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T

thunderfoot

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Hiya gang! Decided to start a thread to give all of us one place to post problems modding A2 and solutions for them. Kinda hard to go running all over the place for answers to things some of us have not experienced before. Or have not experienced in a long time. Hopefully, this thread will become yet another resource for the A2 Community newbies.

A few suggestions to make it easier to for the rest of us to help you.

- Telling us "It's broke and I don't know what I did.", makes it very hard to help you. Please be as exact as you can about when the fault occured, what you were doing at the time and what was the error.

EXAMPLE: I just installed the Blah Blah Mod using the auto-installer. When I started the game and selected the GodShip with the Penultimate Mega Oblivion Phasers the game crashed to desk top right after I tried to fire on another ship.

- Expressing frustration with either the Helpee or the Helper should be considered a No-No. We were all newbies once. Doesn't hurt to be reminded of this regularly. Their game is broken and they cannot play it and they want to know why right now! Further, they want the solution to be as quick an painless as we make it appear. This is A2. Nothing is ever as easy as it appears. And this is one of the simpler games to mod. Come take a look at my 5GB+ Dawn of War custom install if you want to see something complicated.

When one of the older hands offers advice, it is good intentioned and thoughtful. The advice is something they themselves usually do when they have a problem. "I already tried that and it didn't work.", is about the fastest way I know to get me to avoid a problems thread like the plague. Especially if it appears from the postings the Helpee is not making an attempt to use the good advice given to him/her. It is entirely understandable for one to be frustrated with A2. I have been pulling out the rest of my hair over this game for years now. Think first and then post. A little tact goes a long way. The operative phrase here is "Grace under pressure". The A2 Community is the finest bunch of online people I associate with. They are generous to a fault and far more considerate of others than nearly any other online game Community I can think of. If you've already tried something before asking for help, please tell us. Checks one off the list.

- When helping someone out, be clear and concise. Not everyone is hip to all the jargon and gobbledeygook which has sprung up over the years around modding this game. Do not make assumptions. The person whose thread you posted in may not know at all what you mean by, "Check the BBOM or over at SB34.". Are these these files? Where are they in the game? All we've done here is confuse someone further. Worse, we probably made them mad in addition to their already being frustrated. If you roll your eyes at what some new person has posted and think, "Jeez! Everyone knows about _____!", this thread probably is not the best place for you to be posting.

That's all I have for now. I'm hoping this will become a sticky such as they have over at A2 Files. MaP did a stellar service to the Community in starting that thread. I access it regularly. Strongly suggest others do as well. In time, this thread may become as useful. *crosses fingers*

Hiya, gang!

This is stuff which everyone knows about but at the same time everyone forgets about. Hunh? Did the Redneck just go all metaphysical on us? Nope. Not at all. Just thought I'd pass along a few things to save some pain. It was painful for me and I'd like others to avoid this pain if I can help it.

How to avoid the pain of having something wreck your game so badly you have to rebuild it? Simple. Back up the game. Make yourself a zipped copy of your custom install and a zipped copy of a Stock version. Does not matter where you keep these zipped copies at, either. Having a zipped copy of your current custom install means you'll never, ever have to worry again about trashing your game. You used one of those heathen, Godforsaken auto installers to place some new ships in your game and then all you get are error messages? No problem! Delete the install and unzip a copy of the backup. Ta Da!! Five minutes to unzip a new install of your current game versus a day or more to reinstall the mods you've already added? I'll take Unzipped for one hundred, Alex.

Why would I want a copy of Stock as well? This is a very good question! I am glad you asked. Two reasons. 1- Gives you a place to mod which does not trash your custom install. 2 - Gives you a place to function check a mod you want before you shift it over to your custom install. My current install is about 2.75GB There is no way I am going to allow anything anywhere near it until I am quite sure it functions as advertised. As awful as it sounds there are A2 modders out there who cannot mod. They get something to work and they haven't a clue as to how. They then decide to share this with us. Some of us know just enough about modding the game to get ourselves into trouble. Before you go placing something into the game willy nilly, check it in a stock version to ensure everything is there and everything works.

The next part is directed at newbie modders. You've just made the perfect GodShip version of Defiant and you decide to share her with the rest of us. Great! We need another GodShip version of Defiant! There is no such thing as enough Federation GodShips anyway, right? This is why I got into doing BSG, thl'Ingan, and Rihannsu ships. But this is for another post. The point here is this one. If your directions can be misunderstood or any part of your mod can be used incorrectly, then somebody somewhere will do so. They will then proclaim loudly that your mod is junk, you broke their game, there is no cure for world hunger and you are responsible for everything which is wrong with the world in the 21st century. Wow. Tough break for you, isn't it? Avoid all this by keeping this thought in mind. When you write the directions for installing your mod, assume the very first person whom D/L's it is modding A2 for the very first time. Further, this is the very first time they will have modded any game. A first time D/Ler chooses something just released by a newbie modder. Scary, isn't it?

Everyone prides themselves on how beautiful and accurate their ships are. How many of us place the same effort into installation directions? Into spell checking ODFs. Into making sure the Sprite entries match everything else. In making sure there are the correct number of quotation marks? Never ceases to amaze me how poorly written some of these installation instructions are. It is kind of embarrassing, actually. Someone brilliant enough to make an exact copy of Narada, for example, cannot spell? Nonsense! One of the reasons my mods have been well received is I take the time to ensure the install instructions are accurate and correct. Then I hand these off to someone else for them to look at. Without fail, they find something I forgot or misspelled or left out. so I add in the things left out and then give it back to them for the whole process to begin again. They then find other things I forgot and so on. Until finally, they can find no more errors. Now it is time for someone else to validate the first person and myself did indeed find all the errors.

