I added files and instructions on adding containers to the world, which will appear even in existing saves. I recommend all future mods use containers instead of merchants. Because containers are the only 100% conflict free option on adding all your items to an easily accessible location for players to find. Using merchants means that only the mod loaded last will have its items appear, if multiple mods use the same merchant.
NOTICE 16.11.2020
This template has now been downloaded more then 100 times. Which is excellent news and I am happy to have helped so many people start figuring out how to make Weapons and Armour mods for BG3. I am also a little disappointed though. Not a single Weapons and Armour mod has been released after I wrote this guide. While personal use is fine, I didn't write this guide to provide content just for modders, but also for players.
I had never released any mods before BG3. Though I dabbled a little with minor edits in other games. That said. BG3 modding is so simple that anyone with any computer skill will be able to master it. I did. And when I did, I needed a little help, though no one then knew all that I know now, and there were no guides. I told those who helped me that I had no intention to release any of the modifications I made. A short while ago I received a notice from NexusMods that my mods had been uniquely downloaded over 1000 times. Quite an accomplishment for someone with no prior modding skills.
I also created a new username for Nexus for my mods. And now I have made roughly 80 posts here on the Nexus, and most of them are for helping people, either the modders here or players on the comment sections of my other mods. I have spent days perfecting my skills, and then helping others perfect theirs. So I went from not wanting to release any of my armors, to releasing dozens of armors. Some even for races and genders that I don't use.
So I'd like to ask all the 100+ people who have downloaded this guide. Please consider releasing the mods that you make for yourselves. Give them a little polish and then release them into to the wide world for others to enjoy. With minimal polish and effort, you can bring a little bit of fun and enjoyment to the lives of dozens, hundreds or even thousands of peoples lives. And in these times when many of us are stuck inside, I'm sure we could all use some extra enjoyment.
And remember. Baldur's Gate 3 is still in Early Access. Many models and assets are still missing from the game, and many more are still imperfect. So nothing you make will be as perfect as they would be for an actually released game. And that's okay. The people playing this game don't expect a perfect experience from the main game, so your mods don't need to be perfect either. This is a great time to get a heads up as modder for one the greatest RPGs of all time.
I recommend that you use my armor template mainly for learning. When creating new armors for mods that you intend to release. Copy the +1 variant from the main RootTemplate, and use that as a base for your mod. Do not copy and use the base version, as that contains extra data not necessary for mods. Since it also serves as a ParentTemplate for all other armors of that type.
When you release armor mods. If you do not create new modded visuals for all race and gender combinations. Please set them with related unmodded visuals. For example. If you create a new human female halfplate, set all other genders and races to the normal halfplate visuals. This is done with no extra effort, if you use the closest existing armor GameObject as a base for your mod.
My template contains the casual outfit I created for all races and genders, to use as a base visual, if you want to create other casual outfits. Since there are no casual armors in the main game to use as a base.
Could you pleas make a Video guide for modifying existing weapons? Like adjusting there damage, giving them spells/ abilities, making them legendary, and giving them elemental damage pleas.
