[03-01] January, 2003

[03-01] January, 2003

Description: Archived Keep updates.

Categories: Keep Updates


January 31, 2003

by JBouley (Jeff)



We have another new modding breakthrough. Nefarius has discovered that you can add new monster tokens
to Diablo II...which is something I always wondered about but never had the time to explore. Why is this
important? Well, before if you wanted to change monsters animations, you had to sacrifice the animations
already assigned to a given token in the game. But now you can have more animation variety and not have
to replace any of the existing animations. No, you cannot yet add lines to monstats.txt, but you can have many
varieties of monsters within that limitation. To learn more, check out the thread in the Phrozen Forums, which
you can reach by clicking here.



Hosted Site News

There are several big things happening at some of our hosted sites. And here they are:



The Stairway to Oblivion

Nefarius has a nifty little tool that will allow you to translate your .pcx images into .dc6 format with a
single click, preventing you from having to type in all the names one-by-one in an MS-DOS window if you are
using dc6con. You still need to have the dc6con program available here at the Keep, as Nefarius' new tool
works with that program...it just happens to do all your typing for you. You can use the nav bar at left to
visit his site, or just
click here
to download the image conversion tool.



Sir_General's Rune Mod

The Rune Mod hasn't just been updated, it's apparently been launched into the stratosphere of modding
innovations. You can apparently customize items now by right-clicking an item like you would an Identify
Scroll, and the mod features a 'kill counter' to tell you how many baddies you've slain. Use the navbar at left
or click here to visit the site.



Baldur's Gate Mod

The creators of the BG Mod are on their way out...one to the military and one to heavy-duty academic studies.
This might mean the death of the BG Mod, or it may mean someone new taking the helm and keeping it going. To
find out more, click here
and read the discussion of the issue in our Phrozen Forums.



And Another One Joins the Fray

We've got another new hosted site to welcome: Doomsday Mod by rav3n. Just go ahead and
click here to visit the new site and find out more
about this mod.



Rating the Mods

Well, not exactly. We don't go for that around here, as one person's idea of fantastic modding is another
person's boring experience. But we do like to have reviews of mods that talk about their pros and cons;
where they excel and where they might fall short. In addition to staff reviewer Eisead and the occasional guest
review, we now have a new place for you to read and post: The Mod Review Forum in the Phrozen Forums. It's a
place where you can comment on Mod Reviews that have appeared on this site, a place where you can post comments
and mini-reviews on a mod you've played, and a place where you can volunteer to write a full review for
Phrozen Keep. Use the Phrozen Forums link in the navbar if you don't already have the forums bookmarked, and
see what's happening.



A New Plugin: Watcha Wearin'?

Enq brings us a new plugin entitled the 'What Armor Plugin.' It makes it so that all the different types and
levels of armor have a different appearance on the character animations when work. If you don't feel like
searching through the 'Standard Plugins' portion of our
Plugins Section
, then click here for
faster delivery. You can also see how the armors look like on an amazon by

clicking here.



Guides and Resources

Here are some new items to help with your modding (Once again, Nefarius has been busy):



lvlprest.txt file guide by Nefarius

(Read it now)



Using Monsters as Missiles and Advanced

Missile Editing
by Nefarius

(Read it now)



Updated/Corrected Magic Code Master List

by Nefarius

(Read it now)



New Mods to Play

Here are the latest additions to our Mods Area for 1.09
mods:



Suicidal Tendancies v0.1 beta by spin

(Get it now)



Suicidal Tendancies v0.1 beta (direct version) by spin

(Get it now)



Combat Elf Mod v1.0 by greenPÄladin

(Get it now)



Legends of the Inferno v0.01 by Booga


(Get it now)



Blessed Noise

Here are some more Warcraft 3 sound files convered by Phrozen Heart in the 'Sound Effects' area of the File
Center, a subsection of the Plugins section's 'Audio
Plugins' area. You can also use the links below.



Assorted Critters

(download now)



Assorted Doodads

(download now)



Weapons Pack 1

(download now)



Weapons Pack 2


(download now)



Weapons Pack 3

(download now)



Weapons Pack 4

(download now)



Ending on a Humorous Note

In our Humor Section, we have some very good reasons from a D2 player named 420 why
maybe, just maybe, we shouldn't trust Tyreal and some of those other 'helpful' individuals in the game. To
find out what I'm talking about, visit 'Tyreal is Evil' in our humor section or just go ahead and
click here.






