Radish Trial 1 Installation Step By Step Guide

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Folder Structure

Downloading and installing all the tools, as well as its requirements, can create a mess, if you just throw everything in one or two folders.
Therefor I would strongly recommend drawing up a well structured folder-hierarchie.

Tip: Place your root-folder for modding as close to the base (C:/, H:/, G:/, etc..) of your disk as possible and avoid any special characters.
Both can cause serious errors, when trying to run the tools correctly.

In the following paragraphs I will use the following basic structure (You need to change the paths to your folder structure accordingly):

Root H:\Witcher 3  
Game Installation H:\Witcher 3\_game  shared for all your mod-projects
External Tools    H:\Witcher 3\_modTools shared for all your mod-projects
Mod-Projects H:\Witcher 3\_projects  
Download H:\Witcher 3\downloads just for convenience

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Please note that a lot of (sub-)folders may be added to this structure later on in this guide. This is just the basic structure!


About the Game

Tip: Always use a completely fresh game-installation for modding! For this guide We are going to install it completely from ground up.

Install the game into your chosen directory.

Tip: If you want to play the game normally while modding at the same time, I would recommend to have to separate game-installations.
To create a new game-installation (in GOG) just rename the current on (e.g. put a _ in front of the name) and restart GOG completely.
Now GOG should offer you to install the game to your desired directory. After the installation, just configurate the path back to the original installation folder.

My installation window:

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Tip: Always use an English game installation! Radish Modding Tools do not support other languages natively. This will lead to funny quest names and descriptions :-)

GOG will install your game to [Game Installation]\The Witcher 3 Wild Hunt GOTY.  That unnecessary folder is not to my taste, so I am going to move the game-files directly to my [Game Installation] Folder instead. You don't have to follow this step, but please keep in mind for the future paths, should you not follow.

My _game folder looks like this right now:

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For a lot of the used tools it is important to enable debugging scripts. This will allow the tools to dump the in-game data for further use.
To achieve this, we are going to add  -debugscripts to our shortcut.

My shortcut properties:

Shortcut.1.PNG

Uncooking

Now that we have a clean install of The Witcher 3 Wild Hunt we can proceed to a step called uncooking the game.
This uncooking decodes the game files and makes them editable/usable for our own mods. There are 2 ways of uncooking the games files, a short one and a longer one.

Tip: Do both! For some people one way work, for some the other one. Some people even had to do both.
Save yourself some pain and troubleshooting and go both ways in the first place.

For some (mostly bigger) mods it can be necessary to uncook some additional files (e.g. shadow meshes). 
It will be covered in this guide, but is fully optional for basic quests.

 

Tools needed

Too uncook the games files You'll need several tools, including wcc_lite, radish tools and Quick_BMS. 

 

The Witcher 3 Modkit (wcc_lite)

First tool We are going to have a closer look at is the official witcher modkit.

You can find it here: https://www.nexusmods.com/witcher3/mods/3173?tab=files&file_id=21542

After downloading unzip the setup.exe into any folder of choice and execute it.
It will automatically install into C:\Program Files (x86)\Witcher 3 Mod Tools. That is not necessarily the path, where We want it.
To have all Our tools together, move the folder Witcher 3 Mod Tools into Your [External Tools] (see table above for my absolute path) folder.

My _modTools\Witcher 3 Mod Tools folder:

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Now that we have the Modkit installed, we are going to patch it. This step is not necessary, but highly recommended to enhance performance!

The Patch can be found here: https://forums.cdprojektred.com/index.php?threads/patched-wcc_lite-for-faster-startup.6883680/

Download the file and overwrite the wcc_lite.exe, which is located in [External Tools]\Witcher 3 Mod Tools\bin\x64\wcc_lite.exe.
Now Your wcc_lite is succesfully patched!

Next step is to download the wcc_lite UI for easier use, because wcc_lite is basically just a command line programm.

The UI can be found here: https://www.nexusmods.com/witcher3/mods/3332?tab=files&file_id=22973

Download it and paste it in your [External Tools]\Witcher 3 Mod Tools folder.

After starting it up the first time, You will be asked to locate Your wcc_lite.
Just follow the above mentioned path and select it.

Now Your wcc_lite should be fully functional and usable!

 

Quick_BMS

The second way of uncooking your game requires Quick_BMS together with a preset from the Radish Tools Nexus page.

Quick_BMS can be downloaded here: https://aluigi.altervista.org/quickbms.htm

Create a new Folder into your [External Tools] path. I will for instance call it Quick BMS.
Extract all the files from the downloaded zip into this newly created folder.

