'Modern Warfare' Discussion Thread

Ok, each day im gonna try and do a daily report on wht ive done etc. so people know.

Anyway firstly bad news - I cant seem to get the animation for the apache to work right, so ive started animating it again. And then i encountered another problem... each rotation key can be no bigger than 90 degrees, so when i was making the rotor blades rotate i was following that rule until i went 13.1-90=-76.9, but when the game read it it said it was bigger than 90 degrees - who knows.

Anyway the good news... When sorting out and extracting the unknowns from the newest patch i found a new file which ive heard people mention before, its a slk file which will allow me to make completely new base spells. So instead of basing spells off old ones, we can make our own new spells.
- hope you understand. Anyway thats it from me today.

Thanks, glad to know you're "back" :)

Explain?

Sounds good ... we can change the tooltips and corresponding orders in the Trigger Editor, yes? (for example, "Order [unit] to Coalition - Snipe" and so on)

tileset, alphas are screwed up, you might wanna fix it.

ok nice work - ill look at them in a sec.

Ill talk more later - i cant be stuffed writing everything again becuase i had writen it when the comp stuffed up.

But long stury short - ive fixed the problem with the animations, i can change what the orderstrigns say, and i can make new spells, and add them together tec. i think.

Anyway we need to work out hero abilities fro the 5 coalition heroes.
so far we only have Ranger - Shot set, speed buff, and air strike(U) oh yeah, and was it the green beret that has auras?

Apart from that ill keep the info going, and Edward keep working on attack types etc. and the coalition tech tree plz.

Good stuff! I'm glad to see that your hiatus was brief and that you as the leader are proving yourself to be no mere figurehead :)


The Green Beret has auras, but I attributed the Air Strike to him.


You mean renaming the attack types and their damage? Eep ... it looks like the damages are going to be by "range"l:


How do these sound? (The differentiation gave me an idea for a Saddam's Forces advantage; the Coalition infantry mostly deals Light damage while Saddam's Forces infantry deal[s] Medium damage.)

Haven't decided the armor types yet, and I THINK I have the tech tree all down ... how's resource collection going to work in melee, again?

Ok, first i wanna thank AnzWhore for the desert tileset, i think they look pretty good, what do you think Edward?

Also about the not just being a figurehead thing... Yea ur right i am involved and spend as much time as possible and spend a good 3hrs at LEAST each day. But sadly enough i also have a busy life outsode of computer stuff, so i always cant be here. So ill do my best and keep things going according to plan.

Anyway, more good news - backing up what i said the other day about the slk files. Today i studied the AbilityData.slk, and AbilityMetaData.slk, and im pretty sure that i can push parts from different spells together.
i.e. I will add the morph ability and drop ability together, so when the blackhawk is flying, it will land and drop the units at the same time, all in one ability.

Yea, so now we can do a lot more with abilites - if you want me to add between 1-6 spells together i can. So think of the possibilities, try and think of new spells that we want. And i fully understand the Engineering upgrade spell and many others aswell, so lets try and make insane new abilities ay?

Anyway i wanna try and start soe work on the .slk files this weekend, so Edward if you can try and finish the coalition tech tree soon, ill finish the slk's. For now ill just use stuff from the one uve already given me.

B.T.W. For the Beta demo, we will have a small campaign, and the Coalition team with a few melee maps. If we cant complete the whole coaition team by then well just use like 3/4 of it. Does that sound ok?

About the equipement, I don't think that "heavy" soldiers(as I mentioned before) should be able to carry equipment, because they already are carrying a heavy weapon of some kind.
Mission ideas, well, I saw a TV program about a news reporter that came to Iraq before the war. He met some american news reporters that helped him, but that's not the mission idea. The main idea is that in the program soldiers had to protect the reporters, so that's quite an idea, but I'm not sure if it's good enough.

Didn't see it; link me to it?


