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Heroes Community > Heroes 5 - Modders Workshop > Thread: Heroes 5.5 - Eternal Essence - Design
Thread: Heroes 5.5 - Eternal Essence - Design This thread is 9 pages long: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 · «PREV / NEXT»
Quantomas
Quantomas


Responsible
Famous Hero
AI Wizard
posted May 29, 2011 11:13 AM
Edited by Quantomas at 11:16, 29 May 2011.

Quote:


Good. That's a fair start.

You have to dig deeper. Just follow the path of the linked documents. In the *-geom.xdb you find coordinates:

<RootMesh>Magic_guild_lv1</RootMesh>
<RootJoint/>
<Size>
<x>1.54413</x>
<y>1.54413</y>
<z>24.1494</z>
</Size>
<Center>
<x>307.513</x>
<y>312.529</y>
<z>17.6649</z>
</Center>
<BestFitPoint>
<x>307.513</x>
<y>312.529</y>
<z>29.7396</z>
</BestFitPoint>
<Dir>
<x>0</x>
<y>0</y>
<z>0</z>
<w>0</w>
</Dir>
<AIGeometry href="MagicGuild_u1r0-geom-AI.xdb#xpointer(/AIGeometry)"/>
<NumMeshes>1</NumMeshes>
<MaterialQuantities>
<Item>1</Item>
</MaterialQuantities>
<MeshNames>
<Item>Magic_guild_lvShape1</Item>
</MeshNames>

Essentially, what you would need to do for a successful experiment, is to modify the ArenaModObject files for one building to link to another model, so that it is shown in the game.

Figure out where the model is actually stored. Try to load the model in an editor once you have identified it. Save it under a different name. Make the ArenaModObject reference your new model.

This would be the required full turn-around process for us to import (or alter) any model as we see fit. If one step in this process somehow doesn't work, try to figure out why. If it is a hard-coded issue, e.g. for example the .exe does checksum verification or whatever, I will resolve the roadblock.

This way we will get where we want sooner or later.

Quote:
We mustn't forget that a new faction isn't only the town screen. We would need a fully working new hero class. What about the racial skill? We would have two classes with the same racial. And the hero specializations? Of course we can use the existing ones, but in the new faction tier specializations wouldn't work...

Sure. But as with the models there is already a way to get the designs into the game. I think the town model definition is by far the most complex one, once we have researched this, we should have no problem for example to create the icons for the town build screen.

Regarding, hero classes and skills, I think Magnomagus has the know-how to do this. This will be completely moddable.

Technically, we can do whatever we want, the H3 Magic University for example. There are no limits that we can't tackle, it's just a question whether it is feasible. If you guys support me with doing the valuable research tasks, we definitely can do more.

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Consus
Consus


Hired Hero
posted June 03, 2011 09:19 PM
Edited by Consus at 21:21, 03 Jun 2011.

Quote:
You have to dig deeper. Just follow the path of the linked documents. In the *-geom.xdb you find coordinates:

<RootMesh>Magic_guild_lv1</RootMesh>
<RootJoint/>
<Size>
<x>1.54413</x>
<y>1.54413</y>
<z>24.1494</z>
</Size>
<Center>
<x>307.513</x>
<y>312.529</y>
<z>17.6649</z>
</Center>
<BestFitPoint>
<x>307.513</x>
<y>312.529</y>
<z>29.7396</z>
</BestFitPoint>
<Dir>
<x>0</x>
<y>0</y>
<z>0</z>
<w>0</w>
</Dir>

I tested, changing these values does nothing, at least it doesn't affect position. I have no idea how to place different models properly. For example, if you use necro marketplace model for haven blacksmith, you'll get:






I see Fauch is working on the Oblivion town. Are you going to support adding current modded towns as new factions in the next release? If so, I would remake my Conflux mod so that it doesn't replace Academy.

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Cepheus
Cepheus


Honorable
Legendary Hero
Far-flung Keeper
posted June 05, 2011 05:07 PM

Awesome work on the new build.

In what will hopefully become an interface revamp, I am looking into changing the fonts of H5 to something readable. The cursive stuff annoys me at the best of times and is partially illegible at the worst. The graphic resources for the H5 fonts are in texts.pak/UI/fonts whereas some UTF16-LE data is in texts.pak/bin/fonts.