Next step is to download the Radish Quick_BMS Uncook Script.

It can be found here: https://www.nexusmods.com/witcher3/mods/3620?tab=files&file_id=25205

Extract all the files to your Quick_BMS folder, as well.

Too set up Quick_BMS, open the copied .bat file called radish.uncook and adjust the two paths according to your installation/preference.
The first path SET W3_DIR=d:\The Witcher 3 Wild Hunt becomes SET W3_DIR=H:\Witcher 3\_game.

The second path the uncooked files will be copied to. Because this is just a temporary path, you can choose it, how you want.
In my case (I want to keep the uncooked data) I'm going to create a new folder path:

Uncooked Game Files H:\Witcher 3\_uncooked

This folder will contain all uncooked game files from all sources.

Tip: All the uncooked game data can take up to > 100 GB of disk space, so if you're low on available space, you don't need to keep your uncooked game data permanentely.

The second path SET OUTPUT_DIR=d:\tmp\qbms.all thus becomes SET OUTPUT_DIR=H:\Witcher 3\_uncooked\Quick BMS.

My radish.uncook.bat:

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Now your Quick_BMS should also be good to go!

 

The Radish Tools

Next Step is to download the external (non-ingame) part of the Radish Tools, including all the encoders.

Download: https://www.nexusmods.com/witcher3/mods/3620?tab=files&file_id=31085

Extract the radish-tools folder into your [External Tools]\Witcher 3 Mod Tools. This is path is not necessary for the tools to work, but is more of personal taste.

My [External Tools]\Witcher 3 Mod Tools (_modTools\Witcher 3 Mod Tools) now:

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That's all You need to install for uncooking the games files!
You're almost through 20% ;-)

 

 

The Uncooking itself

Warning: As mentioned above, uncooking all the files requires a minimum disk space of 100 GB so please make sure to have enough left!

 

wcc_lite

To uncook the game files via wcc_lite (the long way) open up the wcc_lite UI.
On the left hand side You will find a command called uncook.
After checking it You should see the following picture:

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On the right side You can find a lot of parameters. Most of them aren't important as for now.
We want to focus on the parameters indir and outdir.

We are going to fill it as the following:

indir [Game Installation]\content H:\Witcher 3\_game\content
outdir [Uncooked Game Files]\Wcc H:\Witcher 3\_uncooked\Wcc

After filling in the parameters hit Run Command in the upper right corner.

Warning: This will take up to a few hours so get yourself some coffee or some hours of sleep :-)

Your wcc UI should now look like this:

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Your [Uncooked Data]\Wcc should now look like this:

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As you might have noticed the folder structure of this path looks similar to Your [External Tools]\Witcher 3 Mod Tools\r4data.
When the uncooking is finished, We want to copy all the files from our [Uncooked Game Files]\Wccinto this folder.

Warning: Do not override any files in [External Tools]\Witcher 3 Mod Tools\r4data, when asked to! They contain additional information.

Warning: This copying can also take some time, so get yourself another cup of coffee :-)

 

Quick_BMS

Uncooking via Quick_BMS is a bit more simple, as We already set up the paths correctly, before.
To uncook the files just run the edited radish.uncook.bat.

When the command line tool is finished, it should look like this:

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Executing this tool won't take as much time as wcc, but it will still run for a few minutes.
After the completion locate your [Uncooked Game Files]\Quick BMS folder and copy all the data to your [External Tools]\Witcher 3 Mod Tools\r4data, as well.

Warning: Do not override any files in [External Tools]\Witcher 3 Mod Tools\r4data, when asked to! They contain additional information.

 

Some additional Files

Besides the uncooked games files Radish Tools do some other files, as well.

These can be downloaded here: https://www.nexusmods.com/witcher3/mods/3620?tab=files&file_id=25206

After downloading, extract the scripts folder to your r4data folder.

To summarize: We've uncooked the game files via wcc_lite and Quick_BMS, copied them into [External Tools]\Witcher 3 Mod Tools\r4data and added the scripts folder provided by the Radish Nexus site, either.

 

 

Uncooking additional meshes (optional) (example: shadowmeshes)

For bigger projects with a lot of custom meshes (e.g in a new hub), it can be necessary to extract further files.
In this particular case I will show, how to uncook shadwomeshes for correct display of shadows in custom environments.

First, we need to navigate into [External Tools]\Witcher 3 Mod Tools\radish-tools\repo.shadowmeshes.
If the tools are installed correctly, there should exist an uncook.meshes.bat file.
Edit the file with a text-editor of your choice. Here we need to set the paths to our game directory, the modkit and the radish tools.

