Stock terrains update and new effects pack

[+Stary 2,427]

tracersmoke.tga alphachannel

 

BUT

 

Quack74, it seem you have it wrongly installed..? Why they float such in the air? You dropped both tracersmoke.tga and tracersmokeemitter.ini to Effects folder?

[Panama Red 22]

First of all, I want to thank Stary for the wonderful new terrains. They really add to the FE game and I am really enjoying his mod.

 

What got me thinking was two comments made in this thread:

1. Stary's statement about the Alpha rendering error causing the far item to be seen in front of the closer item

2. quack74's comment about all the X trees.

After tinkering with the Cambrai_data.ini file (Alpha section), and thinking about what has been said, I think I can answer a couple of questions.

 

I think that TK purposely set the Alpha rendering the way he did for a very specific reason. If you notice TK does not have a lot of trees in the stock FE game and I think for two reasons:

1. Older PC's with their FPS load

2. Alpha rendering. If you look at the stock FE trees when you fly over them, you will notice that you can not see the tree as an X, you only see the flat side that faces you because the way he has the Alpha rendering, so it looks natural up close and there are not a lot of trees to interfere with far items showing before closer items.

 

When you add a lot of trees (Alpha objects), it brings out two problems in the game:

1. Your FPS drop with all the additional items that must be accounted for in the game

2. The "Alpha rendering" problem where the rear trees are seen in front of the closer trees

 

By fixing the "Alpha rendering" problem, you create another problem and that is you now see the X trees as you fly over them since the game can no longer only show you the flat side of the tree, but must show you all of the tree.

 

I do give Stary a big thank you for attempting the address the X tree problem caused by changing the Alpha rendering by including the tree base so the X is not as obvious when you fly the trees (but this does add a heavier load to the game). I am referring to his great "Green Hell 2" mod where he included three versions of his trees for each level of PC (high, medium and low).

 

I guess this all goes back to the old saying "that there is no free lunch" and that everything you do has a compromise someplace. I just hope that Stary's additional tree shading will help solve the obvious X tree problem, because this is a really great mod that just needs the trees tweaked so the X tree "Alpha rendering" problem is not as obvious.

[+quack74 329]

tracersmoke.tga alphachannel

 

BUT

 

Quack74, it seem you have it wrongly installed..? Why they float such in the air? You dropped both tracersmoke.tga and tracersmokeemitter.ini to Effects folder?

 

 

Yeah, somewhere when messing with my effects I missed placed the gun smoke that I was using. Now I get the squiggly lines. I havnt been able to work on it yet. Not sure what happened or what I need to do To get back the correct smoke effect from gun fire.

[+Stary 2,427]

quack, what version of tracersmokeemitter.ini are you using?

 

Open the file and look for tga texture name (ie. smoke2.tga) <-the one you'll need, should be listed near the end of the file in [...material] section

[Mike Dora 171]

Stary,

 

I know this is sounding greedy, after all the excellent work you'v done on Cambrai and Verdun, but I'vs also been trying to use your new seasons, tiles and trees for Edward's Flanders terrain and Gepard's Vosges terrain. Been fairly successful, with one snag, can't get the cities to look right. I keep getting the mess shown below. I'm pretty sure that it must be something simple (isn't it always?), but all my experiments have failed. Can you maybe help again please sir?

 

Thanks

 

Mike

[+Stary 2,427]

Wrong texture referenced in terrain's data.ini file. Make sure you apply the same "solidobjecttexture=" and "alphaobjecttexture=" to the texture.

 

example from wwiCambrai_data.ini:

 

[Texture023]

Filename=FrFarm2Town25b.BMP

HasWater=0

Color=0.287909,0.328317,0.230120

SolidObjectTexture=WW1_city.tga

AlphaObjectTexture=ter_newtrees1.tga

 

[Texture024]

Filename=FrFarm2Town25c.BMP

HasWater=0

Color=0.283886,0.324579,0.229152

SolidObjectTexture=WW1_city.tga

AlphaObjectTexture=ter_newtrees1.tga

 

the ones in red specify the textures engine apply to solid and alpha type ground objects, so in ie. Vogesen_data.ini, the same must be applied for the FrFarm2Town25b.BMP and FrFarm2Town25c.BMP, and every other texture listed in the data ini

 

And here's the Vogesen version I did few weeks ago to use the 7seasons:

[Mike Dora 171]

Wrong texture referenced in terrain's data.ini file. Make sure you apply the same "solidobjecttexture=" and "alphaobjecttexture=" to the texture.

