A start on the .MESH file format

[Trotski12]

Have you tested this with long spear units, and do they have second and third rows pitching in on the fight.

Yes the bounding sphere dictates how far away the weapon is effective, from the battle I fought with these models (in 1.1 vanilla) it seemed that the AI could get all ranks of the spears involved.

It's not how the things are going on with pikes... only one or two ranks can fight, ignorring the 4 th value of the bouding sphere...

Take a look :





crap...

[GrumpyOldMan]

Hi Trotski12

It's not how the things are going on with pikes... only one or two ranks can fight, ignorring the 4 th value of the bouding sphere...

Take a look :

crap...

I think it's a limitation on the game engine rather than anything to do with the bounding sphere. But when you sit down and analyse it, the fact that they're animating, moving, checking for collisions for a few thousand figures and running an AI, all at a reasonable frame rate is not something to be sneezed at. The code is very well optimised and it can only get better from here. Once you've got the basics like vertex/matrix animation, collisions and (sigh) eye candy done you can concentrate on further improvements - like combined arms, the end of the 'propeller wheel' (relic of the nineties that it is), proper use of depth in formation animations, etc. Did I mention combined arms by the way ?

Cheers

GrumpyOldMan

[GrumpyOldMan]

Hi All

Just a quick question (me being too lazy to try it myself), has anybody had any joy in using the Officer slots in the edu?

Cheers

GrumpyOldMan

[SigniferOne]

Well it really seems like the bounding sphere is too small if those spearmen let the enemy approach them so closely. Try doubling the size of the bounding sphere, see what happens :)

PS I've been too lazy to try the officer slots as well.

[Andromachus Theodoulos]

@Grumpy,

Update on CAS converting...

I have converted several RTW models form various mods trying to bring them in MilkShape.

I tried NTW2 models and I was able to bring them in to MilkShape quite easily.

I also tried both RTWBI (Barbarian Invasion) and some RTR models and on some of the models the conveter poops out only producing a 1KB file with the following in it...

//Milkshape 3D

Frames: 1
Frame: 1

On others, like the Burgundian Lancers (RTWBI) I did get a file but an error message showed up saying: "parameter must be positive", when I bring it up in MilkShape, I get an "Error importing MilkShape 3D ascii" This has happened with the bulk of the RTR files as well

I am using the latest converter you posted, 1.2.

Let me know and I will post some txt files for you to look at...

Please advise...

Thanks!!!

AT

[Trotski12]

Hum i'll try, but it seems that bouding sphere have something to do with the visibility too. I mean, one time i tried to change the first digit to 15. (i'm a bezerker, i know :p) and, when viewing at the unit IG with with a particular angle of view, (when you're looking the face of your guy, move to look at the left shoulder) the guys are disapearing when closing to theim, from a distance around 5-8 meters IG.

Well did'nt noticed something different, cause of work (in france we got a presidential issue :p ) but i'll try to look what happens more carefully.


@grumpyoldman :

didn't really understood what you said... can i mail you just to discuss what exactly you know about the game is working, if i'm not too disturbing, and if you got the time to do so?

(and, i think, it's not a bad idea to experiment what's the bouding sphere issue and post here clearly what does it do)

Edit :

So i tried to change each value..

Well for the 3 firts ones, it change the visibility of the unit



(here the 2 first values changes to 5)

and the fourth, it seems that it have nothing to do with weapon length :



the cahrge and fight sequence is exactly the same as if i did'nt modified the values.

something strange, without any modifcation on those values, just the model's pike lenght
the landsknecht had litteraly "stepped" to death the swiss, without allowing theim to flee.

But the thing is taht they still "engage" melee at the same distance (the phalanx formation proprety i think) :





any suggestion?

[Lysander]

has anybody had any joy in using the Officer slots in the edu?

I have been able to add officers in through the edu (just like in RTW), but I only tried the vanilla meshes for this

[GrumpyOldMan]

Hi Guys

I've been working on some mid 17c musketeers and I've finally finished the coat, leg and hat variations. I've put up some pics so people can see. I'll upload a zip with the meshes and textures so people working in that period can use them if they want to.











Edit:- I've uploaded the files at http://www.twcenter.net/forums/downl...o=file&id=1307 there's no text entries though.

Cheers

GrumpyOldMan

[GrumpyOldMan]

Hi AT

@Grumpy,

Update on CAS converting...

I have converted several RTW models form various mods trying to bring them in MilkShape.

I tried NTW2 models and I was able to bring them in to MilkShape quite easily.

I also tried both RTWBI (Barbarian Invasion) and some RTR models and on some of the models the conveter poops out only producing a 1KB file with the following in it...

