Fix Tristian missing EXP / Levels

Hello pathfinder gamers.

Look at your EXP. Now look at your Tristian's EXP. Now back to your EXP. Now back to your Tristian's EXP.
Sadly, your Tristian's EXP isn't your EXP. But if you follow this guide, it could be!

I will show you how to quickly and simply edit your save file to bring Tristian up to the level of the rest of your party, so you can use him until Owlcat brings out an official fix to this issue.

Introduction

If you've completed the first chapter of the game and recruited Tristian, you've probably noticed that he isn't at the same level as the rest of your party.

While the game does give you a kingdom task to send him on training, this will only grant him one additional level, and if you're like me and did ALL of the content available before recruiting him, he is still going to be a ways behind. In my case, even after completing his training mission, he was level 4, while my party was level 6.

Apparently, this is due to the fact that he will only start gaining experience from when you initially rescue him, so if you leave that too long and do a bunch of side-stuff, he will fall behind.
Annoying, right?

But fear not! By doing a simple and safe edit in your save file, you can update his experience to be at the same level as the rest of your party, and get some use out of him.

WARNING: This fix involves editing save files, which could corrupt your save. I highly recommend you create a new manual save to apply this fix to, so you can resume your game from your original save in case something goes wrong.

That being said, this fix is extremely simple, so unless you manage to CTRL+A and Delete all the contents of your save, you should be absolutely fine.

Note: I am writing this guide to put a fix out there that I discovered for my own playthrough, but I will not be checking in regularly to provide support.

Lastly, credit to ghost.v2.6 for showing me how to edit save files in this post:
https://steamcommunity.com/app/640820/discussions/0/3393916911747792556/

How-to instructions

Step 1: Start Pathfinder: Kingmaker and load the save you want to fix.

Step 2: Note down Tristians level and experience, e.g. level: 4, EXP: 11152.



Step 3: Note down your character's experience, e.g. EXP: 24167.



Step 4: Alt+TAB and open your saved games folder.
On Windows: %userprofile%\appdata\locallow\Owlcat Games\Pathfinder Kingmaker\Saved Games



Step 5: Open the save you want to fix with WinRAR or Winzip.
IMPORTANT: Open it, do NOT extract it!

Step 6 (Optional): Buy WinRAR.

Step 7: Within the archive, find and open the file "party.json" with a text editor, e.g. WordPad.



Step 8: Hit CTRL+F and search for Tristians experience, which you noted down earlier. In my case, it was "11152".



This should be the only number in the file with that exact value, but just to be certain, check that the preceding "CharacterLevel":x value matches Tristians level.

Step 9: Change the EXP value to the EXP value of your character, which you noted down earlier.



Step 10: Save the text file and close it.

Step 11: Click Yes to update the archive.



Step 12: REJOICE! Now, without even having to close the game, reload the save you just edited and BEHOLD! Tristian is ready to level up.

[Remove skull merchant]

why do you need Tristian to be higher level anyway. Youll keep him out of the frontline all the sam. Better solution: dont use Tristian at all, and swap him out for your frontliner that shrugs off several status effects.

[shivanwurm]

Nvm, I found my issue. I was checking after I saved the json file, I needed to exit the Win program to save the zks file as well. Working as described now.

[Moos]

@shivanwurm Then you did something wrong. The above how-to is very good and worked for many others.

[shivanwurm]

I edited the json file as described but the exp did not update in game. The game still runs normal.

[Grey]

@r.shenk_86 the .zks is the archive file. Doubleclick that or right-click -> open with WinRAR, and it should show you the list of .json files within the archive. Then continue instructions.

[r.shenk_86]

So I've followed the instructions and opened the save I want to edit with WinRAR and the only file there is the .zks file that I compressed, I tried it with WinZip too and the same thing.

[Zandel_Corrin]

OR you could just do the Temple of the Elk as soon as it spawns and gain him in your party at lvl 3 when you are still lvl 2 and almost lvl 3. Then he will always be your level or slightly higher. Of course Jeythal ends up under-leveled then but really who cares about her anyway?

[Moos]

@tristan.louis.haller the .zks files are archives, just follow the instructions.

[tristan.louis.haller]

When I open my Saved Games folder, they're all .zks files, not archives; if I try to open the .zks files with WordPad, it just displays gibberish symbols. Anything I can do?

[SlicerDicer]

thanks, this worked well.