NearInfinity and dialog.tlk - did I mess things up?

Quichybo

Ahoy!
I edited a weapon's description in Baldur's Gate EET via NearInfinity and forgot to backup dialog.tlk although I was reminded.
I did not add anything, just changed two numbers to make the description fit its weapon's stats. I wasn't aware that the complete dialog.tlk would be changed / rebuild / recompiled whatever.
After having done this I read here in this Forum that dialog.tlk should not be edited via NearInfinity. I didn't edit it directly but via the identified item's description. So did I mess up the dialog.tlk or even the whole installation?
Would be nasty to run into a plotstopper in a few months because of my mistake.
The modification itself worked and so far there have been no errors.
Also: How do I know that there is an error in these regards? Wrong dialogue for some situations or crash to desktop?
I would be happy for any helpful thoughts on this matter.
Thanks in advance
Quichybo

kjeron

The backup is recommended because such changes to dialog.tlk are permanent - to get a clean copy you would have to redownload the game (maybe not all the files, depends on how each platform works).

Quichybo wrote: »

Also: How do I know that there is an error in these regards? Wrong dialogue for some situations or crash to desktop?Quichybo

More likely the latter than the former in my experience, but it usually occurs due to using invalid character encoding for a given language set (such as the wrong "ō" in Ninjatō).

Quichybo

Thanks, so I could also undo it if I simply edited it back to the old numbers and go back to the original file? I feared that editing anything might change the order of things, as "the latest change is always at the end of the file and the indices are now messed up". But what you tell me sounds relieving.
I already have a modded game, so it is by far not the original file anymore

kjeron

Quichybo wrote: »

Thanks, so I could also undo it if I simply edited it back to the old numbers and go back to the original file? I feared that editing anything might change the order of things, as "the latest change is always at the end of the file and the indices are now messed up". But what you tell me sounds relieving.
I already have a modded game, so it is by far not the original file anymore

Newly added strings are always added to the end, modifying existing strings through NI should update the file properly to avoid breaking it, as should Weidu installs.
Strings added by Weidu are also permanent additions, but existing strings modified by Weidu will be reverted (provided a successful uninstall of the mod).

Quichybo

Great. For me getting to know how a game works (rules and engine) is part of playing it, also part of the fun.

Noloir

kjeron wrote: »

Quichybo wrote: »

Thanks, so I could also undo it if I simply edited it back to the old numbers and go back to the original file? I feared that editing anything might change the order of things, as "the latest change is always at the end of the file and the indices are now messed up". But what you tell me sounds relieving.
I already have a modded game, so it is by far not the original file anymore

Newly added strings are always added to the end, modifying existing strings through NI should update the file properly to avoid breaking it, as should Weidu installs.
Strings added by Weidu are also permanent additions, but existing strings modified by Weidu will be reverted (provided a successful uninstall of the mod).

Do you know of a way to transfer an edited dialog.tlk over to Android successfully? When I mod the patch.obb file by transfering it over to PC after compressing to transfer it back to Android the file size keeps increasing by over 1GB crashing the game on transfer.

Gusinda

Hi @Noloir, made a comment about this in the Android modding thread. Suggested a different method.

Gus