Question about to place a Elephant in....

[Jumper]

I wanted to ask how i could place a Elephant ( unit ) for the faction thrace.
i don't now how i have to place it.
i think that it has to do with descr_buildings.txt
i know that i have to place 2 things in descr_model_battle.txt one for the elephant and one for the driver cq unit
so far i was with a little bit more than that.
no errors seen and still no elephant on screen.
and a elephant is big believe me and he can't hide it self so quick on my screen.

so if there is someone who wanted to help me, thanks for now.

[Myrddraal]

So you want to add an elephant unit to thrace. By that I take it you want elephants to be recruitable by thrace right?

Lets use carthaginian elephant african as an example

1. Open export_descr_unit.txt and look for the entry for elephants:

type             carthaginian elephant african
dictionary       carthaginian_elephant_african      ; War Elephants
category         cavalry
class            heavy
voice_type       Medium_1
soldier          carthaginian_elephant_crew, 18, 6, 1
mount            elephant african
mount_effect     horse +4, chariot +8, camel +4
attributes       sea_faring, can_run_amok, frighten_foot, frighten_mounted
formation        7, 11, 13,16, 1, square
stat_health      1, 12
stat_pri         6, 3, arrow, 120, 60, missile, archery, piercing, none, 25 ,1
stat_pri_attr    no
stat_sec         6, 8, no, 0, 0, melee, other, blunt, none, 25 ,1
stat_sec_attr    area, launching, ap
stat_pri_armour  0, 4, 0, flesh
stat_sec_armour  13, 3, flesh
stat_heat        -1
stat_ground      0, 1, -6, -1
stat_mental      8, normal, untrained
stat_charge_dist 30
stat_fire_delay  0
stat_food        60, 300
stat_cost        2, 2520, 490, 260, 380, 2520
ownership        carthage

You need to make the following edits here (highlighted in blue):

ownership        carthage, thrace

2. Now open descr_model_battle.txt and find the entry for carthaginian_elephant_crew (you get this name from the 'soldier' line in export_descr_unit.txt)

type                carthaginian_elephant_crew
skeleton            fs_forest_elephant_rider
indiv_range            40
texture                carthage, data/models_unit/textures/unit_carthage_light_archer_carthage.tga
model_flexi        data/models_unit/unit_carthage_archer_high.cas, 15
model_flexi        data/models_unit/unit_carthage_archer_med.cas, 30
model_flexi        data/models_unit/unit_carthage_archer_low.cas, 40
model_flexi        data/models_unit/unit_carthage_archer_lowest.cas, max
model_sprite        carthage, 60.0, data/sprites/carthage_carthaginian_elephant_crew_sprite.spr
model_tri            400, 0.5f, 0.5f, 0.5f

In this section textures are assigned for different factions. For now, we'll use the same textures, but for thrace. Make the following edits (highlighted in blue):

type                carthaginian_elephant_crew
skeleton            fs_forest_elephant_rider
indiv_range            40
texture                carthage, data/models_unit/textures/unit_carthage_light_archer_carthage.tga
texture                thrace, data/models_unit/textures/unit_carthage_light_archer_carthage.tga
model_flexi        data/models_unit/unit_carthage_archer_high.cas, 15
model_flexi        data/models_unit/unit_carthage_archer_med.cas, 30
model_flexi        data/models_unit/unit_carthage_archer_low.cas, 40
model_flexi        data/models_unit/unit_carthage_archer_lowest.cas, max
model_sprite        carthage, 60.0, data/sprites/carthage_carthaginian_elephant_crew_sprite.spr
model_sprite        thrace, 60.0, data/sprites/carthage_carthaginian_elephant_crew_sprite.spr
model_tri            400, 0.5f, 0.5f, 0.5f

And you're done!

BTW, I suggest you read some of the tutorials in the Modification Guides, Tools & Tutorials database. The question you're asking is quite basic, and you could find a lot of your answers there.

Good luck

[Jumper]

Myrddraal Thanks for your explonation, i am happy to see this kind.
and yes i will listen to your suggest, before i put somequestions.
Thanks again...

