"Charging" SFX

I'm wanting to create a "charging" SFX in Magos' Model Editor, but I need to know a few things first:

• Should I make a bone? Should I attach said bone to a helper, or the other way around?
• I want the particles to spawn at a distance from the bone, and then accelerate towards it before disappearing. How can this be achieved? How can I make this happen at random intervals?
• Should I add a glow or light emitter (possible?) if I'm triggering this with other effects? (ie. Ruby/Sapphire's Solarbeam attack, Diamond/Pearl's Charge, etc.)
• I know I probably won't think of this, but... Should I have a birth/stand/death animation set, or just stick with one animation?
• I'm using a generic glow texture for the particles, what colors would be a good idea to have? (Please do NOT suggest that I attempt a rainbow!!!)

Thank you for your time.

1. It depends what you're doing. Do you have geometry? Then yes, you need at least one bone. Otherwise, no. Stuff helpers, they're just faggottry that probably makes no difference on today's computers.

2. I have no idea, I think you can make particles move by adding translation keyframes in the emitter. I've never tried it, and I don't entirely trust it.

3. Do you need lights? Remember that if this is a spammable effect, then steer away from lights -- more than three or four in close proximity will either cancel each other out or cause horrible square edges if you're at the side of a lighting cell (whatever that is).

4. That depends on what you're doing with your effect. Does it need to burst into life, should it explode on death? If it's just an emitter or two, then you're fine with just stand -- when the effect is created, it will start producing particles and that's fine (though have a generic death sequence that just immediately switches off the emitter, so it does actually stop).

5. Depends entirely on the effect you're trying to achieve. Remember that with additive particles, dark colours will pretty much disappear. If you're on blend, then go nuts.

Hmm... I'm wanting to make the particles start at a spherical distance from a point, and shrink as they pull into the point. Really make it feel as if the caster is pulling in energy from around him/her/it (obviously with different colors depending on the ability, though that can be done with different tints). I don't really know how I'd do a constant pull though...

EDIT: is it possible to reverse a particle emitter to pull in, instead of fly out?

Hard Way: You have to have multiple helpers rotating in a circle around the point (Sort of like electrons of an atom). The helpers then require rotated particles facing the point. The particles will fly towards the point and thus, creating the illusion of particles forming a shrinking sphere.

Easy Way: Just make a particle with 180 latitude and make the particles shrink as the life increases. You won't get much of an "absorbing" look but it's a lot easier to work with.

It's summer vacation for me, I'm willing to learn this method. A "few" questions though:

• Would the emitters be required to be attached to a helper if I wanted to change it's rotation (with or without the spinning)?
• I've glanced at a few tutorials, but I'm not sure which of the two model-related sections I should browse through. - I found out that the Model Editing Tutorials is chock full of 3DSM 5 tutorials.... Something I cannot bother myself to get.
• How should I rotate a helper around a point? Should it be attached to something at the point?
• Off-Topic: Because I'm bored... How much wood would a woodchuck chuck if a woodchuck could chuck wood?
• Are keyframes related to seconds? If so: How many does it take to equal 1 second in real-time?

1000 frames per second in Warcraft, and don't ever let anyone tell you it's 960, because it's not.

Grrr! This tutorial is confusing the hell outta me!

EDIT: Ok... How should I make the partcles/helpers orbit the point, and which curve method would be easier to work with?

EDITEDIT: I found the OrbCorruptionSpecialArt.mdx in the .mpq, would it be a good thing to base the effect off of?

Dude, you're asking artistic questions in a technical forum -- I'm not going to tell you how to make your effect, you're going to have to do that yourself. You've found yourself a base model, now roll with it.

Please stop bumping.