Need .ase adjustment

[Springheel]

Could someone that uses blender have a look at the clipmodel for models/darkmod/decorative/vases/pot_large.ase?

 

When I drop the vase on its side, it sinks into the floor so far that I can see the floor inside the pot. I assume the clipmodel just needs to be made wider, but I can't open it to check.

 

The clipmodel is here: "models/darkmod/misc/clipmodels/pot_large_cm.ase"

 

If someone could adjust it that would be great.

[Baddcog]

That's my pot with metal rings. It was never meant to be a moveable.

 

 

1 it is quite large, and 2, the collision model is shaped like the pot so things can be put inside it.

 

If the collision is made so it can be moved, then items that are dropped 'in' it will just float on top of it.

 

It is also pot_medium and pot_small. Which are also not that small. So then their collision needs redone...

 

They have been in the mod for years now.

 

I request they not be changed.

 

The large pot is like 3 feet in diameter.

 

Honestly I don't know why a moveable entity was made out of it. This is something someone should have actually looked at the collision model in the editor before just making all pots moveables. Now instead we want to revert how it was purposely modeled to suit sloppy work in the entity dept. And we can't remove the entity because it might break maps...

 

And we can't have one entity with collision mesh one way and a model with it another... Or it will be inconsistent.

[Springheel]

If the collision is made so it can be moved, then items that are dropped 'in' it will just float on top of it.

 

 

The collision model I'm talking about is a separate model that is only used for the movable version. All pots and vases have separate .cm files, so that mappers that want to put things in it can use a static model (which doesn't use the .cm), but the option to use it as a movable still exists.

 

I didn't create the movable entity; it's been there for ages, along with the separate .cm. The .cm just needs adjusting.

[Baddcog]

Oh, well that would just be a brushed base collision then eh?

[Springheel]

Sorry, I'm typing with 3 kids running around. They're not actually .cm files. They're actual models, but just a simplified collision mesh for movables. You can look in the misc/clipmodels folder (I see I mistyped the location in my first post) to see them.

[Baddcog]

Well, I assume they were just made as brushes and exported to .ase. That way you can size them to fit without having to import models also, all in DR.

 

I can't open ase, as ridiculous as that is (not being able to import Max file into Max) unless I load up Max 5... And I never have gotten my head wrapped around the Blender interface.

[OrbWeaver]

Are there even any ASE scripts that work for the latest Blender 2.6x series? All I can find are 2.4x and 2.5x versions, which don't seem to work (at least they don't show up in the interface when installed).

[Nosslak]

Are there even any ASE scripts that work for the latest Blender 2.6x series? All I can find are 2.4x and 2.5x versions, which don't seem to work (at least they don't show up in the interface when installed).

There is this one:

http://campagnini.net/2011/04/16/blender-to-udk-ase-export/

The exporter for 2.49 felt a lot better as I didn't need to combine all meshes and it didn't triangulate the meshes in Blender either, even if you wanted it to triangulate the resulting files. I tried using it on my bed model but couldn't get it to work so it might be a bit borked (or I just failed somewhere along the line).

[Tels]

Redoing the CM in DR and exporting it as ASE might actually work if all else fails - CMs are dead simple.

[Springheel]

Looks like most of the .ase pots need adjustments to their clipmodels. If they were .lwo I could have them fixed in under a minute each. Wish I had a nickel for every time .ase models have kept me from getting things done.

[Baddcog]

Well, it's like Tels said, a few minutes in the editor will fix the problem. You can easily size them how you want. Problem is 3 foot round pots (why a thief would want to move them I don't know) and a 7 sided collision cylinder don't mesh well. You're going to have clipping no matter what. They're either going to clip into the floor (they are fairly thin and round shaped, so the floor will clip through them) or they are going to float above it.

 

And you can't edit the mesh as I said above, or then it screws up the collision mesh for how it was intended to be used in the first place.

 

Again, the perfect example of why sometimes too much is just too much. We can't do it all with the limitations in place. It's either a workable collision mesh or a good collision mesh so things can go inside of them.

 

Why does a thief need to move a huge pot again?

 

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This is bascially feature creep.

 

Models that are meant for decor, are now being treated like every other physics object whether or not they really should be.

 

We don't need every possible tool we can think of and we don't need every possible model to be a moveable.

[Tels]

Looks like most of the .ase pots need adjustments to their clipmodels. If they were .lwo I could have them fixed in under a minute each. Wish I had a nickel for every time .ase models have kept me from getting things done.

 

Heh, I have the same feeling in reverse, I can't work on LWO. But I had this idea, what if we make the engine capable of switching seemless between these two? Can't find the LWO, look for ASE. Can't find ASE, look for LWO?

 

Then we could simply swap formats w/o breaking any maps!

[Tels]

Well, it's like Tels said, a few minutes in the editor will fix the problem. You can easily size them how you want. Problem is 3 foot round pots (why a thief would want to move them I don't know) and a 7 sided collision cylinder don't mesh well. You're going to have clipping no matter what. They're either going to clip into the floor (they are fairly thin and round shaped, so the floor will clip through them) or they are going to float above it.

 

And you can't edit the mesh as I said above, or then it screws up the collision mesh for how it was intended to be used in the first place.