You have to sweat the details. Sweat is what produces results. Sweat will make up for a lack of talent. The one thing someone wants above all else when adding in your new GodShip is for it to work without crashing the game. Honest. There are great many mods out there for A2 which are brilliant and have little or no instructions at all. And these get added to games a lot. Really? And then the people whom D/L'd these tell others how great the mod is. Really? And no one ever says an unkind word to anyone else about your GodShip mod. Really? Presentation is just as important as content. Well written, accurate installation instructions, and readmes, tell the potential downloader you are serious about modding. You have taken enough pride in that new ship to make the extra effort it takes to allow even someone whom has never done anything like this before to enjoy it to the same level of quality you do. So make the effort. Yeah, it's boring writing stuff no one reads. Yeah, it's tiresome and not nearly as much fun as hardpointing the little jewel you're sharing with the rest of us. But done properly, it can make the difference between your mod being seen as just another mod or one of those things everyone wants in their game.
 
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Jetfreak

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Righty then, thanks for opening this help thread man. I'll start with my first inquiry.

I'm still quite the newbie in the modelling arena. I just got milkshape last week and I've been tinkering with some models at hand. Lighting, scales, material settings, basic ports you name it.

But I'd really like to ask how you can move and edit a ship's hardpoints using the software.

Do you select and move them manually? Because it always reverts to the original position every time I re-export the mesh.

Any thoughts on this?
 
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Ryderstorm

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Ive had that problem. A few things that help are....make sure scene_root is located at dead nutz zero absolute..same with h_hardpoints. I do move hardpoints around manually but usualy only by 2 axies at a time or less. To set Nodes(hardpoints) precisely select the node then use the move tools numeric dialog and make sure the movement is set corectly in the drop down menu..Absolute uses x,y,z zero as its reference point and will move what is selected to cordinates around z,y,z zero. If u use relative on the other hand the calculation is made from the curent point(dimension) so basicly wherever that point lies is x,y,z zero but not really...in other words absolute zero is the exact center of ms3d and relative is like taking a step away from where you are at right now radther than off of center of ms3d. Make sure to use absolute when moving scene_root and h_hardpoints and click the move button located near the numeric dialog.

Hope that helped somehow. I have tried to explaine that concept to fellow machinist in my trade when I do need to train them and they always have problems grasping this concept. Except in our trade relative is actualy incremental for us in the states(typicly). With that said maybe Im not so good a teacher and somebody else can give better guidance.
 

Jetfreak

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All right, thanks for the heads up. I'll give it another shot and see how it goes.
 
T

thunderfoot

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Jet, something I find which helps in positioning the hps properly is to do one axis at a time. Right click on the general location for the point. then switch to one of the three views and move the point to the location you want along that axis. You cannot use the the 3D view to position hps. The tool for moving joints using the kepypad inputs can be very incremental. I also immediately name the point as as soon as I move it. I then save the model right then, so I don't lose any work I've already done. I've never run across the problem you are describing though. MS3D can be a little confusing sometimes. The tutorials over at the MS3D forums have some pretty good advice and I've spent hours trawling them. Best advice is to go slow, take your time, and be patient.
 

Jetfreak

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Tried both and still no luck guys. The model is as stubborn as ever and refuses to accept the edits. I moved the hardpoints using the above steps but still comes out wrong in-game.
 
A

apoclaydon

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you could try tools -> Zero Joints that may help otherwise i'm stumped just moving the hardpoint joints shouldda worked
 

Adm_Z

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Yeah, As long as the hierarchy is right, I have always just been able to move them and they stay there. :confused:
 
T

thunderfoot

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Sounds kinda dumb and I am really grasping at straws here but:
Is the SOD file in Read Only format?
When you are done moving the HPs, are you saving the file or are you exporting it?
 

Jetfreak

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In the "tools" menu. I choose "select" then pick "joint" in the option tabs then move the hps.

I also re-export the model the Armada 2 SOD format when done.

And FYI I'm editing Aad's Sabre model. I also unchecked the read only attribute.



EDIT: I also tried editing another model's hp's (The Fleet Ops Venture this time). And luckily, it worked. The hardpoints were moved successfully. Hmm...

Anyway, can anyone check Aad's Sabre and move the hp's? I'd like to see the results. Maybe the model itself is borked.
 
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Starfox1701

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Well all of my SOD are not read only but I don't remember wheather they started out that way. As for the saving I always Save the model file up to the point were you are ready to export. This is becasue you have to leave your rotation points on the model till just before you export.
 

Ryderstorm

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Im grasping at straws here too but here is something I thought of. If the mesh nodes are not set up properly that might throw off the models geometry in relation to the skeleton. So u might have the appearence of hardpoints being off when really it might me the actual ship geometry that is off. Im not too sure of that actually happening though.

I dont have the neccesary importer though to test the sod your attempting to edit but obviously others who are far more expericed than me do.

Btw I just remembered something odd that has happened to me. Try changing the destination of where you save the exported sod. For some dumb reason far beyond my understanding ms3d was not exporting a model corectly for me until I changed the output destination. Then it was exporting it corectly. weird....:confused:
 

EAS_Intrepid

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Im grasping at straws here too but here is something I thought of. If the mesh nodes are not set up properly that might throw off the models geometry in relation to the skeleton. So u might have the appearence of hardpoints being off when really it might me the actual ship geometry that is off. Im not too sure of that actually happening though.

