Jagged Alliance 2 Modding Knowledge Base

A comprehensive, reverse-engineered reference guide for modern asset injection into the Jagged Alliance 2 1.13 engine. Built from the ground up during the production of the Fallout Total Conversion Mod.

Pipeline Overview

The JA2 v1.13 engine relies on a strict combination of hardcoded spatial dimension crops (.STI), rigidly constrained ASCII-shifted binary payloads (.EDT), and highly flexible array configurations (.XML). This site documents the math required to translate modern high-res assets into these engine vectors.

Core Systems Matrix

ETRLE Image Engine

Details on the 255-Indexed physical constraints, BigFace vs SmallFaces architectural limits, and the required 106x122 exact bounding box translations.

AIMBIOS.EDT Binary

Documentation of the ord(char) + 1 ASCII shift encryption array and the strict 1120-byte per-mercenary bio boundaries.

XML Profiles & Gear

Data mapping references for MercProfiles.xml and MercStartingGear.xml. Weapon integer tables, trait hooks, and behavioral modifiers.