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Your first change

Designer · 10 min · No code

Result: your party leader has a new name and portrait and starts at a higher level. You'll see it on the HUD and in the Party menu the moment you press Play.

Before you start

How a party member is put together

Each party member is two assets:

Asset Example Decides
Member definition Characters/VRoid/Kael/PartyMember_VRoid_L Name, portrait, battle role, and which pawn Blueprint to spawn
Pawn Blueprint named in the definition's Member Class Mesh, abilities, stats, starting level, the Arts they can learn

The definition is who the character is; the pawn Blueprint is the body they fight in. A reserve member has no body in the world at all, only a definition, which is why the name and portrait live there.

Steps

1. Find your leader

  1. In the Content Browser, open XenoCore Content › Characters › Party and double-click BP_XenoCore_Party. It is the party component: it holds the roster.
  2. Click Class Defaults in the toolbar. In the Details panel, under XenoCore › Party, look at Starting Roster. The members are fielded in this order until Max Active Members is reached; the rest start in reserve. Leader Slot says which of the active members you control, 0 being the first.
  3. In the sample, the roster is two VRoid characters, Kael (PartyMember_VRoid_L, the leader) and Mira (PartyMember_VRoid_K). The other five sample characters join later, recruited from NPCs on Gaur Plain. Click the Browse arrow (the magnifying glass) beside Kael's entry: the Content Browser jumps to Characters/VRoid/Kael/PartyMember_VRoid_L. Double-click it to open it.

2. Rename them and change their portrait

In the member definition, under XenoCore › Party:

  1. Set Display Name to a name of your own.
  2. Set Portrait to a different texture from Characters/Party/Portraits, for example T_XenoCore_Portrait_Orange. Portrait is the head-and-shoulders picture on the HUD and in most menus.
  3. Save.

The main menu uses a second picture

The main menu's character cards draw Menu Portrait, a full-body picture, from the same asset. Kael has one, so his main-menu card keeps showing him until you change Menu Portrait too, or clear it (an empty Menu Portrait falls back to Portrait).

3. Start them at a higher level

  1. In the same definition, find Member Class (under XenoCore › Party). Click the magnifying glass beside it to find the Blueprint it names (B_XenoCore_Party_VRoid_L for Kael) in the Content Browser, and double-click it.
  2. Click Class Defaults. In the Details panel, under XenoCore › Combatant, set Combatant Level to 20.
  3. Compile and Save.

Combatant Level is the level a character starts at. After that the progression system owns their level, and it is saved with the game. Every stat is read from a curve at that level, so HP, Strength, Ether and Agility all rise together.

Test it

  1. Open Maps/L_XenoCore_Gym and press Play.
  2. The leader's HUD plate shows the new name and portrait.
  3. Open the menu (pad Y, keyboard I) and go to the Party screen. The leader reads Lv 20, with higher HP and stats than before.

Starting from the title screen instead

Continue on the title screen loads your newest save, and a save remembers each character's level. A changed starting level shows up in a New Game, or in a map started directly with Play, as above.

If it doesn't work

The character never appears

Member Class is empty, or its pawn has no Combatant Pawn Data. The party cannot spawn that character. To check, right-click the member definition and choose Asset Actions › Validate Assets: the Message Log names the missing setting. Set both.

The old name or level still shows

You started from Continue on the title screen, which loads a save, or you edited a different character than the leader. Start from the gym as above, and check that the Starting Roster entry at Leader Slot is the definition you edited.

The level changed but the stats did not

The pawn's Stats Effect is empty. The character then runs on default stats, and an error naming the pawn is logged on every Play. Set it back to the stats effect it had.

Child or duplicate?

Every new thing you make starts from something XenoCore ships. Which way you start depends on what kind of asset it is:

You are making Do this Why
A Blueprint: a party member, enemy, weapon actor, Art ability, NPC, AI controller Right-click the base and choose Create Child Blueprint Class (for example from B_XenoCore_Party_VRoid_Base, B_XenoCore_Enemy_Base, B_XenoCore_Sword_Base, GA_XenoCore_Art_Base, GA_XenoCore_TalentArt_Base) The child keeps everything the base does, and picks up fixes when XenoCore updates. A duplicate is frozen at the day you copied it, and carries the sample's own settings with it.
A data asset or table row: an Art definition, drop table, quest, member definition, stats effect, curve row Right-click a sample and choose Duplicate, then change it These hold only numbers and references, so there is nothing to inherit.
An item definition: a weapon, armour piece or gem item Duplicate an item of the same kind. Never create one blank An item definition cannot have a Blueprint parent, and a blank one has no equipment settings, so it cannot be equipped.
A menu or HUD widget you want to restyle Duplicate the shipped widget into your own folder A child widget cannot change the layout it inherits; the duplicate keeps the same C++ parent, so its behaviour is unchanged.

Not sure which kind it is?

Open the asset. If the editor shows a Graph or Viewport tab, it is a Blueprint: make a child. If it opens straight to a Details panel or a table, it is data: duplicate it.

You now have

A character changed by you, and the two-asset shape every party member shares.

Next: Your first art