Guide for new modders Requisted

[Stolij]

I started trying to mod rimworld yesterday, but i noticed the lack of documentation for new modders, maybe it would be nice if someone who knows how to mod could make a guide for alpha 14, because i cant find a up to date guide.

i was searching for a guide for:

• Production benches (smelter, smithy, etc)
• Making Pawns do a job on a new Production bench

Any help is really Appreciated, Thanks!

[kaptain_kavern]

Hi Stolij,

(Please note that I only know XML modding - no C# skills at all - and all I can say is about XML files only. Also keep in mind that the game is still in Alpha stage, so it's kinda impossible to have up-to-date guides all the time)

Most of the documentations from prior versions stand still IMHO.

What I mean is that 90% of what you can learn on the wiki(an other link) and here on the forum haven't changed. The way things are done, how files and def "work together", etc ... All of this haven't changed too much and don't change that much between each new Alphas. (All the mod update I've done were mostly matters of updating <tags> that have changed).

What change often is tags and their uses but not the logic behind.

So i can only advise you to read anything you can find even stuff from A12 and such.

Also, if he continue to do it, Tynan keep a detailled log of what he change between updates (here for A13to14 - use of CTRL+F is advised ^^)

[kaptain_kavern]

Oh a tip I totally forgot to mention : be on the hunt for Github links in modders release post, because it means you can read their code!(and if the code is commented you can learn quite much that way - again the use of the search feature is a blessing) 

Here is mine BTW : https://github.com/kaptain-kavern

[Shinzy]

Mimicking =P that's the best way to learn at this point of time in my opinion

try to find a mod that does something similar


Anyhow for a bench you need your building def, you can find an example in the core in Defs/ThingDefs_Buildings/Buildings_production.xml (look at the stonecutting bench for example)

and to get the pawns to work the bench, you need a work giver, which can be found in core aswell WorkGiverDefs
and find the bit about the Stonecutting bench again to see how it did it

[CallMeDio]

The only thing I missed on the start was some kind of documentation and tutorial on detouring core methods and reflection (C#), on detouring I found help here on the forum and for reflection I found mostly on other places because it is widely used for other stuff. For C# general questions like what is this error and how to do something you will pretty much find everything on stackoverflow after a google search.
I recommend Mimicking too, I did my first xml mod pretty fast after downloading other xml mod, seeing its files and comparing to the game def files.
And you will see this forum is a living rimworld modding wiki, anything you ask here someone who knows it will appear to help really fast  .

[milon]

I definitely found it difficult, but keep in mind it's still in Alpha.  Any quality guide will take time to write, and we get a new version every few months.  It's a moving target right now, which is a virtually impossible goal for good guides.  We'll have really good guides once the game is mechanics-complete. 

Until then, use my auto-generated documentation of RimWorld's use of XML (link in sig).

[Jaxxa]

I think that My OmniGel mod should cover what you are asking for with Production Benches, and it is on GitHub. Feel free to give me a should if you want somthign explained more.

https://github.com/jaxxa/ED-OmniGel

As for starting out, I started out small, making a few modifications and updating other mods until I got the hang of it and moved on to doing new things.