DirectSong/Tokens

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“

I've been asked a few times over the last six months about the "DirectSong tokens" and what they mean. These are seven letter tokens that tell DirectSong what is going on in the game, so it can find a playlist. I couldn't find any documentation on it except this text file from 2006. I did mild editing on it. I'm probably the person that wrote this summary in 2006, and as I look at it, I'm befuddled by what it means. If you have DirectSong installed, the information below might help you decode what it is trying to do (you can edit the GuildWars.ds file in a text editor, if you are brave). I wish I could be more help, but it was a long time ago, and back from the days when we compressed all knowledge into the smallest possible space for efficiency. (After all - no monthly fee but still internet and server costs to pay! Hence - very tight budgets for transferring data. In this case, the tokens fit into a single 32-bit integer, which meant some of the letters mapped to the same number!)

Good luck. I feel i'm posting more of a puzzle than actual answers. Also, this looks like it only had tokens through the Factions release.

— Stephen Clarke-Willson

DirectSong Tokens

4/27/2006

5/24/2018 (edits)

Copyright 2006, 2018 ArenaNet, LLC.

Overview

Each music call takes three tokens as arguments in addition to the name of the audio file.

These tokens are used by DirectSong to lookup alternative music to play. These are necessary because all filenames are stripped from gw.dat.

The general idea is that each token provides increasing 'specificity'. The first token is frequently 'ambient', followed by the realm name, and then a token that represents the specific piece of music.

Tokens

The following token is the ultimate default token. If nothing else triggers, then 'ambient' will trigger.

• ambient

The following tokens are used in Grenth's Footprint and Sorrow's Furnace to support the free Mini-Pak, which has been downloaded 95,000 times!

• bossbat
• dungbsa
• dungbsb
• dungbsc
• dungbsd
• dungbse
• dungbsi
• snowdaa
• snowdab
• snowdac
• snowoaa
• snowoab
• snowoai
• snowsaa
• snowsab
• snowsac

The following tokens are 'region' tokens, and usually go into slot 2.

Note: all tokens need to be seven characters long.

Note: 'aaa' and ' ' convert to the same thing, numerically, but for readability we always fill out a small token with a's.

In general, avoid small tokens.

• edenaaa -- Pre-searing Ascalon
• coastal -- Coastal levels
• crystal -- Crystal desert levels
• guildaa -- Guild halls
• holiday -- Placeholder for holiday music to ensure it is not overriden by DirectSong. Save for one-off holiday usage.
• loginaa -- Goes in slot two for all login script music.
• outpost -- Not used after the next live update - replaced with lots of 'outxxxx' tokens so the Outpost music can be better configured.
• riftaaa -- PvP arenas
• riftgld -- PvP arenas and guild outposts
• overgwn -- Overgrown region
• scorchd -- Scorched region
• snowaaa -- Snow region - again, the 'aaa' is really the same as ' '
• villaga -- A couple of villages got special treatment.
• volcanc -- Volanic region

The following tokens represent specific adventuring music. For instance, 'coasada' means Coastal Adventure music, 'a' version. 'coasadb' is the same, but the 'b' version of the music. The 'genexxx' versions are 'generic', but generally used in Overgrown. They are popular pieces.

• coasada
• crysada
• edenada
• edenadb
• geneada
• geneadb
• geneadc
• geneadd
• scorada
• scoradb
• snowada
• volcada
• volcadb

The following tokens are only used in EdenEnvironment.ascr. Not sure why this is special.

• edencva
• edencvb

The following tokens represent each piece of login music.

• loginza
• loginzb
• loginzc
• loginzd
• loginze

The following tokens support lots of variation in Outpost music. The all start with 'out', then three letters for the region, such

as 'cos' for coastal, 'cry' for crystal, etc. Then a letter that maps to a piece of music that can be overridden with a playlist by DirectSong.

• outcosc
• outcosd
• outcryc
• outcryd
• outednc
• outednd
• outglda
• outgldb
• outovrc
• outovrd
• outposc
• outposd
• outpose
• outposf
• outposr
• outpost
• outposx
• outrfta
• outrftb
• outscrc
• outscrd
• outsnwc
• outsnwd
• outvolc
• outvold

The following tokens are for Factions:

Adventuring Token1:

• Ambienf

Outpost Token1:

• canthaa
• outposp
• outprur
• outposs
• outposu

Adventuring/Outpost Token2:

• petrify
• ruralaa
• seabeda
• urbanaa

Adventuring Token3:

• Petrada
• petradb
• petradc

• ruraada
• ruraadb
• ruraadc

• seabada
• seabadb
• seabadc

• urbaada
• urbaadb
• urbaadc

Guild Hall Token3:

• canadaa
• canadab
• canadac
• canadad
• canadae
• canadaf

Outpost Token3:

• outpeta
• outpetb
• outpetc

• outrura
• outrurb
• outrurc

• outseaa
• outseab
• outseac

• outurba
• outurbb
• outurbc