Helmet texture displaying fine in milkshape but not ingame

[vikingchild]

Hi folks, i've kitbashed a new unit together and everything looks perfect apart from one helmet texture.

I copy and pasted the helmet into my new modified dds file in paintshop.

Going into milkshape and assigning the new diff material to the figure the helmet texture only partially covers the helmet model...

So using the texture coordinate editor i've been able to align the the texture properly and the model looks great in milkshape.

But how do i save the modified texture in milkshape so the helmet texture is in the right place and i can then convert the dds file back to a texture file? I'm using the free version and the 30 day trial period has long since passed!

[Callistonian]

Milkshape doesn't edit textures, at least not directly (there may be a plugin for that). The texture coordinate editor, as its name implies, handles texture coordinates (often called u,v coordinates in texture space as opposed to x,y,z coordinates in 3D space) for the mesh; simply saving the mesh will preserve your new u,v's. Convert your new .ms3d file to .mesh using whatever converter. Then convert your new texture from .dds to .texture using whatever converter and remember to set it up in bmdb and don't forget about the normal map.

[vikingchild]

Whenever I try to save (or save as) the model in milkshape it says I need to buy the registration key... If I exit milkshape (from the drop down menu) it'll ask me do I want to save the modified model and so I select 'yes'.

That's the only way I can get changes to work... But converting it back to a mesh file again to plonk back in my mod is still giving me the weird misaligned texture on the helmet.

[Callistonian]

That would be a hilarious oversight on Mete's part if it actually works to bypass the registration key. Have you checked that it's not just closing the file without saving your changes? Trying back converting the .mesh file and see if your changes are present still there. The only other explanation is that the texture is incorrect either because you didn't export it or didn't reference it correctly in bmdb or the normal map is extremely wonky.

TWC doesn't allow advocating for piracy so I'm not allowed to tell you to just find a registry key online. If you get tired of dealing with Milkshape you could try Blender for editing and IWTE for conversion.

[vikingchild]

I went back and created a new diff texture, moving the helmet texture and coordinates to a free spot, but now the helmet doesn't show up in my game now at all! So I've decided to cut my losses and just have the unit with 3 helmet variants.

Incidently on that subject: the 4 helmets that I merged with my unit, only the fourth helmet was giving me bother, the other 3 were present from the start even though I never copied their textures or had to fiddle with the texture coordinator... They just worked

[Callistonian]

I went back and created a new diff texture, moving the helmet texture and coordinates to a free spot, but now the helmet doesn't show up in my game now at all! So I've decided to cut my losses and just have the unit with 3 helmet variants.

Did you confirm that your edits are being saved by back converting a .mesh file? Problems with particular variants could indicate an issue with the mesh comment data.

Incidently on that subject: the 4 helmets that I merged with my unit, only the fourth helmet was giving me bother, the other 3 were present from the start even though I never copied their textures or had to fiddle with the texture coordinator... They just worked

Are you saying these helmets worked correctly in-game or that they showed up correctly only in Milkshape? If the former, then that can only be due to the fact that both the unit you took the helmets from and the unit you gave the helmets to use the same textures in the same places. If the latter, then it just means you merged the materials from the original unit into the scene in Milkshape but those extra materials won't be preserved when you export to .mesh and won't be used by the game.

[vikingchild]

OK so bizarrely all 4 helmets are now showing up in game!



The problem helmet was the second from the right, when i moved its position on the texture file yesterday and checked it in custom battle mode only the other 3 helmets were being displayed... It was at this point i had resigned myself to just having these helmets in my unit and forgetting about the fourth one! But today i checked again and there it is.

Certainly i'm not experienced enough in modelling so far but i'm pretty bamboozled by this all the same lol

My base model is the Byzantine spearmen (ere_medium_spearmen) from Broken Crescent, i deleted the helmets, spears and shields and merged them with the ones from this unit from Tsardoms coz basically they're much cooler looking imo



You'll notice the helmets are displayed exactly identically even though they're from 2 completely different mods!

And this is my texture file



The ONLY addition i made to this is the helmet circled, the other 3 helmets textures aren't present. So how is it that the 3 helmets are displaying their proper textures from the Tsardoms unit even though i didn't include them in the base texture file?

TBH though, the unit is working for me so i won't push my luck on this, just thought it was a bit of an oddity.

Oh and PS;

I've discovered with milkshape now that i can save models if i hit 'new' and it'll ask me if i want to save the modified file... So at least i don't have to keep exiting and then going back into it lol

[Callistonian]

So, some of the helmet textures are on the Figure material and texture and some are on the Attachments material and texture. You can see which material the mesh groups are assigned to in Milkshape and check the UV coordinates in the texture coordinate editor.

It's pretty funny that you can bypass Milkshape's registration key by saving without using the save button. Iirc, there are other restrictions though, so you may want to find a registration key anyway.

[vikingchild]

Yes I've now found that although the helmet maps are assigned to the figure their textures are on the attachments dds... When I scaled down the figures dds in the texture coordinates editor I could see them 'off page' in their positions where they'd be if I was looking at the attachments file in the TCE... Mega confusing! But nevertheless all good!

[Callistonian]

Any 'off page' UV coordinates are still going to be assigned to the same texture. You can visualize it like a patchwork of the same texture being repeated endlessly in the u and v directions to infinity. So if you have a texture that is, for example, 100 by 100, and you have a UV coordinate a 0,150, then it will be on the part of the texture that shows up at 0,50.

Also remember that "Figure" and "Attachments" are just conventional names, they don't need to be used for those things. All that matters is that units on the battle map can have two sets of textures and since you have faction-by-faction control in bmdb, you can use this strategically (i.e. some factions have the same Figure texture [to save space] but different Attachments texture).

[vikingchild]

Ah gotcha, thanks for the insights!

[Murmandamus]

Wouldn't blender be better?

[Murmandamus]

Sorry, forgot to check dates on post, I was simply dealing with a similar issue, I forget sometimes I'm old as well is this game, evening.

[Louis Lux]

There is no such thing as better in this context. Milkshape is a great tool for small edits and the interface is really simple and easy to use.