A start on the .MESH file format

**KnightErrant** · 03-09-2007, 04:12

Nice looking unit there. I tried the Casuir
excision method on feudal_knights_lod0.mesh
and it worked in a custom battle so I'm happy
to see this. Registered now so I've got to
upgrade ASAP to play with the new features.

**GrumpyOldMan** · 03-09-2007, 04:42

Hi @KE

Originally Posted by KnightErrant

I tried the Casuir excision method on feudal_knights_lod0.mesh and it worked in a custom battle so I'm happy to see this.

Me too, This also means that the engine is strong enough to withstand this sort of punishment. From Casuir's post he also deleted from the 3 (changed to 0) down to the end of the streams and it still worked, so the blip in progression between header/footers was also acceptable.

Cheers

GrumpyOldMan

**KnightErrant** · 03-09-2007, 05:38

Didn't catch that the first time. I left
in the 3 0 0 0 converted to 0 0 0 0 but
deleted from the number of vertices to
end of data. That is encouraging that you
can be a little loose in the format and the game
still keeps track of how to get to its data.

**Russ Mitchell** · 03-09-2007, 05:59

Thanks for your work, gents. I follow the gist, but not the code details, and it's still fascinating.

**Andromachus Theodoulos** · 03-09-2007, 16:32

@All...

This is awesome, I am 36 years old and I feel like a little kid in a hobby shop. Having the ability to add and remove weapons and shields??? Awesome.

@GOM,
Will MilkShape allow us to modify the actual mesh, like say if we wanted to modify a helmet to make it look different. Would we be able to do that??

And I assume that if we can switch shields and weapons around, we can also change stuff like the helmet models as well, because some of these are attachments, I think?

Very nice work.

Can't wait for the converters and other stuff to be ready...

Like most everyone else, the code stuff is over my head right now, but the excitement is almost uncontainable...

Also, another note to all...

Would we be able to use MilkShape to modify the Rome Total War models as well. I know they are in a cas format (I think) what extra programming would be required there???

Again, Thanks for all the hard work, you are going to make a lot of Total War diehards very happy...

AT

**Suraknar** · 03-10-2007, 02:50

As Caliban says the mesh file being used is not any sort of file that will work with a current plugin, etc. We don't have to follow the CA development path to come up with working mesh files, just something that the engine recognises and will use. We shouldn't try to make this harder than it really is. I've had some feedback from Caliban and this seems to be getting a bit easier.

What I'm planning is:-

1 A .MESH to MS3D converter - this is about 98% complete

2. Load .MESH and export single group as .MS3D - about 65% complete

3. A .MS3D to .MESH converter - A gleam in my eye but shouldn't take too long

Any other thoughts?

Cheers

GrumpyOldMan

Yes this is sensible indeed, it will permit new units, and Milkshape is very accessible compared to other 3D packages, I for one am excited!

Great progress all! :)

**KnightErrant** · 03-10-2007, 03:50

Well I'm embarassed

, I put my excised unit
in my mod folder, not the true /data/unit_models/_units
etc. last night. I put it in the right place and now I'm crashing
the game. I tried the set
3 to 0 and remove from the number of vertices to the
end of mystery data as well as removing the whole entry
including what I think are the headers and footers but no
luck. Crashes with an unspecified error. Casuir, do you know
what I'm doing wrong?

**GrumpyOldMan** · 03-10-2007, 04:13

Hi All

I just wanted to post that after I put in a bug report on the Regroup groups function in Milkshape that it has been fixed and reuploaded to the Milkshape site. If you've downloaded Milkshape 1.8 before you may want to redownload to get the fixed version.

@Andromachus Theodoulos

Milkshape is a full mesh manipulation tool so you can modify mesh appearance, vertex/bone assignments, etc. Once this all up and running, the possibilities extend well beyond just switching weapons/shields of existing figures. From what I can see and have understood, as long as your figure is understood by the engine it can be used; so this means heads, bodies, arms, legs, weapons, etc will be able to be swapped or exchanged for new ones. As long as they all fit together and have the right values, they'll work.

I could probably do a .CAS to MS3D converter but that may have to wait for a while, although now I think of it I may do one that extracts an unassigned mesh and the M2TW skeleton (different skeletons used). Note to RTW modders, meshes will work with 100% assignments (just not look as purty) but the meshes will have to be sliced up into chunks as groups. Might be easier to use closest fit M2TW body parts and new textures.

Cheers

GrumpyOldMan