Quantomas, if I encounter any hardcoded blocks while experimenting with this work, will you be able to help me bypass any problems?
____________
"Those who forget their history are inevitably doomed to repeat it." —Proverb, Might and Magic VIII

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TheBaron
TheBaron


Promising
Known Hero
dreamer of dreams
posted June 05, 2011 05:13 PM

Will it be possible to display the correct grammar for units ala correct singular and plurals?

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Fauch
Fauch


Responsible
Undefeatable Hero
posted June 05, 2011 06:22 PM
Edited by Fauch at 17:48, 13 Jun 2011.

list of creatures abilities that should be fixed :

-armored doesn't work against :
==> force arrow
==> weakening aura (the -2 defense reduction)

-enchanted obsidian doesn't protect against :
==> call of the storm
==> explosion
==> searing aura
==> set a fire
==> fire shield
==> magma shield
==> lava breath

-poisonous attack / venom works on unit with magic immunity. maybe it's not a glitch.

-fire shield / magma shield:
aura of fire vulnerability and mark of fire don't increase damage

-random bless : the creature can't cast on itself (I think). the spell isn't duplicated by the child of light ability.

-flame strike : works on creatures that are immune to fire. ignores everything that may increase or decrease fire damage. doesn't deal fire damage.

-ride by attack / agility : doesn't work if the creature having this ability is a flyer

-stormstrike / lightning bolt : works on creatures that are immune to air. ignores everything that may increase or decrease air damage. doesn't deal air damage.

-take roots : I tested it a long time ago, but I think that any creature using this ability actually turns into an ancient treant (the model change)

-immunity to frenzy : this ability is stronger than sandro's cloak, unlike undead or immune to mind control for example. may be the same for immunity to puppet master. not sure if it is a glitch.

-immunity to magic : lay hands doesn't seem to work on that creature. poisonous attack works.

-immunity to slow : this unit can be wounded

-lay hands : doesn't work on creature with magic immunity. works on undead, mechanical and elemental units.

-incineration : works on creatures that are immune to fire. ignores everything that may increase or decrease fire damage. doesn't deal fire damage.

-death cloud : deals damage to elemental and mechanical units.

-taunt : works on mechanical creatures (?? )

-lightning breath : works on creatures that are immune to air. ignores everything that may increase or decrease air damage. doesn't deal air damage.

-fire breath : works on creatures that are immune to fire. ignores everything that may increase or decrease fire damage. doesn't deal fire damage.
though, maybe those 2 abilities shouldn't change.

-force arrow : ignores armored

-flame wave : works on creatures that are immune to fire. ignores everything that may increase or decrease fire damage. doesn't deal fire damage.

-magic attack : from what I remember, glitchy if given to large creatures.

-presence of the storm : flying creatures take no damage when flying through a storm (it makes sense if they teleport, but don't tell me they fly over the storm??  

-mechanical : can be stunned, can be taunted

-manoeuver : doesn't trigger if the creature is attacked without retaliation

perks :

-barbarian luck : doesn't work as it should

-banish : too weak ?
-soulfire : too weak
-spoils of war : too weak ?
-tremors : too weak ?
-chilling bones : too weak ?

-demonic fire : works on creatures that are immune to fire. ignores everything that may increase or decrease fire damage. doesn't deal fire damage.

-mark of the damned / counter strike / powerful blow : mark of the damned is triggered when the marked creature retaliates while counter strike isn't triggered when the marked creature suffers a retaliation and powerful blow isn't triggered when the marked creature retaliates

-enchanted ballista : could it be made to work without having the enchanted arrow perk?

-demonic retaliation : could it be made to work without having the demonic fire perk?

Spells :

the game may crash when a creature casts land mines.

there is no empowered firewall

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Quantomas
Quantomas


Responsible
Famous Hero
AI Wizard
posted June 07, 2011 02:04 AM
Edited by Quantomas at 02:06, 07 Jun 2011.

