24 replies to this topic

[hatfarm]

So, I'm thinking about making something similar to my editor but making it for editing the actual .exe. I'm wondering if people would want this and what type of features people would want. I need to hear input, so let me know.

[stewart]

What kind of featues do you think it could offer?

[hatfarm]

Well, for starters you could edit your starting base. Edit Stats for Aliens, tanks and Civilians. Edit the facility properties. Maybe edit the weapons stats although that's a completely different file. Well, we'll see. Thanks.

Lemme know what you'd be interested in.

[Exo2000]

Ideally, if you want an all around editor;

Soldiers
Equipment
Armour
Weapons
Tanks
Aliens
Terror Units (Alien Tanks)
Civilians
Starting Base Layout
Facilities
Storage
Money

If it's possible, even cashflow. Though the Money feature would make it redundant.

[hatfarm]

Ideally, if you want an all around editor;

Soldiers
Equipment
Armour
Weapons
Tanks
Aliens
Terror Units (Alien Tanks)
Civilians
Starting Base Layout
Facilities
Storage
Money

If it's possible, even cashflow. Though the Money feature would make it redundant.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Most of that is in there, though I only have the ability to edit soldier names. Equipment, Armour, Weapons and Money are not in there as I know the first three are in a different file. I don't know how money is stored but I'll check it out. Thanks for the suggestions. If you're interested, I need beta testers.

[stewart]

All these things are handled, I believe by other editors; what about:
- editing the research tree
- changing what base facilities do
- making purchaseable equipment require rearch or at least manufacture
- adding completely new weapons or facilites or aliens for that matter
- porting some of the Xcom2 features into Xcom 1, like doublemap base assaults.

[Greylocke]

All these things are handled, I believe by other editors; what about:
- editing the research tree
- changing what base facilities do
- making purchaseable equipment require rearch or at least manufacture
- adding completely new weapons or facilites or aliens for that matter
- porting some of the Xcom2 features into Xcom 1, like doublemap base assaults.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

A lot of those sound fantastic! Especially being able to add to the research tree (It needs to be larger dammit!) and being able to manufacture rifles and rifle mags would be good too. Yes the game NEEDS more weapons! All i find is ways to modify existing weapons into other weapons... i dont like this, so have more weapons would be sweet! And not necessarily more powerful weapons... just different.

[Blehm 98]

Hmm, if you can, add in the Gatling laser that is somewhere in the code, NKF replaced the laser rifle with it but he couldn't make a new weapon, sadly

[stewart]

Gatling Laser? Why not just Continuuos Beem Laser?

[Blehm 98]

It was a troop held weapon, continious stream would be less accurate, and it would take tons of power to make a continuous beam

[NKF]

The gatling laser (my name for it because the battlescape 'in soldier's hand' image reuses the autocannon although its inventory image is the laser rifle). Deals 8 points less damage than the laser pistol and is less accurate and much slower then the rifle, however its autoshot is moderately accurate and only costs 15%! That's 6 Autoshots a turn. Although it's weaker than the laser pistol, I would have really preferred this weapon over the heavy laser. Fantastic weapon.

Has two versions, an ultra heavy version (needs 40 strength) and a ridiculously light version (needs 1 strength).

I found this in three of the six unused item slots in UFO. It only needs a minor tweak to enable the firing mode selection menu. The only other tweak that needs to be done is to change the bullet image - which is somewhere in tactical.exe. As it is, it'll look as though it's firing HWP cannon rounds.

You can actually add this item into the game. I've added it onto the Skyranger and it appeared in combat. However, it will never appear in the transfer screens nor will it have a proper item label.

So the trick here would be to add this item into the transfer screens so you could make use of them. But not just for the laser, but for the other unused items as well. It would allow you to add up to 6 weapon mods and not touch everything else in the game. In TFTD these are used for the gauss clips and drills.

Ooh, some way to re-enable the melee attack menu so we don't have to resort to stacking the stun-rod onto weapons to get the melee attacks. That would be grand.

- NKF

[Blehm 98]

NKF, where are the files you edit for this?

[NKF]

All of what I mentioned? Well.. let's see.

The weapon data is in obdata.dat (geodata folder)

The code handling the transfer menus would be somewhere (craft, base, purchase, etc) in geoscape.exe (or the geoscape.exe portion of the .exe for the Collectors Edition). Same as the 80 item limit, I'd imagine.

The inventory of the ships are in craft.dat and the inventory for bases are in base.dat (savegame folder). A couple of existing store editors name these unused slots as "Engineer" or "Medic" or as other things for some very odd reason.

The bit of code that controls how the objects in obdata.dat behave (like flares lighting up, stun rods using the melee attack, probes probing, etc) would definitely be somewhere in tactical.exe (or the tactical portion of the executable for the CE). I'll bet the HWP/Terror Unit turret information is in here as well as the unique abilities for the various actors (Cyberdiscs expoding, AI using impregnation attacks for chryssalids, etc)

It's just a matter of finding where the information tables that store all this information reside. If you can mask off parts of the executable you know will not contain any information and search for known values (or familiar series of numbers near each other), you're bound to find something.

