[02-04] April, 2002

[02-04] April, 2002

Description: Archived Keep updates.

Categories: Keep Updates


April 29th, 2002

by JBouley
(Jeff)



Good grief! Were did the last 8 days go?



OK, still trying to juggle real life and virtual life. Until
I get it all balanced out and update other pages here at the
Keep, here are a few more tidbits to hold you over:



Middle Earth is here!



This week we welcome aboard Varaya and Khan, makers of the Tolkien-base mod
Middle Earth mod for both Diablo 1 and 2. Check out their site at http://www.planetdiablo.com/vkmods!



Yet More Animation Conversions



Here are some Baldur's Gate 2 animations converted into D2
format, and credit where due:



Blue
Salamanders
from Apocalypse_Demon, the Otyugh
from badasswerewolf, and from King Cold...the axe-wielding HREF='http://www.potatojoe.com/pkfiles/plugins/axegoblin.zip'>Goblin,
the Tazok

and something called a Serrated
Skeleton
(which might be a Bone Golem...I'm not sure).



Darkness Weaves...again!



RexxLaww wanted to let me and all of you know that his latest
Darkness Weaves modding effort, DWX2, recently went into public
release. Check it out in the Darkness Weaves site, one of hosted
site listed on the left side of this page. It's not for the faint
of heart...this is an Iron Man-style mod, which is something
that can make you start thinking that playing a Hardcore character
in Hell difficulty is a walk in the park.



Been Around a While...but Still Going Strong



Eastern Sun, one of the more long-lived and popular mods for
D2, is now undergoing beta testing for version 2.10 (and has
been for a couple weeks...sorry for the delay in announcing it,
Perfect Cell). Visit the Eastern Sun site, which is another one
of our hosted sites listed at left, to learn more and to download
the files.



Until Next Time...



I know the last few updates to the page have been hit-and-run
(compared to my usual long-winded updates in the past). Part
of the problem is a lack of time on my part lately and desparate
need to make money to pay rent. But another issue is that Phrozen
Heart and I (and other admins too) have been working on refinements
to the site and ways to improve our file downloading process
(given some of the twitchiness FilePlanet sometimes experiences).
So, even if I had more time, I'm a bit limited at the moment
in terms of what I can upload while we make these changes and
try to keep on top of everything. Thanks in advance for your
patience.




April 21st, 2002

by JBouley
(Jeff)



I may have been a bit too pessimistic with my fears regarding
mods and Mac OS X in my last update. (Also, I've been getting
some more promising info on Mac modding...still some big gaps
in mod functionality, but once I sort thorugh everything I hope
to be able to offer a good start on tools).



Anyway, here are instructions forwarded to me on installing
mod patches for OS X. They come to me via Jim Stegbauer (who's
been one of my Mac modding information sources lately) and apparently
originated from someone named Sylvan Korvus.



-------------------------------------------------------------------------



INSTALLING MODS ON MAC OS X



Step 1 Backup your AR "Diablo II Patch" file.




Step 2 Install D2 Carbon as per Blizzard's instructions




Step 3 Backup the file "Diablo II Patch (Carbon)"





Step 4 Rename your AR patch file to "Diablo II Patch
(Carbon)



Step 5 Place the renamed AR patch file in the Diablo II
Files folder.



Note: It APPEARS that D2 Carbon ignores "Diablo II
Patch". However, for safety's sake, use 2 copies of the
AR file, one named as each. This also allows you to play the
OS 9 version of D2 in the same folder.



There is a problem of the game quitting and having to do a
complete reset if you do not also change the orginal Diablo II
Patch to the Diablo II Mod Patch.



Hope this helps every OSX gamer, and it does work, if you
don't change the orginal Diablo II Patch you will develope volume
structure problems!!!!

-------------------------------------------------------------------------



See you all in another couple days...hopefully with a wider
variety of updates on modding tools and resources both for the
PC and the Mac.




April 19th, 2002


by JBouley
(Jeff)



This won't be a very stellar update today...between being
sick with food poisoning most of last week, being down to one
computer (two laptops of three are currently dead) and having
to share it with my wife...well, not much time.



