MD3s vs npcs and large numbers of both

[Thor the Bassis]

I've been doing some mapping for a single player level where you escape from the federation ship as Qui Gon Jinn and Obi-Wan Kenobi in Episode 1. Everything has been going smoothly until I enter the massive hangar at the end of the level. Now might be a good time to point out the hangar isn't as massive as the one in the film. It is, however about 10,000 radiant units square and has one large model which is the trade federation dropship that Obi-Wan will stow away in. In the hangar there are 27 MTTs and 27 ATTs (ye alot of npcs). My comp. will cope with this with only slight lag that you can only just tell. Then you leave this hangar (as you board a different ship to Obi_Wan) but first have to go to the control room of the hangar and open the secret entrance (to hide the fact the federation have an army they have stored all the tanks in secret compartments behind secret doors! ooooooh!). In the control room about 20 battle droids are spawned when you go up the lift to the control room and then it becomes more viable to count seconds per frame not frames per second. This wouldn't be a problem but I want the control room to be attached to the roof and looking out over the hangar through large windows as if its a place where the whole hangar can be overseen from.

 

My question is this: Will changing all the MTT and ATT npcs to MD3s lower the lag or will I have to do something clever with a camera portal which shows a picture in the windows which portals to a low poly map showing the basics of what would be seen from the control room?

 

Or possibly script for the whole ship to be boarded by all the vehicles and then they disappear before you go to the control room?

 

(did any of that make sense?)(is this forum as dead as a very dead thing?)

[Johnpp]

The forum is not all dead. Just most parts of it.

 

No, turning them into .MD3 files will not give better FPS, and you will also get the NPCs root animation. You know, when they stick their arms and legs out.

 

If you turn them into MD3's and lower the poly/vertex count it will give you better FPS but you still get that annoying root animation.

 

I think you should just stick with NPCs unless you can model. Then you can change that silly animation.

[Thor the Bassis]

ok i've turned to scripting all the models to board the dropship - this takes three minutes! It's worked but after about 5 scripts fire the game crashes It's either the number of scripts running or the number of models in the same area - all the models move to the same spot and then become invisible and non-solid. There must be 30 npcs in the same spot but invisible and non-solid so there must be some kinda engine mess up.

 

I shall try moving the models away from this spot but this could apply to someone else so i think theres a limit to how many models can be in one spot even though they're non-solid.