Exploring Area Modules and their components (Was a Discussion on scripts)

[Pavlos]

[edit 1] I've been able to introduce the modified model in-game, without the shuttle. Although, it's not exporting my new plane which fills the space left by the shuttle placement. Although, I believe it's something related to the textures as I can walk on it (it's just that I can see the skybox below). I'll post an screenshot tomorrow. Maybe we are just a step before being able to perform further changes on area models. I guess others will be easier than this one (my apologies of not choosing the most easy one for testing).

 

You can walk on the empty space? You are doing well then . Erm... a way you could cover up that empty hole is by creating a placeable that is just a flat object with the same texture as the ground around it.

[blawk]

You can walk on the empty space? You are doing well then . Erm... a way you could cover up that empty hole is by creating a placeable that is just a flat object with the same texture as the ground around it.

 

Haven't edited the walkmesh but I can walk over it except just one edge (apparently it's just an edge) that stops me from walking sometimes. I just can get around it.

 

BTW, a plane mesh is a flat object that's what I did exactly as mentioned in the message. I could try to spawn a re-skinned shuttle there. Although, I'm now trying to ge a working Mr. Potato there (I use that mesh when testing, no specific reason for the potato powah). Will bring a Millenium Falcon mesh probably, but that's going to require a few hours. It's the best solution to avoid messing with the plane anymore.

 

Cheers.

[blawk]

OK, I finally got myself where I wanted to be since I started messing around with the model.

 

 

Some [highlight]facts[/highlight] on area editing:

 

• Sometimes it's a matter of having good luck. Errors come when compiling probably (no, it won't stop compiling, but the model won't behave as expected)
  
• [highlight]Removal of (tri)meshes is OK and will always work. Just make sure it's not merged down with another object or alike.[/highlight]
  
• You can't use overloaded meshes. Keep it simple.
  
• [highlight] For adding new meshes, keep in mind that they need to be linked to another Aurora object in the model (eg. AuroraBase, AuroraTrimesh). This seems to solve most of the woes. Apparently, they also must override mat values (ambient color, etc).[/highlight]
  
• [highlight] Adding new lights works! [/highlight]
  

 

More to come, I just need to catch up and find out WT* is making some objects to keep out of getting their textures loaded.

 

Cheers.

[Pavlos]

Adding new lights works!

 

How?! I was under the impression that this was the thing that was stopping area creation... please tell us how this works!

[stoffe]

More to come, I just need to catch up and find out WT* is making some objects to keep out of getting their textures loaded.

 

I don't know if it applies to your situation, but I have a vague memory of the game engine being a bit touchy about loading textures from override that aren't already present in the texturepacks, for some types of objects. If all else fails you could try adding your new textures to the Texturepack ERF file and see if that makes a difference.

[Darkkender]

Hey Blawk I am really eager to hear more about your results. Does this mean you can remove some model objects from a scene with some limited success? Such as removing crates and barrels that are not placeable files but directly inserted into a module? I would really love to hear more on that Voodoo magic.

[blawk]

Hey Blawk I am really eager to hear more about your results. Does this mean you can remove some model objects from a scene with some limited success? Such as removing crates and barrels that are not placeable files but directly inserted into a module? I would really love to hear more on that Voodoo magic.

 

You can actually remove any (tri)mesh and it won't be a problem unless it conflicts with something else (like a linked mesh). For example, it's OK to remove a crate but it's stupid to try to remove a ground plane because objects right on it will be linked (except emitters, but I'm unsure if this applies for every case).

 

MDL requires you to have everything linked. From (top) parent (AuroraBase) to each AuroraTrimesh. Unlinked objects aren't exported.

 

I'm still getting sick of the texture loading problem, I have no issues when adding new objects but it sometimes work (ie. loads an existing texture) and sometimes doesn't.

 

BTW, you need to de-activate sanity checks when exporting the model via NWNmax. It sometimes shows up stuff which isn't actually broken. Then use mdlops to compile the ascii mdl.

 

No need to use the replacer or similar stuff. That's good for skins and the like, but way too out of place for area models.

 

I may be able to get time for describing the process with more detail, but it's unlikely I'll get it soon. I'm too busy right now

 

Anyways, it's not that complicated. If you have minimal knowledge on the tools, it's just a matter of tinkering for a while.

 

Cheers.

[Darkkender]

I didn't know mdlops had a compile feature. I've always tried using the replacer feature and always had failures. If you could screenshot the compile method It would be really apreciated.

[blawk]

I didn't know mdlops had a compile feature. I've always tried using the replacer feature and always had failures. If you could screenshot the compile method It would be really apreciated.

 

Select the file of the ascii MDL exported by NWNmax. Click "Read & Write model" button. You're done for testing.

 

It's documented in the README.

 

Cheers.

[blawk]

I don't know if it applies to your situation, but I have a vague memory of the game engine being a bit touchy about loading textures from override that aren't already present in the texturepacks, for some types of objects. If all else fails you could try adding your new textures to the Texturepack ERF file and see if that makes a difference.

 

How can I do that actually?

 

I'm just done with the model and got everything working except the texture for the oil tanks.

 

Many thanks in advance.

 

Cheers!

[Pavlos]

Extract the entire ERF with KotOR Tool. Add your new file to them and then recompile with the same name and put it in "texturepacks" (I think that is it's name).

[blawk]

Extract the entire ERF with KotOR Tool. Add your new file to them and then recompile with the same name and put it in "texturepacks" (I think that is it's name).

 

Oh, yep. But I was thinking on a method which is not that overkill. I think there's a tool around that allows you to append files to an existing erf. Any idea on that?

 

I'll try the way you mentioned, but it would be good to have some other one. I don't know how one could solve the problem of distributing modified ERF files, as each one is around 400MB. That's just so hardcore that I would give up and use basic stuff which doesn't require me to touch the ERF files.

 

Thanks again!

Cheers.

 

edit 1: [highlight]Didn't work[/highlight]. Yikes, I extracted everything, then added my file and it doesn't show up in the module. The texture isn't loaded . Any idea on other reasons that could cause this malfunction? TGA file properties?

[blawk]

Those are textures. I suspect they may be some sort of emiters (vfx) just like smoke and fireplace effect.

 

Yes, OmniEmitters are placed in the area (room) models. For example, in the Polar Plateau (261tel), right in the middle of the crashed shuttle trimesh (for smoke vfx). Actually, you can play with them (just clone one and place it wherever you want).

[stoffe]

Yikes, I extracted everything, then added my file and it doesn't show up in the module. The texture isn't loaded . Any idea on other reasons that could cause this malfunction? TGA file properties?

 

Some more random ideas that come to mind, keep in mind that modeling isn't my area of expertise so take what I say with a grain of salt. Anyway, the game is fairly touchy with texture properties in some places. For example I've had trouble getting portraits to show unless they are 24 Bit, while clothing textured had to be 32 bit (with an alpha cannel).

 

If you haven't already, make sure the textures are 32 bit with a blank alpha channel (unless you use it for something of course).

 

Also, the dimensions of textures matter... Don't know if there's a fancy name for it in english, but it has to follow the scale 16, 32, 64, 128, 256, 512 etc, or it may cause trouble.

 

Finally, check that the names of your textures aren't too long or contain fancy characters. Resrefs (filename without extension) can be at most 16 characters long and only contain lowercase alphanumerical characters and no spaces.