[Dibelius]

Hi,
I wonna make shellmap with lots of destroyed or damaged civilian structures. so long no problem. But I'm having poblems with the LOD. the fps are very low at the moment. My thought was to reduce the particles which civilian structures always have when they are damaged or destroyed. I mean the flames and the smoke. And of course the buildings are indistructible on this map.

So I created a map.ini in which I removed the "DamageFX", the "TransitionDamageFX" and the "StructureCollapseUpdate". (they don't need it all).

But the problem is not yet fixed. The smoke and fire particles are still there and after a short time I don't see them, but they are still there all the time (sometimes they come again shortly).

The thing is that the shellmap in normal "singleplayer" mode runs even more quickly (the cam on all the rest) but in shellmap mode it runs with fewer fps.

I hope that someone can help me out of this disaster.


//NOTE: I tested it in "singleplayer" and "shellmap" mode with exactly the same scripts! Sure the permanent generic scripts (music) and the flag conditions don't work in singleplayer mode... maybe this is the real problem?

[GuyInTheWindow]

I think its a gameData.ini/Model thing. Its because the gamedata.ini specifies curtain bone names to automatically emit particle effects on curtain states. I don't understand how it fully works but you can see this in the gamedata.ini

  AutoFireParticleSmallPrefix   = FireS
  AutoFireParticleSmallSystem   = FireFactionSmall
  AutoFireParticleSmallMax      = 2
  AutoFireParticleMediumPrefix  = FireM
  AutoFireParticleMediumSystem  = FireFactionMedium
  AutoFireParticleMediumMax     = 1
  AutoFireParticleLargePrefix   = FireL
  AutoFireParticleLargeSystem   = FireFactionLarge
  AutoFireParticleLargeMax      = 1
  AutoSmokeParticleSmallPrefix  = SmokeS
  AutoSmokeParticleSmallSystem  = SmokeFactionSmall
  AutoSmokeParticleSmallMax     = 4
  AutoSmokeParticleMediumPrefix = SmokeM
  AutoSmokeParticleMediumSystem = SmokeFactionMedium
  AutoSmokeParticleMediumMax    = 2
  AutoSmokeParticleLargePrefix  = SmokeL
  AutoSmokeParticleLargeSystem  = SmokeFactionLarge
  AutoSmokeParticleLargeMax     = 1
  AutoAflameParticlePrefix      = Aflame
  AutoAflameParticleSystem      = FireBuildingSmall
  AutoAflameParticleMax         = 4

And this is probaly the problem. You could try hiding the bones, but I'm not really sure on how to fix this.

[Dibelius]

thx so far
but I wonder, why only Civilian Buildings use this code. My damaged defense towers don't emit such particles. Can it be that already the "Side = Civilian" thing defines this?!
If there's no other fixing possibility I must copy the buildings, give them a new side and change some things... that should help I think

[GuyInTheWindow]

The reason why your custom defense towers, assuming it isn't official work/model, it doesn't have any of the bones with the following names listed in the gamedata.ini:
FireSxx
FireMxx
FireLxx
SmokeSxx
SmokeMxx
SmokeLxx
Aflamexx

The xx represents numbers like 01, 02, 03, etc.

Im pretty sure that in zh, fraction buildings also use this code since there are lots of commented out code that is simular to the auto-generation from gamedata.ini. Too bad not much models use the aflame bones. I think it looks cool when the building generates stuff to show its still taking flame damage.

[Airstriker]

When a building is "aflame" all the smoke bones emit flame.

[Dibelius]

yeah sure. it looks cool. But that all steals performance and the shellmap lags already through the generic script (for music changes) in shell mode., cause these scripts loop every frame.

and I see. My towers don't have such bones (nice to know ^^). If I understand u correctly that would mean, I can't fix the problem without modifying the structure models itself?! *damn*
So my idea with new ini codes for those buildings is bullshit...
I do not want to modify all those buildings just to delete these bones...

[GuyInTheWindow]

Well the Aflame effect only effects 4 bones with Aflamexx name, not smoke. If you look at the gamedata.ini above, you can see you can set the base bone name and max effects for the bones listed.

Dibelius, you could try, if you didn't, what i said before and try using HideSubobject to hide the bones. I never tried it however. If that doesn't work, you'll have to edit the models itself.

[Dibelius]

I gonna give it up now. HideSubObjects cause the particle effects to be emitted at the origin of each model (X:0 Y:0 Z:0).

Another problem:
I have given my defense towers the "FireS" and "SmokeS" bones and it works so far
The problem is now that I have attached some of these bones to a turret. And when it turns, the particle effect doesn't turn with it. It emits at the default position. Same with animted things. (Sure I have included "ParticlesAttachedToAnimatedBones = Yes" in the code). But this doesn't work too.

any idea?

//EDIT: omg. it was too easy that I don't get it ^^
I must simply do these attached particle bones with the "ParticleSysBone" tag in the code. *LOL*