678 replies to this topic

[Nazgûl]

And here we go... a slightly reskinned Gothmog on Warg...
Thanks you Ithron for helping with the animations on Warg

He's a bit slow on mount toggle, but that can probably be adjusted somewhere... *looking*
Also, he oly have one animation for attack while mounted, and it's not that good, but it will have to do



I will now try to ad audio...

Edited by Nazgûl, 01 February 2007 - 12:00 AM.

[BigRedKane]

Looking very cool Nazgul...

Is gothmog the dude who was talking to the Witch King just before the battle of Minias Tirith?...he aso side stepped a catapulted section of castle wall.
He's an ugly dude...very arrogant too....lol.
Don't quite remember how he died in the movies though.

It would be cool if you were able to post 2 screenshots side by side (since you did a re-skin)...one with your re-skin, one without. 'cos looking at him off the bat like that, he don't look all that different from the one I got from The War mod (you shoulda checked that for the Warg Riding thing...he does that in Zen's mod too).

If Gothmog is the aforemeantioned dude who spoke to the Witch King then Lurtz's voice is pretty close to his, in my opinion, so I don't think that would look too weird. And the only Lurtz specific phrase I ever heard was "Saruman will be pleased"...most of his other phrases are pretty generic and could apply to anyone with a deep, gruff, spiteful voice...lol.

On noticing Zimoo's post about the sounds I was wondering if one had to use .wav files or can one use mp3's?....I prefer mp3's....mainly 'cos I got a huge sound/music library full of 'em (mostly ripped/created myself)....heh. .Wav's also seem to be larger (file size) for the same quality/length of music or sound, leastways in my experience they are.

Anyways, keep up the great work Nazgul...

[Nazgûl]

Thanks BigRed

Well, yes... he's that dude exactly. A pretty important figure in the story since he's actually the battle ground commander of that particular battle at Minas Tirith. He's usually refered to as the Lieutenant of Morgul, which could be translated to the commander of all orcs I guess, since he's an orc himself. This is refering to the movies now... In the books no reference is given to his race, but one would presume he's an orc of some higher sort Also, if one is going to dig into the books, the name Gothmog is also the name of the Balrog leader from the first age, which can be confusing *lol*

I thought about using Lurtz voice too, if I cant pull this off... and maybe I will, cause I have the sounds in that folder now, and Ive added codes in Voice.ini, but the game wont use them. I THINK this might have something to do with me not using the -mod command (yet)?

(I don't think mp3 will work Red)

About his skin: His just SLIGHTLY reskinned. That is Ive changed his colors, and thats wery obvious in Photoshop, but not as obvious in game. 1) I removed all the RED from his cloth and replaced with dark brown (leather). 2) I darkened the metal severely, which will notice on a map with less daylight

Now back to the audio... Any takes on way I can't hear it? Am I right about the -mod thing? =/ It will probably work if I incorporate it into the existing big for audio though... but that wont fly for a release of this mod...

[BigRedKane]

I'm aware of the Balrog known as Gothmog from the first age....and yeah, could get confusing...lol. That's why it's wise to incorporate thier other titles when talking about them (ie. Gothmog the orc commander and Gothmog the Balrog)...saves many headaches later...heh.

The Audio thing should work, as you said, if you include it in an existing audio file that the game uses, packing it in with the other audio stuffs, and then over-writing the original file....but like you said it probably won't go down too well for release to the public. Likely you'll need the -mod command for public release version, that's how most public released extra assets and stuff seem to be done.

I think it would be a good idea to learn both ways - file replacement and -mod command. 'cos then those, like myself, who'd prefer the file replacement way can pack the extra assets from your mod themselves.

It's a shame I haven't progressed enough to help you more with the sounds....at the moment I've been helping King Thranduil in another thread with a particularly complicated problem (leastways for me it was complicated...lol). However for the most part that's been solved...I just need to tweak a few things and then I can move on with the stuff I wanted to do (sort out sounds, add Sauron tower etc), but you'll probably be finished with your sound stuffs before I get anywhere near haveing a working sound set.

Hopefully I might learn a thing or two from your thread and others.

[Nazgûl]

....at the moment I've been helping King Thranduil in another thread with a particularly complicated problem (leastways for me it was complicated...lol).

I guess that's the Celeborn stuff? Good, cause I'm aiming to ad him too, and Galadriel without ring as well. They're both in the campaign so, it shouldn't be that hard?... I hope!