I dont have the neccesary importer though to test the sod your attempting to edit but obviously others who are far more expericed than me do.

Usually this happens when the h_hardpoint node is on a different location than the h_scene root. At least that is what I expirienced.
I usually try to have them match positions (by using "snap to grid" in Milkshape) and then the hardpoints are on the right positions.
This, by the way, also happens with the h_lights (and subnodes) and h_damage (and subnodes)

Btw I just remembered something odd that has happened to me. Try changing the destination of where you save the exported sod. For some dumb reason far beyond my understanding ms3d was not exporting a model corectly for me until I changed the output destination. Then it was exporting it corectly. weird....:confused:

Yeah, I know this from exporters for MS Train Sim (gmax) (even worse here, btw) and Armada 2, too.
Usually I delete the old file, before I export the new mesh. Usually this helps.

Computers do strange things now and then, don't they?
 

Jetfreak

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Thanks for the additional input, I'll try the above suggestions and see if they do any good.

Other models work fine though, I can easily move hp's easily with them.
 

Jetfreak

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I'm back guys and with a new question as well.

Now it's about editing a model's mesh axis. How do you move it and what are the steps?
 

Starfox1701

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What do you mean "mesh axis"? If you mean recentering the mesh this is what I do. First I hide all the centered joints like h_root and h_hardpoint. Then I go to the edit menu and select all from there. Then I just move it where I want it.
 
T

thunderfoot

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The Akira Treatment

Hiya gang!

Today we'll talk about textures. How to get them to look as you like and such. Textures are what make a ship look good, not the model itself. A good set of textures, properly applied, can make a so so model look excellent. A tacky set of textures will make anything look bad. No matter how many polies the model has. Of all the parts of modeling a ship, I find the most tedious one is correctly texturing said ship. No matter what you do, someone will always dislike your textures for some reason. And if they do not have good reason, they'll make one up. This was a long post when I first previewed it. So I've spoilered it to make it a little more manageable. The last few spoilers are pictures of Jetfreak's texture redo of the Warbird after I applied the Akira Treatment to the already excellent redo. I was surprised and delighted by the results. My Warbirds now have something they've been lacking which I was unaware of. Character.
First off, we'll discuss size and number of textures. Size is important. The bigger the texture the more details you can include. This has an upper limit however. A 16MB texture for a scout ship is a bit much. A texture set of seventeen textures for a destroyer, not including Borg textures, is also a bit much.

To quote someone, I cannot remember who, "Lag is bad and must be avoided."

I have discovered a texture which is 512 x 512 pixels seems to be about the best compromise between detail and playability. This texture will be 1MB in size when lightmaps are applied. Since I am very seldom looking at just one ship when I play, the more ships I have onscreen with extra large texture sets the slower they load and the more lag I have. Some people are fiends for accuracy and will no doubt disagree strongly with this. When they do and I D/L that hyper detailed ship they've just made, I re size the textures to 512 x 512 anyways. I play/mod A2 on a laptop so my video card is too small by just enough to cause me significant problems when something is larger than this.

Number of textures per ship can also be a problem. For some ships, such as Ent-E, I want her to be as perfect as possible. a large number of textures isn't really a problem. I use Jet's redo of the CG Sovvy which has six textures. But if I try to use a ship which has more than six textures, I run into problems whenever I try to build a large number of them at once. Solving this one requires some modeling skills. But it can be done.

Some ships, such as those K7A made, include a set of textures which have the word 'specular' in the name. You do not have to install these into your game. The A2 game engine does not recognize nor can it use speculars. At least as far as I know. I just got done rebuilding my custom install and included K7A's Kvorrt, which includes a set of speculars. I detected no difference at all in the ship's appearance in game when I removed the specular textures. A specular texture is used to make a ship 'shiny' and metallic looking. Lambert lighting applied to the model itself will accomplish the same thing. If the lightmaps are applied correctly to the texture.

***​

I have gained a somewhat undeserved reputation throughout the Community for doing something I call, the "Akira Treatment". This is a series of adjustments I do to a texture to enhance the details and make the model look nicer ingame. It is called this because the very first ship I ever applied it to was MaP's BIVR Akira. I've covered all this before in previous posts in various places. What I haven't done is set it all down in one place in the order I do it in. Further, the procedure has been modified from the original idea quite a bit. It can be applied to screen shots as well. None of it is very complicated or tricky and anyone can do it. The end results are sometimes surprising in how detailed their quality is.

First off, I think of the model as an actual three dimensional object. Because it is. What gives a three dimensional object mass and definition are lighting and shadows. If it has no shadows, then it has no mass. It looks flat. If the texture color pallette is too bright or the details do not have enough contrast, then the best model in the world looks terrible. Someone spent a great deal of time on a ship, making it perfect. Surely it is worth going a bit slower and ensuring all the details are brought out as well.

Next let us discuss gamma settings or brightness of a texture. Nearly every single A2 custom ship available, including any I've released, has a gamma setting which is far too high. A lot of custom Starfleet ships actually glow in the dark. Turning down the gamma will add shadows and enhance details by itself. Very, very occasionally, you'll run across a ship which has the gamma set too low. Too much shadowing is just as bad as too much light.

Sharpening the texture enhances the details. The details are what makes a ship look ingame like it does in the series or films. This can be overdone, however. The details are part of the ship they should not be all of the ship. Sharpen the details too much and the ship starts to have white lines along edges. Details such as portholes and windows can also be enhanced with lightmaps. Lightmaps will be covered later on.

