Cerez

Thanks for your help guys. Hmm... This is not quite what I'm looking for. I have a mod that needs to activate a player model based on the player's current settings, and then revert back to the original model with the same toggle function. I need to be able to store a value from an existing cvar in a newly created one in order to remember the player's previous model and revert back to it.

That's okay, @@Milamber, I figured as much. I'm still waiting for the right person to come along... She looks like a very interesting character, and she certainly has an impressive backstory. That reminds me, do we have the Cathar species in JK yet?

You're right, @@NumberWan. I tried re-watching the series from the beginning, and I just can't get past the first two seasons. I always end up skipping them and moving to the third. In the first two seasons Ahsoka is very much a child, and story doesn't seem to be pulling in so much as the later seasons. I haven't analysed it detail yet, but I presume this is because the first two are relatively simple in premise, made for children mostly (in a strange/elaborate kind of way), and avoid tackling serious relationships. Even A New Hope dives into adult themes of personal loss and tragedy, and the prequels deal with political concepts, but the Clone Wars series managed to dive deeper into these themes and present a more personal/engaging and realistic experience. I guess that's why I love Ahsoka's story so much. That's why I was sad to see it go, too, especially after things started to get really interesting. David (the director) and the team really took things to the next level, story-wise, and it was really catching on… I'm just glad that in the end they managed to conclude it somehow.

Where did you get these commands Asgarath? Most of these cvars don't seem to be present in MP at all... However, "sex" is, and it holds the value I'm looking for for the gender of the character ("male" or "female"). Now I have all three variables that I need: 1. model = the current player model 2. sex = the current player model gender 3. old_model = my custom cvar used to store a string Now the question is whether/how it is possible to tell the engine to store the current value of model in old_model. set old_model model is interpreted literally, and not as a variable with a stored value. Is there a way to indicate that model is a variable, not a string? P.S. snd doesn't seem to work from the command line, either… :/ The voice seems to be tied to the sound.cfg defined in each model...

Hmm… what would that involve? Does that mean changing the game code? How would you open a menu to test a cvar and run the commands?

Okay, I did some research and it turns out that you can set a custom variable (cvar) with the set command, but how do you transfer the value of model into the custom cvar? And, more importantly, is there a way to create a conditional (if-else) statement in a CFG script?

Okay, unusual question: Is there any way to query the current player model and store the data in a custom variable through a console script (CFG) in JKA? Let's say I'm using the Kyle model, and I'd like to memorise the current model's gender and model name so that I can use it for reference in a script. What I'm trying to do is get the game to automatically determine if a player model is male, female, or alien, and load a new model in its place that corresponds to the appropriate gender, then toggle back to the original player model using the set variable. I know this is pretty advanced for JKA, but is there any way something like this could actually be accomplished? EDIT: I know that you can query the current player model with the model/playermodel command, but is there any way to store that info in a custom variable?

Just a wild idea, but why not Frankestein Obi-Wan's head onto a clone trooper model? could do a great job of this. That'd be pretty close to what you are looking for, wouldn't it?

That's true. But I liked it that way. The overall themes in Star Wars are not for kids anyway. They are much too suggestive and adult in concept.

Well, I'm afraid to suggest, seeing as most of my suggestions have been turned away in the past. I don't want to seem selfish, but I would love it if someone actually attempted to model Ahsoka as a real SW character for the first time. Hirman did a quick job of it early in his development as a modeller, and compared to everything else it is a poor attempt at best. I don't want force anyone to work on it, and I would really like it if it was a work of passion. That said, there are still so many other character in Star Wars that are missing a worthy representation in JK as well. Pick something that inspires you, and that you feel you're up for the challenge to do.

Well, yes and no, because the animation director co-ordinates the visualisation process, and s/he is following direction from the director of the series, who in turn follows direction from the producers, who are Disney employees. So at the end if the day the one who invests money in the series is the one who decides how the series will look. If they say make it more childish, that's what the animation department will have to deal with. That's a very interesting insight, NumberWan. I actually really like your trail of thought here. I wonder if this is because the stories keep getting worse or because people need time to adjust to new stories? I suppose it's the latter. I wasn't around in the 80s, but it's very interesting that The Empire Strikes Back was deemed not as good as A New Hope back then. It probably has to do with the whole "sequels are not as good as the original" concept. How was Return of the Jedi received when it first came out? As a die-hard Clone Wars series fan I must protest. CW had a highly distinct visual style focused on simplicity, but the level of detail and representation was carefully thought out. Rebels is a much too stripped down version of the CW style that looks more like a regular cheap kids' Saturday cartoon than something that was given serious thought.

Oh, I didn't know that. Thanks Circa. I'll submit them, then.

I think a complete overhaul of the animation code might actually be a really good idea if it was rewritten to allow more freedom and flexibility, but I'm not sure that that would be in the scope of OpenJK. In fact, probably not. I've sort of started playing around with that idea in my facial expressions tweak, and I've noticed that the Raven team has rushed things quite a bit and only programmed for Icarus what they needed specifically for the story in the game. They didn't code the animations with extensibility in mind, and not a lot of thought was given to combining certain animations for the sake of creating new ones. In other words, it's a big mess, and to fix it we need a new design and extensive code rewriting. Otherwise you could build the new (waist-up) shooting stances around the current limitations, and try to make them look good even with the default idle stance. Making the characters hold the weapons proper will still make a huge difference to the overall game experience.

