designing a class that will be used in Origins, Awakening, Golems of Amgarrak and Witch Hunt, you need to consider how the class fits into the lore of Thedas; when I created the Tevinter Warden Class (using a previous class creation tutorial) I initially intended for the Warden class (the original name) to be a fusion of the Ranger and Druid from Dungeons and Dragons. After careful consideration, i felt that since the game lore did not provide a way to justify "earth spirits" granting spell-like abilities, I would make them into a group of highly trained Warriors with arcane spellcasting abilities. I also felt that the origins of the class should tie into the setting in such a way as to give it the feel of something that Bioware would have created if they had desired to.
Designing classes for stand-alone modules may or may not be similar, depending on the setting used; an module set in Thedas obviously should follow the above guidelines, but modules set in other places (like the BAldur's Gate 2 Redux mod) should be made more loosely tied to lore.
Class Abilities
Race and Origin Restrictions
This is an interesting thing; while there may be no lore-based reason to deny a given custom class to any race or origin, there may well br other reasons to do so. For example, there may be certain things that you want to give to your new class that don't fit well with your vision of certain of the races in the game; this is where restricting by race or origin comes in. The easiest way to implement these restrictions in the Origins Campaign is to limit the class to specific origins. There is one caveat I need to mention though; due to how Bioware implemented the Noble Origins, you cannot easily restrict a class to either the Human Noble or Dwarf Noble, nor can you properly implement restricting a Magic-using class in the Origins Campaign. That is one current bug in my Tevinter Warden class that I do plan on fixing eventually.
Other Ability decisions
What Bioware Modules to support
This decision is up to you, but I have designed my class to support Origins, Awakening, Golems of Amgarrak and Witch Hunt.
Should you support Community modules
This is a difficult question to answer; if you're doing this for a custom campaign you are making, and the class doesn't make much sense outside of it, then you don't need to. On the other hand, if you're going to support the official Bioware modules like I did, it might be a good idea to contact module authors to see if you can work with them to make your class work in their stand-alone module; I have contacted one and have attempted to make a mod for his module and I may cotact others to do the same thing.
Equipment
Your new class (and specializations as well) will need items that they can use; you can just equip them with basic armor and weapons, but they should also have specific items that are only usable by that class. As an example, in my Tevinter Warden class mod, I added starter versions of custom armor and weapons that had specific properties that would benefit the class. One thing you need to do, especially if you intend for your class to be usable in Origins, Awakening, Golems of Amgarrak and Witch Hunt, is make sure those items are set as Core Game Resources owned by your Origins class module; this will enable them to transfer into the expansion and DLCs without your character ending up naked. This is what Bioware did with the items from the Return to Ostagar DLC, but was not used for Stone Prisoner or Warden's Keep.
Armor
Your new class needs to provide something to protect it, be it armor or robes (no naked berserkers allowed). What they will look like depends on your ability to create new models yourself or acquire them from someone who can do the work for you; you can also use the models provided by Bioware if you wish.
Weapons
As with Armor, your new class needs weapons (unarmed combat is strongly discouraged by the in-game load screens). As with Armor, you can make or acquire models, or use the ones Bioware provided.
Class foundation data
Now that you have a vision for your class and some idea of the equipment they will need, we can move on to actually creating the class; this part can be very frustrating, but I've pulled my hair out figuring these things out so hopefully you won't have to.
Please note that there are some steps that may seem senseless in the following sections, and they may not all be needed, depending on what kind of module you are using the class in; I will point out the things that are likely not going to be needed for stand-alone modules when I go through the actual assembly process for the module.
2da files needed
The following is a list of files that are needed when creating new base classes for DAO's Origins campaign; I will also show the files needed to add the class to Awakening, Golems of Amgarrak, and Witch Hunt:
Origins 2DA Files
CLA_base.xls\CLA_data
2da_base.xls\M2DA_base
background.xls\Backgrounds
background.xls\background_defaults
background.xls\chargen_preload
ALWizard_default.xls\ALWizard_default
Achievements.xls\Achievements
CLA_base is where the classes are defined for the game engine to find. You will need to make two copies of the CLA_base worksheet; I will explain why later on. M2DA-base is where you will add references to any new 2DA files you create; this will allow the game engine to know what to do with them. Backgrounds, background_default, and chargen_preload are where you define the specifics of your new class so that you can create new characters in the character generation screen. ALWizard is the class's AutoLevel package (this is mainly useful if you plan to create companions with the class in your mod; it's not strictly neccesary otherwise) Achievements is used in two ways; one is to add new class-specific achievement messages (like when unlocking specializations) and the other is related to the reason you need two copies of the CLA_base worksheet.
Awakening 2DA Files
CLA_base.xls\CLA_data_gxa
2da_base.xls\M2DA_base_gxa
background.xls\Backgrounds_gxa
background.xls\background_defaults_gxa
background.xls\chargen_preload_gxa
ALWizard_default.xls\ALWizard_default_gxa
Achievements.xls\Achievements_gxa
Scripts needed
You will need copies of many of the default scripts; I will include a builder to builder file with these premade, so you won't need to do it yourself.
You will need a module script; I will include a basic one in the builder to builder file.
One thing that is critical to note; you do not need to put any files in the users packages/core/override folder for your class mod to work.
Creature templates
You will need to make duplicates of the default_player character template in the toolset; one each for the races/origins you wish the class to be available to. I may include these in the builder to builder file for you to rename as needed.
Putting it all together
To quote Han Solo in Star Wars "Here's where the fun begins". Now we need to put all these things together to make a working class.
