MAW Effects

[Flyby PC 23]

Just for my own amusement, I've been trying to get the superb MAW flares to work in my OFF.

 

I've had some success, but it's been so long since I tinkered with CFS3 'gubbins' that I can't really remember all the 't's to cross and 'i's to dot so everything works correctly. Here are a couple of screenshots. My question is, does this missing 'something' look like a line I've missed from the effects file?

 

I can't post this change fellas, it's a MAW effect for which I claim absolutely no credit whatsoever, and I don't have authority or permission to share it. I loved the effect in MAW, and it's purely for my own fun to get it working in OFF.

 

Anybody got an idea? The flare 'thing' is there, represented with the white box, so that means its the effect missing, and/or probably a line missing from the effectxml doesn't it? I am sooo rusty at doing this.

[theultimat 5]

I'm not sure if this is the case with the CFS3 engine, but on another game I used to mod, when you got white squares in an effect it was because it couldn't find the correct texture file. As I said, I'm not sure if this is the case with CFS3, but it's worth checking all the same. :)

[Hasse Wind 46]

It would be great to have some improved flares in OFF2. But maybe they are already included? I wouldn't be surprised if they were!

[Olham 164]

Some craft have them already now. But not my beloved Albatros...

Any chance, devs?

[Flyby PC 23]

What I'm really after is similar flares, but smaller perhaps, and in keeping with activity in the trenches rather than lighting up the sky as the MAW flares are intended. Sentries hearing noises in no-mans land might send up a flare, or perhaps a trip wire might set them off too. I fairly sure such ordinance did exist. They were just rockets really.

 

 

 

When Very lights are shining

Sure 'tis like the morning dew,

And when shells begin a bursting

It makes you think your times come too.

And when you start advancing

Five nines and gas comes through,

Sure when Very lights are shining

'Tis rum or lead for you.

 

 

 

 

In fact, come to think of it, i wonder if the trenches had blackouts, or whether you'd see lamps and lanterns flickering at night too.

 

 

 

And if it's a texture issue, wouldn't I get the big yellow smilie rather than a white box?

Edited April 27, 2012 by Flyby PC

[Olham 164]

I don't think you could see any lights from the enemy's trenches.

Even lighting a cigarette had striktly to be done low, so snipers couldn't aim at you.

 

What you had were white flares, bathing the pockmarked trenchscapes in a false light for a minute.

They fired those every now and then to make sure the enemy wasn't underway in the cover of darkness.

[Flyby PC 23]

Yes, those are the ones, very lights I think they're called.

 

I know about the light in immediate peril, but further back in the trenches, out of snipers sight or range, I don't know whether they'd have a formal blackout or not. I've heard nothing either way.

[gaw 5]

shoot me if I'm wrong but I seem to recall that the squares were the result of duplicate effect files.....this was a fix you might find over at Combat Ace

[RAF_Louvert 101]

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Flyby, have you copied and pasted the needed files into your 'weapons' folder?

 

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[Flyby PC 23]

Yes, or at least I think I have. The flare gun is a facility, built up with a flare cannon vehicle, so there is a facitly, a vehicle, a weapon file and effects file, and lines to add into the main effect.xml file. i think I've got all the folders and files, but the needle in the haystack is the effects.xml.

 

I've read the folders and searched for text lines which mention flare etc, but I've obviously missed something....

 

I don't think its a duplicate effect because I don't recall being asked to overwrite anything. - but I could be wrong.

 

 

I haven't buggered about with files for 3 years plus, and wasn't especially good with them back then, but I've forgotten what little I did know.

 

I don't want to copy the MAW file as such, just deconstruct it and understand how it works and have a bash at my own flare, giving to due credit to MAW for the original.

 

 

 

(Cough, cough. Shhh, don't tell anyone, but what I'm really hoping for is a Dev to say Oh Flyby, don't go bothering your fluffy little head about this flare business, just wait and see what P4 has to offer.... )

 

 

 

Edit 2, and yes, there was an fx texture file I copied too

Edited April 29, 2012 by Flyby PC

[RAF_Louvert 101]

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Wish I could help you Flyby, but it looks as if you've already tried everything I would have done in the situation. I've a hunch you are on track about a command line in the 'effects.html' file. Best of luck Sir.

 

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[cptroyce 0]

>> Even lighting a cigarette had striktly to be done low, so snipers couldn't aim at you. <<

When I was a kid and started smoking..thankfully, gave it up years and years ago..there was a caution of "three on a match was bad luck".

I believe that came from WW1, where if you kept the flame going long enough for three guys to lit their cigarettes, someone usually got shot or shot at.

[RAF_Louvert 101]

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I am quite sure that 'three on a match' predates WWI, CptRoyce. Since the Great War was fought from the trenches it was unlikely an enemy sniper would have seen matches being lit at all. I seem to recall the superstition gained footing during the Boer War. There is an old religious connotation to the idea though as well. Because the three alter candles are always lit from the same flame, it is considered bad luck to light three things of the secular world from a single fire source.

 

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[Flyby PC 23]

I heard the third shot was unlucky too, but I don't think it was luck. The glow from lighting a cigarette or pipe was quite visible at night. The first light or 'glow', the sniper saw a target and raised his rifle, the second light he found his range and bearing, and was ready to shoot at the third light. If you took the third light, you really did take your life in your hands.

[Flyby PC 23]

On the subject of unlucky lights, I reckon I'll hold off buying my holiday flat in Dubai. I don't think this should have happened....