 

Again, the perfect example of why sometimes too much is just too much. We can't do it all with the limitations in place. It's either a workable collision mesh or a good collision mesh so things can go inside of them.

 

Why does a thief need to move a huge pot again?

 

----------

This is bascially feature creep.

 

Models that are meant for decor, are now being treated like every other physics object whether or not they really should be.

 

We don't need every possible tool we can think of and we don't need every possible model to be a moveable.

 

While I agree with you a bit here, I think we can also now fix the damn limited physics - at least these ridicoulus CM limits. Then we no longer need special CMs for moveables, they would be an optional optimization (like shadow meshes), and no longer a hard requirement that is too little to be workable (just think of moveable chairs where you can't shoot an arrow under a chair).

 

Having every thing moveable in a level opens up a lot of new player possibilities, physics puzzles etc. I'd love to see these things explored a lot more.

[Baddcog]

Well, what comes first.

 

A-The collision meshes which are bad, only to be refixed later ...

 

B-Or the fixed physics so we can add good collision once.

 

A has the problem we have now, collision models which are too low density to get good clipping on large/complex objects.

 

B has the problem of not having someone who can/will do the work to fix the physics, I'm sure that's not easy.

 

So for the time being we are stuck with A, so we prepare for B which may never happen?, and if it does all that work needs redone because it was done in a way that would work with A?

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I'd also like to be able to talk directly to the AI and have them talk back. Should we record lines for them now and hope someone jumps on speak recognition later?

[Springheel]

I'm not quite sure I see the problem. If mappers want a static version of the pot that they can drop things into, they have one. If they want a movable version for whatever reason, they have one. The collision mesh on the latter won't be perfect, but that's the price of having movables in D3.

[Tels]

I think B (fix the physics engine) needs to come first - fixing the CMs is a lot of work that will not be satisf. (because they canbe only too simplistic). However, in somce specific cases we can probably improve the CM a lot with very little time - and then we should do it.

 

I think having the ability to load either ASE or LWO depending on which exists might be an easy fix and would prove very valuable. So we should attempt this first, anyway, because it makes life simpler in other case, too.

 

Edit: Also what Springheel said.

[Springheel]

I think having the ability to load either ASE or LWO depending on which exists might be an easy fix and would prove very valuable. So we should attempt this first, anyway, because it makes life simpler in other case, too.

 

I'm not sure I see what the benefit of that would be. It wouldn't have any effect on what we're discussing here.

[Tels]

I'm not sure I see what the benefit of that would be. It wouldn't have any effect on what we're discussing here.

 

It would. You could take the ASE modekl, throw it away, build a new LWO model, and insert it and everything would still work. Right now, the engine looks for the .ase as that is hard-coded in every place, and you cannot swap that for an .lwo. And "not being able to edit an ASE" is your problem, right?

[Springheel]

It would. You could take the ASE modekl, throw it away, build a new LWO model,

 

If you're talking about the collision model, I planned to do that anyway. The clipmodel is not hardcoded, it is referenced in the entitydef, so replacing an .ase with a .lwo is simple. (Either that, or it's built into the model itself, in which case I couldn't modify it anyway.)

 

The only reason I asked for help is that I can't load the original model in Lightwave to see the exact dimensions in order to make the clipmodel as accurate as possible.

[Baddcog]

But you can in dr. It still leaves the point of not having enough sides available in a collision model to make a large round/thin pot not clip or float.

 

Unless dr exported ase/ enitity bound clip models have some magic properties that allow them to be more dense than one included in a model.

[Springheel]

But you can in dr

 

I've no idea how to do that in DR and have too many other things to do to learn right now. I'll have to find another workaround, I guess. If that's how the current .ase clipmodels were made then I'm not very impressed, as I'm finding frequent problems with all of the .ase ones.

[greebo]

I can have a look at the model. I can at least export stuff to ASE using the latest Blender, I recently modeled something for the campaign and the export script worked (although it was rather hard to track down).

[greebo]

Are you referring to this problem, I guess:

 

 

I haven't tried yet, but if I made the mesh larger it pot would start "floating", wouldn't it?

 

Here's the cm (16 faces):

 

[Baddcog]

Yeah that's my point. It's too big of a pot, and has too much shape in it's sides, So you're either going to get clipping, or it's going to float. It's not an ase thing, or someone who modeled it thing.

 

It's a physics engine thing.

 

The collision model I made fits it quite well for dropping things into it, or have arrows bounce off of it.

 

Like i said earlier, some things just shouldn't have been made moveable entities. If the physics get improved then we could simply use the shape of the model itself, or the included optimized collision, and we could place pots on peoples heads like in Skyrim so they don't see us looting.

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As far as making the ase in DR it's quite simple. Drag a brush around the object, size/shape it accordingly (not going over the 16 tri limit), apply collision material, export as .ase from the menu, assign that name in the def file.

[Springheel]

The pots with .lwo cms don't float and they don't clip (at least nowhere near as much) so it obviously can be done.

 

The problem affects the smaller .ase pots as well, so arguing over whether the large one should be a movable or not is pointless.

 

Thanks for the offer greebo, but you've got plenty on your plate too. I'll do it.