gmax question... anyone.. devs...?

(TheKGBspy) #1

i have a question about mesh and terrain.

I am a modder from C&C Renegade, and i worked with gmax for a long time. I know Gmax has game x-pack to make mesh and stuff for specific games. Gmax has a Quake md3 exporter. I would like to know if i can export the m3d stuff from gmax and use them in ET? and can i also make my terrain mesh in gmax, export as md3, then apply texture stuff in SD editor?

this would really help me. thats about 2 years i didint make a map for RTCW with gtk radiant and im very rusted with this editor.

If you wanna take a look on my renegade to red alert2 convertion go there:

http://creations.cnc-fr.com/index.php?id_rub=7

:smiley: :banana:

(sock) #2

Yes you can use Gmax to create MD3 for the RTCW:ET engine. There are limits to the MD3 format thou, I think it is 1000 polygon per model, but you could create your model in seperate sections. Seperate smaller models would look better with higher skin resolutions.

What ever you do, DO NOT TRY AND CREATE A TERRAIN OUT OF MD3. I cannot stress this enough because you will not have the blending of the terrain engine, plus the engine is not optimized for terrains made from models. The overheads of all the model skins in texture memory it would be bad. We did look at this at the early development stages of ET and found it was a non-starter because of too many technical problems.

Once you have created all your MD3’s in Gmax then create your shader for the skin and that should be it. (Use existing models for examples of what to do with the skin shader)

The construction system fully supports MD3’s and with a rough clip brush structure it should be fine. The only downside to creating MD3’s is simply the time and skills needed to do this. The current GTK editor does support ASE models created from brushwork and sometimes this method can be alot quicker.

Sock
:moo: z0r

(TheKGBspy) #3

tanx alot :drink:

(TheKGBspy) #4

i made some test in gmax… i didint saw the export map option in Tempest x-pack.

i opened a map already made with tempest x-pack (yep it have shader and stuff loaded in gmax and i can even apply them). i compiled the map as a .map then opened it in Sd Radiant. Opened fine. there a screen shot from SD editor.

thats mean i can do all my mesh in gmax, export as .map, apply shader in SD editor (since i dont have ET shaders in gmax stuff) then add additional stuff (axis/allied spwaners… etc) then compilate to play on ET.

by this way, the blending problem about m3d wont be there? since im compiling as .map with shaders? should this way be better to make maps instead on my original m3d idea?

:banana:

(TheKGBspy) #5

:bump:

(sock) #6

This is something you will have to experiment with yourself. We never used gmax in the production of any of the SD maps and tbh the GTKeditor is perfectly suited for doing the job. If I want to put a nail into a piece of wood I would use a hammer, yes I could try banging the nail with another piece of wood instead, but why when the hammer is perfectly suited for the job.

Sock
:moo: z0r

(TheKGBspy) #7

hehe nice reply :cool:

what i do if even the hammer is suitable for the task, but my hammer skill arent good but im better with a srewdriver? :wink:

ok so ill start my test this week end and i will keep you updated :slight_smile: and then try to modify the tempest x-pack to make it fully compatible with ET.

anyway thanks again sock for your support. ET community and support is very good… Long live ET.

(Hewster) #8

Hi,

I spent quite some time with Gmax when i first mapped for RtCW,
I got all shaders & entities working, and could basically build my map in
Gmax… However… I gave up on it becasue of 2 main reasons:

  1. map loading takes sooooooooooooooo long !!!
  2. map navigation is absolute pants compared to radiant.

I then only used gmax for creating md3’s, which it is excellent at doing
(esp if you know how to use all the modifiers ect)
Also, learning to use Gmax will give you good experiance of the 3DsMax
layout & interface, something that will be very handy if you ever want to
get a job doing 3D modeling

So my advise is… forget about making a map in Gmax, and use it for
creating your md3 models :slight_smile:

Hewster