SigniferOne's Animations Pack

[Spartan357]

Np Cyber. Just thought i'd ask

[The White Knight]

Okay SigniferOne; what's your next project? Elephant archer-animations (*sounds hopefully*)

[almeja]

Firts of all, I hope you all join me in an uproar of thanks for Signifier's work. Thanks to him we now have greek hoplites who fight as they were supposed to do.
Second, I still don't understand how the CA people managed to overlook such important aspects. I will agree with Signifier that the game they have given us is wonderful, but wouldn't it be a a pity if all their research (which they obviously did!) were marred by inconsistencies such as those corrected by our modders here?
Third, I have a question that is primarily addressed to Signifier, but also to anyone who can possibly help or at least tell me to despair: after installing the new hoplite animations I watched them perform brilliantly in combat, but when I ordered my hoplite unit to move, chaos ensued. Troops were moving all over their line, much like cavalry that has just charged through an enemy line, then doubles up to charge again etc. There was no order, nothing resembling a disciplined line.
I am using no mods, I have not upgraded to version 1.2 or otherwise, and I have simply tweaked the units to my liking. But I suspect the unit stats have nothing to do with it. Could it be that some other factor, such as spacing between the troops, could affect the animation? Or the fact that I have not bothered to take away the secondary weapon, as suggested by Signifier?
In any case, please respond. It feels that I have been given the most extraordinary gift with one hand, then had it stolen with the other. I suspect children feel much like that when you take away their candy. If I were 10 years younger this problem would have resulted in my becoming a deprived child, with serious sessions with a therapist laying in store in the future.
And thanks for kindly reading this and taking the trouble to answer.

[SigniferOne]

almeja, that sometimes happens with infantry units, they begin to act like cavalry (which is what I presume happened here). It's a sort of bug from CA, and just need to wait two months until it's fixed (in the expansion). This bug happens very rarely (clearly, because you were able to move them successfully beforehand), and the best solution to it, for now, is to Stop the soldiers when they begin doing this, and give the order again.

White Knight: don't you mean elephant javelin animations?

[almeja]

Well, now, thank you for your incredibly fast answer. I will have to wait for the expansion pack, if that's the only way... I will, however, experiment with other factors (such as soldier spacing, guard modes etc) and if succesful I will let you know. In any case consider myself in your debt (deep bow and a preposterous flourish).

[Prof]

the animations are awesome

do you think, you can make a javelin-animation for elephants and chariots? and a spear animation for elephants?

[GODzilla]

Hi SigniferOne. The time being I'm in some kind of holiday from rtw, which means I didn't played it in a while. So I just didn't see that you finally released a new version of your animations mod which I used to wait for so long ^^.

I just tried it out and it's really really truly super great .

Of course there is always something I find to criticize *gg*. But no, it's more like a request than criticism .

First, something to stare at: http://people.freenet.de/chagemann/s...ieldglitch.jpg

As you can see the sword is clipping trough the shield (these are prometheus legions and I guess many people use them). I had this problem with your first release, back then I just made the shield smaller.

But I'm afraid this is no option this time. The reason: It took me at least two hours to fit the shield (shield size, position, angle and so on) in order not to clip in testudo formation. With the original release of prometheus there are huge clipping problems in testudo formation .

See: http://people.freenet.de/chagemann/s...tudoglitch.jpg

So what I would like you to do is adding a secondary gladius animation, with just one difference: More space between sword and shield.

I know you must be very busy, so take your time, no hurry about that. As I said I just take a break of playing rtw (instead: GTA SA and Battlefield 2 ) and so there's no need for you to do this soon. But it would be cool if you think about it. Let me know if you agree .

[The White Knight]

White Knight: don't you mean elephant javelin animations?

Is that possible? This would be incredible superawsome! :d

[driddle]

Historically accurate Roman legionary animations (fs_s1_gladius):
- no wild cheering for Romans during startup
- proper relaxed standing animations
- during a fight, holding the shield close and the gladius ready next to it
- stabbing fighting style with the gladius, no slashing

The wild cheering for the Romans is historical. I refer you to this quote form Polybius.