Bump mapping a texture offsets everything in the direction you choose by one or two pixels. Why would anyone want to do this? Because it also enhances the details. Especially the more subtle ones. This will add smaller shadows in addition to the shadowing already applied by reducing the gamma settings. A good example of this are the various indentations and small curves along the upper neck of the D'Deridex. Applying the bump map directly to the texture rather than as a separate texture works just as well and has the virtue of one less file the game has to load.

Lightmaps, or alpha channels, or masks are parts of the texture which the game engine displays as translucent. These are normally any window, or engine grille or exhaust. When the game shadows the part of the ship with these, they are displayed as glowing and lit from behind. Done properly, these can really enhance the appearance of any model. Done badly or with too much lit up, they can make a ship look cartoonish. Starfleet ships are especially susceptible to this. The myriad windows which are only slightly different in color from the hull can be very hard to find and equally hard to mask. I have found some texture sets where the glow from the window or engine grille is supposed to light the surrounding parts of the ship. Again, when done properly, this add a depth and dimension to the texture which really sets the model off well. When done sloppily, there are parts of the model which are lit which probably shouldn't be.

From painting 1/285th lead miniatures, I have learned a few things about color. First off it is good to exaggerate the colors slightly. When you have two or more colors in the basic pallette for the texture, move them one shade further apart from each other. Remember, the goal here is to make the ship look good ingame, not in your graphics app. You'll need to switch back and forth from the game to your graphics app whicle checking these colors are correctly done. What may look a little off in the app may actually be perfect ingame. Thankfully after doing this a few times, you'll get a feel for which colors are correct in the graphics application. From painting leads, I also learned the fine art of restraint. When you get to the point, "Where just one more ____ would do it.", STOP! They very next thing you do will be over the top and completely ruin what until now has been a beautiful set of textures.

***​

"Okay, Thunder, now that you've teased us enough how about giving us the procedure, hunh?" Sure. Here they are in order. Open the texture. Remove or flip the lightmaps. Sharpen the texture. Adjust the gamma. Apply the bump map. Return or reapply the lightmaps. Save the texture. As an optional last step, reopen the texture and re size it to 512 x 512 pixels if it is larger.

- Open the texture. Please check the properties before you open it and ensure the 'Read Only' box is unchecked. Otherwise, you'll not be able to save the texture. It sounds silly but you would not believe how many times I have forgotten this. To get a texture just perfect and then be unable to save the changes is very frustrating. Might not be a bad idea to also have a picture of the actual ship handy you are working on, if there is one available. Even a blurry low resolution combat shot of the ship can be helpful in keeping your adjustments on track.

- Remove or flip the lightmaps. COREL Photo Paint 9 is the application I use and it refers to alpha channels as masks. These mask the parts of the ship which are not lit. Unfortunately, My app does not allow me to split the mask off from the main texture. To work on the entire texture at once I invert the mask. This sometimes means my windows and engine parts may wind up very oddly colored. This is not a problem as long as I have one set of textures for the ship which are not adjusted and are separate from the textures I am currently working on. I can always go back and copy/paste the original mask onto the modified texture. Sometimes, there will be multiple masks applied to the same texture. In this case, just remove them all. I've no way way of knowing at all which masks cover what and I prefer to have only one set of alphas per texture to keep the file size down. It can be tedious to go back and manually reapply the mask but in the end it will be worth it.

- Sharpen the texture. This is one of the first things I began doing to modify textures way back when. I did not know at all what I was doing and over the years, have fully explored what my Corel would let me do. The current settings I use for this are an Edge Level percentage of 25 with a Threshold of 32. I've no idea what the equivalent settings for PSP would be. There is a check box for preserving the colors as well. Make sure you have this turned on. When sharpening a texture, restraint is again the order of the day. Too much will be far worse looking than none at all. We are still switching between looking at the ship ingame and in the app. DO NOT use just the Storm3D viewer. The viewer reduces the quality of the textures slightly. Far better to check ingame and make sure things look right where most people will see the ship.

- Adjust the gamma. This is the next thing I learned to do. Reducing the gamma of a texture makes it darker. Doing so after sharpening the texture brings out a lot of fine details which the original maker of the texture may have included. I usually start by reducing it by 10-15%. This is where the shadows get added and the depth of the texture improved. Again, this must be applied in small steps to make sure you get the effect you want. Too dark will hide details just as well as too bright. Most of the textures on custom ships are far too bright for my taste. Especially on Starfleet ships. Neon bone white should not be a color choice anyone wants except for specific reasons.

- Apply the bump map. This is a step I consider optional. Not all textures need this. I scale the texture by two pixels, with a floor of 0 and a ceiling of 255 and a highlight of one pixel. It works especially well with azteced hulls or other textures where the surface is composed of a great many hull plates and protrusions. Such as on Battlestar Galactica. Small steps are once more the order of the day. Add something, check it, and then add a little more. By this time in the process, it is very easy to break the texture beyond repair. A good eye and a steady composure are needed to avoid getting carried away.

- Return or reapply the lightmaps. In the home stretch now. Invert the mask one more time. This should bring back the original alpha channel. Or you could copy paste the original mask from the original texture. Most graphic apps allow one to paint on a mask. Useful because during the previous steps of the process the colors of the windows and engine parts may have changed to something undesirable. Pick the original color and then apply it. Copy/pasting from the original texture can be tricky if you do not maximize your view of the modified texture. I usually pick a an obvious part of the copied texture, such as a corner of the engine exhaust, and expand the view right on down to the pixel level. This keeps me from misplacing the mask on the new texture.

