Hey Izanagi.
The trinkets themselves are located in the default.trinkets file and they have ‘buffs’ listed in the shared/buffs/buffs.json file, you can edit either with your favorite text editor. Remember to back up your files before editing them in case something goes awry.
- The best defense is a good defense filled with spears.
Y’all,
I’m completely new to modding, and I’ve been trying to figure out how to actually change things without destroying them. I’ve finally found the actual game files, or at least some of them. There don’t seem to be any audio files or images, it’s a bunch of Java Script files.
2) where are all the images and audio files that this code presumably uses to, you know, run the game?
From what I can tell the sound files are stored in ‘banks’ which we can’t (?) access, I would hazard a guess though that they are linked/paired with the ability ID’s you’ll find in the corresponding monster files. The images are located in each individual monster directory, stored within a separate folder. So the images for the swine reaver (the one with the ball and chain) are located in monsters/swine_reaver/anim and monsters/swine_reaver/fx.
So here are my newbie questions:
1) what can I touch without incurring the wrath of Azathoth?
WITHOUT incurring the wrath? Almost nothing. 
I’ve managed to strip all the trinkets, quirks, abilities, camping skills, available inventory, and text from the game on more than one occasion. I’ve also had the game CTD immediately upon entering combat if a monster isn’t set up correctly and fail to load because I’ve forgotten {‘s or “‘s. I highly recommend backing up your save-game before testing out changes – this way you can restore it if/when things go… poorly.
- The best defense is a good defense filled with spears.
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2) What does “.combat_stat_buff 1” do? As far as I can see it appears in front of different buffs and penalties, so my guess is it’s just a requirement for the skill to register as combat buffs/debuffs.
answer: nobody knows for sure, and those who know do not speak.
2.1) Looks like if you leave .duration away from the effect, the effect is only on that particular use of the skill. ie: extra damage vs enemy type. Conflicted by some hero skills, though.
I think I can answer this one. .combat_stat_buff 1 looks like a flag to me – it’s a programming term to mean ‘true’ or ‘false’ with ‘0’ = false and ‘1’ = true. In this case it means the effect IS a combat stat buff and most likely indicates that the next parameter indicates the type(s) of buffs to be applied. Why not use true/false? Dunno! Sometimes percentages are used, and other times decimal numbers so I chalk it up to ‘if it works don’t fix it’ logic. :p
3) What does “.buff_ids” do? It appears to somehow relate to finding values from elsewhere from game files, and if so, where can those values and effects be normally found?
answer: shared\buff has a file for advanced buffs. For combat purposes it looks like this is the only way to make effects affect various resistances.
You are correct. This seems to allow for effects in the shared/buffs directory allowing you to define buffs beyond those that were originally in the effects file. If I recall correctly the ‘buff_ids’ wasn’t present in these files during the earlier portions of early access.
.on_hit true/ (false?) and .on_miss true/false tells if the effect takes place on target even if attack roll doesn’t result in a hit. There wasn’t even a single instance of .on_hit false in the game files, though. Not sure if this could lead to effects that give at least something for the performer, even if it misses?
I’ve always read these parameters as being different ways to express the same thing, unless perhaps ‘miss’ is not applied when an enemy ‘dodges’, since I believe miss and dodge are separate things that can occur.
Adding a new monster for dummies:
One other place you’ll need to go if you’re making skills from scratch (or renaming things) is the AI file for the creature. You can find this in raid/ai under the lovely name of ‘monster_brains_definition’. This assumes you are coming up with your own combat brains for the creature as well.
- The best defense is a good defense filled with spears.
Yup, those are the save files. I’m not familiar with how Mac does things, but if you’re playing on Steam then the default path for game files is Steam\steamapps\common\DarkestDungeon.
Yeah! That’s where I went, actually. On my mac that folder only contains two files called _osx and _osxnosteam and both of them just launch the game when I click on them.
I think this might be a mac thing, I’ll try borrowing someone’s PC to see if I get different results there.
Just updated with new content! Keep an eye out for Pitch Black Dungeon 5.1: A Jester’s Tale slated for release in about two weeks!
Creator of Lighter Dungeon, Pitch Black Dungeon, and Twisted Dungeon
Adding a new monster for dummies:
One other place you’ll need to go if you’re making skills from scratch (or renaming things) is the AI file for the creature. You can find this in raid/ai under the lovely name of ‘monster_brains_definition’. This assumes you are coming up with your own combat brains for the creature as well.
Thanks for comment. I’m going to edit OP later with additional details.
Also, yeah, the monster brain file probably should be mentioned. I left it out because it looks kind of “advanced” monster editing. Also, I haven’t been able to include a custom brain into the monster_brains_definition. Whenever I do that, whole AI system breaks down and crashes the game though I haven’t broken any apparent tags. Should the file be edited with some other program than notepad?
Thanks! This will be useful!
I may have to create a new thread for this, but is there a way to remove the requirement to use 4 heroes on a mission?
Also, yeah, the monster brain file probably should be mentioned. I left it out because it looks kind of “advanced” monster editing. Also, I haven’t been able to include a custom brain into the monster_brains_definition. Whenever I do that, whole AI system breaks down and crashes the game though I haven’t broken any apparent tags. Should the file be edited with some other program than notepad?
