Gonna throw in stuff about the way I personally use VS-Code in here for new people.

File Setup

There are various locations you can put the mod's folder, I would personally recommend creating a remote file link inside the Paradox Interactive/Crusader Kings 3/mod folder, which links to the actual folder which you keep inside your github folder. Using "Add Folder to Workspace", load the LotrRealmsInExileDev folder into your workspace.

I would personally recommend also throwing in the actual game folder in above this (locate em in steam). This way you can search specific things and compare them to vanilla with ease (more on this later) You can also load in other mods if you want to compare files, search in em or copy stuff over (In this case I have RICE)

I would then recommend saving your workspace as a file so you can easily load it with "Open workspace from file" later on.

Search Parameters

In order to avoid constantly searching the gamefiles and editing them by accident, I usually keep the game (and RICE) folder inside of my "Files to exclude" section, unless im specifically looking for something in there.

As for "files to include", I would always suggest limiting this depending what you are working on.

Example 1

For example, if you are coding a flavor event and want to search up some stuff related to how its triggered etc, you can keep it to only search common/on_action; events and localization/english. This will make it faster to search stuff and make quick changes.

Example 2

On the other hand, if Im editing history, I'll often keep it restricted to history/characters and history/titles, so you can quickly find character IDs, what tiles what character has, etc without opening a bunch of individual character files.

Example 3

Finally, if you are trying to find a specific vanilla event or figure out how a scripted thing works, if might be worth removing most restrictions and just trying to find any mentions of that specific thing in the code. That way you wont accidentially miss it when an effect is used somewhere you excluded by accident.

You can also use the main game folder to directly compare our compatched version of the file and see if we missed anything or broke it somehow.

Extensions

Theres a bunch of extensions that can be useful. I use these three to make code easier to read. CWTools is an extension specifically developed for paradox games with a bunch of useful features (like auto-generating loc files), but I personally dont use it because I have found its very performance intensive. Might be worth giving it a shot!

XOXO -Juke