Slitherine

If I wanted to create a tile representing a palisade with traps:
the wall edge
the front area of the square with : pits or other symbolic trap representation
how would I create from scratch
how would I mod some existing tile
how would I add penalty/casualties for crossing over

I'm thinking to employ in scenarios that have to do with Caesar and the Gauls.
What is the developers view on things like siege towers, fire to weaken a palisade, boiling oil ect
I think you know where I'm going with this.

Thanks

There's no easy reply to that. It looks complicated but you can break it down into small steps

To create from scratch ...

1. you need to learn to model and UV low poly models.
2. Then create high poly models and likely sculpt them.
3. Then you need to be able to bake out colour, normal, spec, gloss and alpha maps.
4. Presumably you'll need to animate the traps.
5. You then need to convert them all to the .s4f format with our proprietry tool (I'm sure its been made available)
6. Drop models and textures into the objects folder for each location (so you need varieties for Northern Europe, Southern Europe and Middle East becaseu of the way the editor works)
7. Then is the bit I know little about .. edit scripts/txt files so the game knows what the objects are, how to display them, how to position them on the map, how to trigger trap animations and what effect they have on a unit etc.
8. Get them into the game, test, and then go back to 1. to fix any issues.

Or best bet would be to pair up with one of the other modders on here who's already got experience. Plenty are taking things from other Slitherine games and getting them into this engine.

zuPferd wrote:If I wanted to create a tile representing a palisade with traps:
the wall edge
the front area of the square with : pits or other symbolic trap representation
how would I create from scratch
how would I mod some existing tile
how would I add penalty/casualties for crossing over

I'm thinking to employ in scenarios that have to do with Caesar and the Gauls.
What is the developers view on things like siege towers, fire to weaken a palisade, boiling oil ect
I think you know where I'm going with this.

Thanks

I think Odenathus has already done something similar to what you want in his Alesia and Philippi scenarios, have you downloaded them?

Thanks Paul yes I have and played the battle. Very hard

[quote="Patrick Ward"]There's no easy reply to that. It looks complicated but you can break it down into small steps

Thank You for your time Patrick.
I have borrowed some of the graphics from Pike and Shot, mainly the medium walls
I basically was going to give them a tall grass look and design a palisade to fit on top.
I was wondering what program to use to open the fog II graphic file for manipulation.

Best Regards

You can't edit the s4f files as they're proprietry. The most you can do is reassign the default textures but that only affects the editor anyway.

Most of P&S was created in Blender which for its many faults and terrible UX is free and has all the tools you need. (In addition to the Archon conversion tool).

Thank You Patrick

If you don't feel up to wrestling with sf4 files (and I certainly don't) there is a lot you can still do with the Objects files from both this and P&S, by recolouring and erasing different areas of the pictures. Similarly, you can change the Tiles file to create, say, pits and caltrops, then stick the Rough Terrain (or Cliff, Enclosure, etc) overlays on them to get the difficulty you want. You can mix and match them with Objects and Tiles from the existing files to get different effects.

Far from perfect but, as an example, I made (erased) gaps in the Low Wall from P&S to get a stake effect, then stuck them onto the Northern Europe Ditch from FoG II.

Actually making a new set of siege engines would mean modelling sf4.

That proprietary tool is the file SlithExporter0012.ms, isn't it? As I understand the relevant posts, this seems to be a plugin/custom script exporter for 3ds Max by Autodesk. Is that right?

Is there any way I can create models in Blender then somehow convert them to the proprietary format? I simply can't afford several thousand dollars per year subscription fee for 3ds Max, if that's the "Max" software mentioned on the forum.

Cheers,
Peter

That is the old scripted exporter for BA (I think!). There is a new tool which takes in FBX files and exports files the game can use.

http://www.slitherine.com/forum/viewtop ... 92&t=81693

Cheers

Pip

Thanks, Pip. I'll try and figure it out.

I could probably help out on this. I have imported a bunch of 3D models into Pike & Shot and FoG II. I even made a video tutorial on the Pike & Shot forums.

The new Slitherine converter named Archaon simply takes an FBX format file and converts it to a game ready S4F file. They won't let you go the opposite way.
That FBX file is a format used in a lot of 3D design tools. I think it was made specifically so differing programs could import/export and exchange 3D objects with each other.

So you could make a 3D object in any program, such as Blender, or 3DS Max and export it to FBX, then get it into the game.

What might save you time and effort, is if you look through "Pike & Shot" and "Battle Academy", or even "Hell" for already made scenery to import. "Hell" might have some medieval/fantasy terrain that might come close. "Sengoku Jidai" also might have similar walls etc. Look at the picture below, that slanted stone wall could probably double in a Gallic setting. I think I even see a type of Palisade on the bottom right.

I am also just about to start a mini project trying to get some American Farm Fences (Split-Rail fences, aka ZigZag fences) into the game, so I can see if I find any Palisade type walls.

JamesManhattan wrote:
What might save you time and effort, is if you look through "Pike & Shot" and "Battle Academy", or even "Hell" for already made scenery to import. "Hell" might have some medieval/fantasy terrain that might come close. "Sengoku Jidai" also might have similar walls etc. Look at the picture below, that slanted stone wall could probably double in a Gallic setting. I think I even see a type of Palisade on the bottom right.

Sorry James, what game is "Hell"?

Paul59 wrote:
Sorry James, what game is "Hell"?

A Slitherine game literally named "Hell". It is Fantasy themed, so it's got magic etc, all using the same Battle Academy/Pike & Shot engine.
http://www.slitherine.com/products/prod ... atformID=1

It's actually a great resource to mine Special Abilities scripts if needed. There are a bunch of spells and magic abilities. I always imagined making a mod for it.

Thanks, James, that is extremely helpful. I've started learning 3D modelling with Blender. As I'm finding, it's a serious skill set that will take time to learn.

Cheers,
Peter

The "slanted wall" in that Sengoku Jidai screenshot is actually a type of slope tile. Not a wall object.