Faranim's Guide to Spell Editing v1.0

Okay guys....I figured I might as well write a formal guide to Spell Editing based on what I currently know/have figured out.

Please read this guide and tell me if there's anything I left out or is unclear.....I have attached the file to this post as well.....Hope this helps the newbies out there!



Faranim's Step - By - Step guide to Warcraft III Spell Editing.

Version 1.0 - Initial Release

Version 1.1 - Re-wrote middle section to be more of a flow chart type format.

Introduction
-------------

Okay, this is meant to be a simple guide to help newbies learn how to create their own custom spells.
I have never written any sort of FAQ or guide before so just bear with me if I ramble on....


I. What You will NEED
---------------------

Spell editing is IMPOSSIBLE without the following:

1. Warcraft III and the World Editor that comes with it.
2. A MPQ program capable of extracting and importing files from .mpq archives.
3. Microsoft Excel (It IS possible using Notepad but it gets pretty confusing)

II. What you REALLY REALLY SHOULD GET
--------------------------------------

These are HIGHLY RECOMMENDED tools:

1. An enhanced WE (WE is short for WORLD EDITOR). UMSWE is fine.
2. A tool for viewing .blp files (WC3 Image Extractor II works great)
3. DashiofDeath's new Spell Editor


III. Getting Set Up
------------------------

Here's the preparation for spell editing:

1. Using your MPQ program, extract the following from War3.mpq
-AbilityData.slk
-HumanAbilityFunc.txt
-HumanAbilityStrings.txt
-NightElfAbilityFunc.txt
-NightElfAbilityStrings.txt
-OrcAbilityFunc.txt
-OrcAbilityStrings.txt
-UndeadAbilityFunc.txt
-UndeadAbilityStrings.txt
-NeutralAbilityFunc.txt
-NeutralAbilityStrings.txt

2. Now, open up War3Patch.mpq and extract those same files, overwriting the previous ones.
This is done because some of the files have remained unchanged since the release of Warcraft III
Those skills that have been altered since version 1.00 have had their files changed and the updated
files are located in the War3Patch.mpq file.

3. Unzip DashiofDeath's World Editor DIRECTLY INTO THE WARCRAFT III FOLDER.
4. Move the AbilityData.slk and the .txt files DIRECTLY INTO THE WARCRAFT III FOLDER.

IV. Making your Abilities
--------------------------------

Okay, you're all set up? Now it's time to make some skills!
First, you need to choose the 'Base' skill. This skill determines the general behavior of your ability.

For simplicity's sake, follow these steps below:

Step 1: What kind of ability are you trying to make (Item, Unit, Hero) ?

Step 2: How is your ability going to act? You need to base your ability on a pre-existing one.

Step 3: Open up AbilityData.slk (Using Microsoft Excel) and find an Ability that acts similarly to the one you wish to create.
EXAMPLES:
To create a direct damage spell (Spell that deals damage to a single target) you could base it off of:
Storm Bolt, Death Coil (for non-undead enemies), Fire Bolt, or Thunder Bolt (Creep)
To create a healing spell (for a single target) you can base it off of:
Holy Light, Heal, Revujenation
To create a Stat Boosting Item (Such as a tome of +30 Strength) base it off of:
StrengthMod, AgilityMod, IntelligenceMod, Permanent All +1
To create a sleep skill for normal units (Non-hero) base it on Sleep

Step 4: Copy the row for your Base skill into a new blank row at the bottom of the spreadsheet.

Step 5: Assign properties to your new skill using DashiofDeath's Skill Editor.
A. Set the ability type to Hero/Unit/Item
B. Change the mana cost, durations, range, area of effects, cooldown, etc for your ability
C. For Data11, Data12, Data21, etc look in AbilityData.slk using Excel. There should be comments
to explain what each field does for your Base ability.

Step 6: Open (Race)AbilityFunc.txt using Notepad. (Race) stands for the race that corresponds to your base ability.

Step 7: Create a copy of your base ability following the following steps:
A. Find your Base Ability in the .txt file (If your ability is "Sleep" there should be a line that looks like:
\\Dreadlord - Sleep
B. Copy from that line (Including the spell name) all the way down to just before the next ability.
C. Go to the end of the text file and paste a copy of the ability.
Change the comment (AKA \\Dreadlord - Sleep ) into one that reflects your spell (EX \\Cleric - Area Healing ).
D. Now, there should be a code in the form [Axxx] for your ability just below the comment field. This code is used by Warcraft III
to determine the graphics and button positions of your spell. CHANGE this code to a NEW, UNIQUE, FOUR CHARACTER CODE.
This code you come up with will be the code for your new ability.
Tip - None of the pre-existing codes use arabic numerals (1, 2, 3, 4...0). Using them in your custom abilitys
is highly recommended as it guarantess you do not have a duplicate.
E. Now, looking at the rest of the code, there should be fields such as "Art", "ResearchArt", "ButtonPos", "TargetArt" and so on.
F. IF, anywhere in your ability code there is something of the form [Bxxx] or [Xxxx] you are in trouble. Currently, I do not know how
to make copies of spells with these fields. Your best bet is to go BACK to Step 3 and choose a new base ability.....sorry.
G. As long as your ability doesn't contain B or X codes you can change the following:
i. Graphics for your spell (The button you press to activate it)
ii. The location of this spell button
iii. The animations associated with the spell.
iv. Any other information regarding the ability.

