Blastcore: Phoenix 2

[Ezcoo 47]

Don't forget every single change i have to make, major or minor i have to restart the game everytime just to see the results and i mean that to a extreme. In the space of like 1hr work i will restart the game 30-40 times.

Hey, if you have spare RAM in your PC, you could put the whole game or some important .pbos at least on RAMDisk. It reduces the load times quite a lot (even if compared to SSD, average DDR3 is about 10-20x faster than SSD (?) and the latency is barely existent), and with 30-40 restarts per hour those saved seconds really do matter.

Thanks for the great mod! :ok:

[rehtus777 10]

Points taken, the flares are WIP so is the Muzzleflash on tank cannons. Both are supposed have a kinda of flare with them but they arnt working atm thats why they look abit iffy. I will make the explosions slightly less yellowish as pointed out. I can tone down the amount of smoke grenades produce too although as i said before theres a high chance they will be made sep to the BC mod in the future. Adding light sources to sparks is a no go, it will wipe out other lights in the area as there is a limit on the amount of light sources allowed in any giving scene.

As for the light sources i still have to match them to the explosions. I did have a differnt kind of light design before where the light would fade up and down again insted of being just on/off but it produced some problems and was replaced with a more basic design for the moment till i can get the concept i was working on to work as intended.

Have to remember some things just gobbles up time than others i spent like 3 weeks on just one effect alone to get it work right. Other times things can be easy fixes with slight adjustments, most of the things mentioned are pretty simple to fix. But like the cannons and vehicle flares that was just gobbling up time without much progress.

Its like whatcha do spend loads of time on something which in the end is the result you wanted or settle for something that works for the moment and move on to another effect which needs less time. I know that after a while when i keep hitting a wall over something it gets abit boring and i rapidly lose interest in the whole thing.

Don't forget every single change i have to make, major or minor i have to restart the game everytime just to see the results and i mean that to a extreme. In the space of like 1hr work i will restart the game 30-40 times.

Anyway ive already fixed a few things mentioned so over the holidays when im happy with the progress i will update with the results.

If "burnout" and "Time Restraints" are an issue, why not ask one of these good men on here who understand scripts and code to help out? :D

Anyway.....again, thanks for your time. You do this "without charge" and give it to us free and we appreciate it very very much. It shows you're a "Team Player" in the Armaverse who is passionate about a great game. As we all know, the game-play in the Arma Series is second-to-none..... being able to call in air strikes, have a helicopter transport you, script your own battles, and etc. is just incredible (unlike COD or BF4).

Well, it's Saturday and it's almost time to go to the liquor store and buy some special Christmas Beers.... get buzzed ....... and enjoy the "Blastcore" ArmA 3 Show. Cheers.

[INF_MIke64 53]

While playing with the camera i noticed the DAGR missile effect sometimes lagged a few missile lengths behind the missile (it can change) and the light source coming from the front of the first smoke plume not the missile, while i expect it to be a performance issue on my end just thought you should know. Is there anyway you can make the white smoke from explosions more of a dirty grey most explosions on the ground kick up loads of dirt.

I know it sounds minor stuff but I love the detail especially the sparks. love the work and looking forward to seeing more of it.

[Siege-A 4054]

Been doing some tests with this mod and have been very pleased with the results (still surprised my comp hasn't fried from the massive amount of explosions I had going on at once, lol.), and everything seems very impressive so far. The only issue that I have with the whole thing (apart from what many have already mentioned), is the yellow sparks that are generated from the bullet impact when something like an APC or such is firing. While it is a nice effect, it doesn't quite make sense to have the sparks generated for everything it hits. I would expect maybe another vehicle to produce sparks if shot, but something like a building or the ground should have a different type of impact.

I appreciate the mod and in no way think any less of the work you've done just because of these small issues. Your projects have always been top-notch as far back as I can remember, so thank you again for your time and dedication to this wonderful addition to ArmA.

[LordJarhead 1721]

i knew they would go wrong everytime ive released them it comes out wrong.

Yep, I totally know what you mean, OS. I end the same way every time -.-

LJ

[snowingjimbob 34]

First off, this mod is bloody awesome! I'm throughly impressed with all that I've seen and so glad you've released it.

A quick thought:

Is there more dust blown up from helicopter rotor wash then the vanilla version? I can see that the wind/dust might seem to blow a bit further out but on my end it looks quite weak. The vanilla version might even have had more... But then again, I'm one of the guys who can't see much dust/particles from small arms bullet impacts so maybe it's something to do with that... Would be really sweet if there was a ton of dust when landing and taking off! Tons like the smoke grenades ;-)

I think everything is AMAZING! Thanks for the countless hours you've poured into this--it really has paid off.

