Civ5 Modding Tutorials

Getting started

Get a tour.

If you have no idea about modding and what are Lua and Xml, you should give a look at Civ5 Modding Explained.

Read the guide.

The best introduction to civ5 modding is still the Kael's Guide. However it was written a long time ago and some informations are obsolete or missing.

Import your files into VFS.

The main change since Kael wrote his guide is about the VFS (Virtual File System). Basically you should include your art assets, UI and lua files into the VFS. In ModBuddy, select those files, hit F4 to open the properties window, check "import into VFS". Forgetting this is a common cause of troubles for beginners. The VFS index only takes into account the first eight chars so beware of conflicts.

Get the right tools for the job.

See Civ5 Useful Programs. You should have installed the SDK of course, but it is also strongly recommended that you get a tool to search in all civ5 files at once, to compensate for the lack of documentation. You may also need additional softwares to extract and read the textures, test and debug your mod, etc.

Modify your ini files.

In config.ini, set LoggingEnabled, EnableLuaDebugLibrary and DebugPanel to 1. In usersettings.ini, set DebugMode to 1. Those files are located in My Documents/My Games/Sid Meiers' Civilization V.

Tutorials

See also the Modding tutorials section on the forums.
Also note that the XML and Lua sections each contain specific tutorials, articles and extensive documentation.

Background

• Modding Limits and Issues
• Create and use DDS textures
• Adding custom data and using them in Lua
• Localization Syntax

Common tasks

• New Leaders (2D images)
• New Resources
• New Buildings
• New Specialists
• New Units

Specific topics

• Culture buildings - vanilla and G&K cross compatibility
• Import civ4 units into civ5
• Locking techs on a civilization basis
• Making units that use Civ5 animations
• Guide to Adding a new Resource with Custom Reskins