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Great work Coplann

Great work Coplann

Great work Coplann Link I love this Babylon 5 Ships.
Can you make more Babylon 5 ships (my favorite ships: White Star,Shadow,G`Quan,Star Fury,Omega Destroyer)

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Reply #51 Top
ya, though I dont know why the tutorial/example and the Lintira are still not approved (both are older entries than the Starfuries or Omega).
Reply #52 Top
someone said the White Star model is too small in GC. should I increase the size? ^^
Reply #53 Top
[Hull Name="HugeHull3"]
[DisplayName]Battelcrab[/DisplayName]
[Description]The Shadow ship from Babylon 5.[/Description]
[Cost]160[/Cost]
[Size]80[/Size]
[SensorRange]4[/SensorRange]
[HP]48[/HP]
[Model]Battelcrab[/Model]
[Thumbnail]SHADOW-01a[/Thumbnail]
[Speed]1[/Speed]
[Category]Huge[/Category]
[Logistics]6[/Logistics]
[Tech_Requirement]Massive Scale Building[/Tech_Requirement]
[/Hull]

The models should be renamed - Whitestar.x to S99_Whitestar.x - like that.
All the .png and the .x model files go into the GFX\Models folder.
Edit the GC2Types.xml file by adding a section at the end for each model.
In the above example, I associated the Shadow ship with a huge hull. This one is called Hull3 because there is already a Hull0, Hull1 and Hull2 for the huge ships. Just rename the section as is appropriate for your particular GC2Types file. The next one I do as huge will be Hull4, and so on.
Then change the names and descriptions, and indicate which model file and thumbnail file to use. All the models usually come with at least one .png file, and some are better for the actual thumbnail - although the artists rarely make a specific thumbnail file for this for some odd reason.

And in the [Model]Battelcrab[/Model] and [Thumbnail]SHADOW-01a[/Thumbnail] you will notice that only the base filename is used - so the file named S99_Battlecrab.x is referred to as only Battlecrab, without the S99_ or the .x extension, and the thumbnail is shadow-01a without the .png extension.


I just figured this out today by reading one of the help files on this forum, by the way, so that I could use the Bab5 ships like this. It's not hard once you get the hang of it.

And I had to change one thing before I could paste the above example into this post.
I had to change the < to [ and the > to ], so you will need to make sure they are changed back if you copy and paste this example. It should be clear once you get into the GC2Types file, as to how the syntax is laid out. I just used Notepad to find and replace those items. (I usually use Wordpad for the actual editing stuff, though.)

Reply #54 Top
Hi Coplann!

Saubere Arbeit erstmal. Ich wollt mich auch daran versuchen einige der Babylon Schiffe zu erstellen. Nun dank deinem Tutorial bin ich schonmal soweit gekommen die Freespace Modelle in 3D Max zu haben... Nun mein Problem:

..Wo sind die Texturen, die ich im Material Editor auswählen soll?? Muss Ich die auch aus irgendeiner Datei extrahieren? Wenn ja wo?

Achja und kann man die von dir erstellten Modelle importieren und noch die Größe anpassen? Die White Star ist winzig & Nial ein wenig gross.

PS: Wenn ichs gepeilt bekomme dann gibts bald nen paar Narn Schiffe mehr
Reply #55 Top
@robalis:

du musstest doch die Freespace Modelle auch erst extrahieren. im gleichem Atemzug gilt es auch die Texturen (kommen als DDS) zu extrahieren um sie dann in Max für die Materialien zu verwenden.

den White Star habe ich bereits vergrößert (dauert wieder bis er approved in der Library auftaucht). Den Nial finde ich persönlich nicht zu groß. als Small-Hull passt er ganz gut ins Konzept. Das das Spiel keine originalen Größenverhältnisse unterstützt sollte ja auch klar sein. Im Vergleich zu einem Zestörer würde man die Jäger sonst garnicht mehr sehen.

wenn du einen X-Importer findest der binär-codierte und komprimierte X Files nach Max o.ä. importieren kann könntest du sie importieren. mir ist aber kein solches Plugin bekannt. Meine eigenen Max Files dazu werde ich aus Respekt gegenüber den Moddern von Freespace 2 nicht veröffentlichen. ^^
Reply #56 Top
Narg. Hatte sie entpackt nur kannte ich das dds format nicht und habe nach pcx files gesucht ^^

Alles klar danke. Dann setz ich mich nochmal ran. Muss mich erstmal einarbeiten. Max ist doch recht kompliziert wenn man das erste mal dransitzt.

