ARK Dev Kit Update Notes! (Current: 222.6)

anonymous_user_84030502 · July 16, 2015, 3:12am

v222.6

Features :
v222.6 adds some new options for Total Conversions in the PrimalGlobals Blueprint:
bTotalConversionShowUnofficialServers: this will make your TC show “Unofficial” Servers by default (since most TC’s except for SotF do not have Official Servers ). Defaults to TRUE
UIOnlyShowMapFileNames: This is an array of filenames (no extension and not case sensitive) for Maps to list in your TC’s Host Game UI. If your TC includes and only supports a custom map, then you’ll want to add it to this array. If there are entries in this array, then all installed maps are shown.
UIOnlyShowModIDs: This is an array of Steam Workshop ID’s for your Total Conversion to support. If there are no entries in this array, all Mods will be shown at the Host Game UI. If there are any entries, only Mod ID’s in that array will be shown. If you want no mods to show, just add one entry that is an invalid ID like “0”

Contains updated “TheIsland” Map files featuring the latest spawners as well! (Quetz, Giganotosaurus, etc)

v222.5

v220.1

v217.0

v210.0

v206.2 (06/09/2015)

v201.6 (25/08/2015)

v201.5 (22/08/2015)

New Features :

you don’t have to cook any maps for TC’s anymore (unless you want new maps). It’ll automatically figure out ANY assets changed anywhere regardless of map cooking. Recommend you don’t Cook TheIsland in fact, because by avoiding cooking TheIsland, a TC will take less memory and time to Cook. It’ll still automatically Cook any Changes you made to TheIsland . Cooking in general also takes a lot less memory now anyway

All the latest 201.5 content and functionality!

Capability to use UE Marketplace Meshes, Textures, Materials, and Particle Systems

Of special interest to modders, the capability for Items to get blueprint event when it is Equipped, when it’s Unequipped, and also get a Blueprint Tick when equipped!!! Also, via the Scuba Gear,a working example of how an Item can effectively manage a buff while the item is equipped (Scuba Fins add water-only speed buff, Scuba Tank adds water-only Oxygen &stamina buff, Scuba goggles add an extra post processing and remove some water post processing). With blueprint item events, Items can have wayyyy more custom functionality via Blueprint than ever before.

To use the new item events: bUseblueprintEquippedNotifications and bUseEpuippedItemBlueprintTick (on the item BP)

IBL Capture Actors now have a “bUseMapRelativeSaving” option, use in mod maps IF you wanna bake & save unique IBL data for your map, and not use one of the pre-created IBL values

v200.5 (8/19/2015)

v193 (8/4/2015)

Fixed various bugs associated with loading & listing mods, latest game content & engrams (Bear Traps), in addition to the patch notes here ( -Patch Notes- Archival (v278.73 & Below) :: ARK: Survival Evolved General Discussions ) some small new ARK Dev Kit general features include:

Dino subclasses can now simply have their own additional CharacterStatusComponent added onto the Components array. Just give the CharacterStatusComponent class that you want to take effect a higher “CharacterStatusComponentPriority” value, in the CharacterStatusComponent Blueprint. So this way you can make a “RaptorElite” which is a subclass of the standard Raptor, but uses its own “RaptorElite” character status component with unique values.

PrimalCharacter classes now have a default PrimalBuffs array that is added to them upon creation.

A level’s PrimalWorldSettings now has an array called NPCRandomSpawnClassWeights that lets you specify globally that a Dino should be replaced with a weighted array of possible dinos (used for the “rare” elite dino variants). We can and probably should also wrap this to PrimalGameData as well, but haven’t yet.

v190 (7/29/2015)

Stackable Mod support! This allows multiple mods to be used together and combine their changes – works with existing mods too! and you can use Mods on custom maps now. To Use Stackable Mods from the in-game menu, simply goto the “Host Game” menu and then select a map, and a list of mods to stack. The top mod will take priority (i.e. is most likely to fully work), and any secondary mods will attempt to add items and other overrides, they may or may not work depending on what those mods actually do (most mods that add items will work as secondary mods… whereas you’ll likely want to use any major rebalancing mod as your “base” mod :). We’ll continue to add more functionality for what Stacked Mods can do, so stay tuned!

