Help with installing mods that don't have core files?

[fallenangle]

I've been trying to download and install The Firemind's Scion of Darkness's, and East Bay's decks, among others, but even when I attempt to move all of the separate content into the correct folders in the "Custom" folder created with Riiak's Deckbuilder, the decks do not appear in-game and appear incomplete (missing artwork or cards) when I view them in the Deckbuilder. So far I have been able to install all of the mods with core wad files without encountering any problems, but haven't had any luck with any of the individual mods except Balmung. Can anyone give me some advice on how to get the decks with downloads split across multiple files working properly, or be kind enough to upload some of them as single core wads so that I can get them working myself? Any help you could offer me would be greatly appreciated, as I've tried downloading and installing the Firemind's, Scion of Darkness's, and East Bay's files and decks multiple times without any success.

Thanks for all your help.

[BloodReyvyn]

All of the .wad files need to be extracted to the install directory of the game, not any custom folder. Wherever you have DotP_D14.exe installed is where the files all need to go.

EXAMPLE: Steam installs the game to "C:\Program Files (x86)\Steam\steamapps\common\Magic 2014"

[fallenangle]

Thanks for your reply, but I just put the Firemind's unpacked Wads in the same directory as the executable for the game and nothing showed up in-game. The same thing happened when I tried putting the unpacked mono-black deck and other wads and also got no result. The packed wads are also in my main directory.

I'm still not sure where the problem is. Anything with one core mod seems to work fine; it's only the mods that split their files across multiple downloads that seem to cause the problem (I've double-checked that I downloaded all the necessary files for The Firemind's mod, too, but I still can't get any of it to show up in-game.) Any help you can provide would be much appreciated.

Thanks again for all of your help.

[thefiremind]

I don't know how to help because I don't use unpacked WADs in game. What I always do is to keep WAD files in the game folder for playing and testing, and unpacked WAD folders in another place for editing. I can understand that it's not the best solution if disk space matters, but I have enough free space to allow that. If I remember well, DotP2012 didn't allow to use unpacked data, and since I started to mod with that game, I got used to its rule.

[Ratava]

may I ask a question?

why unpacking a *.wad in the first place?
is there a benefit from unpacking and then placing it in the game-folder
instead of using the *.wad?

or did i miss something? ^^

i just put all the *.wad in my magic folder

[RiiakShiNal]

The only real benefits I can think of for using unpacked directories over packed WADs are the ability to use standard Text search tools and the ease of making changes to files without needing to repack them for each test. Both DotP 2013 and 2014 (I also know DotP 2010 supported unpacked mods, though I didn't mod for DotP 2012) easily support unpacked wads as long as the main wad directory has an appropriate HEADER.XML file.

In general there is no real need to unpack other people's mods to simply use what's in them. If you must unpack them (for whatever reason) then there are some things you need to be aware of.

• Most modders no longer include the extra HEADER.XML that is required for unpacked. They now rely solely on the wad header (which is basically the necessary file, but it unpacks as @header.xml instead of as HEADER.XML and unpacks to the wrong place to be usable in unpacked directories).
• You can't use the "_unpacked" directories directly for example if unpacking thefiremind's cards you can't use DATA_DLC_TFM_CARDS_unpacked, you have to use the directory inside it (DATA_DLC_TFM_CARDS), but you also have to move the @header.xml from DATA_DLC_TFM_CARDS_unpacked to inside DATA_DLC_TFM_CARDS and rename it to HEADER.XML.
• Simply copying decks from other unpacked wads into the "DATA_DLC_DECK_BUILDER_CUSTOM" directory is not enough to make them work because you will then be missing the content pack enabling XML that is present in the headers of one of the other mod's wads (this is because there are issues with making too many decks with always_available="true" in content_pack="0").

Now you said you didn't have any problems with mods that had a core file, but thefiremind's and Scion of Darkness's both have core wads (DATA_DLC_TFM_ART & DATA_DLC_TFM_CARDS, DATA_DLC_ARTWORK_1404 & DATA_DLC_CARDS_1404) so are you sure you downloaded and installed them properly?

[fallenangle]

Thanks to everyone for your replies. What I really meant to say when I said "core file" was "core wad," i.e., one that has a Data_All Platforms folder that contains all the appropriate files for the mod. I can get any mod that uses a core wad to appear in-game and be usable; but I cannot get any of the mods that are split into parts (such as Scion of Darkness's and The Firemind's) to even appear in-game, in spite of the fact that the folder where my executable is contains both packed and unpacked wads for these mods and looks largely like the file Ratava posted. I'm not quite sure what the problem is. Don't get me wrong, I love using Kev's, Bloodrevyn's, and Summonole's mods, but I'd like to be able to use some of the others, too. I just can't seem to get any of them to work. If anyone has any other advice, I would be much obliged if you could share it with me.

Thanks for all your help.

[drleg3nd]

if you mean decks like mine which does not have a core wad,open the deck list on each deck to see what is reqd since some cards are used from other mods. if for what ever reason you dont want a certain deck from the other mods just download the core wads of X modder without downloading there decks. only mod that contains core and decks in one file is kev's i believe. hope that helps