I'll be back in a couple days with a more "newsy"
update. In the meantime, I just want to quickly warn players
of mods who are on Mac computers that mods may not work on the
OSX operating system. Apparently, the Blizzard patches use some
different format and now have (Carbon) after the filename,
whatever that means. If the information I have is correct, renaming
the patch file for a mod won't be enought for OSX users.



I hope I'm wrong about that, but it seems that as hard as
life was for mod players on Macs (only being able to use .MPQ
mods and never -direct mods) and for modders on Macs (having
almost no tools to mod with) before OSX, it might be a
lot harder for those who upgrade to OSX. Pre-OSX users should
be fine.



I will keep you posted, and I'll have some links to tools
for Mac modders on pre-OSX systems in the next page update.




April 11th, 2002

by JBouley
(Jeff)



Still getting back into the "swing of things." I
haven't updated the various site pages to reflect the addition
of stuff in my April 3 update, but at least the links in that
news blurb are actually accessing GameSpy's public servers now.



I really will update pages and let you know here when I have
done so. Once again, for this installment, the links on this
page will have to hold you over until I carve out some time in
the next couple days for page-building and editing. I also have
some tutorials and resrouces to add, so good stuff is on the
way next time. Here's the "good stuff" I have to hold
you over until then:



Calling Mac Experts!



The problem of people with Mac computers not being able to
mod has been a problem since waaaay back. But I've been getting
more and more e-mails from desparate Mac users. Please, is there
anyone here who knows enough about Mac programming and modding
to make some basic tools, at least for extracting, packing and
testing modded files? If so, please get to work...many Mac owners
will worship at your feet if you do.



Blizzard Law



Blizzard filed suit last Friday against BnetD and their website,
so that battle is far from over. You can download the suit in
a PDF file at slashdot.




How About the Right Plug-In This Time?



Seems the gem plug-in I posted about last time from Shadow
Talon (filename: newgems.zip) was an old version. Get the correct,
up-to-date version (filename: st_gemsplugin.zip) by clicking
here
. Happy socketing to all.



Sanctuary is Still in Chaos



...but at least the new version is out. I finally finished
up version 1.03 of my Santuary in Chaos mod. New armor and weapons
graphics (for sets, uniques, exceptionals and elites), bug fixes,
more recipes (including one that will recharge the uber-charms
in my mod), hireling changes (different skill sets), new elite
unique items (many of them class-specific), and so on. Version
2.0 is probably a couple weeks off at least...but well underway.
Get it by clicking right
here
.



New Monster Animations



I have a whole pile of monster animations that were sent to
me many months ago and that have been converted to .dcc format
for use in D2 modding, just rolling them out a little at a time.
This time around, we have from Baldur's Gate the Greater
Werewolf
, Air
Elemental
, Water
Elemental
, and a lesser(?) Fire
Elemental
. And, from Icewind Dale, we have an Earth
Elemental
, Fire
Elemental
and Water
Elemental
.




April 3rd, 2002

by JBouley
(Jeff)



Like it or not...I'm baaaaaaack! Many thanks to Phrozen Heart
for being so kind as to cover my hindquarters while I was struggling
through my forced cross-country relocation. I won't say I really,
really like where I've landed...but I'm adjusting, at
least. ;-)



And before I get into the news of the day, week or whatever...let
me also say I've changed my e-mail address. My old AOL address
still works, but I've had it up to my eyeballs with America Online
and have switched to the far more reliable Microsoft Network
(MSN) despite reservations about anything owned and operated
by Bill Gates. (Just kidding, Bill...don't sue me or have me
killed). The new e-mail address is JeffBouley888@msn.com.
For those of you who correspond with me online, make note of
the change, please...you'll get much quicker response that way.



One more thing: I'm still a little tight on time so the news
items below that should also be posted on other pages like Tools
of the Trade, or made into Web pages in and of themselves (like
resource guide and tutorials) will not get that treatment for
a couple days at least. So you're stuck with just the links on
this page for now. Sorry. :-o



News from Modders



Two well-established modders have asked me to "get the
word out" for them...



In the case of Fireheart, one of the authors of the Fusion

and Cold Fusion mods, he wants to know if anyone is interested
in him pursuing a mod for the D2 expansion. So, if you liked
his work before, and you want to see more, let him know. The
Fusion/Tactics Central site is one of our hosted sites. Just
head to the left side of this page to visit and let Fireheart
know if he should consider more modding work on your behalf.



