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boeduur
boeduur
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Modding the UI/Game Visuals in Reb? Need Help. *UPDATED*

Which files to edit?

June 2, 2013 12:06:43 PM from Sins of a Solar Empire ForumsSins of a Solar Empire Forums

Hi all,

 

Looking to make a ui mod, and am having a hard time finding which files control the specific elements I want to touch.

I'm guessing they are brush files, but can't figure out which ones.

A couple questions for you all, hoping that someone has found these:

 

A ) What file controls the planet boundary image? The thin band around the gravity well.

 

B ) What file controls the phase lane image?

 

C ) What file controls the planet image file (when zoomed out)? FIGURED OUT

 

 

Finally, a question on how the file's work. Additive versus replicative. If I CREATE a mod file, with an identical name to a reference file, will what I input add to the basic loaded sins reference file? Or will it not load the original file, and only load mine?

 

Thanks all very much. I know these are modding newb questions, but I couldn't find any similar topics via search.

-Boe

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boeduur
GoaFan77
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Reply #1 June 2, 2013 2:07:04 PM
from Sins of a Solar Empire ForumsSins of a Solar Empire Forums

I'm guessing they are brush files, but can't figure out which ones.

Window files set up the position of UI elements, brushes files point to the position and file of the UI elements on a texture sheet. If you're serious about making this chances are you'll have to open them all up anyways.

A ) What file controls the planet boundary image? The thin band around the gravity well.

B ) What file controls the phase lane image?

Probably a texture file somewhere, I don't think either is controlled by a windows file.

Finally, a question on how the file's work. Additive versus replicative. If I CREATE a mod file, with an identical name to a reference file, will what I input add to the basic loaded sins reference file? Or will it not load the original file, and only load mine?

It will load your new file and totally ignore the standard file.

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boeduur
boeduur
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Reply #2 June 2, 2013 5:39:49 PM
from Sins of a Solar Empire ForumsSins of a Solar Empire Forums

Ok, fair enough. And, thanks for responding.

 

Perhaps you can help me with another question. I have a particle designed, in PF, and I now want to apply it to planet graphics. How do I do that?

 

Thanks!

-Boe

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boeduur
GoaFan77
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Reply #3 June 2, 2013 7:07:08 PM
from Sins of a Solar Empire ForumsSins of a Solar Empire Forums

Quoting boeduur,
reply 2
Perhaps you can help me with another question. I have a particle designed, in PF, and I now want to apply it to planet graphics. How do I do that?

I'm not a particle forge expert, but such effects are usually applied by a buff from the planet (unless its something like a magnetic cloud, I think that's done in the mesh somehow). Look at abilities like clairvoyance to have an idea of how it is done.

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boeduur
IskatuMesk
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Reply #4 June 2, 2013 8:59:07 PM
from Sins of a Solar Empire ForumsSins of a Solar Empire Forums

A flair hardpoint on the mesh would suffice if you are precise. This will, however, effect all things using that mesh.

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boeduur
myfist0
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Reply #5 June 2, 2013 9:33:32 PM
from Sins of a Solar Empire ForumsSins of a Solar Empire Forums

Quoting boeduur,
reply 2
Perhaps you can help me with another question. I have a particle designed, in PF, and I now want to apply it to planet graphics. How do I do that?

If you want it to show all the time, then a flair point needs to be added to the mesh. If it's from an ability, you can use the existing points like Above, Center, Aura (below) or a custom mesh point where you want called Ability-1 thru 5

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boeduur
boeduur
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Reply #6 June 2, 2013 10:19:05 PM
from Sins of a Solar Empire ForumsSins of a Solar Empire Forums

Wow, that sounds complicated. Looking at it more thoroughly, thanks to GoaFan's recommendation, I will be going the Ability route. Should be sufficient for my needs.

 

Final (haha) question for you all. Is there a way to trigger such an ability (as adds a visual effect), when an invasion begins on that planet? Like an "OnInvasion" command?

 

Thanks again!

-Boe

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boeduur
boeduur
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Reply #7 June 5, 2013 8:30:34 AM
from Sins of a Solar Empire ForumsSins of a Solar Empire Forums

ok, figured out the invasion thing. just gotta get the coding right.

 

got the abilities to work, thanks to your assistance, but now im running into a weird thing. when i save, and reload the game, on the reload the particle effect is gone. i imagine because the ability already fired, the buff was applied, but sins didnt feel the need to re-up the fx. anyone know a work around on this?

 

part of it could be that i had to put a stackLimit 1 on the buff entity, because otherwise it would keep firing the fx, causing them to look like solid bands instead of text. that was the cause of the aforementioned brightness, many stacked layers of the effect. gotta be a happy median somewhere...

thanks again,

-Boe

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boeduur
Seleuceia
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Reply #8 June 5, 2013 3:33:01 PM
from Sins of a Solar Empire ForumsSins of a Solar Empire Forums

When dealing with effects there is PlayAttachedEffect and PlayPersistantAttachedEffect....

Maybe try the persistant if you haven't already...

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boeduur
boeduur
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Reply #9 June 6, 2013 9:42:05 AM
from Sins of a Solar Empire ForumsSins of a Solar Empire Forums

Sadly, I already had it set to persistent, but I appreciate the suggestion.

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boeduur
Seleuceia
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Reply #10 June 6, 2013 2:14:57 PM
from Sins of a Solar Empire ForumsSins of a Solar Empire Forums

Yeah your only way to get out of that then is to switch from instant action to periodic action....which may or may not be viable for you...

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boeduur
boeduur
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Reply #11 June 6, 2013 2:26:39 PM
from Sins of a Solar Empire ForumsSins of a Solar Empire Forums

on the Eclipse page, i see this as an explanation of the call functions:

 

 

but no explanation of these functions. interval time is obvious, as is the action type. but what is the counttype? what functions do you use on it?

 

thanks for your help!

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boeduur
Seleuceia
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Reply #12 June 6, 2013 3:31:46 PM
from Sins of a Solar Empire ForumsSins of a Solar Empire Forums

Better sometimes to just find a pre-existing ability to model...

Many of the passive AoE abilities in this game use periodic actions...you could look at something like energy aura or targeting uplink...

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