Mit dem Nial hast wohl recht. Ich hab gesehen das es ein ähnliches Modell noch gibt das zu "tiny" passen würde. Die Freespace Modelle sind schon echt Klasse. Ich habe noch eine Seite mit 3ds Modellen gefunden. Vielleicht ist da ja noch eines dabei das FP2 nicht hat http://www.ultradrive.com/files/
(einige der Schiffe sind allerdings etwas..überdimensioniert ^^)

Leider sind viele alte Babylon 5 Projekte nicht mehr verfügbar und es wird sicher nicht einfach für eine Total Conversion pro Volk ein Schiff jeder Größenklasse zu finden. Abgesehen davon das es sehr viel Zeit in Anspruch nimmt.

Ich habe gelesen den Sharlin gibts es in zwei Größen. evtl könnte man einen als "huge" lassen und einen zweiten eine nummer kleiner klasse "large". Genau wie die Battlecabs die ja schon bei Freespace in drei Größen verfügbar sind.



Ps: ich bin nun etwas weiter aber es tun sich immer wieder Probleme auf die das Tutorial nicht klärt. Falls du Zeit und Lust hast, könntest du mir ja vielleicht die ein oder andere Sache per Messenger erklären! Ich wäre schon gewillt etwas mehr Zeit darin zu stecken solch einen Mod zu verwirklichen.
Reply #57 Top
@ robalis 666
für uns wurde extra ein deutscher Tread (Modder Forum) eröffnet ,ich werde ihn mal hochholen und mich dort äußern.
Link.

Reply #58 Top
die Größen der Schiffe kann man nach Lust und Laune mit jedem beliebigen 3D Editor ändern, dafür braucht man keine separaten Modelle.

Ich denke auch nicht, dass es ein Problem ist für alle Größenklassen Schiffe der "Core"-Rassen von B5 zu erhalten.

Minbari sind ja schon komplett bei mir: Nial (small/tiny), Lintira (small), White Star (medium), Tinashi (Large), Sharlin (Huge)^.

Wobei ich persönlich eh nie tiny-Schiffe benutze. Außer als Sensordrohnen. ^^

Earth Force hat natürlich noch ein paar mehr Schiffe: Aurora (tiny/small), Thunderbolt (tiny/small), Olympus (medium), Hyperion (Large), Omega/Nova/Warlock (Huge)

Bei den Narn und Centauri gibts auf jeden Fall 2 Zerstörer und 1 Jäger. Braucht man an sich nur noch ein weiteres Schiff.

Und wenn man die alle hat kann man ja einfach noch Hüllen und Jewelry aus den Einzelteilen herstellen, so dass ein Spieler sich selber Designs daraus basteln kann. Einzige Problem dabei sind die Hardpoints.

die einzige andere wichtige Fraktion ist die Liga der Blockfreien Welten. Die Mitgliedsrassen davon spielen allein eh keine Rolle also hat man Vree Saucers, Drazi Sunhawks, Brakiri Zielscheiben etc zur Verfügung für eine Rasse in GC2. ^^

worauf man auf jeden Fall achten sollte ist, dass die Schiffe mit weniger als 10000 Polygonen auskommen, besser noch unter 5000. Anderenfalls kann das ins Auge gehen wenn dann mal wirklich einer ein großes Spiel mit hunderten solcher Schiffe spielt.

edit:
und ab jetzt hier nur weiter in englisch bitte, sonst fühlen sich andere hier nur ausgeschlossen ^^
Reply #59 Top
This work is indeed fantastic Coplann.

If I may make a request, can you make a Warlock and a Black Omega X? I love them so much, i'd appreciate it.
Reply #60 Top
I will definitly release a warlock. finished the Nova Class today. will work on the Olympus next, then the Warlock and then probably on the Omega-X (also known as Advanced Omega, Black Omega is just the name of the elite starfury squad of the psi-corps by the way ) before I will turn my attention to Narn and Centauri,
Reply #61 Top
I will definitly release a warlock. finished the Nova Class today. will work on the Olympus next, then the Warlock and then probably on the Omega-X (also known as Advanced Omega, Black Omega is just the name of the elite starfury squad of the psi-corps by the way ) before I will turn my attention to Narn and Centauri,


can you then package them all together afterwards..... as a mod pack...

can you also release some new planet skins, and some tech stuff, maybe a few new graphics for the various star bases...