- NKF

Edited by NKF, 15 June 2005 - 01:02 AM.

[Blehm 98]

Yeah, how do i edit or change it? How do i access Geoscape and Tactical.exe? I also noticed a lot of empty and undefined slots

[NKF]

It's almost like a "Chicken-Egg, which came first?" problem. Almost, but not quite.

Hatfarm's new project is to address this issue, but in order to build the editor, we need information on how to edit the executable.

At the moment, one solution would be to use a hex editor (I use MS-Edit in binary mode - but there's bound to be something better than this).

- NKF

[Blehm 98]

sorry, but is MSedit a file that comes standard with XP?

[j'ordos]

I myself use xvi32 (http://www.chmaas.ha...xvi32/xvi32.htm), it's free, small and does everything I need, but I don't have much knowledge about other hex editors, so I can't compare really...

[Greylocke]

I would perform sexual favours for anyone who could make those weapons usable! And hand to hand would be a blast!

[CopyBass]

I would perform sexual favours for anyone who could make those weapons usable! And hand to hand would be a blast!

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

... Sound's good, though. Loved your first editor

[Jenny]

Anyone know whether or not it's possible to edit newly recruited soldier's stats? Since it's usually in a set range I was wondering if you could change that. Might be interesting to play with.

Also, if not editable, does anyone know what these ranges are exactly? I noticed TUs tend to range from 50-60ish.

[edit] Just for clarification, I am not trying to edit an existing soldier's stats. I want to change the RANGE of stats that are assigned to new soldiers when you recruit them (I'd assume it's in the EXE somewhere).

Edited by Jenny, 07 February 2006 - 06:23 AM.

[Zombie]

Here are the ranges for starting soldier abilities, Jen:

STATISTIC      MIN   MAX   RANGE
Time Units      50    60     11
Stamina         40    70     31
Health          25    40     16
Bravery         10    60      6
Reactions       30    60     31
Firing Acc.     40    70     31
Throw Acc.      50    80     31
Strength        20    40     21
Psi Str.         0   100    101
Psi Skill       16    24      9

If you want to see the statistical analysis info, look here. WARNING: lots of boring numbers.

Where these starting abilities are stored in the executable is unknown at the moment. If I get some time I'll dig around in there a bit.

- Zombie

[stewart]

Anyone know whether or not it's possible to edit newly recruited soldier's stats? Since it's usually in a set range I was wondering if you could change that. Might be interesting to play with.

Also, if not editable, does anyone know what these ranges are exactly? I noticed TUs tend to range from 50-60ish.

[edit] Just for clarification, I am not trying to edit an existing soldier's stats. I want to change the RANGE of stats that are assigned to new soldiers when you recruit them (I'd assume it's in the EXE somewhere).

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Get yourself a disassembler and have a field day my dear; I suspect you are right that it's in the exe?

Wait there's a command in DOS called Debug I think that may let you edit the executable.

Make a copy first or you might be one unhappy allbeit tall girl.

[Zombie]

I use MS-Edit instead of DOS for editing. While it's not too good at displaying values, it gets the job done. Just type "edit" at a DOS prompt and away you go.

I had a chance to look for starting soldier attributes in the exe, but it is just so large that it is tough to find exactly where they are located. It's definitely not in the first 1/3 of it, that's for sure.

- Zombie

[NKF]

Zombie, here's what I do.

First of all, remember that the first bit of the executable is the executable stub. Contains all the basic bits and pieces that none of us are really interested in, but it's there. You can ignore all that.

Next, convert the number you want to find in little endian format. You can use MS Calculator (or any old scientific calculator with base-N modes). Enter the number you want in decimal, switch to hexadecimal mode, write each pair of values in reverse (add an extra 0 in front if you have an uneven amount of numbers/characters). This converts your number into little endian format. For example, if I were looking for 1254, this gives me 4E6. In little endian, it'll be e604. Next, enter each pair of the hexadecimal numbers into the calculator in hex mode, switch to decimal and take note of its value.

Back in MS-Edit, go to search>find then enter the sequence of numbers via the usual alt+numeric keypad method. OR, if you've found an identical value in the code, highlight it, then go to search>find and unless there are spaces in the selection, you should get an exact copy of what you're looking for in the text to find field. Now just search away. Use F3 to repeat the search over and over.

The best way to figure out what's what is to have a look at the adjacent values to see if you recognise any of it.

It's surprising, but you can actually find quite a lot of items this way.

Try to open the executable in an easy to work with width. Say 100. That way you can get your exact location in the file by row * 100 + column.

- NKF

Edited by NKF, 01 March 2006 - 02:11 AM.

[Jenny]

Thanks for the info, guys. I'll see what I can find out with some simple hex browsing!