Of all the parts of this procedure, I spend the most time tinkering with this step. A great many people use the magic wand approach and just tap near a window or strobe light. This is fine most of the time. With windows which are not colored white, it can light up more area than desired. The result of this is a row of windows which look fuzzy or distorted. I much prefer a clean edge to a mask which matches the edge of the window pixels as closely as possible. Same with any strobe lights on the ship. They just look nicer when the light comes from a specific point on the ship rather than a general area. If it is a large window which lights the nearby hull pixels I can always feather the mask afterwards. Most of of the time feathering a mask is not needed or wanted. This feathering effect gets overdone anyway IMO. The only place it should be used is whenever a spotlight is mounted on the ship to illuminate a specific part of the ship. Such as the registry for a heroShip.

- Save the texture. Actually this the next to last save. I save the texture bewteen steps. This way if I screw up a step, I do not lose all the work I've done pr finaly eviously. This save is for the final texture I intend to use ingame. I also have a copy of the original texture somewheres. I can always go back to what the modeler did in the first place in case I did something wrong. It is a little aggravating to have to begin anew, but sometimes, this is the only way to save that ship you really wanted so badly.

- OPTIONAL. Re size the texture to 512 x 512 pixels. This is not required nor should it be. And it should only be done to textures which are larger than this. Smaller textures being sized up will result in details becoming fuzzy or lost. For those of you who play A2 on a 3200 x 2400 monitor, using a cold fusion powered graphics card which has 1 Terabyte of VRAM, it is entirely redundant. For the rest of us, using that beautiful ship which will become the centerpiece of our fleet and has 12MB of texture files, it probably is not. Lag is induced by the game engine having too many open files at once. We may not be able to reduce the number of files, but we can and should keep the sizes to a manageable level. 512 x 512 pixels with a lightmap applied makes the texture file 1.0MB in size. I think this is about the best compromise between accuracy and playability.
z000.jpg
z001.jpg
z002.jpg
z003.jpg
z004.jpg
Well this is all I have right now. Thanks for the time and attention, I appreciate it. I hope this helps and I look forward to your next project.
 

Jetfreak

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Very descriptive TF, but I have some brief additions if I may. :cool:

***​

Always remember that even texture edits such as this still involves a fair bit of artistic license and personal standards.

What you edit and how you do it is all up to you. Whether it's a minor detail enhancement or a subtle color change. But always keep in mind that not everybody will like it if you ever release or show it to them. Some people are just bound by certain factors (Canon for example) too much and some cannot stand such changes, even it it is for the sake of artistic license.

It's best to know this aspect of texture editing in advance. I myself have dealt with much critique on the subject so I should know. Tread carefully with them like what TF has said and try not to overdo it.

------------

In the end though, retexturing is a wonderful thing once you get the hang of it.

Oh, and TF would you mind If I add more reference pics in the next posts? I'd like to showcase some before and after shots of some of my retexture projects.
 
T

thunderfoot

Deleted Due to Inactivity
Former MSFC Member
The idea here is to help people become better modders, Jetfreak. No better way to do so than before and after pics.
 

Jetfreak

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All right man, I'll post them below. :D

Oh btw, that's Neon Warbird as well. And still looking great after all these years.


So, in regards to the before and after shots, you will see that what Thunderfoot has elaborated has been applied in the following textures.

Let's begin:

HESovy.png


Shown here is Hawkeye's Sovereign. You will observe that the initial textures are very bright and lacks much detail due to the overall whiteness of the coloring.

By adjusting the brightness to a lower setting and raising the contrast quite a bit, you will notice that the tiny details such as panelling eventually comes out. Giving the hull much needed "Character".

Do note that this may be overdone. Experiment with adjusting them carefully and try to maintain a balance of aesthetics and details.

MAPVenator.png


Moving on here, this is MAP's texture set for his Venator Star Destroyer model. Notice how the brightness-contrast aspect has again been applied. But this edit also involved a slight color change from a light brown to a more pearl colored hull.

The color change here simply involved lessening the saturation of the textures. I lowered it slightly to achieve the results I wanted.

Once done, I applied the Open Circle Fleet Logo as a final touch up. :D

FlopsGriffin.png


I will be honest that this edit was inspired by Thunderfoot's very own Hawk Project which involved a very similar edit to another Romulan ship.

Shown here is the texture set for the Fleet Ops Griffin. Notice how the above edits have been applied again. Contrasting once again helped the details stand out but the color change to a more familiar Romulan look is most apparent.

This was achieved by adjusting the hue to a more green setting and slightly adding a bit more saturation.

That's it for now gents, stay cool. :cool:
 

Amateur

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Could I just add, if I may, that if the texture has things like windows and such on an alpha channel then Photoshop can be used to select only them, then you can invert selection to get the parts you want.

I found this very important when re-colouring an old Constitution class; it looked silly with brown windows!

And I wished there was something like this when I learned to make texture edits a few years back...
 
T

thunderfoot

Deleted Due to Inactivity
Former MSFC Member
64 bit Windows7, a 1920 x 1080 screen, and A2

Alrighty then. Got my custom install working. Sort of. The game will launch. The game will play. But everything is sized to the monitor screen of my new 'puter. Which means everything is distorted to a ridiculous degree.

Does anyone know how to return A2 to a normal sized format? I'd like to run the thing 1440 x 900 but I'd be really happy with plain old 1024 x 768 if someone will tell me how to fix this.