The other modder, RexxLaww, just wanted to announce that he's
begun closed beta testing of Darkness Weaves eXpansion 2
(DWX2) and expects to release it soon. Hopefully, he hasn't already
finished and released it, which would be embarrassing evidence
of how slow I've been getting back to updating this home page.



Coding Guide



Vexorg was kind enough to compile a file with all (or close
enough to "all" anyway) of the major codes used in
.txt file modding, so that you can have a convenient resource.
It's more than 20 pages long (as a Word file), so it's obviously
quite comprehensive. Download it here
and stick it in a convenient place near your computer or on your
hard drive.



Getting the Inside Scoop on Animations



Another useful resource comes to us from Myhrginoc. It's a
table of .dcc files related to all of the missiles, monsters,
objects and overlays in d2data.mpq and d2exp.mpq. The table lists
the number of animation directions, frames per direction and
total frames in each .dcc file. This will save some time and
pain for many folks working with animation substitutions and
animation conversions for D2. Get it right
here
.



Getting Animation Files in Line



From BlacKD comes a visual basic application that will "realign"
.cl2 file directions to be compatible with .dcc formats. He says
you just have to load a .cl2 file or any folder (it will scan
that folder and subfolders for .cl2 files) and will do the proper
changes. Click
here
to download it and try it out.



Converting .bin Files



A long, long, loooong time ago, REM Dragon sent me a Bin Utility
program that will allow you to covert some .bin files to .txt
format. To be honest, I'm pretty stupid when it comes to using
DOS (it's a wonder I every figured out how to use the dc6con
program here at the Keep)...and I think that DOS commands are
what's required with this program...so I haven't been able to
test it myself. It comes with a readme file, so here's hoping
anyone who's interested can make it work better than I can. Yes,
the great, big, bad D2 modder Jeff is sometimes a computer idiot.
I also cannot do coding and am therefore in danger of being made
extinct by people who can hex edit .dll files. ;-) Get the bin
utility by clicking here.



Seeking Out Item Codes



People who make new items often find themselves wondering,
"Has the itemcode I assigned for this cool new armor (or
weapon, or miscellaneous items) already been used by Blizzard
for one of the other items in the game?" Wonder no more!
KeiferHub provided us with a program that searches the files
for itemcodes. I believe you need to have VB Runtime 6 to operate
this program. Download the item code search utility here.



Jeweler's Paradise



Shadow Talon has done a bit of work on gem-oriented stuff.
Two major contributions, in fact.



First, click
here
if you want his .zip file that contains new gem inventory
graphics, a list of magic properties that work (or don't work)
when applied to gems, and a little tutorial on making new gems.
All very useful items to have at our fingertips.



Second, he also has a plug-in of new gems and recipes for
them. Get it by clicking
here
. There are more than 200 new gems: 70 "minor gems,"

70 "major gems" and 70 "melding gems." He
has included new cube recipes for upgrading the new gems, recipes
for changing the old gems and recipe for cycling through all
the gems. According to Shadow Talon, the melding gems will "give"
their properties to armors and weapons. I'm not sure what that
means...but it sounds good, doesn't it? :-)



Another Graphics Pack



One of the regular posters to our forum, gorothon, passed
along a Diablo 1 item pack to me a while back. I do believe the
link to the original D1 pack we had here broke a while back,
so this might be good for you if you don't want to hunt through
Stargazer's very large item pack to find D1 items. I also recall
that gorothon had a few items in the pack that weren't D1-oriented.
Download gorothon's work by clicking here.



Newbie Mod



Don't know if Surray is still working on his mod, but a while
back he asked me to put his first-ever mod up on the Keep... HREF='http://www.fileplanet.com/dl/dl.asp?/planetdiablo/phrozenkeep/040302/surrays_mod_b1.zip'>click
here
for Surray's Fun Mod. Surray, if you have an
updated version, let me know and get it to me.




March 27th, 2002

by Phrozen
Heart



Yeah, yeah, I know I'm supposed to be on vacation but I've
been emailed a few bits and pieces and I know I'll forget to
tell Jeff, so here goes...



