Beginner questions on ressource nodes and stack sizes

Hi there,

I just wrote down my ideas for my first ark mod. But before I start coding, there are some last questions I was not able to answer myself or to find tutorials about.
Maybe some of you can suggest me tutorials / manpages that help me to answer this questions.
Would be really helpful for my first modding adventure :wink:

Ok, for my planned mod I ā€¦

  • have to use different stack sizes for a new item in inventory or a storage box
  • need to introduce a new ressource node in specific areas
  • would like to change the spoil time of items in a box related to special other items in the box (like in the preserving bin)

To my beginner-mind the second point seems to be the hardest. Introducing a new ressource node with a new harvestable ressource in a specific area of the map ā€¦
Do you know any modding ressources that can be used as examples / self-study material to find out how to solve theese requirements?

Regards,

Hey ,
If i am reading it correctly the second points you want to be able to place a resource on a certain map that then allows the player to harvest and use it. If this is the case then you can watch this tutorial it should help Ark Dev Kit: Tutorial 12- Placing Resources on the Island - YouTube with the placement of the resource.

Ark Dev Kit Tutorial: 11- Creating a Harvestable Resource! - YouTube This video should help with making a harvestable resource.

I am then lead to believe the others are to do with the item blueprint. I might be mistaken so please correct me if i am wrong.

Hope i helped a bit and good luck in your modding adventures. :slight_smile:

Hey Mozarano,
yes, this video series helped me a lot. Thanks.

I still have problems with points 1 and 3. I also think it might be related to the blueprints, but I canā€™t find options for that. Neither I found a possibility to script such things.
So Iā€™ll figure out my thoughts with some more details:

The spoil time of items in the box should be multiplied for every stack of a special resource, counting up to 5 slots for the multiplier
Logic of the preserving bin is to be auto-activated with sparkpowder and to consume the sparkpowder.
So here is no kind of consumption and a spoilage multiplier that differs for the amount of stacks in the remote inventory.
Is it possible to script this?

This new resource (spoiling, btw.) has a stack size of 2 in inventory. But in the structures inventory Iā€™d like to stack up to 10.
Is it possible to use a different stack size here?

Hi ,
I believe this is what you are looking for or close enough to it.
for point one.

and for point two

Hope that helps. You should be able to find that in your PrimalItemResource{Your resource name} and/or if a consumable PrimalItemConsumable{your item name} whatever it is your making :slight_smile:
Any issues just reply

Hi Mozarano,

thanks, that really helped me to find the right values to modify.
I was looking for the graph editor. As a programmer I was looking for something to write down code, so I didnā€™t recognize that as the place to build the logic ^^

Now I started to work on the map extension.
I planned to support TheIsland and TheCenter. Wookie only mentions extensions to TheIsland. Is it possible to ā€œimportā€ data of other maps into the devkit to modify them as I do with TheIsland?

Hey ,
Yes this is possible all you have to do if go to the mods section and locate the Center folder.
7f92f9ca3d97ba72150d7f6caf68602aba1da1b0.jpeg

After that it should come up with a load of files. You want to click on this one.
CenterMapSelect.JPG

Beware if you have a slow PC it might and probably will take a long time the dev kit might even crash but donā€™t worry youā€™ll get there.
After this should show

If you follow the rest of the video it should help with placing the resources. It should be no different.
Any questions just ask :slight_smile:

Hope that helps

  • Moza

Yes, helped a lot. Thank you.

I have a last question / problem.
Because I want to support different maps, I created a new level in the islandsubmaps folder as in wookies tutorial.
On this level I placed the foilage nodes.
Afterwards I created a new mod as copy from the generic mod, adjusted names and descriptions and cooked a map extension including the new level for this mod.

The harvestable node is still part of my first mod, not part of the one with the map extension.
Starting a singleplayer game with my first mod and the map extension I can see my new level listed in the loading screen. So the level is loaded.
But the nodes do not appear on the map.

Is it not possible to place harvest nodes from other mods in a map extension? Do they have to be part of the same mod?

Ok, for the moment I threw away the idea to cook seperate map extensions for the maps. First Iā€™d be glad to have it working for TheIsland.

Here are the steps I did:

  • created a new level in TheIslands submap directory
  • placed my resource nodes as I did on the test map
  • verified to have em on the correct level by toggle the visibiliby of my level in the level browser
  • cooked an island extension using my new level and the mods main level file
  • cooked the mod
  • uploaded to steam
  • clean reinstall of the mod via steam (deleted all cached files from the mod)
  • tested in local game and on a dedicated testserver

Everything in my mod works, except the map extension.
Is there any other pitfall I should be aware of?

First, open your mod folder in steam so you can see all the downloaded files for the mod. You should have a ā€œMapsā€ folder that contains your sublevel.

If there is a maps folder -

Make sure that the resource nodes you placed saved to your sublevel by opening up your sublevel and you should see your added items in the scene outliner on the right

ce8acae0f9c9dcb511fe87f8e06a610a.png

If the maps folder is not there, I donā€™t know why because if your sublevel is listed in the cook window like your pic above, and itā€™s spelled correctly, and you click cook ā€œCook Map Extensionā€ it should be cooking.

Thanks for your hints. It helped me to get the problem fixed.

There was no maps-folder in the mod directory.
So I added a path for a temp output directory. There was a map created but not included when uploading the mod.
I tried cooking before upload:

  • map extension and then a game mod
  • game mod only
  • map extension only

There was nothing more than the game mod in the mod folder.

So I seeked for caches in the epic program folder, found some mod directories under ā€œEpic Games\ARKDevKit\ModTools\Outputā€ and deleted them all.
Afterwards I cooked again a map extension (no game mod this time!), uploaded it and now it works!
It seems if I cooked both, map extension and game mod it always preferred game mod instead of combining both to one upload ā€¦

However ā€¦

Thanks Moza and P0k3r for your patience and help.

testmod output is for doing exactly how it sounds. It cooks a LOCAL testmod so you can test it LOCALLY. That version is not meant to be uploaded hence no upload button. Simply making sure the testmod output line is blank will ensure that you can upload your mod