The next thing is getting the Editor to work again. Right now whenever I try to redo the command line, the system tells me I have an error and will not allow this. Is this related to the screen size problem and is it repairable?

Storm3D Viewer works magnificently and causes no problems whatsoever. And believe it or not My Corel Photo Paint 9 loaded and works flawlessly with no hickups at all. I would prefer for answers to help Stock A2 and keep my custom install basd on Stock like it has been for so many years now. I may have to install the Patch Project 1.2.5 or change to a FLOPs based install. This means none of my current mods will work. Obviously someone whipping out the standard, "Just switch to FLOPs, Dude!", answer would not be my preferred choice here.
 

Dominus_Noctis

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I have a laptop that runs A2 in 1440x900, so it should definitely be possible. Have you tried running A2 in XP compatibility? I'm not really sure what would cause that...

The editor probably won't run because of UAC setttings - so I'd recommend moving your folder to the desktop the first time, or running A2 as an admin :sweat:

I will point out that with relatively little effort you should be able to get your mods to work in Fleet Ops (there are only a few stock variables changed now, which can easily be fixed with an autoreplacer) :)
 
T

thunderfoot

Deleted Due to Inactivity
Former MSFC Member
Thanks for the ideas I had not considered, Dominus. Much appreciated. I've turned the UAC completely off. Most useless piece of code Micro$oft ever came up with, BTW. This seemed to help some. Still have the full size completely distorted A2 screen. If you like your Federation saucers the size of, well, saucers, then you'd love this. Oddly, Legacy does not have te same problems and A2 is similar enough it should not either. My IL-2 Sturmovik 1946 runs windowed on the left side of the screen. Looks beautiful too. F4-U1A's stooping like hawks onto hapless Bettys is both gorgeous and terrifying. Haven't tried to play it online yet but can't wait!

Like most of the problems I have had with A2 over the years this one has a solution and it will just take time to find.
 

swilson0907

Crewman 1at Class
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Messages
156
I'm back guys and with a new question as well.

Now it's about editing a model's mesh axis. How do you move it and what are the steps?

By any chance, did you get an answer to this Jetfreak (I think people call you Jet for short)?

I ask if you have an answer because I also have a problem with this and I think it might be the reason why one of my ships is moving backwards.

****

Also, I am having trouble in Milkshape3D and I think people may have been ignoring my post about it so I'll just ask it again:

In the original thread on this page, I have some screenshots that help with explaining this (MSFC).

Earlier today, I was finishing up the Wraith Super Hiveship (or as some might know it as: the ZPM Powered Hiveship from StarGate Atlantis' series final "Enemy at the Gate". It was the ship that Atlantis destroyed over Earth just before ending up landing in the ocean near I'd guess California.

I got this model from the Bridge Commander Files and it is a one time use ship for my game. A new ZPM Powered Hiveship commanded by Todd the Wraith. I think I did a good job on this following the steps that k_merse gave me, but I do think I may have made on mistake, the portion that is labeled h_engines is in the wrong spot and I realized after finishing everything, I only found out because the texture for that spot says engines (in the attached MS3D screenshots, it is the blue line going to the left wing-like structure from about the center of the ship) and I saved it as a SOD before realizing this, and I'm afraid to move it because what if it moves everything else?

It took me three hours to finish this, the model was done and just needed to be hardpointed (it the mesh (MS3D file) came with the full Bridge Commander version of the ship so I guess was meant to be used for something like this to convert it to another game). Well working on this, I came up with some questions.

1) Is the joints (Hardpoints) off the model if you using the 3D model/graphic of the ship to help place them? (Looking at the screenshots you'll see that this is the case the with my conversion of the MS3D file.)

2) Why when you change the view of the model in the 3D viewing portion that the hardpoints and lines don't change with the rotation? (This happens in one of the screenshots, you might be able to spot it, it is the finished/final product.)

3) My two screenshots of the Notepad document breaking down the usage of the hardpoints (I believe its called an HP Map), is that a good thing to have done?

4) Is there any special thing that you are supposed to do before saving the file as a SOD? (I am asking this for one important reason, it appears that after all of this work, the weapons don't want to fire on this thing at all. This is the same thing that is happening with anything I seem to do in MS3D including the ship that I just changed the textures on (see this thread: MSFC).

Now here is the final version of my MS3D conversion, the screenshot of the ship ingame (which I still have to find the perfect ScaleSOD size to make it slightly bigger than my regular Hiveship which stands at ScaleSOD = 10 (at that size this covers the screen) and also the ship's ODF file...
Toddhiveship
Code:
// Begin main properties

unitName = "ZPM Powered Wraith Hiveship"
tooltip = "Todd's Wraith Hiveship"
verboseTooltip = "The ZPM Powered Wraith Hiveship is just like the ZPM Powered Wraith Cruiser created by Todd's underling except for this ship was created by Todd and its creation was allowed by both the IOA, and  StarGate Command along with the Atlantis Expedition in return for Todd's loyalty to the expedition and to Colonel John Sheppard. Its creation along with the new ZPM Powered Cruiser is due to Todd's help in defeating the original ZPM Powered Hiveship. If Todd betrays the Atlantis Expedition, both ships have a Failsafe Device that can be activated that will destroy the ship and kill everyone aboard. There is only one of both of these vessels in existance."