Nude Assassin Mod

At one point, no one thought this was possible and with various
urban legends floating round about a naked assassin or sorceress
mod, it came as a mildly amusing suprise to come across this
impressive creation. While on one note, seeing a bare-chested
killing machine running round disembowelling demons is just a
simple novelty but on the flip side it shows that D2 mod making
is still evolving with people now actually editing their own
animations rather than just converting. Any cool animations are
always impressive but usually original ones are more so. The
mod in question was created by someone by the name of Blue Orange
and to get your hands on it, you need to download the 6 pieces
of the compressed RAR archive ( 1

| 2
| 3
| 4
| 5
| 6

). For the impatient perverts amongst you, click
here
for a quick screenshot.



Welcome to "The Ancients"

We welcome aboard another hosted site to our modding family here
at the Keep in the shape of Deathscythe and SilentX and their
Ancients mod! You can check out their site by either clicking
here
or checking out their link under the hosted sites tab
on our nav bar.




March 19th, 2002

by Phrozen
Heart



Adios...

A fairly short update for everyone today considering my parents
are visiting from England starting thursday so I won't be around
for a while but if things go to plan, Jeff should hopefully be
back with you all for the next update.



Annual Drunkard's Day


Hope everyone had a great St Patrick's day on sunday and didn't
get arrested :-)



Fileplanet Strikes Again

Once again the infamous Fileplanet has one of it's random freak-out
fits causing large numbers of people to not be able to download.
Upon clicking a link to a Fileplanet hosted file, visitors are
taken straight to the FP front page instead of their chosen link
for no apparent reason. To us, this is pretty much the final
nail in the coffin as far as FP is concerned so hopefully our
file database conversion should be available shortly. Remote
access to the other server has been resumed and everything is
uploaded, I just need to make time to link it all through the
database.



Even more animations

Thanks once again to Zeruel for submitting even more animation
plugins to the Keep. I'm pretty sure they're all from BG2, check
out Sarevok,
the John
Irenicus
and the Djinn.
All three are available from the animation
plugin page
or by clicking their names here for direct links.
Zereul also pointed out to me the Ice Demon from last update
is actually the ice golem from Icewind Dale not BG2 :-)



Feeling colorful anyone?

Thanks go out to Paul Siramy for submitting a useful resource
that explains the use of colorshifts on magical items which I
think many people will find useful. Check out the resources
page
for this and a wealth of other useful information. Paul
has also sent us a nice little command line program called DC6Color
that allows you see what your DC6 files will look like with the
various color shifts D2 applies, very cool. Click
here
for the direct link or check it out in the tools
section
.



WinMPQ


Mod makers might be interested in checking out a mod utility
that was recently brought to my attention by Fusman named WinMPQ.
I haven't really had a chance to experiment with it yet but at
first glance it appears to be a combination of MPQ View and MPQ
2K through a winzip looking windows interface. The utility was
most likely developed for use with Starcraft but as Blizzard
uses the same MPQ format uniformly across the board then there's
no reason why we can't make the most of it. The utility requires
the visual basic run time 4 files and a special direct x control
but I've added both to the winmpq zip before I uploaded it to
the Keep. Click
here
to download v1.47 from this site or you can check out
the author Shadowflare's site by clicking
here
.



Finally one that works...

As much of a novelty as it is, I've uploaded a newly generated
datafile for use with MPQ view that is actually complete. Some
of the previous datafiles we've had uploaded at the Keep have
been either flawed or outdated which resulted in users not being
able to extract the files they need. I've reuploaded MPQ with
the new datafile which can be downloaded by clicking
here
as well as uploading the datafile as a stand alone zip
file which you can download
here
.



WoC mod updated

Spawn contacted me regarding his Waves of Chaos mod and pointed
out that the beta 2 version I uploaded recently is actually a
slightly older version with beta 5 being the current release.
I've uploaded the new version and redirected the link in the
tools page to cater for WoC b5.



IG testing closed

We are no longer taking applications to be part of the first
round of beta testing of the "Idiot's Guide to D2 Mod Making
v1.2" tutorial. Thanks to all who didn't reply in time,
the opportunity for further rounds of testing will be available
in the not too distant future. For every who has received a reply
on the subject, I'll be contacting you all shortly with the first
full length draft of the tutorial.



