Graphical Quibbles...

[GeoModder]

Heheh, those are nice looking, Lord Tirian.

 

[deadliver]

Very cool!

 

[Pfeffersack]

I like them a lot as well

 

[Maniac]

Thanks for the units Lord Tirian!

 

[Lord Tirian]

As I was looking through the units... I was looking at the datalinks a lot - and something bothered me: The backgrounds for units are Earth backgrounds. For water units, that's okay, oceans are oceans... but for land units? So I changed the land background a bit, it should look more fitting now. Also a bit for the air background - instead of a bright beach, there's now a arid coast below!

Furthermore, I didn't like the magtube graphics, so I reskinned the warplane graphics from FF to blue - I think they look more "route"-ish than the jumplanes (mainly because it's not a single blue energy beam, but something wider). Added bonus: The connectors are smaller and hence the connector that appears in bases will be less obtrusive than the big white something from the jumplane.

Finally, I wanted to make the plasma thrower plasma more... plasma-like. Now it's glowing and bright! I like it, but it's pretty bright, so people may think that I've overdone it - if so, tell me and I'll turn it down a bit.

The zip contains all three tweaks, but they're pretty easy to sort out, in case you don't want to use all of them (I guess the route change may be something that's more a matter of taste - and maybe ditto for the plasma). Also attached are screenshots.

Of course, if something is "not quite right", tell me and I will fiddle around, like changing textures a bit or changing colours etc.)

Cheers, LT.

 

[GeoModder]

Nice tweaks there, Lord Tirian.
Although I'd like to see the plasma effect in motion first.

 

[Lord Tirian]

Although I'd like to see the plasma effect in motion first.

Hey, if it does turn out to be too bright, I made a second version that's less bright, more like a bluish flame - I've attached a screenshot. Also, I discovered that the particle system can produce hilarious overkill effects - I've made a second screenshot showing a short test of what the Helion could use as "flamethrower" (looks more like a "sunthrower!" ).

Cheers, LT.

 

[GeoModder]

...I've made a second screenshot showing a short test of what the Helion could use as "flamethrower" (looks more like a "sunthrower!" )...

Preliminary analysis indicates that our rivals have developed a safe and reliable
method to simulate conditions existing on the interior of a stellar mass.
The fabrication and transmutation of materials possible in such an environment
guarantees significant industrial and military applications.

Probe Team Operations Directorate,
Top Secret Report



Not to be left behind, this is what you might find in Planetfall next update with Maniac's consent.

Spoiler :

 

[Deliverator]

I discovered that the particle system can produce hilarious overkill effects

Particle systems seem to be something that no one has really investigated. Changing the colour is pretty straightforward, but everything else seems to be unknown. If you have discovered anything about how they work it would be great to know it...

 

[Maniac]

As I was looking through the units... I was looking at the datalinks a lot - and something bothered me: The backgrounds for units are Earth backgrounds. For water units, that's okay, oceans are oceans... but for land units? So I changed the land background a bit, it should look more fitting now. Also a bit for the air background - instead of a bright beach, there's now a arid coast below!

Thanks! This has long bothered me too, but I didn't know where to change it.

Finally, I wanted to make the plasma thrower plasma more... plasma-like. Now it's glowing and bright! I like it, but it's pretty bright, so people may think that I've overdone it - if so, tell me and I'll turn it down a bit.

Thanks, this was in fact bothering me too.
I don't really have an opinion (or see any difference ) between the two varieties of flame brightness you posted.

Furthermore, I didn't like the magtube graphics, so I reskinned the warplane graphics from FF to blue - I think they look more "route"-ish than the jumplanes (mainly because it's not a single blue energy beam, but something wider). Added bonus: The connectors are smaller and hence the connector that appears in bases will be less obtrusive than the big white something from the jumplane.

