.Sab File Extension Request: Variable Blades

[Lathain Valtiel]

As you know, those who want to mess with their lightsabers can do several things. They can change the hilt of a given weapon, make it a trail-less blade, or what have you.

 

What you CAN'T do is make it stay a lightsaber, but change the blade itself.

 

My proposal is thus:

 

Add a new, client side variable to .sab files. This variable, named, say, bladedirectory, will then have a file-path next to it. This file path will specify a folder, hopefully filled with files that correspond to the lightsaber blade files in gfx/effects/sabers in name only. The existence of this variable would inform the game to do the follow:

 

1: Instead of drawing the blade with the textures in gfx/effects/sabers, it would instead draw a blade coming from that hilt with the appropriately named textures in the bladedirectory on the client side.

 

2: The game will redirect the shaders that are normally looked up for saber rendering (gfx/effects/saber/Saberblur for example), to their appropriate new location (instead of calling the previous example, it would look for a shader named BLADEDIRECTORY/SaberBlur).

 

And that's it. Of course, tie it to the saberTrail .sab variable in case somebody only wants a new blade with no trail (sabertrail 1 has a normal trail, 2 uses swordtrail,. and 0 means no trail) or wants a metal sword with a different trail than the boring gray default one..

[razorace]

Would it be better if we just made the blade style selectable like the blade color?

[Lathain Valtiel]

That means more work to modify it to your liking.

 

Plus, I imagine you can only code so many slots to store core styles in unless you go nuts with some special functions.

[Vruki Salet]

What might these new blades look like? I mean, I know that theoretically someone could make whatever effect or texture they wanted but what are *you* imagining?

[Lathain Valtiel]

For me, personally? I'd just change the lightsaber core into a double-edged sword-like blade if I could.

[razorace]

I think the texture would have to be 2d no matter what I do.

[Tokakeke]

Didn't catch the whole of this, so this might be repetitive but:

 

I'd like to see a system where when a hilt is selected, a saber blade type is automatically selected for them.

 

Blue for Anakin Skywalkers

Green for Qui-Gon

 

This could be changed but it'd just be the default (instead of yellow).

 

Also, it would select a blade type (large core, small core, no blade, small glow, trail, etc).

 

This would be interesting for something like the Magna Guard's electrostaff.

 

A list of hilts would be contained in a separate file (like the true view stuff) and a bunch of variables would be there for each.

[Lathain Valtiel]

That kind of system is pointless and arbitrary Tokakeke, and serves no concievable purpose. The system Razor just proposed over mine is the epitome of easily done customization.

 

...Then there's the fact that .sab files do a lot of what you just wanted.

 

Razor: Of course the texture would be 2D... It's not like the current sabers aren't... Or do you mean something else?

[razorace]

Well, I meant that a double edged sword blade would look like it was always facing the same direction from you.

[Lathain Valtiel]

Oh, that's a given unless I make it an actual sword. I just mean I'd make a core that's really pointy.

[razorace]

Oh, ok.

[Tokakeke]

That kind of system is pointless and arbitrary Tokakeke, and serves no concievable purpose. The system Razor just proposed over mine is the epitome of easily done customization.

 

Jesus, guess I won't be making any suggestions again. Thanks for the thought-out tactful reply.

[razorace]

Don't mind Lath. He's a bit negative about other people's opinons if they don't agree with his own.

[Lathain Valtiel]

I got angry because about half of what he suggested can be done client-side with .sab files.

 

It's already possible to do these with sab files:

 

Erase the lightsaber blade (good for swords)

Eliminate the saber trail

Control the blade color to a certain point (this feature may be broken, or I'm not sure it even works)

 

It's possible to change the strength of the lightsaber's glow with RGB saber options.

 

What he suggested makes a choice for the user. And why should code be wasted on such, when instead you can have all that he suggested and more, and have it completely customizable?

 

There would actually be ways to abuse the system to make new trails if this is implemented (especially if it falls back on defaults if it can't find certain files), as the lightsaber trail is rendered regardless of the existence of an actual lightsaber blade provided trailstyle is 1.

 

As it stands, I apologize for my tone, but the suggestion simply irked me for the above reasons.

[JRHockney*]

Not everyone is a coding genius here, Lathain. Some people are on this forum because they believe in OJP and make suggestions based on what they think would be a good idea. Toka believes in OJP enough to lend us is server to test Enhanced and his opinion is more than welcome as far as I'm concerned.

[Lathain Valtiel]

I'm not speaking in terms of code, I am speaking in terms of logic.

 

Let's put this in a simple way.

 

Say you have two choices.

 

Choice 1, his suggestion: The ability for hilt files to specify a blade's trail, the ability to select the default color for the user, the ability to select the core type for the user, and so on.

 

Or, we have Razor's suggestion, which modded mine:

 

Choice 2: Instead of doing the above, we enable core makers to insert a directory, say cores, in their pk3s. Now, we have sub-choices.

 

---Sub Choice 1: Inside this core directory would be subdirectories, each for a new core and trail. Inside them, besides the texture files required for any saber, would be perhaps a small text file, similar to description.txt whose only purpose would be to name the style.

 

Along with this, the core pk3 would include a new shader file, of course in the shaders directory, so that their core would work correctly (effectively just renaming paths unless you want to change the shaders themselves around too).

 

Presumably what would happen is a similar deal with the holster files... The game would read off the cores directory for files, and add the core styles to a nifty little menu similarly to that used for hilts (probably on another screen similarly to how RGB Saber Setup does it). I'd be willing to do the UI work if necessary, though I'm not sure there is currently a function in JKA that can search through directories for files such as I describe.

 

OR we have sub choice 2.

 

---

 

Sub Choice 2: A similar deal with the .sab files. Perhaps, in the postulated cores directory, we have have text files with a new extension, like, oh, .lsc (Light Saber Core). The .LSC files would name individual core styles, and specify the directory their files are in. The available styles would be displayed ina list almost eaxctly like that of hilts, only probably on a seperate screen.

 

---

 

Selecting the various core styles would override the default lightsaber core (there would of course be an entry named default if possible.). Presumably the core styles would bow to the preferences within .sab files as well.

 

I don't see the contest. Do you?

[Tokakeke]

I'm sorry I haven't looked at every single aspect of the JKA engine. I am more concerned with mapping than I am with CODING. As I did say in my first post I DID NOT UNDERSTAND THE WHOLE OF THIS THREAD.

 

 

If you think my idea's **** fine, but don't start talking down to me like I'm some sort of idiot. It's insulting.

[Lathain Valtiel]

Hey, Ia lready apologized. I'm just illustrating how it doesn't really make much sense.