Coming soon...

Well we're still waiting for the administrative cogs to grind
into motion regarding Riparious getting hosted at the Keep, he's
sent me some screenshots of the new inventory graphics he's working
on right now which just look simply awesome in my opinion. HREF='sshots/elemental.jpg'>Click here to check out the great
new elemental swords.



March 14th, 2002

by Phrozen
Heart



Sorry, no PHP just yet

Sorry people but the PHP update is going to have to wait a little
longer due to FTP problems I'm having with one of the servers
we're using. The whole setup is working fine but without FTP
access, I can't add in the latest material. We hope to have everything
up and running ASAP.



Deadline drawing ever closer

Just in case anyone out there can't count, Blizzard has seven
days left to respond to the letter from the EFF regarding Bnetd
before their software is re-instated to the site.



Plugin Drive


To all the mod makers and animation converters out there, we're
having somewhat of a plugin drive here at the Keep and we're
asking for everything from BG and D1 animations to regular plugins
for beginners. Send your submissions to my usual address at HREF='mailto:phrozenheart@planetdiablo.com'>phrozenheart@planetdiablo.com.



Volunteers Wanted

I've been tinkering with the Idiot's Guide to D2 Mod Making that
Mordini and I wrote and brought it up to v1.2 but I need a small
group of modding beginners to try it out before I post it. What
I'm looking for are people who've never really attempted modding
or never managed it successfully to try out the guide and provide
feedback and suggestions. All contributors will receive full
credit as usual.



New Cube Tutorial

Check out 54x's great new tutorial in the tutorial
section
on how to add new cube recipes to the Horadric Cube
or click here to go direct.



Mod Releases

A few new mods for you this week plus a couple of re-releases
due to popular demand. First up I've uploaded the standard MPQ
versions of Phrozen Solid by Mordini (click
here
) and the 8play mod by Fusman that I updated (click
here
). As for the new releases, check out the
Ancients mod
by Deathscythe and SilentX, Waves
of Chaos
by Spawn_VN and Middle
Earth v1.6 Final
by Varaya and Khan. All five mods are available
from the mod archive.



I am paying attention, honestly....

Jeff was kind enough to point out that last update I forgot to
mention a couple of plugins which I added to the animation
plugin section
which were for the Silver
Dragon
by Ratsbane and the BG
Iron Golem
by Apocalypse Demon. Sorry people :-)



More BG Plugins

Thanks go out to Zeruel for sending us three new Baldur's Gate
animatation plugins, this time in the form of the Ice
Demon
, the Dark
Ninja
and the Naga
Princess
. All three are available from the animation
plugin page
or by clicking their names here for direct links.



Cool New Graphics

Riparious (who should hopefully be joining us as a hosted site
shortly) has created a bunch of new graphical materials for D2
modders including a complete skilltree background replacement
for the sorceress (click
here
) and a bunch of great new and edited inventory graphics
for gems (click
here
) and general equipment (click
here
) which are all available from the plugins
section
. For more information and screenshots, you can check
out his existing site by clicking
here
.




March 12th, 2002

by Phrozen
Heart



Just a quick update, the real one will be here in a few days
hopefully.



Bnetd Teams Up With EFF

The Electronic Frontier Foundation

has taken up the Bnetd case and issued a response to Blizzard's
cease and desist letter stating that unless Blizzard does something
about it, Bnetd will go live again in 10 days. You can check
out the piece at Yale's
LawMeme
or read the official press release from bnetd and
EFF by clicking
here
.




March 7th, 2002

by Phrozen
Heart



Yep, sorry people but you're still stuck with me for this
week :-) I've spoken with Jeff via email and everything's going
as planned plus he let me in on what some of his uploaded files
from last week are so I've added them to this update.



Beginning of the Transition

Not sure when exactly, but sometime over the next few weeks (hopefully),
we'll be unveiling part of the new PHP site re-write in the form
of the php/mysql file center I mentioned last update. This should
hopefully make the whole downloading experience a much simpler
one compared to the pain of messing with Fileplanet's 'public
servers' at the moment.



Round 2 to Bnetd?