 

http://gulfnews.com/gntv/news/building-blaze-in-sharjah-1.1014783

 

 

No injuries to anyone, but 102 flats damaged by fire. (It's not Dubai, but the Arab Emirates).

[Flyby PC 23]

Got it.

 

Oh yeah......

[Flyby PC 23]

It wasn't the effects. I backed up my OFF effects and replaced it with the MAW effects and still got the squares, so the effects wasn't the glitch.

 

Went back to MAW, and copied all the dr- based effects and fire based weapons and effects and copied everything across. If it asked for an overwrite I said no to keep everything OFF intact, so I'm guessing I'd missed one of the fire effects in the FXtextures folder. Be nice to know the actual folder so my OCD over dysfunctional files cluttering up my OFF doesn't keep me awake at night, but at least it's working now.

[RAF_Louvert 101]

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SWEET! Now Flyby, please outline how we can do the same thing if we so desire, (and we do so desire).

 

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[Flyby PC 23]

Gulp. I knew somebody was going to ask me that.

 

OK. Standard format, backup everything you're going to change BEFORE you change it. This is CFS3, and it will bite you if you blink.

 

 

In MAW Facilites, you need to copy dr_flaregun to your OFF Facilities.

 

In MAW Vehicles, you need to copy dr_flare_cannon folder across to your OFF vehicles.

 

In MAW Weapons copy across folder dr_flare_round to OFF Weapons.

 

In MAW Guns, copy across dr_flare_gun.

 

Effects/FXTextures is the tricky one. dr_flarelight is obvious, but I think theres one of the fireballs or fire related files need copied too. I copied all the files with fire in the title, and when I pasted them into the OFF FXtextures, when asked to overwrite, I said no. You don't need to change any existing OFF files for this to work. (I think this is where I went wrong first time around and this is the folder where my white boxes crept in).

 

That just leaves the lines to write into your main effects.xml file. This is another occassions to upset those OCD afflicted people here I've probably copied lots of stuff I don't need, from your MAW effects file, copy all text from <flare_hover_smoke... all the way down to <house chimney smoke. Copy that text into the end of your OFF effects folder, just before the <\effects> at the end, making sure your < and > stanzas are correctly resolved. The text in the MAW effects is quite near the start, and I use notepad to hunt for 'flare or 'hover'.

 

That should be you, but don't blame me if it doesn't work. If you dabble beneath the surface of CFS3, you know it's a place to move cautiously, backup and write down what you do, so you can undo it.

 

 

 

Nearly forgetting - This should leave your flaregun installed, but you still need to place it in a mission with mission builder. When you're building a mission, in facilities, you will find a flaregun facility, and place this where you want it to fire flares. Whenever I put it in, I make the flaregun enemy, so it shoots flares at me. I don't know if that's necessary, but I've always done it. Remember to make the mission night time, and hopefully that's you up and running. One or two flareguns is all you need. All those flares in my screenshots are from 3 flareguns.

'

 

Edit - And please remember, this is a MAW effect, and all credit for it goes to MAW. If anybody objects to copying the effect across, I'll scrub my explanation and ask for the thread to be deleted. This is just fun for me, and telling you how I did it. Last thing I'd ever want to do is upset a MAW guru.

Edited May 1, 2012 by Flyby PC

[RAF_Louvert 101]

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You forgot to sum up with, "Easy Peasy".

 

Thanks muchly, Flyby.

 

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[Flyby PC 23]

Have fun Lou.

 

If it helps, just sing the Rattlin' Bog song as you go.

 

Ro, Ro, the rattling bog,... now on this limb there was a twig, a rare twig, a rattling twig, a twig on a banch, and a branch on a limb, and a limb on a tree, and a tree in a bog, and a bog down in the valley-o.

It's just like MAW.

 

Now in this MAW, there is a flare, a rare flare, a ratling flare. A flare on a flare_round, a flare_round on a gun, a gun on a flare_cannon, a flare_cannon on a flaregun facility, and a flaregun faciltiy in no-mans land down in the trenches-o.

 

There now. I'm sure that's made everything MUCH clearer.

[OlPaint01 0]

@Flyby

 

I lost my copy of MAW installer several years ago when my hard drive crashed and burned. Where can we get another copy? I would love to get the flare effects discussed in this OP for my copy of OFF. Would it be possible for you to build a Flare MOD for JSGME?

 

OlPaint

[Flyby PC 23]

Hold the phone Lou - something isn't right.

 

 

I don't see any OFF problems, but my orange glows seem to be independent from the flares. Most work fine, but I also see flares with no glow and glows with no flares. The overall ambience is there, but there is still something not right. Hmmm. Hope I've not turned a flak burst effect into a flare....

 

 

 

Olpaint01, I don't know if you can still get MAW these days, there was a specific website but that's long gone. It was freeware to distribute, so let me have a dig and see if I still have the correct files or a DVD somewhere. Might take me a while because it'll be on an old PC, but I'll see what I can find...

Edited May 2, 2012 by Flyby PC

[Olham 164]

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SWEET! Now Flyby, please outline how we can do the same thing if we so desire, (and we do so desire).

 

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Sometimes you must love this man for his talent of expressing our desires with the most flourish words!

 

Yes, that is looking mighty good, FlyBy! And we do so desire indeed!

[Flyby PC 23]

Ok, so thinking out loud, I didn't overwrite any existing OFF files, so hopefully this might just be an effects XML error, and I've inadvertantly attached an effect to the wrong event, and it's just a case of finding it....

 

 

 

See the trouble that follows when you override your inner OCD?

Edited May 2, 2012 by Flyby PC