Hard Light Productions Forums
Hosted Projects - Standalone => The Babylon Project => Public Development => Topic started by: boewolf on December 30, 2009, 03:14:29 am
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Is it possible or even advisable to try and make some custom content that is compatible with Zathras? If so what is the best way to go about adding such content?
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Yes it's not only possible but we encourage it. First thing is to get familiar with the rules: http://www.hard-light.net/forums/index.php?topic=56303.0 while Zathras may bend those on occasion it's a good idea to follow them for anything not just Zathras.
As for how to go about adding it well you can't. We do that. Best bet is to post about what you are working on or what you have and we will review it. If it's something that improves the game and doesn't break backward compatibility it may go into Zathras. Remember not everything can go in we do have to pick and choose at times. Even if it doesn't you can still post it for people to use in their campaigns.
Moving to public development for further discussion.
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Well in short I intent to try and make shadow variants of the Nova, Midwinter, Warlock, the G.O.D. Basically a shadow EA fleet. I am intending to let my imagination run a little in the what if line and try my had at getting the EA to take over the universe in the name of the Shadows. Make everyone the slaves, and become the Shadows favored underlings.
So I'm looking at a few re skins and new tables. Possible campaign down the line.
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looking forward to it.
This also provides a example for some basic Zathras policy:
1.) Let's say you replace the textures and the tables for the EA ships with new ones. In that case, your stuff will not be added to Zathras, since it would break backwards compatibility with every other campaign using EA ships, that's almost every campaign :lol:. However, nothing prevents you from for example placing your new replacement files in a seperate mod, which uses Zathras via the multi-mod feature.
2.) If you decide to go another way, making new tables (copy and paste ;7 ) and not replacing but only adding stuff, adding something like that to Zathras can be discussed and is almost certain if there is already some great content using it. It's a case by case decision, no promises but Zathras was released to give the development into the hands of the community, not to lock them out, so no worries.
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Option 2. Gotta put a stop to Mr Sharadin. He will probably die a horrid death. He would be too threatening to the shadows galactic domination. So there would probably be some Shadow tech EA vs normal EA under Sharadin's command.
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You forget that the Shadows tried to turn Sheridan over to their side. And since he is, what they call a nexus, that might be the key event were your timeline split form the official one.
Or you could make a Dark Distorted Mirror (http://www.b5-dark-mirror.co.uk/) mod. That'd be awsome if you can come up with nice models for the darkstars and citatel.
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After looking at what is available in the EA fleet, The Icarus with a few modifications would probably make a good looking darkstar (whitestar equivalent). Would that satisfy?
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Just in case you don't know that story I liked to, the Darkstar is a kind of successor to the Whitestar. Bigger, badder and including a telepath that is completely grown into the ship and is part of a network of similarly enslaved telepath all over the galaxy.
So I think the Icarus wouldn't work too well, because it is simply too small and not organic looking in it's shape.
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Well we have a Nova shadow hybrid already. It should be going into Zathras at some point (aka as soon as I have time to finish it).
As for the others reskins Vid's pretty much hit the nail on the head. If you can keep it to textures that is best. There are a limited number of ship slots so table entries for such things we don't hand out lightly. Now that doesn't mean that if you do a really good new model we won't accept it.
There is also a third option that has been used. The original 2008 Xmas pack included both tables and textures for the recolored civis. The textures made it into Zathras and can be used by texture replacement but the table entries themselves didn't.
Oh and there will be beams for that Nova added to Zathras as well so other EA ships can use those.
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From what I have been reading in other threads, for all intensive purposes of mission making and what not, any new content I use in the short term can all just sit in the normal TBP root data folder for the time being? And later make it compatible with Zathras?
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It should work that way, though you may also put it into "data" folder of Zathras.
This may be a better solution.
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Worrying about Zathras and stuff is necessary when you start thinking about releasing it to the public :lol: for development purposes, it's not of our concern what you do to your TBP installation. Still, there is the smart way of doing it and the not-so-smart-making-a-quick-game-impossible-way.
