Need Tutorials for making a vehicle AddOn with Interior in ArmA III

[Aebian 18]

Hi there,

i'm new to the modelling scene in ArmA and wanna get my model InGame with an working interior.

Are there any Tutorials for these? And can you give me some tipps?

I'm using Autodesk 3Ds Max 2014 ^^

[p1nga 23]

Hi there,

i'm new to the modelling scene in ArmA and wanna get my model InGame with an working interior.

Are there any Tutorials for these? And can you give me some tipps?

I'm using Autodesk 3Ds Max 2014 ^^

I'm on a similar path, i have a model, and i have gotten it into ARMA3, i can enter the vehicle as a Driver, Commander, Gunner, Cargo, i can fire the cannon, but the vehicle will not move anywhere and the cannon will not rotate on any axis, so if you find a guide, or figure it all out, please let me know, i will do the same, and i will also create a guide to getting a basic vehicle working when i get one working.

[p1nga 23]

so i have managed to get my vehicle into the game and driving, however with some problems. The reason i could not get the model to move/drive was something to do with the physX setup.

I utilize the base config of the Marid, and change what i need, however the vehicle will not move, by elimination i have come to find that if i disable the physX simulation i.e. comment out the line "simulation = 'carx';" then the vehicle will work, however ofcourse none of the gearbox or engine settings have any effect, and it seems its stuck in 1st gear at a max of 60km/h and has the standard Offroad sounds.

I had not setup most of the required selections and axis for the vehicles wheels and suspension etc, so im assuming that they need to all be completed for the physX simulation to work at all. I wonder if it might be possible to just setup the vehicle to work like a old ArmA2 vehicle at the moment without the physX simulation....................looking into this tonight.

[sebj 10]

so im assuming that they need to all be completed for the physX simulation to work at all.

Yes I think same.

I think that the minimum requirement is to create suspensions animations, with model.cfg etc...Mr Super-Truite and me are working on a sample model (for tutorial purpose) to test the physx step by step.

For the moment I think that the model is too rigid (because of no suspension yet) and that's why it's not possible to keep it on the ground.

I confirm too that once we deactivate the Physx into the config file everything work fine with same geometry weight and others p3d params...

[Sealife 22]

for now only tip i can give is to select all parts CTRL -A in geometry and give full vehicle weight of 5000 this will give you none Bounce to sky vehicle with BIS offroad wheel settings

obviously from then try some balance and weight reduction .

it is only way i got car to work without physx LOD (the silly advice 14e13 or whatever is pure bullshit) but still leaving CarX in the config.cpp

another untried way maybe to actually add the possibility to add the Geom Phys lod but i dont know the exact name , if you look in the root of oxygen there is a string tale for the Lod propertis , maybe ( guessing) if you add or Overwrite an unused lod and binarise the game will accept it as genuine lod.

again for clarity in the std folder in o2 scripts there are some .hpp , i havent had time to see if these are live documents old reffernces but if you try remember to back up :)

[sebj 10]

@sealife, Hmm interesting.

Anyway I'll still try to do it with the 4e13 LOD as described in the Wiki.

If there is no solution I'll wait for the new release of O2 or a better tuto in the Wiki...

The best of the best would be to have a sample model from BIS... that should be better that a long explanation in the Wiki...

[granQ 293]

I can upload our car later I guess, but physx works great with just everything defined in memory lod and no extra geolods.

however, not confirmed, but it seems our custom physx vehicles works great in singelplayer but in big coops (30+ players) it might cause a lot of crashes, we haven't be able to confirm but my god bis, give us the tools already.

[Aebian 18]

Okay nice to hear.

Is it hard to work with physx? xD

[sebj 10]

@granQ great, yeah it could be nice for the sample model ;) thanks in advance for your upload and help.

So you mean you already have the new version of O² from BIS??!!

I dream to have every tools to get this damn physx to work (especially for our Ekranoplan project...)

cya guys

[p1nga 23]

with an update, i sort of gave up on the vehicle, but came back to it today, after some changes i have the vehicle working using the CarX simulation, however now the wheels do not spin, the wheels spin when using 'car' simulation but changing to the physx simulation results in wheels that do not spin, the front wheels however do still turn with the steering source.

:(

[rooster3d 10]

Hello all!

I think I get where the OP is coming from in his op. It seems he is a seasoned modeller, but new to the ArmA way. For anyone new to ArmA editing who may be reading the progression of this thread, like me, the second post might already be where we get lost. How did pastor399 even get his model into the game, or even in to Oxygen 2 for that matter. For those of you unfamiliar with the tool set, Oxygen 2 is the BIS module that is kind of like their own 3dsMax, Maya, etc, where you can import your models and define all the LODs and textures. pastor399's posts are great, but I'm not sure I'm there yet.

Looking online for tutorials is helping somewhat, but most of them reference ArmA 2 editing which in turn references even older ArmA editing. It can be a bit of a headache trying to put all the pieces of the pieces together, especially for modelers - right-brained folk.

I've created fully-rigged models that have worked in other engines (Unreal Engine 2.5, Unreal Engine 3, Refractor 2, CryEngine 2, and CryEngine 3), but am looking for that secret handshake that gets my new models into the Real Virtuality 4 Engine. I bring this up because it seems in this engine there is a bigger gap to be bridged between creating and importing.

I hope this post helps others like me who may still be like :confused:. Thanks to all of those who have posted so far - great thread!!

[[aps]gnat 28]

Considering the ArmA3 tools aren't even released, I don't see any "secret handshake" coming from the community.

Unless you think you can bribe BI, you wait like the rest of us. arma2 tuts and tools is about all we have.

[rooster3d 10]

That's cool. I hear ya Gnat. I've tried to import a heli into O2 with .3ds and .obj. I must be doing something wrong. The .3ds file was lacking smoothing groups, and the .obj file had misnamed all the parts. It was weird, because when I selected a part in O2, it would highlight the correct part but only select all the verts of another part!

I have a technical question about cars. When considering the wheels and suspension on a car, should we model them fully extended, as if the car is off the ground? ...Or should we model the whole car as if it were in its normal rest position on ground, with the suspension slightly compressed? Forgive me if it's a noob question.

[[aps]gnat 28]

Cars Q;

Doesnt matter, you can define suspension travel with MEMORY LOD points (and animation in the MODEL.CFG) above and below any modelled "middle" position.

[rooster3d 10]

That's good news. So, on to even more suspension questions! :o Will the engine support non-traditional suspension orientation?

I've got a buggy which utilizes the old Beetle-style suspension arms, which at first glance look like their pivot is oriented parallel to the chassis, instead of the traditional perpendicular method.

On the front suspension, there is a pair of arms per wheel traveling parallel to one another. Is it tricky to rig this for the game, or is it kind of straight forward like IK? I remember in UE 2.5 we had to script one arm to acquire the angle of the other arm and constantly rotate itself on that information.

The motion of the rear suspension is a little wonky. It's hard to tell by looking at any photos for reference, but the pivot for a Beetle rear suspension arm seems offset (like by 3° or 4°). At rest, the wheels would be parallel to the body, but otherwise they would be askew. If the engine supports this unusual set up, then my secondary concern here is: would an out-of-line wheel in mid-damper cause the vehicle to do something crazy like jump 350m into the air?

[[aps]gnat 28]

Can't speak for how they have improved the suspension simulation (physics) in Arma3, but I doubt it will "jump" your vehicle.

As for animation, yes you can have "rotation" suspension. As for keeping the wheel parallel (double-wishbone suspension?) it can be done but it's just a little extra trouble.

[rooster3d 10]

Thanks for your replies! I only ask about weird jumping because I have noticed some things like that with some of the vanilla vehicles. Driving a tank into a tree or a vehicle spawning in your vehicle's exact location can launch you high into the air.

[p1nga 23]

Thanks for your replies! I only ask about weird jumping because I have noticed some things like that with some of the vanilla vehicles. Driving a tank into a tree or a vehicle spawning in your vehicle's exact location can launch you high into the air.

I don't believe that happens any more, at least i have not seen it happen since the first patch post release.

[[aps]gnat 28]

Bug as pastor said.

Search the forums and you will find a couple threads discussing suspension setup. Early discussion ahead of proper BIKI documentation.

[Aebian 18]

@[APS]Gnat:

Can i borrow you? xD

I need some teaching hands to get my models into ArmA 3 with configs etc.

And i also wanna do this myself alone in the future

http://files.industrial-destruction.de/3DsMaxBell407.png (327 kB)

Edited November 8, 2013 by Mitchell

[[aps]gnat 28]

Sorry Mitchell, I have too many things of my own, so I, like others here, assist via forums.

TONS of helping threads here in the ArmA3 Editing section, even more that are 95% relevant in the ArmA2 Editing section.

Then when you have a specific problem that you can find the solution here, open a new thread.

[Aebian 18]

hmm okay :D