[Jumper]

sorry but i didn't work
I yhink that i have to change something also in the export_descr_buildings.txt
file and even something in barack ore something else.
But thats what i think, i think!!!
And yes i did read somethings in the side where you advies me to read .
But nothing did work for now.
So i hope you could help me again a little bit
Also you did write one thing wrong in the Sprite.spr
it has to be Thrace in the last blue line.

well people who could help me, please don't be afraid , let me now something, like how the weather is to day.

[Myrddraal]

You're quite right about the last blue line.

So the instructions I gave you didn't look at recruitment at all, (which is handled in edb). Are the elephants availiable for Thrace in Custom Battle?

[Monkwarrior]

It seems to me that probably you need also to "clone" the texture for the mount (elephant itself) from another faction, let's say carthaginians or seleucids. I think that thrace has no elephant texture assigned.

[Makanyane]

you're missing two things to get it into campaign game,
1. export_descr_buildings
look for line like

recruit "carthaginian elephant african" 0 requires factions { carthage, } and resource elephants

and change to

recruit "carthaginian elephant african" 0 requires factions { carthage, thrace, } and resource elephants

that makes them recruitable by thrace but only in regions that already have elephants resource. You can delete 'and resource elephants' bit so everywhere can build them (I'd advise deleting map.rwm as well if you change anything to do with resources but confess to becoming a bit confused by that, btw it doesn't hurt to do it anyway)

To leave 'and resource elephants' in, to restrict them to certain regions - as its not a hidden resource i think the one you need to add is to descr_strat, in the top section of that you need line like

resource elephants, 64, 26

but with co-ordinate of a valid point (not in city, on mountain, in sea etc)
for a location in the region that you want to recruit elephants. (its always advisable to find locations before you start other changes - in case you can't then get in to game to find valid locations) Again for this I'd advise deleting map.rwm (hidden resources go in descr_regions, but elephants appear in both and its a while since I changed anything on this!)

Mydraal's

type carthaginian_elephant_crew
skeleton fs_forest_elephant_rider
indiv_range 40
texture carthage, data/models_unit/textures/unit_carthage_light_archer_carthage.tga
texture thrace, data/models_unit/textures/unit_carthage_light_archer_carthage.tga
model_flexi data/models_unit/unit_carthage_archer_high.cas, 15
model_flexi data/models_unit/unit_carthage_archer_med.cas, 30
model_flexi data/models_unit/unit_carthage_archer_low.cas, 40
model_flexi data/models_unit/unit_carthage_archer_lowest.cas, max
model_sprite carthage, 60.0, data/sprites/carthage_carthaginian_elephant_crew_sprite.spr
model_sprite thrace, 60.0, data/sprites/carthage_carthaginian_elephant_crew_sprite.spr
model_tri 400, 0.5f, 0.5f, 0.5f

I think was actually completely workable - elephant's will look exactly like carthages - as using the same existing texture and sprite - there is really no point in copying existing texture, re-naming it and changing texture line in DMB unless you've actually going to re-design / re-colour a new texture which is a whole different tutorial (same applies for sprite).

You can look up mount type in EDU and then refer to DMB, for this it should be elephant_african

type elephant_african
skeleton fs_indian_elephant ; indian is correct, african skeleton is only for cataphract
indiv_range 40
texture carthage, data/models_unit/textures/mount_african_elephant.tga
texture seleucid, data/models_unit/textures/mount_african_elephant_seleucid.tga
texture parthia, data/models_unit/textures/mount_african_elephant_parthia.tga
texture merc, data/models_unit/textures/mount_african_elephant_mercenary.tga
model_flexi data/models_unit/mount_elephant_african_400.CAS, 15
model_flexi data/models_unit/mount_elephant_african_300.CAS, 30
model_flexi data/models_unit/mount_elephant_african_200.CAS, 60
model_flexi data/models_unit/mount_elephant_african_100.CAS, 80
model_flexi data/models_unit/mount_elephant_african_70.CAS, max
model_tri 700, 0.3f, 0.3f, 0.3f

You can provide 'thrace,' line for texture selecting whichever existing tga is most appropriate. If you don't add in the 'thrace' lines it will generally just default to one of the others (not necesarily the one you wanted) - the thing that actually crashes game is if you specify file path to a tga / dds that doesn't exist.