I realize the subject is a bit more technical than is ordinarily discussed on these forums, but I searched numerous warcraft 3 mapmaking sites and wasn't able to find any information on this that was written after Frozen Throne came out.

I'm looking to create a new sound set for my campaign (unit sound set, meaning the set of sounds the unit uses when selected and given orders). Because of the size of my campaign, I can't replace any "unused" sounds because there won't be any unused. Even if there is a map that doesn't use one of the unit sound sets, another map in the campaign will, and if the user loads that map after loading the one with the replaced sound without quitting the game first, the replaced sound will play in the new map, which is a problem.

I also can't simulate unit sound sets with triggers because then the unit portrait wouldn't play a talk animation. Using a transmission would overwrite other unit portrait events such as clicking a new unit before the first one is done talking.

I read about attaching sounds to the models, but unless I misunderstood, that will only work for death, walk, and combat sounds, not unit speech.

I thought the solution might lie in editing "unitacksounds.slk" and importing with the import manager, overwriting the original file, but that only seems to be the file that specifies the sounds within each sound set, not the file that defines them.

I'd appreciate any indication anybody can give that this is even possible, even if you aren't sure how it's done.

[edit: spelling]

So realizing the chances of getting any response are slim, I also posted the thread here:
http://www.wc3c.net/showthread.php?p=1128745#post1128745
Read if interested. The response I got there from a member who I judge to be very knowledgeable says it is not possible to do.

I know how much people love correcting wrong answers more than they like answering questions, so if anybody knows that this is in fact possible, please let me know. :-)

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Q u o t e:
I thought the solution might lie in editing "unitacksounds.slk" and importing with the import manager, overwriting the original file, but that only seems to be the file that specifies the sounds within each sound set, not the file that defines them.

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Why do you think so? I believe the soundsets themselves are defined there too since it just makes sence and the file contains more fields than the assigned sounds, so more data is added to the set than just the sounds. Also the soundset label searched for when clicking a unit could be auto-generated, it's always <generalSoundSetOfUnit>+Pissed.

However, I was not able to overshadow the slk file yet, so even replacing sounds of existing sets did not work.

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Q u o t e:

Why do you think so? I believe the soundsets themselves are defined there too since it just makes sence and the file contains more fields than the assigned sounds, so more data is added to the set than just the sounds. Also the soundset label searched for when clicking a unit could be auto-generated, it's always <generalSoundSetOfUnit>+Pissed.

However, I was not able to overshadow the slk file yet, so even replacing sounds of existing sets did not work.

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You may be right. I was guessing mostly. My reasoning was, take the unit, Stormreaver Hermit. Its soundset is "ShamanX" (same as the Shaman but without quotes referring to the Horde and being a shaman). "ShamanX" doesn't appear anywhere in the file, but ShamanXWhat, ShamanXPissed, ShamanXYesAttack, ShamanXYes, ShamanXReady, and ShamanXWarcry do. However, nowhere in War3patch.mpq was I able to find the text "ShamanX" outside of UnitAckSounds.slk, and the sound set must be defined within that directory since otherwise the new neutral hero units wouldn't have sound sets. So I suppose it makes more sense to assume that the World Editor generates the names of the sound sets by looking in UnitAckSounds.slk and chopping off the end of the SoundName fields.

I too have been unable to figure a way to import the .slk file though. I tried importing this one, and tried importing multiple .slks that seemed to be inter-related with it, but was only able to get the game to do nothing, or crash. It may be the case that .slk's can't be replaced in that manner.

I remember way back in the day, Brett Wood mentioned he would like to add a feature to modify and add sound sets to the World Editor, and that's probably why the sound-editing capabilities of the SC2 Galaxy Editor are so great. Since there's a new custom map virus threat out (see this thread: http://forums.battle.net/thread.html?topicId=27796209364&postId=277930680220&sid=3000#6 ) we can expect another War3 patch in the future, and I'd love to see a soundset editor added (after all, Blizzard added hashtables, which I still don't understand, within the last year or two).