That is actually easier than you might think, as long as you have the right tools. Padme4000 has a great tutorial on Youtube for getting BG3 Modders' Multitool and LSLIB set up. Once you do that, you can export the game files, and find the Weapon.txt [UnpackedData>Shared>Public>Shared>Stats>Generated>Data] Typical weapon entry might look like this:
new entry "WPN_Longsword" type "Weapon" using "_BaseWeapon" data "RootTemplate" "1865323f-b428-4791-a0a9-578841e57463" data "Damage Type" "Slashing" data "Damage" "1d8" data "ValueLevel" "2" data "Weight" "1.35" data "BoostsOnEquipMainHand" "UnlockSpell(Target_PommelStrike);UnlockSpell(Target_Slash_New):UnlockSpell(Rush_SpringAttack)" data "Weapon Group" "MartialMeleeWeapon" data "VersatileDamage" "1d10" data "Weapon Properties" "Versatile;Melee;Dippable" data "Proficiency Group" "Longswords;MartialWeapons"
If we want to make a magical longsword that deals Necrotic damage:
new entry "WPN_Longsword" type "Weapon" using "_BaseWeapon" data "RootTemplate" "e3b2adb6-7493-466e-9c65-4281fb74e83f" data "Damage Type" "Necrotic" data "Damage" "1d8" data "ValueLevel" "2" data "Weight" "1.35" data "BoostsOnEquipMainHand" "UnlockSpell(Target_PommelStrike);UnlockSpell(Target_Slash_New):UnlockSpell(Rush_SpringAttack)" data "Weapon Group" "MartialMeleeWeapon" data "Rarity" "Rare" data "VersatileDamage" "1d10" data "DefaultBoosts" "WeaponEnchantment(2);WeaponProperty(Magical)" data "Weapon Properties" "Versatile;Thrown;Melee;Dippable;Magical" data "Proficiency Group" "Longswords;MartialWeapons" data "PassivesOnEquip" "ExtraAttack;CHA_CompassSpear_Passive"
Well, we did a couple extra fun things here: We changed the RootTemplate Code to now use the model for the +2 Longsword We changed the damage from slashing to necrotic We added the "rare" weapon tag Added a +2 enchantment, given it the Thrown property, and flagged the sword as magic Finally we granted the wielder Extra Attack and True Strike on a failed attack roll
You can find all of this pretty easily by digging through the files
Don't ask me how to repack everything and get it working with BG3MM, because I'm not quite there yet. Right now I'm just editing the weapons from the AMX bag for practice
Which line of code effects the icon for the weapon as it's in your inventory and hotbar? checking your comment and other helped me get over the wall i was stuck on for a bit. thanks.
Here's another rookie question: so if I understand this correctly, if I want to change the AC of an existing armor mod from 10 to 15, for example, all I have to do is to crack open the Armor.txt and change the value next to "ArmorClass"?
Stella work going to all this effort, thanks to you it's taken me a week to not knowing anything about modding to hitting a Tier 3, custom items, colours, enchantments and icons in the game AND working, including equipable belts like the SFWBasket mod.
I'm hitting a snag with brand new meshes on animations though...
This looks like it's likely the code, as it converts to DAE, but not GR2 (error line in the command line GR2processor). What I was doing was basically trying to convert trap Disarm kits to be worn, but because they have no parent skeleton this is where the snag hits.
Weighting and converting hasn't been a problem, it's exported fine to DAE, it's just that line conersion.
EDIT:
I've managed to sus it and successfully run custom rigged armour pieces in game! Having a hiccup or two with texture pathways (that bright green is not easy on the eyes), but yeah...got it working, no borking with physics going mad, everything works fine (just the damn textures....hopefully I'll get it fixed soon).
If I can help you let me know, the GR2 import/export on Blender is a little fragile, simply weighing a new armour to an armature won't work, you have to scrub some of the bone weights (as it ends up copying weights it would never need). Doesn't take long to manually do it and once done it exports to GR2 fine.
EDIT 2:
And done! It was the material ID I had listed incorrectly. All working now as it should.
How did you get physics working? I'm trying to make an alternate version of %RACE%_%GEND%_ARM_Laezel_Githyanki_A_Body.GR2, and those damn crotch-flaps are doing all kinds of crazy s#*! in-game. Like, they fly straight up, or fold up, or stick out at weird angles.. I made four LODs for the model (cause the only video guide on YouTube said to), and I'm wondering if the PhysicsTemplate ("9bce2e4c-9705-1446-29f7-9b7fa93dbd30") for that model doesn't allow for that many. The various race's base-game models for that armor have varying numbers of LODs, but never more than three. I think I've gone as far as I can, just reverse-engineering .lsfs from modding templates and Larian's own files. It's getting pretty frustrating.
Both the %RACE%\[PAK]_%Gender%Body-type%_Armor\_merged.lsf files for DGB_F and HUM_FS have actual physics listed in that armor's entry. But none of the others do. So that covers all of the females that use the Strong body-type. But what about the others? I assume they follow a shared template. But how do I get it to apply to the Body armor I made?
[EDIT]: Nevermind, I figured it out. Trial and error, ftw. (mostly error!)
i am trying to figure out how to put a "glow" effect on a staff. Similar to Blood of Lathandar or Nyrulna. I basically want a toggleable light effect like Gandalf staff or Raistlin's staff of Magius. So far i am able to get it all working except the "glow" effect. When i toggle the weapon it shows i have Lathandars light blessing and when i toggle it off it goes away but i cant figure out how to get the visual effect.
