Consolidating your files in the standard directories

The most recent updates have employed an installer, and this in turn forced me to consider using standard directories for NPC Engineer. You can, of course, change from these standards to any other directory, including your desktop should you wish. However if you want to use the standard directories to simplify working with the various modules of NPC Engineer as they get written, this article will help you centralise everything.

Firstly, the default directories:

Installation directory
   C:\Program Files (x86)\NPC Engineer (you are unlikely to need this)

NPC Engineer data directory

   C:\Users\xxxxxxx\AppData\Roaming\NPC Engineer
Saved Project files

   C:\Users\xxxxxxx\AppData\Roaming\NPC Engineer\Saved Project Files
Saved NPC files

   C:\Users\xxxxxxx\AppData\Roaming\NPC Engineer\Saved NPC Files

All of these directories are available within NPC Engineer's 'Explorer' menu to save you having to remember or type them.

It should be noted that 'xxxxxxx' is your logon name for Windows, and that the directory structure might look slightly different depending on Windows version. NPC Engineer knows where everything is, though, and using the links in the Explorer menu will be the easiest way to get to where you want to go. From here on in, I will refer to the root of these as {appdata} (so {appdata}/NPC Engineer for example).

You can change the main NPC Engineer data directory and the Saved NPC files directory in the 'settings' dialogue, as shown to the right.

The default is also to rename then copy image and token files to your NPC directory so that all the pertinent files for the NPC are kept together.

If you want to move NPC files to a new directory, set the directory here first. Exit NPC Engineer. Copy the files to the new directory rather than move them, then re-open NPC Engineer.

Once you have done this it should be safe to go back and delete the original folder of NPCs to tidy up your hard drive.

Use the same method to consolidate your NPC Engineer.ini and json files - copy them from your old installation directory to your {appdata}\NPC Engineer directory. Once you have pointed to the new directory in NPC Engineer you can delete the originals.


Moving projects into the 'Saved Projects Files' directory is a little more fragile. It follows the same method, though.

Firstly, copy the whole project directory to {appdata}\NPC Engineer\Saved Project Files\.
Next, copy the project's .ini file to {appdata\NPC Engineer\.
Now open NPC Engineer and open the project management window:

Change the path for your module to where you want it to be ({appdata}\NPC Engineer\Saved Project Files\).

Do this for each project. You should be safe to delete the original folders at this point. If NPC Engineer fails to launch, put the files back and contact me on Discord.

Maasq