Kick ass :D does it stay on the ground when finished dropping? (There's also the option of having an animation of troops fast-roping down while it remains airborne.)


The Engineering Upgrade? What? :\


Okay, I'll work on it. I'd prefer to get the tree done right around the time that the map is (so the units can just be dropped into the map), but the Coalition unit tree is 80% finished; I nominate that since the two beta maps confirmed will be combat alone, it might save time to omit upgrades from them.


Sounds good. It's okay to prioritize making the Bradley (M2) before the Humvee. However, a SOF (Soldier of Fortune) article I read said that Humvees are simply military SUVs with guns, and inadequate -- so I suggest you start researching the M113 Gavin (a heavier-armored, tracked armored personnel carrier) and possibly make a model for it; I'm putting it down on the tree, and may have that complete or "finalized" (beta) by the time that the map is done ...

P.S. Moecraft - sounds interesting! (Assuming we have a campaign-only "Reporter" unit, without weapons.)

About the Tileset, it further up the page somewhere.
And yeah, the helicopter will morph into its ground state when dropping the people off. We could have another ability where the helicopter flies low, and people rope out and then the heli flies up to its normal height again - if you want.

The Engineering ability is a move on the Goblin Tinkerer that upgrades his other abilities, and makes them better, and it also increases his armor.

Yeah, we wont have upgrades in the beta campaign. When u say the map, do u mean the map u were originaly making in the first place?
For the tech tree i just want a list of units first, so i can finally get some stuff done in the slk's. And then abilities as soon as possible.

So are we gonna replace the Humvee? I dont think we should because they are still used in this war. But thats just my opinion.

Anyway thats about it from me - but, for the helicopter rotorblades - im gonna do the same thing as the flying machine and put a blur picture in the model so the blades look as if they are spinning faster.

Hey, hows it going?

I've finally got around to finisheing the basic aniamtions for the Apache and M1 Abrams.

So here they are...

1 - there are txt documents telling people how ive arranged the skin.
2 - the models are already imported in the map so if you wanna test them out - go ahead.
3 - ok, firstly these need new skins. And secondly, Edward if you can fix up the unit data so the model works better that would be good.

So when the skin is finished or the unit data, can the people that done it post it up on this thread again, so i can complete stuff. Feel free to add ideas as to how the models/animations can be improved.

--> Oh yea, i just remebered we stil need a new console designed for the Coalition team for the beta - any1 interested? plz reply here.

Went over the models yesterday; did David build these?

The Models Themselves
Fixing the projectile origins will be easy, but we need to figure out how big these models are in proportion to each other, and have scaling values in mind, because some things (for example, the Gunner on the M1 Abrams with Gunner) are WAY too small.

(As I pointed out yesterday, even with scaling value 1.00 instead of 0.80, the gunner is smaller than a troll's axe.)

To use the Gyrocopter-style blur on the Apache is an okay idea, since I'm assuming that a 100% overhaul of the units used in the game, as well as the strings, will allow us to have them as the base units and thus save map space (ie, a Coalition vs. Saddam's Forces melee map only being 10kb in size) and time. However, it lacks any attack animation, and in anti-air/infantry, it even lacked projectile art! If this can be corrected, placing the projectile origins will be a cinch.

Model Ideas/Fixes
Reference points need a thorough overall, and scaling values need to be decided on, both as absolute values (numbers), in comparison to each other, and in comparison with WC3 units.

Apache: It should rock slightly about when using its twin 2.75" Hydra rockets (though there's one projectile origin, the rockets will appear separately just forward of the rocket pods, and then come together as they reach the target, or split off versus two), perhaps also when using its 30mm chaingun, definitely if using the Hellfire missile item (as a spell animation). I've already corrected the selection circle so that its height is 200 instead of 230, where it would fit in.