Thank you for this guide, a little outdated as it might be. I'm having trouble getting the containers to spawn in world, even though I managed to conjure the mod item itself with the help of Spawn Any Item. Any tips on where I might start to locate what's causing the issue?
I know this guide is outdated, but I would like to know how to change a model that is already in the game for another that is also in the game, I like the "Half Demon (Cambion)" mod, but the swords that a skill summons are Too goofy for my taste and I would like to change to a model that is already in the game and not make a new model from scratch.
Hello! Great mod! Super new to modding but your guide was clear and made the process easy! Thank you. Could you give me some pointers on how to make custom armour for body mods? I would love to re-work a lot of the armours on the nexus to other body/curvy/unique tav types... Any help would be appreciated.
This guide is quite outdated, but good to know that some people still find this useful.
I personally do not plan to support alternative body types. The amount of those mods keep increasing, so if I ever supported one, I would constantly get requests to support others. As such, I haven't done any of this type work myself. But in general, you need to 3D edit the GR2 files to fit these new body types. I would recommend checking out my Sample 3D Edited Equipment mod and any mods that already include alt body type armors.
100 comments
I added files and instructions on adding containers to the world, which will appear even in existing saves. I recommend all future mods use containers instead of merchants. Because containers are the only 100% conflict free option on adding all your items to an easily accessible location for players to find. Using merchants means that only the mod loaded last will have its items appear, if multiple mods use the same merchant.
NOTICE 16.11.2020
This template has now been downloaded more then 100 times. Which is excellent news and I am happy to have helped so many people start figuring out how to make Weapons and Armour mods for BG3. I am also a little disappointed though. Not a single Weapons and Armour mod has been released after I wrote this guide. While personal use is fine, I didn't write this guide to provide content just for modders, but also for players.
I had never released any mods before BG3. Though I dabbled a little with minor edits in other games. That said. BG3 modding is so simple that anyone with any computer skill will be able to master it. I did. And when I did, I needed a little help, though no one then knew all that I know now, and there were no guides. I told those who helped me that I had no intention to release any of the modifications I made. A short while ago I received a notice from NexusMods that my mods had been uniquely downloaded over 1000 times. Quite an accomplishment for someone with no prior modding skills.
I also created a new username for Nexus for my mods. And now I have made roughly 80 posts here on the Nexus, and most of them are for helping people, either the modders here or players on the comment sections of my other mods. I have spent days perfecting my skills, and then helping others perfect theirs. So I went from not wanting to release any of my armors, to releasing dozens of armors. Some even for races and genders that I don't use.
So I'd like to ask all the 100+ people who have downloaded this guide. Please consider releasing the mods that you make for yourselves. Give them a little polish and then release them into to the wide world for others to enjoy. With minimal polish and effort, you can bring a little bit of fun and enjoyment to the lives of dozens, hundreds or even thousands of peoples lives. And in these times when many of us are stuck inside, I'm sure we could all use some extra enjoyment.
And remember. Baldur's Gate 3 is still in Early Access. Many models and assets are still missing from the game, and many more are still imperfect. So nothing you make will be as perfect as they would be for an actually released game. And that's okay. The people playing this game don't expect a perfect experience from the main game, so your mods don't need to be perfect either. This is a great time to get a heads up as modder for one the greatest RPGs of all time.
When you release armor mods. If you do not create new modded visuals for all race and gender combinations. Please set them with related unmodded visuals. For example. If you create a new human female halfplate, set all other genders and races to the normal halfplate visuals. This is done with no extra effort, if you use the closest existing armor GameObject as a base for your mod.
My template contains the casual outfit I created for all races and genders, to use as a base visual, if you want to create other casual outfits. Since there are no casual armors in the main game to use as a base.
Padme4000 has a great tutorial on Youtube for getting BG3 Modders' Multitool and LSLIB set up.