Quote:
In what will hopefully become an interface revamp, I am looking into changing the fonts of H5 to something readable. The cursive stuff annoys me at the best of times and is partially illegible at the worst. The graphic resources for the H5 fonts are in texts.pak/UI/fonts whereas some UTF16-LE data is in texts.pak/bin/fonts.

Quantomas, if I encounter any hardcoded blocks while experimenting with this work, will you be able to help me bypass any problems?

Changing the font size is actually fairly easy. I came across this while doing the widescreen migration and to solve a bug in the town build window (the last 0 of the cost was often cropped, 3.1 vanilla still has this) I had to drill down all the way to the level where the kerning is done (the way the computer calculates the space between characters in a word). It turned out that most of the UI is actually working in a fixed virtual resolution on all screen sizes, whereas the text is indeed processed for the real screen resolution.

On my setup (1680x1050), H5 is actually one of the games that produces outstandingly clear text in the interface. I guess that you either have a higher resolution or some other Windows setting that changes the dpi of the screen. Try to set your resolution in H5 lower, it will hardly loose any quality, but chances are that it increases the readability of the text.

This means, negative, I don't see any real reason to work on the text interface. No research necessary, if scaling is an issue this can be done easily, most likely there are parameters in the paks that can affect this already.

Great work on the UI for the eight skill enhancement. There is only one issue, that in the hero meet screen the arrow actions for the abilities of the second hero are not mapped properly. There is something we don't understand yet, and I will release in the next days 3.1.9 with special debugging support for the button messages and it will also dump all the elements of the UI layout (2D only). It helped me a great deal to track down various widescreen and interface design issues. But no need for any more action on your part right now, the hero meet arrow issue is but a small nuisance not warranting a big effort right now. 3.1.9 is just meant to assist us, or if you have a sudden flash what might be the cause and want to experiment a bit with the interface.

What I believe another fairly important research task, aside from the town screens, is to create a complete list of all game elements that are loaded from the game database. This list would be the root of all UI and game database research tasks. We could check what we know already, and see what we don't know.

Quote:
Will it be possible to display the correct grammar for units ala correct singular and plurals?

With the current H5 code base, it would be necessary to check and adapt hundreds of places to display the proper grammar. If we get to a point, where EE does have its own interface core, there is a chance to do something like this, but otherwise it's not feasible.

@Consus
Thanks for trying. No problem, if you consider this research task too big. No questions asked. As mentioned in another thread, we should all focus on what we can do best. I am pretty sure that the research path I have described will lead eventually to the goal. Is there someone who can lend a hand or take over?

Regarding the question, whether I will provide support for partially modded towns, the answer is, this would probably take one or two months alone. What I will do instead, in due time, is to create a clean loading mechanism for any new town/faction that you guys can use without my doing. But for this we need to understand how the game database loads these elements.

Regarding work on individual skills, there is no feasible way that I could implement all these skills by hand in any decent time. Instead, I will use the same approach as explained above for the town screens. In the end there will be a simple mechanism to define new skills and classes in .xdb without my doing, so that the game will recognize them automatically.

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Fauch
Fauch


Responsible
Undefeatable Hero
posted June 07, 2011 02:00 PM

actually it's no new skills, it's modded old ones

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Cepheus
Cepheus


Honorable
Legendary Hero
Far-flung Keeper
posted June 07, 2011 03:02 PM

Quote:
On my setup (1680x1050), H5 is actually one of the games that produces outstandingly clear text in the interface. I guess that you either have a higher resolution or some other Windows setting that changes the dpi of the screen. Try to set your resolution in H5 lower, it will hardly loose any quality, but chances are that it increases the readability of the text.


Not the size of fonts but the font itself. A more short- than long-term goal of course. What I was wondering is whether there is a hardcoded block in the UTF16-LE files defining the position of the characters in the .dds files. I'm not able t tell.

Quote:
What I believe another fairly important research task, aside from the town screens, is to create a complete list of all game elements that are loaded from the game database. This list would be the root of all UI and game database research tasks. We could check what we know already, and see what we don't know.


I have a decent understanding of what is and isn't hardcoded, and I am willing to bet Magnomagus knows just as much, if not more. We have been messing with these databases since 2007 after all. The problem is organising the info so you can easily access and use it. I'll see what I can do.