Looks like the rebuttal to Blizzard's
"Intelectual Property" dispute with Bnetd and other
server-emulation organizations by members of the LawMeme project
at Yale Law School has had more of an impact than everyone previously
thought with Bnetd re-opening
their doors for the moment. This fight still seems to be leaning
towards the Blizzard camp
though due to them having the resources to conduct a lengthy
court battle where Bnetd

doesn't. For the full story directly from Bnet, click
here
.



Mod Releases

Prior to his departure, Jeff released v1.02 of his excellent
Sanctuary in Chaos mod which you you can download
directly here
or as usual it's available from the archive.



Another mod to be added to our mod archive
is Devil's Uprising v1.0 which includes features such as increased
stash, cube and inventory sizes as well as a new magical item
called a "Holy Cross". Either check out the archive
or click
here
to get the file directly.



Resource Rampage

Well okay, maybe it's not much of a rampage considering there's
a few new things but I just felt like being enthusiastic considering
we haven't had much stuff to add to the resources
section
in a while.



First up, Nefarius has updated his monstats.txt guide for
v1.09 which you can check out
by clicking here
.



Nefarius has also supplied us with a thread he started in
the forums which contains useful reference information to use
when creating new cube recipes. Click
here
to check it out.



Thanks go out to Scott Weaver for his amendment
to the Ric Faith's skills.txt guide
which explains how the
SrcDam column works.



Today marks the welcome return of modding resources by our
old friend 54x with a general overview resource for anyone working
with the magical modifier codes. Click
here
to take a look along with it being available in the
resources section



New Tools



The long awaited v1.10 of Phalzyr's D2 modder utility has
been released as a beta upgrade which now supports D2 v1.09!
You can check it out at Phalzyr's
site here
or from our Tools of the Trade
page
. Just so you know, this upgrade DOES require a previous
full version first.



Clannad has released the latest version of his great D2 image
tool DC6Maker v3.0 which should be a staple in any real modder's
arsenal. It's currently available by either clicking
here
, from our Tools of the Trade page

or from Clannad's
website
.



With all the graphical conversions from D1 to D2 going on
at the moment, Myhrginoc has created a datafile for use with
Simply Red's MPQ View utility that shows the file structure for
the D1 MPQ file. Click
here
or visit the Tools of the Trade
page
to download the file.



Dead Link Fixed


While I've been working on the PHP rewrite of the site, it appears
that some of the current pages are badly in need of some work.
I've fixed a dead link to Bartuc's Freestyle mod v1.2 and if
anyone else finds other dead links, let me know.




February 28 Phrozen
Heart



Now don't get too used to this bonus update, it's just an
addition to yesterday's :-).



The Closure of Bnetd



I received an email earlier today which intrigued me considerably
from a guy named Ernest Miller. LawMeme (www.lawmeme.org),
a project of the Information Society Project at Yale Law School
(www.law.yale.edu/isp/),
has posted an article with detailed background and legal analysis
of the Blizzard vs. Bnetd case which can be viewed by clicking
here
. I think our visitors might find the legal aspect of
the whole situation very informative. Another very interesting
point is an analysis and rebuttal of Blizzard's server emulation
FAQ by Tim Neu which is located
here
.



Behind the Scenes



While I'm posting again, I might as well let everyone know
a little about what I've been up to in my absense. Let's face
it that this place needs a major overhaul in the HTML coding
department. Netscape users receive blank or screwed up pages,
some pages have outdated navigation bars while others don't,
that stupid "Pheremones" banner is stuck permanently
on certain pages due to incorrect codes,the list goes on and
on. The main thing I've been working on is a complete rewrite
of the site from scratch, using the same design and graphics
but recoding the site in it's entirety using PHP rather than
just HTML. PHP uses all the same commands as HTML with tonnes
of extra stuff including the ability to have the site template
as seperate files so the layout and nav bar are always consistant
throughout. The new template has been tested thoroughly using
the latest versions of Internet Explorer, Netscape Navigator
and AOL. Another major feature that's near completely is a PHP/MySql
file center which allows easy browsing and downloading of files
WITHOUT HAVING TO SCREW WITH FILE PLANET which I'm sure will
please a lot of people.



Doh!



Just noticed a screw up in yesterday's update with the d/l
link to the Infinite Gems plugin being mispelled which results
in a dead link. That's been fixed in addition to adding all four
plugins directly to the general plugin page itself. Sorry for
any trouble this might have caused.



