Adding custom objects

[cookies2432 105]

Hi!

 

I'm trying to add custom objects into terrain builder but unfortunately it doesn't show the texture when i try to. How i add them is that i unpack the pbo and then put in the folder from it into the P:/a3 folder. Is that the correct or wrong way to do it, i get the objects but they don't show any textures.

[zukov 490]

Third party add ons don't go in a3 folder put them in the root of p drive

[1para{god-father} 105]

Just put them in your p:   i.e  p:\Jbad_structures , etc... as Zukov advised

 

Remove them from your p:/a3 folder  :)

[cookies2432 105]

Thanks!

[cookies2432 105]

still getting this issue: https://gyazo.com/9d4e52192af91c928998c13926d05e0d

[Bnae 1431]

Did you get answer to your last question?

Because i have the same problem now with ibr_* plants. I'm thinking that you have to plant the trees and bushes without textures on Bulldozer?

Or is this just a bigger problem that i have to fix before i start working with the terrain?

[cookies2432 105]

I have no idea how to fix it  :(, still no answer as well. 

[bushlurker 46]

The first thing you have to realise with all Arma models is that they contain Hardcoded Absolute paths to their textures...

 

Here's a quick fictitious example...

 

The model "small_rocks.p3d" is found in the location P:\A3\Rocks\

The "P:\" part is removed, so inside that small_rocks.p3d model are paths to the textures which read "A3\Rocks\Data\<the texture.paa>"

 

Regardless of where you put that model on your P:\ drive - it will still look along that path for its textures, So when you add that model to the TB library, place it on your terrain and check it out in buldozer - there's the rock, and, if the textures are present at the correct location, its a textured rock...

 

Now... lets say you want to use Icebreakers plants package, which he created for his own terrains. Icebreakr's usually OK with that sort of thing (though it's usually considered polite to ask first) so, the first thing you need to do is to put the contents of that "ibr_plants.pbo" on to your P:\drive - somewhere - so you can add them to TB and use them.... So you unpack the .pbo and you get a folder called "ibr_plants"... So far, so good...

 

Now, where do you put it?

 

Lets say you just dump it in the P:\A3 folder, then you open TB and add the models to the library from that location... You add some trees to your terrain and check them out in buldozer...

The models are there OK, but the textures aren't!... Why's that?

 

Inside every one of the models there are paths to textures... the model is trying to follow those paths and it's not finding the textures where it hardcoded expects them to be...

 

So - how do you know where to put the ibr_plants folder so it works properly??

 

Well... at some point in the past, Icebreakr made this models pack, and he did that - somewhere - on P:\...

 

As you unpack his final result from that job, the ibr_plants.pbo, Mikeros ExtractPbo tool  - should - create a file, probably called "PBOPREFIX.txt" ... This is a simple text file which contains.... The Original Path to the location where Ice made the plants pack... This is the path thats hardcoded in the models, this is where the models are looking for their textures...

 

Since you can't edit those models and change the internal paths, you need to make sure you put the models and textures in their correct, original place, and use the models from THAT location when you add them into TB for use... That way, the model looks along its hardcoded path for the texture, finds it, and all is well...

Better still, in game, when you load your terrain, it'll look along the same paths (basically, it'll look for that ibr_plants.pbo, find it, and use both the models and their textures successfully)...

 

So - you look at the pboprefix.txt file, it says "ibr_plants\" and nothing else.... Imagine the P:\ back on to the beginning of that path and you have "P:\ibr_plants\" - THATS where the folder needs to go - directly on P:\

 

If you unpacked one of my pbo's like "afghan_city_objects.pbo", and the pboprefix.txt file read "bush\terrains\afghan\afghan_city_objects\" then you'd need to recreate that path on your P:\ drive... Make a P:\bush\folder, with "terrain" and"afghan" subfolders, then finally drop in the unpacked "afghan_city_objects" folder at that location, and add them into TB and use them from there....

 

Your terrain is an addon, all its paths to models (and their textures) are hardcoded too, so now you have paths hardcoded into your .wrp which read "look for ibr_plants for the models and ibr_plants\data for their textures" (the P:\whatever\if\anything\ part of the path is ignored, the game looks directly for "ibr_plants", or rather, its packed equivalent "ibr_plants.pbo")...

