Dragon Age Toolset Repository

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Tarshana
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Games: Mass Effect Trilogy, Dragon Age: Origins, Dragon Age 2, Dragon Age Inquistion, Jade Empire
Origin: Tarshana
Posts: 58 Likes: 63

Dragon Age Toolset Repository Sept 9, 2016 1:30:12 GMT

Quote

Post by Tarshana on Sept 9, 2016 1:30:12 GMT

This thread reserved for Toolset walkthroughs and information. NOTE: The Wiki is scheduled to be removed soon. I have a full copy/backup and while a lot of info is out of date, it is free to give to anyone who wants it. Feel free to PM me for a copy

Dragon Age Toolset Download - if this link is missing please pm for updated link

Installing the toolset

The Dragon Age Toolset installer comes with several pieces of third-party software that are needed for the toolset to function. They are:

DirectX 9.0c
Visual C Runtime Library
Microsoft SQL Server Express 2005 Edition
Nvidia PhysX drivers

These components will be installed along with the toolset by the toolset's installer.

Location

SPOILER: Click to show

The first screen you'll get to after starting the installer and passing the title page is the install location selector. The toolset can only install the program into a specific subdirectory of the Dragon Age game directory, so you won't be able to alter the installation path; it's for informational purposes.

Note: MSSQL Express 2005 is bundled with this toolset and is required for it to function. Unfortunately, MSSQL Express 2005's installer has a limitation that prevents it from installing to a directory path that's longer than 58 characters.

However, this limitation no longer affects the installation, since version 1.01 of the toolset installer installs the SQL instance to a shorter path to avoid this issue. It now installs to Program Files\DAODB\. See installation into a directory with a long path name for details.

Components

SPOILER: Click to show

The next screen after location has been selected is where you can choose which components to install. There are only two selectable components here; Core Resources (the toolset itself) and Microsoft SQL Server Express. To run the toolkit you'll obviously need to install the Core Resources option. SQL Server is presented as a separate option so that if you already have a database server installed on your system you can use that instead of installing a whole new one.

If you don't have an SQL server installed, or if you don't know whether you have one installed, it's safe to go with the default and install SQL Server Express. SQLServer's installer will check the existing components and, finding that all required components are already in place, won't do anything after you click "finish."

Manual database selection

SPOILER: Click to show

If you choose not to install SQL Server Express, the installer will ask for a database server and database name to install the toolset's resource database to instead. The default server is .\BWDATOOLSET and the default database name is bw_dragonage_content.

Installation

SPOILER: Click to show

Once you have selected these options the Dragon Age toolset will begin the installation process. This can take a while. When the install process is finished you'll be given the option to read a readme.txt file.

The toolset will create a start menu folder named "Dragon Age". The start menu folder will include a link to start the toolset, a link to the toolset's uninstaller, and a link to the toolset's external configuration utility.

The installer will write a log file in your My Documents folder. If installation fails this log file will be helpful for debugging purposes.

If you are installing over a previous version of the toolset, you may need to update the format of your old database to make it compatible with the new version of the toolset. See database migration for details.

Lightmapper

SPOILER: Click to show

The lightmapper is the tool used to calculate lighting in level layouts. You only need to use it if you're going to be creating or modifying level layouts. The lightmapper included with the toolset requires Python to run but Python isn't currently bundled with the toolset, so if you don't already have it installed you'll need to do the following:

Install Python 2.5.4

Install the win32 extensions for Python 2.5

OR

Install ActiveState Python 2.5.5.7

Note: The Community Edition of this release is no longer available! If you have not purchased a Business or Enterprise license from ActiveState you will need to use the python.org release and the pywin32 extensions (2014-04-13).

The easiest way to do this is to download and install ActiveState python which comes with the needed extensions. Just click through the defaults on the installer and you will be ready to go. If you want to use python.org installer, maker sure to install it first, then install the win32 extensions.

If you don't have Python installed and try to run the lightmapper, you'll receive a standard Windows error message indicating that "EclipseRay.exe has stopped working.

Note for 64 bit machines: There appears to be a bug with the 64-bit version of ActiveState Python 2.5 for Windows that prevents the lightmapper from functioning. Install the 32-bit version instead, it works. The 32-bit version is the one linked above.

Do not install both ActivePython and Python.org. This will most likely cause you to get an Error Code 1 when rendering lightmaps.

If you get an error code of -1073741819 this means you either have the 64 bit version or you have a version higher than 2.5. Uninstall and use the installers from the links above.

If you get an error code of -1073741515, try copying the python25.dll (from your python installation directory) into the <dragon age install directory>\tools\lightmapper folder and restarting the toolset.