DIR_MODKIT is the main directory of the Official W3 Modkit
DIR_ENCODER is the directory, where all the radish encoders can be found.

My uncook.meshes.bat file:

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Tip: If you chose a path with paranthesis () in it, you have to escape them with a ^ (see comment in file)!

It is possible that the following error occurs:

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If that happens, at least one shadowmesh hasen't been patched successfully. This can lead to errors in your mod, but there's currently now easy way around it.

 


Installing the Radish Tools

Requirements

After all the necessary game files are uncooked, we can start to install all the latest in-game mods, as well as its requirements.

The first mod we are going to install is the Community Patch - Base Mod.

You can find it here: https://www.nexusmods.com/witcher3/mods/3652?tab=files&file_id=24139

After downloading the archive, extract the folders mods and content into your [Game Installation] directory and overwrite if prompted.. Done!

Next mod we are going to need is Community Patch - Bootstrap and Utilities Mod.
The installation here is a bit more complicated.

First we are going to choose a base version of the mod. There are 2 different files to choose from:

1) You have no custom map changing mods installed (recommended for modding the game): https://www.nexusmods.com/witcher3/mods/2109?tab=files&file_id=23947
2) You have a custom map mod (e.g. All Quest Objectives On Map or Colored Map Markers): https://www.nexusmods.com/witcher3/mods/2109?tab=files&file_id=24145

After downloading either the first or the second archive, extract the dlc and mods folder into your  [Game Installation] directory.

Warning: Make sure you only install one of the two versions!

Next step is to download the bootstrap registry.

It can be found here: https://www.nexusmods.com/witcher3/mods/2109?tab=files&file_id=23946

In this archive you will only find a mods folder; copy it into your [Game Installation] directory... Done! ... Almost ;-)

To make this mod usable, we will also need to add the content of [Game Installation]\mods\modBootstrap\modBootstrap.input.settings to our Witcher 3 input settings.
We achive that by locating our W3 input file (commonly: C:\Users\[Your User]\Documents\The Witcher 3\input.settings) and pasting the content to the bottom of the file.

After pasting the content, my input.settings looks like this:

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Now the Community Patch - Bootstrap and Utilities Mod should finally be installed correctly.

Next we need Community Patch - Shared Imports.

Just download the archive here: https://www.nexusmods.com/witcher3/mods/2110?tab=files&file_id=27873

and (again -.-) extract the mods folder to your [Game Installation] directory.

 

 

The Radish Bundle

Our next step is to download the Radish Ingame Bundle. 

You can get it here: https://www.nexusmods.com/witcher3/mods/3620?tab=files&file_id=31079

Extract both the dlc and the mods folder into your [Game Installation] directory and overwrite any files, when prompted.

Next you need to paste the content of all the *.input.settings files from the archive into your W3 input (see above).

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We're coming closer now! :-)

Next we are going to register our mods, so that we can load them in-game.
Therefor, we need to locate our mods_registry.ws. The file is located at [Game Installation]\mods\modBootstrap-registry\content\scripts\local\mods_registry.ws.
You can edit it with any text editor of your choice. Now we are going to add: 

add(modCreate_EnvUiMod());
add(modCreate_RadishUi());

somewhere in the function createMods().

My mods_registry.ws looks like this:

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The template project

Now, that all the necessary tools (including their requirements) are installed, we're going to have a closer look at the template project.

You can download it here: https://www.nexusmods.com/witcher3/mods/3620?tab=files&file_id=31076

Extract it and copy it into your [Projects] folder.

The most important file for now is the _settings_.bat located in [Projects]\modHubTest.
Edit it with a text editor of choice.

First of all we need to change paths again.
The paths are exactly the same, as when uncooking the shadow meshes:

1) Game Installation
2) The official Modkit
3) Path where the Radish Encoders are located

My _settings_.bat file:

Settings.1.PNG

After adjusting the paths correctly, we further have to remove SET RELEASE_VERSION=YES (Line 21) by making it a comment.

Settings.2.PNG

This setting will hinder any source information of this mod to be seen in-game. That's not what we want.

After editing the _settings_.bat file, we need to create junction links.
Fortunately, this is made pretty easy. We just need to start the _createLinks_.bat once and confirm by typing (yes: english), j (ja: german), etc...

CreateLinks.1.PNG

Tip: Both errors at the top can be ignored.

Now the template-project should be launchable.
You can build the test mod by starting full.rebuild.bat.