mounting and dismounting-in game

[Chilly5]

Ok, I was wondering if this is possible. I know that this is moddable to make 2 different units (one infantry one cavalry) out game (cant really find the right word . . .). but would it be possible to create a mod that allows units in-game, like in-battle, to dismount and mount on horses? like, for instance, you see triarii coming at your greek cavlary, rather than going to a suicide charge, you order them to dismount and attack, giving them a slight more of a chance to live. this is probably impossible, but is it even possible to do something along the lines of what I heard: that in mediveil (sp?) you can dismount certain knightly units before a battle (never played mediveil) , does anyone think implementing that in rtw is possible?
as for the mount-dismount in-battle, prehaps a way to do this would be to somehow to use seige wepons? remodel, reskin, recode, and reanimate say, a ram to be a group of horses? (dont ask me what a group of horses would be doing standing in the middle of a battle) so then, when say, some eastern infantry come and decide to ride the horses. you tell them to "pick up the siege equipment" and they all get their horse and ride and you reanimate the push-ram animation and change it to fs_hc_spearman or something, then at least they can ride the horse (you make the ram speed faster). this helps them to get from one place to another, but i dont think they can fight (seige wepons cant fight), and if they do, the game may crash. but anyway, is this possible? can this be implemented into the rtw engine?

[madd069]

I am 99.9999% sure it cant. About your siege idea....
If you made a sige weopon look like a bunch of horses, it would still be 1 objust. It or they or watever wuld have to stop to turn, and nothing could go inbeetween the horses, for they are still 1 object. Making alpha-something just makes stuff invisibly (circular shields are squere with invisibly edges), not makes them seperate.

I am really tired right now so I hope this post makes sense.

[Bruticus the Steadfast]

I wish we could, but its really more hassle then its worth I think haha. Just try to fix the general problems like most of the major mods have.

[dark_shadow89]

Troy Total War is trying to implement this. Is this where you got the siege engine idea from Chilly?

[Zuwxiv]

Probably not possible, or not worth the work. It would take forever to do... almost literally. But nonetheless, that is a very good idea, with the seige equipment. I really wouldn't know, though...

[dark_shadow89]

We've got a pair of very talented scripters and animators working on this. It is do-able.

[Chilly5]

um, no i didnt get this from troy . . . in fact by some distant relation i think troy may have gotten this from me . . . strange. it was an idea ages ago in RTWH maybe one of your staff read it and found out of the idea . . . if you can make this work, I think that one of the LOTR mods may need it . . . i dont think they thought about needing it but they might in order to simulate the rohan royal guard dismounting and mounting, in fact, many of rohan cav mount and dismount .. . .

anyway, thats good to here that it is possible. and also dark_shadow89, i have a unrelated question for you: do you think that the people making atlantis-total war (or rome total war return of atlantis), which is right now me and two other people, could join troy totalwar and instead of making atlantis total war a invasion mod for vanilla, how bout we make it for troy? a invasion mod for troy, whats the catch? well, we just need help from your team, we need at least one modeler to help us model some of the units . . . so just to make a expansion mod for troy, but we will need to overwrite a original faction . . . . but you can choose that for the expansion i guess . .. .note: this doesnt mean that it will be for BI . . . we just think its more appropreate for a atlantis mod to be part of troy, y'know they are both greek myths . . .. basically related. so can we?

[dark_shadow89]

Oh, ok, I think I know how the idea spread. Ben_is_sparky joined us, and I believe he was one of the people trying to implement it at RTWH?

We have no plans at the moment to include an Atlantis faction, which had no mention in the Illiad, so sorry, I'm gonna have to say no there. Also, we've used up all teh available culture slots, and don't intend to scrap any of the factions included in the mod.

[madd069]

We've got a pair of very talented scripters and animators working on this. It is do-able.

Im afraid to tell you it is probably not.

[dark_shadow89]

I'm not going to bother getting into a discussion about whether it's doable or not. We have some very good modders working on it, that's all I'm gonna say.

[GodsPetMonkey]

I'm not going to bother getting into a discussion about whether it's doable or not. We have some very good modders working on it, that's all I'm gonna say.

If you have an animator and a scripter to spare in order to work on this, you clearly have to many team members.

But not everyone knows the problems your going to face, so I'll list a few that I quickly thought of...

1. You can't give one unit two skeletons for the same weapon. This means your unit, if you can get this working, will either be walking around floating above the ground with its legs akimbo, or standing straight with his legs through the horses chest when riding. Not to mention the issues surrounding how the animations all fit together (fs_hc anims are very different from normal fs anims)

2. Siege engines have a limited number of animations for their crew (see carry_and_artillery). None of these happen to invoke an attack in game (you can make the model swing, but it's purely visual). So far, the only way to be able to set when an attack is launched (tying it to an animation frame) is with a Dev copy of RTW...

3. Siege engines cant enter cities

4. Siege engines tend to form up in a single straight line...

That's enough for now... I'm sure you will be a while whilst your experts try to solve those problems.

[Chilly5]

well, i'm fairly certain that mounting and attacking is impossible, but they can ride, and they dont have to be in a infantry animation, like the animation for the ram has the infantry pushing too, so instead of pushing, it can show them fully mounted.

As for the atlantis faction, sure its not in the illiad, but we arnt going to delete a faction for a vanilla troy. just once troy comes out, we make a expansion for it . . . . fine . .. you declined . . . i wont bother you more ... .

[madd069]

Oh, ok, I think I know how the idea spread. Ben_is_sparky joined us, and I believe he was one of the people trying to implement it at RTWH?

We have no plans at the moment to include an Atlantis faction, which had no mention in the Illiad, so sorry, I'm gonna have to say no there. Also, we've used up all teh available culture slots, and don't intend to scrap any of the factions included in the mod.

For the problems monkey mentioned, plus nothing could go beetween infantry/horses, this would be impossible.

[Destraex]

its all about having the option before the battle, say at a siege you dismount the men in the deployment phase.
You cannot remount them during the battle

[SigniferOne]

Well, let them try to do it, don't dissuade them from doing it guys... That's like someone telling Vercingetorix that it's impossible to be able to change skins for the game, some weeks after RTW came out.