sacred_k/docs/art-tooltip.md

What improves an art (mods/arttooltip.cpp)

Request of 2026-10-18: "edit ALL skill tooltips, to show which attributes and abilities improve them in which way".

Follow-ups the same day: arts as objects carrying their effects, name and tooltip, no art-id checks in code; a dense block, one line per Fertigkeit or attribute ("Stärke -> Schaden +12%"); only skills and attributes that act on the art; unlearned skills (of the hero's class) with 0% and greyed out; lines sorted by impact. Then: only "Regenerationszeit" (faster regeneration rates are shown as the time they save), no attribute flavor texts; one line per effect (an attribute with two effects gets two lines, each sorted by its own size); a wider tooltip so the lines don't wrap.

Design

• game::Art (game/engine/art.{h,cpp}): built on demand by FindArt(id) from the game's definitions (name text SpellDef / CombatMoveDef +4, launch type, spell or weapon damage values, regeneration group). Improvements(creature) gives every (skill or attribute, stat, percent) acting on the art for that hero; Tooltip = the game's text, the mods' filters (AddTooltipFilter, e.g. Blitzschlag's values), then the block.
• Art ids appear only in data: the game's per-skill art lists and three exceptions (Energieblitze regenerates as magic; 0x3fa and 0x38 take weapon damage factors), both in art.cpp.
• Weapon skills count only with their weapon in hand (the game's checks 0x54a3e0 / 0x54a220 / 0x54a2f0 / 0x54a2e0 / 0x54a110, weapon class); only the skills of the weapon in hand are listed. Their second curve (SP) is the attack speed (+0x3c; the skill text labels it with text 0x44c, the same "speed" text the magic schools use for +0x3e).
• mods/arttooltip.cpp hooks ArtTooltip and hands the text to the art.
• Width: tooltips with flag 0x80 wrap in cUI_Tooltip::FormatText (0x6e6630): the first space after 45 characters of a line becomes a line break (cmp ecx, 5Ah on the line's bytes at 0x6e687d); the layout (0x6e7730) then sizes the window to the longest line + 8. Colour codes (\cAARRGGBB, 10 characters) counted there; the mod replaces the check so they don't, and texts containing "Verbessert durch:" wrap after 56.

Sources

Texts: scripts/us/global.res holds the German texts (despite the folder): "SZ", then 16-byte entries {key hash, offset, 0, length}, the UTF-16 text at offset + 4. Skill names are game text 0x24b7 + skill id (character panel 0x6abc8d); attribute names UI_ATTRIB_STRENGTH, _RESISTANCE, _GESCHICK, _PHYREG, _MAGREG, _CHARISMA.

Skill ids (0x565f30's switch, names in file order): 1 Himmelsmagie, 2 Waffenkunde, 3 Stangenwaffen, 4 Schwertkunde, 5 Axtkampf, 6 Zwei-Waffen-Kampf, 7 Fernkampf, 8 Wendigkeit, 9 Parade, 0xa Konstitution, 0xb Rüstung, 0xc Meditation, 0xd Klingenkampf, 0xe Magiekunde, 0xf Feuermagie, 0x10 Wassermagie, 0x11 Erdmagie, 0x12 Luftmagie, 0x13 Mondmagie, 0x14 Vampirismus, 0x15 Handel, 0x16 Reiten, 0x17 Entwaffnung, 0x18 Faustkampf, 0x19 Konzentration, 0x1a Ballistik, 0x1b Fallenkunst, 0x1c Blutrausch, 0x1d Waffentechnik, 0x1e Zweihandwaffen, 0x1f Zwergenkunde, 0x20 Höllenmacht, 0x21 Schmiedekunst.

Balance values (globals 0xad2400.., parsed as key=value around 0x5eb4xx; no Balance.txt ships, so the defaults stand). Skill curves are 12-byte {start <k>off, half <k>_s, limit <k>_w} at 0xad2450 + 12 n: WK Waffenkunde, MK Magiekunde, FK/SK/AK/KK/STK/BK/FEK weapon skills (AW / SP), HM/FM/EM/WM/LM/MM schools, BA, BL, KO Konzentration, Med Meditation, W, HR, HP, P, R (resistances), then the price tables; HOM 0xad368c, WT 0xad3698. Value(level) = 0 below 1, else start + 2 (limit − start)(1 − 1/((level − 1)/half + 1)) percent (DiminishingCurve 0x565c30).

