3rd Party Modpack Guidelines

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Watchful11

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A 3rd party modpack is a modpack distributed through the FTB launcher that is not maintained by the FTB team.

There are three types of 3rd party modpacks:
  • Private Packs:
These are packs used only on one specific server. Their intention is to allow servers to customize their server experience without compromising the ease of installation offered by the FTB launcher. These modpacks must only be accessible behind a application process of some form. The code may not be posted publicly.​
  • Unlisted Public Packs:
These are public modpacks intended to be used by the general populace, but they are still behind a code. They can also be intended for a specific server where there is no application process. The code may be posted publicly.​
  • Listed Public Packs:
These are public modpacks that have been approved by the FTB team for being well built, unique and popular. They are available by default on the launcher without a code.
The 3rd party team regularly reviews the Public Packs forum section for modpacks we like. We will then approach the author about listing their pack. You cannot submit a pack as a listed pack. Here are the base requirements we are looking for.
- The pack must already be on the FTB launcher with public permissions.
- The pack must be substantially different from all other official and 3rd party listed packs on the launcher for 1.7.
- The pack must be well supported. You need at to at least have a thread in the Public Packs section and be available to answer and fix bug reports.

Submitting your pack:
Submit your 3rd Party Modpack by filling out this form. Once you submit your pack you will be directed to a private forum thread where a 3rd party team member will respond with infomation about your submission within 72 hours.

Most of the fields are self-explanatory, but here are specific instructions for the Link field and the permissions section.
The link is the pack itself. It must be hosted on dropbox.com, mediafire.com, onedrive.live.com or drive.google.com. A direct link, one that returns the zip without any additional clicking, is acceptable as well, though we reserve the right to refuse to accept a specific host at our descretion.
The zip should only consist of the files necessary to pack, minus Forge. In most cases this will only be the minecraft folder with the mods and configs folders inside. You may also include 42x42 pixel and a 420x200 pixel png images. Each must be under 150kb in size. If the images are not submitted, defaults will be used. Here is an example.

Here is the permissions website for reference. As mentioned at the top of this document, there is a difference between public and private packs. Refer to either the public policy or the private policy columns depending on the type of pack you are submitting.
  • If a mod is on the site and is listed as "Open" or "FTB", you don't have to do anything with it.
  • If a mod is on the site, but is listed as "Notify" or "Request", write a line in the "Non-open site mods" field with the name of the mod and a link to an image hosted on Imgur of you notifying the author or the author giving you permission.
  • If a mod is not on the site, write a line in the "Other mods" field with the following.
    • Name of the mod
    • Author of the mod
    • A link to the mod page
    • If the license for the mod is not at the previous link, a link to the license
    • If the license does not give permission, a link to an image hosted on Imgur of the author giving permission.
We anticipate that more than 95% of mods will be listed as "Open" on the spreadsheet and will not require any effort on your part.
If you are including fastcraft in your pack, add the following line or something similar in your pack description.

This pack contains <a color="aqua" href="http://forum.industrial-craft.net/index.php?page=Thread&threadID=10820">Fastcraft</a>, by Player, enabled by default. Fastcraft enhances Minecraft with increased performance. Bug reports being made directly to Mod Authors should state Fastcraft is enabled.

We have decided to require notifying Player of inclusion in modpacks. Hence you will need to post a screenshot of the notification.
These are a number of finer details that are not necessary for submitting a pack, but may be helpful for pack authors who wish to have more control.

Server link: This is a link to a zip of server files for the pack. They will be available through the launcher similar to the official FTB pack server files. This is only for public packs. Due to the ongoing legal problems with bukkit, cauldron server files are not permitted. The server files are uploaded as is. We recommend taking the server files from one of the official packs and inserting your own mods and configs folders.

Description: The description is a string of arbitrary length. It is displayed with html, so you can use any html tags to format it. If no html tags are in your description, we will insert <br> in place of new lines so they display properly.

pack version: Only numbers and .'s may be used. We suggest Semantic versioning, for example X.Y.Z, the submitter can increase the X, Y or Z when updates are submitted. If you don't specify a version, the pack will start at version 1.0.0 and increment each time you submit an update.

Pack code: The modpack code can only consist of lowercase and uppercase letters as well as numbers.

Minecraft version: Minecraft versions 1.6.4, 1.7.2, 1.7.10 and 1.8 are supported. If you don't give the minecraft version, we'll make a reasonable guess.

