Designing Your Ck2 Coat Of Arms

Coats of arms (CoA) are heraldic designs that uniquely identify a title or a dynasty. They are composed of a shield inside a frame and may be displayed in 2D or 3D. To make a new coat of arms in CK2, you will need to create a tga-formatted image file and add your graphics to the game. You will need to go to the game's interface folder and find coat_of_arms.txt. Copy this file to your mod's interface folder and open it up. You will need to add a new texture declaration to the end of the file, specifying the file name, the number of columns and rows in your tga file, and the number of frames. Finally, you will need to assign coats to dynasties by editing the dynasties.txt file.

Create a new directory in your /mod folder

To create a new directory in your /mod folder, follow these steps:

First, create a new directory in your /mod folder. Within that directory, add the following subfolders: common, gfx/coat_of_arms, and interface. This is where you'll put all the files you assemble for your customization.

At the top of the /mod folder, create a new text file with the extension .mod, i.e. custom_coas.mod. Write the following two lines in it:

Name = ""

Path = "mod/"

Replace the text within the <> with the text you want displayed in the load screen and the directory you just created.

Create a tga-formatted image file

To create a TGA-formatted image file, you will need to use a graphics editor such as Corel Painter, Photoshop, GIMP, or Paint.NET.

TGA stands for "Truevision Graphics Adapter" and is a raster graphics file format developed by Truevision Inc. It is a format suitable for containing low-resolution graphics like icons, 2D images, and line drawings.

When creating your TGA file, it is recommended that you consolidate all the graphics into a single file, laid out in a grid. The Dynasty DLC pack for CK2 allots 128x128 pixels for each coat of arms, but you can potentially go bigger to give yourself additional resolution.

Once you have created your TGA file, save it in your mod's gfx/coat_of_arms directory and name it whatever you want.

Add your graphics to the game

Go to the game's interface folder and find coat_of_arms.txt. Copy this file to your mod's interface folder. When you load your mod, your custom coat_of_arms.txt file will be loaded instead of the game's default. Open your mod's copy of the file and look through it for a declaration called textures. You will need to go to the textures section you're interested in (western or Muslim) and add a new texture declaration to the end. Change the file name to match the file name you chose.

Amend 'x' to equal the number of columns in your tga file (even columns that are blank). Amend 'y' to equal the number of rows in your tga file (even those that are blank). Set noOfFrames to equal x times y. If there are blank squares in your tga file in the last row, you can prevent yourself from accidentally assigning a dynasty to that blank graphic by lowering noOfFrames. But, I don't think it's necessary. As for color, emblem, and random, I'd recommend the values I define above. To my knowledge, color and emblem relate to random CoAs.

Take note of how many texture declarations there are in the textures entry you amended. If it's the Western group and you have the Dynasty CoA DLC, it will probably be the 6th entry. Defining the wrong values for x and y will cause your CoAs to be distorted. This is what happened to the DLC content following the 1.03b patch. There was a mismatch in the shape of the tga file and the shape defined in coat_of_arms.txt.

Assign coats to dynasties

To assign coats to dynasties, you must first create a unique numeric ID for the dynasty, as well as a name and culture. This information will be added to the game's common folder in dynasties.txt.

Next, you will need to create a tga-formatted image file for your coat of arms. This can be done using a graphics editor. It is recommended that you consolidate all graphics into a single file, laid out in a grid. Save your tga file in your mod's gfx/coat_of_arms directory.

Once you have created your tga file, you will need to add your graphics to the game. Go to the game's interface folder and find coat_of_arms.txt. Copy this file to your mod's interface folder. You will need to add a new texture declaration to the end of the file, specifying the file name, the number of columns and rows, and the number of frames.

Finally, you will need to assign your coat of arms to your dynasty. Go back to dynasties.txt and add a third field: coat_of_arms. Set templates = 0 and specify the texture and texture_internal values for your coat of arms. The texture value maps to the texture declaration in coat_of_arms.txt, and the texture_internal value tells the game which grid space within your tga file to use for the coat of arms.

Example

Let's say you have created a tga file with the following graphics:

! [Example Coat of Arms Graphics](https://i.imgur.com/ZRTj3ZJ.png)

You would first need to add a new texture declaration to coat_of_arms.txt:

Texture = { file = "gfx\\coats_of_arms\\my_coa.tga" size = { x = 4 y = 3 } noOfFrames = 12 color = 0 emblem = no random = no # Do not use for random CoAs }

Next, you would assign the coat of arms to your dynasty in dynasties.txt:

123 = { name="Menteith" culture = scottish coat_of_arms = { template = 0 layer = { texture = 2 texture_internal = 5 emblem = 0 color = 0 color = 0 color = 0 } } }

In this example, the texture value is set to 2, which corresponds to the second column of the tga file. The texture_internal value is set to 5, which corresponds to the fifth row of the tga file. So the game will use the coat of arms in the second column and fifth row of the tga file for the "Menteith" dynasty.

Verify and maintain your mod

Once you've accomplished all the steps above, you should be good to go! Run CK2 with your mod checked on the load screen. Verify that your coats of arms are present. If not, review the instructions above and see if you made a mistake. If you're still having a problem, try a very simple, single-coat modification. Eliminate possible causes of your issue by simplifying your mod.

If a patch or DLC modifies coat_of_arms.txt or dynasties.txt, then your mod will not be fully compatible. They might add a new texture entry, which you won't have in your mod. They might add new dynasties that won't show up when you play your mod. So always check to see if the date stamp on those files in the core game has changed when you update. If they have, you will probably need to amend your files to account for this. For example, if the game adds a new texture entry, you'll need to add it to your coat_of_arms.txt file and update your dynasties.txt texture declarations to match.

If you want to load two or more mods together that modify coat_of_arms.txt and/or dynasties.txt, then only one will get utilized. The safest thing to do is to merge changes from multiple mods into a new, uber-mod that includes all changes and avoids file clashes.

Frequently asked questions