Me thinking FUBAR explained it well :yes: Not everything needs a table :lol:
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The best thing to do is make a mod folder and use a mod.ini with Zathras listed as a secondary. That way even if it doesn't make Zathras you are already set up for releasing it yourself.
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It should work that way, though you may also put it into "data" folder of Zathras.
This may be a better solution.
If you do that though it might interfere with other mods and campaigns for TBP. Following FUBAR's advice allows you to develop your own campaigns easily while not preventing you from playing other peoples. :)
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Well we have a Nova shadow hybrid already. It should be going into Zathras at some point (aka as soon as I have time to finish it).
Does it have Shadow-"Legs"? If not. What does it have, that it wont have, when you modify the ship via Fred?
My personally Opinon:
TBP has enogh Earth Ships. There is no need for more. Icarus excluded, because it was in the show. Therefore I would see it rather if the focus would lie now on extraterrestial ships. Therefore it would be me rather if (pure) Alien ships are in the focus.
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It just has redone textures and new weapons. There were some pics of it around here somewhere.
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New weapons mean Submodels? Turrets? Or only a TPM?
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New weapons as in new weapons. Same turrets but they fire a new beam type using 3.6.11 code features.
Might as well pull up the old pics:
(http://fubar5.fubar.org/tbp/screenshots/novax_plate3.jpg)
(http://fubar5.fubar.org/tbp/screenshots/nova-x_new3.jpg)
(http://fubar5.fubar.org/tbp/screenshots/novax_beams0.jpg)
(http://fubar5.fubar.org/tbp/screenshots/novax_beams1.jpg)
(http://fubar5.fubar.org/tbp/screenshots/novax_beams2.jpg)
Most of those were work in progress and I don't think a decision was ever made about nameplate style. The one in FRED + a nameplate is probably closest to what it is.
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After noticing how the shadow stuff was going to be applied directly in Fred about the only thing I need to do is make an equivalent to the whitestar. I'll post something on that when I have something to show.
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Reading somewhere around here, do side mounted multi part turrets work in TBP?
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They should but there are some like the ones on the side of the nova that look like multi part but aren't.
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Depends on whether or not they work in fs2_open.
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They do.
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New weapons as in new weapons. Same turrets but they fire a new beam type using 3.6.11 code features.
Might as well pull up the old pics:
(http://fubar5.fubar.org/tbp/screenshots/novax_plate3.jpg)
(http://fubar5.fubar.org/tbp/screenshots/nova-x_new3.jpg)
(http://fubar5.fubar.org/tbp/screenshots/novax_beams0.jpg)
(http://fubar5.fubar.org/tbp/screenshots/novax_beams1.jpg)
(http://fubar5.fubar.org/tbp/screenshots/novax_beams2.jpg)
Most of those were work in progress and I don't think a decision was ever made about nameplate style. The one in FRED + a nameplate is probably closest to what it is.
Just out of curiosity are these new skins available yet?
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No the original nameplate scheme had issues and was redone leaving the demo version of the textures pretty useless. It's not hard to redo and I do have it on the list. Only a couple of things ahead of it.
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I personally don't like the nameplates over the semi organic hull. Besides the Nova, are there any semi organic skins for the Midwinter and the EA fighters?
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No but that could be done.
Nameplate is optional. The default is no plate.
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Weird. Just earlier today I was experimenting with the Shadow textures and I got the animated one overlayed on the Thunderbolt's standard texture. I threw in a shinemap for good form, but the effect needs some tweaking.
(http://img571.imageshack.us/img571/9359/eatboltadv.jpg) (http://img571.imageshack.us/i/eatboltadv.jpg/)
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I think someone already did a shadow one. I'll have to look but check in Zathras.
Besides without a link to the texture we can't test it :P
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Well, I have started some freding. Not that these missions are going to be overly balanced... Yet... Given its going to be younger races vs EA Shadow tech. Will get harder once its EA Shadow vs Minbari then Drakh and Centauri. Maybe even EA Shadow and the Shadows chasing the Vorlon out of the galaxy.