January 24, 2003

by JBouley (Jeff)



LATE NEWS!

[Whoops! Forgot to mention something when I first posted this update. In hosted
site-related news, Enq has released version v3.20 of Seasons After. Click here
to check out the site and see what's what. Sorry for the oversight, enq.]



Many apologies for the lateness of this home page update. Between massive work personally and other issues, I've been
unable to even think about updates. So let's start correcting that now, eh?



The Sound and the Fury

More Warcraft 3 sound files convered by Phrozen Heart. They are in the 'Sound Effects' area of the File Center,
a subsection of the Plugins section's 'Audio Plugins'
area. You can also use the links below.



Human Buildings

(download now)



Night Elf Buildings

(download now)



Orc Buildings


(download now)



Undead Buildings

(download now)



Other Buildings

(download now)



Finally, Map Central!

After many false starts and delays, deathfile's new site, 'Deathfile's Sanctuary,' is now finally a hosted site with us.
Of course, you can find the link for it in our nav bar, or you could just
click here. This site is an excellent source of map plugins
and other modding information, mostly map-related. It's small for now, but growing. If you have map plug-ins of your own,
you should contact deathfile, because currently, his 'map plugins by others' section is empty. You don't want him to hog all
the credit for map plugins, do you?

;-)



Yes, Master...

...Master of Arms, that is. In the Mods area of the File Center, we now have
the Master of Arms Mod v1.1 by Kraj. The focus of this mod is on 'leveled items.' Almost no items drop; the ones that
do are basic items such as potions and keys. Equipment is obtained by buying basic items from vendors,
which are then upgraded based on character level to become more powerful.



Kraj took this approach for three reasons: (1) to eliminate the endless item runs and waiting for a
better item to randomly drop; (2) characters can specifically tailor their equipment from the very beggining,
and therefore tailor their strategy better to what they want; (3) having limited mods available on equipment forces
players to choose what mods will complement their character best. If you don't want to walk all the way to our File
Center, just go ahead and click here to get to it.



Fight a Friend; Become Your Enemy

We've got two new animations in our Animation Plugins area. One makes
Cain into an enemy (we had an older plugin that did that, but this one is improved). The other changes your necromancer
into Mephisto, visually that is. Both sound cool to me. I always wanted to beat the heck out of old Deckard, anyway.



Cain As An Enemy v2.0 by Nefarius


(get this animation now)



Mephisto DCC Necro Conversion Beta v0.95 by Zhoulomcrist

(get this animation now)



How About a New Tool?

We have a newer version of MPQ2K, version 2.0 by Quantum, to be precise. It's in the

Tools area of our File Center, or you can
click here. We probably would have added it earlier, but had the
impression it only really worked with Starcraft. We've been told by a member, though, that it works quite nicely for
D2 and has better functionality than the earlier version of MPQ2K.



A New Review

We have a review of Seven Lances. It's not for the most recent version, which came out right after Brother Laz finished
reviewing the mod (bad luck)...but he plans to have an update to the review soon. To view it, go to our
Mod Reviews area, or click here to
instantly view one man's view of Foxbat's Seven Lances v1.05.



Need a Laugh?

I sure do, after the rough week I had. So visit our Humor area click
here
to read 'Why Most Modding Is Done By Men' by Gengelbach.



Learn More, Mod More

He's been ever so productive lately, and this time we have the 'Item Specific Affixes and Itemtypes' tutorial
by Nefarius. More tutorials and file guides are on the way soon, we're happy to report. This latest offering is in our
Tutorials area, of course, or you can click here.






January 11, 2003

by JBouley (Jeff)



We are proud to announce that as of his latest review (which we'll get to in a bit), Eisead is now a staff mod
reviewer. He'll be getting reviews to us as often as he can, whether that be weekly or every few weeks (we all know
how life intrudes on our gaming, don't we?). This doesn't mean we don't need other reviewers. We welcome people to do
guest reviews using a similar format as previous reviews, and we are still considering the possibility of having two
staff reviewers...if, that is, someone else shows the dedication to be a regular contributor. You know where to find me
if you are interested. And once again, welcome to the family, Eisead.