Step 8: Create a copy of your Ability Tooltips by doing the following:
A. Find your Base ability in (Race)AbilityStrings.txt
B. Make a copy of it and re-comment it (Same as in Step 7)
Make sure that you give it the SAME FOUR CHARACTER CODE that you used in (Race)AbilityFunc.txt
C. Again, if it has B or X codes you need to choose a new base ability
D. Feel free to change the tooltips and stuff in this text file....I will add what each field is at a later date.

Step 9: Assign your new Art and Tooltips to your Custom Ability
A. In AbilityData.slk, go to the copy of your base ability that you made in Step 4.
B. In the first and third colums (Alias and UberAlias) change the code to that of your new ability.
C. Do NOT change the 2nd column (The 'code' column)! This code MUST be a pre-existing one which Warcraft III understands.

Step 10: Finalizing your ability in the Editor
A. Okay, you are done with the editing part of spell creation....now it's time to see if it works!
B. Copy all altered files (AbilityData.slk and any altered .txt files) into the Warcraft III\Units folder.
C. Open up the world editor and see if your skill appears in the list!
i. If your ability is there...GREAT! you can now give it to any unit/hero/item you want
ii. If it is not showing up in the lists, you probably made a mistake. Double check for typos in the .txt files.
There are still many problems that I have not figured out regarding custom skills....I don't have any real answers
on how to fix things. Aside from typos in the .txt files, I do not know what else could be causing your problem.



V Finalizing your Spell/Ability
----------------------------------

Okay, so you're finally done altering files....now it's time to add your ability to Warcraft III.

First, Make a Backup of your War3Patch.mpq file.

Now, Open up War3Patch.mpq and ADD in the files that you have edited (AbilityData.slk and any .txt files you may have changed)

If you did things correctly, your new ability should work in the game.
Keep in mind that your new ability will only work on your own computer, since only YOU have the altered files.

VI So how do I play my map online?
------------------------------------

This is actually quite simple.
All you need to do is "attach" any altered files to the map(s) that use them.
Look at the ReadMe for your MPQ program on how to do this.


VII Final Notes
------------------

Okay, that's all there is to it! Sure there is a lot of stuff I have left out, and I will probably add it to this guide sooner or later....
I hope what I said up there made enough sense for you to get things to work....if not please e-mail me with any questions you might have.

I sincerely hope that this guide will help people create their own abilities easier than before.

VIII Contact Information
------------------------

E-mail: [email protected]
Warcraft III Username: Faranim@Azeroth, Faranim@USEast.


Thanks for reading!




Last Updated on 11-26 at 11:30 EST. (-5 GMT)

Rats...forgot the file attachment.

Great guide. This should help out alot of people. I'll give an example how to use your imagination in editing spells to create tomorrow.:

-Aura that decay's enemy's HP/second.
-Hero Spell that restores 150, 200. 250HP, 50, 75, 100mana to all nearby friendly units.
-Death Smash passive ability that has 5% chance to instantly kill a non hero/building.
-Hero Freeze passive ability that freezes ground units for a couple seconds with 8/6/4 cooldown.

Great tutorial :D

Just asking cause I tried doing that with a modified War Stomp... everything worked except my modifications to the "targs" field, which were ignored. Look like some lazy Blizzard programmer hard-coded it... :(
I'll try it with the Thunder Clasp tonight.

I don't post here much (mostly lurk around) - but this is a really good tutorial. It makes it all so easy =O O= =O

Good job, Faranim. I'm sure this will help some ppl new to ability editing. Keep up the good work.

I'm having trouble with putting it into the MPQ file... can you make those instructions more clear? (section V)

Problems I have with this guide:

1) Assumes you want to make a copy of an ability, and not edit the ability itself*.

*If editing the ability itself is impossible, and it is necessary to make a copy, you should state that.

2) I'm very confused now about [Bxxx] and [Xxxx] spells. I have seen maps that use modified spells with these fields on bnet. This site has a map that uses a modified Blizzard called Electrocute, used by the sorceress character.

3) A bunch of abilities don't have entries in one/both TXT files of any race. These are usually creep abilities. Please comment on these, including if/how they are alterable.

Other than that, nice job. I still can't get my modifications to work though...

cyrano- just look around the forums, that question has been asnwered probably about 6 billion times

Maybe you're not importing them with the right pre-fixes.

a.k.a. Units\HumanAbilityStrings.txt

Thank you! Jesus!

Include what draco just said in the Tutorial. Something like this:

IN ORDER FOR CHANGES TO TAKE EFFECT, THEY MUST HAVE THE CORRECT PREFIXES, SUCH AS...

I spent all damn day trying to figure out what I was doing wrong! ten minutes after I saw this post I fixed it. It is definitely an integral piece of information.

Include it, or I shall stare at you thusly: emote_sweat

From my experience, modifying [Bxxx] and [Xxxx] spells works fine; I made a modified Blizzard myself without any problems.
What I have never managed to get working is duplicating a spell with [Bxxx] or [Xxxx] fields. ie, creating new [Bxxx] or [Xxxx] fields does not work (AFAIK).

there isnt anything special u have to do to make a 1 lvl spell into a 3 lvl 1 is there? my spells arent all working right

its quite easy just take the spell you want change, copy it (its not neccasary but recomended) change its # of levels to 3 (or 2) and fill out the different info for lvl 2 and lvl 3