[razgriz33 10]

Yep, I totally know what you mean, OS. I end the same way every time -.-

LJ

I love the mods you have both done respectively, I'm all up for giving it some publicity and encourage players to use it on our servers

(AhoyWorld)

Just need those darned keys! so we are elated that JSRS 2's finally came. Joker above included. Just this one to go!

BC if i may call it that looks awesome and gives me back the faith i need to carry on playing arma. Awesome job.

In short: we love the mods and want to let the public play them with signature safety!

p.s. I've tried renaming the key on joker's behalf and unfortunately it did not work.

Cheers

[shiznyte 10]

First I'll commend you on an epic job. Doing things I'll never know how to do and making ArmA come to life a little more.

Second I have to pick at the color. Waaay too much yellow in explosions/burning. Every explosion and burning looks like you hit a container of yellow flares, and every missile/rocket fired looks like it's propelled by yellow flares. The yellow is understandable at night with a MLRS launch or rockets/missiles. Colors seem much brighter at night without sunlight, still I think they could be toned down a little on how bright they are. But during the day they should burn a dark healthy orange at the initial flash into a brighter orange in flight.

MLRS: Orange ignition to a brighter orange in flight.

I don't know if it is possible for you to make colors change in flight or not. But for a more realistic feel you might try to do so if it's possible.

Explosions/Burning: Explosions and burning wrecks day or night should be a healthy bright orange flash and fade into a deeper orange as it burns. With a much more earth colored dust and black smoke, not white dust.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iSgIvYIJOoU

Again, I don't know if mixing all these colors of impact to burning is possible, but it's much more realistic than yellow flare fire. As well as earthy dust with black smoke vs white dust.

Other than they wicked bright yellow on everything, awesome work!

Edited December 21, 2013 by Shiznyte
edit

[stephsen 79]

Really great work OS ...this mod push arma3 to the next level , i dont know whats correct, but the lightglint from burning wrecks is to far-reaching and to yellow ,maybe a little bit weaker and more orange shine that would be nice.

Greetz

[x3djokerx 1]

I think someone mentioned how to fix them,

which was rename the bisign file to WarFXPE.pbo.WarFXPE.bisign

i knew they would go wrong everytime ive released them it comes out wrong.

that is exactly what needed to be done. just take the .bisign out of the keys folder and rename it what you have, place it next to the .pbo in the addons folder and it now works. Thanks

[LucidPotato 10]

- The 20mm has no explosion or light which is intended. I thought it would be ideal for a stealth heli, i can add it in if its really wanted tho.

Please please please add explosion and light effect. For me personally it is bringing down immersion while using the heli. In the real world there is an explosion and there are smoke trails/tracers on missles and cannon.

[Rodbar 10]

Hi Opticalsnare,

i like that someone in the community focusses on improving the vanilla effects. I prefer changes that make the effects more realistic and give the gameplay a more authentic feeling. Your mod seems to focus more on "hoolywood-effects". Nevertheless i am interested in your mod and like to help you improving it. Subsequently a bug list and some suggestions for improvements.

I like the shell ejection on the AA-tanks, but like somebody else already mentioned, it ejects 3 shells for every shot. Besides that the ejection path should be more to the sides and the back of the turret like its indicated in the screenshot (video reference:

):

http://s1.directupload.net/images/131221/temp/x7y23au3.jpg

Furthermore you should get rid of the "explosion effect" tagged in the next screen. It doesn't look good and is unnecessary as the effect already looks great without it as you can see in the previous screenshot. Beyond that the muzzle flash of the AA-gun in first person view can lead to epileptic shock and headaches.

http://s14.directupload.net/images/131221/temp/q5ph9vdo.jpg

You already pointed out that you will tweak the tank cannon effect in the near future. I hope you will fix the bad flame effect which looks very pixelated. The HE-explosion effect should be over-worked too, the vanilla one looks much better. Yours is very small and doesn't look very impressive.

http://s14.directupload.net/images/131221/temp/xoxcbmpy.jpg

Most of your explosion effects are too bright in my opinion and the greenish/yelloish tint they have were also mentioned in this thread before. In addition to that i suggest to make the light effect a split second longer so that its still visible while the explosion sprite shows up. The red arrows indicate the area that isn't lit up but should be.

http://s7.directupload.net/images/131221/temp/la3wg428.jpg

After your explosion sprite vanishes the spark effects kick in. Make them a small light source if possible. Otherwise you might be able to fake it by just letting the previous light effect mentioned in the screen above last a little bit longer but with a greatly reduced radius.

