M2TW Modeler's Toolbox - Version 0.6 Beta Released On 06/06/2015

[Deerslayer]

Forgive me for this question.
You could create a script to import models and animations of the games E: TW and N: TW?

[Kahvipannu]

I had some problems back in the day with this, propably it was at my end, but I now tryed again after clean up of my PC, and it works like charm. This is awesome tool, thank you.

[Araval]

There's a model that I put together using this tool and when I want to convert it to mesh, it says: "The conversion of the MS3D model has failed because it contains one or more underweighted vertices." I was suggested to push the show unassigned vertexes button in Milkshape but none popped up.

Does anyone have a clue how to fix it?

EDIT: problem fixed thanks to GeMiNi][SaNDy!

[G|I|Sandy]

Has anyone managed to unpack a mod's animations, add a new animation and pack it all back in using this tool? I am trying to add Marka horses animations to existing animations pack.

I don't like how the tool unpacks the animations into a redundant data/animations/mods/"your mod name"/data/animations folder. Doesn't make sense.

EDIT: You need to unpack both pack.dat and skeleton.dat files. Include the new animations into the pack.list and skeleton.list files respectively. Then place the corresponding .cas animations files and skeleton files into the respective folders (path thats in the pack.list file). Then build the packs. Works like a charm. This means you can add new animations to any mod. I also edited descr_skeleton file prior to all this.

Sandy

[G|I|Sandy]

Getting an error when trying to convert mesh to ms3d and the other way around. Merge function works.

[ERROR - EXCEPTION]
Type: System.ArgumentException
Message: String cannot be of zero length.
Parameter name: oldValue

[ERROR - STACK TRACE]
at System.String.ReplaceInternal(String oldValue, String newValue)
at System.String.Replace(String oldValue, String newValue)
at ..
(String , String , String )
at ..
( )
at ..
( , Object , EventArgs )
at System.Windows.Forms.Button.OnMouseUp(MouseEventArgs mevent)
at System.Windows.Forms.Control.WmMouseUp(Message& m, MouseButtons button, Int32 clicks)
at System.Windows.Forms.Control.WndProc(Message& m)
at System.Windows.Forms.ButtonBase.WndProc(Message& m)
at System.Windows.Forms.Button.WndProc(Message& m)
at System.Windows.Forms.NativeWindow.Callback(IntPtr hWnd, Int32 msg, IntPtr wparam, IntPtr lparam)

[INFORMATION - ENVIRONMENT]
Culture: en-US
Framework: 4.0.30319.34014
Machine: SANDY
OS: Microsoft Windows NT 6.2.9200.0 64-Bit
[INFORMATION - APPLICATION]
64-Bit Yes
Location: D:\My Work\My tools\M2TWMT-0.4B\M2TWMT.exe
Name: M2TWMT, Version=0.4.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=391cffbff65ad34e
Working Set: 44130304

[Zarathos]

There's a model that I put together using this tool and when I want to convert it to mesh, it says: "The conversion of the MS3D model has failed because it contains one or more underweighted vertices." I was suggested to push the show unassigned vertexes button in Milkshape but none popped up.

Does anyone have a clue how to fix it?

EDIT: problem fixed thanks to GeMiNi][SaNDy!

May I know how this was fixed please? Maybe it's a problem related to my software.

Has anyone managed to unpack a mod's animations, add a new animation and pack it all back in using this tool? I am trying to add Marka horses animations to existing animations pack.

I don't like how the tool unpacks the animations into a redundant data/animations/mods/"your mod name"/data/animations folder. Doesn't make sense.

EDIT: You need to unpack both pack.dat and skeleton.dat files. Include the new animations into the pack.list and skeleton.list files respectively. Then place the corresponding .cas animations files and skeleton files into the respective folders (path thats in the pack.list file). Then build the packs. Works like a charm. This means you can add new animations to any mod. I also edited descr_skeleton file prior to all this.

Sandy

I'll take a look to the path generation for unpacking. I see you have already solved this, anyway the skeletons TXT files is totally ignored by the tool and the mod itself, don't bother updating it

Getting an error when trying to convert mesh to ms3d and the other way around. Merge function works.

[ERROR - EXCEPTION]
Type: System.ArgumentException
Message: String cannot be of zero length.
Parameter name: oldValue

[ERROR - STACK TRACE]
at System.String.ReplaceInternal(String oldValue, String newValue)
at System.String.Replace(String oldValue, String newValue)
at ..(String , String , String )
at ..( )
at ..( , Object , EventArgs )
at System.Windows.Forms.Button.OnMouseUp(MouseEventArgs mevent)
at System.Windows.Forms.Control.WmMouseUp(Message& m, MouseButtons button, Int32 clicks)
at System.Windows.Forms.Control.WndProc(Message& m)
at System.Windows.Forms.ButtonBase.WndProc(Message& m)
at System.Windows.Forms.Button.WndProc(Message& m)
at System.Windows.Forms.NativeWindow.Callback(IntPtr hWnd, Int32 msg, IntPtr wparam, IntPtr lparam)

[INFORMATION - ENVIRONMENT]
Culture: en-US
Framework: 4.0.30319.34014
Machine: SANDY
OS: Microsoft Windows NT 6.2.9200.0 64-Bit
[INFORMATION - APPLICATION]
64-Bit Yes
Location: D:\My Work\My tools\M2TWMT-0.4B\M2TWMT.exe
Name: M2TWMT, Version=0.4.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=391cffbff65ad34e
Working Set: 44130304

Ah, this is awesome. May I ask you to upload somewhere the model?

[G|I|Sandy]

Ah, this is awesome. May I ask you to upload somewhere the model?

