Can Creature-type Mods be Made to Play as? *Edited to have Questions*

[FrontierHero]

So my friend is trying to decide whether they should make a mod character for themselves in DST or not; the art is no problem (they're a great artist), but the hard part is that they have several mod ideas to make, and one of them (the most desired one) is to make a modded character that will not look human/humanoid, and does not act like a human. 

They want to make a modded character of their OC, and their OC is a horse. They would rather not make an anthro horse, and they would like to have it look like a regular equine. (walks on all four legs and all that). They're also thinking about making grass a food item, and having the character be able to be ridden by another player, like a beefalo (you know, with them being a horse and all). It just would not require a saddle; the saddle would probably only give a slight speed boost or something.

I seriously doubt this mod could be made the way one would normally go about making a mod, as the mod's coding probably would not have front arms function like back ones, the file sizes would not be big enough to allow a horse body, and it would just all around require new coding.

But, I have heard that there is a mod out there that allows players to play as creatures, such as rabbits and hounds...is this true? I have not been able to find it. If this is true, would it be possible to install this mod, and create the horse as a creature instead, modeled after a beefalo or a volt goat? and if so, are both of these mods Client Mods? 

If this would work, I will edit this thread to contain more questions, but if not, I will not post any further questions about this, as it would be pointless.

It is also ok if this would not work, as my friend has other mod ideas they could use instead. This one is just the one that they would like to do most.

thank you for reading, and posting any help if you can! I know this is a tremendous thing to work around, so any advice is seriously greatly appreciated

EDIT: I HAVE FOUND OUT THIS IS POSSIBLE TO DO, SO HERE ARE THE QUESTIONS MY FRIEND HAS FOR THIS

1. Where can the Volt Goat image files be found to work off of?

I assumed you could find the goat's image files in program files (x86)/steam/steamapps/common/Don't Starve Together/data, but I looked around, and found no such thing. I looked other places as well, but I am not able to find anything like this; I have found files named 'lightning_goat', but no 'volt_goat', and even when I opened up those files, no image files were inside. Is this the way to find the files or am I doing it wrong? (or would it just be easier to download a similar custom creature mod off of Steam Workshop and work off that?) 

2. how to make grass a food item?

my friend want to have this, and I'm pretty sure this is what you would put in something like this into modmain.lua.

I found this in another thread, where someone wanted to make nightmare fuel a food item, but I do not know what I would need to change (like this is FOODTYPE.SHADOW...would grass be FOODTYPE.GRASS? It would probably work like flowers would, but I do not know what foodtype a flower is.

local FOODTYPE = GLOBAL.FOODTYPE
FOODTYPE.SHADOW = "SHADOW"

AddComponentPostInit("eater", function(self)
    function self:SetCanEatShadows()
        table.insert(self.preferseating, FOODTYPE.SHADOW)
        table.insert(self.caneat, FOODTYPE.SHADOW)
        self.inst:AddTag(FOODTYPE.SHADOW.."_eater")
    end
end)

AddPrefabPostInit("nightmarefuel", function(inst)
    if not GLOBAL.TheWorld.ismastersim then
        return inst
    end
    inst:AddComponent("edible")
    inst.components.edible.foodtype = FOODTYPE.SHADOW
    inst.components.edible.healthvalue = 5--CHANGE THESE 3 VALUES TO ANYTHING YOU WANT
    inst.components.edible.hungervalue = 10
    inst.components.edible.sanityvalue = 15
end)

3. can I make my own saddle?

My friend want to be able to make a custom saddle for two reasons:

1. they want an easier crafting method

2. the saddle made for beefalos are bigger than they should probably be for a horse model, and will most definitely be floating above the back if put on, as the horse model will not be as big as a beefalo.

I am only wondering if making a new saddle will require editing the original saddle's files, and if the crafting items needed can be edited within the item's files. 

Edited February 20, 2017 by FrontierHero
I've found out this is possible to do, so I've added questions

[Lumina]

http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=622471256

This mod allows you to play as creature of DST universe. There are others variants with others monsters.

 

7 hours ago, FrontierHero said:

and if so, are both of these mods Client Mods? 

A mod adding a character can't be client side only. A mod adding custom item can't be client side only. I don't see a way to make this kind of mod client side only.

I also don't see why a mod must be client side only.

 

Also, i don't think you could use beefalo as a template for a horse. Reindeer of volt goat will be better, even if a little skinny, because they have 4 real legs. Beefalo have a massive body and 4 feets.

[FrontierHero]

5 hours ago, Lumina said:

A mod adding a character can't be client side only. A mod adding custom item can't be client side only. I don't see a way to make this kind of mod client side only.

I also don't see why a mod must be client side only.

I am probably wrong, but I assumed that client mods were mods that don't require other people to manually download it to be able to see it, as long as they have the auto-download feature turned on. I was just wondering if these would be considered client mods to make it easier, assuming they were downloaded automatically like that. 

But thank you very much for the link! I really appreciate the help, and now that I know this is actually achievable, I will get to work helping them with the mod if they need it. I'll edit this post with some questions soon. I'm grateful for people like you helping me out; it's sch a generous community!

[Lumina]

3 hours ago, FrontierHero said:

I am probably wrong, but I assumed that client mods were mods that don't require other people to manually download it to be able to see it, as long as they have the auto-download feature turned on.

Sorry i misunderstood what you were asking.

You have 3 kind of mod. Client only, server only, and all client require mod (if i don't forget one). Your mod should be "all client require mode", and yes, it should be auto-dowloaded if the server has this mod enabled and if the player has the feature enabled, as long as your mod is in the workshop.

 

I hope this time i answered the right question.

 

[FrontierHero]

oh, that's very helpful, thank you! I was a little shaky with the mod type before, thank you for explaining that, it really helped!

2 hours ago, Lumina said:

I hope this time i answered the right question.

You say 'this time' like you haven't been helpful yet; you've really helped a lot! I just didn't explain my question very well lol. thank you for your help!