Horse Grenadier

[PPQ_Purple]

A Horse Grenadier is a type of mounted soldier armed with grenades. Simple as can be.

The upload contains a complete set of mounted combat animations both melee and ranged as well as everything else you need to get the unit working as well as an example for the XML.

The melee and basic horse animations are based off the mongol horseman with a sword from Warlords and the grenade throwing is obviously modeled after the grenadier.

This unit was originally created by me as an attempt to make a ranged spell throwing unit for FFH. But it was easily adapted to the more mundane role.

Images and download can be found on the resource page:
https://forums.civfanatics.com/resources/horse-grenadier.27035/


As always: Comment, rate, subscribe.

 

[Sword_Of_Geddon]

This is a really nice unit Purple, its great to see combat animations applied to new kinds of units, great idea!

 

[MatteM]

Nice work Purple! Glad to see some of us hasn't given up on the greatest version of civ , do you have any particular release schedule or overall plans for units in the future? The T-35 Heavy tank I have already included in a mod I'm working on, the horse grenadier could make a good special unit for some equestrian civ.

 

[PPQ_Purple]

Not really no. I am basically working on a massive art module for Ashes of Erebus, the FFH modmod. You can find it here by the way. So most of my work goes into that. But occasionally I just randomly make something like the T-35 because I get inspired. So I have absolutely no scedule or anything.

But I am taking requests provisionally. As in, if you have an idea I'll see what I can do but no promises. So feel free to suggest stuff.

 

[MatteM]

That's cool, well since you asked I noticed that there is a M3 Stuart, but no M5 Stuart. Since that is not that much different (sloped armor), perhaps it would be a piece of cake just changing the model slightly with the animations the
same, if I knew how to alter models of Nif I would give it a go but I have no 3d software, and only know the basics in NifScope. Otherwise the FV 101 Scorpion or the PT 76 would be awesome, but I know not what models you already
have.

 

[PPQ_Purple]

I'll take a look at the three in the next couple days. Just do me a favor and triple check that none of them already exist in the unit database because there are some funky things in there that you'd newer expect.

 

[MatteM]

Cool! No I have pretty much vacuumed the internet of civ 4 units, never seen them anywhere. If you want me to make texture skins for them I’ll be glad to, as they are/were used by so many countries.

 

[PPQ_Purple]

Ask and ye shall receive: https://forums.civfanatics.com/resources/pt-76.27050/

I deliberately left the texture without any markings if you want to make various national versions. If you do however I just ask 2 things:
1. Keep the credits.txt file in the download and follow the instructions therein.
2. Have your download contain a link to my download.

 

[MatteM]

Fantastic! That was fast, and I really like that the amphibious details are visible

I'll will of course give all credits, and keep the download link. If I post the reskins (I could post just the .dds files in a zip) do you want me to start a new thread perhaps not to clutter this one?

 

[PPQ_Purple]

As far as threads go it does not really matter as the main file is going into the database anyway. But if you are going to make loads of skins distributing it as dds files might be best simply for file size.

This being said, one thing I can't master is damage textures. Like, I've tried. But I don't get it. So if you have any knowledge of this or know someone that does do offer suggestions.

 

[MatteM]

Ok, if you want you can change the name of this thread to "PPQ Purple Unit thread" for discussions on your unit projects . Unfortunately I have not played around in Blender very
much to be of help with damage textures but I saw an old thread where the Coyote gave a description of the process in:

https://forums.civfanatics.com/threads/f4u1d.328516/

But more to your problem:

first, to solve this, you must use Blender, but not to model, to habe a working damage texture you need three things:

1. an aniamtion which supports damage textures (i´m not sure, but iirc the avenger did not have this - there should be some kfs with damage in her names) [ok it´s possible to play around with the kfm and add such kfs from another animation to the animation and change the names in the kfs to fit the model, but thats a bit more than basic civ4 file playing], to stay easy, use the damage texture of this units for yours

2. the model must be rigged (for this you need Blender), because you must apply a shader to the model, only with shader the texture slot for the damage textures is supported (because of non working SkinPartition for non shader models you can only add actual a damage texture to a real shader model)

3. Nifscope for the final steps

after you imported the model in Blender (can also import .obj) and rigged it there to the dummy node, export the model again and (from here the steps are done in nifscope) copy the exported NiTriShape back to the clean nif (now outside the dummy node, because of the rigging it´s already affected from the movement of the node), to get rif of some not wanted export effects.