When the phalanxes were close to each other, Romans fell upon their foes, raising their war-cry and clashing their shields with their spears as is their practice,

Polybius, The Histories, Book XV, Section 12.8 (Online at LacusCurtius) The Battle of Zama (202 BC)

At least some slashing is also historical. Polybius clearly says they used there swords for both cutting and thrusting.

Such being in general and in detail the disposition of the phalanx, I have now, for purposes of comparison, to speak of the peculiarities of the Roman equipment and system of formation and the points of difference in both. Now in the case of the Romans also each soldier with his arms occupies a space of three feet in breadth, but as in their mode of fighting each man must move separately, as he has to cover his person with his long shield, turning to meet each expected blow, and as he uses his sword both for cutting and thrusting it is obvious that a looser order is required, and each man must be at a distance of at least three feet from the man next him in the same rank and those in front of and behind him, if they are to be of proper use.

Polybius, The Histories, Book XVIII, Section 30.5 (Online at LacusCurtius) The Battle of Cynoscephalae (197 BC)

[ShangTang]

almeja, that sometimes happens with infantry units, they begin to act like cavalry (which is what I presume happened here). It's a sort of bug from CA, and just need to wait two months until it's fixed (in the expansion). This bug happens very rarely (clearly, because you were able to move them successfully beforehand), and the best solution to it, for now, is to Stop the soldiers when they begin doing this, and give the order again.?

SPQR actually fixed this. Can LT and you can merge your mods together?

[SigniferOne]

I thought he took back his comment that he fixed it?

[maximusminimus]

Sig, did you add the idle/relaxed swordsmen animation to the fs_s1_barbswordsman skeleton?
I think that animation still isn't working for me. It worked just one time for the hastati with the fs_s1_gladius, when they were on a city wall, but the animation was kicking in and out...
Is it working good for you?

[SigniferOne]

No there's no idle/relaxed animation for anyone other than s1_gladius. I think spear units are fine as they are, and maybe i'll get to fixing the non roman sword units some other time. Remember that unlike Romans, the others have long swords so it's quite an issue of where to "put them" so as not to touch the guys next to you. But the Roman relaxed anims work very well for me, I'm not sure what the problem is you're experiencing. The "Idle" anims are not converted to that relaxed stance, so after an idle anim such as stretching, they do seem to return to the old stiff stance, but at the end they always revert to relaxed.

[maximusminimus]

Hmmm, i'll test it further and let you know.
Please implement that idle/relaxed animation to the other swordsmen on a future release.

EDIT: Yep, the animations are working fine. I wasn't playing with the Romans, that's why i didn't see it well. :wink:
I hope your Rome project doesn't keep you away from this animations project for too long.

[mike^_^]

Just downloaded this magnificent piece of work, these animations SigniferOne made are definately a must for anyone looking to improve their overall experience with Rome - Total War.

Thank you, and very nice work

[SigniferOne]

It is always a lot more difficult to modify animations than the models, where in just 30 seconds you can resize the shield. Point Prometheus to this thread, see what he can do. I already moved the arm before, to give more room for bigger shields, but the current ones in your screenshot look just too huge. I simply don't believe such huge shields were used.

[Chilly5]

i dont know if anyone pointed this out, but i think that signifer's barbarian slash animation would work really good with axe men, i mean, CAs axemen are crap, they didnt have their own animation . . . who would stab with an axe?!

just making my useless point here . . .

[maximusminimus]

Hey Sig, would it be possible for the swordsmen to hold their swords in the same relaxed way while marching?
I think that would look so much better.

[GODzilla]

It is always a lot more difficult to modify animations than the models, where in just 30 seconds you can resize the shield. Point Prometheus to this thread, see what he can do. I already moved the arm before, to give more room for bigger shields, but the current ones in your screenshot look just too huge. I simply don't believe such huge shields were used.

Hehe, and prometheus said that these shields are 100% historically accurate .

Of course, if there's no other solution, I will resize the shields, because your animations are simply a must. The sad thing about that will be that from then on I will have much clipping glitches with the testudo-formation .

Ok, another point: Will you add animations used as "junctions" between idle and moving the sword animation? Because there's still this kind of "sudden move", when the sword goes back into the new idle animation.....you know what I mean? Also when they switch between different animations while fighting, it's always a "sudden move" without smooth junction...

[SigniferOne]

You mean the Romans?