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I can upload (http://www.mediafire.com/?2au19bytfap68f7) what I have now but the effect isn't up to what I'd like at the moment:
- The effect is too dark for my liking, and you can barely tell the texture is moving unless the environmental light source is shining directly on it
(gamma in screenshot isn't representative of what I see in-game).
- There's a single frame at the beginning of the animation where I erased the Shadow skin over the cockpit windows when I was planning on animating the
shine map too. This is a simple fix and barely noticeable as is, but still needs to be addressed.
- I didn't modify the T-bolt2a texture, which covers the engine cowlings. As such you can still see some green on the model. More noticeable than the above
point, but not hard to correct either.
- I increased the brightness/contrast on the base T-bolt texture to make the paneling stand out more but neglected to gray out the green decals. At this
point I might just leave that bit, since the green doesn't show through the Shadow skin anyway.
- That little break in the cockpit window on the shinemap is GLARING (literally).
- Would like to modify the model file itself to give the thing some treadmark Shadow spikes. Not too many though.
- Anything else I can nitpick. :D
The effect is basically identical to the standard Shadow skin: 20 frames ran at 30 fps. I haven't found anything in the Zathras .vps that would imply a Shadow skinned EA fighter yet.
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One thing to keep in mind when doing textures: There will no longer be b c and d lod versions. I've already removed almost all of the ea ones. Just a few caps to do. This will be in the next Zathras.
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Do you have any timetable for the next Zathras because I'm sitting on several other texture jobs in various states of completion and four new music tracks. All are in need of testing. I was going at a decent clip until classes started then work on my TBP campaign went into molasses mode.
[edit] Didn't know that about the LOD textures. Do you have any details on how that works now?
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Timetable = soon. It will be 3.6.13 compatible as 3.6.12 and 3.6.13 need different table entries do to a SNAFU in the warp code backporting. As soon as I get the remaining EA ships re-LODed and debris done if needed. You can see the progress here: http://hard-light.net/mantis/view.php?id=509
Crew shuttle/support ship already has the LODs done just need some debris. That covers almost every species support as well.
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Here's the link (http://www.mediafire.com/?dahxipcvdi50gvg) for the new music. Two were drawn from the canceled Into the Fire game, specifically tracks B and the Intro. One was drawn from various The Lost Tales samples, and the fourth was composed from elements of The Long, Twilight Struggle suite. They're in .ogg format with an accompanying .tbm file, if you plan on testing remember to extract to a mod folder or make a new one.
I want to work on the transitions a little bit to make them smoother, and I was planning on adding at least one briefing track from ITF - E. There might be enough stuff in The Coming of Shadows for a fifth track too, not sure yet.
I'll resume work on the textures as time allows. Not having to do b, c, and d textures for the LODs is going to save serious time.
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Great I'll get them tested. I warn you I don't have an ear for this kind of thing so feedback from others will be the way to go. My job is just to see if they work. I will rename it to Slasher.vp just to make it easier to keep track of and update.
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I can upload (http://www.mediafire.com/?2au19bytfap68f7) what I have now but the effect isn't up to what I'd like at the moment:
- The effect is too dark for my liking, and you can barely tell the texture is moving unless the environmental light source is shining directly on it
(gamma in screenshot isn't representative of what I see in-game).
- There's a single frame at the beginning of the animation where I erased the Shadow skin over the cockpit windows when I was planning on animating the
shine map too. This is a simple fix and barely noticeable as is, but still needs to be addressed.
- I didn't modify the T-bolt2a texture, which covers the engine cowlings. As such you can still see some green on the model. More noticeable than the above
point, but not hard to correct either.
- I increased the brightness/contrast on the base T-bolt texture to make the paneling stand out more but neglected to gray out the green decals. At this
point I might just leave that bit, since the green doesn't show through the Shadow skin anyway.
- That little break in the cockpit window on the shinemap is GLARING (literally).
- Would like to modify the model file itself to give the thing some treadmark Shadow spikes. Not too many though.
- Anything else I can nitpick. :D
The effect is basically identical to the standard Shadow skin: 20 frames ran at 30 fps. I haven't found anything in the Zathras .vps that would imply a Shadow skinned EA fighter yet.