To specify stacked mods for dedicated server commandline, you first need to manually install the Mods by copying over the Mod files, then specify Steam Published File ID’s in your Server’s GameUserSettings.ini like so (and just load the map via commandline):
ActiveMods=487516323,485734065

Or use a Commandline to launch it like this:
ShooterGameServer.exe /Game/Mods/485317707/halo?listen?GameModIds=222SomeMod222,333Shield333
(the left-most ID is the top mod)

(where “halo”, for example, is the map included with Mod:
Steam Workshop::The Silent Cartographer

This syntax will be updated soon to be entirely Steam FileID driven, and we’ll also integrate automatic downloading/updating of mods into the dedicated server based on the ID’s.

What defines whether a mod lists in the “Mods” section of the Host Game Menu? Simply whether you cook a custom PrimalGameData.
(Note that Mods will also list in the Maps Section wherein choosing them will simply load TheIsland afterwards, we’ll fix that later.)

What data can stack from extra stacked Mods? Specifically, these values are currently stacked (with the first mod listed functioning as normal with complete PrimalGameData, and then the next mods in order taking precedence over the later listed ones):
Remap_NPC += InMergeCanidate-&gt;Remap_NPC;
Remap_SupplyCrates += InMergeCanidate-&gt;Remap_SupplyCrates;
Remap_ResourceComponents += InMergeCanidate-&gt;Remap_ResourceComponents;
Remap_NPCSpawnEntries += InMergeCanidate-&gt;Remap_NPCSpawnEntries;
Remap_Engrams += InMergeCanidate-&gt;Remap_Engrams;
Remap_Items += InMergeCanidate-&gt;Remap_Items;
AdditionalEngramBlueprintClasses += InMergeCanidate-&gt;AdditionalEngramBlueprintClasses;
AdditionalStructuresToPlace += InMergeCanidate-&gt;AdditionalStructuresToPlace; 
AdditionalStructureEngrams += InMergeCanidate-&gt;AdditionalStructureEngrams;
Soon we’ll actually try to dynamically “diff” the PrimalGameDatas to combine any changed values and not just those arrays, but for now this should work effectively for adding more items, structures, and class remaps via multiple mods.

Also notes from v190:

Remap_Engrams will now also remap the Engram Requirements!

The new Remap_Items array will actually remap a PrimalItem class to a different PrimalItem when it’s created.

The new AdditionalStructureEngrams array is a much simpler way to add more Engrams to a Structure. Simply add elements to that array, specify the Structure class, and then the array of additional items to add to it (the item classes, not the actual engram classes). Those will then appear as Craftable Engrams within the Structure (presuming the Player has learned the Engram)! This way, you don’t have to modify any of the base structure classes directly if you just want to add more craftable items at, say, the Smithy Structure, and you retain forward-compatibility with other mods and future additions to the base game.

7/23/2015

7/22/2015

v188 (7/21/2015)

v187.2

ARK Dev Kit v187.2 has been released, please update the ARK Dev Kit Tool from Steam, and also install the new Engine binaries from ! In addition to the general patchnotes for ARK v187 ( ), here are the specific new additions to the Dev Kit functionality:

You can now override the values of a specific Engrams by ClassName via the GameMode (rather than using indices, so the override will never become out-of-date), like so, in your GameMode class:
OverrideNamedEngramEntries=(EngramClassName=“EngramEntry_AlarmTrap_C”,EngramHidden=true,EngramPointsCost=3,EngramLevelRequirement=2,RemoveEngramPreReq=false)

You can also set only specific Engram classes to be visible, all others than the ones specified in your GameMode’s “OverrideNamedEngramEntries” will then automatically be hidden, in your GameMode class:
bOnlyAllowSpecifiedEngrams=true/false

(Another way to hide a base-game Engram is to use the Remap_Engrams array in your GamaData to remap it to “none” class )

If you want to add a new buildable Structure, in addition to putting the Engram on the “AdditionalEngramsBlueprintClasses” array in your PrimalGameData, you should add the Structure class into this array of your PrimalGameData so that the Structure is buildable: AdditionalStructuresToPlace

(This approach is recommended, rather than overriding the Structure Placer blueprint which is fairly complex – the ‘AdditionalStructuresToPlace’ array is future-proofed to ensure a mod doesn’t conflict with any future Structures that we add.)