Not to my knowledge. I’ve been able to add a new zombie and have it prefer to do things based on the AI I set in the file using just open-office writer (notepad as well). Alas for me I can’t get the summoning other monsters to work properly, but I can tell it’s trying its utmost to do so.
- The best defense is a good defense filled with spears.
Here’s a new, fairly small API framework for working with .darkest files. It allows you to tweak settings across all .darkest files at once, which makes fine tuning your changes much easier. Plus, you don’t have to make the changes by hand. A proof of concept mod comes with the source code that multiplies all health and damage values by 1000.
Figure would be handy to have a general thread about my character moding.
Still slowly working on some new mod classes. One should be up this weekend (hopefully). But still need some more testing.
Have another WIP or a range damage dealer. Trying to work in some interesting skill sets for him. (almost find a tweaking way to do stun to Marked target).
Shield Maiden still need to be update as well… but want to do some balancing as well.
Few more concept still hope to be made, but lack time… sigh.
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Also let me know if got any feed back or balance-suggestion for the existing class mods. Thanks.
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Class Mods
UPDATED: Assassin | Pit Fighter | Surgeon ( Still need work: Mesmer | Trap Maker | Shield Miaden )
Keep it up ActionJack you’re one of the few class modders out there that still continue to make good looking class mods.
So I actually got stuff to click together when it came to modding and it ended up creating a new class I’m actually happy with and I’m releasing it to the public, currently his animations are a bit meh considering I haven’t change it from the Default Fx and what not but that’s for a later update.
Link to the mod: http://www.nexusmods.com/darkestdungeon/mods/128/?
DISCLAIMER!
I did not create the artwork for this class mod, the person you should be thanking is “DarkestAnon” for he is the one who made this a crusader variant, I merely decided to make this into a class.
LINK TO HIS MOD: http://www.nexusmods.com/darkestdungeon/mods/100/?
As a PC user who knows their way around the majority of the game files, here’s what you need to know:
The steam file for darkest dungeon is where the meat of it is all at. Audio is currently inaccessible to modders, so any new heroes or enemies or skills will be soundless. Pretty much anything can fuck your game up if you miss-code it properly, although the game has become more stable with modding than it used to be so the game will usually still work but just be glitchy if you messed something up. Pay very close attention to your additions/revisions to the coding, 80% of the content that isn’t core game stuff is just editable text files and pngs. The best way to figure out what bugs the game up beyond that is trial and error and asking more specific questions once you’ve hit roadblocks. I never modded anything in my life before DD, this game is extremely easy to mod even as it is right now. You won’t be able to really seriously mess with the game at a base level, but beyond that the sky is the limit.
I tried to attach the error message in question. Still can’t get custom brains to work.
edit: ahhahhahhah. All those countless hours I spent figuring this out. So many wasted hours, days, weeks… years. All of this just because there was a comma in the end of a wrong tag!
Update.
It works perfectly. Fake riposte via Swine Prince revenge mechanics works.
One wrong comma made me lose more than one full working day worth of time. I need a moment here.
Hello team. I’m looking for a good way to edit the JSON files that appear to be encrypted, such as “persist.estate.JSON”, which has a lot of encoded language in it. I tried using the Oracle NetBeans option and Java JDK, and even NotePad++ but nothing seemed to work. Any ideas?
Thanks in advance.
Alright so currently I’m working on a class mod called Corrupted Storyteller and their role is to up back healing and giving out buffs, now the question is what should these skills be called and what can they do?
I would also like some Camping skills designed too so if you can help me figure out some I will greatly appreciate it 😀
(The image below is a very early version of her sprites so don’t worry she’s subject to change)
Well this is weird. Notepad++ opens my persist.estate.json file just fine. Are we talking about the same file? Path from scripts\starting_save ?
Ok, so i’m sorry to reply so late, and it would SERIOUSLY help me if you replied quickly cuz i really wanna try these mods, so:
My game ALSO gives me a msg then crashes, except it’s different then the one that Anisyu got, it says:
Assert Failed:
(pReturnMonsterBrainClass !=nullptr)
AI::MonsterBrainClassLibrary::GetMonsterBrainClass in monster_brain_class.cpp line 809
No MonsterBrainClass with id:ancestor_big_D
Also BTW whatever Alerand3 first said about replacing words in the effects and copying those lnes into the .info thingy seems to already be done as i check it, so i’m guessing that u already updated the files after he said that
PLEASE REPLY QUICKLY AND THANK YOU
ooohohohoHOOHOHHOHOHO
I never considered myself a genius until now, (I still dont i dnt know why i started the sentence like this) But i found out the problem AND solution:
so for SOME reason, when i dragged in the folder, it deleted everything the game had in that folder and replaced it only with the mod files, and when i looked in the mod files it had the mod files PLUS the default game files, so i put in everythign back WITH the mod files, and now the game works, but i havent found a surgeon yet, and will notify if he never comes up or it crashes in battle
CANT WAIT TO TRY THE MOD