I'm not yet in a big hurry. Feel free to take your time to get the effect you desire. It doesn't seem to hard to change a set of textures later. If I get around to making a spiked T-Bolt I'll pass it on to you.
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I know this is kind of impolite ;), but seeing this is the most active thread here, may I ask what can be done about the 3D jumppoint effect? There was some discussion but then it fell dormant. I'm still thinking that the 3D version is too long and the 2D version is too short and a middle solution with the flash at the end would be perfect. Just play the Shadow Dancing mission of Star Fury Pilot with all the jumppoints opening around you, and you will notice what I mean...
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Really at this point not much. Changing the size of it or location of the center would break almost every mission ever made. Maybe additional effects will be possible via code at some point.
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Changing the size of it or location of the center would break almost every mission ever made.
I don't think that this would happen. The ships emerge from the flash which is rather in the middle of the 3D cone and I suspect this is the coordinate where the jumppoint is placed. What I would like to see is the much too long cone after the flash being moved to end exactly at this point. The 2D version does this but is too short at the front, just imagine left from the flash of the top picture with right of the flash of the bottom picture, merged together at the ship end.
(http://img835.imageshack.us/img835/1121/screen0003.jpg) (http://img835.imageshack.us/i/screen0003.jpg/)
(http://img101.imageshack.us/img101/3921/screen0006.jpg) (http://img101.imageshack.us/i/screen0006.jpg/)
If you could point me to the tools needed to edit FS2 models I would try to take a look myself. I used Blender to look at Bloodlines models a long time ago once... :)
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You're probably familiar with how to get stuff out of the .vp files at this point. In TBP's core.vp, look under the model subdirectory for the model files. I think vortex.pof and warp.pof are the model files for the jump effects. PCS2 (http://www.hard-light.net/forums/index.php/topic,52098.0.html) is now the standard .pof viewing program, so you can use it to check before converting into Blender.
You'll need to convert the POFs (http://www.hard-light.net/wiki/index.php/POF_to_Blender_Conversions) to a format Blender can understand, then eventually reconvert (http://www.hard-light.net/wiki/index.php/Blender_to_POF_Conversions) them back into the game. The tutorial thread (http://www.hard-light.net/forums/index.php?topic=70249.0) in the modding forum has some other resources that could be helpful too.
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You'll need to convert the POFs (http://www.hard-light.net/wiki/index.php/POF_to_Blender_Conversions) to a format Blender can understand, then eventually reconvert (http://www.hard-light.net/wiki/index.php/Blender_to_POF_Conversions) them back into the game.
Uff, that looks more complicated than I thought! Couldn't somebody of you with all these programs already running try to do what I suggest ;)? FUBAR did decrease the transparency of the effect recently, couldn't he just pull the end of the cone of the current 3D model back until it meets the flash position?
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You don't seem to understand. The flash occurs at the center of the pof. Making the effect shorter will not move the flash out of the center. If I chopped the cone in half then it would be in the center of the remaining half. This would also move the position of the effect so that any time it is placed in a jumpgate it would now be at the wrong position thus breaking those missions.
The flash and jump are 2 completely different effects played in the same spot by the code.
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The flash occurs at the center of the pof.
Hm, it doesn't look like that for the 2D version. So how is that done? Is the 2D cone effect unsymetrical? Is the half of the cone beyond the flash invisible in that case? Could this be reproduced to get a 2D/3D compromise?
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I think what FUBAR is saying is that the game is coded to render the flash at the center of the jump effect's model. If model is changed such that the center is actually at the tail end of the .pof it'll throw all kinds of mission out of whack. Any mission where a ship or warp-effect SEXP was placed with any amount of precision is going to suffer, and there are plenty that do just that.
Ironically, in the show, when viewed from the side, jump points look flat much like the 2D version in the game.
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Ironically, in the show, when viewed from the side, jump points look flat much like the 2D version in the game.
Really, in which episode is this visible? Which gives me another idea: Is the 2D version actually 2D? The picture posted here looks as if it contains at least two vertices. Maybe we could just extend them or add some more to make it look like the mouth of the 3D version, because obviously the 2D flash effect is at the end of the cone and not at the middle. What do you think?
