DAO Mod noob

[rsredmage]

Hey I have been looking around on this site as well as google and I still do not understand the different types of mods. For the DAO Modmanager it only finds DAZIPS which apparently I did download some and it found them but not ALL of the mods I downloaded as a pack. But what about .msh? I downloaded Amazon curves by Neojam and I can not get them to load. I also did not have a documents//bioware//Dragon age//packages//core//override folder so I created it.

 

So I do have DAO Modmanager but I do not have this tooltip I see mentioned in forums and I can't figure out if I need it to make mods work and how the program itself works....

 

So basically my questions are this: 1) How do I differentiate which mods I put in //override (and how do I make them work in that folder) and which I use the modmanager for and 2) Do I need the tooltip everyone mentions?

[DarkeWolf]

huh. This is wierd. I've been doing this for HOW long, and I dunno what tooltip you're talking about. Huh.

 

K, well.... anyway. lol.

 

1) Dazip or .zip can be used directly with damodder or damodmanager. .dazip is all the installer that came with the game will recognize.

1a) .7z .rar .tar .par all have to be extracted from their compressed folders and added into a .zip file before they can be used. OR in the case of .rar you can just rename the .rar to .zip and then drag and drop (DnD) it in.

2) pretty much any other extension, like .msh .mor can go directly to the override folder. With the exception of .chr which has to go into the documents/bioware/dragon age/pre-release characters folder. savegame files, also go into documents/bioware/dragon age/characters/saves folder. .override files have to be installed via DnD to the "Installed Override's" box in da modmanager.

 

3) Any file that is located in the Override folder should work, as long as a dependant file isnt missing. What I mean is... if it is just say a .mor (which is a facemorph) file it will work once it's in there. If its a .msh file, it will also need it's textures, its dao files, and 2da files, in order for that item to show up, along with it's script to make it load into the actual gameplay (forget what extention the scripts use).

Except with .override files. As I mentioned before, those have to be installed via damodmanager.

 

I hope that helps to clear some of it up for you. I Know, this game is complicated sometimes.

Welcome to the Nexus forums! Hope to see you stick around and become part of the "pack" around here :smile:

[rsredmage]

Yea that helped a LOT see I was just adding to override folder figuring that was all that was needed but after looking around I think maybe the files I was downloading, for some reason, didn't come with the dependent files. I tried re downloading the files twice more and it worked. Yay for win7 (EXTREME sarcasm)

[DarkeWolf]

Cool! I'm glad to hear that you got it working! :thumbsup:

 

Eh, that happens sometimes :sad: We get in too much of a hurry to publish something and forget to add something to the archive. Or ohgawd the file got corrupted in transit.

If I might ask, in case anybody else has an issue with that particular mod, which one was it?

 

HAHAHAHA You're not the first person I've heard lament win7!

 

You're running the 32bit version, I take it? Just guessing, as usually 64bit user's first posts are about how to get the damodder and damodmanager to work with the 64bit.

 

But good deal that you got that one sorted out, glad to hear it :smile:

[rsredmage]

Actually no, 64-Bit. I am decent with computers and can figure out work loop holes and all, it was just a mix between limited description on their files and not fully understanding some of the programs. Oh so if it says I need a DAzip file but it does not contain a DAzip, from my understanding of your post I need to put it into a zip folder?

[DarkeWolf]

Ah cool, well..if you had any incompatibilities, I'm glad that you got them sorted out :smile:

Yeah, there's a lot of different, and new (to most of us) file extensions used with this game. I can completely understand how confusing it can be.

 

Essentially... .dazip is no different at all from a .zip file. At least not in any means relative to doing installs for the game. And aside from the fact that Bioware's installer doesnt use a codec for .zip, using instead their own format .dazip. But yeah, damodder and damodmanager will both recognize both formats equally well. :wink:

(hope I didnt over complicate that.)

Simplified- if using daupdater.exe... .zip = bad.

if using damodder or damodmanager .zip = is ok

 

When I said that theres not really any difference in them.... you can convert the two formats back and forth just by renaming the extension. You can turn a .zip into a .dazip. Or turn a .dazip into a .zip just by changing the part of the name after the "."

I do it all the time, because sometimes I want to see something inside, or need a filename from inside a .dazip file.

 

Now, I dont think that I mentioned this before, but the GAME itself, willl not read any compressed format. So you can't have any .rar .7z .zip .override or .dazip folders inside of your documents/bioware/ folder and expect them to work.

That however, has two sides to that coin. From an installation standpoint...it causes novice users some problems because they just drop them in there, and figure they will work. BUT.... from a backups standpoint.... :thumbsup:

Say that you're gonna do a savegame edit to change the face morph that your character uses, and want to backup the file, in case you botch it up in the toolset. Just right click on it, create a .zip archive of it, and instant backup! If you do botch the edit, all you have to do is right click the .zip and choose "extract here", over-writing or deleting the botched file. :biggrin: