Graphical Quibbles...

[Deliverator]

Weirdly enough, the "classical" smac graphics (foil, unity transport) show parts under the water surface.

This is actually the <bRenderBelowWater>1</bRenderBelowWater> tag in CIV4UnitInfos.xml - I tested it for the Armor unit and it shows up beneath the water as you would expect. It is a shame there isn't bRenderBelowWater tag for features, buildings and citysets.

Spoiler :

Another handy one from the Console commands list is Graphics.setWireframe true. Here is the same view with it on and off - you can see that the city, fungus and ice shelf is still there but are all invisible below the water line.

Spoiler :

So it seems like only units have a way of appearing beneath the water line.

 

[Lord Tirian]

Spoiler :

This image actually shows a major problem with that problem, if we want to preserve the waterline somehow: The borders are underwater and can't be seen since they now cling to the (submerged) seabed - and ship and building nifs can be adjusted in height... but I'm not so sure about the border (since it needs to be non-floating on land as well).

Cheers, LT.

 

[Deliverator]

This image actually shows a major problem with that problem, if we want to preserve the waterline somehow: The borders are underwater and can't be seen since they now cling to the (submerged) seabed - and ship and building nifs can be adjusted in height... but I'm not so sure about the border (since it needs to be non-floating on land as well).

The only way I can think of that might actually work would be to switch off the vanilla water layer completely and make a new water layer so that everything can be seen through it. Perhaps you could just make a tiled endlessly looping effect and trigger it from python like the Dune Wars sandstorms.

 

[GeoModder]

I'm pretty sure the standard height is 49 not 59.

Typo. Sorry.

This is actually the <bRenderBelowWater>1</bRenderBelowWater> tag in CIV4UnitInfos.xml - I tested it for the Armor unit and it shows up beneath the water as you would expect. It is a shame there isn't bRenderBelowWater tag for features, buildings and citysets.

Ah, that's why submarines in Civ4 render below the waterline.
But if this tag works for units, wouldn't it be possible to link it to features, buildings and citysets through the SDK?

Another handy one from the Console commands list is Graphics.setWireframe true. Here is the same view with it on and off - you can see that the city, fungus and ice shelf is still there but are all invisible below the water line.

Did you take these screenshots with the waterheight at zero?

If citysets show up on water at waterheight 0, does that mean the reason why citysets don't show up on water is because they are completely underwater? What would happen if a cityset was created with a higher z-axis, supposedly floating in the air?

I don't think so. Otherwise tall buildings (like for instance used in the Morganite cityset) would show up above waterlevel.
It seems it is only when the waterheight is set at 0, and hacked back to a higher level through the python console that city buildings are generated on the seabottom. But if you increase the z-axis for a faction cityset, that means land-based cities of that faction will float in the air.

 

[GeoModder]

The only way I can think of that might actually work would be to switch off the vanilla water layer completely and make a new water layer so that everything can be seen through it.

That would be the easiest solution.

 

[RocknD]

Can anyone tell me what this is?
Was playing Zak and had a transport with an In Vitro on board when this happened.

 

[Deliverator]

But if this tag works for units, wouldn't it be possible to link it to features, buildings and citysets through the SDK?

Sadly, I don't think is something you can do via the SDK. I think the SDK just hands the bRenderBelowWater value on to the game executable. I could be wrong though...

...switch off the vanilla water layer completely and make a new water layer so that everything can be seen through it.

That would be the easiest solution.

I'm not sure about easy, but it might be worth some experimentation.

Did you take these screenshots with the waterheight at zero?

Yes, set to zero in the XML and then set the water height to 49 via the Python console.

 

[GeoModder]

Yes, set to zero in the XML and then set the water height to 49 via the Python console.

Too bad. If the wired frame screenshot was taken in normal mode, that would mean city graphics are rendered below the waterlevel.

 

[GeoModder]

A request for Lord Tirian: could you separate one of the 4 corner towers of the Concordat and make a separate .nif from it? This would be a good graphic for say the Commune improvement.

 

[Maniac]

* Gamefont icons for bonus resources

Spoiler :

Brilliance and Fungal Gin need both a button and a resource. Re Fungal Gin, I'd imagine it is colourless rather than red like wine.

Coral reef, fungicide, grenade fruit, iridium/rubidium?, methane ice, pholus mutagen, planet pearls and radiotrophic fungus need a gamefont icon.

Wikipedia says both Iridium and Rubidium look silvery-white, so I don't really know how to represent those differently. Aluminium could fit, but that still leaves one element remaining. Perhaps the Marble icon fits as well, but that was drawn over, so it would need to be re-added.

Perhaps Pholus Mutagen could be the Rare DNA icon in the same colour as Red Algae.