http://s1.directupload.net/images/131221/temp/bm8ezrfu.jpg

Your smoke screen effect is far better than the vanilla one but should last much longer and be directional.

http://s14.directupload.net/images/131221/temp/ezdl4nqm.jpg

The dust kicked up by a handgranade is too white in my opinion. It should be more ground colored.

http://s1.directupload.net/images/131221/temp/fct2skko.jpg

Flares are only white points and don't generate very much smoke. In its current state the vanilla flares look better in my opinion.

http://s14.directupload.net/images/131221/temp/92i39ykb.jpg

I like the amount of debris that fly through the air when a vehicle explodes but the burning parts (green arrow) are too bouncy. The smoke could be more black (blue arrow) and the fire/explosion effect (red arrow) i don't like at all. I prefer dusty/smoky explosions. Besides that the high smoke columns greated by burning vehicles are great but currently only seem to work with tank wracks. While we are on tanks, the secondary explosions from the tank wracks are only white smoke. I am sure you can come up with something more interesting in the future. Your best bet would be to do something like this:

.

http://s7.directupload.net/images/131221/temp/hntr6nke.jpg

Your rocket artillery looks really great. Some improvements though: The smoke could be less white and it should kick up a lot of dust behind the launcher (red arrows).

http://s14.directupload.net/images/131221/temp/ooizyvf8.jpg

My two cents regarding smoke grenades:

Don't touch them. There are to many gameplay problems in terms of AI and player visibility.

That's it for the moment. I hope that my post helps you improving your mod and don't get depressed by hearing that much criticism.

I agree with this post , its a great mod but be careful not to become over cooked to where its getting cheesy , look towards realism and depth .

Awesome job you have done

[progamer 14]

Are the effects intended to get away from the arcade like vanilla effects and make them more realistic?

And could the shrapnel kill humans when it hits them?

[tonic-_- 53]

I think someone mentioned how to fix them,

which was rename the bisign file to WarFXPE.pbo.WarFXPE.bisign

i knew they would go wrong everytime ive released them it comes out wrong.

Correct, Signatures work like this:

WarFXPE.pbo.WarFXPE.bisign

File you are signing (full file name)

Signature Key

identifier that its a signature

Using the dsSignFile via CMD should spit it all out with no problems. If you use other third party stuff they may be glitchy at times. It gets more confusing when using multiple privatekeys :P

[Opticalsnare 12]

The mod was never meant to be realistic. I tried it when i first started and it was pretty hard getting the effects to do exactly what you wanted them to do.

A simple way of putting it is take a peice of paper close your eyes and try and draw something in detail, open your eyes and think what the feck is that. The biggest problem i have and always had making this mod is that its based on visual design right, but you can't see what you are actually doing. Try asking a modeller to make a 3d model of something with no viewports or render screen theyd be like what da faa. The ability not to see your effects change in realtime with the adjustments you make is the most annoying and frustrating aspect of what im trying to do. And this is the main reason i am calling it a day once i have fixed the issues and supported feedback after a couple of updates its just not fun anymore.

I had a go at making some particles in Cryengine 3 some time back and because they have a built in realtime and a much more user friendly interface and more control over the particles i was able to make a fairly decent from stratch mind explosion effect like what i would like to appear in A3 and it took me like 30mins :butbut:, it took me 2 bloody weeks of constantly loading up A3 testing it and closing making adjustments in the config packing mod back up loading up again and doing this over and over again to get the GBU/MK82 effect to even appear decent and i still wasnt happy with it. I have got A3 on SSD, empty world, min addons but it still takes time. So yeah it is a pretty frustrating way of doing something which is not how it should be.

[das attorney 858]

The mod was never meant to be realistic. I tried it when i first started and it was pretty hard getting the effects to do exactly what you wanted them to do.

A simple way of putting it is take a peice of paper close your eyes and try and draw something in detail, open your eyes and think what the feck is that. The biggest problem i have and always had making this mod is that its based on visual design right, but you can't see what you are actually doing. Try asking a modeller to make a 3d model of something with no viewports or render screen theyd be like what da faa. The ability not to see your effects change in realtime with the adjustments you make is the most annoying and frustrating aspect of what im trying to do. And this is the main reason i am calling it a day once i have fixed the issues and supported feedback after a couple of updates its just not fun anymore.

I had a go at making some particles in Cryengine 3 some time back and because they have a built in realtime and a much more user friendly interface and more control over the particles i was able to make a fairly decent from stratch mind explosion effect like what i would like to appear in A3 and it took me like 30mins :butbut:, it took me 2 bloody weeks of constantly loading up A3 testing it and closing making adjustments in the config packing mod back up loading up again and doing this over and over again to get the GBU/MK82 effect to even appear decent and i still wasnt happy with it. I have got A3 on SSD, empty world, min addons but it still takes time. So yeah it is a pretty frustrating way of doing something which is not how it should be.

