Making your own appid_linking-txt

[Mindtroverted]

Hello colleagues!
I have downloaded most of the decks available here on this forum and now I have 160+ decks for my MTG 2013. I'm running the updated Theta release which doesn't need Rick's dll. Almost every deck works fine (all of them work, while maybe 3 or 4 have a messed up title or no preview picture, etc.). However, the unlock deck button does not work for any of the decks. I've unpacked my .wad files and found I have several appid_linking.txt files. I did a closer look and found that there were inconsistencies between them (probably owing to the fact that some decks are older and contain redundant application ids or sth. My question for you is: How would I go about making my own appid_linking.txt file?
I know that there are four lines for each deck. I know the first line goes in square brackets and is the title of the deck, the second being the unique id of the deck and the third and fourth line being ids for unlocking the deck or foiling it. What I don't know is how to acquire this information from my unpacked .wad files myself and write it down so I can make an appid_linking.txt file that I can be 100% sure works on all my decks.

[RiiakShiNal]

For detailed information about the APPID_LINKING.TXT file itself check this post.

As for getting the information you need for the APPID_LINKING.TXT file from the unpacked wads just look at the decks and unlocks (the name in [] is just a friendly identifier and is not really necessary as even an empty set of brackets works). The second line of the APPID_LINKING.TXT entries is the deck uid (found in the deck XML files), but not all decks need an entry as either they do not have unlocks or the only unlocks they have are of the "Promo" type (game_mode="2"). So you only need to make sure that decks that have normal unlocks (game_mode="0") have an entry. The AppIds can be virtually any number you want because you are using a Theta release, though 97330 should keep them permanently unlocked/foiled.

[Mindtroverted]

Thanks for the information. I did it but I had only slight success. Maybe 10% of the decks have had their cards unlocked. I don't know what I am doing wrong but I am also unable to enter a duel in the campaign screen although I can enter a duel from free-for-all, wayback, etc. I'm attaching my appid_linking.txt and script_log.txt

[RiiakShiNal]

I don't know why it is not working for you. The script log points to an error in a single specific card, but that should not be causing the problems you are mentioning. Are you using the APPID_LINKING.TXT in an unpacked state or did you pack it into a wad?

As for campaign issues the wayback 2012 campaign can cause some fairly large problems with the official expansion so it may be the cause of not being able to enter a duel in the campaign screen.

[Mindtroverted]

I put it into the config folder of data_pc of data_core and repacked it. I tried removing all the .wad files except the ones that come with the game and the problem is still there. But when I unpacked the data_core and removed the appid-linking.txt, everything seems to work fine again so whatever the problem, it's not caused by the mods but by the appid_linking.txt, even though I've double checked and there are no decks which have the same uid (and even if there were, the problem would appear even without the appid_linking.txt when I put the two decks back in the MTG folder). This one's a total mystery to me. The only thing that I could think of is that the names of the decks in the [] do matter because that's the only thing where I improvised. I'll continue experimenting and hope I'll find the cause.

P.S. Oh, so the official DLCs aren't working as they should? Then how do other people use them? If I finish the campaign first and then put the official dlc's into the folder, will the problem be limited only to the campaign? If they do cause serious problems maybe I should avoid them for now. After all, even without the new dlc's I have enough decks to play with.

[RiiakShiNal]

The official DLCs do work the way they are supposed to, but Official Expansion 1 uses the same campaign id as kevlahnota used for the wayback 2012 campaign (in the Community DLC) so they conflict and cause problems. We don't know a way to work around this because the only campaign ids that were free and worked are now all used by Official Expansion 1. That is also one of the reasons other modders (myself included) have not created campaigns.

[Mindtroverted]

I have started from scratch again. I have an idea of how to avoid any problems, but it'll take me a while. Is there any way of using both the decks from the official Expansion 1 and from the COMMUNITY DLC without problems? I just want to be able to use those decks. If it's not possible, would you be able to tell me which files exactly conflict? By this I mean specific files in the unpacked .wad files, of course so I can see if I can edit it somehow to just get the decks.

[thefiremind]

would you be able to tell me which files exactly conflict?

If the only conflict is the campaign, just delete DATA_DLC_0999\DATA_DECKS\DATA_DLC_0999\DATA_ALL_PLATFORMS\CAMPAIGN (the file inside or the whole directory, it's the same).

[RiiakShiNal]

As thefiremind said if you remove the campaign xml (or the directory) from the Community DLC that should resolve the conflicts. Though to use the decks you will still need to "unlock" them by adding always_available="true" to the deck tags in each deck XML for the community DLC. If you want to also use the campaign and encounter decks then you also need to remove the never_available="true" attributes from those decks.