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I can't remember which episode, but this topic came up years ago and someone referenced the show. Apparently jump points are flat when viewed from the side, and only appear to have the added dimension when seen from the front.
[edit] Now that I think about it, this was back when we were still on the VWBB boards. Legend of the Rangers had just come out and we were having a big debate/argument over whether or not to switch to the Crusade style jump points or use the ones in LotR. That was over eight years ago. Obviously we did neither, since the jump effect you see now is relatively unchanged from the one that was released with TBP 1.0 back in 2001. :D
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Legend of the Rangers had just come out and we were having a big debate/argument over whether or not to switch to the Crusade style jump points or use the ones in LotR.
I'm glad you didn't switch because these new jumppoints were as stupid as most of the non Foundation Imaging stuff. Now what about the 2D model, could it be changed?
Update: I also noticed that when a warp effect is triggered manually in the fs2 files it looks like the 3D version even if 2D warp effect is selected in Launcher. Why is this?
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Do you mean when a warp-effect SEXP is used? The mission designer can force the use of one jump point model or another in FRED2. I believe it's the last argument for that particular operator, but I can't remember what its default setting is.
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The side-view thing from the show was actually from "A Call To Arms". As the Victory and Excalibur are jumping at one point, you see them approach what appears to be a very shallow bowl-shaped effect and vanish into it, but it still appears to be the traditional cone/tunnel entrance when viewed from the front. Due to rendering issues, there is currently no way to make the jump point look that for the game. Personally, I'd rather keep the cone effect for the jump rather than the shallow one, since they are more often seen from the front. I would like to see the newer double-sided cone used to reduce the see-the-arriving-ship-through-the-side-of-the-cone issue.
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I was worried I was coming off as a Crazy Man on that episode thing. Thanks, Trivial Psychic.
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The side-view thing from the show was actually from "A Call To Arms".
Well, for me this wouldn't count as "canon" anyway because after Foundation Imaging left Netter Digital produced too many bad or inconsistent effects. I still remember the wrong sized Centauri Primus cruiser flying backwards in Sleeping in Light, because they obviously didn't know what they were doing. Also most of the ND models were ugly compared with the Foundation Imaging ones and the whole concept of the Excalibur didn't fit one bit into the Babylon 5 universe. I really liked about it before that the races and their ship design made sense and this got completely lost when FI was gone :(...
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The side-view thing from the show was actually from "A Call To Arms".
I still remember the wrong sized Centauri Primus cruiser flying backwards in Sleeping in Light,...
I don't recall that one, but I do recall the backwards-flying Minbari Nials that were WAY over-sized, in "Legend of the Rangers".
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I think Sleeping in Light was filmed/produced in the Season 4 run anyway, back when JMS wasn't sure if Warner Brothers would sign off on the show's fifth season.
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I think Sleeping in Light was filmed/produced in the Season 4 run anyway, back when JMS wasn't sure if Warner Brothers would sign off on the show's fifth season.
Yes, still Foundation Imaging was gone at the time and Netter Digital just wasn't up to it's standards. Just compare the Drakh ships to anything that FI did before...
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I didn't actually know that. The difference between B5 and Crusade is like day and light to me, but I've never picked up on changes during the original series' run.
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I didn't actually know that. The difference between B5 and Crusade is like day and light to me, but I've never picked up on changes during the original series' run.
Yeah, I followed it closely at the time and it was all Star Trek's and JMS's fault. To me a big part of Babylon 5 was due to the great ships and effects done by the Foundation Imaging effects company founded by Rob Thornton. Even now nothing comes close to their ship designs which actually show off how advanced a race is and what kind of psychology they favor. Like functional gray EA ships compared to colorful Narn ships or elegant Minbari ships, not to speak of the living ships of the Vorlons and Shadows which was an idea of Thornton which JMS just worked with.