// Starting Race
race = "species8472"

// This ship is a hero.
isHero = 1

// Ship label provided because this is a unique ship.
label = "Todd's Hiveship"

// Build Time
buildTime = 50.0

// Officer Cost To Build
officerCost = 260

// Crew Cost To Build
crewCost = 7500

// Maximum Crew Compacity
maximumCrew = 75000

// Max Crew Added To The Crew Compacity
maxCrewGain = 95000

// Bio-Matter Cost To Build
biomatterCost = 4850

// Maximum Shields
maxShields = 99999999

// Maximum Ship Health
maxHealth = 999950

// Hitpoints
shieldGeneratorHitPoints = 19500
engine****Points = 19500
weapon****Points = 19500
lifeSupportHitPoints = 19500
sensor****Points = 19500

// Shield Recharge Rate
shieldRate = 1.0

// Maximum Special Energy
maxSpecialEnergy = 99900

// Special Energy Recharge Rate
specialEnergyRate = 10

// Ship Class
shipclass = "battleship"

// Attack Power
attackPower = 2.00f

// Attack Power Intrinsic Value
intrinsicValue = 0.50f

//**********************************************************************
//Possible Craft Names 
possibleCraftNames = 
	"Hiveship"

//**********************************************************************
//ART PARAMETERS & WEAPON NAMES

// ZPM Powered Hiveship Pulse Beam Weapons - Side 1 & Front
weapon1 = "ZPMwhivepulse"
weaponHardpoints1 = "hp01" "hp02" "hp03" "hp04" "hp05" "hp06" "hp07" "hp08" "hp09" "hp10" "hp11" "hp12" "hp13"

// ZPM Powered Hiveship Pulse Beam Weapons - Side 2 & Back
weapon2 = "ZPMwhivepulse"
weaponHardpoints2 = "hp14" "hp15" "hp16" "hp17" "hp18" "hp19" "hp20" "hp21" "hp22" "hp23" "hp24" "hp25" "hp26" "hp27" "hp28" "hp29" "hp30" "hp31" "hp32"

// Hiveship Pulse Beam Weapons - Side 1 & Front
weapon3 = "whivepulse"
weaponHardpoints3 = "hp01" "hp02" "hp03" "hp04" "hp05" "hp06" "hp07" "hp08" "hp09" "hp10" "hp11" "hp12" "hp13"

// Hiveship Pulse Beam Weapons - Side 2 & Back
weapon4 = "whivepulse"
weaponHardpoints4 = "hp14" "hp15" "hp16" "hp17" "hp18" "hp19" "hp20" "hp21" "hp22" "hp23" "hp24" "hp25" "hp26" "hp27" "hp28" "hp29" "hp30" "hp31" "hp32"

// ZPM Powered Hiveship Pulse Beam Weapons - Underneath Part 1
weapon5 = "ZPMwhivepulse"
weaponHardpoints5 = "hp41" "hp42"

// ZPM Powered Hiveship Pulse Beam Weapons - Underneath Part 2
weapon6 = "ZPMwhivepulse"
weaponHardpoints6 = "hp49" "hp50" "hp51" "hp52" 

// Hiveship Pulse Beam Weapons - Underneath Part 1
weapon7 = "whivepulse"
weaponHardpoints7 = "hp41" "hp42"

// Hiveship Pulse Beam Weapons - Underneath Part 2
weapon8 = "whivepulse"
weaponHardpoints8 = "hp49" "hp50" "hp51" "hp52" 

// ZPM Powered Hiveship Pulse Beam Weapons - Left Wing-Structure
weapon9 = "ZPMwhivepulse"
weaponHardpoints9 = "hp53" "hp54" "hp55" "hp56" "hp57"

// ZPM Powered Hiveship Pulse Beam Weapons - Right Wing-Structure
weapon10 = "ZPMwhivepulse"
weaponHardpoints10 = "hp33" "hp34" "hp35" "hp36" "hp37"

// Hiveship Pulse Beam Weapons - Left Wing-Structure
weapon11 = "whivepulse"
weaponHardpoints11 = "hp53" "hp54" "hp55" "hp56" "hp57"

// Hiveship Pulse Beam Weapons - Right Wing-Structure
weapon12 = "whivepulse"
weaponHardpoints12 = "hp33" "hp34" "hp35" "hp36" "hp37" 

// ZPM Powered Hiveship Beam Weapons - Right Wing-Structure
weapon13 = "ZPMwhivephaser"
weaponHardpoints13 = "hp43" "hp44" 

// ZPM Powered Hiveship Beam Weapons - Left Wing-Structure
weapon14 = "ZPMwhivephaser"
weaponHardpoints14 = "hp47" "hp48" 

// Self Destruct
weapon15 = "gselfdes"
weaponHardpoints15 = "hp38"

// Launch Wraith Darts
weapon16 = "gwdarts"
weaponHardpoints16 = "hp21" "hp22"

// Wraith Hull Regeneration
weapon17 = "gwraithhullregeration"
weaponHardpoints17 = "hp38"

// Ancient Deflective Shield
weapon18 = "ZPMancientshield"
weaponHardpoints18 = "hp38"

// ZPM Powered Wraith Sublight Boost
weapon19 = "ZPMpowerthrust"
weaponHardpoints19 = "hp45" "hp46"