Why not do a little research into other Star Wars characters? I think this is the third or fourth time someone's making a Revan model. The Star Wars universe is massive, and once you start reading, there are so many interesting characters to choose from. There are a lot of minor characters in this list, but every once and again you come across someone interesting with a detailed backstory and a more significant role in Star Wars fiction/media: http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Category:Individuals Find a character that you find interesting that no-one's made (or is already making) a decent model of. Take a unique look, a new species -- something that presents a new challenge for your modelling skills.

Wohoho! That is indeed the readme we are looking for. You must have magical powers, Ruxith. Well, there you go guys, the full mod. It just needs to be packaged into a ZIP file.

No, unfortunately I don't have the original ZIP or readme for the Imperial Officer… Once unpacked, I generally only keep the PK3s. And this was downloaded a long long time ago. Can the readme not be found online, either? EDIT: I'll see if I can get in touch with HapSlash again and if he still has it.

Well, I'm just saying. No harm in that. Everyone can do what they like, of course, but if too many of us make something that already exists as an acceptable model (Raven quality / +), we will end up with a lack of an extended Star Wars cast such as what we have now. It'd be nice to tackle more variety, that's all I'm saying.

I don't know... I think there's a point where perfecting an already decent model seems wasteful. Especially if that means not concentrating on Star Wars characters that still don't have a place in JK. I can understand remaking a terrible model to something that's acceptable or decent, but anything that comes close to the default set of Raven characters in quality (or surpasses them) is sufficient to portray that character in the game. Beyond that perfection is wasteful, I think. Efforts should be concentrated on bringing new characters to the game, not on upping superfluous details, no matter how nice they look. I'm not saying that for study purposes one shouldn't aim to do better, but sometimes an original approach is better than a copy even in such an instance.

@@Circa, is anyone going to upload Wedge's maps, or should I submit them? I prefer the staff did it so that it doesn't appear under my files, but as an official JKHub upload. Wedge is fine with it as long as the readmes and original author details are kept intact. @@McGroose I saw this a bit late. This is what I have from HapSlash. I think it's exactly what you're looking for: https://www.dropbox.com/s/g73d9y0rzwfq7da/Imperial%20Officer.pk3

Payments are not allowed/legal (since this is based on copyrighted material), but you can make a voluntary donation to the person/artist. Yep, the head needs to be squashed vertically a bit, but otherwise the Anakin model does fit him quite well. Any Game of Thrones fans ready to Frankenstein and make a worthy skin here? B)

Just out of curiosity, do we have any JKA animation experts here? Both the new shooting stances (for all the characters, actually) and the eye-movement are a great idea. The eye-movement is a little harder to program, and the engine uses head movement already, as @@therfiles has pointed out, to achieve a similar -- albeit somewhat less detailed -- effect. That shooting stance got me really jumpy, though @@minilogoguy18. Realistic animations like these would be fantastic. @ is right, the original Dark Forces had stances that were a lot more natural than those in Jedi Outcast. That's actually one of the reasons I keep going back to that game for a more authentic Star Wars experience. The big challenge is tying them together into a smooth sequence. If you look at all the custom JK animation mods that have been created so far, the one thing they all have in common is that the stances and animations don't really tie in well together. They often appear jerky in their transitions, and simply don't look natural. Whoever embarks on this challenge will need to think of all the moves and actions as a cohesive whole, and plan and test with all the possible combinations they are used in in order to tie the movement/animation together. This is one of the real challenges/limitations with this engine, I think. Especially because length for each animation is "hard-wired" in the code, and so it cannot be changed unless changes are also made to the code. That said, I don't see why lifting the gun up to a little higher then waist-level will cause any problems. Some carefully thought out small tweaks are definitely possible even without changing the code.

We should definitely create a collective resource of tutorials from our skilled JKA veterans for future generations, and to make it easier for newcomers to seek answers themselves. I know @@Inyri has written a couple of excellent tutorials on weapons modelling in the past as well and these things just disappear out of sight if they are not saved/maintained as a collective resource. It really is a waste when that happens, especially since the authors spent a lot of time and patience writing/filming them to share their knowledge and tips. With a decline in our numbers we really need all these tutorials somehow collected and consolidated (hosted) to welcome new talent and engagement in the JK modding community.

@@Serenity937, just to say that I've managed to patch my build of OpenJK to remove the jumping behaviour, and the results are fantastic! The bots will now attack and evade, and if there is no path they will either walk on a way of their own choosing, or stop and hide, waiting for an unsuspecting enemy to pass by, and attack by surprise. I've had a great experience duelling Darth Vader where he fell off the normal bot path and I lost sight of him. When I went to the lower level to search, he took me by surprise with a lightsaber throw which I barely managed to block, and then he stood clam in the shadows, waiting ready for my attack. It was just like in the movies! Thanks so much for your help!