Spring RTS Engine

Ok, new troubles:
I really cant get 3ds Max (I'm using v. 5) to export correctly into UpSpring. The model objects are all shuffled around and the hierarchy isn't intact. For some reason "torso" is on top now, and all objects are under it.. Is there any special options i should be ticking in 3ds max?

Centurion...

The more subojbects that you have the more the model will eat resources. If an object can be combined then do it. Each subobject must be moved. So please combine the unecessary parts of your hierarchy.

Ok, thanks. Well I apparantely misunderstood and tought the 2048 limit also applied to .s30 files. Glad it doesnt, even tough I'm still gonna share textures for the sake of optimizing.

Hmn, yeah i guess I'll have to combine some objects, should not be a problem. Anyone got any clues on the export import issue to UpSpring?

caydr or ARGH would be good to ask.

please could u do the models in Heavy Gear 2 quality but better textures

i have heavy gear 2 in 3 different cd's and that was much back in the old days... everybody asked why i have 3 cd's and for some reason i didnt even know but now it seems that 2 of them dont work sooooo...

I have Heavy Gear 1, if you'd like the .pdf of all the gears and tanks, I'd be glad to e-mail it to you. It details all the weapons and units, and very nice illustrations as well. Since you're making the mod, I'd assume you have these sources yourself, but there is no harm in asking, is there?

Thanks, FizzWizz, but I'm all set as far as sources go. I myself own both HG1 and 2, good manuals in both... But I can't seem to find a .pdf version of the HG1 manual on the cd, where is it located? I do have the paper version and other pdfs ofcourse so I'm okay as it is.

Masse: Yeah, I am going to try to match HG2 when it comes to visual quality, and hopefull surpass it too when it comes to textures and so. I'm guessing however that the hg2 models were something like 1500-2000 polies each and I really cant go that high, even if spring could take it perhaps. But the textures were quite bland in HG2 and i plan on having nicer, grittier textures!

centurion, how many mechs would you have on screen at one moment?

I URGE you to try my mod.. similar concept I.E. giant biped weapon systems. It has the current hurdles you would run into, walking animations on high poly models. Anyway, the main slowdown I find in spring would be comprised of 3 things: pathing, shaddows and collision. 2 of those are unrelated to the poly count.

Hey, I will try out your mod! It seems quit neat, and I'm sure it'll be quite enlightening to see how you've structured things :)
Well, it's bedtime now, got the whole weekend in front of me, and hopefully i'll be able to squeeze som modding between eating, sleeping, schoolwork, moving to a new place and trying to maintain a social life But it'll be alright

Hope i can show you some in game stuff real soon!

no rush, I will look forward to seeing your progress.

*poke* *poke*.... any progress?

Hey all!
Sorry for not posting in a little while, been real hectic and alot to do. However there has been some progress, got the hunter done and I am as we speak trying to get it ingame and working somewhat, I'll post pics if i can later today. As soon as i get a framework up, ie basic script, a weapon or two etc and get a grip of things it should be alot easier to implement new stuff.

Breaktrough!

But still alot to fix :)
The UVMap is garbled for some reason, shows up fine in UpSpring. Gotta sort it out, i guess. Also, I'm using the Arm PeeWee script as a placeholder so the animations are a bit strange :)
But hey, it's ingame!

feel free to steal code from my mod. Just credit what code you take.

As far as your texture being garbled.. flip it vertically and it will look right.

Wohoo! Thanks smoth, it worked!

Still a long way to go before it acts right but the fact that the model shows up atleast and is properly textures is a relief :) Does anyone know why one of the legs is partially transparent?
Also, now i need to get to know the whole scripting bit :) Any clues where to start, any good tutorials or programs to generate animation scripts?

centurion, s3o textures don't use a swapmap... You can't reuse texture space on UV's. Each model calls thier specific UV and thier specific coolnessmap (the second texture where all the selflighting, reflectionmapping and other stuff goes) and that's it. You could make several of the same model use different texture maps, but each one would have to be a different unit.

[edit] about the transparent leg face, was it not UV mapped? Non mapped segments can't be rendered... otherwize it looks like the face was accidentally deleted at some point...

it looks inverted centurion, check to see if the faces are inverted.

If you mirrored that leg to make it the same as the other one, then the faces will be inverted as smoth said. I think Upspring has an 'invert face' tool, but im not sure if it works.

Hey thanks for the tip, I did flip the leg in 3d studio max, probably is that thats the problem.

I've been thinking alot about gameplay alot and right now I'm thinking mainly about two things: map sizes and economy. Firstly, I will design this mod to use larger map sizes than TA, preferably 16x16 and more, to allow arty units, recon units and more tactics come into play. Does spring have a problem with larger map sizes?

About economy, I'm thinking that metal will be "changed to" (or rather, considered as) resource points, ie supplies, ammo, fuel etc, and energy is purely energy used to power structures and turrets. Resource producing structures would be things like ammo dumps, fuel depots, and forward outposts. Forward outposts would be the equivalent of standard MEXes and the basic reward for capturing territory. As you strengthen your grip on your territory you can replace them by better but more fragile structures, who produce more resource points. Stuff like ammo dumps and fuel depots would however blow large holes in your base when destroyed to further emphasize that they are only for "safe" territories. "Building" units and structures would only cost resource points and build times would relatively fast.

On the side of defensive structures the whole spectrum is planned, from simple HMG encampents and light mortar nests to large turreted pulse lasers. All the automated turrets however costs energy both to operate and fire and to have them it is necessary to have large, expensive generator buildings. So there are no cheapy energy producing facilities, a la solar collectors. The reson for this is that the minimal wattage of such facilities are by far insufficiant to power large automated turret complexes and also to make it a viable strategy to use pinpoint strikes to knock out the generator facilities rather than going head on versus the turrets, a la Heavy gear 2.

This would play together with maps where strategically important areas like cities/towns would give much more resources to the player holding them (ie the one who has built forward outposts or similar there) than basic wilderness terrain. This would create natural hotspots on the areas that would be realistic, ie holding a town is actually a good thing. I plan to make custom features such as buildings for mappers to place to make realistic looking and feeling maps.

What do you think?

Wow a modder who is really trying to shake up the usual system in place.

Sounds Awesome! wish I could help more but im neither a Heavy Gear nut nor a modder/modeller of any sort .