I don't really have an opinion on this one - all the available magtube graphics look good to me. So I might as well follow your preference. I didn't include this one in the just released patch though. Reason: I had a look at the CvPlot::checkLateEra which was added by Firaxis in patch 3.19, and this makes it possible to change when roads change to their late era graphics (instead of the current # of eras / 2). So we can have two different sets of magtubes: I'd let them change graphics upon research of Gravitonics. I figured I'd ask you guys which graphics you would like to use for the pre- and post-Gravitonics magtubes.

One hurdle before I can implement this though: while it's possible to change the code that decides when the 'late era' kicks in, I haven't got a clue (or have forgotten) how the game knows what graphics it should use for the late era roads. I don't see anything in the XML. Furthermore, all the faction-specific eras (except the PKs) are in the second half of the list of Eras in CIV4EraInfos.xml, so under the current code I would expect the magtubes to already start with modern road graphics instead of the jumplane graphics. Yet they don't.

GeoModder, can you shed some light on this? IIRC you had some previous experience on this matter? Or at least I remember us talking about it.

Btw, could you please put the Morgan Industries image between spoilers or turn it into a thumbnail? It's screwing up the thread layout.

 

[Lord Tirian]

Thanks, this was in fact bothering me too.
I don't really have an opinion (or see any difference ) between the two varieties of flame brightness you posted.

The first one is more translucent - sort of re-colours everything behind it to bright blue tones. The second one is more like a glowing material - after testing the both of them in tandem, I now prefer the second one because it feels like it has "more volume" or is more tangible. Also, I fixed the plasmathrower's animations, so you don't hear the machine gun when he fires, just the fiery kawoosh. The revised effect and the animation fix are both attached - you might want to test both plasma flames, but my preference is now with the second version.

I'd let them change graphics upon research of Gravitonics. I figured I'd ask you guys which graphics you would like to use for the pre- and post-Gravitonics magtubes.

Oh, that's cool! I'd love to see the current beam graphic as post-Gravitonics graphics! I only fiddled around with it, because I felt an energy beam looks too advanced for a magtube you get mid-game. As sort of super-advanced technology (like Gravitonics), the beam is a great fit, however!

Cheers, LT.

 

[Maniac]

Thanks for the plasma thrower update!

For the earlier magtube graphics, I assume you prefer your recoloured blueish over the unmodded orangeish?

 

[GeoModder]

One hurdle before I can implement this though: while it's possible to change the code that decides when the 'late era' kicks in, I haven't got a clue (or have forgotten) how the game knows what graphics it should use for the late era roads. I don't see anything in the XML. Furthermore, all the faction-specific eras (except the PKs) are in the second half of the list of Eras in CIV4EraInfos.xml, so under the current code I would expect the magtubes to already start with modern road graphics instead of the jumplane graphics. Yet they don't.

GeoModder, can you shed some light on this? IIRC you had some previous experience on this matter? Or at least I remember us talking about it.

IIRC it's in the SDK directly linked to the number of era's. in Vanilla game the 7 era's are divided in 3 downwards which results in a Ancient/Classical, Medieval/Renaissance and Industrial/Modern/Future block. Since your mod started with 3 era's that made things easy, but I have no idea how those faction-specific era's would influence it. In worst case, every faction is down to two era's. If that is the case, adding a new era for each faction would solve it.
We can test it actually. Just put 3 graphics on the same building for each era (arrival, expansion and crossfire), and see if despite that a faction switches to its own era after arrival, the graphic changes according to era. If it does, magtubes should do the same.

Btw, could you please put the Morgan Industries image between spoilers or turn it into a thumbnail? It's screwing up the thread layout.

Done. Sorry.

 

[Lord Tirian]

In worst case, every faction is down to two era's. If that is the case, adding a new era for each faction would solve it.

At that point, it's adding at least 7 eras (not counting the SMAX factions) - wouldn't it be easier to just use four eras (Arrival/Expansion/Alien Crossfire) and make the art difference an ArtStyle-thing, just like the different artstyles (European, Asian, etc.) are handled in vanilla civ?