Quote:
Thanks for trying. No problem, if you consider this research task too big. No questions asked. As mentioned in another thread, we should all focus on what we can do best. I am pretty sure that the research path I have described will lead eventually to the goal. Is there someone who can lend a hand or take over?


I am doing the same research. I can confirm that the models' positions are not re-determinable anywhere by the game itself or its .xdb files. Their positions were all specified in Maya (or whatever editor) and applied directly to the model. There was no *need* to alter their position, and hence Nival created no functionality to do so. This can be witnessed by loading the Arenas\Town model instances into the map editor. I'll attempt to have the game load up a Necropolis model in the Haven.
____________
"Those who forget their history are inevitably doomed to repeat it." —Proverb, Might and Magic VIII

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Quantomas
Quantomas


Responsible
Famous Hero
AI Wizard
posted June 07, 2011 05:07 PM

Quote:
I am doing the same research. I can confirm that the models' positions are not re-determinable anywhere by the game itself or its .xdb files. Their positions were all specified in Maya (or whatever editor) and applied directly to the model. There was no *need* to alter their position, and hence Nival created no functionality to do so. This can be witnessed by loading the Arenas\Town model instances into the map editor. I'll attempt to have the game load up a Necropolis model in the Haven.

Brilliant! That would be a good test for validating this. If you could modify Haven to use the Necropolis models, just the link to the raw model data, nothing else, we can verify in which way the data in the town screen definition affects the model layout. If it indeed turns out, that the model is not relatively positioned, the next step would be to change the model itself, to achieve the proper effect. One way or another we are going to get models to change their position.

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Cepheus
Cepheus


Honorable
Legendary Hero
Far-flung Keeper
posted June 07, 2011 05:21 PM
Edited by Cepheus at 17:21, 07 Jun 2011.

Quote:
Brilliant! That would be a good test for validating this. If you could modify Haven to use the Necropolis models, just the link to the raw model data, nothing else, we can verify in which way the data in the town screen definition affects the model layout. If it indeed turns out, that the model is not relatively positioned, the next step would be to change the model itself, to achieve the proper effect. One way or another we are going to get models to change their position.



Done (to some extent). I replaced the Haven Mage Guild graphics with the Necropolis' (and some other nonsense in the background). I'm absolutely certain we could move that building, but only by altering its .mb file in Maya (?) and reimporting.
____________
"Those who forget their history are inevitably doomed to repeat it." —Proverb, Might and Magic VIII

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Quantomas
Quantomas


Responsible
Famous Hero
AI Wizard
posted June 09, 2011 12:33 AM
Edited by Quantomas at 00:34, 09 Jun 2011.

Quote:
Not the size of fonts but the font itself. A more short- than long-term goal of course. What I was wondering is whether there is a hardcoded block in the UTF16-LE files defining the position of the characters in the .dds files. I'm not able to tell.

I am still wondering what trouble the font gives you. Is that something related to the screen resolution? For me, on my system H5 is indeed one of the games that produces the best legible text. I guess we see different things on our screens.

Quote:
Done (to some extent). I replaced the Haven Mage Guild graphics with the Necropolis' (and some other nonsense in the background). I'm absolutely certain we could move that building, but only by altering its .mb file in Maya (?) and reimporting.

Ok, I will see what's the matter with these coordinates, maybe get them working for us.

Do we know what we can do with the models? Can we alter them, or import new ones?

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rpgyay
rpgyay


Known Hero
posted June 11, 2011 12:57 AM

I have a question regarding what circumstances simultaneous turns break on multiplayer and if it were possible (later in the future) make it so that if players were far enough away that simultaneous turns would turn back on? Usually after hotseat gets activated we lose interest since turns take progressively longer.

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Fauch
Fauch


Responsible
Undefeatable Hero
posted June 11, 2011 06:31 PM
Edited by Fauch at 23:03, 11 Jun 2011.

the game may crash when a creature casts land mines.

flying creatures take no damage when flying through a storm (it makes sense if they teleport, but don't tell me they fly over the storm?? )

there is no empowered firewall

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PyroStock
PyroStock


Adventuring Hero
posted June 13, 2011 01:29 PM
Edited by PyroStock at 13:32, 13 Jun 2011.