I know where you're coming from mate. I remember they had (for a very short time) an Arma 2 beta where you could change config values on the fly (either in mission, or at the start of a mission - I can't remember). I wish they would do something like that for Arma 3 and open it up so you can change configs in game for testing. Maybe under a separate branch (so you have stable, dev and modder branches). Then there wouldn't be any issues with somebody joining games online and changing their configs in MP.

Really good addon btw - been playing about with it tonight and it's pretty fly :)

[Opticalsnare 12]

I know where you're coming from mate. I remember they had (for a very short time) an Arma 2 beta where you could change config values on the fly (either in mission, or at the start of a mission - I can't remember). I wish they would do something like that for Arma 3 and open it up so you can change configs in game for testing. Maybe under a separate branch (so you have stable, dev and modder branches). Then there wouldn't be any issues with somebody joining games online and changing their configs in MP.

Really good addon btw - been playing about with it tonight and it's pretty fly :)

Yea i got that it works in A3, good for mostly setting up the basic stuff like smoke and some other stuff i did the burning vehicles fire and smoke in that but like i said its basic. When you start getting into the more detailed or complex stuff like explosions you need to be able to have the complete effect like fireball, fire, sparks, debris, stones, smoke, lighting etc interval changes of both emitter and effects linked to it. Its a good place to start to get the overall understanding of what each value does and its limits though.

http://www.armaholic.com/page.php?id=21218

Edited December 22, 2013 by Opticalsnare

[ffur2007slx2_5 11]

Hi Opticalsnare, some tiny suggestions maybe you can refer to.

I guess configured fired_EH should support projectile reference directly rather than tracing it via “neraestObjectâ€. Perhaps such changing will be a little bit risky and troublesome cuz it requires rewriting the official effects. But it may optimize the performance a little more.

Another, personally speaking, I recommend using SetLightIntensity instead of SetLightBrightness at present unless BI Dev gives an explanation to this ticket: http://feedback.arma3.com/view.php?id=16613

As for the older light effect command, I discovered that SetLightBrightness also be intercepted by newer light effect family, like SetLightAttenuation etc. So you may consider replacing SetLightBrightness in your scripts, good luck, looking forward your better visual presentation :)ïŠ

[mythlawlbear 10]

Amazing mod really love it, only 3 issues that im seeing. Fires look way too yellow, flares are too bright (they where perfect vanilla!) and I think there is a bug with the blood. When I shoot someone blood flys straight up into the air.

Edit: Blood issues seems to be a conflicting issue with Speed Of Sound, incase anyone else is using that mod =] if anyone wants to fix it, just open speed of sound/addons and remove

speedofsound_gibs.pbo

speedofsound_gibs.pbo.SOS.bsign

On the plus side, Smoke looks amazing and actually runs smoother then vanilla smoke and Battlefields finally look like battlefields!

Edited December 22, 2013 by mythlawlbear

[chakflying 10]

It definitely looks awesome!

But I would appreciate if the particles have less contrast, higher resolution and softer edges.

Also, are the illumination for fire looking too yellow and should be more orange?

[FUNKYCHUNKY2017 10]

made my arma game outstanding esp on my new rigs thanks

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=buUOEyTQsxI

[serjames 357]

I must be the only one here, but I prefer the Speed of sounds Gibs Blood spray - with the Stupid armour values that seem to mean 5 to 6 hits is needed to take someone down a spray on a hit at least gives me some idea I'm doing some damage.

I don't seem to be able to get the same visual cue from Blastcore. Is there a way to "turn-off" the blastcore hit indicator so I can put the SOS gibs one back ?

Other than that I LOVE the mod :)

SJ

[bigpickle 0]

Amazing work as always OS. Congratulations on your release and merry Christmas.

(Check Pm)

regards

Bp

[Nikoteen 24]

Hey Optical,

Very good release, R1 is impressive already! Thank you so much for your hard work.

Wish you the best. Merry Christmas ! :)

[artisanal 22]

Hey OS, at first I thought the colour of fire & explosions was quite accurate, but then I checked out some footage of explosions, and one video (actually many videos of the same event) contains valuable footage of explosions at night. As you can see the color of the detonation is very "yellowish" (quite like the colour used in your mod at the moment) but quickly (I mean, like, less than 0.5 seconds after detonation) the colour turns orange.

Edited December 22, 2013 by Artisanal