NVIDIA PhysX

SPOILER: Click to show

Currently, the Toolset relies on a version of PhysX which may not be readily accessible to some users, specifically 9.09.0408. It is not included in the latest NVIDIA drivers, and it can render certain parts of the Toolset, specifically pathfinding and lightmapping, partially or totally inoperable.

If you have the game install disc, the correct PhysX installer is included on it. If not, you can download and install it from NVIDIA's web site.

Configuration

SPOILER: Click to show

The external configuration utility ConfigureToolset.exe (found in the Dragon Age\tools directory) is used to configure the toolset's database connection and to tell the toolset where the game's executable is. You shouldn't need to run the configuration utility during routine usage of the toolset, and if the defaults set up by your installer work you may not need to run it at all.

The default database string is "Provider=SQLOLEDB.1;Integrated Security=SSPI;Persist Security Info=False;Initial Catalog=bw_dragonage_content;Data Source=.\SQLEXPRESS". For advanced configuration, click on the ellipsis button (Ellipsis.png) to open the data link properties window.

Moving the database files from the default location

By default, the database data and log files are loaded into C:\Program Files\DAODB\data and are called bw_dragonage_content.mdf and bw_dragonage_content.ldf.

For Vista and Win7 installations, the Program Files path will be whatever is commonly used. If you cannot find the folder, do a search for .mdf files and you should get to the required folder.

If you have customized your database during installation, replace the bw_dragonage_content with your database name.

As you start working on your module and checking in resources, the database will grow in size. If you want to move the database files elsewhere to free up space on C:, do the steps below.

Make sure you have backed up your dragon age database - See Database_backup_and_restore for information on how to do it

Open Microsoft SQL Server Management Studio Express - If you don't have it, you can download it here

Open a New Query window either by clicking New Query button on the toolbar or going to File -> New -> Query with Current Connection or using the shortcut Ctrl+N

Type the following into the query window and execute (F5) to detach the dragon age database from the data files

use master
go
sp_detach_db 'bw_dragonage_content'
go

Move the database files to the new location

Type the following into the query window and execute (F5) to attach the dragon age database to the data files

use master
go
sp_attach_db 'bw_dragonage_content','<path to the .mdf file>\bw_dragonage_content.mdf','<path to the .ldf file>\bw_dragonage_content.ldf'
go

To check the path to the data files, you can type the following into the query window and execute it

use bw_dragonage_content
go
sp_helpfile
go

This Microsoft KB article has more details, if required.

Uninstallation

SPOILER: Click to show

An uninstaller shortcut is available from the same start menu folder as the toolset itself. It will autodetect the location you installed the toolset in, display it to you to confirm that this is correct, and then after you click "next" it will ask which components to uninstall.

Core Resources - uninstalled by default, this is the toolset itself.

Database - Since the uninstaller can't automatically determine if you're using SQLServer Express purposes other than just the Dragon Age toolset, SQLServer is not uninstalled automatically by default. To have the uninstaller remove the database server as well, unselect this checkbox.

The uninstaller is generated on installation and therefore isn't signed. This may cause Vista to complain under some circumstances but shouldn't affect the uninstaller's functioning.

Troubleshooting

Note: It is said that Windows 10 users need to install the Toolset under Windows 8.1

If you experience a crash, logs can be found in My Documents\BioWare\Dragon Age\Toolset\logs. The log filenames will include the date on which the log file was created. Sending in a log will help greatly with bug fixing.

Last Edit: Sept 11, 2016 19:46:50 GMT by Tarshana

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Tarshana
N2

Games: Mass Effect Trilogy, Dragon Age: Origins, Dragon Age 2, Dragon Age Inquistion, Jade Empire
Origin: Tarshana
Posts: 58 Likes: 63

Dragon Age Toolset Repository Sept 11, 2016 9:35:55 GMT

Quote

Post by Tarshana on Sept 11, 2016 9:35:55 GMT

written by weriKK on the BSN Legacy I am copying this for sake of information hoarding

Custom Player Items In Single Player - UPDATED
Posted: 2009-11-06 - 208 comment(s) - 0 trackback(s)
Category: Addins
I've updated this tutorial to meet some higher quality standards and added some extra information to it as well.

During this step-by-step tutorial I will show you how to create and add two custom items to the inventory of your Single Player character, namely a longsword and a shield, very much like the various pre-order Bonus DLC packs do. For this tutorial you will need a genuine copy of Dragon Age: Origins in order to be able to download the Dragon Age Toolset. While the concept of this tutorial seems simple on paper, you will soon realize that it is a rather complicated task to add a custom item to the game, especially if you are new to modding.

