adding all the HP points without any real model geometry? I could imagine if it were possible that the unit would really look (no pun intended) strange seeing weapons fire and missiles coming from out of nowhere. Still, a whole race/mod could be created in record time right? Geeze, I need to a new hobby before I lose it completrly.
You're better off setting up a box as needed and giving the box a completely transparent texture..... I dont think BZ2 can make hps jsut float on their own (unless you have a dummyroot, then it MIGHT work)
plus, have you ever tried to GET in a vehicle that has no geometry? Its nearly impossible. Same with vehicles that have teeny tiny geometry.
Yeah, its possible. I had made a construction rig once that was basicly only a bunch of hp's linked to one main hp to see what was required to make it. During the test the construction rig drove through my ship after i first placed it. You'll need to have all the required parts for each type of class in order not cause any problems. My first model looked good in the modeling program but after i got it imported i tried placing it on the map & didn't see anything. While testing a weapon i noticed a small fruit fly moving around on my monitor & i tried to kill it will my hand only to find out that was the model i placed. no bigger than the size of a grain of sand.
dont need to make it small or no gemoetry, open the thing in threed, select every material, go to the opacity slider and stick it down to 0...
one transparent vehicle lol
That's cool GH. It just seems the more I consider modeling stuff for the game the wilder my imagination becomes. I remember in one dream I had years back in which I was being hounded by a Scion Warrior tank in the wreckage of a bombed out city trying to get away from it without must success. Ever since then my mind has started to imagine the coolest looking ships. If only I can figure out how to reproduce these models in my 3d modeling application. Boy! Would I be one happy camper...BNG.
PS: I'm going to try to produce some transparent units something like the alien in the movie Predator. I recall one Cerberi unit that looks nearly invisible. I wonder if it was painted with a transparent texture? GSL, supports something like it but I think it's more of a shader effect. Just have to do some more testing with th material editor tools to figure it out.
Cool TJ, I give er a whirl bro!
Quotedont need to make it small or no gemoetry, open the thing in threed, select every material, go to the opacity slider and stick it down to 0...
one transparent vehicle lol
Unless you turn all the lighting off.
i vote useing morphtank class if u want the ship to also be stealthed
Quote from: General BlackDragon on July 07, 2008, 10:05:22 PM
i vote useing morphtank class if u want the ship to also be stealthed
Same, and give it the crome effect (instead of animated) with the smoke.tga as the env texture, so it looks like it fades out.
How?
Quote from: Steeveeo on July 07, 2008, 11:40:47 PM
Same, and give it the crome effect (instead of animated) with the smoke.tga as the env texture, so it looks like it fades out.
that works?
Um... no.
-Av-
poo....:(
You might wanna ask GSH to get that working.. I remember that Chinese units faded out when they morphed.
Quote from: Avatar on July 08, 2008, 12:06:19 AM
Um... no.
-Av-
I don't see why not. Since, IIRC, you can set a chrome texture on a per-race basis, just set it to smoke.tga.
Don't believe me? Make a new scion ship that morphs into something with an invisible geometry (somehow), then do the console command chrome.texture smoke.tga.
I sometimes set that for the fun of all biometal effects looking like water.
The actual cloaking effect is just VIR, which is just 'winking' out. What you're doing is using the chrome effect from the morph as a sort of inbetween state, between solid and invisible, so the ship goes sortof smokey and then blinks out. To do that you're sacrificing the chrome texture of the map...
Now, in BZC scrap is painted, not chromed, so it would look a bit better than using this in regular BZ2, but you're still sacrificing the chrome texture... and I have things that use the chrome texture that I don't want looking smokey or watery...
Still, it's a brilliant idea and nothing in BZ-land is without drawbacks. Might be useful for some of the Chinese missions should I ever get to TRO...
And I'm sure GBD is off messing with it right now... :)
-Av-
The map's chrome texture should survive ok I think, you can now specify a chrome texture in the units odf.
What I think nobody is going to be able to do is make a morphing tank that morphs into something with an invisible geometry, as morphing is just animating the model, I don't think you can make it disappear like that.
Is there any way for a non-animated unit to use chrome morph as it cloaks??
Any unit that is able to morph can be chromed, even though it isn't animated.
I wonder if invisible geometry can be set in the hierarchal tree? In GSL using opening it and right clicking an object in the tree has an option to uncheck make visible and the object no longer appears. However, when I save the object and view it in 3DEX the object still appears visible. I guess what I need to do is add a transparent shader to the texture I use for it.
Textures with transparency's will work, but I don't know how you could switch them in game, the ship would always be transparent. That would be very bad for the fps.
yea avatar, it could be set per ship. Each ship could have a different chrome texture. Maybe thicker images for the bigger ships :)
Could someone please do an example?
I have been trying to get this working with no success.
I added that Spectator ship thinger awhile back. Lets you wander around the battlefield invisible/untargetable to everything.
Just an example of how to get a non animated ship to chrome-morph.. please.
I think if you dont specify an animation, then it wont. I think it will still chrome if you dont specify.
I speak "Steveveeo"... let me translate. :)
If you don't specify an animation then it won't animate during the morph, but it will still chrome.
So... if you can specify a chrome texture per ship then this should work to some extent. The ship should go smoky or semi-transparent or whatever texture you choose, and then completely invisible at the end if you use the 'cloaked when morphed' flag.
An example? Lol... I'll get my rabid quality control guy on that right away, as if he already wasn't... :evil:
-Av-
@ Whoever asked will it chrome during morph after I answered it......
Quote from: Warfreak on July 09, 2008, 02:35:38 PM
Any unit that is able to morph can be chromed, even though it isn't animated.
WHAT DID I JUST FINISH SAYING!!!! Please read all posts, helps keep the topics going in circles... Not mad, just seemed pointless to make Avatar reanswer an already answered Mystery of the Universe :roll:
@ Avatar: I can put together a quickie chroming box.. :D
Quote from: Avatar on July 10, 2008, 11:49:30 AM
I speak "Steveveeo"... let me translate. :)
Oh hush! I was distracted when I wrote that! :P (Mainly with this missing AIP issue)
I Actually havn't been paying much attention to that yet, although it sounds freakishly interesting :evil:
I could make the ships use any texture i want, at and alpha i want, to achieve desired effect. :)
Quote from: Warfreak on July 10, 2008, 02:04:28 PM
@ Whoever asked will it chrome during morph after I answered it......
WHAT DID I JUST FINISH SAYING!!!! Please read all posts, helps keep the topics going in circles... Not mad, just seemed pointless to make Avatar reanswer an already answered Mystery of the Universe :roll:
@ Avatar: I can put together a quickie chroming box.. :D
So to crome an unanimated unit morphing is impossible? :P
Doesn't the cloak start instantly or does it wait for the morph animation? (Referring to in pb4)
If i've been looking at GH's Phantom Warrior correctly, it seems to pull it off after the morph.