//Milkshape 3D

Frames: 1
Frame: 1

On others, like the Burgundian Lancers (RTWBI) I did get a file but an error message showed up saying: "parameter must be positive", when I bring it up in MilkShape, I get an "Error importing MilkShape 3D ascii" This has happened with the bulk of the RTR files as well

I am using the latest converter you posted, 1.2.

Let me know and I will post some txt files for you to look at...

Please advise...

Thanks!!!

AT

Ooops, well you know the last exe I sent you was to fix a problem with converting cas' with more than 10 groups.... ummh, it looks like this one only works on cas' of more than 10 groups . Where it bombs out, my guess is there's less than 10 groups in the cas. Try converting with 1.1 and see if that works while I take an extremely large tree branch to my pc and code. The Milkshape ascii files are straight text so you can open them up in Notepad or similar, if you do get a problem compare a known good ascii file with the problem file for any formating issues. If there's an extra linefeed hanging around you'll get 2 or 3 little squares in the number of meshes.

Cheers

GrumpyOldMan

[GrumpyOldMan]

Hi Trotski12

Hum i'll try, but it seems that bouding sphere have something to do with the visibility too. I mean, one time i tried to change the first digit to 15. (i'm a bezerker, i know :p) and, when viewing at the unit IG with with a particular angle of view, (when you're looking the face of your guy, move to look at the left shoulder) the guys are disapearing when closing to theim, from a distance around 5-8 meters IG.

Well did'nt noticed something different, cause of work (in france we got a presidential issue :p ) but i'll try to look what happens more carefully.


@grumpyoldman :

didn't really understood what you said... can i mail you just to discuss what exactly you know about the game is working, if i'm not too disturbing, and if you got the time to do so?

(and, i think, it's not a bad idea to experiment what's the bouding sphere issue and post here clearly what does it do)

Edit :

So i tried to change each value..

Well for the 3 firts ones, it change the visibility of the unit

(here the 2 first values changes to 5)

and the fourth, it seems that it have nothing to do with weapon length :

the cahrge and fight sequence is exactly the same as if i did'nt modified the values.

something strange, without any modifcation on those values, just the model's pike lenght
the landsknecht had litteraly "stepped" to death the swiss, without allowing theim to flee.

But the thing is taht they still "engage" melee at the same distance (the phalanx formation proprety i think) :



any suggestion?

Thanks for experimenting with the bounding sphere values the more we learn the more we can do as modders.

Re your question on my knowledge of the mechanics of m2tw, I don't have any sort of detailed knowledge of this particular game but I have been looking at RTS' for a long time and I can guess what the system designers are doing and what sort of methods they are probably using. The main issue is not to get confused with control of individual soldiers (units) and regiments (formations). The bounding sphere is one method of controlling the interaction of the units (we're just not sure exactly how yet ). Controlling the behaviour of one unit however won't affect the controls placed on the formation. The formation has a separate and distinct method of control and once the formation has been set, the information on where a particular unit should be is relayed to that unit, and then various controls, actions and interactions affect that unit. So this means that although we can play all we like with the bounding sphere, this will not affect how the formations move and react - so charge and reaction remain the same. I don't know how deeply you want to go into this but there are lots of excellent articles and tutorials spread around various gaming and programming sites. Don't be put off by the age of any articles, the fundamental basics of movement, formations, collisions, pathfinding etc have not changed that much in the last 10-15 years - just the code to do it has improved dramatically

Have you tried shortening the pike length to spear length with the same bounding sphere values, be interesting to see what happens.

Cheers

GrumpyOldMan

[Trotski12]

The main issue is not to get confused with control of individual soldiers (units) and regiments (formations).

I know, and as i'm trying to make pikes more usefull (well, more real), i'm tryign to determinate how i can make the guys separatly (units) fight from a longer distance, and after i'll what i can do for formations (but i think noone found a way to edit theim, isn't it? if someone knows something about it, i'll love him forever :p (please, girls first :D )

And i don't know how much anims and skeletons affect both the units side and the formation one.

fshort spears and long 4 th value :

http://trotski12.free.fr/mtw2/splb.jpg

long spears and short 4 th value

http://trotski12.free.fr/mtw2/lpsb.jpg

Oh, and i have to shut down the converter every time i launch the game, cause it slow it down... too much

[hellenes]

Grumpy is it possible to increase the body part variations? So almost every soldier in a unit looks different? It would be handy for a possible LotR2TW mod...

