Troubleshooting

Almost every problem is diagnosable from Player.log:

%LocalAppData%Low\Hovgaard Games\Big Ambitions\Player.log

A healthy run looks like this:

[Mod:BAHelpApi] Help API ready (help system reachable: True).
[HelpApi] Applied 9 mod help page(s).

My pages don’t appear at all

Check the log for Applied N mod help page(s).

No `Applied` line, and no warnings

Your registration probably never ran. Confirm your mod loaded at all ([Mod:YourMod] lines), and that RegisterPage is actually reached — it is easy to put it behind an early return.

`No HelpSystem found after 60s`

The library could not find the help window in any loaded scene. This is the one failure it cannot work around. Report it as an issue with your game version.

`help system reachable: False`

The reflection this library depends on failed — almost certainly a game update renamed something. The log names exactly which member was not found:

[HelpApi] help system internals not found (_categories=True, LoadCategories=False,
ReloadHelpStructure=True). The game version has probably changed.

Dependent mods keep working, minus help pages. Please open an issue with that line.

My page appears but is blank

You are missing the content key. The library warns about this:

[HelpApi] Page 'furniture-mymodwidget' from 'MyMod' is missing localisation for
'help_mymod:itemname_widget_content' (page body).

The content key is help_ + your pageKeyPrefix + _content. A prefix containing a colon keeps it — for mymod:itemname_widget the content key is help_mymod:itemname_widget_content, not help_mymod_itemname_widget_content.

My page’s title is a raw key

The pageKeyPrefix itself has no localisation entry. Add it, or point the prefix at a key you already have such as your item’s name key.

My category heading is a raw key

You passed a category key the game does not know and did not localise it. Either use a HelpCategories constant, or add the key to your locale files.

My page is in the wrong place in the list

Pages insert alphabetically by localised title. If yours looks misplaced, the title is probably falling back to the raw key because its localisation is missing — fix that and the position corrects itself.

To keep registration order instead, pass HelpPageOrder.Append.

Links in my page don’t work

Dead text instead of a link — the target slug does not exist. Check spelling, and remember slugs are case-sensitive. Use HelpApi.PageExists(slug) to check before emitting a link.
Link does nothing — for address: links, the format is address:16 11s: street number, space, street abbreviation. No comma.
Use HelpLinks.Page / HelpLinks.Address rather than hand-writing the Markdown.

My mod won’t load: “Dependency mod ‘BAHelpApi’ failed to load”

BAHelpApi is missing or itself failed. Check it is enabled in the Mods menu, and look earlier in the log for why it failed. This message is the dependency system working correctly — your mod is being held back rather than loaded into a broken state.

My mod won’t load: version mismatch

BAHelpApi requires major 1 but mod provides 2

Your mod was built against a different major version than the one installed. Rebuild against the installed version, or update the library.

Pages appear twice, or one mod’s pages are missing

You have two copies of the library loaded — almost always because a mod shipped BAHelpApi.dll inside its own Dependencies/ folder as well as depending on the Workshop item.

Two copies load as two assemblies with separate static registration lists. Only one drives the help window; the other’s pages never appear. Remove the bundled copy and depend on the Workshop item.

Everything works, then stops after changing language

It should not — the library re-applies pages when the game rebuilds its help structure, and that rebuild is exactly what a language change triggers. If pages vanish and do not come back within a second or two, please open an issue.

Reporting a bug

Please include:

your Big Ambitions version and whether it is a beta branch
the [HelpApi] and [Mod:BAHelpApi] lines from Player.log
how you register your pages
the relevant keys from your locale file

Open an issue

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