In the interim, I decided there are in fact units that I won't be using in any of my campaign missions, (about exactly as many as I needed to replace sounds for actually), so I was able to make the new sounds the old-fashioned way. I'd still like a "cleaner" method of doing it though, one that doesn't involve making other sounds unusable in case I decide to expand my campaign to include those units.

I have an update of sorts to my understanding of UnitAckSounds.slk. I noticed the other day, that the Pig Farm has no sound effect when clicked, but also fails to make a clicking sound effect. I looked it up in the Object Editor and saw it used the PigFarm Soundset, so I looked that one up in UnitAckSounds.slk. According to the .slk, the Pig Farm should have been using the sound "Buildings\Orc\PigFarm\PigFarmWhat1.wav". Interestingly, there is no such sound in the game, but creating a new sound and importing it to that filename and path, I was able to get a building using the PigFarm soundset to make a new sound without overriding any old sounds!

This has limited applications though, because surely there can't be many Soundsets that are already defined but have no associated sound files. I considered looking up Medivh, who uses the "Medivh" soundset and yet has no sounds when clicked or ordered, but when I looked for that soundset in UnitAckSounds.slk, I found that there were no entries there. The term"Medivh" never appears in the file (so if the name doesn't appear in the file, the soundsets must be defined somewhere else, and this file only lists the sounds within each pre-defined soundset).

I wonder, just how many soundsets in UnitAckSounds have files specified that don't exist in the game though? Surely the Pig Farm isn't alone.

I got curious. This list may not be exhaustive, but these are the files I found that are referenced but don't exist:

=====================

Buildings\Orc\OrcLumbermill\OrcLumberMill.wav (OrcLumberMill)
Buildings\Orc\PigFarm\PigFarmWhat1.wav (PigFarm)
Buildings\Other\DraeneiHut0\DraeneiHutWhat1.wav (DraeneiHut)
Buildings\Other\SacrificialAltar\SacrificialAltarWhat1.wav (SacrificialAltar)

HeroRanger
Units\Human\HeroRanger\HeroRangerWhat1.wav
Units\Human\HeroRanger\HeroRangerWhat2.wav
Units\Human\HeroRanger\HeroRangerWhat3.wav
Units\Human\HeroRanger\HeroRangerWhat4.wav
Units\Human\HeroRanger\HeroRangerWhat5.wav
Units\Human\HeroRanger\HeroRangerPissed1.wav
Units\Human\HeroRanger\HeroRangerPissed2.wav
Units\Human\HeroRanger\HeroRangerPissed3.wav
Units\Human\HeroRanger\HeroRangerPissed4.wav
Units\Human\HeroRanger\HeroRangerPissed5.wav
Units\Human\HeroRanger\HeroRangerPissed6.wav
Units\Human\HeroRanger\HeroRangerYesAttack1.wav
Units\Human\HeroRanger\HeroRangerYesAttack2.wav
Units\Human\HeroRanger\HeroRangerYesAttack3.wav
Units\Human\HeroRanger\HeroRangerYes1.wav
Units\Human\HeroRanger\HeroRangerYes2.wav
Units\Human\HeroRanger\HeroRangerYes3.wav
Units\Human\HeroRanger\HeroRangerYes4.wav
Units\Human\HeroRanger\HeroRangerYes5.wav
Units\Human\HeroRanger\HeroRangerYes6.wav
Units\Human\HeroRanger\HeroRangerReady1.wav
Units\Human\HeroRanger\HeroRangerWarcry1.wav

\Units\Creeps\HeroTinkerFactory\PocketFactoryWhat.wav
(Yes, it starts with "\Units" rather than "Units". Dunno what's up with that, and there's already "birth" and "launch" sounds for the pocket factory.)

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The following soundsets don't appear to be used by any units I can find, but do have associated sounds in the game:
BearDen (BarrowDen is a different sound set)
GargoyleSpire
MaievLater (the only difference from Maiev is that the "Illidan is out there somewhere" quote is removed).

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Other oddities I've noticed:

"Bristleback" and "RazorMane" appear to be identical.

"ForestTroll" and "ForestTrollShadowPriest" appear to be identical.

