[Spoon]

Hey folks
After several days of information gathering, learning how the tools work and forum/wiki searching. I've finally managed to create something slightely resembeling a fighter in 3ds max 6, exported it to .pof and edited it in PCS2. Now here is something I just can't figure out. For some reason all kinds of default fighter (any) weapons seem to ignore the shield mesh. It only shows up and blocks shots when those shots would have missed the hull anyway.

This is how the shield mesh looks like in PCS2.

And this is in max (saving it as .jpg instantly makes it look horribly grainy)
I tried 'flipping normals' on the shield mesh in 3ds max but that just crashes the .pof exporter. I tried increasing the size of the mesh as well as making it as form fitting as possible. I read somewhere on these forums that having a mesh of 80 faces should be good etc. But none of this solves this!

Any help would be much appriciated!

[Ziame]

For me that's a perfect shuttle. Good work on this fighter so far. Had to say this<;, though I can't help you

[Nuke]

whit i do in a situation like this is grab all your shield verts and hit weld (be sure your threshold is low enough). thin make sure the mesh is triangulated. if all else fails, get it into truespace glue it to a cube and run that through pcs2. then import it into your model with the good geometry. might also be something to do with the shield collision chunk, which is fairly new. but from your first image it seems a couple of those polies are being uncooperative.

[Spoon]

For me that's a perfect shuttle. Good work on this fighter so far. Had to say this<;, though I can't help you

Thanks 
It's still far away from completed though.

whit i do in a situation like this is grab all your shield verts and hit weld (be sure your threshold is low enough). thin make sure the mesh is triangulated. if all else fails, get it into truespace glue it to a cube and run that through pcs2. then import it into your model with the good geometry. might also be something to do with the shield collision chunk, which is fairly new. but from your first image it seems a couple of those polies are being uncooperative.

Well it's a standard 3ds max geosphere but I tried welding anyway. No effect. Not completely sure on the triangulated part.
Whats this shield collision chunk you speak of?
Just to note that the few faces that are lit up in the first screenie in pcs2 seem to be a basic lighting effect that just rotates along.

Results I had so far: 'Normal' shield mesh doesn't stop any hit thats directed at the hull. Just shows up when shots are near misses
'flipped normals' shield mesh (yeah I said the flipping crashed the exporter, I was just doing it wrong) only stops shots coming from the front, back and sides but refuses duty when it comes to shots coming from up and below.

[Water]

Try an 80 face sphere and see if that makes a difference.

[stumpjumper920]

ok im no expert, but one thing you might try is importing another fighter (or bomber depending on size) shield mesh in PCS2, just go to the shield tree and click the load button and then select the ship you want to use.  Then hopefully this will at least give you a comparison and a check to make sure its nothing else...  oh yea right you need to get a ship to get the shield from first. haha  One suggestion would be scoobs models, i know they work and they come in all sizes.  Good Luck!

[Spoon]

Oh man this is driving me nuts 

I tried the suggestion of the sphere and hell even a cube. Both of these give far far better results then the geosphere. They almost act normal. 'cept when getting shot at from certain angles. Then the shots will go straight through unto the hull

[Vasudan Admiral]

From the look of the PCS2 screen there and the descriptions, I'm going to guess that your shield faces are partially inverted. All shots will travel right through those faces facing inwards on one side, probably go through the ship, and get caught on other faces facing inwards on the other side.

Blender has a 'recalculate normals inside/outside' function that should do exactly what you need - so look for something similar in max. 'Flip normals' will simply invert which faces are causing trouble.

[Spoon]

I tried flipping the normals, I tried flipping the bird. Cube/Sphere shapes will give decent results but certain shots at certain angles will still pass through. I'm really at a loss here. I tried every possible shape. I tried every suggestion given here in this thread and I tried a dozend of other things. I'm starting to suspect it might have something to do with the model itself instead of the shield mesh (but that seems so unlogical all things considered?)

[Hellstryker]

Well, we can take a look at it if you upload it (preferably in .3ds)

[Spoon]

http://rapidshare.com/files/207926582/Thanksinadvance.rar.html
Then please do. Oh and if you open it in PCS2 recalculate the MOI else its going to get bounced around like crazy in FS2.
Shots always seem to pass through near the cockpit area or at the tip of the wings.

[Hellstryker]

I said in .3ds because not all of us have max.

[Spoon]

Woops, I guess I saved it instead of exported it. Better dubble check that next time.
sorry!
http://rapidshare.com/files/208121884/Thistimeforsure.rar.html

[Topgun]

I tried flipping the normals, I tried flipping the bird.

They need to be recalculated, not flipped.

[Water]

The shield normals are ok.

Don't uvmap the shield. It's unnecessary.

For the ship - you can save 100 polys by deleting the unseen polys in the middle. - 50 per mirrored side.

[Spoon]

The shield normals are ok.

Don't uvmap the shield. It's unnecessary.

For the ship - you can save 100 polys by deleting the unseen polys in the middle. - 50 per mirrored side.

but I didn't uvmapped the shield... (at least not on purpose that is, who knows what exporting to .3ds and opening it in an other program does...)
And yes dully noted on the polys, the model I uploaded isn't exactly a final version.

Well... I can't get the shield mesh to stop 100% of the shots. However in a sudden burst of random insight I gave the ship a Surface Shields flag in the ships.tbl. And this solves the problem! Sure, shots will still mysteriously penetrate the shield mesh at certain angles but thanks to SS the damage will be done to the shields instead of the hull. The shield mesh will show up properly etc.

You can still color me confused as to why the shield mesh is not working 100% though.

[Vasudan Admiral]

Hmm, just to be sure it isn't something else - try importing the shield data from a similarly sized retail ship. (The 'load' button top right of PCS2's interface)

[Spoon]

Hmm, just to be sure it isn't something else - try importing the shield data from a similarly sized retail ship. (The 'load' button top right of PCS2's interface)

Tried that, pretty much gives the same result.

[chief1983]

Are we sure this isn't regular game behavior?  I've had plenty of shots at least partially rip through my shields and hit hull, even with shields at full strength.  The shields do still take some damage, but some leeches through and does hull damage too.

Also, I wonder if there's anything related to the radius of the ship going on.  And the shield mesh has to be fairly close to the ship at all places, depending on how large the ship is.

[Vasudan Admiral]

Well in that case it sounds like it may not be a shield mesh problem after all. Can you upload the POF and table perhaps for testing/checking?