Forge Version: If you don't specify this, the current recommended version for the minecraft version of your pack will be used. This can change week to week and may break your pack if you do not specify.

Author: If you don't specify this, the forum username of the submitter will be used.

Pack Images: Pack images are optional. They must be of the dimensions specified and must be png's. If either image is over 150kb, it will be compressed. They are used as so. They should be named packname-icon.png and packname-splash.png.

Zip Name: The zip file should be named following this convention. Packname-Packversion.zip

Permissions Checking: @Zlepper has made a helpful tool for checking permissions and compiling packs for submission. You can find it here
In partnership with Curse, we offer the ability to sync your modpack from the FTB launcher to the Curse Client.

To opt in to this program, first create a curseforge modpack project using this form. You will need to fill in all the fields, including uploading a square image at least 400x400 pixels. Reply to your modpack thread with a your curseforge project ID. This can be found on your project page as in this image. We will respond once the pack has been added to the system. It may take up to a few hours for your pack to convert the first time, especially if you have a lot of old versions. Future updates should only take 15-20 minutes.

What will be synced:
  • All existing modpack versions
  • All future modpack versions
  • The current recommended version on the launcher will be marked recommended on the client

What will not be synced:
  • Images
  • Author
  • Description
  • Mod list in the description (unsupported by curse)
  • Server files (unsupported by curse)

If you already have your modpack on the client, you can still use the existing project ID. Old curseforge versions will be overwritten by old FTB launcher versions. Versions added on the curse side will not sync back to the FTB side.

You must have a public modpack, listed or unlisted, to be eligible. Private modpacks are not currently allowed. In standing with our no profit policy, you may not turn on curse reward points for your project if it goes through this system.

Since this system goes through the normal FTB permission checks, it bypasses the curse permission checks, allowing you to use any mods you can get permission for.

Updating your pack:
Reply to your thread, which can be found here once you have submitted the pack, with a link to the complete new zip. The images should not be included unless they have changed. You can change your pack code at infrequent intervals, but the old code will remain available. However, only the new code will update.

You cannot update only the server, forge version, images, description or any other pack details. These must be updated with a full pack update.

Give in your message any updated details about the pack, new description, any new permissions, new forge version, etc.

A 3rd party team member will update your pack within 72 hours and respond once they have done so.

If you have a team and want multiple people to be able to submit updates, have each of them fill this form.

We use four tags on the private pack threads to indicate upload status.
  • Awaiting Approval: This indicates that your pack is not on the launcher and a team member has not checked it yet.
  • Denied: This indicates you are missing permission on your initial submission. Simply provide the requested permissions in the same thread to proceed.
  • Approved: Your pack has been approved and is now on the launcher.
  • Upload Waiting: Your pack is on the launcher, but has a new upload waiting.
Awaiting Approval and Denied are only used on an initial pack submission. A pack update with missing perms is moved back to the Approved tag.

Tags are set by the team and are an indication that we know you have something waiting and we will get to it as soon as possible.

Do not bump update threads. We work from the oldest unanswered thread to the newest, so bumping your thread will only result in taking longer for us to address it.

If there are delays or an important problem has been found with the system, we will post an update here.

**Donations to cover running costs are acceptable, however, profit generation from modpacks is strictly prohibited**

This is an extensive video by @tfox83 covering the pack submission and update process.
In chapter 3 tfox talks about update submission deadlines. We have decided to do away with those deadlines. Most of the time your update will go up the same day or next.
 
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Watchful11

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Changed the name of private public packs to just public packs. Should have done that originally.
 

Watchful11

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Big guidelines update. This is now the only thread, the others have been condensed into it.
 
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Watchful11

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Added paragraph on how to update your pack, forgot it in the first revision.

Added a note on how to submit server files.

Added a video by tfox showing how to set up your mod pack. More coming soon.
 

Watchful11

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Minor format changes.

Added the explicit stipulation that you cannot profit off packs. While it may be possible to only use mods where the author does not care about profit, the majority of them do. I have decided to not attempt to differentiate between them.

Images should no longer be included in pack updates unless you are changing them.
 
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Watchful11

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1.7 now supported. Added a link to tfox's thread with permissions from official packs for people to copy.
 

Watchful11

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Readded that upload days are Thursday and Friday.
 

Watchful11

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A number of small changes. I have set up a github repo to track stuff now. You can find it here.
 
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