 

example from wwiCambrai_data.ini:

 

[Texture023]

Filename=FrFarm2Town25b.BMP

HasWater=0

Color=0.287909,0.328317,0.230120

SolidObjectTexture=WW1_city.tga

AlphaObjectTexture=ter_newtrees1.tga

 

[Texture024]

Filename=FrFarm2Town25c.BMP

HasWater=0

Color=0.283886,0.324579,0.229152

SolidObjectTexture=WW1_city.tga

AlphaObjectTexture=ter_newtrees1.tga

 

the ones in red specify the textures engine apply to solid and alpha type ground objects, so in ie. Vogesen_data.ini, the same must be applied for the FrFarm2Town25b.BMP and FrFarm2Town25c.BMP, and every other texture listed in the data ini

 

And here's the Vogesen version I did few weeks ago to use the 7seasons:

 

 

 

Many thanks again Stary, now I've got Vosges working right, and Flanders almost right. Still having a bit of a snag with cities in the latter though, as shown below. Some of the buildings look OK, but some are flashing. What bit am I missing out, or is it maybe just "finger trouble" on my part? BTW for the record I'va also attached my current Flanders.ini file.

 

Thanks!

 

Mike

[+Stary 2,427]

Mike, make sure you type the right extension, .tga not .bmp; also remember to change the [solidobjecttexture] settings in Flanders_data.ini

[Mike Dora 171]

Mike, make sure you type the right extension, .tga not .bmp; also remember to change the [solidobjecttexture] settings in Flanders_data.ini

 

Stary

 

You did it again - what I needed was this text in the [solidObjectTextureMaterial] part of the Flanders_data.ini file:

 

[solidObjectTextureMaterial]

DepthBufferCheck=TRUE

DepthBufferWrite=TRUE

RenderedInOrder=TRUE

//FALSE

AlphaTestEnabled=TRUE

//FALSE

CullMode=NO_CULL

//CLOCKWISE

LightEnabled=TRUE

SpecularEnabled=FALSE

EmissiveEnabled=FALSE

FogEnabled=TRUE

AmbientColor=1.000000,1.000000,1.000000,1.000000

DiffuseColor=1.000000,1.000000,1.000000,1.000000

ZBufferOffset=0.000000

BlendOp=BLEND_DST_ALPHA

//ONE

NumTextureStages=1

TextureStage[01].TextureName=

TextureStage[01].MipMap=TRUE

TextureStage[01].FilterEnabled=TRUE

TextureStage[01].StageColorOp=TEXTURE_MODULATE_DIFFUSE

TextureStage[01].StageAlphaOp=TEXTURE

//NO_OP

 

 

And now it works!

 

Thanks again

 

Mike

[NathanKell 0]

I just want to add my second round of 2 cents and say how quickly and completely I became used to actually having trees in the forests! It's really almost indescribable, the difference it makes: one gets so used to, in games, seeing a few trees here and there as shorthand for "here be forest" that it really takes you back to see forest from the _trees_, not the terrain texture. Further, to have snow and mud, and mud and snow, really brings home that Flanders feel--it just doesn't seem right when everything's dry and bright. :]

So, thank you Stary!

[+Stary 2,427]

If only we could collide with them OFF/ROF style... Not going to happen, not with this version of engine

[FalconC45 162]

Hey Stary,

 

Does the seasons work in single missions? The seasons would not appear, like in December and etc. Did I miss a installation step somewhere?

 

Falcon

[Panama Red 22]

Hey Stary,

 

Does the seasons work in single missions? The seasons would not appear, like in December and etc. Did I miss a installation step somewhere?

 

Falcon

 

 

Yes, the seasons work with single missions. Set your mission date for January and see the snow on the ground (if you loaded all of Stary's season folders that came in his package).

[+Stary 2,427]

FalconCAF, they work in Single Missions w/o problems. Did you overwrite the terrain's both terrainname.ini and terrainname_data.ini files?

[FalconC45 162]

FalconCAF, they work in Single Missions w/o problems. Did you overwrite the terrain's both terrainname.ini and terrainname_data.ini files?

 

Yes I did. I'll test it tomorrow again.

 

Falcon