Glest & Animations

[divineauthority]

Hi, I'm back again

I was just wondering if there are any restrictions with regards to animations in Glest. My main questions are:
- Is it ok to use the skin modifier to rig a model? (I'm using 3ds Max)
- Are there particular lengths for different animations? (eg a move animation must be 12 frames, attack must be 16 or something)
- Do the animations need to be a particular frame rate?

I did try searching the mods forum but nothing helpful popped up.

Thanks in advance or any help.

[titi]

I cannot say anything about the 3ds-max exporter and his limits( most of us use blender ), but glest doesn't have a limit for animation number of frames or framerates in animations
But for performance reasons its wise not to use to many frames and high framerates. In big games there are lots of models who have to be animated!
In the xml-files you can adjust the speed of the animation.
The glest 3ds max exporter is not available for all versions of 3dsmax!

[divineauthority]

Thanks for the speedy reply.

I know the exporter's for 3ds Max 7, I'm using 8 and was hoping that the script will still work as there isn't too much difference between the two programs (or at least not when compared to the difference between 8 and Max 2008).

I did see in another thread that around 15 frames was the best? Anyway, I ought to try the exporter first and see if it works, if not then I'm going to have to try and find a way around it If it does work then I should have a very early alpha of my post-apocalyptic car mod out sometime in the next 2 weeks.

Thanks again.

[Omega]

I don't know 3DS Max, but in blender, you can have a walk animation with just 4 frames. An attack animation can have 4 or 5, a death animation might have as much as 6 or even 7. 15 seems a bit high. Glest does a great job at smoothing these.
http://http://glest.110mb.com/animation.html

[mictes]

n1 website omega !

RESPECT^*3 !!!    

[wciow]

You need to advertise that web page more on the forums. Its really good!!  

[divineauthority]

15's too much?   Some of the animations in that could end up as long as 100 frames.

Well that makes life considerably easier and that site you've linked to is brilliant despite the fact I'm not using blender.

Cheers!

[Omega]

I'm glad you like it. I'm advertising it as much as possible and do if anyone asks a questions such as 'how do I model?' or 'how do I animate?' I'll just redirect them to my new site.

Glad to have helped and happy modeling!

[wciow]

15's too much?  

Well theres no real limit that I know of.

Basically each attack has an attack speed setting which defines how often a unit attacks (about every 2-3 seconds average i think). Animations in Glest are tailored to fit this so 10-12 frames for 2-3 seconds is about right.

Most Glest modders have stuck pretty close to the original game design. However, the attack speed could be changed to say a 20 second attack with a matching animation lasting approx 100 frames.

A more advanced type of animation would be chained attacks. The unit would attack at standard Glest speed but its animation would have say 100 frames with 10 individual attacks linked together. This would help to stop attacks becoming too generic as they currently are in Glest.

[divineauthority]

Ok, cheers for the info. I'm gonna have a look at the sample models that were posted up to get a general idea.

For everyone's information (even though you mostly use blender) the exporter does work for Max 8 and I got my first model into the game (unanimated though, I was just testing the exporter works). It felt like Christmas had came early Omega's Labyrinth has given me ideas. Also I never realised that lua scripting was possible. I've done a bit for Dawn Of War so I might look into this and see if I can get an experience system working between maps...

No promises though, I am still very much a beginner. If any body thinks they could contribute I'd be extremely grateful.

[Omega]

AH, Lau is great, though note that it is for scenarios, and it should be learned well before doing anything big. Looking at existing scenarios and such should get the layout of glests lau, but also there's this: http://http://glest.110mb.com/lau.html

[Please, it's Lua! - @kukac@]