Also, Dinos now have a floating point NPCZoneVolumeCountWeight value, so that for example tiny insects cost 0.1 but a proper could cost 2.0, to fill up an NPC Volume. This was useful to get a lot more Ants to spawn than larger Dinos, without having fewer big Dinos – you can see this in-use in the new Ant Character Blueprints

v186.3

Hey all, we’ve posted ARK Dev Kit 186.3 – please download the latest from Steam and also download+install the new Engine\ files from GitHub ( ).

General ARK patch notes are listed here ( ), and new features pertinent to the ARK Dev Kit include:

We fixed – we hope – the fail case where an item would fail to upload and then forever after fail to upload until you deleted your upload data-config files. If an upload fails now, the Dev Kit won’t try to cache the (apparentlly invalid) Steam PublishedFileId. Furthermore, if you have a problem uploading in the future, you can click the “Reset Publisher” button on the Upload to Steam menu, which will force the Dev Kit to upload with a totally new PublishedFileId. If you ever want to change the PublishedfileID manually (in case you reset it and want to restore it to Update an existing Workshop Item), then you can do so by editing this file in a text editor:
“steamapps\common\ARKDevKit\Projects\ShooterGame\Saved\Mods.db”

You no longer have to manually add items to the “Master Item List” in order to use new Items in your Mod. This was causing problems with original items from Saved Games getting wrong network indices if that array was replaced/modified/added. In fact, that array really has no key meaning anymore, so don’t bother editing it. Rather, to add an Item, just reference it somewhere used by your content: in a supply crate, in a loot drop, or add the Engram for it to the Additional Engram Entries array of your PrimalGameData (if you just really, really want it cooked without a direct reference, then add it to the “Extra Resources” list of your PrimalGameData). That’s all.
Remember, you can dynamically give items to yourself using this cheat command:

cheat giveitem “FULL Path of Item” [ItemCount] [ItemQuality] [IsBlueprint]
such as:
cheat giveitem “Blueprint’/Game/PrimalEarth/CoreBlueprints/Resources/PrimalItemResource_Wood.PrimalItemResource_Wood’” 1 1 false

(Omit the cheat if you’re playing singleplayer)

You can now more easily add Engrams also via the “Additional Engram Blueprint Classes”, if you want the game to also support all of the BASE GAME engrams as well – even when we add more :). If you want to replace BASE Game engrams completely, then you should use the “Remap_Engrams” array in your PrimalGameData. Soon you will also be able to REMOVE base game engrams by replacing them with a NULL class, but that won’t work until v187 – for now to remove existing game engrams you can still use the “Override Engram Entries” array in your TestGameMode, though we’ll be changing that soon to support names rather than indices which tend to change

You can also add MORE Dino Entries (Survivor Dossier Profiles) with the Additional Dino Entries array in the PrimalGameData. To add an amusing new Dossier for your, of course, Godzilla-sized Raptor.

The benefit of using these Additional Arrays, rather than the original arrays, is to support all of the dynamically-expanding base game content as well, if that is something you want to do. (If you just want to replace the base game content, then feel free to override the original arrays directly).

If you’re making a mod, you can now set the “Mod Name” and “Mod Description” in your PrimalGameData. Players will see this on their Pause screen which will help remind them what mod they’re playing, and what it does – since sometimes the changes of a mod can be subtle

“How-To Map” and “How-To Mod” Intro Video tutorials should finally be posted tonight!

(Regarding this patch note: “* Mods that change the player class now still get armor attached properly” – as you should see in v186, that should just “work” now, should not require any modifications to your assets. Under the hood: the game now dynamically determines the attachments for the correct gender player class, rather than doing an exact class equality comparison.)

anonymous_user_10f0ff50 · July 16, 2015, 3:33am

Super excited!!!

cwm33 · July 16, 2015, 3:38am

There are quite a few files missing in the devkit related to the new items released with 186.