Useful Information



Despite the fact that common sense probably should have intervened
in some point in the proceedings, I learned this morning that
an evening meal consisting of chili-cheese dip and chips, followed
by salsa and chips, followed by salsa con queso and chips washed
down with a considerable amount of lemon and lime koolaid doesn't
make for an overally nutritious experience. This combined with
the digestive after effects being comparable to low-grade chemical
warfare will certainly deter myself and hopefully all of you
from trying anything similar in the near future...




February 27 Phrozen
Heart



Hey all, I'm back for a brief period to help Jeff out while
he embarks on his trip half way across the country. I know everyone
here wishes him well and hope to hear from him as soon as possible.
For those of you who don't already know, due to other on and
offline commitments, I've permanently demoted myself to assistant
webmaster to help out with certain admin sides of the site rather
than running the place that Jeff does so well. I apologise for
any updates Jeff may have promised anyone, there's a directory
full of new stuff here that he's uploaded but I can only identify
a small portion. For the next week or two, anyone wanting anything
posting here can email me at phrozenheart@planetdiablo.com.



The Closure of Bnetd



With several different services available at present that
provide realm server emulation, Blizzard has finally confronted
these sites with the threat of legal action due to their lack
of CD-key verification. This specifically pertains to the upcoming
Warcraft 3 as it would allow pirated copies of the game to be
played on these pseudo-realms. Due to Blizzard's request, HREF='http://www.bnetd.com/'>Bnetd has ceased service for
now with FSGS also suspending further software downloads. This
doesn't boad well for anyone who currently runs a mod server
and you can check out the discussion in the forums on the entire
subject by clicking
here
.



Harry Potter strikes back...



We welcome aboard DjYeLLoJeLLo, Baz and Craft to the Keep
with their Harry Potter mod for Diablo 2. You check them out
by visiting their site at http://www.planetdiablo.com/harrypotter/!



'Final' Middle Earth mod released



Version 1.6 of the well-known Middle Earth mod by Varaya and
Khan has been released this week and is available from their
site at http://www.vkmods.de.
ME fans don't fret, Khan told me "It is called final, so
we're planning to only provide fixes to major bugs or the adding
of really nifty features (if some are found) from now on"

so things aren't grinding to a complete halt..



The Plugins Just Keep On Coming



I've upload 4 new standard plugins to the site but haven't
actually had time to link to them yet so here they are : HREF='http://www.fileplanet.com/dl/dl.asp?/planetdiablo/phrozenkeep/plugins/plugin-2playsim.zip'>2
Player Sim
, 4
Player Sim
, 8
Player Sim
, and Infinite
Gems
. All of which are pretty self-explanatory by their titles
but include readme files just in case.



Mods in the Media



I've been informed of a nice article in an online magazine
on the subject of various PC mods which included a mention of
the Phrozen Keep as "the best-known Diablo II mod site"
which is always nice :-). You can check out the article by HREF='http://www.rochestercomputers.com/articles.cfm?getarticle=179&go=0.06452162'>clicking
here
.




February 18 Jeff
(JBouley)



Quick update. I'll have more in a couple days. All the items
below were uploaded thanks to Phrozen Heart...my impending move
on March 1 halfway across the country is keeping me pretty busy
with packing and such. I have uploaded some stuff myself...just
haven't had time to organize it and announce it.



Phrozen Solid v1.0



Mordini was kind enough to combine eight of the Keep's plug-ins
into one mod for your convenience. He wants to make sure you
all understand that he didn't write the changes for this mod...only
put existing plug-ins to work. So for those who wonder: Yes,
in many cases you can cobble together several plug-ins to make
a functional mod. For the readme file, click
here
. To download the Phrozen Solid mod, click
here
.




8-Play Mod



Fusman's eight-play mod has been converted for the latest
LoD patch (1.09d). For the readme file, click
here
. To download the mod, click
here
.



Easier Directory Switching



The DOS Here Utility (by Microsoft) lets you switch
to a specific directory in DOS without having to go through all
the paths. To consult the readme file, click
here
. To download this utility, click
here
.