"Gnoll" and "GnollKing" appear to be identical.

"HeroMountainKing" and "HeroAvatarMountainKing" appear to be identical.

"Proudmoore" is identical to "HeroPaladin" except that it skips over the first 3 pissed quotes and removes a what and yesattack quote to use them as ready and warcry quotes. It seems like a very strange way to go about changing up his soundset for a unit the player never controls anyway.

"SludgeMonster" is identical to "WaterElemental" except that SludgeMonster has a what sound double as a ready sound, while WaterElemental has no ready sound.

"Assassin" and "Watcher" both borrow a small number of sounds from "Archer."

"IceTroll" and "IceTrollShadowPriest" appear to be identical with the exception that "IceTrollShadowPriest" has a 5th "pissed" quote that "IceTroll" doesn't. There is no file for this pissed quote, so clicking the unit to the point of pissing him off 5 times results in a "blank" click that the IceTroll doesn't suffer from. Of course you could use this as an opportunity to add a new sound.

DoomGuard uses (a small portion of) Wendigo sounds instead of having its own sounds. Zombie uses different sounds, also from the Wendigo sounds.

"ChaosGrunt" appears to have reduced the number of sounds used from "Grunt" with no apparent reason as to why or which sounds got axed. It has no pissed or warcry sounds.

"KotoBeast" is the same as "KotoBeastNoRider" except that the riderless version omits the pissed quote "Here comes the beast again" (the only quote where the rider speaks).

"ShamanX" is identical to "Shaman" but removes all references to "warchief", "the horde" and for some reason, rain. Other references to thunder and lightning remain.

"Nerubian" is the same as "CryptFiend", but it uses the first 3 what sounds as its ready sound. This is the only, or one of the few soundsets with multiple ready sounds. It lacks pissed and warcry sounds.

"Revenant" uses a fraction of "Gargoyle" the sounds, and has a gargoyle what sound as its ready sound.

"Skeleton" appears identical to "SkeletonArcher". They both use what sounds as their ready sounds.

"BloodElfWorker" and "BloodElfEngineer" are the same, but BloodElfWorker has no quotes refering to being an engineer specifically.

"OgreOneHead" is the same as "Ogre" but of couse using only quotes from one of the two heads.

There is a soundset for "SheepRandomSounds". Not sure what's up with that, but it does use the regular sheep sounds.

Draenei Chieftain's Hut doesn't use the "DraeneiChieftainHut" soundset o_O

"HighElfSwordsMan" and "Priest" are identical except that the Swordsman removes all references to magic, leaving all the references to the Light.
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"Medivh" does not appear in the .slk file because it is not a valid soundset! You cannot set a unit to the Medivh soundset, and when you modify Medivh's soundset, you see that it defaults to NONE rather than Medivh which it starts as. The same goes for the following Soundsets (may not be a complete list):
Medivh
HumanMage
GrainWarehouse
HealingWard
SentryWard
StasisTotem
FountainOfLifeDefiled
FountainOfLifeBlood
PlagueCloud
BookOfSummoning
DemonGate
Frostmourne
GranaryInfected
Warlock
owl
HornOfCenarius
GoblinLandMine
CentaurTent
ForestTrollHut0
ForestTrollHut1
FurbolgHut
GnollHut
HarpyNest
IceTrollHut0
IceTrollHut1
MurlocHut0
MurlocHut1
NerubianZiggurat
TaurenTent
TaurenTent2
Tent
ChaosSpaceOrc
Zergling :-(
CircleOfPower
CityBuilding0
CityBuilding1
CityBuildinga
CityBuildingb
CityBuildingc
CityBuildingd
CityBuildinge
CityBuildingf
CityBuilding2
CityBuilding3
CityBuilding4
CityBuilding5
CityBuilding6
CityBuilding7
CityBuilding8
CityBuilding9



I did this mainly out of curiosity, but it seams that the HeroRanger is the way to go for creating a complete new soundset. Unfortunately it only works for one soundset. If you're looking for a building, Sacrificial Altar, Pig Farm, Draenei Hut, and OrcLumberMill are available.