The blueprints that provide us with editable data are missing for:
The Grill
Reinforced Ceiling-Door
Reinforced Window-Door
All types of kibble

The core blueprint is also missing for the WeaponAlarmTrap, but it exists for the PoisonTrap.

Might be more, but that’s what I’ve found, or shall I say what I’ve been unable to find thusfar.

anonymous_user_84030502 · July 16, 2015, 3:47am

Ah yes, re-uploading the Steam Depot now with the new content, should be up in about 10 min – will post when it’s done

anonymous_user_10f0ff50 · July 16, 2015, 3:53am

awesome!!!

anonymous_user_84030502 · July 16, 2015, 4:06am

That’s posted now

JasonFJ · July 16, 2015, 5:35am

You guys rock seriously. If you’re ever in Singapore I wanna buy you all beers

cwm33 · July 16, 2015, 5:31pm

f3b77a25051a2a5d092bcdcd1fdce5dfe90f34078a95bdce6f051751f4803fed.jpg

Thanks! Now to tinker around with all your hard work.

anonymous_user_84030502 · July 16, 2015, 10:29pm

Note:
Later today we’ll upload to the ARK Dev Kit the following Maya Source Rigs:
FPV Hatchet
FPV Pistol
FPV Bow
Male TPV
Female TPV

This will make it much, much easier for modders to create new animations for the first person weapons and third person characters (as well as make new meshes that are rigged to those skeletons, if they wish).
We’ll probably add the currently-released dino sources and the rest of the FPV weapons later too, but this is a start at least

Cheers,

anonymous_user_10f0ff50 · July 18, 2015, 3:45am

Sweet, I just downloaded that update… now to get maya and learn that also.

P.S. any ETA(general is totally okay, like 1 day, 3 days, 2 weeks, just and idea) on how far behind the 187 main game update we will be?

EDIT Well I’m not a student, and I don’t have $3,600 to drop for the full license, or $120/mo for the desktop version… anyway can swing a deal with them like the Unreal guys? That would be epic!

cwm33 · July 18, 2015, 5:26pm

Could you please update the Steam Depot with the full set of Crossbow blueprints?

FGS-Gladman · July 18, 2015, 6:42pm

You don’t need Maya to edit animations. You should be able to do that from within UE4.

anonymous_user_10f0ff50 · July 18, 2015, 7:07pm

Not for the animations, but for editing/making new models.

anonymous_user_2fc9d794 · July 20, 2015, 1:34am

Keep up the great work!

Each new release eases the modding pain. You guys are moving quickly in the right direction!

JasonFJ · July 21, 2015, 8:30am

Hey devs, just a reminder that the Add Structures to Place still needs some back-end fixes. I posted on a separate thread, but note that structures you place… that require it’s own inventory… are still not reference-able from the structure. e.g. if you create a new standing torch… .add the structure… it will still by default point to the vanilla standing torch inventory blueprint.

anonymous_user_f655d7bd · July 23, 2015, 5:44am

I am a little confused, is the ark dev kit now at 188 or still at 187.2. Was it just notes for 188.0

“7/21/2015: ARK Dev Kit v187.2 has been released”

anonymous_user_84030502 · July 23, 2015, 6:39am

7/22/2015: Added new “SmallIsland” example level, which is a fully functioning outdoors ARK Survival level but at a much smaller scale, to help you analyze how everything is setup: the sky, the IBL probes, the water postprocessing, the NPC Spawners and Supply Crates, all the core stuff is in that tiny little example map now, which can be cooked and uploaded to Steam Workshop, modified, expanded, whatever you want

anonymous_user_34f59e211 · July 23, 2015, 7:04am

Thank you so much for this.

BlueFreakQ · July 23, 2015, 3:15pm

Hello,
I don’t know if I’m going blind or just need some sleep, lol, but I can’t seem to find these files. If anyone has the path to them I would appreciate it.
Thank you for the small island example, it will be very helpful.

~Q~

anonymous_user_84030502 · July 24, 2015, 5:11am

They’re being uploaded right now