Critters size and PC protos... ?!?

[Sirren67]

O.k, a couple of questions:
A): I made two critters for BGE which are causing troubles. They're huge critters, approximately the size of a deathclaw. The huger one crashes the mapper as soon as I hit f8, the smaller crashes it when I try to attack. I noticed that deathclaws/brahmins and other huge critters "block" a round space of 7 hexes (human sized critters only take one). I double checked everything and came to the conclusion that it's the critter size that crashes the mapper. How can I have a critter to be multi-hex?
(If my explanation isn't that clear, put a brahmin and a human on a map, turn grid on and you'll see what i mean when talking about size...)
B): the new female critter is meant to be used by the player, so the best way to test animations would be an armour giving that appearance. The point is you need to make a proto. I got a look at the original hero protos and found nothing special about them (apart from unedited stats and skills). How can I have the engine use a proto for the player?
Thanks in advance.

 

[lisac2k]

A) Not sure, but it has to be possible (somehow). Try editing its proto from Mapper. The other option would be to hex the proto of brahmin and try to find if something's in there.
B) I'm not quite sure how to force the engine to use a new set of (armor) animations for the dude. My guess is that it's hardcoded, so the only possibility would be to replace one of the existing dudes' protos.

Both of these issues need a lot of experiments...

EDIT: for B) You can add a new proto containing the new animations, but the engine won't use it. I believe it's hardcoded, and the engine uses only default protos (and their animations) for the dude. If there's any other solution, I'm not aware of it ATM.

 

[Chris Parks]

A) There's a button, maybe in flags (I can't remember) where you can set the value for a multi hex critter

 

[Sirren67]

Chris_Parks, I edited the proto with the flag and it soesn't crash the mapper upon hitting f8. It still crashes it when attack it though. I get the usual sound error window.
Lisac2k, Andy's loader maker lets the player start with any sprite you whish, so my guess is the thing is hardcoded too. Wild_qwerty converted the environmental armour sprites: I'll look into that. I hope that'is possible to fix the thing without sacrificing any existing sprites... We're talking about two, here.
See you.

 

[lisac2k]

...Lisac2k, Andy's loader maker lets the player start with any sprite you whish, so my guess is the thing is hardcoded too...

It is, indeed. It can be set (in fallout2.exe) which set of animations is used for starting the game, and which one after the VSUIT.MVE has been played. It can be easily done with a hex editor, no problems at all.

Wild_qwerty converted the environmental armour sprites: I'll look into that. I hope that'is possible to fix the thing without sacrificing any existing sprites... We're talking about two, here.

I think this will be impossible. You'll have to sacrifice at least one set of animations (two for two sexes, or one for androgynous dude).

E.g. if you set that dude starts as a guy/girl in a fancy suit, you'll have to sacrifice two set of animations, and those are HMWARR (for male) and HFPRIM (for female). These animations is impossible to use later, at least for the dude (you can use them for other critters). I find this not being a critical loss, since these sets are (almost) useless - they don't have animations with weapons, except spear and unarmed.

Fallout2.exe recognizes the next sets of animations for the dude:

HA NPWR = Adv. Power Armor
HA POWR = Power Armor
HA ROBE = Purple Robes

HF CMBT = Fem Combat Armor
HF JMPS = Fem Vault13 Jump suit
HF LTHR = Fem Leather Armor
HF MAXX = Fem Leather Jacket
HF METL = Fem Metal Armor
HF PRIM = Fem Primitive

HM CMBT = Male Combat Armor
HM JMPS = Male Vault13 Jump suit
HM LTHR = Male Leather Armor
HM MAXX = Male Leather Jacket
HM METL = Male Metal Armor
HM WARR = Male Primitive

You can "substitute" one of these sets with your sets, but you can not add new sets. If you add a set more, it will be there, but it won't be recognized by the engine (fallout2.exe). The engine handles only the above mentioned sets (when it comes to dude), and you can't force it to handle more.

This is where we return to the issue about Fallout 2 source code. If we'd had it, then we could do something about it (the best example for this is Jagged Alliance 2).

But we're getting too far now...