Getting Started

Getting Started

This page gets the extension installed and pointed at your game in about five minutes.

1. Install the extension

The extension is Paradox Modding Toolkit, id JDeffner.px-toolkit.

• From the Marketplace: search for "Paradox Modding Toolkit" in the Extensions view (Ctrl+Shift+X) and install it.
• From a .vsix file: open the Extensions view, open the ... menu at the top of the view, choose Install from VSIX..., and pick the downloaded file. Releases are attached to the GitHub releases page.

Already using the old CK3 Modding Toolkit (JDeffner.ck3-modding-toolkit)? That is a different Marketplace listing and it will not update into this one. See Upgrading for the (short) migration.

Not a VS Code user? The language server runs standalone from any LSP client. See Outside VS Code.

2. Open your mod folder

Open the folder that contains your mod's descriptor (File → Open Folder...). For CK3 that is the folder with descriptor.mod, common/, events/ and localization/ inside it; for Victoria 3 and EU5 it is the folder with .metadata/.

If you keep several mods, open a parent directory that holds all of them, or add each mod as a folder in a multi-root workspace. All of them are treated as first-class mods, indexed together. There is no "primary mod" to pick. See Multi Mod and Translation.

VS Code newcomers: the folder you open is your "workspace". Most of what this extension does is scoped to the mods it finds inside that workspace. Outside a mod workspace, the toolkit stays quiet: no status bar entry, no views, no commands cluttering the palette.

3. Run Setup

Open the command palette (Ctrl+Shift+P) and run Paradox: Run Setup & Health Check. It:

• detects which game this workspace mods (see Supported Games),
• finds that game's install via Steam,
• checks the dump folder (where the game writes error.log and the script_docs dumps),
• offers to download tiger, the validator the diagnostics integration wraps, where one exists for the game.

The default answer to "what do I need to configure?" is nothing. Setup auto-detects the machine paths, and everything in Configuration is optional. Run Setup once and you are ready to edit.

The walkthrough (Get started with the Paradox Modding Toolkit, in VS Code's Welcome page) covers the same ground step by step if you prefer that.

4. Dump your own game data

Recommended on CK3, essential on Victoria 3 and EU5.

CK3 and Vic3 ship bundled dump snapshots, so completion works out of the box; CK3 additionally has bundled wiki tables. EU5 ships neither yet. Your own dump always wins outright, because it matches your exact game version.

1. Launch the game with the -debug_mode launch option, or run Paradox: Launch Game (debug mode) from the palette.
2. In game, open the console with the backtick key (`, above Tab).
3. Type script_docs and press Enter. The game writes the dumps to its dump folder (logs/ on CK3, docs/ on Vic3 and EU5, see Supported Games).
4. Back in VS Code, run Paradox: Reload Game Data (script_docs).

This gives you the exact effect, trigger, scope, event-target and modifier data for your installed version, including the scope-transition data the scope engine relies on. Do it again after a game patch to stay current. The status bar tells you which source is active ("bundled script_docs snapshot" versus "script_docs + wiki").

While you are in the console, the data-types dump does the same for the GUI and localization data-binding API (the [Character.GetFather...] chains). The command is DumpDataTypes on CK3 and dump_data_types on Vic3 and EU5; Setup names the right one for your game.

5. Find your way around

• The Paradox icon in the activity bar opens the Project dashboard and the mod views. See Sidebar Views.
• The status bar carries the toolkit item (click it to re-run Setup) and, in a game with a tiger, a tiger item (click it to validate).
• Five keybindings ship by default; everything else is on the command palette under Paradox, Paradox Tiger and Paradox Localization. See Configuration.

Next

• Feature Overview for the visual tour.
• Editor Features for the day-to-day tour of what you get while editing.
• Configuration if auto-detection missed something, or you want to tune diagnostics.

Working in a workspace with a total conversion or a dozen mods? docs/PERFORMANCE.md has the measured costs and the settings that shrink them.