We're still on the lookout for a staff interviewer or two...someone who can interview via e-mail or instant messaging
modders and other contributors to the modding community on a weekly or every two week basis, ideally. Also, we are
considering the creation of a researcher position, someone who can scan through other D2 sites (that includes sites
hosted through us and sites that are NOT affiliated with us) and let Phrozen Heart and I know about new and interesting
things that we should be adding to our file center or announcing here on the home page. Let me know if you are interested
in either of those staff positions, and we can talk about specifics.



Shiny, Brand-Spankin' New Forums


It's been weeks upon weeks in the making, but we have unveiled the new forums, with lots of new features, new functionality,
and a better look (including a multitude of new emoticons/smilies). We even have image hosting now. You can upload an
avatar for your account (only one at a time, though), which you can use in our forums. No more having to host your image
elsewhere, which can be a pain in the hindquarters. By the way, I take absolutely no credit for these wonderful new forums.
Our forum tech support expert, spin, did most of the heavy lifting, and Phrozen Heart picked up what tiny bit of slack was
left. I was busy drinking lattes. By the way, you don't need to re-register. Your account should still be fine, although
if you have problems, let us know...there are still a few little bugs, and at least one member got caught by one and was
unable to log onto his account.



You can visit the new forums by clicking here, and to see a list of the new
features, you can click here.



That Review I Mentioned Earlier...

This time around, our new mod reviewer Eisead has taken a look at the Middle Earth Mod (version 1.8) by Varaya and Khan,
and he has given us his fair and balanced assessment. You can go to our Mod Reviews area to
find it. Or, for quicker viewing, click here.



Updates to the Site

The new Phrozen Forums aren't the only update. Although not as flashy or exciting, we also have some updates to modding
resources here at the Keep. And here they are:



File Guide Updates

New annex onto level.txt guide by Nefarius

>> click here to access

Update to armor.txt guide by Nefarius


>> click here to access

Update to superuniques.txt guide by Nefarius

>> click here to access



Resource Update

Update to DT1 File Format resource by Paul Siramy


>> click here to access



Tutorial Updates

Also in the realm of fixes to our material, Nefarius has made some updates to a couple of his tutorials, and added a new
one, too.



First, for the Level Increase tutorial, there was a mistake about 5 billion. You should change any instance of
'5,000,000,000' you made in following the tutorial to '4,294,967,295' instead. Nefarius was still operating from old data
when he wrote it, but recently noticed the error (exceeding the 4.29 billion mark crashes the game). You can view the
updated tutorial by clicking here.



Also, for the Cow Level Waypoint tutorial, Nefarius fixed a small typo. It originally read 'Change it from 255
to 2 and walla!' but it was supposed to say 'Change it from 255 to 1 and walla!' Hopefully, no one has been tearing their
hair out because of crashes due to this little error. You can read the updated tutorial by

clicking here
.



Newly added to our tutorials is another Nefarius piece of work, How to Make (Nearly) Any Monster Do Damage When It
Dies
. I think the title pretty much says it all, but to find out how to do it, you'll need to view the
tutorial. If you'd rather not hunt around the Tutorials area of our site, you can just
click here to view it right away.



New Members of the Clan

We have two new hosted sites to announce. We had hoped to have three to announce, but we're still having some set-up
problems with GameSpy for deathfile's map site. We're trying to get it squared away as soon as possible, though. Here
are the ones that are actually up and running right now (you can also get to them from our nav bar at left):



Belize's Revenge by DDDiablo

(click here to visit)



The Stairway to Oblivion by Nefarius


(click here to visit)



The Stairway to Oblivion site has a number of goodies. Unlike many of our hosted sites, the name of the site isn't a
name of a mod. Among the offerings on the site are the Xyrax and Fixer mods, plus a small gameplay enhancement mod Nefarius
recently produced and a small VBScript tool he made that creates shortcuts for its user (aka -direct -txt -w -skiptobnet)
and is fully configurable.



We're Not Fond of {filtered}...

...But We Like Map Packs


And *Astalion* brings us two map packs for your map plugin needs. You can find them both in the File Center's
Map Plugins area, or use the links below to find out more about them
and download them if you like what you read in the documentation.



Astalion's Map Pack #1 (get it here)

Astalion's Map Pack #2 (get it here)



Noisy Little Buggers ;-)

Here is Phrozen Heart's weekly donation of sound files ripped from Warcraft 3. They are in the 'Sound Effects' area of the
File Center, a subsection of the Plugins section's 'Audio Plugins'
area. You can also use the links below.



