New to modding (especially for FO76)

[TPhelps91387]

Hello everyone.

I have only in the past week or so gained an interest in modding (I've done a couple of minor mods on games in the past, but have probably done more game modding in the past week than in the past 10 years, excluding using a GameShark on my Pokemon G/S games).

I have a couple of mods in mind that I would like to try and create myself and I /think/ I've pieced together an understanding and the tools to do it. I'm sure the same procedure could be applied to many other games, but I do think it should be noted that I am talking specifically about modding for Fallout 76

To my understanding, I could take an existing .ba2 file, copy it so I have a back up of the original in case I really mess something up, use the b.a.e. to unpack it (from my understanding, you could use either the copy or the original), replace the asset, then repackage it with archive2 from the creation kit, name it to whatever_I_like.ba2, then add whatever_I_like to my customer.ini. (if this is incorrect, I would appreciate any corrections or tips/tricks/instructions anyone could provide me on how to create a mod.)

What my main question here is, "how do I find the asset I want to mod?"

I'm not looking for someone I can ask "ok, so here is my idea for a mod, show me where to put it."

What I'm wanting to know is how do I go about searching/mapping the locations of assets? Or create a new .ba2 with the proper mapping for the mod I want to create?

If someone can point me to good YouTube videos or give me some instructions/insight into this, I would really appreciate it.

[HeyYou]

The ba2 files are just compressed archives, they will have the same structure when unpacked, as you will find in the game. (data as top level directory, the sub-directories for things like meshes, textures, etc.) If you know which specific asset you are looking for, you can use xedit (not sure if it works with 76) to find the name of the object you are looking for, and in that record you will find texture paths and such. Then you will know what you need to do. :)