CHARACTR.TMP — Runtime Character Cache

Temporary file containing the current party’s character data after a saved game is loaded. A bridge between the durable save format and the live runtime party state.

Extension: CHARACTR.TMP
Location: Game root (runtime-generated)
Byte order: Little-endian (16-bit)
Size: Variable — 2-byte count + 10-byte index table + 20-byte image IDs + (num_chars × 554-byte character records)
Compression: None
Magic: None
Status: Partial
Source: Wendigo — character.tmp.html; byte-level validation against a live file pending

Canonical source: character.tmp.html (Wendigo’s Darklands repo)

File Layout

Offset 0x00:  word        num_characters
Offset 0x02:  word[5]     char_index    — party character indices
Offset 0x0C:  string[5]   images        — 4-byte image-group IDs for each party member
Offset 0x20:  character[] characters    — num_characters × character struct

The character struct is the same used in the save-file format. See Save File for the character struct layout.

Image group identifiers

Each images entry is a 4-byte fixed-width string identifying the character’s sprite set (e.g. E00C, F01C). These correspond to the *.CAT file prefixes in the battle sprite catalogs.

Confidence

Medium. Structure from community reference; byte-level validation against a live file is pending.