Goblin Sapper

(download now)



Ice Troll

(download now)



Iron Golem


(download now)



Murloc

(download now)



Rock Golem

(download now)



Wind Serpent

(download now)



In Other News

Rather, in old news, I should say. If you want to read any news from December, it's been archived to the News Archives. Or,
you can just click here to read it.






January 2, 2003

by JBouley (Jeff)



Hey! I actually remembered to type '2003' instead of '2002.' I almost always mess up the first time I have to deal with
a new calendar year. Anyway, Happy New Year to everyone. Phrozen Heart or I will probably clean up the home page and archive
the December news in the coming days...just don't want to deal with it tonight.

;-)



Now, on to the latest and greatest news in this haven of mod making and mod playing...



New Zy-El


I've been advised by e-mail (several days ago, that is) that the Zy-El mod has a new version and a new Web site. In the
interest of 'full disclosure,' here is the link to the site. And with that
said...



...Here is Zy-El 2, and More

Three new mods are in the Mod
section
of our File Center, including the aforementioned Zy-El 2 mod. Here are the quick links:



Zy-El v2.0 by Kato


(Get the mod here)



Mojo Mod v1.0 by Mojo King

(Get the mod here)



Master of Arms Mod v1.0 by Kraj


(Get the mod here)



When you get to the download/summary page using the above links, each mod has a link for documentation if you
want to learn more before going through the work of downloading them.



Tutorial Choices

First, I fixed my 'enemy golems' tutorial. There was a small typo in which I referred to the 'Dir' columns in MonType.txt
as 'Mode' columns. Although many people probably used the tutorial without problems (since my instructions were pretty
much to copy-paste everything in the MonType row except the first column), I figured I should try to prevent confusion.



Also, we have a whole new tutorial, on how to create a Waypoint to the Cow Level, from our ever-productive Nefarius.
You can get to his tutorial by visiting the Tutorials area of our site, or by just
clicking here for instant teleportation to the document.



And Speaking of Cow Level Waypoints...

...deathfile, the prolific maker of map plugins, has made a new plugin, the Way Point to Cow Level v1.01. It is
in the Plugins section of our File Center, or you can
click here to get to it a bit faster. We should soon have a hosted
site for deathfile and his maps, and soon after that launches, we will also open up a forum for deathfile in the
Phrozen Forums.



Shining Bright and Back in Action

Incandescent One, who operates our hosted site Incandescence, has revamped the items section of his site. It has
always had a wealth of monster animations, sound files and such, but now the items part of it (D1 and Hellfire item
inventory graphics) is more user-friendly.



Or, in IO's own words: Before it was simple links to the 2 item packs, now it is a browsable section of the site
where all items can be viewed by category and saved individually, bit like an on-line scrap book. I'll be doing the same
with the skill icons before i go back to animations projects.
.



And Speaking of Inventory Graphics...

Good grief, everything seems to be interconnected this week, doesn't it? ;-)



Anyway, we have two new resources related to item graphics. One is a list of unused inventory graphics (and their codes)
that are already in the D2 game files. All you need to do is plug their codes into the appropriate column in the .txt file
and make sure the height and width columns are set right. The other one is unused flippyfile animations and their codes,
which are just as easy to use (flippyfiles are the animations that you see when a monster or chest drops an item).
Here they are:



Unused Inventory Graphics compiled by Nefarius


(Click here to view)



Unused Flippy Files compiled by SiLenTx & *Astalion*

(Click here to view)



Sound Off!

Rounding out this update, just like last time, is another herd of sound files from Warcraft 3, courtesy of Phrozen Heart.
They are in the 'Sound Effects' area of the File Center, a subsection of the
Plugins section's
'Audio Plugins' area. You can also use the links below.



Furbolg

(download now)



Gnoll

(download now)



Gnoll Archer


(download now)



Harpy

(download now)



Owl Bear

(download now)






December News

The December news (and older news as well) can be accessed in our News Archive section.

Link to this article: Select all

[url=https://www.d2mods.info/forum/kb/viewarticle?a=144&sid=a764a8f2a01010637c5ef4c8de85f1e7]Knowledge Base - [03-01] January, 2003[/url]
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