The AI

1>The AI is overall better at clearing it's starting area.  However, the AI hero now seems to never attack Dwarven Conservatories (which never auto-restock) and many other 'treasury buildings'.  In the original ToE 3.1 the AI often cleaned these up.

2>Is it possible to get the AI to use 2-3 abilities in Academy's mini-artifacts instead of just 1?

3>Is it possible to get the AI to use Haven's training buildings for more paladins?

4>Is it possible to get the AI to adjust it's equipment when it obtains better equipment (like replace the sword+2 when it finds the axe+4 or rare artifact,etc)?  Perhaps even sell items it doesn't use or redistribute them among it's other heroes.

5>Is it possible for the AI to see the value of a hero in taverns?  If a high level hero shows up in a tavern with lots of items they're probably worth the money (even if all the items are sold).

6>In a recent 3.1c game on a huge map, when I finally advanced into the AI's territory I was not approached by the AI's main army 2 out of 3 times and found their town weakly defended.  When I conquered it the AI's main army never attempted to conquer any town (despite being listed as stronger than my army) and ultimately the AI ran out of time.  This happened in the original ToE3.1 as well, but is there a way to make the AI aware of this death clock so it can attempt a final battle(s) to save itself (even if it the odds are bad)?  It would also make it less boring.
6b>Also what does the AI do if it is on a huge or impossible map and cleans out it's whole area finishing in a far dead end such that a 7 day outlook shows nothing to do?  Would it just sit there or travel back to it's nearest town or ?

7>The AI doesn't understand that if it has too many large size creatures in it's army then it won't be able to bring them all into battle.  Therefore, it makes it's army weaker (for example) by having ghost dragons, spectral dragons, master liches, arch-liches, wraiths, banshees and vampire lords.  Is there a way for the AI to choose it's units better?



Quote:
poisonous attack / venom works on unit with magic immunity. maybe it's not a glitch.


It never seemed like a glitch to me since the poisons/venoms were not of magic origin IMO.
____________

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Fauch
Fauch


Responsible
Undefeatable Hero
posted June 13, 2011 01:43 PM

yeah but they are immune to plague, so that's a bit funny

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magnomagus
magnomagus


Admirable
Legendary Hero
modding wizard
posted June 13, 2011 02:14 PM

I think all those illogical immunities were left in for balance reasons (incineration, flamewave etc.)

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Fauch
Fauch


Responsible
Undefeatable Hero
posted June 13, 2011 02:22 PM
Edited by Fauch at 14:27, 13 Jun 2011.

you mean absence of immunities.

I was like "wtf???" the 1st time one of my fire immune stacks got killed by flame strike

of course for some abilities like fire or lightning breath it might be complicated, even though it worked in H4.
but stormstrike, for example, counts for 2 attack, the 2nd one being the chain lightning. we could imagine that the 1st attack (the axe swing) will always work, but the chain lightning will fail against units that have air immunity for example. for stormbolt, it's not a problem, even if the whole opponent army has air immunity, since it's not the main attack of the thunder thane.

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Quantomas
Quantomas


Responsible
Famous Hero
AI Wizard
posted June 13, 2011 04:54 PM

@PyroStock

1 - that's currently intentional that the AI does not clear treasure vaults

2 + 3 - will be done with algrebraic factorization

4 + 5 - should be improved until 3.2

6 - it should work in 3.1.9 and also in 3.1c; if we confirm that kamikazee or valid capture attempts are not pursued, it's a bug

6b - will be resolved with the strategic end stage

7 - yes, the combat AI needs an overhaul

@Fauch
The magic immunities and attack modes will be cleaned up with the magic terrain, which in turn requires a much more clean approach to all skills and creature perks

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bingdevil
bingdevil

Tavern Dweller
posted June 20, 2011 04:53 AM

at first thank you for make such AI mods

but it has somes important BUGS

ESP  the AI can not get boat or summon boat

I try many times  at expert difficult .
____________

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rpgyay
rpgyay


Known Hero
posted June 28, 2011 08:20 PM

I think a lot of us like the feature you added with hiding the artifacts on the map but perhaps that could be a separate option so that if people wanted they could have the feature with or without a hero guarding it?

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