How the game applies them

cCreatureArts::Recalculate (0x579560), then ApplySkill (0x565f30) per skill row with level = bought + item levels:

• Attributes (+0x10 u16[6]) = invested (+0x1c) + base (+0x4a) + base × (level − 1) / 10, plus items. Hero level +0x56.
• Damage factors, 4 types (physical, fire, magic, poison): weapon / combat arts +0x96 + +0xa6, spells +0x96 + +0xb6 (ArtTooltip multiplies spell values by these; arts 0x3fa and 0x38 by the combat ones). +0x96 = 1 + items. Attribute shares with F = (156 − BalStatOff) × level / 156
  • BalStatOff + 9 and invested points p, base b, item points q:
  • +0xa6 physical: (b F/10 + p + q) of Stärke, or Geschick when HoldsRangedWeapon (0x54a110), / BalCharPD
  • +0xaa fire: (2 p + b F/10 + q) of Stärke and Geschick / BalCharFD
  • +0xae magic: (b F/10 + p + q) of Mentale Regeneration / BalCharMD
  • +0xb2 poison: (2 p + b F/10 + q) of Widerstand and Charisma / BalCharGD
  • +0xb6..+0xc2 spells: (b F/10 + p) of Mentale Regeneration / BalCharMD
  • Waffenkunde adds its % to +0xa6..+0xb2, Magiekunde to +0xb6..+0xc2.
• Regeneration rates: +0xee magic = (1 + items + Meditation %) × (1 + Mentale Regeneration / 100), +0xf2 combat = (1 + items) × (1 + Physische Regeneration / 100). Creature type 8 (Zwerg) gets +0xee = +0xf2.
• Regeneration time: ApplySkillToArts (0x565c80) divides each listed art's cooldown total by 1 + value / 100. With the attack flag it also adds curve FEK..SP (0xad2504) to +0x3e while the art is the selected art slot. Lists (art ids) per skill:
  • Himmelsmagie (HM, attack): d f 11 12 13 14 15 16 3fb
  • Feuermagie (FM, attack): 5 b 17 18; Wassermagie (WM): 1b 4 22 23; Erdmagie (EM): 2 10 19 1a; Luftmagie (LM): 1 1c 1d 21; Mondmagie (MM): 3 7 24..2a
  • Vampirismus (KO): 3ff 401 403 405 40e..411 408 2b 406 407 409..40d
  • Konzentration (KO): 3e8..3fa 3fc 421..434 41e 3fe 400 402 404 412..416 443 446 444 449 44e 44a 44d 44b 44f 44c 436 437 438 43a 43b 43c 441
  • Ballistik (BA, attack) and Fallenkunst (KO): 417..41d
  • Blutrausch (BL, attack): 3fe 2b 408 406 407 409..40d
  • Waffentechnik (WT, attack) and Zwergenkunde (KO): 43f 43e 43d 37..3b
  • Höllenmacht (HOM): 3c..43
• The weapon skills (Stangenwaffen, Schwertkunde, Axtkampf, ...) raise the attack value (+0xe6, AW curve) and attack speed (+0x3c, SP curve) while their weapon is held; listed for weapon arts with that weapon in hand.
• The held weapon's damage per type (physical, fire, magic, poison) is at cCreatureArts +0x76 + 4 t (max) and +0x86 + 4 t (min); the damage range functions (0x563e90 .. 0x564160) multiply them by +0x96 + +0xa6 + 4 t. The attributes' damage lines are listed only for the types the weapon deals.

Measured 2026-10-18 (diag log): +0xa6..+0xb2 and +0xb6 equal the sums of the listed shares exactly (e.g. 5.422 = Waffenkunde 300.96% + Stärke 241.21%), Physische Regeneration matches +0xf2 / (1 + items).

Art definitions: ArtSpellDef (arts.h) as ArtTooltip finds the spell values (own SpellDef, or the one CombatMoveDef::LinkedSpell 0x4d1c50 names); damage values 4 × (base, per level) s16 at SpellDef +0x42.