I love B5 like no otha.
Reply #62 Top
Problem with B5 textures
I’m sure I must be doing something wrong. I tried to follow the directions here: Link and ended up with:



And:



I renamed the files:
S0_whitestar-01a.png
S0_whitestar-02a.png
S0_whitestar-03a.png
S0_whitestar-04a.png
S0_WhiteStar.X
S0_wsgeneric-01a.png
S0_wsturret-01a.png
I stuck the files into my “C:\Games\GalCiv2\Gfx\Models” directory. Then I added:

To the C:\Games\GalCiv2\Data\English\GC2Types.xml file. What did I do wrong?

Also, I followed the same procedure with the Aurora, Thunderbolt, Omega, and Hyperion. I got similar results. Turning off the textures and restarting gets me even more bland-looking ships, so _some_ textures must be getting through. But I don’t know how to make it better...
Reply #63 Top
@MOIISKA: I wont upload them as an all-in-one package because #1 the Stardock Library can only handle files less or equall than 20 Megs. #2 its a pain to upload that big packages with only 128 kbit/sec upstream.

as for the other stuff, I probably could. however my time is limited and probably spent already up until mid next year.

@Andrew Cory: never ever rename texture files. they are hardcoded into the X-File.

Also I dont think you need to add any references to the textures in the XML-files.

obviously the game then only takes that single texture (whitestar-02a in this case) and applies it to the whole model completely ignoring the UVW maps.
Reply #64 Top
Gotcha Coplann... good work though...

once someone figure out how to seperate the SAJ (ships as Jewlery) from the regular jewlery items in the game, I will add more.....

I hate having to scroll through the whole menu looking for one item.. it's annoying.

Reply #65 Top
Coplann: Excellent! Thank you for your help, and also for putting these together in the first place. As it happens, I’m about to start watching season 4 of B5 (for the N’th time), and this is a nice bonus...

There is a great mod just waiting to be built from your work...
Reply #66 Top
Owing to coplann,I have now my first Babylon 5 ships converted.It is a Brakiri Battle Cruiser and the Excalibur .I have it upload in the library.
The dummies do not fit 100%,however it should function...
Reply #67 Top
First I want to say thanks to Coplann and Vorlone for the mods. I have been using them all weekend and I love them.

I down loaded the directions that Coplann made so I could try to make my own but I think its all beyond me.

For some reason the earth ships are almost to dark to see, except for the Excalibur which isn’t so dark. The Nova is so large you only see a small part of its mid section in the shipbuilder window and even though I made it a large hull the Omega is still really small.

The names of the B5 ships always seemed confusing to me. Like the Omega Class Destroyer which I thought was a Destroyer it’s actually more like a Cruiser.

I went to http://www.b5tech.com/links.htm#4 and compared all the ships mass and length to each other to decide what class they would fit in. The only ship that’s class and name matched was the Olympus Corvette. I ranked all the ships up like this

Olympus – Corvette - small
Hyperion – Destroyer - medium
Nova – Cruiser - large
Omega – Cruiser - large
Warlock – Battleship - huge

Your mileage may vary.



Reply #68 Top
I agree white star is way to small, you should make it medium size as i think its a medium class ship. Other then that... i Love it.. thankx much
Reply #69 Top

For some reason the earth ships are almost to dark to see, except for the Excalibur which isn’t so dark. The Nova is so large you only see a small part of its mid section in the shipbuilder window and even though I made it a large hull the Omega is still really small.


if a ship is too dark, its actually not too dark, but there is a bug that sometimes makes GC2 throw light at it from below the ship instead of from up top. I still dont know what causes this (ships I convert for GC2 the same way are sometimes correct, sometimes bugged). Iam still trying to figure this out. I managed to fix it for the Aurora Starfury (merged the Aurora and a scene with model that had correct lighting). I will continue to bugfix the dark ones as I have time.

the ship size is a real problem. for some people ships are too big, for some others they are too small. its a matter of taste. one part of the problem is that there is no way to know what the ship looks like for all hull sizes ingame when you are in the 3D Editor.

The Nova is pretty large in the ship designer for me too, but looks quiet well-sized in the actual game then. If I made it smaller for the ship designer it would be way too small in the game. It is supposed to be as big as the Omega, however the Omega has an animation (the rotating hull section). The animation kinda screws with the way the game adapts the sizes itsself. So I had to considerable reduce the size of it (it was bigger than 3 parsec at first) to make it fit into 1 parsec. The Ship designer screen then made it appear alot smaller even tho its still pretty big in the real game.

Its a total hassle.

