Hi Bwian

Quote Originally Posted by Bwian
can't blame a guy for trying

If the animations work like they did in RTW, then it should just be a question of adjusting the root bone start positions, and applying the samechange in translation on the Z axis to set it on the ground. The rest of hte movements are relative to this, so the actual movements could be preserved. As you say...the actual distance moved would need changing if the skeleton was a smaller unit. This adjusts their actual movement rate on the battlefield ( good ) for those short-legged units!

The main worry I had was the eventual size of the animation pack when we are done.... I reckon I need a unique set for Dwarves, one for Orcs and some odd-balls...which I hope to modify Elephant skeletons to get. The mounts have far fewer animations, and this is a BIG time saver!

Some of the animas I want, though, are simple re-scales with the bones in odentical proportion. Vercingetorix's tool allowed a 'global re-scale' of hte skeleton, which used th estandard animations with a scaled up model. Does this possibility still exist? For a 'large human' such as the Ushabti or Bone Giant, Chaos Demons and Rat Ogre, I could use such a facility. It would avoid the extra animations in the pack, and save a whole lot of duplicate animations being packed. Just a thought
Seeing we are now rebuilding the idx and dat files (Yayyy!!!!) to be used there is a beaut little facility available in descr_skeleton.txt (which is used as the basis for the building), SCALE!!!! . This means that if you want to use the fs_horse animations for a small pony, you can copy the horse animations, apply a scale and rename it bw_small_pony or whatever. This has the effect (I'm assuming but it is logical) that the skeleton and all it's height above ground and movement would be scaled as well. If you have a look at fs_horse it has a scale of 1.12 or something similar applied in the descr_skeleton.txt. So if you're mainly concerned with just rescaled skeletons, the gift from Caliban of the raw anim files is really great because now we have the facility to bring scale into the engine with just editing the descr_skeleton.txt. Just be aware that if the engine finds a rescaled skeleton it has to load all the animations again so memory might be an issue if you use lots of rescaled skeletons. Moderation and planning ahead should make this a non-issue though.

Cheers

GrumpyOldMan