Making a Worker

Hey, all. I have a custom model that I would like turned into a "worker" unit, i.e. with proper Work, Stand Gold/Lumber animations and geosets and all that nonsense.

The only reason this isn't a [Request] is that, in talking with RDZ, he seemed to think that this could possibly be a helpful 'quasi-tutorial' for this kind of thing (correct me if I'm wrong).

Any help would be appreciated. I am willing to do the work for this (hopefully I can follow along) if anyone is willing to help.

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So here's the model (it's a Troll, of course ^^), it's skin, and it's portrait. If it looks familiar, that's because it is; it's from the GTW mod (which I have yet to get around to releasing. :< I'm working on it).

~Permission to Edit~

Interestingly enough, it's texture actually includes the Gold-Sack/Lumber-Stack textures, yet the model doesn't have that. (also, the attached texture is not Jungle Troll-blue)

Permission to edit?

EDIT: lol, dynamic accuracy and physics system.

thats gtw then, right?
well, open up any worker in wc3viewer and compare which animations you need and which dont!

Ah yes, my bad. Attached to first post

Quite. :P

Well, sure. But I don't eve know the first step (I know some of what to do).

Doing single AnimTransfer's always bugs for me. And then there's the whole geoset thing; I can geomerge, I guess, and move it around, but should I use the provided texture (more streamlined?), or just point to the ingame textures? Then there's all that arm moving and junk, which might not work correctly with the wonky Troll bones...

Hence the thread.

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Woot! 2,666th post!

The obvious first step is to make sure that you have the necessary to do what you require. Second step is to determine how you intend to mine said resources because if you intend to mine a resource in a different manner than the default, your plans regarding animations will obviously have to change. Given the fact the trolls usually already have three idle animations. You can usually get away with slightly tweaking the first animation to create the idle animations for gold and lumber harvesting however since this is a custom model and I lack the programmes on this PC to check this may not be the case in this example.

ah, so that i get this right, the threads intention is to learn how to merge different animations on one skeleton?
and not which animations a worker needs?

I would say both but it isn't my place to say one way or the other.

I'm pretty sure I have every feasible tool I could possibly need for this (aside from 3dsmax 5 + Art Tools :P); the question is whether I have the necessary knowledge or expertise to use those tools correctly.
(To which the answer would be "no". :P)

Eh? I'm not sure what you mean. But Jungle Troll Groundlings are very similar to Orc Peons; they just chop down lumber and mine for gold. Same same. (so if I get what you're saying, I can likely just duplicate the Attack animation and call it "Work")

Yeah... He's got a bit of a hunch, so simply transferring anims may or may not work. Tweaking, probably.

Eh, both?

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What might help is a checklist? What do I (or anyone else) need to make a worker: Step 1?

I guess this should help... Its a start, I suppose.

Animations Names for Workers:

Collects gold Section

Standard method: (peasant, peon, etc)
"Stand Ready"
"Stand Work"
"Stand Work Gold"
"Stand Ready Gold"
"Walk Gold"
"Attack Gold" - Only needed if it can attack

Garrision method: (Wisp)
No Animations required

Spell Method: (Acotyle)
"Stand Work Gold"

Collects lumber Section

Standard method: (peasant, peon, etc)
"Stand Ready"
"Stand Work"
"Stand Work Lumber"
"Stand Ready Lumber"
"walk Lumber"
"Attack Lumber"

Spell Method: (Wisp)
"Stand Lumber"
"Stand Work"

Ah, thanks.

So... First step?

Forget about the first step already! You've already done that (downloading the necessary apps) & the second step (Decide how it collects resources). Using the information above, you have the names of the animations you need which are:

"Stand Ready"
"Stand Work"
"Stand Work Gold"
"Stand Work Lumber"
"Stand Ready Gold"
"Stand Ready Lumber"
"Walk Gold"
"Walk Lumber"
"Attack Gold"
"Attack Lumber"

What you need to do next is identify what animations the existing model has that can recycled to fill those animations listed above or in other words blatently Copied, Pasted & Renamed.

Well, I apologize for wasting any time; in the course of the last few weeks, a random modeller went ahead and made some custom workers for my project, thus making this thread of no further use. Also, we didn't really get anywhere with making a custom worker, so the idea to make it a psuedo-Tutorial is out.