My suggestion if you want different sizes:
get Kryo's Hull Mod, then add every ship as jewelry. then you can scale hull sizes the same way you can scale ship parts in the ship designer.

Iam currently playing a game with all Earth Force ships to see how the sizes stack up versus each other and may then release modified ships. however they may still be too big or small for everyone else taste.

The names of the B5 ships always seemed confusing to me. Like the Omega Class Destroyer which I thought was a Destroyer it’s actually more like a Cruiser.


yes thats actually a political thing of the Earth Alliance. The Nova that is as big as the Omega is called Dreadnought, but after the Earth-Minbari War when Earth started to produce Omegas the Earth Force thought it was smart to call them destroyers instead. dont ask me why, I dont remember. ^^

the ship classification you did is the same Iam running right now (Starfuries tiny, Olympus small, Hyperion medium etc).

I added the ships like this: Aurora, Standard tiny hull, no tech requirements, then Thunderbolt after you got Advanced Hulls (more expensive, but also more space and hit points than Aurora, but tiny too). Same for Nova and Omega (after you got Superior Hulls). Still have to make the Warlock next weekend.
Reply #70 Top
Oh man, the warlock! Was that ever actually featured in an episode? Given that I’ve got a pretty good idea of what it looks like, and yet wasn’t in production until at least season 5, I don’t think so. Yet if it was, let me know what ep—I’ve got ‘em all on my HDD...

Would it be possible—and I know this would be asking a huge deal—for you to release parts of your models as jewelry and let us build our own? Perhaps you could/would even files like “AuroraScout.xml” and its accompanying “S0_UD_AuroraScout0.shipcfg” as the official “semi-cannon” ships. I’ve got this idea that a mod could be built this way—something that would replace _everything_ in the game...

Hm: 6 ship styles and 6 major races in B5 (Human, Minbari, Narn, Centari, Vorlon, shadow), plus 1 “Everybody catchall” ship style for minor races, and a B5 league of non-aligned worlds--- yes, this game is ripe for a B5 mod!
Reply #71 Top
My suggestion if you want different sizes:
get Kryo's Hull Mod, then add every ship as jewelry. then you can scale hull sizes the same way you can scale ship parts in the ship designer.


I did not know that ship sizes in the designer and ships in the actual game were some how linked. Do you know if I will have the same problem you did? If I make the Nova smaller in the ship designer will it be too small in game? Or if I make the Omega larger will it be way too big?

Again I want to say thanks for the mods. I looked at your tutorial and it dose look like a hassle. I don’t have or even know how to use the programs you’re using but if there’s any none skilled stuff I can do I would be glad to help out. I have lots of free time.

Oh man, the warlock!

I can’t wait to see the Olympus. I have hordes of small corvettes guarding my borders.
Reply #72 Top
I got lots of models for the Drakh too (more than for shadows or vorlons). Iam thinking it would be best to have the Drakh and instead give access to Shadow or Vorlon ships through ethical alignment (Good versus Evil, even tho Vorlons arent really good and shadows arent really evil in the first place.

or you could have events like the Lucky Ranger event (like finding a Shadow Ship during an excavation on Mars ).

I got all 5 seasons of B5 on DVD as well as the In the Beginning movie. I dont remember seeing a Warlock there myself. However I also played the Trading Card Game from B5 and there is a Warlock-card whichs picture looks like it was taken from the show (and every card from the game was taken from the show or movies anyway).

As for hull-parts and jewelry, yes I can do them and I will, but not before I finished all other ships (so give me a year or two ).

I did not know that ship sizes in the designer and ships in the actual game were some how linked. Do you know if I will have the same problem you did? If I make the Nova smaller in the ship designer will it be too small in game? Or if I make the Omega larger will it be way too big?


I guess so. I didnt try it myself (not using Kryo's at the moment). Iam still waiting on Stardock's Modding Tutorial in hope to solve riddles like this, but it seems they kinda forgot about it.
Reply #73 Top
You obviously know best, but wouldn’t it be easier to simply create the parts/jewelry as you create the models?
Reply #74 Top
nope, placing and orienting the hardpoints correctly is alot harder for jewelry than just for adding weapons/shield/etc

especially if you want to be able to recreate the full ship models from the jewelry-parts
Reply #75 Top
I just spent half a day making a Olympus class corvette with the in game ship desinger. It may not be perfect but i think i got the basic look and im prety proud of it. If i new where the files were and what not i would submit it to the library. Also since Coplan has the real ships i dont think any one would want my patchwork ship