At that time Paramount had already used the first draft of the Babylon 5 script, pitched to them earlier and rejected, to create DS9 which angered JMS a lot, rightfully so in my opinion, but they still used models in their effects. After seing what FI was doing for B5 they decided to buy them off. Thornton wanted to do effects for both shows but JMS was angry again and feared to get less attention from FI compared to ST so he let them go and with the producer of B5, Douglas Netter, they founded Netter Digital thinking they could just reproduce the stuff FI made. They couldn't!
The switch was done in the middle of season 4 which can already be seen in the Drakh ship design. It got worse in season 5, Crusade and everything after that because they just didn't keep the standards of FI to keep the effects as consistent as the rest of the show. Speaking of which, have some of you tested my Star Fury Pilot patch yet? Because I improved it some more to bring some of the missions closer to the way they were shown in the original series. Only in minor ways like the Narn cruisers in Twilight Struggle not attacking in line. Should I upload version 1.1 somewhere?
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Yeah, Crusade's FX in particular seemed kinda :(.
About the HEU missions, might as well upload them. If you think the pack is polished enough at this point for a more open test, you might try posting in the Missions and Campaigns forum to net another person or two to try it out.
Just noticed "day and light" in my last post. My brain is frying, sorry.
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About the HEU missions, might as well upload them. If you think the pack is polished enough at this point for a more open test, you might try posting in the Missions and Campaigns forum to net another person or two to try it out.
Okay, I uploaded the current version to FileFront and will post about this in the other forum too:
http://www.filefront.com/17386623/b5sfpup11.zip
Speaking of fixes and hoping that Vidmaster monitors this thread ;), I've just finished his first Fortune Hunters campaign without any problems! But there is a small issue in the last mission when you stumble upon the Centauri at Gorash 7. In the end scene where the Cash is supposed to escape, the jumppoint that opens looks like an entry point and not an exit point. I've now started with the second campaign and have another question in the first real mission. Does it really make sense that a Minbari Ranger is flying a Centauri shuttle? Were the Centauri involved with the Rangers at all at that point? I know, I'm just nitpicking, but small details like those bother me and would be easy to fix :).
I also noticed several typos here and there in most of the campaigns I have played until now. Maybe some native English speaker could go over all the text for the DVD 2.0 release, especially looking for other minor errors like mixed up "then" and "than" too...
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Yeah, Crusade's FX in particular seemed kinda :(.
They were better than Legend of the Rangers.
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Speaking of Babylon 5, it seems as if The Babylon Project is not the only thing still alive ;). At the New York Comic Con JMS mentioned the following: “I said to Warner Bros. a while back, 'When you’re ready to do something real with 'Babylon 5,' either a big-budget film or a TV show, if you want to do one of those two things, call me, otherwise don’t bother me.' About a month ago the phone rang. I don’t know where this is gonna go yet, but when they call you, there’s something going on. I can’t tell you what it is yet and it may not go anywhere, but there is movement in the tall grass.”
Also due to my Bloodlines patch I have connections to the The Patches Scroll site which want's to expend into mods and has connections to bigger game sites like Blues News. So if you want anything of TBP mirrored there or announced on Blues News, I should be able to arrange that :)! Maybe for Zathras 2.0 or the upcoming DVD 2.0 release? If there is indeed new B5 content in the making, this could revive the interest in your work, after all as far as I know it's the only B5 mod/game that actually has been finished! I updated the B5 Wikipedia article on it too ;)...
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There have been so many false starts I know better than to get my hopes up. For eight years, the best one liners on the TBP team have always come from Skullar. I still haven't forgotten "the Lost Tales should have stayed lost." :D Skullar, come baaaaaaaaack!
But who knows, maybe JMS will be able to work his magic again.
Keeping with the off topic theme, things are pretty quiet around here. I think 0rph3u5 is working on his FS2 projects right now, Vidmaster is embattled in coursework, and FUBAR probably wants to take a much deserved break after Zathras 2.0. I know there were a couple campaigns announced over the summer but they're in silent running if they're still active. I've been trying to simultaneously work on a rerelease of Relic and another campaign while handling a dozen other things and it's turning into a little mess. The good news is Relic 1.1 will be out this coming Saturday with bug fixes, some redone textures, and an achievement system I threw in last minute. I might have some more news at that time, but we'll see.