[Herkus]

yes, it is possible

[hellenes]

yes, it is possible

So it is possible to have 150 guys looking all different with different faces/bodies/arms/legs? WOW!!!!
This might allow to make an Orc Unit in which every single orc is different...
But doesnt it have a hit on performance or its bareable?

[Herkus]

So it is possible to have 150 guys looking all different with different faces/bodies/arms/legs? WOW!!!!
This might allow to make an Orc Unit in which every single orc is different...
But doesnt it have a hit on performance or its bareable?

Well I doubt that you could make 150 different body models and I guess that it is not possible technically too.
But for example you can make for you Orc unit 5 different body models, 5 different leg models, 5 different arm models, 5 different helmets. By making that amount of models for different part - you can get 625 variations, not to mention that you can also add 5 different heads and even more shields.

The performance would be hit if those models would be way too detailed (poly count).

[Bwian]

Making progress..... but I can't work out what I am doing wrong here

I have not bothered to fully weight the model yet, but have short-cutted it by assigning all the verts to the abs bone. I know what this will do, and it's doing what I expected. No..the problem is elsewhere!

I have a problem getting the textures to show up. The texture has been converted from a DXT5 to a texture file, and is in the texture folder for the model. It just won't show up! I have changed the texture entry in the models db, and changed the mesh there. The mesh change shows up fine..but the texture is all wrong.

I also can't get the models to show up close in.....zoom in and they disappear!

It's not a lod thing...since I have duplicated the same model for lod0,1,2 and 3. It's baffling me.....

[Herkus]

@Bwian.
Hmm, thats strange. Did you mapped your mesh in Max? If yes, maybe during exporting to milkshape the texture map coordinates were lost?
Can't think of anything else right now.

[hellenes]

Well I doubt that you could make 150 different body models and I guess that it is not possible technically too.
But for example you can make for you Orc unit 5 different body models, 5 different leg models, 5 different arm models, 5 different helmets. By making that amount of models for different part - you can get 625 variations, not to mention that you can also add 5 different heads and even more shields.

The performance would be hit if those models would be way too detailed (poly count).

So the limit is 5 different heads? Hmmm so it means that 30 guys will look exactly the same...
Is this an engine limit? Hardcoded?

[Herkus]

So the limit is 5 different heads? Hmmm so it means that 30 guys will look exactly the same...
Is this an engine limit? Hardcoded?

5 heads are not the limit. I have seen seven iirc. 30 guys might share the same face out of 150 (if there are 5 different head models), but every other part from their outfit, body or equipment will be different.

There probably is the engine limit, though this is just a guess. Hardcoded most likely, though we know very little(or nothing) about hardcoded stuff for unit models.

[Roman_Man#3]

I think that 30 guys looking the same is a lot better than 150 guys. And a lot of Orcs had very similar faces, just use a texture to differentiate

[Bwian]

Herkus .... that's what I thought initially, but when I imported it into Milkshape and pointed the material editor at the correct texture file, the texture showed up fine there.... so I know the mapping is intact.

When I load the model into the editor, though, I do not get it textured.

The same happened, though, when I was making hte 'mix n match' highland arquebusier on the tutorial.

[GrumpyOldMan]

Hi Trotski12

I know, and as i'm trying to make pikes more usefull (well, more real), i'm tryign to determinate how i can make the guys separatly (units) fight from a longer distance, and after i'll what i can do for formations (but i think noone found a way to edit theim, isn't it? if someone knows something about it, i'll love him forever :p (please, girls first :D )

And i don't know how much anims and skeletons affect both the units side and the formation one.

fshort spears and long 4 th value :

http://trotski12.free.fr/mtw2/splb.jpg

long spears and short 4 th value

http://trotski12.free.fr/mtw2/lpsb.jpg

Oh, and i have to shut down the converter every time i launch the game, cause it slow it down... too much

Thanks again for your work on experimenting, from your screen pics, it does seem that the 4th values or sphere radius does have an effect on fighting distance. Did you notice that the charge distance, etc for the formation remained the same for both cases?

Oh, and i have to shut down the converter every time i launch the game, cause it slow it down... too much

If you press the keyboard 'End' key it will suspend processing of the converter, the 'Home' key restarts operation.

Cheers

GrumpyOldMan

[GrumpyOldMan]

Hi Bwian

Herkus .... that's what I thought initially, but when I imported it into Milkshape and pointed the material editor at the correct texture file, the texture showed up fine there.... so I know the mapping is intact.

When I load the model into the editor, though, I do not get it textured.

The same happened, though, when I was making hte 'mix n match' highland arquebusier on the tutorial.

