Weapon creation Problem

Im not very familiar with modeling but I figured I could somehow seperate a weapon from an existing wc3 model, and then export it to use as a special effect. Well... I was able to get rid of everything except for the weapon but that didnt work out, then I tryed shrinking the model down and sticking it into the weapon but no luck there either. If someone could just point me towards a good tutorial or offer some advice Id be very thankful.
Im using 3Dmax 5.0

Import using something like this....

• Go to the utilities panel (red hammer on right).
• Click MAXScript.
• Click Run Script.
• Browse to select your script.
• Choose the "Static" option on the new window on that panel.
• Uncheck bone rotation
• Click "Import MDX..."
• Browse to select the MDX you want the weapon from.

Next, go to the modifier panel and delete everything but the weapon. I'm assuming you already know how to do this. Center the model as well.

Now, make a material.
First, export your texture as a TGA.

• Open Warcraft 3 Viewer.
• Press CTRL-F to and search for the name of the texture.
• Write down the path once you find it.
• Close the search window. Click the "Extract (and convert) BLP file" button and export it as a TGA.
• Back in 3ds max, open the material editor by pressing M.
• Change the type (it's a button on the right below the preview spheres) from Standard to Warcraft III.
• Open the "Maps" rollout by clicking the + next to it.
• Click the "None" next to Diffuse Color.
• Choose Bitmap.
• Browse to select your TGA.
• Click and drag the preview sphere (which should not have you texture on it) onto the model.

Finally, export. You'll need the art tools. Go to File->Export and choose Warcraft III MDL/MDX as the type. Use whateveryourweaponis.MDL as the name (replacing whateveryourweaponis with whatever your weapon is, of course). The .MDL is important because it cuts out another converting step.

Open the .MDL you just exported with notepad. Scroll down to where you see "Textures 1 {". Just below, you should see a .BLP file, the one that you set to be the material. Change the path inside the quotes to match the one that you noted earlier (when converting the BLP to a TGA).

Open Yobguls' converter and convert the MDL to MDX. To implement, you should only need to import the MDX.

Im going to try it out:) Thank you so much for the help.

When I exported it out of max, it made a few other files (white.blp and my texture). Do I need to import those into wc3 as well?

Ive been messing with it for a while and can't get anything to work:/ I followed what you said as best I could, and everthing seemed to be right except that my texture was visible on the material ball before I dragged it onto the model.

Upload your mdl and max and I'll try to figure out where you messed up.

Here they are.

You somehow had two materials when you should only have one. Posting a screenshot of your material editor would help.
Before you do that though, open your material editor and check if you have a white material. If you do, click and drag from a grey (default) one onto it (using the preview circles of each).

Your other problem was that you didn't follow this step:
If you search for Rifleman in the previewer (like you did when you extracted), you'll find that that the path is Units\Human\Rifleman\Rifleman.blp . Change the path to that. It should look like...

Bitmap {
Image "Units\Human\Rifleman\Rifleman.blp",
}

I have a working version here; I just MDL edited out the material and changed the path. You can compare your version to this one.

I tryed making my mdl like yours, but now it just crashes the editor:/ Ill keep messing with it and try to get it to work. Ill also try and figure out the extra material thing. Ty again.

I redid the entire thing, and it worked:) Thank you for all of your help.

If you post your .max, I should be able to point out what's wrong (as long as I can open it with my 4.2). I forgot to tell you something else... In the material editor, under the 'Extended parameters' rollout, turn on two-color alpha. This allows transparency.