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Hello! Thank you for all your hard work. I was wondering if there are any resources for learning about how to make custom crafting stations in general, and I was also wondering how difficult it is in terms of modding abilities. Have my own sci fi setup that I wanna build crafting stations for, and I wan a know where to start learning. Thanks!
Hey there, long answer here, so I've divided it up into sub-sections. See below the cut
There are no tutorials for making crafting stations specifically. Honestly, the difficulty depends on your experience making custom objects, modding BHAV's, testing and the complexity of what you want to make.
The first thing you will want to start with is learning basic object creation, there are plenty of tutorials on every aspect of this. Remember: object creation is not just about SimPE! It also involves meshing and creating textures.
Then once you have a handle on that, you will want to learn BHAV modding. Resources for this type of modding are rarer, documentation can be spotty, but good places to start are Echo's BHAV tutorial @midgethetree's Resources page and @picknmixsims' Primitives page on his site.
Another good way to learn BHAV modding is to look at other people's code. See if others have made code that might be useful to you. Look at how they did it and try to understand why it was made this way. Screenshot a BHAV, label every node with what it does.
Seeing as you're interested in crafting stations in particular, you can take a look at custom crafting stations. A few you could look at are Nadira's Sculpture Manufactory at MTS or anything "descended" from Beck's crafting stations like @deedee-sims' Woodworking station, @nixedsims' Blacksmith Crafting station or @fireflowersims' Candle Crafting station. You could also look at our code for insights, though we do not support straight-up cloning.
But, before you can get to actually making a station, it's important to get a good idea of what you intend to make. The planning stage is as important as the development. What will the station make? Will it require resources a la Sun&Moon? Money a la EAxis OFB stations? Or perhaps the only investment is time and motives? Each of these options are different in coding. And if it needs resources, you'll have to create those resources too. Can the action be interrupted? That'll add some complexity. Autonomy and/or trait options are other things to consider. We like to have the basics planned out before we begin coding in earnest. This gives us a good idea of whether we can do this with our current arsenal or if we need to develop some more parts.
What I've found useful in this stage is reducing the station down to its basic steps: sim goes to the station, does animation, x things get removed from their inventory, then y other thing gets added. This is a very basic example, most stations are more complex than that, but it can help you get a general idea of how to structure your code.
It's also good to remember that crafting stations are not just code... We put a significant amount of time into the visuals. Sourcing meshes and textures or creating them from scratch, mapping said meshes to look good with the textures, optimizing them so they perform well without sacrificing quality. It's an entire development process that takes time.
Testing is another important aspect. We test when developing new code, we test before we duplicate code, we test after we duplicated code. We have some amazing beta testers that help out a lot with this, but even then, things will probably slip past that'll require fixing later on. I cannot understate how important testing is.
When learning how to do any modding, especially BHAV modding, It's a good idea to find a Discord server with experienced modders to join up. @gayars' Sims Crafters is an excellent place for this, as is the PBK Discord. I have also heard good things about @lazyduchess' server.
The important thing is that you have a place where you can ask people for help; both with testing your stuff and figuring out how to resolve that stubborn bug. There is no shame in it, we've all been there. Do not expect people to fix all your issues for you - you'll still have to do the majority of the heavy lifting yourself - but they may just point you in the right direction. Just stay polite and be willing to learn.
So well, Crafting Stations involve quite a bit, but I highly encourage you to dive in and see what you can achieve. Remember: it's not a race, it's a journey. Enjoy the process, errors are your friends. Don't be discouraged if it takes months, so do some of our projects. Laundry took 1.5 years.
The best of luck!