Add a shader (best use the same like the original model (OM) - for more details use Refars tutorial as reference). Afterwards to make the things a bit more easy, open the nif with the OM of the used animation in a second nifscope instance.

Now rename your NiTriShape to the exact name of the OM NiTriShape, after this copy the OM NiMaterialProperty and NiTexturingProperty in the nif of your model and exchange the ones with the ones of the OM (properties of the NiTriShape)

change the name of the texture in the NiTexturingProperty to the ones of your model

delete the now no longer need old properties of your model

now it should work

[the important things are the NiAlphaController of the NiMaterialProperty and the NiTextureTransformController of the NiTexturingProperty, which are affected by the animations controlling the damage texture (by the name of the NiTriShape), also the settings of the 'Decal 0 Texture' {the slot for the damage texture} are important]

 

[MatteM]

https://forums.civfanatics.com/threads/tutorial-damage-states-for-custom-units-with-3ds-max.240956/

And this one gives a description for 3ds Max

 

[PPQ_Purple]

Edit: Those instructions are good for when I am setting up a new model from scratch. As in, new animation set and everything. But with these units I am just making a mesh and adding it to an existing animation set (tank) so they won't really work.

My problem right now is basically that I am suffering from what can only be described as color bleed. As in, the teamcolor bleeds into the texture somehow and taints the whole model. And I can't fix that.

So no damage textures ever from me.

 

[MatteM]

I see, well no big problem as far as I'm concerned, the damage textures are mostly eye-candy anyways. I do know Xenomorph added gloss maps. damage states and textures to a lot of units made by others:
https://forums.civfanatics.com/threads/xenos-modified-models-gallery.288025/

Maybe I can look through what he has written in the threads for some clue.

Edit:
In a post on page 5 Refar wrote: "Damage texture is applied as overlay. I'ts mostly transparent anyway, only blending in the parts that are actually damaged. If you set the UV map in a way, where a small, comletely transparent part of the texture is applied to the whole model, you get no discoloration. This is waht happens when there is no damage, via animated uv. Just keep the few pixels it zooms to really transparent - most of the time these are right in the middle of the texture image."

Also a german site has a tutorial for Max (in english), but maybe it only applies for making models from scratch:
http://www.civilized.de/www/content/civ4/docs/3D_Units.pdf

Actually this tutorial seem to write quite a lot on the subject of damage states and textures, hope it is of some use anyways.

 

[Sword_Of_Geddon]

This is abit of an odd request, and I'm not sure its been done already or not but is it possible for you to make a mesoamerican looking unit that uses a laser blast unit effect?

I've been wanting to create a Mu Civilization, based partly on the Lost Land from the Turok series of games and the Coatyl from Rise of Legends. New units are precious to modding.

 

[PPQ_Purple]

I am not familiar with any of the mentioned source material. So I am not quite sure what you want. Like I don't even know if it's supposed to be infantry, cavalry, tank? So whilst I'd be open to the idea you'll have to give me some more data to work off.

 

[Sword_Of_Geddon]

Sure, I will try

Here are some pictures for concept art purposes:











Basically for a weapon it would be a staff that fires a laser blast, think Stargate's Jaffa Warriors which an example of which is this:



As for the units appearence the above images are only examples, feel free to create to your heart's content

 

[PPQ_Purple]

I'll see if I can put it on my todo list. Speaking of that does anyone here know how to work bilboards for nif files?

 

[PPQ_Purple]

By the way, if anyone is interested in seeing what my problem with damage textures is see here:
https://forums.civfanatics.com/threads/quick-modding-questions-thread.351519/page-264#post-15207091

 

[Leoreth]

I have a Horse Grenadier unit, which starts throwing grenades at a neighboring tile when set to sleep:

Spoiler :

My guess is the mission is assigned to the wrong animation in the kfm file, but I have no idea how to fix this. Can someone take a look for me? Unit assets and the art defines XML are attached.

Hey, in hopes you see this here: I ran into an issue with the Horse Grenadier animations, original post is in the C&C questions thread, click through to find the attached files. Thanks!