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Actually I've been working on the next Zathras since even before 2.0 was released. Adding missing LODs and debris to ships, removing unneeded maps and fixing other bugs I find while doing it. Heck probably put in 60+ hours in the last week just on that.
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There have been so many false starts I know better than to get my hopes up.
Yeah, I know...
I still haven't forgotten "the Lost Tales should have stayed lost." :D Skullar, come baaaaaaaaack!
I agree with Skullar on this, in my opinion Crusade and the 5th season were already bad. JMS is great when he can plan something, but improvisation or acknowledging others' achievements are not his strengths.
But who knows, maybe JMS will be able to work his magic again.
He has indeed more main-stream publicity now after "The Changeling".
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Actually I've been working on the next Zathras since even before 2.0 was released. Adding missing LODs and debris to ships, removing unneeded maps and fixing other bugs I find while doing it.
Any chance of improving the 3D jumppoint effect ;)? Also shouldn't Zathras 2.0 be on the main page now?
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Ooooooookay, FUBAR opted not to take a vacation! While we're sort of on the subject of LODs, is the EA Aurora going to utilize just one main texture? I'm still not entirely clear on how LODs and their textures are going to work. I only ask because if I can save time by not customizing ship_01b/ship_01c/ship_01d textures it would be win.
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One set of textures. All the b, c, d variants will no longer be needed.
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Does it really make sense that a Minbari Ranger is flying a Centauri shuttle? Were the Centauri involved with the Rangers at all at that point? I know, I'm just nitpicking, but small details like those bother me and would be easy to fix :).
Aside from the Centauri blockading that Ranger training facility on behalf of the Shadows, no, they were not involved with the Rangers.
However, I don't see a problem with a Centauri shuttle among the Rangers. The Rangers probably tried getting their hands on every ship they could get in those days, and unlike Centauri cap ships or fighters, a shuttle might have been easily acquired. I imagine ships of that class were freely available to anyone who could pay for them.
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However, I don't see a problem with a Centauri shuttle among the Rangers.
I still don't like it. It just looks strange having a Minbari talking out of a Centauri shuttle ;). Speaking of Fortune Hunters, I didn't manage to beat the "Shadow Base Mission" after several tries, so I removed some fighter wings to finish it :)! Is this because I'm a beginner or is this mission bugged? I didn't even notice why the mission failed, were the Harvester shuttles killed or the Enfili damaged too much? Something is amiss here...
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It's not bugged. That mission is really, really hard. Either the Minbari cruiser gets taken out by the Shadow fighters, or one of the shuttles later on in the mission bites the dust. I managed to beat that mission once by, pretty much, being everywhere at the same time.
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It's not bugged. That mission is really, really hard. Either the Minbari cruiser gets taken out by the Shadow fighters, or one of the shuttles later on in the mission bites the dust.
Yeah, I noticed that indeed if one shuttle is destroyed the mission ends. This is a bad mission design IMHO because after frantically fighting for a very long time everything depends on such a weak link.
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With a little luck I should have a few good missions that set up the EA shadow teched war against almost everyone.
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With a little luck I should have a few good missions that set up the EA shadow teched war against almost everyone.
Sounds interesting. :nod: Any more info you can give us?
BTW, looking forward to Skullar's EACW campaign, as well. :drevil:
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If I was to say anything much more. I would have to put you on a skylark headed for implantation to a Shadow battle crab. Oh hell. I've said too much. Looks like Nergal is the next Shadow slave in the bulk of the camp.
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I finally used the "rearm" command and have some suggestions:
1) Please rename it to "Rearm/repair me" or to "Support me" in the options because this is not obvious.
Also in the communication menu I would remove the "subsys" because this is just confusing info as well.
2) The docking shuttle clips into the screen. Can this be fixed? Or maybe a maintenance bot be used?
This would make more sense in the B5 universe anyway, nobody would send a shuttle into a dogfight ;).
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1. The interface is hard coded so no.