 

Next... Since your terrain now relies on this "external pbo" you need to tell your main terrain config that, so it will error and prompt the user if that now essential extra .pbo is missing... Something like...

 

requiredAddons[] = {ibr_plants};

 

would probably do...

 

And, of course, you'll either need to include the ibr_plants.pbo with your final package, or inform your users that its a "required file" which they can get by downloading any Icebreakr terrain where it's used.. Or, if they simply have an Icebreakr terrain which uses that .pbo loaded at the same time as yours, that would also ensure that required file was available...

 

 

B

[Bnae 1431]

Perfect answer, thank you so much for your time and effort!

[spookygnu 563]

what an absolute great little tutorial that is. now that helps me out too in knowing what to do if i have problems. Bush you never cease to amaze at the amount of helpful knowledge you dish out. ;)  :clap:  :icon_w00t:

[cookies2432 105]

The tutorial is great but it sadly doesn't work for me, the rvmat files say that the texture files should be in a "CA" folder inside of the P: drive meanwhile the prefix file says "plants_winter". None of them seem to work.

[bushlurker 46]

Sounds like you've picked a tricky addon to work with...

 

To start with, "CA" is the "P:\drive prefix" for the Arma 2 game content.

Just like you have a P:\A3\ folder, with basically the whole of Arma 3 unpacked and arranged properly in the correct folder structure, back in the Arma 2 days, modders had the same thing, except it was called P:\CA

 

Your models sound like a typical "minimal" retexture from Arma 2.

 

At a guess, I'd say what's been done is that the required models have been placed in a P:\plants_winter folder - almost certainly with a \Data\ subfolder for textures. Then, the required "visible to the player" original plant textures have been copied over to this new Data folder, and then retextured to look "wintery". Then, the models in P:\plants_winter had the paths to those visible textures redirected to this local \Data\subfolder, so they'd use the wintery textures instead of the stock Arma 2 ones and the player would see - winter plants.

However, plants and veg have complicated textures which involve bumpmap and "mc" materials (textures), and also .rvmat files to control how all these textures are applied... There are paths to ALL of these files inside the model.p3d itself.

 

Since it's not necessary to change any of that other stuff in order to make a plant look "wintery" there's really no need to change those other paths, this is an Arma 2 addon, being used in Arma 2, so those CA\Plants2\wherever\ textures will ALWAYS be there, since they're part of Arma 2 itself.

 

Except now they're in Arma 3 and there is no CA - no Arma 2 content... so those textures can't be found...

 

Without looking at the structure of the addon itself and checking all the paths to stuff I can't say for sure that's your particular issue, but in general, anything looking for CA\Anything is from Arma 2, and still wants to be in Arma 2...

 

 

B

[cookies2432 105]

I'll try my finest to fix it :)

[cookies2432 105]

Even tho i'm amazing my finest didn't work.

[cookies2432 105]

Any help would be much appriciated :)

[bushlurker 46]

Basically you have two choices - edit the plants pack, or provide the CA (Arma 2) content it's looking for, in the place it expects... Both options are a little tricky but perfectly possible if you're careful (always make backups). Checking thru the forum threads here for people doing or discussing similar things is a Very Good Idea too - this level of tinkering around isn't exactly beginners stuff...

 

For either approach you'd first need a proper P:\CA folder with the Arma 2 content...

 

Once you have that, if you wanted to edit the plants pack you'd...

 

Ask whoever the author of the plants pack is if it's OK to do so, then...

Create a new folder somewhere on P:\ for the new plants pack... If it's going to be associated with your terrain, then right beside your terrain and similarly named might be a good idea

 

like, your terrain is   P:\MyTag\My_New_Terrain

then you could use   P:\MyTag\My_New_Terrain_Objects\winterplants\

... for the location.

Then you copy all the winter plant models .p3d's to that folder - just the model .p3d's themselves.

Then you need to get, install and read the read me for Mikero's "MoveFolder" tool.

You can point that to that new models folder and run it and it will read all the paths in every one of the models, follow those paths (even if they lead to the P:\CA folder - which is why you need one), and fetch every texture and rvmat those plants will use, then it will create a \Data subdirectory in your new models folder, copy all the files there, then repath every path in both the models and the rvmats to point to that new "local Data" folder

End result is a self contained plants pack which contains all the models, plus all their textures, all repathed to suit that new location..