Regarding its transformations, I understand that it'll retain its ground form whether or not a pilot's inside (think Mount/Dismount), but its morph (Take Off/Land) animations needs overhauling. It's jarring to see it tilt slightly forward when moving then stop suddenly, so maybe lessen the difference of angles between Stand Alternate and Walk Alternate? Finally, while I like its ability to move while taking off, its death animation is just to disappear in a mist of red/grey smoke (instead of keeling over or crashing to the ground and exploding), and that looks weak. More importantly, however, the Apache actually sinks into the ground when it does Storm Crow/Night Elf Form; please fix this!

Abrams: Okay to a point. However, as previously stated, the gunner is way too small. Here's how big an Abrams machine gunner looks in comparison to the Abrams: http://www.csulb.edu/~rlewis4/Abrams.jpg

Animations-wise, I've accepted that the treads can't be animated, but the attack animations need fixing so that the turret moves rearward with recoil instead of the whole tank, and that there's actually recoil on part of the the machine gun and the gunner. Finally, for death, it actually needs to explode instead of fading into the ground :P

How's multiple stand animations for the M1-with-gunner (solely gunner looking around) sound?

Postscripts
P.S. Dunno who can help with the interface, I'm afraid :( however, it should be applied to all cinematics ...

P.P.S. We came up with the idea that using a form of Call to Arms or Battlestations, units produced before an upgrade will not benefit until either ability (modified) is used to call it back to the appropriate base for refitting; units produced after the upgrade will benefit normally.

P.P.P.S. I think that our allowance of attack items for everyone will institute a new dynamic to the game, in the form of actually being able to produce/build items, and in striving to consistently producing them faster than the enemy can while keeping "carriers" (for example, an Apache with a Hellfire missile in each of its 6 slots) alive better than the enemy can. This sound interesting to anyone?

You mean like a type of ammunition?
If yes, well, if anyone can make an ability that forces the unit to use an item on the target it would be wonderful. A good idea of using that kind of ammo is with vehicles mostly(as you said, an apache with hellfire missiles), make a building that produces "special" ammo(missiles and stuff), most of the units will have special ammunition. When I read that I thought about a "commando"-like unit that can use many types of ammunition(like giving him daggers, pistols or other weapons), this type can be used instead of heroes, so the campaign will still have the WC3 hero touch :)
If no, I'll try to think about an idea tomorrow.

Hey, hows it going? Today i managed to get he models working a lot better in the w/e with the missiles coming out at the right time and the projectiles showing up, the reason some of the aniamtions didn't show up was that its the riflemans projectile, so u only see it hit the target. Ive also stopped the apache from angling itself with the ground.

ill work on the death aniamtions later, because explosions are not specialty, as in i suck at them.

About the apache taking off... the w/e makes the morph animation sink into the ground first for some random reason, but ive tried to counter it. Ive remade some of the animations and was gonna put the new map up, but after reading ur last post edward i think ill go back and change the animations a bit. So I should put them up tomorrow then.

For the proportion problem, just change the scaling value in the w/e and see what looks best i guess.

B.T.W. the projectiles not showing up had nothing to do with the models/origins, they were all fine, once again it was the w/e data.

Umm, maybe increasing the blendtime will result in the apache not suddenly going from angled to flat?

Anyway, what do u mean exactly by the term Interface - interface for what?

Ive also noticed a problem with our blackhawk battlestations idea...how can we get all of the blackhawk to return to base if some dont have pilots? I think for the blackhawk it will be best to give each unit the personal upgrade a bit like destroyers..what do u think?

And i like the idea of the items.....anyway i think thats about it for today.

Srry all ive been busy with assignments and tests etc. still am ... has anyone fixed the alpha on the terrain ??? i can cause ive got paint shop pro 7 i could do it
and about the sig has there been any decisions made yet ?

If you are keen to fix the alpha's go ahead, it will save me time. Do you know how to edit alphas etc?

Ok, for sigs i decided to leave photos out, but they can't be made until i get the M1 Abrams skinned and the Apache skinned. As soon as they are done ill finish the sigs.