The source codes, a Builder-Builder-Load package and the finished addon will all be available at the end of this blog post.

That being said, let's jump into the deep water!

Creating a new module

Before anything else, we will have to create a new modul in the Toolset that we can later load from the game:
Click File -> Manage Modules, create a New... module and watch the Object Inspector pop up

In the Name field, type in the desired name of your module: "My Custom Items Addin". This is the name that will show up on the DLC list.

In the UID field, put in a unique identifier that will refer to your module, for example: "my_custom_items". This will also serve as the directory name of your addin inside the Addins directory of the game.

From the Extended Module dropdown, select Single Player, since we want to add extended content to the Single Player campaign.

Click OK and close this window.

Open the module.

Go back to the Manage Modules window. Select our new module, click Hierarchy..., put a tick next to Single Player. Then click OK.

Go back into the Properties of the module.

Find the Script field, click on the ... and wait for the Resource Open/Save dialog to appear.

Click on the New button and in the Resource Name field type in the name of the script you will use for handling all the events sent to this module. Let's call this script "my_event_handler".

In the Folder field, we can set up a custom folder for our module. By default everything goes into the root of the resource palette window which can get messy after a while. In order to prevent this, type in "\MyCustomItems\" into this field and click OK.

Open the module again.

It is important to use an UID that no other module uses. This is the name you will refer to your module later on in the Toolset and also the name your module's directory will be called.

It is EXTREMELY important that you create your own event handling script. Omitting this step can cause major bugs in the game, and brake other mods that would otherwise function properly as well. The only exception to this rule is when you do not wish to handle any kind of events, in which case you can select (None) from the list.

Adding our custom items to the module

Once we have created our module, we can start creating our custom items. Most of the objects that we can create with the Toolset have an already pre-defined template. All we have to do is change the properties of these templates to create our unique items.
In order to create an item using a template, we have to look for the Palette Window. If you can not find it, you can open it through View -> Palette.

Click on the "ALL" icon on the top of the Palette Window. This will show every asset available to you.

Find the MyCustomItems directory you created earlier. Right click on it and select New -> Item. The Create New Resource pop up should pop up

In the Resource Name field, type in an identifier for your item. I used "my_custom_weapon".

Because we want to create an item that can be used by the player later on, we have to make sure that it is part of the core game resources; from the Module dropdown, select Core Game Resources.

The Owner Modul should be the name of our module, in my case: My Custom Items Addin.

We are done here, click OK, close this window and see the magic happen.

If everything went according the plan ( and why should it not... ) you should stare at the properties window of our newly created item.
Let us go through the more important fields on this list and create a nice Longsword.

Base Item Type: This field defines the type of the item we will have. We want a longword, from the dropdown menu select Weapon - Longsword.

Description: You can set here the in game description of the item. (This is what you will see whenever you inspect it.) For example: "Mighty Longsword of my right hand!"

Icon: Click on ... to open up a file open dialog and look for a nice icon for your item. I used ico_longsword.dds. (All icons start with ico_ prefix!

Inventory Subgroup: Set this to 205000. This value defines the position of our item on the inventory list. All longswords use this number in the game.

Item Variation: In this dropdown you can select from the available variations of the models used for longswords. I went with Longsword 5, but you can choose any of them you like.

MaterialProgression & Material Type: In addition to base item type, material type grants significant bonuses to an item (Rune slots, damage, critical hit chance, armor penetration, missile deflection, armor and so on) and mainly define the end quality and Tier of your items. Tier 7 is Dragonbone, Tier 6 would be Silverite. The rest is up to you to figure out! MaterialProgression is mainly used to determine how items scale. I am not sure whether this is relevant for player items, to be safe, I choose Weapon, Dragonbone for both.

Name: This is the actual name you will see in game, like "Unstoppable Force".

Tag: This field will be used later on to refer to our item. I use the exact same thing I used for the resource name which can be found in the field just above this one: "my_custom_weapon".

Cost: This is the price of the item in copper. 100 is one silver, etc

Item Properties: This is where you can add different special attributes to your items.

OnHit Effect & OnHit Power: Similarly to the previous, they are used to add another special ability to your weapon that is used when you hit with the sword. For example, +10 extra damage vs. darkspawn.

If you want to know more about material types and how they affect the outcome of your item, or simply want to be able to calculate the item stats without loading your mod in game, look no further: The Secret Behind Item Statistics

If you want to know more about the rest of the statistics, the easiest way to learn is to simply browse the Palette Window an and View the resources.

All right! We are done setting up our sword. We won't have to touch this anymore. On the palette window, right click on your item and select check in. This will load it into the database.

