New SOD Exporter for 3DS Max =ALL VERSIONS=

[Dominus_Noctis]

Posting one part at a time is best in my opinion - it's easy to get distracted/disgruntled, not to mention maintaining articles as you find errors takes time too. At least that's been my experience while working on our guide. I don't think I'd ever have been able to release the modding guides without the release of incremental steps.

Having it in an easily modifiable format is also the best possible world as well: as soon as I switched from PDF to web-based, my productivity and comfort greatly increased. Not to mention your audience increases hugely, which is good for rapid dissemination. The PDF versions of our guide received only roughly a thousand downloads altogether, but the online version receives that amount in a matter of days.

If you're really serious about this, and interested in the following, we can talk about adding you as an editor to our guide. I wouldn't mind adding an extra partition for Armada I as well, though that might depend just how extensive it might grow to be (as primary focus is still on helping FO modders).

 

[MrVulcan]

Thanks for that offer, Dominus. I am not sure that an Armada 1 section will be helpful in the guide as it might end up confusing people familiar only with FleetOps. Having said that, I think a lot of the stuff in that list applies equally well to all Armadas.. Why don't I actually start writing, and later decide

As for the incremental releases, I agree on all accounts. There is something about having produced many stacks of printed reports for school and work that makes me neglect the friendlier online format. Online articles it'll be. Some of the animation related articles would also benefit from video examples.

 

[pepperman]

Oops, I posted, then went to edit, then got distracted, then came back and was told that the edit limit has expired.. so here's the rest of what I wanted to say

I will eventually make a modelling tutorial for 3dsMax, in addition to the stuff I have in the exporter documentation.

In fact, I want to package all of my tools/docs into one modding guide. This is so far off though that it's not even on my todo list yet.. lol

[Ideal future=on]
Tutorials:

• Modding basics, tips and tricks
• Modelling in 3dsMax
• Advanced modding concepts, the really cool stuff
  
  - In-depth sprite/texture animations
  - In-depth SOD animations
  - How to use lighting and material properties
  - How to create damage effects and proper usage of the hierarchy
  - Composite effects using multiple ODFs for map effects
  - Custom explosion effects using SODs
  - AI tips and tricks, behavior parameters and build locations​
• Misc
  
  - Light maps / glows
  - GUI editing tips. Resolution-specific GUI
  - Team colours
  - yard animations
  - Physics tips (mostly A1 for now)​

Tools:

• Armada Debugger (A1, A2, FleetOps)
• SOD Exporters
• ODF Creation / management excel scripts

[Ideal future=off]

Maybe that's not so far off.. some of that has already been written. Only thing stopping me from posting that stuff is aversion of incompletion. Should I just post articles? Might help in actually getting this stuff finished.

I wonder if making your own Wiki/blog site could accomplish what you want.

 

[Majestic]

I wonder if making your own Wiki/blog site could accomplish what you want.

Mr Vulcan, if you decided you need to go that way, give me a PM and we can talk.

 

[MrVulcan]

Pepperman,
I think blog style articles will be most suitable. A wiki style guide would be difficult to differentiate from other modding tutorials / guides / references as it'll have to cover all the basics as much as the extra stuff that I really want to focus on.. I don't wish to rewrite the modding guides already available. Topic focused articles would probably compliment all the other material out there the best. I think MSFC has a somewhat underused blog feature?

Majestic,
Thanks, we can discuss this for sure. Right now I'm not exactly ready to start writing.. this time of the year is exceedingly busy. Probably in a few weeks

 

[CABAL]

I think the blog was actually removed during the upgrade because it was underused.

 

[Majestic]

Majestic,
Thanks, we can discuss this for sure. Right now I'm not exactly ready to start writing.. this time of the year is exceedingly busy. Probably in a few weeks

When you're ready shoot me a PM.

I think the blog was actually removed during the upgrade because it was underused.

It was disabled due to an issue with the skin. It's something I fully intend to re-enable in a couple of weeks when I bring the site down again.