// Hardpoints to hit for various systems and other locations.
sensorsTargetHardpoints = "hp01" "hp02" "hp03" "hp04" "hp05" "hp06" "hp07" "hp08" "hp09" "hp10" "hp11" "hp12" "hp13" "hp14" "hp15" "hp16" "hp17" "hp18" "hp19" "hp20" "hp21"
criticalTargetHardpoints = "hp01" "hp02" "hp03" "hp04" "hp05" "hp06" "hp07" "hp08" "hp09" "hp10" "hp11" "hp12" "hp13" "hp14" "hp15" "hp16" "hp17" "hp18" "hp19" "hp20" "hp21"
hullTargetHardpoints = "hp01" "hp02" "hp03" "hp04" "hp05" "hp06" "hp07" "hp08" "hp09" "hp10" "hp11" "hp12" "hp13" "hp14" "hp15" "hp16" "hp17" "hp18" "hp19" "hp20" "hp21" "hp22"
shieldGeneratorTargetHardpoints = "hp01" "hp02" "hp03" "hp04" "hp05" "hp06" "hp07" "hp08" "hp09" "hp10" "hp11" "hp12" "hp13" "hp14" "hp15" "hp16" "hp17" "hp18" "hp19" "hp20"
lifeSupportTargetHardpoints = "hp01" "hp02" "hp03" "hp04" "hp05" "hp06" "hp07" "hp08" "hp09" "hp10" "hp11" "hp12" "hp13" "hp14" "hp15" "hp16" "hp17" "hp18" "hp19" "hp20" "hp21"
enginesTargetHardpoints = "hp01" "hp02" "hp03" "hp04" "hp05" "hp06" "hp07" "hp08" "hp09" "hp10" "hp11" "hp12" "hp13" "hp14" "hp15" "hp16" "hp17" "hp18" "hp19" "hp20" "hp21"

//**********************************************************************
//SYSTEM HITPOINTS
//These values are the hitpoint values of the systems
//If the value is set to zero the ship does not have that system
engine****Percent = 5.0f
lifeSupportHitPercent = 8.5f
weapon****Percent = 5.0f
shieldGeneratorHitPercent = 8.0f
sensor****Percent = 998.0f
crewHitPercent = 335.0f
hullHitPercent = 357.0f

//**********************************************************************
// Message & Sound Parameters
//**********************************************************************
eventSelect = "BattleSelect"
eventAcknowledge = "BattleAcknowledge"
eventAttack = "BattleAttack"
eventStop = "BattleStop"
eventMove = "BattleMove"
eventRepair = "BattleRepair"

//**********************************************************************
// Begin misc properties
saneCrewLossMethod = 1
weaponYellow = 1.0f
weaponRed = 2.0f
ScaleSOD = 6.1
physicsFile = "sdreadphys.odf"
trekPhysicsFile = "trek_sspecialphys.odf"
avoidanceClass = 8
canAttackPlanets = 1
fireball = "xfirebmd"
shipType = "B"
shieldDelay = 5.0f
rangeScan = 6950.0f
damagedScan = 4550.0
shieldProtection = 1.0
enginesRepairTime = 0.2f
lifeSupportRepairTime = 0.04f
weaponsRepairTime = 0.2f
shieldGeneratorRepairTime = 0.2f
sensorsRepairTime = 0.2f
enginesCrewLoss = 2.0f
lifeSupportCrewLoss = 2.5f
weaponsCrewLoss = 1.0f
shieldGeneratorCrewLoss = 1.0f
sensorsCrewLoss = 0.0f
lifeSupportLoss = 2.0f
weldingRadius = 1.0
classLabel = "craft"
aiName = "CraftProcess"
ship = 1
has_hitpoints = 1
has_crew = 1
combat = 1
alert = 1
can_sandd = 1
can_explore = 1
transporter = 1
SHOW_SW_AUTONOMY = 1
SHOW_MOVEMENT_AUTONOMY = 1

I found the perfect size for the ZPM Powered Hiveship, ScaleSOD = 4.1. At this size, it is just a tad bigger than my normal powered Hiveship.

Also with the mistake involving the h_engines in MS3D doesn't appear to affect the textured modeled. The engine textures are in their right place. The reason I asked that question before was I was afraid that it was going to have something to do with how the ship was going to look ingame or act. I now believe that h_engines is refers to the Engine Hitpoints on the model ingame, am I right?

Well I still can't figure out why the weapons don't work on anything I create or finish through MS3D, the Special Weapons work, at least Self Destruct and Defensive like the ZPM Powered Ancient Shield on this ship, so why not the automatic standard weapons?

Well I'm only quoting my original text here because this is a Help Thread after all and since I've posted that, I have been looking for help on that problem and it has stopped my learning process of even using MS3D.
 

Majestic

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Are you using a wide screen monitor? If so Lord_Trekie helped me solve this same issue when I first got mine, and that is running your screen resolution at it's maximum size, mine being 1680x1050.
 
T

thunderfoot

Deleted Due to Inactivity
Former MSFC Member
Are you using a wide screen monitor? If so Lord_Trekie helped me solve this same issue when I first got mine, and that is running your screen resolution at it's maximum size, mine being 1680x1050.
And where do I set this at? The screen res in the game only goes to 1280 x 1024 currently. Do I need to reset this inside the RTS_CFG.h file?
 

Jetfreak

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Messages
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I ask if you have an answer because I also have a problem with this and I think it might be the reason why one of my ships is moving backwards.

See Starfox's post next to mine. ;) I think this is caused by certain models. Some meshes tend to be "subborn" when you edit them. Like a certain Sabre Class which never responds to hp adjustments. :yuck:
 

Majestic

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And where do I set this at? The screen res in the game only goes to 1280 x 1024 currently. Do I need to reset this inside the RTS_CFG.h file?

No it's in windows, the screen resolution option settings.
 
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