[Mindtroverted]

Thank you both. Now the only remaining thing is to find out why my appid_linking.txt is acting up. Setting 97330 or 0 causes this problem in the campaign to occur (no mods installed). If I leave the original .txt then I have the 11 original decks and they are fully unlocked. I assume I'll have to c/p the promo and unlock ids from the UNLOCKS folder for each .wad.

[thefiremind]

Thank you both. Now the only remaining thing is to find out why my appid_linking.txt is acting up. Setting 97330 or 0 causes this problem in the campaign to occur (no mods installed). If I leave the original .txt then I have the 11 original decks and they are fully unlocked. I assume I'll have to c/p the promo and unlock ids from the UNLOCKS folder for each .wad.

The IDs from the UNLOCKS folders have nothing to do with APPID_LINKING. But your problem is strange because the campaign shouldn't bother APPID_LINKING at all... have you tried to use the APPID_LINKING suggested by RiiakShiNal (with either 97330 or 0) after deleting your profile? If you need to know where your profile is stored, I'll borrow RiiakShiNal's words from another topic...

Skidrow stores its profiles in:
%AppData%\Local\SKIDROW\97330\Storage
C:\Users\<User>\AppData\Local\SKIDROW\97330\Storage (usually this on Windows Vista)

Theta stores it's profiles in a directory off of the main game directory usually named <UserName>_swarm.

Of course you can move your profile somewhere else instead of deleting it, so you can restore it if you need to.

[Mindtroverted]

have you tried to use the APPID_LINKING suggested by RiiakShiNal (with either 97330 or 0) after deleting your profile? If you need to know where your profile is stored, I'll borrow RiiakShiNal's words from another topic...

Skidrow stores its profiles in:
%AppData%\Local\SKIDROW\97330\Storage
C:\Users\<User>\AppData\Local\SKIDROW\97330\Storage (usually this on Windows Vista)

Theta stores it's profiles in a directory off of the main game directory usually named <UserName>_swarm.

Yes, I have tried doing that, but I'll do it once more to confirm. I even looked at the places where SKIDROW stores its profiles just in case. I am almost finished inserting every mod I have. No problems whatsoever until now because I haven't toucked the appid file.
Tha nature of the problem is like this: after I edit the appid file and enter the game, after clicking the campaign button the first tab on the left becomes "challenges" instead of "campaign", and when I select the first opponent in the "campaign" tab and select my deck the game sends me back to the screen where you select your opponent instead of starting the duel. You are right, it's weird because I haven't read anyone having a similar problem. What's even weirder is that I don't get a script_log when I do this. The script_log I had gotten and uploaded earlier was caused by my unprofessional editing of specific wad files. Now that I inserted the original .wad files without editing the script_log doesn't appear anymore.

[thefiremind]

Tha nature of the problem is like this: after I edit the appid file and enter the game, after clicking the campaign button the first tab on the left becomes "challenges" instead of "campaign", and when I select the first opponent in the "campaign" tab and select my deck the game sends me back to the screen where you select your opponent instead of starting the duel.

I had this problem while I was trying to make a custom campaign (before the RTR DLC came out), but the reason was obvious for me: I was messing up with the campaign itself. The custom campaigns were also appearing in reverse order (and I never understood how the official campaigns keep their correct order), but then again, I was messing with campaigns so I could have expected something wrong with them.

There's still one thing you can try: leave the core WAD untouched and keep your custom APPID_LINKING in a separate WAD. If you need a WAD to start with, use my unlocker here:
viewtopic.php?f=102&t=9304#p107136
Note that I use 2 copies of the same APPID_LINKING.TXT: one in DATA_ALL_PLATFORMS and one in DATA_PC, just to be sure that any game version can find it.
After all, it's coherent with what I know: custom campaigns get scrambled, and if you edit the core WAD it becomes a custom WAD somehow...

[Mindtroverted]

I have successfully entered all of the mods. Even the community DLC seems to be working with the CAMPAIGN folder intact. I guess that means I don't have the first official expansion (at least not the campaign part of it). I've counted 198 decks. All of the decks themselves are unlocked but none of the cards are because I haven't touched the appid yet. I'll go with your unlocker thefiremind and see where that gets me. One lesson I'd draw from this is that you should NEVER touch the DATA_CORE.WAD file unless you truly know what you're doing
You've been a great help. I honestly didn't expect this much of constructive feedback and solutions. Thank you again. Will report back on whether the unlocking was successful

[Mindtroverted]

Update:
Haven't had time to add uids to the appid manually but around 10-15% of the decks do get unlocked with thefiremind's unlocking wad. A script_log has reappeared and cerebral eruption is again causing some problems. But that's just a single card, right?
Currently in the process of establishing a LAN over hamachi but no luck so far. I obviously don't know the right procedure or there must be some kind of catch I'm missing