Your first mod

This walkthrough makes a small texture mod: it replaces one skin icon, builds the mod and installs it to try it in game. The same steps work for any change the Studio can make.

1. Create the project

Click New mod project on the welcome screen (or in the menu at the top left). The wizard has three steps:

1. Your mod: the name players see, your author name and the version. The mod id (the permanent, lowercase name of the mod, like kasumi-icon) is made from the name; you can change it later. The version uses semantic versioning: start at 1.0.0.
2. Game folder: the CookedPCConsole folder of the Paladins instance you want to mod. The wizard checks that it really is one and lists the folders you used before.
3. Project folder: where the project lives. By default it is Documents/Tempest Mods/<id>.

Create project makes the folder and opens it:

Tempest Mods/kasumi-icon/
├── kasumi-icon.twrk   the project file: your edits and where you were
├── mod-files/         extra files shipped with the mod (scripts, DLLs, anything else)
└── builds/            the .tempest files you build

The header now shows the project name with its save state. You never need to save by hand: the project saves itself a moment after every change and shows Saved when it is done.

2. Find what to change

Press Ctrl+F (Cmd+F on macOS) to search every package of the game. The first search reads every package's table of contents, which takes a few seconds; later searches are instant. Type part of an object's path, for example skinicon_kasumi, and pick a result. The Studio opens the package and selects the object.

You can also browse: the Packages view lists every package on the left, the selected package's objects in the middle as a tree, and the selected object on the right. Ctrl+P jumps to a package by name.

3. Make the change

With a texture selected, the Preview tab shows it. Click Replace… in the object's toolbar, Browse… to a PNG or DDS file and confirm. The defaults keep the original's pixel format and mip chain; a PNG is re-encoded to that format, and the new image is stored inside the package, so no other file needs changing.

The package now has a dot next to its name in the list and on its tab: it has edits. In a project those edits are kept in the project file, not written into the game folder. Ctrl+Z undoes the change if you picked the wrong file.

Other things you might change: a sound (Replace… with an Ogg or WAV file, or Edit to trim it), a mesh (glTF, FBX or OBJ), any property on the Properties tab, or rows of assembly.dat in the Assembly view. See Packages and Assembly.

4. Build the mod

Click Build mod in the header (or press Ctrl+3). The mod cooker shows:

• What goes in: one line per game file you changed, with the number of objects or rows changed. Click the count to see the list. The … menu on each line can show the changes, leave the file out of the mod, ship it whole, or discard your edits to it.
• Details: the name, version, author, icon and description, prefilled from the wizard.
• Build: what is still missing, if anything, and the Build button.

Mods that ship scripts or DLLs have to be signed. The first time, the cooker offers Create key, which makes your personal signing key; it is reused for every mod after that. A texture mod does not need it, but signing never hurts.

Click Build 1.0.0. The mod is written to builds/kasumi-icon-1.0.0.tempest.

5. Try it

Click Install to try it. The cooker installs the mod into the game folder you are editing, through the launcher's own installer, so it behaves exactly like a mod installed from the repository. Start the game from the launcher and check the change. Install elsewhere… installs into another game folder.

To change something, edit again, raise the version (1.0.1) and build again. The cooker asks before replacing a version you already built.

6. Come back later

Close the Studio or the project whenever you like: your edits stay in the project. To continue, open the project from the welcome screen's recent list or with Open project… (Ctrl+Alt+O): the game folder, your edits, your open tabs and the mod details come back as you left them.

7. Publish

When the mod is ready for others, open Publish to mods.lowrezstudio.com under the Build button, fill in the patches it works with and a summary, and publish. You need an account and an API key on the website first: see Publishing mods.