I think that I will try to ad this to asset, before I try to copy it into the existing audio file. Maybe asset will tell the game to look in that folder as with skins... (My mod is also the file replacement mod u know)

[BigRedKane]

Yeah, that's the Celeborn one.
It's easy enough to get Celeborn and non-ring hero Galadriel in the game, but by default they will have no level and no powers. In short they're pretty useless without further modding.
That's where my mod comes in, however it relies on a fair bit of modified code from The War mod (with changing as little of the rest of the game as possible). An unfortunate side effect so far has been I had to also mod Thranduil because his wild walk power caused a game.dat error....but I think a Mirkwood Archer summon is more useful and a suitable replacement.

If you're interested in the Celeborn mod and wish me to add Galadriel to it just let me know, chances are King Thranduil will probably want a non-ring hero version of Galadriel too...heh.
I added Celeborn's object ini as a seperate ini file, I prefer to work like that even with child objects as it helps to keep track of things in a more orderly fashion, and it would probably be of benefit if you wish to poke around in there (or anyone else for that matter).

Currently I got the headache of getting the elven upgrades to work with the Lorien Archers that Celeborn summons, but I'm sure I'll nail that soon.

Edited by BigRedKane, 01 February 2007 - 10:08 AM.

[Nazgûl]

That sounds great BigRed! If you could provide a working soultion for me to ad both Celeborn and Galadriel without ring, I would place you in the credits for sure Are they the models from the campaign or are new new models? They campaign ones look really good actually

BTW: I got the sounds for Gothmog working... it was me suffering from to little sleep, that had me place the Audio map in the wrong folder

Now I will start working on adding Orc pikemen.... You cant have a tru confrontation between Rohirrim and Orcs without their pikemen, "useless" as they may be *lol* Get back to me about the elven stuff when you have it ready to go, and I'll bow down at your feet... well almost *lol*

[BigRedKane]

lol...

They're the models from the campaign...actually Celeborn is just Elrond re-skinned, he's a child object of Elrond. (sorry to burst any bubbles there on the possibility of a unique model ).

One of the problems I had with Celeborn was changing his name from Elrond to Celeborn. In the fortress build tree he's still named Elrond but has Celeborn's portrait pic....and when he is built and you either hover the mouse over him or his portrait in the bottom of the screen, then he is named Celeborn.
I used the lotr.str file from The War mod to help correct the problem with all but how he's named in the fortress build tree....can't seem to fix that.
Not sure if I'll have the same prob with Galadriel.

Glad to hear you got your sounds sorted.
I was going to suggest checking the spelling on the references or checking the file tree earlier, but I figured that was something you would have done already...lol. One should never under-estimate the effect of lack of sleep...heh.

I'll be sure to get back to you about the elven stuff when I'm done.

[zimoo]

Celeborn does have his own model, but uses Elrond's commandset/audio/anims.

About the recruit text, add the following to his childobject:

RecruitText  = CONTROLBAR:CelebornRecruit
	ReviveText	= CONTROLBAR:CelebornRevive

Then in lotr.str, add those blocks like so:

CONTROLBAR:CelebornRecruit
"Recruit Celeborn, Lord of Lothlorien"
END

CONTROLBAR:CelebornRevive
"Revive the fallen hero, Celeborn"
END

If you need any more help making these two buildable just ask, I did it myself quite easily (although I won't post up the code, as it uses about 20 new macros and a few new specialpowers )

[Nazgûl]

Sounds great Zimoo, I will start working on them as soon as I'm done with adding orc pikemen, the last unit I will need for this "movie mod". Then all factions will have new units except the goblins

And yes BigRed, the preference would be to have a seprate ini for both Celeborn and Galadriel, but I guess that shouldn't be that impossible to fix Talk to u later about that

Gotta have some luch now, do some work, and then back to modding...

[BigRedKane]

If Celeborn has his own model then why is he set up as a child object to Elrond? Child objects use the same model, animations and other data by default (unless you apply code to tell the game engine to change something...like the health for example). I've created several heros/units in this method and some only have a few lines of code as a result, it's a useful way of cloneing a hero without over-writing the original as well (if you want the same appearance but new powers or something).

One wouldn't need to set a child object if one is just useing the animations, sounds and so on since they have their own references, it's also highly unlikely that two different models would be able to share the same animations, this is due to how models are boned and how the meshes are grouped.