Not so awesome for me. I was almost done with a big update. As for your questions, its with all models. Same thing for dds and texture conversions. I tried redownloading the application again, still same thing. I used it extensively in the past several months. Never had a problem. Yesterday it started giving me this error. Packing/unpacking, importing EDU, and Merging ms3ds work fine. I believe this may have to do with Windows update or something similar since it just started yesterday out of nowhere.

Can someone confirm whether they get the same error?

Awesome tool by the way. I can't imagine working without it anymore. I hope this can be fixed soon.

Sandy

[Zarathos]

Ah crap, this is probably due to a Framework update!

May I ask if you are running the application with some kind of compatibility or into some protected environment?
Again, may I ask for one of those textures/models?

[G|I|Sandy]

Attached a model and its textures in both formats. I do not use any environment. I tried to launch it with administrator privileges, no luck. Just to be sure i changed permissions of the folder to full, no luck either. This security UAC thing is always causing trouble, but not in this case i think.

Sandy

[Zarathos]

Mh... well, they are working like a charm for me. Really.
It's crazy but I reported no errors from conversion processes. Must be something on your environment configuration.

[G|I|Sandy]

I figured it out. It only happens when i set the Use File Suffixes setting to OFF. I remember now that i changed that a couple of days ago because i was tired of renaming converted files all the time. I was then working with animations exclusively for a couple of days and hadn't noticed that conversion didn't work anymore. Changing the setting back to ON solves the problem. Seems this feature is bugged.

Sandy

[Zarathos]

Great catch man!
Thank you I'm gonna fix this for the next release!

[Araval]

May I know how this was fixed please? Maybe it's a problem related to my software.

Since one part of a model didn't appear in game after converting with GOAT, Sandy suggested me to reassign it to the correct bone. In MilkShape everything looked ok to me but there must have been unassigned or underweighed vertices. Your tool seems to be more sensitive to things like this than GOAT for example.

[Lifthrasir]

Is there anybody able to explain me in a simple way how to use this (see below) to rebuilt skeletons?

2) How to rebuild original skeletons?

The original models' "base pose" skeletons can be found into the extensionless files that can be found inside/data/animations/skeletons.dat. So, to rebuild original skeletons you first have to unpack that file using this tool (update its executable files with those ones which are more recent and contain a lot of bug fixes). In order to do this you have to unzip the downloaded archive in your /data/animations/ directory and then run extract_skeletons.bat​:

I can't make it work and don't understand what I'm doing wrong.
If I use the original XIDX, I can unpack the animations. However, when using the M2TW Modeler's Toolbox, the skeletons appears like a sphere. If I try to use the latest files (mentioned above in the quote), I can't extract anything.

Many thanks in advance.

[Zarathos]

Skeletons are only useful to be rebuilt when you are up to create new animations or to have a better vision/test on the model during the bones rigging process.
1) Unpack skeleton files.
2) Enable the rebuinding option in the tool.
3) Convert the MESH to MS3D.
4) When prompted, select the skeleton corresponding to the animation that the model is using in BMDB.

[Zarathos]

BTW, fixing various bugs I discovered how to calculate bounding spheres for the M2TW meshes.
Bounding spheres are built using the values you can find in the model comments:

-0.01930268
0.2401515
0.4286239
1.331218
/

They have multiple functions in the M2TW engine:
1) They are used by soldiers to know when they are close to an enemy and they can hit him.
2) They are used for collision calculations.
3) They are used as a deceleration area for charges (charging speed is reduced when soldiers enters a bounding sphere of an enemy.

Now... I can say for sure that 99,9% of the custom models made by M2TW community have wrong bounding spheres. They are probably enough to create a correct collision area, but they are totally unrelated to the real mesh itself since normally when you are creating a new pikemen unit, for example, you copy and past the bounding sphere values from another similar pikemen unit. Now, with the next version of the tool, this problem is no more... and everybody will be able to improve the collision of their custom units.

[G|I|Sandy]

Now, with the next version of the tool, this problem is no more... and everybody will be able to improve the collision of their custom units.

This is awesome! These numbers always worried me and caused troubles sometimes when using GOAT. Just like you mentioned I was copying these numbers from relevant vanilla meshes (spearmen from spearmen, archers from archers, etc).

As I mentioned before, this tool is invaluable. When 2014 awards come, you should be nominated for Opifex award. In fact, it should be done sooner. Let's hope some of the hex admins see this and take action.

Sandy

[Lifthrasir]

Skeletons are only useful to be rebuilt when you are up to create new animations or to have a better vision/test on the model during the bones rigging process.
1) Unpack skeleton files.
2) Enable the rebuinding option in the tool.
3) Convert the MESH to MS3D.
4) When prompted, select the skeleton corresponding to the animation that the model is using in BMDB.

Many thanks for your answer Zaratos. But I still don't understand why the skeleton appears like a sphere when I use your tool, even if I don't rebuilt it? Could it be due to a wrong version of Python? I had an issue like that recently with GOAT (couldn't convert some Meshes).
My problem is that I need to create new unit cards. By the past, I used MS3D and the skeleton rotation to make the right position of the model. But now, as it appears as a sphere, I can't do it.
However, it seems that there's nothing relating to the files I mentioned in my previous post.

[Zarathos]

@Lifthrasir: in Milkshape, to File -> Preferences -> Misc and set the property "Joint Size" to 0.025000.

A new version is out! Enjoy bounding spheres

[Lifthrasir]

I'ved done that already. The result was that the sphere diameter apprears smaller than before. Any way, I'll try your new version and see if I still have the same issue