 

The second option is to use AllInArma, or it's successor, the Community Upgrade Project mods

AiA has stopped development, though it's 90%+ working where it matters, and CUP is picking up where AiA left off and is still WIP

 

Basically, both of these mods effectively add ALL Arma 2 content to the main Arma 3 game... If that mod is running, Arma 3 HAS a "CA" folder...

 

So you would just carry on using your current plants pack as it is... For TB and buldozer viewing, those pesky missing CA textures would be made available - because you added a proper CA folder to your P:\ drive

And, in game, there'd be no errors either, because when the plants went looking for their Arma 2 textures in Arma 3, AllInArma, or CUP would be there, ready to provide them.

This approach would make AiA (or CUP) a "required addon" for your terrain, people would have to have that mod and be running it in order to use your terrain..

That's not quite as horrific as it sounds - AiA was/is pretty popular, and a lot of people will have it already, and secondly, since it basically provides ALL Arma 2 content within Arma 3, you're free to use any and all of the CA (Arma2) content which you have on P:\ on your terrain....

For that reason, an AiA dependency is is something quite a few recent terrain guys have chosen to use...

 

 

B

[cookies2432 105]

How do you mean with AiA? Do i need to include it somehow for terrain builder or just run it with arma 3?

[cookies2432 105]

Anyone knows? Also i have looked around the forums for every single error i've gotten, just couldn't find any answer this time, that's why i asked.

[RiotRain 0]

Hmm i read this collection closely and it seems it solve my (no textures in terrainbuilder) Issue quite well.

 

But now i have a problem i build everything quite well and in terrainbuilder it works BUT if i load the @my file with the needed addons in @Myfile/addons the plants don`t get shown in eden editor. 

 

In my case i am building a Iland and it is quite far but why ever i cannot get the plants working. 

 

I got allowence to use different stuff from a few builder and tryed it with different kinds of plants at last i tryed brg_Africa because Variable and icebreakr told me to now my problem is 

The message Arma 3 Prompt is "Cannot load a3/brg_africa/brg_cocunutpalm5.p3d"

 

In p drive it is where it should be a3 folder 

i also tryed to repack a3 folder to a pbo and set it in my active arma directory ..... even this don`t work. 

 

Now my question 

I did everything like toturials told me and addons like nam or pandora work without changing something in my arma mainfile system (4 shure i have to pack the addon in and i did) 

 

But why i cannot get my own mod use the bgr_afrika pbo i am totally clueless 

 

Anny ideas from the community because i am working on this problem since 2 month now 

 

Thanks and best wishes 

 

 

 

Ps:

 

If someone wanna be so nice possibility of Teamviewer and ts is given so maybe its faster or easier to show or to explain if you wanna help plz pm me 

[HorribleGoat 1473]

As bushlurker above said, don't put the unpacked custom files in the A3 folder. Only real A3 files go there.

From your path:

a3/brg_africa/brg_cocunutpalm5.p3d

Id assume you have unpacked the files in P:\a3\brg_africa\*unpacked custom files from brg_africa*

when they should be in 

P:\brg_africa\*unpacked custom files from brg_africa*

Move the files and add them again with the right path to your map.

[Auss 208]

the rule for adding objects is as follows:

 

ARMA3 BIS made objects go in P:\A3

ARMA1 &ARMA2 BIS Objects go in P:\CA

Custom made addons go in the root of P:\

[cookies2432 105]

the rule for adding objects is as follows:

 

ARMA3 BIS made objects go in P:\A3

ARMA1 &ARMA2 BIS Objects go in P:\CA

Custom made addons go in the root of P:\

Thanks :D I actually started working on a map again and this helped me.

[TheRealRag 0]

the rule for adding objects is as follows:

 

ARMA3 BIS made objects go in P:\A3

ARMA1 &ARMA2 BIS Objects go in P:\CA

Custom made addons go in the root of P:\

How do you get it to see the .PAA?     I get the error while trying to load them in via Bulldozer.

[tazmania720 16]

TexView is used to view .paa

https://community.bistudio.com/wiki/TexView_2

[TheRealRag 0]

TexView is used to view .paa

https://community.bistudio.com/wiki/TexView_2

maybe I used the wrong words,  but every time i try to place a Cup object it doesn't load the texture and I have placed the files as described in this forum..