If Celeborn had his own model it would say this at the top -

Object ElvenCeleborn

instead of -
ChildObject ElvenCeleborn ElvenElrond

The code below near the top of Celeborn's code merely tells the engine to apply Celeborn's skin to Elrond's model....I haven't seen any reference to a new model.
[codebox]
DefaultModelConditionState
Model = EUCELEB_SKN
End
[/codebox]

If you know of a hidden Celeborn model then I'd be delighted to know it's name as I'd prefer a proper Celeborn rather than a child object one.

However I did forget to add the relevant data for Celeborn's recruit and revive and what not in his ini...big DOH!...lol...thanks for reminding me Zimoo.

[zimoo]

I'm pretty sure EUCeleb_skn isn't used by Elrond, hence it's a new model specifically for Celeborn

[BigRedKane]

I assumed that was the skin (texture) of the model...partly 'cos of the SKN part of the name...in which case if it was a re-skin it would be named differant to Elrond's.

I've tried going through the texture big files and only found something similar to Celeborn's name listed like that with about 3 extra characters after it. I have no idea what cockamamey method EA have used for their texture/model referencing system and I'm too tired to try and find out how to unpack the assets file to have a poke around in there.

Going by my experience with how a lot of this game is set up I think it's likely you're right Zimoo and EA need to go back to school to learn about models, textures and nameing things correctly (as well as needing the taste slapped out of their mouth)....lol.
I've also noticed they've got differant formats all over the place and the textures are terrible quality... I bet if I visited their offices they'd have half eaten junk food and stuff on their desks like that twit in Jurrassic Park (think his name was Dennis)...lol.

Anyways...I might try and set Celeborn up as his own parent object and poke around the assets file when I'm a little more awake...just to see what happens and see what I find.

Thanks for your help though, Zimoo.

Noticed you're also from the UK.

[Nertea]

Textures are set up in the model, so there doesn't need to be any logical named relation. It does help when interpreting the files, but otherwise it's not needed. EA refers to the model with an _skn suffix because in 3D terms, skinning is NOT applying the texture. Skinning refers instead to the weighting of vertices in the model (the 'skin') to the bones. So the rueomer_skn really just means "the rigged Eomer model". Nothing to do with the texture.

[BigRedKane]

Thanks Nertea.

In the old days a skin referred to a texture in 3D terms because the models "wore" the textures like "skins", it's still referred to that way in a lot of circles.

But anyways, thanks for clearing that up...saves me digging around...lol.

[Bart]

So the rueomer_skn really just means "the rigged Eomer model"

but nertea, isn't "rigging" the process of actually making the bones?

[Lauri]

as I understand it...

Skin = 2d texture....
model = 3d "skin"
bind\rigging = fixing the verts to the bones...

[Nertea]

In "real" terms (ever since bones arrived on the scene):

Map = 2D texture
Model/Geometry = 3D object
Mapping = process of applying the map to the model
Rigging = setting up kinematic controls for bones
Binding = attaching objects to bones (not the same as skinning)
Skinning = weighting bones

In terms most BFME modders use:

Skin/texture = 2D texture
Model = 3D object
Rigging = binding bones to vertices

2PG: I'm not very clear on that. The way I've been taught is that rigging is like... how bones are allowed to move, but I have also seen the term used for laying down bone structure like you said.

Kane: I very much doubt you'd find an old pro using the term skin for a map .

[Nazgûl]

Nice to see new faces in here

Keep up the interesting discussions, but don't forget my topics... (just kidding)

I've experimented with Celeborn and Galadriel from Cahik's obsolete mod RealityMod (yes, I got his permission), and I got them in game, but setting up powers and FX is plain torture. Adding units is one thing, but "raw" heroes... darn. I'll just kick back in this question and see what BigRed comes up with

Otherwise Im pretty much done with adding units... Yes

On to some polishing...
I find the Hour of the WitchKing to be somewhat boring... I would like a new power for him on foot, and I thought the given one should be the fire sword from the CaH (and make it more powerful). Is that possible without too much hassle?

[King Thranduil]

Looks awesome Nazgul. Adding Celeborn has been a total pain in the neck and I still can't figure out how to add the recruit text. I extract the lotr.str files, add the proper blocks, but I have no clue how to get it back in.

That aside, I wouldn't mind adding Galadriel.

If you want to know, Gimli and Aragorn killed Gothmog in the movie's extended addition.

Edited by King Thranduil, 01 February 2007 - 11:56 PM.