I'm not sure what's happened here. Have you checked the Tab/Model/Comments to make sure the correct bounding sphere values are present? Have you updated the texture normal file? If the texture shows up ok in Milkshape it should be transferring across to m2tw. Have you checked to make sure that the vertex weighting has been kicked in? Even if you are not using it, it must be present to make a valid m2tw mesh. Go to Menu/Vertex/Sims2 Unimesh Show Bone Assignment 2 (or 3 or 4) v.4.07 and for good measure go to Menu/Vertex/Sims2 Unimesh Fix Underweighted Bones v 4.07. This should make sure that the vertex weighting is alive and well.

If none of this works, put the Milkshape file up at some file storage site and PM the address and I'll have a look.

Cheers

GrumpyOldMan

[Caliban]

Looks good GOM, love the hats

[GrumpyOldMan]

Hi hellenes

So the limit is 5 different heads? Hmmm so it means that 30 guys will look exactly the same...
Is this an engine limit? Hardcoded?

No this is just a common sense limit , If you have 150 bodies stored then the texture, unless you make it huge, is going to be very basic indeed. Also for each body texture variation you have to have a body mesh stored within memory so they can be accessed for every frame of animation. So yes you can have a huge texture and a mesh with 150 body variations but you'd be limited to only 5 different unit types. The texture would be a drag on your GPU and the mesh storage and access would be a drag on your CPU and ram. The same number of tris (unless you make the meshes FPS-like superdetailed) would be rendered.

A common sense limit of 3-5 bodies, 2-3 legs, 2-3 arms, 4-8 heads and variations in helmets, weapons and shields together with imaginative use of attachments and equipment would make pretty sure that no two identical figures are created in a regiment of 100-150 figures; and the odds, if there are two identical, of them standing next to each other are pretty small.

Cheers

GrumpyOldMan

[GrumpyOldMan]

Hi Caliban

Looks good GOM, love the hats

Thanks, maybe I can get a job as a milliner now

I'm not happy with them though, I made them a while back for something that had backfaces culled so the rim had to have both sides and I thought I'd cleared it up but looking at the pictures shows me that some of the unnecessary tris are still there, still it was an interesting technical exercise for me

Cheers

GrumpyOldMan

[Bwian]

Thanks for the tips GOM .... let me clarify a little as to what I have/haven't got happening.

1) Weighting.
I am sure the weighting I am seeing is the weighting I put in. I assumed the game model would have to have it in some form, so I assigned all verts to the abs bone. I knew the effect this would have, and I knew it would be easy to spot.

2) Textures.
I haven't changed the texture normal file ... I think this may eaplain some of what I am getting. I will look at that tonight. The texture I am seeing is definitely not showing correctly..but it is showing something! I tried changing the texture back to a stcok texture, and it was clear that the texture changed. Also...the model isn't see through..as I would expect if it coiuldn't find the texture.

3) I have correct values in the model comments tab ( I think ) but I am not 100% sure. I copied these from a stock model, and made sure I had:

class name ( eg head, arms )
part name ( what I had called the part )
0 ( all the bits I looked at had a 0 there! )

Is this right?

What baffles me is that the texture is clearly not showing correct UV mapping, or is showing some very odd variation on it! Also, parts of the model keep disappearing! Look at a rank of troops, and the middle ones are OK, but the ones to the side are just floating heads! Torsos keep vanishing.... very odd! I know I am close.... but this is just not 100% and it's maddening to be this close and yet not succeed

[Casuir]

Pic would help.

[Bwian]

This is the progress to date.

Fixing the normal map sorted out hte texture failing to appear, and this is a step forward! I had the wrong version of hte file in place, and it was screwing it in ways I couldn't have guessed!

Still have some baffling problems though.

Ignore the posture the models are in...I have not properly dealt with the vertex weighting, and I won't until I have the other problems solved!!

problem 1)
I have several variations in the model, all of which are actually in the screenshot...but as you can see, there are pieces missing. Notably, one of the torso variations. Which is a bit odd. Also, when you look at the models to the left of the formation, all you have are heads. If the models were displaying correctly in the other models, why do they vanish ? Aside from the missing torso, all the model parts are showing up in the unit. 3 heads, 2 arms, 1 leg.

problem 2)
When I zoom in close, my new models vanish well before the other units. I thought the lod switching distance was the distance the model switched out... so up close, the highest detail model should ALWAYS be visible. Mine vanish before the English peasants they are fighting.....

[Casuir]

Interesting, are the alphas on the main texture set up right? I'm sure they are but it would cause the meshs to disappear. The heads look like its dropping down to the lower lod, are you using the same file for those? Lod distance is set in the models_db iirc so you might want to check the values there.