Look at this as just a basic how to get started guide for teaching yourself how to mod things in the game. this simple guide is not going to teach you to be a modder but it should show you how to teach yourself to mod anything your interested in.
first let me say that this guide is mainly talking about learning stand alone mods because grouped mods and large mods are too complicated to figure out by dissecting them because you can never know what each file does just by looking at them untill you really understand the files well..
modding 101:
well the first thing you should do is start by downloading every mod there is out there that you can find, even the ones for outdated game versions and burn it all to a disk.
this is your "how it is was done by someone else" instruction manual so you know what files are involved to do this or that with a mod. most mods you might want to do have probably already been done before for an old version of the game or maybe its not done to your taste but it will show you which files are involved and the read mes should tell you what types of changes were made to those files.
you should organise your mods:
mods can be put in groups or catagories that they fall into so break them down into groups that make the most sense to you so you can find what you need later on.
for me i organise them as, environmental, damage related, sound, sensor related, textures, and text editing (which is the easy kind but also easy to mess up with typos).
when you look at mods think about the catagory they fall into because simular catagories are usually done in simular ways. not always but often its the same guidelines you follow but maybe change a different catagory of values in the files.
how to dissect a mod and learn how it was done:
see what the mod does, look at the files in the mod, these are what you need to change to do whatever the mod does, then take a stock unmodded version of the exact same files and open them up side by side to see what was changed and by how much. if there is a read me in the file it tells you what it effects then as you learn you will recognise which files do what in the mod.
if you wanted to, you can do all this without even talking to the guy who did the mod.
in most cases modders are glad to answer any questions you may have. if you dont understand something and the modder cant help you then just ask about it in the forum but remember to be polite and dont say "bernard wouldnt tell me how he did this or that?" just ask in a general manner something like "if i want to increase "XXXX" power, what settings do i need to change?" then when you get your answer you will know the numbers to look at and change and in the process you have learned how to open a mod and find out exactly what was done to the files.
if by some chance the modder isnt around anymore to answer your questions, then use what i told you to get the info you need.
now i will send you a bill in the mail for your education lol.