Now repeat this exact same process and create yourself a shield:

Resource Name: "my_custom_shield"
Base Item Type: Shield - Large Round
Icon: ico_shield_largeroundmetal.dds
Inventory Subgroup: 342000
Item Variation: Large Darkspawn Shield
MaterialProgression: Shield, Dragonbone
MaterialType: Shield, Dragonbone
Name: "Immovable Object"
Tag: "my_custom_shield"

Once you are done with the shield, check this in too.

Adding the items to the player's inventory

Now comes the hard part. Even though we have our custom items in our module, we have to tell the game to give them to our player somehow. This is where scripts come into play.

We have created our event handler script earlier when we set up our module properties. It is time to write the script. On the Palette Window, look for our script called my_event_handler.nss. Double click on it to open it. If you can see a read bar on top of the script editor, right click on the script and check it out. Now we can start editing it.

The programming language that the Dragon Age Toolset uses is very similar to the C programming language, which is (surprise, surprise) not the easiest language to start with for beginners. In this tutorial we will barely scratch the surface, but we will get to a point where we can comfortably add custom items through a script.

While we will go through the script, you will notice that a lot of the lines are beginning with two forward slashes ( "//" ). These lines are comments. They are not part of the actual script, they can be used to put notes into the code. I will use these extensively to explain various parts of the script.

Every time a script is called, the very first thing that game will look for is the main() function. No matter how many functions are in a script file, the very first funtion that will be executed is always the main function. Because of this, it is fitting that we start here too:

void main()
{
}

Dragon Age: Origins has an event driven scripting system. Every time something happens within the game that concerns the modules, the game sends notifications to them. The modules will receive these event notifications and call their event handler script to process the information. Logically, the first thing we have to do is retrieve this information:

void main()
{
event ev = GetCurrentEvent();
int nEventType = GetEventType(ev);
}

Once we have successfully retrieved the event, we have to check whether it is the event we are actually looking for. We want to give our items to our hero character when the module loads the first time, so we are looking for an event called EVENT_TYPE_MODULE_LOAD.

void main()
{
event ev = GetCurrentEvent();
int nEventType = GetEventType(ev);

// We will watch for every event type and if the one we need
// appears we will handle it as a special case. We will ignore the rest
// of the events
switch ( nEventType )
{
// This event happenes every time the module loads
// This usually happenes when creating a new game
// or loading a savegame
case EVENT_TYPE_MODULE_LOAD:
{

// We have dealt with the event we were waiting for.
// At this point we can stop looking for other events
break;
}
default:
break;
}
}

Now we can catch the Module Load event with our script, but it does not do anything interesting yet.
Now we have to tell the script to add our items to the player inventory when the module loads.

There is a specific utility function that adds a set amount of a resource to the player's inventory. This function is called UT_AddItemToInventory, and in it's simplest form it takes 2 parameters: the resource to add to the inventory and the amount we would like to add.

But before we could use this function, we have to tell the Toolset where can it find it. This is fairly simple, the function is inside another script file called "utility_h". All we have to do is add an extra line before our main funtion:

-->-->-->--> "utility_h"

void main()
{
...

After this, we can extend our script:

// ---- SCRIPT STARTS HERE ----

-->-->-->--> "utility_h"

void main()
{
event ev = GetCurrentEvent();
int nEventType = GetEventType(ev);

// We will watch for every event type and if the one we need
// appears we will handle it as a special case. We will ignore the rest
// of the events
switch ( nEventType )
{
// This event happenes every time the module loads
// This usually happenes when creating a new game
// or loading a savegame
case EVENT_TYPE_MODULE_LOAD:
{
// The UT_AddItemToInventory function adds various resources to a
// creature's inventory. Here we add one weapon and one shield.
UT_AddItemToInventory(R"my_custom_weapon.uti", 1);
UT_AddItemToInventory(R"my_custom_shield.uti", 1);

// We have dealt with the event we were waiting for.
// At this point we can stop looking for other events
break;
}
default:
break;
}
}
// ---- SCRIPT ENDS HERE ----

Not bad, we are getting there. But we still have a problem. Even though this script would work at this point and give our character the desired items, it would do so every time we load our save game. After a while we would stockpile a massive amount of armaments

What can we do to avoid this? We have to find a way to keep track whether we gave the items to the player already or not. There are various ways for doing this, we will use Plot flags now, mostly so you can get some insight of this too and to take a very short brake from scripting before your brains melt

We will come back to this script later, but for now, make sure it is saved, and move your attention toward the Palette Window for a last time and just like before, right click and add a new plot.

Type "my_custom_plot" into the Resource Name field and click OK.

Once the plot editor opened, right click anywhere and Insert -> Main Flag.