Once you do that, you can export the game files, and find the Weapon.txt
[UnpackedData>Shared>Public>Shared>Stats>Generated>Data]
Typical weapon entry might look like this:
new entry "WPN_Longsword"
type "Weapon"
using "_BaseWeapon"
data "RootTemplate" "1865323f-b428-4791-a0a9-578841e57463"
data "Damage Type" "Slashing"
data "Damage" "1d8"
data "ValueLevel" "2"
data "Weight" "1.35"
data "BoostsOnEquipMainHand" "UnlockSpell(Target_PommelStrike);UnlockSpell(Target_Slash_New):UnlockSpell(Rush_SpringAttack)"
data "Weapon Group" "MartialMeleeWeapon"
data "VersatileDamage" "1d10"
data "Weapon Properties" "Versatile;Melee;Dippable"
data "Proficiency Group" "Longswords;MartialWeapons"
If we want to make a magical longsword that deals Necrotic damage:
new entry "WPN_Longsword"
type "Weapon"
using "_BaseWeapon"
data "RootTemplate" "e3b2adb6-7493-466e-9c65-4281fb74e83f"
data "Damage Type" "Necrotic"
data "Damage" "1d8"
data "ValueLevel" "2"
data "Weight" "1.35"
data "BoostsOnEquipMainHand" "UnlockSpell(Target_PommelStrike);UnlockSpell(Target_Slash_New):UnlockSpell(Rush_SpringAttack)"
data "Weapon Group" "MartialMeleeWeapon"
data "Rarity" "Rare"
data "VersatileDamage" "1d10"
data "DefaultBoosts" "WeaponEnchantment(2);WeaponProperty(Magical)"
data "Weapon Properties" "Versatile;Thrown;Melee;Dippable;Magical"
data "Proficiency Group" "Longswords;MartialWeapons"
data "PassivesOnEquip" "ExtraAttack;CHA_CompassSpear_Passive"
Well, we did a couple extra fun things here:
We changed the RootTemplate Code to now use the model for the +2 Longsword
We changed the damage from slashing to necrotic
We added the "rare" weapon tag
Added a +2 enchantment, given it the Thrown property, and flagged the sword as magic
Finally we granted the wielder Extra Attack and True Strike on a failed attack roll
You can find all of this pretty easily by digging through the files
Don't ask me how to repack everything and get it working with BG3MM, because
I'm not quite there yet. Right now I'm just editing the weapons from
the AMX bag for practice
checking your comment and other helped me get over the wall i was stuck on for a bit. thanks.
I'm hitting a snag with brand new meshes on animations though...
This looks like it's likely the code, as it converts to DAE, but not GR2 (error line in the command line GR2processor).
What I was doing was basically trying to convert trap Disarm kits to be worn, but because they have no parent skeleton this is where the snag hits.
Weighting and converting hasn't been a problem, it's exported fine to DAE, it's just that line conersion.
EDIT:
I've managed to sus it and successfully run custom rigged armour pieces in game!
Having a hiccup or two with texture pathways (that bright green is not easy on the eyes), but yeah...got it working, no borking with physics going mad, everything works fine (just the damn textures....hopefully I'll get it fixed soon).
If I can help you let me know, the GR2 import/export on Blender is a little fragile, simply weighing a new armour to an armature won't work, you have to scrub some of the bone weights (as it ends up copying weights it would never need). Doesn't take long to manually do it and once done it exports to GR2 fine.
EDIT 2:
And done! It was the material ID I had listed incorrectly.
All working now as it should.
Both the %RACE%\[PAK]_%Gender%Body-type%_Armor\_merged.lsf files for DGB_F and HUM_FS have actual physics listed in that armor's entry. But none of the others do. So that covers all of the females that use the Strong body-type. But what about the others? I assume they follow a shared template. But how do I get it to apply to the Body armor I made?
[EDIT]: Nevermind, I figured it out. Trial and error, ftw. (mostly error!)
Data\Localization\English(or whatever language)\%ModName%.loca
Or can we use the current blender? I'm guessing not, or you wouldn't have specified an older version.
[UPDATE]: Blender 4+ works just fine.
I personally do not plan to support alternative body types. The amount of those mods keep increasing, so if I ever supported one, I would constantly get requests to support others. As such, I haven't done any of this type work myself. But in general, you need to 3D edit the GR2 files to fit these new body types. I would recommend checking out my Sample 3D Edited Equipment mod and any mods that already include alt body type armors.