Or is there anything that would prohibit that from working? (note: I'm not saying it should be done that way or anything - it's more scholarly interest in the matter, because the eras + artstyles-thing sounds simpler to me, as implementing additional eras would add a lot of work anyway - meaning reworking it to artstyles wouldn't be much more work and perhaps cleaner to implement as well)

Cheers, LT.

 

[Maniac]

Geo, you're confusing lots of things.

The division of eras in three groups is for unit graphics only. It has nothing to do with building graphics, nor with road graphics. I already know from the SDK the trigger that makes the road change graphics. What I don't know is how the game knows what graphics to use for modern road graphics.

Anyway, I'll take that to mean you don't know the answer either.

 

[Maniac]

Ugh never mind. I somehow managed to overlook the following in CIV4RouteModelInfos.xml:

<ModelFile>Art/Terrain/Routes/WarpandJumpLanes/JumpLaneD02.nif</ModelFile>
<LateModelFile>Art/Terrain/Routes/WarpandJumpLanes/JumpLaneD02.nif</LateModelFile>

I did a search for 'modern roads' with Windows Grep, but that didn't give any results in the XML. Reason for that simply is that IIRC Firaxis disabled the use of different graphics for modern roads in one of the patches.

 

[GeoModder]

Geo, you're confusing lots of things.

The division of eras in three groups is for unit graphics only. It has nothing to do with building graphics, nor with road graphics. I already know from the SDK the trigger that makes the road change graphics. What I don't know is how the game knows what graphics to use for modern road graphics.

Anyway, I'll take that to mean you don't know the answer either.

However confusing I am, I just did figure out that a graphic won't change in the Crossfire era. The faction specific era is appearantly paramount.
However, a way to let a graphic change how you want it is to rename de jumplane nifs to the modern road nifs.
So if you changed warplanea00.nif to RailroadA00.nif, the game should show the jumplane graphic instead of the railroad graphic.
Of course, since Planetfall seems based on Final Frontier graphicswise, I'm not sure if that would hinder it.

Edit: ah, the file I forget each time. Glad to see you found a more elegant answer.

 

[Lord Tirian]

For the earlier magtube graphics, I assume you prefer your recoloured blueish over the unmodded orangeish?

Actually, I don't care either way - I just made it bluish to match the current colour scheme (I just assumed you preferred something blue, because you used the jumplanes) - and because SMAC also had bluish tinted graphics. Plus, changing the colour is quickly done - so take the original colour or tell me what colour you want - you get it.

Just make sure to use my nif-files, because I adjusted the height to place the connectors exactly on the ground (and I made the connectors a bit smaller, because I really don't like huge pods standing around in the landscape) - that was the really tedious bit to modify all of them!

Cheers, LT.

 

[Lord Tirian]

Hey, just a little update: Fiddled around with the maintenance bay and the energy nexus.

The maintenance bay is now down to 232 polys (before: 1231 polys, though with TriStrips - but even with The_Coyote's 1.5x rule, that's a vast improvement) - mainly gained by removing hidden faces and the overly complex pipe. As last finishing touch, I made the walls inside the bay a bit darker that the outside walls.

The energy nexus went down to 498 polys (before: 1710, though again TriStrips) - it's more of a redesign - I took the basic shape, but made it six barrels (because of the six-city prerequisite; also, I was able to cut a lot of polys there), made the central monolith larger and six-sided and made a new texture, though it's very reminiscent of the old one.

Both models use the old scale and file names, so just put them in and replace the old ones.

Cheers, LT.

 

[GeoModder]

Nice work, LT.
I was wondering, since on the Energy Nexus such a barrel represent the energy bank themself, if a single barrel shouldn't replace the current energybank model? That's a TriStrips model too with almost 1900 polygons.

Any thoughts about that, Maniac? It would free this HothGenerator model for a secret project or a late-tech facility like the singularity inductor or somesuch which can't be expected to be build a lot that late in the game.