[Resolved] Edit save file to restore player on perma-death world

[Brady_The]

As the title suggests, regrets were had, and I'd like to revive myself on a perma-death world after having died. How can I achieve that (I am a bit too "challenged" to read the vcdbs.)?

Cheers.

Edit: I am getting somewhere on my own, but help from somebody who knows which values to replace would still be appreciated.

Edit 2: Derp, there is actually a scrollbar that leads to comments of the binary...

Edit 3: Looks like it'll be a lot harder than I hoped for.

Edit 4: Never mind. I fixed it.

Spoiler

Hehe, thought I'd leave you hanging, hm?

The easy way:

Spoiler

How to recover a perma-death world after dying - the easy way.

All you need is a hardware or software macro solution. In my case I used a Logitech G19 with macro keys.

This works because the chat menu can be access while still in the loading screen, and before the "You are dead" notification blocks any input. Used on 1.19.3 but should be doable on all versions of the game.
------------------------
The macro: "[OPEN CHAT]/wc playerlives -1[ENTER]"
[OPEN CHAT] = The key you use to open the in-game chat. (I don't use the default layout, so unfortunately I cannot tell you which button it is. You'll figure it out!)
[ENTER] = Enter key
------------------------
1. Load the "dead world".
2. Wait until you see the (triple) loading dots.
3. Use macro.
4 Load in, respawn, be happy.

The process is fairly simple and easy. If you don't get it to work first try, work a little on your timing.

------------------------
I apologize for the lag in the video. My computer hasn't be great for over a decade now. Cheers.

The hard way (might not work):

Spoiler

I simply changed the game mode from survival to creative, loaded up the map and switched to survival again. (It turns out that this is much easier than trying to fix playerdata.)

How to:

• Open the save file in question with https://sqlitebrowser.org/.
• Switch to Tab "Browse Data".
• Select Table: "gamedata".
• Select "BLOB" in data row.
• Replace the respective binaries "surviveandbuild." (73 75 72 76 69 76 65 61 6e 64 62 75 69 6c 64 88) with the corresponding binaries of "creativebuilding" (63 72 65 61 74 69 76 65 62 75 69 6c 64 69 6e 67).
  • To help find the correct binaries you can select the whole binary (Ctrl+A), right click and select "Copy Hex and ASCII" (Ctrl+Shift+C), paste it in the editor of your choice and search for the keyword you are looking for.
    • Depending on the save file, the binaries and readable ASCII translations might be wrapped differently. You probably won't find any results by searching directly for whole strings. Your best bet is to search for "surv" and "crea" and find the correct binaries by matching results.
    • Generally the game mode is found fairly close to the end of the save file.
  • Mind the dot in "surviveandbuild.".
  • When you found the correct binaries, note the "address" (first block, depending on save file size 5 to 6 characters, in the example screenshot "678c0"), switch to your internet browser, copy the creative binaries in brackets mentioned above (Ctrl+C), switch to "DB Browser for SQLite", locate the "address", highlight the binaries (or ASCII translation) and paste the "creativebuilding" binaries (Ctrl+V).
• Apply the change, write the change to file (Ctrl+S or File -> Write Changes), start the game, load the save file (might tell you that it is corrupted, but in my case the built-in repair function fixed the file), and continue playing (albeit with the dirty knowledge that you and me are filthy cheaters).

It's possible you have to redo your world settings, if you chose to stray from the defaults.

Always back up your save files before attempting this!

Spoiler

Spoiler

I finally learned from my mistakes and added (due to my non-existent programming skills probably) a hacky but working automatic backup solution for my most recent (to keep the time to copy low) save file.

@echo off
set source="%AppData%\VintagestoryData\Saves"
set target="%AppData%\VintagestoryData\Saves - Backup\*"

FOR /F "delims=" %%I IN ('DIR %source%\*.* /A:-D /O:-D /B') DO COPY %source%\"%%I" %target% & echo %%I & GOTO :END
:END

Start "" "D:\Vintagestory\Vintagestory.exe"

Of course you have to replace "D:\Vintagestory\Vintagestory.exe" with your personal installation path.

 

Edited August 11, 2024 by Brady_The
Added Easy Solution, and Backup Hack

[Brick]

Thanks man. I used the *Macro* method but instead of macro I simply opened chat, used ctrl+v, and pressed Enter during those three dots stage cause world was loading slow enough for me to do it manually without any software.

[Brady_The]

1 hour ago, Brick said:

Thanks man. I used the *Macro* method but instead of macro I simply opened chat, used ctrl+v, and pressed Enter during those three dots stage cause world was loading slow enough for me to do it manually without any software.

Nice! I feel a bit silly now that I didn't even consider Ctrl+V. My computer should be slow enough. Haha

[Krougal]

Considering the point of perma-death is well...perma-death...I feel we should publicly ridicule you or something.

 

[Brady_The]

50 minutes ago, Krougal said:

Considering the point of perma-death is well...perma-death...I feel we should publicly ridicule you or something.

Feel free to do so. Just be aware that I'll shoot back.

[Brick]

On 10/27/2024 at 12:18 AM, Krougal said:

Considering the point of perma-death is well...perma-death...I feel we should publicly ridicule you or something.

 

Well. Perma-death is fun while you are alive. When you play with it on, it gives more adrenaline and more tense situations. However when you fail and die after sinking enough hours - it is too hard to let go of the developed world, the world that contain traces of that adventure. In my case after restoring the world I didnt proceed to keep playing it. Just left the world as a reminder that I can revisit and look back. There is no shame if you dont try to trick others or yourself. Would be nice if VS had a default of switching to spectator mode instead of trying to delete everything dont you agree?

[Thorfinn]

4 hours ago, Brick said:

Would be nice if VS had a default of switching to spectator mode instead of trying to delete everything dont you agree?

Simple enough. Don't set it to permadeath, but limit yourself to 1 death, then change the world's name to remind you that you have to switch to /gm 3 or whatever it is when you load that world. Maybe prepend a "Spectator" to the world name or something? We trust you.

[EDIT]

Oh, and welcome to the forums, @Brick!

Edited November 2, 2024 by Thorfinn

[Sergio de Sá Gallego]

good post mate!

one think, this could help if i need to change the amounts of lives a player has left?
i want a way to change it on my world

i guess that would be in playedata table, but i dont know in which part of the data blob will be that info

[Brady_The]

53 minutes ago, Sergio de Sá Gallego said:

i want a way to change it on my world

Luckily there is a much more convenient way to change the amount of player lives! Put

/worldConfig playerlives [-1 .. 99]

in the chat, where "-1" means infinite lives.

See https://wiki.vintagestory.at/index.php/World_Configuration.

Edited November 4, 2024 by Brady_The

[Sergio de Sá Gallego]

7 hours ago, Brady_The said:

7 hours ago, Sergio de Sá Gallego said:

i want a way to change it on my world

Luckily there is a much more convenient way to change the amount of player lives! Put

/worldConfig playerlives [-1 .. 99]

in the chat, where "-1" means infinite lives.

See https://wiki.vintagestory.at/index.php/World_Configuration.

 

No no, i know that command, the max lives are already set at 20 or 15 im not sure at all.
What i want to do, is giving the players more lives depending on what they accomplish (we set an event and the price are three more lives, for example)

For example, i cant see how much lives left i have in my solo world, and, if for any reason, i wanted to give myself more lives, there is also no way to do it with commands.

The only command i saw, is the one you sent me already, but that only applies to the max lives of all the world, while i want to change the amounts of lives left on player a, b, c... Is there any way through the hex edit? i couldnt find anything about it on playerdata or gamedata.