2. Support ships were required for all species by the engine (don't know if they still are) and there was only one allowed per species. One does not fit all ships so you get the clipping. I can try to improve it but no guarantees. If I make it work for one it might look terrible for the rest.
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1. The interface is hard coded so no.
Really? I would have thought that changing shown text would be a simple thing to do! After all you must have changed a lot of text from the Freespace universe to the B5 universe...
2. Support ships were required for all species by the engine (don't know if they still are) and there was only one allowed per species. One does not fit all ships so you get the clipping.
Ah. Still my idea of using the maintenance bots for the EA could possible fix this, because only its arms may appear on screen which might look better. Can you please try this out for me?
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Some things are hard coded some aren't.
Using the maint bot is not possible as it is not the proper ship class. Support ships are a special class. Also you think the shuttle has clipping issues what do you think a maint bot's arms would do when it docked? Go right through your fighter that's what.
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Using the maint bot is not possible as it is not the proper ship class. Support ships are a special class.
And this has to be a shuttle? And it can't be a special class maint bot just from the model side?
Also you think the shuttle has clipping issues what do you think a maint bot's arms would do when it docked? Go right through your fighter that's what.
Yeah possibly ;), but I had hoped that it would look as if the arms would dangle down in front of the window. It may be worth a try would it not?
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1. The interface is hard coded so no.
Really? I would have thought that changing shown text would be a simple thing to do! After all you must have changed a lot of text from the Freespace universe to the B5 universe...
Not in the interface. It's entirely the same as in FS2, to my knowledge.
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Not in the interface. It's entirely the same as in FS2, to my knowledge.
Interesting. My experience with patching Bloodlines showed me that there usually must be a text file for localisation of the interface which can then be used to change any text.
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Not in the interface. It's entirely the same as in FS2, to my knowledge.
Interesting. My experience with patching Bloodlines showed me that there usually must be a text file for localisation of the interface which can then be used to change any text.
Irrelevant to the fact that the TBP interface text has not to my knowledge been changed from FS2, which is the point of my statement, which was in turn meant to repudiate your assertion that a lot of text must have been changed in creating TBP. Whether or not it's possible to do it is tangential.
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Irrelevant to the fact that the TBP interface text has not to my knowledge been changed from FS2...
You are right. A quick look shows that even the shield options are still in TBP which make no sense except for Firstones ships. Another quick look with an editor shows that the relevant text is indeed in the main engine file, but I don't think it should be edited for such a small detail. There isn't enough space anyway...
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If it could be altered tableside like you said, though, that'd be awesome - but I think the English defaults at least may be hardcoded.
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If it could be altered tableside like you said, though, that'd be awesome - but I think the English defaults at least may be hardcoded.
The English defaults are inside the exe itself and I couldn't find any additional tables, so I would guess it's not easy. Maybe looking at a localized FS 2 version would give some information but I don't have one...
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It should be possible to write a strings/tstrings.tbl for TBP. Information can be found on the wiki. Some (http://www.hard-light.net/wiki/index.php/Portal:Modding) useful (http://www.hard-light.net/wiki/index.php/Tables) information (http://www.hard-light.net/wiki/index.php/Strings.tbl) here (http://www.hard-light.net/wiki/index.php/Tstrings.tbl).
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It should be possible to write a strings/tstrings.tbl for TBP. Information can be found on the wiki. Some (http://www.hard-light.net/wiki/index.php/Portal:Modding) useful (http://www.hard-light.net/wiki/index.php/Tables) information (http://www.hard-light.net/wiki/index.php/Strings.tbl) here (http://www.hard-light.net/wiki/index.php/Tstrings.tbl).
Thanks for the info. The relevant file is indeed strings.tbl and I easily changed "Rearm me" and "Rearm/Repair subsys" to "Rearm/Repair" on each occassion. Could this be included into the next Zathras ;)? I also checked the clipping support with a Minbari fighter and of course it wouldn't make any sense having every race being supported by EA mainbots. So the clipping is something we have to live with, like with the general clipping in capital ships where very often one is able to fly right into a fighter bay and then inside out of the shiphull :)!