[Shivan Hunter]

Basically, why aren't they working?

Code: [Select]

$Name: UEF Kentauroi
+nocreate
$Thruster Particles: YES
$Thruster Particle Bitmap: missilespew03.eff
$Min Radius: 0.5
$Max Radius: 2
$Min Created: 1
$Max Created: 5
$Variance: 0.1
$Afterburner Particle Bitmap: particlesmoke01.eff
$Min Radius: 0.5
$Max Radius: 2
$Min Created: 1
$Max Created: 5
$Variance: 0.1
Yes, I have both WiH and the MVPs loaded as mods. It doesn't work either with or without the .eff, and debug reports no errors.

log, loading WiH, playing the Kentauroi Race mission and exiting.

If I screwed up the syntax I blame it on being 7 in the morning and I haven't slept yet. Ahh, summer...

[Fury]

Remove YES after $Thruster Particles: and remove file extensions. Missilespews in the latest mediavps are a bit too long to be used as ship thrusters, but this is an example.

Code: [Select]

#Ship classes
 
$Name:          GTF Ulysses
+nocreate
$Thruster02 Length factor:          0.0
$Thruster Particles:
    $Thruster Particle Bitmap:      missilespew03
    $Min Radius:                    1.036298
    $Max Radius:                    1.036298
    $Min created:                   1
    $Max created:                   1
    $Variance:                      0.0
$Thruster Particles:
    $Afterburner Particle Bitmap:   missilespew02
    $Min Radius:                    1.036298
    $Max Radius:                    2.072596
    $Min created:                   2
    $Max created:                   2
    $Variance:                      0.01
   
#End

Edit: Note that Min and Max radius use thruster radius values taken from pof file.

[Shivan Hunter]

lol, I originally didn't have either of those (extensions and "YES")... I also didn't have #Ship Classes and #End. Blarghz.

[Shivan Hunter]

So, I've been playing around with some effects... most taken from the MediaVPs but one made by me...

A Kentauroi doing 120m/s (at probably about 60fps):


A Kentauroi afterburning at 200m/s (again, probably ~60fps) (color is wrong, I was making it for Terran fighters but testing with the Kent):


So does it look like crap? Should I change the afterburner effect so it doesn't look like a chemical rocket? I'll obviously have to do that for the Shivan effect :/

[Dragon]

It looks great, I was going to work on such effects and make a version for Mediavps, but then I got ArmA II (an excellent millitary simulator) and got distracted.
That fire on AB could start closer to the engine.

[Nighteyes]

again, we come to the same problem, please make a test mission, with 2 destroyers, a few corvettes and a few wings of fighters and bombers all using the thruster particles please
at 60fps the thrusters look great, I can probably make a better looking effect for them specifically, but, I honestly think this will look like crap with low fps in big battles...
and don't get me wrong, this IS the direction we should be heading to 

I suggested a while back to try it only with capships at first, as most missions don't have them in numbers like fighters, and I must say it would be awesome to fly through massive plums of engine vapor particles...

[Shivan Hunter]

yeah... like I said in a different thread, the particle system needs some fixing.

About your second point- why should capships have massive plumes of engine vapor particles? The only time there should be any lengthy effect is when a ship is at high speed, which for capships is only on warpin/warpout. Otherwise, the single "ball" sprite right on top of the engine is perfectly fine.

:/

[Commander Zane]

Those screens are uber.

[Fury]

Shivan Hunter, note that you should pay great deal of attention to $Min created and $Max created values. The smaller the numbers you use, the less performance impact there is per ship, meaning more ships within range can have particle thrusters. Particle thrusters aren't displayed if host ship is certain distance away, this distance is not that long either which means only ships close to you have particle effects.

However, I don't really know if thrusters should look like they're chemical engines, it doesn't really fit FSverse.

[Dragon]

I originally made particle thrusters with another universe in mind, I agree that they don't look FSish.

[Aardwolf]

It looks like your ship is exploding.

[Shivan Hunter]

whaargarbl

I need to control particles' relative velocity, and the Wiki doesn't list an entry for that.

Also, GIMPing a new Terran afterburner effect. Have a few ideas for the Vasudan one as well.

[EDITZORZ]

Here are both effects on a Myrm:




...And this seems to be the threshold at which thruster flames are not displayed. Any way to change this via options menu or launcher flag?

[T-LoW]

The 2nd one looks actually pretty cool. But Nr. 1 screams "Magic, ladies and gentlemen!" with its dusty star-smoke-look

[Commander Zane]

I think it looks awesome, keep it up.

[Droid803]

No pixie dust plz.

[JGZinv]

All of them aren't bad IMO.

[Retsof]

are the blue thruster flames that old effect I made for some different kind of flak?  Let me see if I can dig it up...
Ah, here we are:

Otherwise this is pretty sweet, what do I paste into the ships tbl to make it work?  Or better yet, a tbm that has all ships listed so one doesn't have to sort through all the other data.
*Looks at the table entries up top*  Nevermind, I think I figured it out.  I'll have to play with these.

[Aardwolf]

I think it needs to be less noisy

[Dragon]

Are you making these effects for a specific mod?

[Shivan Hunter]

Re: Pixie dust:
I'll remove the particle effect and see how it looks.

Retsof: At the moment, they use a muzzle flash and a particle effect (from the MVPs) and the main effects are something I GIMPed.

Dragon: Nope, just for general use.