SiegeSmith Studio Guide

Studio Guide — the main window

This page is the manual for SiegeSmith's main window: browsing and understanding the game's data, editing it, packaging mods, and launching the game. The level editor has its own manual — the World Builder Guide.

Getting started

SiegeSmith detects your Dungeon Siege installation automatically (GOG, Steam, or disc) and lists its tanks in the left rail. It never modifies your original tanks — everything you build lands in separate files.

• File → Open Tank… opens any .dsres / .dsmap by path; the install rail opens the detected ones with a click.
• File → Refresh Install re-scans after you install or remove mods.
• World → Open World Builder… opens the level editor (non-modal — keep both windows open).

What's in the tanks: Logic.dsres holds game rules and templates, Objects.dsres meshes/animations/art, Terrain.dsres the siege-node terrain pieces, Sound.dsres / Voices.dsres audio, and World.dsmap the shipped campaign's regions.

The Tank Explorer

Open a tank and you get its full file tree.

• Search filters the whole tank by name.
• Asset-category jump buttons land you directly on the big groups (templates, textures, meshes, animations…) without hunting through the tree.
• Properties for the selection show sizes, paths, and CRC32s.
• Right-click any entry: Extract file…, Extract folder / tank…, Export as PNG… (textures), Open externally, Copy path, Copy CRC32. The same extract commands live under Tools.

Selecting any file opens the matching viewer in the workspace. The viewers use the same parsers the SiegeFX engine runs, so what they display is what the game actually loads.

The viewers

Format	What you get
.raw (texture)	Full image with Prev/Next mip navigation and Export PNG… — the round-trip partner of the World Builder's PNG→.raw importer.
.gas (data language)	Three modes: Tree (structured blocks/attributes), Raw (the text), and Edit — editing runs a live validator, so syntax and structure errors surface as you type instead of as a silent in-game failure.
.skrit (script)	Source and Disassembly views with live parse/bind/compile diagnostics and the extern catalogue (what the engine exposes to scripts); Save as… exports.
.asp / .sno (models)	Software-rendered orbit/zoom preview with the real textures resolved; Textured / Wireframe toggles and Reset view. SNO previews also step through surfaces.
.prs (animation)	The structural readout (bones, key counts, note events) plus live playback: the paired .asp rig resolves automatically from the DS1 naming convention and the clip plays, with Play/Pause and a scrub slider. Clips with no matching skinned mesh say so and keep the readout.
.flm (cursor filmstrip)	Frame strip + animated playback.
.wav / .mp3	In-app playback (▶ Play / ■ Stop).
anything else	Text view for text, hex view for binary.

Editing and packaging mods

The classic folder-mod loop, all in one window:

1. Extract the files you want to change (keep your mod folder mirroring tank layout — only changed files belong in it).
2. Edit — .gas in the built-in editor with validation; textures via PNG export → repaint → re-import (the World Builder's Custom tab converts any image back to a valid mip-mapped .raw).
3. Tools → Build Tank from Folder… packs the folder into a proper tank with user priority, so the game prefers your files without the originals ever being touched.
4. Project → Build & Install to Game drops the built tank straight into the game's Resources; Project → Launch Dungeon Siege starts retail. Removing a mod = deleting its tank.

Mod projects (.ssproj) — Project → New/Open/Save keep a mod's folder, tank name, and settings together; Project Files… opens the folder. The edit → build → install → test loop never leaves the app.

For worked recipes (rebalance a weapon, reskin a monster, add loot to a chest), see the Modder's Guide.