How to combine Texture Packs - esp Sphax

[Silmenume]

I am currently using 2 different Sphax texture packs.  Their general one and the Tekkit patch.  Each is mutually exclusive to the other.  While at my base the Tekkit patch is awesome, but the world in vanilla is blah.  The basic Sphax Texture pack is great when out of my base, but when home is quite plain.

 

I have been told that it is relatively easy to combine the two texture packs.  Is there someone in these forums who could please create or post a quick tutorial on how to do this.

 

Please!  Pretty please!

 

Best

Edited September 4, 2014 by Silmenume

[redsector]

Texture packs are just a bunch of graphics packed into a regular old zip file. To combine packs, you have to unzip the files (make sure to keep the folder structure intact), make any changes you want - in your case, that simply means combining the contents of both packs in a single folder - and rezip the result, again keeping the folder structure.

Edited August 26, 2014 by redsector

[Curunir]

Alright, here is a click-through, using the often-requested Sphax PureBDCraft as an example.

 

1. What's this all about?

Resource Packs can add more than just textures (hence the name), but mostly they are about textures only. Textures are the little pictures that the game puts on the sides of blocks, and also on all other surfaces, even handheld tools. So while the basic shape of objects will not change with an alternate texture set, the overall look can change quite dramatically.

 

2. What do I need?

A Resource pack, naturally. Those are usually made for vanilla Minecraft and cover all the blocks in there. We'll go with Sphax, so just pick the correct version (Tekkit is on 1.6.4 right now) from the download page.

 

3. There are weird numbers, like '64x'...

Those numbers represent the texture size, and consequently, texture resolution. No matter how high your ingame resolution may be, the textures are comparatively tiny, and the game's graphics engine will resize, stretch and smooth them as needed (this is, by the way, one point where Anisotropic Filtering and other graphics card functions to improve image quality come into play). Minecraft uses a measly 16x16 default texture size, which is lean on the resources, but also very tiny, and responsible for the "blocky" look. Some texture packs stay within 16x, but most increase it at least to 32x or 64x, forfeiting the blocky look somewhat. There are packs up to 256x or even 512x out there, but those are very demanding on system resources and can cause problems with the base game. It is recommended to use nothing above 128x unless you know what you're doing.

 

4. Ok, which one to get?

We stick with 128x. Why? Because it strikes a good balance. We need mod patches, and some of those are only available up to 128x anyway. If you have a slow computer that is easily stressed, limiting yourself to 64x or even 32x might be a good idea. Just make sure that you pick matching resolutions for both the base pack and the tekkit patch. It will work with non-matching versions, but look a little weird.

 

5. Wait... mod patches?

Yes. Because this is Tekkit. We have 110 mods in there at the moment, most of which add blocks to the game. If you want a resource pack for all of that, fitting textures for each of those mods need to be patched into the base pack. Fortunately, in the case of Sphax almost everything has been patched by diligent contributors.

 

6. Then why can't I just download a complete Tekkit resource pack?

Because licenses. Sphax has decided to make the pack freely available to download and patch, but it may not be re-distributed in a patched state. There are reasons for this, and Sphax is of course entitled to make that decision. This means we can have a complete pack, but we need to assemble it ourselves.

 

7. Do I really need to gather 110 patches now?

Fortunately, no. Most of Tekkit is covered by about three dozen patches, which can be scraped together from Sphax forums. But recently, somebody has been so nice to pre-gather them for you and make a big Tekkit patch again, so you actually only have to download this one. It's for 1.2.9e, our latest recommended version, but it should work on 1.2.10 as well.

 

8. And how to assemble the pack?

The recommended way is not unpacking it, but using 7-Zip (or another archive packer that can work on-the-fly) to directly edit the archive. Make sure you have backup copies of both the base pack and the patch, then open both side by side in 7-Zip.

 

 

In the example, we have the base pack archive top, and the patch archive bottom. Now simply select all contents of the patch archive and drag&drop them into the base pack. Too easy, ain't it?

 

 

7-Zip will immediately get to work...

 

 

...and then ask if you really want to proceed editing the archive.

 

 

Yes, you do want that.

And that's it. Instant patched pack. Just close the files and you're done making it.

You still need to get it in place. If you know where Tekkit keeps the resource packs, just drop it there. Otherwise, go through the game:

 

 

 

 

Following this, you should get a file browser opened at the location where Tekkit needs the pack to be. Drop it right in there. Maybe you will still need to close and re-open the game after doing that.

 

 

The pack should show up on the list. Click on it, then WAIT. The game needs to load and verify all the contents, which can take 10+ seconds even on a fast machine because this pack is rather massive. Just let it sit for a while, until...

 

 

...the interface changes. If it looks like this, you're done. Other packs will look different here, or not even re-skin the menu. You can load your world or join a server now and see if it works.

 

Have fun with the new look.

Edited August 26, 2014 by Curunir

[revfisk]

This is really awesome. I've got it all working and it looks great. One thing I still can't figure out though: the new tekkit only allows for one resource pack, but BDcraft sound comes as as separate pack. Is there a way to combine the two? 

 

Thanks in advance!

[Curunir]

I have not tried any sound pack yet. Since Minecraft 1.6, the game got the ability to add 3rd-party sounds via resource packs (hence also the rename to "resource packs", formerly just "texture packs"), and I assume that you just need to drop the files into the pack using the same method described above. No guarantees, though.

Edited November 4, 2014 by Curunir

[revfisk]

Yeah. That's what I tried, but I can't quite tell if it worked. I'm new to the game. 

 

What's interesting/(that I don't understand,) is if I load vanilla minecraft via the technic loader, I can then select multiple resource packs from the menu. But then with the tekkit (which looks amazing even to a noob), it only allows for one to be selected at a time. Is there some difference in versions of minecraft being used by the various technic packages? (sorry that my terms are probably very untechnical).

[revfisk]

Another noob question:

 

If I do the drag and drop as described above, won't the mcmeta file from the sound package replace the other mcmeta file and so stop the textures/etc from working? 

[revfisk]

Reading this now: '?do=embed' frameborder='0' data-embedContent>>

[Kalbintion]

Yeah. That's what I tried, but I can't quite tell if it worked. I'm new to the game. 

 

What's interesting/(that I don't understand,) is if I load vanilla minecraft via the technic loader, I can then select multiple resource packs from the menu. But then with the tekkit (which looks amazing even to a noob), it only allows for one to be selected at a time. Is there some difference in versions of minecraft being used by the various technic packages? (sorry that my terms are probably very untechnical).

 

1.6.4 only permitted for 1 resource pack to be selected and was the major start to using this name over texture packs, it wasnt until 1.7 where multiple resource packs were allowed.

[Curunir]

Another noob question:

 

If I do the drag and drop as described above, won't the mcmeta file from the sound package replace the other mcmeta file and so stop the textures/etc from working? 

You will have to try, or leave the file out.

 

As for multiple packs: As Kalbintion said, newer Minecraft versions tend to have more options. Observe that while Tekkit is still a 1.6.4 pack, starting vanilla Minecraft will take you to a newer version of the base game. Modpacks are slow to follow those updates, because of the immense amount of migration work that needs to be done each time. The next Tekkit version will probably be based on 1.7.10, but nothing has been officially announced yet.

Edited November 5, 2014 by Curunir