See you in a couple days with more updates. :-)




February 11 Jeff
(JBouley)



Oh, well...had to wait for my normal weekly update to get the
latest news up here...so much for a "bonus" update.
But while I may have made you wait a little, there good stuff
here this week, including some fresh tutorials.



New Lessons for the Weary Modder



The Tutorials section has three
new entries: (1) How to increase the maximum
level
your characters can attain, (2) How to create socketable
rare charms
, and (3) How to make superuniques
drop specific items
when they die. Go read them and expand
your modding mind.



Next update I should have some new resources to help you make
sense of various D2 modding codes and D2 animation file data.
Stay tuned.



Here There Be Dragons! ...and Succubi



Huzzah! The first of what we hope will be many dragons here
at Phrozen Keep is now in the Animation
Plug-Ins
section. King Cold coverted the Red Dragon
from Baldur's Gate II, and I've finally uploaded it. Click
here
if you're too excited to scroll through the plug-ins
page to get the download. By next update, I hope to have the
coverted Silver Dragon by Ratsbane ready for you all.



Also, for those who just don't think the D2 folks did justice
to demonic temptresses, you can also find the original Diablo
1 Succubus files coverted to D2 format in the Animation
Plug-Ins
. Or just click
here
.



Housecleaning



Finally got Darkmage's review of Hell on Earth II up in the
Reviews section. Head over there or
click here for a quick read.



Archived the December 2001 news. You can head to the News
Archives
if you need to catch up on that month or the even
older stuff.



Many thanks to all of those who responded to my call last
week for tutorial translators. If you haven't heard back from
me, it's nothing personal. I'm still trying to catch up from
having been sick almost all of last week. Rest assured that if
you've offered your help, it's not being spurned yet. I just
need to share all your names and credentials with the other admins
and then figure out precisely which tutorials and which languages
we want to concentrate on first. Hope to respond to most (if
not all) of you within the next couple weeks.



Some folks have asked if they can view the .txt files for
my Sanctuary
in Chaos
mod. I have no problem with that as long as you
don't rip off all my ideas and claim them as your own. ;-) You
can get all of the .txt files except cubemain.txt by HREF='http://www.fileplanet.com/dl/dl.asp?/planetdiablo/phrozenkeep/mods/sictexts.zip'>clicking
here
. By the way, I hope to have version 1.02 of SiC ready
before the end of the week.




February 4 Jeff
(JBouley)


Well, I didn't get that weekend update, but hey, Monday night
ain't bad, and it's a few days ahead of the normal schedule at
that. :-)



You Want 250 Levels? You've Got 'Em!



Ever since the faulty 250-level plug-ins were taken down from
the Keep, people have continued to ask where they went. Well,
Syntaks has given us not one but two 250-level plugins...let's
hope there are no bugs in these ones. The "Genuine"

version will allow you to level up at the rate the game originally
intended, while the "Boost" version lets you level
up at twice the rate. Both are available on the General
Plug-Ins
page, or click on Genuine
or Boost
for immediate service.



Some Mods Have Gone, Some Have Returned



Site maintenance was not kind to the links for some mods for
version 1.09 of the expansion, and those missing mods and broken
links have been removed for the moment. But there are still bunches
of 1.09 mods in the Archives and I
was able to get Frodo's D2
Plus Plus
mod and Bilbo's
Mod
back up.



And don't forget to visit our hosted sites, which have mods
of their own available...which you won't find in the Mod Archives.
:-)



Can You Speak the Lingo?



We would like to be able to offer more of our tutorials in
other languages, given that we have so many people here from
so many different parts of the world. If you are equally comfortable
in English and in another language, click my e-mail link at the
top of this news update and let me know. I'd like to know who
is available, interested and has the time for some translating.
Let me know...



Until Next Time...



I have much more I wanted to be able to announce, but the
weekend wasn't as kind to me as I had hoped. However, I will
be uploading some new tutorials and resources that explain various
codes you might need to worry about while modding. For those
who have sent me stuff and are waiting to see it uploaded, have
patience, please. I hope to be posting another update in a couple
days. Thanks.

Link to this article: Select all

[url=https://www.d2mods.info/forum/kb/viewarticle?a=135&sid=cbce2f6d527966befbc57c5ee14e9859]Knowledge Base - [02-04] April, 2002[/url]