Planet Pearls currently is linked to the icon on spot #46, but I don't think that still fits. That icon was added when the resource was still called Resonance Cluster.

If no ideas can be found for unique icons, perhaps for the Planet-providing resources Brilliance, Fungal Gin, Planet Pearls and Radiotrophic Fungus the same icon could be used in different colours, as was done for Rare DNA and Algae. Not sure what that icon could be. The Manifold Nexus icon, icon #46, the Flowering Counter icon, the Planet Attitude icon...?

Copied from the tasklist. I also attached two buttons I made for Methane Ice and Fungicide. Perhaps Fungicide works as well on a scale small enough for the gamefont.

 

[GeoModder]

Finally, I managed to incorporate some trees for the Believers...

They'll be in the upload later on.

 

[Lord Tirian]

Sorry, didn't make as much progress as I hoped, but I've attached the new animations for the hyperian and helion and the recoloured uranium/thorium. I'm working on the greenhouse now and then I'll start to tackle GeoModder's request for the separated tower for the commune.

Cheers, LT.

 

[Lord Tirian]

...and the new greenhouse. Since the texture is mostly new (removing the base gave me lots of extra space), it doesn't look exactly the same. For example, I added some green to the worked greenhouse as well - I think it looks more interesting and less like a blue-painted bunker that way.

I've attached screenshots of the greenhouse rotated by 45° - I prefer the rotated look... but it works both ways, I think (also note that it looks okay on ridges - that was important to me).

It has minimally less polys per greenhouse (from 144 -> 140), so there's not really a performance gain, I guess... but at least it's not *more* polys!

I noticed that worked/non-worked versions don't quite have the same size, but it's possible that I'm still on patch c) and GeoModder fixed that in the meantime, if not, you won't get your commune, Geo! (I'm kidding, of course!)

EDIT: Seeing the screenshots... the greenhouse seems to be a bit big anyway, so it might need Geo's touch anyway - good thing that scale adjustments can be made in the XML!

Cheers, LT.

 

[GeoModder]

I noticed that worked/non-worked versions don't quite have the same size, but it's possible that I'm still on patch c) and GeoModder fixed that in the meantime, if not, you won't get your commune, Geo! (I'm kidding, of course!)

If they're still not the same size, then both the worked and unworked entries must be put in PlotLSystem on the same scale. In most cases I only put one of each version in this file because the other entry is linked by default in artdefines_building. I noticed there's about a 9-10% difference ingame size difference when entries in PlotLSystem and ArtDefines (same object, different texture) use the same scale.

Thanks for reminding me. Next time I work in the PlotLSystem I'll fix it.

I gather the "bright" texture is the worked greenhouse, right?

 

[Lord Tirian]

A request for Lord Tirian: could you separate one of the 4 corner towers of the Concordat and make a separate .nif from it? This would be a good graphic for say the Commune improvement.

Done and attached... I also made buttons based on screenshots for the new communes. The model shares the texture with the concordat temple, so it needs to be in the same folder or the texture needs to be moved to "shared". Model has 180ish polys and I used an fScale of 1.5 on the screenshots.

Cheers, LT.

 

[GeoModder]

Ah, nice work Lord Tirian.

 

[Lord Tirian]

And oh, I started to fiddle on the gamefonts - attached is a screenshot of the fungicide (based on Maniac's button), how does it look? It's a bit less blurry in-game, though, since the jpg-compression makes small things a little bit ugly.

Cheers, LT.

 

[GeoModder]

The icon on itself looks good.
If I compare it with the current fungicide icon (the blueish leaf), it's a bit smaller then your icon. But that's all. I compared the health+your fungicide icon blurryness of your screenshot ingame with how it looks now on my machine. I think it will turn out fine.

Edit: Oh, and your reworked greenhouses look like they belong.

 

[Lord Tirian]

Hey, this is coming out of the blue, I guess, but I *just* saw this thread in the forum and... liked the tech screen (I don't mind horizontal scrolling, but I hate vertical scrolling for the tech screen), so I tried to merge it with the Planetfall tech screen (just Maniac's extra additions for the new effects) and noted that johny smith's screen has wider panels, a bit too wide for Planetfall, since it's one of the more restrained mods out here.

So instead of making them smaller again, I had an idea: I could use the extra space for... prettiness. See screenshot. It's not perfect yet, but... what do you think of the idea?

Cheers, LT.

 

[Pickly]

On the gamefont icons post, which icons are being talkied about in game, and what are the requirements for them?

(For the world editor and civilopedia terrain icons, I've done them as 64 x 64 DDS, with a border around them, but what about the other kind, and is anything else missing?)