Clangen File Editing -- An extended tutorial

CLAN DETAILS
Includes: Changing Clan name, changing leader, making multiple leaders, changing leader's lives, changing territories, editing border Clans, editing wars.

Navigate to the roaming save file -> Saves
Each Clan will have a FOLDER and a .JSON
In this part, we'll cover all the variables in the .JSON

Open and edit this in notepad, wordpad, or a similar BASIC text editor. I do NOT recommend using microsoft or adobe applications (word, pdf modifiers) as they will ruin the formatting and Clangen will not be able to read the file. Alternatively, you can use IDE's (visual studio, jupyter ect) but if you're more comfortable working in those than notepad, you probably don't need me to tell you how to edit a .json

Always hit "save" not "save as" when making changes to any Clangen file! You want to overwrite what is there, not make a new copy.

Punctuation marks (commas, colons) should always go OUTSIDE the quotation marks " " of a string
(ex: "clanname": "Brook",)

When you open a Clan's file, it should look something like this!

{
   "clanname": "Brook",
   "clanage": 8,
   "biome": "Plains",
   "camp_bg": "camp1",
   "gamemode": "expanded",
   "instructor": "47",
   "reputation": 90,
   "mediated": [],
   "starting_season": "Newleaf",
   "temperament": "stoic",
   "version_name": 3,
   "version_commit": "v0.11.2",
   "source_build": false,
   "leader": "42",
   "leader_lives": 0,
   "leader_predecessors": 0,
   "deputy": "42",
   "deputy_predecessors": 0,
   "med_cat": "45",
   "med_cat_number": 0,
   "med_cat_predecessors": 0,
   "clan_cats": "42,42,45,47,46,25,32,33,39,41,43,44,1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8",
   "faded_cats": "",
   "patrolled_cats": [],
   "other_clans_names": "Lavender",
   "other_clans_relations": "10",
   "other_clan_temperament": "mellow",
   "war": {
       "at_war": false,
       "enemy": null,
       "duration": 0
   }
}
I'm going to go through every argument one by one and tell you exactly what it does, how to correctly format changes to it, and what inputs are valid for each field.

"clanname": "Brook",
WHAT: Pretty easy, this is your Clan's name! 
HOW: If you'd like to change your Clan's name, you must change three things: this field in the .json, the file name of the .json, and the file name of the accompanying Clan folder. ALL THREE MUST BE CHANGED TO THE SAME NAME OR YOU WILL NOT BE ABLE TO LOAD THE FILE.
VALID: Do note that Clangen will always automatically append -Clan, so only put the prefix here. You CANNOT have two Clans with the same name, so if you make many Clans, check the list in your saves before you change this. I don't know what the game will do, but it can possibly eat one or both of your saves, so double check your name change is unique before you make the change.
FORMAT: The prefix must be in quotation marks " " -- this is a text string. (ex. "Ghost")

"clanage": 8,
WHAT: This is the the number of moons displayed in game.
HOW: Change the number to whatever you want. This is a cosmetic change and does not affect gameplay at all.
VALID: Any digit, even negative numbers. Go wild. (Note that the game will not generate events or relationships when the counter reaches 0 if you start at a negative value)
FORMAT: A positive digit with no markers. (ex. 4)

"biome": "Plains",
WHAT: This is the biome you chose when you made your Clan. There are currently four biomes: Plains, mountains, forest and beach. Each biome has their own unique patrols and events. Some biomes are more dangerous than others. Some biomes have less prey than others. Some biomes have harder patrol checks than others. Forest is the most forgiving, then plains in the middle, and beach and mountains are considered difficult territory types.
VALID: "Plains" "Mountainous" "Forest" "Beach"
FORMAT: quotation marks

"camp_bg": "camp1",
WHAT: This is the background image of your Clan. It is purely cosmetic and has no in-game effect.
VALID: "camp1" "camp2" "camp3" and for FOREST ONLY "camp4"
FORMAT: lowercase, in quotations, with a number and no space. (ex: "camp3")



"gamemode": "expanded",
WHAT: Clangen has two gamemodes: Classic and Expanded. In Classic, cats cannot be sick; fights result in death or scars only. The game also does not track herbs or prey. Classic is meant for a storytelling experience, while the extra mechanics in expanded allow for harder gameplay challenges.
VALID: "classic" "expanded"
FORMAT: quotation marks
NOTES: You will not have any prey when moving from Classic -> Expanded, and so you must edit those in else your cats will instantly starve and die on the next turn. If moving from Expanded -> Classic, any cats that are in the healer's den will be permanently injured/ill and unable to patrol until their conditions are manually removed. 


"instructor": "47",
WHAT: This is the cat ID of your StarClan guide.
VALID: a cat ID from that Clan's folder -> Clan_cats.json
FORMAT: quotation marks
NOTES: You technically can make your StarClan guide a living cat. All mechanics for a StarClan guide are preserved, including your guide leading followers to the DF if they are exiled there (because they are living, you must file-edit them to the DF and cannot use in-game buttons, but it is possible!)

   "reputation": 90,
WHAT: This is your reputation with outsiders. The higher the number, the more likely your Clan will encounter loners and kittypets that want to join your Clan.
VALID: Default values are 0-100
FORMAT: quotation marks

"mediated": [],
WHAT: This line keeps track of which mediators have worked each moon.
VALID: a cat ID
FORMAT: new line indented, quotation marks (see above formatting guide for indents)

"starting_season": "Newleaf",
WHAT: This is the season at moon 0. The season of all moons is calculated from this.
VALID: "Newleaf" "Greenleaf" "Leaf-fall" "Leaf-bare" (don't ask why two are hyphenated and two aren't!!! I don't make the rules!!)
FORMAT: One of the above four as typed, quotation marks

"temperament": "stoic",
WHAT: This is your Clan's personality. 

save 2 for Clan cat editing (aka adding new cats to the game from scratch, complex family tree edits)

save for patrols

save for relationships

save for backstories, text replacement, ceremonies

save for misc data editing

+ 1 for skinning

I make these in separate posts so that I can use the top directory to link straight to that section, like chapters. Keeps things easy to find and navigate. Also easier to edit