Double click on the name of the flag (most probably it will be FLAG_0 or something similar) and rename it to MY_ITEM_CHECK_FLAG.

Make sure that the Default Value column says Not Set.

Save the file and Check it in. We are done with this.

Head back to our script file! Before we could access our newly created item check plot flag, we have to let the Toolset know how to find it. We will have to add another line before the main function:

-->-->-->--> "utility_h"
-->-->-->--> "plt_my_custom_plot"

void main()
{
...

Notice the "plt_" prefix before the plot file's name! It is very important. This is how you tell the Toolset that this is not another script file, but a plot file.

Only two more things left to add to our script before we are done, we have to check whether the item was already added to our player and we have to set the plot flag when we add the item to the character.

Without further ado, here is the completed script:

// ---- SCRIPT STARTS HERE ----

// Later on in this script, we will use the UT_AddItemToInventory()
// function to add an item to the player's inventory.
// But before we could use it, we have to tell the toolset where
// to look for it. The function is in the "utility_h" script file
// under _Core Includes, we will include this file at the top of
// our script file, above the main function.

-->-->-->--> "utility_h"
-->-->-->--> "plt_my_custom_plot"

void main()
{
// If our plot flag is set to TRUE, that means we have already
// given the items to the player, there is no need to continue
// running this script.
if ( WR_GetPlotFlag( PLT_MY_CUSTOM_PLOT, MY_ITEM_CHECK_FLAG ) == TRUE )
return;

event ev = GetCurrentEvent();
int nEventType = GetEventType(ev);

// We will watch for every event type and if the one we need
// appears we will handle it as a special case. We will ignore the rest
// of the events
switch ( nEventType )
{
// This event happenes every time the module loads
// This usually happenes when creating a new game
// or loading a savegame
case EVENT_TYPE_MODULE_LOAD:
{
// The UT_AddItemToInventory function adds various resources to a
// creature's inventory. Here we add one weapon and one shield.
UT_AddItemToInventory(R"my_custom_weapon.uti", 1);
UT_AddItemToInventory(R"my_custom_shield.uti", 1);

// Set our plot flag to TRUE, so the next time this script tries
// to run it will not add extra items to the player's inventory
WR_SetPlotFlag( PLT_MY_CUSTOM_PLOT, MY_ITEM_CHECK_FLAG, TRUE );

// We have dealt with the event we were waiting for.
// At this point we can stop looking for other events
break;
}
default:
break;
}
}
// ---- SCRIPT ENDS HERE ----

After this is done, you can check this in too. We are almost done. The only thing that's left is exporting our module into Dragon Age: Origins.

Find the MyCustomItems folder that contains all your files and right click on it.

From the popup menu select Export->Export without dependent resources. We can do this because we only used resources that were already part of the core package.

Repeat the above steps for,Generate Module XML & Generate Manifest XML.

Unfortunately there is one additional step, due to a bug in the Toolset. Even though we explicitly said to export out stuff without dependent resources, it seems the Toolset still export some files. If these files are not dealt with they can cause serious harm to your game. To remove these files, navigate to "MyDocuments\Bioware\Dragon Age\packages\core\override\toolsetexport\" and delete every single file from this directory. MAKE SURE YOU ARE IN THE RIGHT DIRECTORY!

At this point, if you boot up Dragon Age: Origins, you should see your modules in the downloadable content section and upon starting the game, your custom longsword and shield should show up in your inventory.

If you want to distribute your module among other people, it might worth to build a package from it. You can do this very easily:

From the toolbar, Tools->Builder->Builder To Player Package. It will ask for your manufest file. In this example, it should be at: Documents\BioWare\Dragon Age\AddIns\my_custom_items\module\override

After this a huge window opens with a tree view. You can untick the whole section starting from packages. All we need is the my_custom_items tree and everything under it.

Click OK and save your very first Dragon Age: Origins Package file.

Drink a beer and celebrate!

You can download the finished addon and take a look at it yourself. You can also download a Builder-To-Load version of the whole addin that can be loaded directly into the Toolset or a simple zip file of the complete exported addin directory.

PLEASE USE THIS DISCUSSION BOARD FOR ANY KIND OF QUESTIONS IN REGARDS TO THE ADDON, the blog comment section is not too good to keep the conversation organized. Also keep in mind that this is the updated version of the guide, previous discussions might not be valid anymore. Thanks!

Update: The whole guide went through a major overhaul on 11/18/2009. If you had problems making things work earlier, it definately worth a second try!

As a sneak peak, here is a screenshot of the mod from the game:

Last Edit: Sept 11, 2016 19:49:55 GMT by Tarshana

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