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Nicholas Bell

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Posts posted by Nicholas Bell

  1. Posted

    How do the modifications to accuracy and precision in this mod interact with the same settings in the player configuration? Are the effects cumulative, multiplicative, or does this mod override the configuration values?

    Thanks. I always appreciate the time and effort of modders like yourself.

  2. Posted

    I am not working on Razani at all because ARMA2 refuses to work on my system and there is no point IMO on completing it only for ARMA. So until BIS patches ARMA2 so it works or I get a new computer (neither seems likely in near future) this project is dead. Too bad, I had a lot of neat ideas for the rest of the map.

  3. Posted

    I'm with you on this problem. Crashes within 5 minutes with my 8800 Ultra (768 MB). I've given up. Tried over a dozen drivers, all the tricks in the forums. Temp at 56 C. No overclocking the GPU. Have posted crash logs, etc at Developers Heaven, so I've done what I can.

    System: XPS 720, Intel Core2 Extreme processor QX6850 (3.00GHz Overclocked to 3.33GHz) w/QuadCore Technology, 8MB Cache, 4GB DDR2 SDRAM at 800MH, 768MB nVidia GeForce 8800 Ultra, 150BG SATA HD (10,000 RPM), 500GB SATA Hard Drive (7200 RPM), Dell UltraSharp Wide 22

    ArmA runs great - usually use 7 km view range without a problem!

    Whole thing just makes me sick. What a waste of my time and money to this point. That will change if a patch fixes the problem. Not in the position to buy a new computer just to play ArmA2 at this point.

  4. Posted

    Thanks Thales100, for taking the time to take and post those images. Looks terrific. Will keep my fingers crossed that 1.03 gets me up and running :)

    @ Nicholas Bell : Wow, thats how it looks , good FPS too even on the Schmalfelden "Extra Heavy Vegetation" map - this stuff is so good that should have been included by BI in the Arma 2 official release or as a patch, all this CAA1 and OAC stuff and these amazing maps

  7. Posted

    Anyone have success with their "old" 8800 Ultra? Was using 174.74 nicely for ArmA. I've been trying many newer versions now without much to say for all the effort. I'm not complaining about frame rates as much, which run anywhere from 20-60 "depending", but rather about graphic artifacts, textures not appearing (light blue bushes especially) no matter how long I wait, and eventually black screen lockup (reboot required).

    Dell XPS 720

    Intel Core2 Extreme processor QX6850 (OC 3.33GHz)

    4GB DDR2 SDRAM at 800MH

    768MB nVidia GeForce 8800 Ultra (driver du jour)

    150MB Raptor SATA HD (10,000 RPM), 500GB SATA Hard Drive (7200 RPM),

    Dell UltraSharp Wide 22"

    Win XP Media (32bit)

    I now I'm showing my age, but I remember great it was to jump from a 386SX to a 486DX playing Dynamix Red Baron. Was like "glass". We were more tolerant back then (almost 20 years now) regarding frame rates. Enjoyed many flight sims at what must have been 10-15 FPS. Today people would be screaming bloody murder, but back then that was "smooth" - well, choppy actually. But the "chop" was consistent which made them playable. In fact after a while one didn't notice. Now if I could get ArmA2 to run a *steady* 20 FPS I would be happy :)

  13. Posted

    Coming along nicely. A couple of things I suggest:

    1. Fix the road intersection by using the proper road terminations.

    2. Use the road smoothing script on all roads, including gravel roads.

    3. Decrease the height of your clutter.

    4. The sand color texture contrasts too much. Edit the color to blend in more with the farmland. Decrease brightness and saturation.

    5. The sand texture mask needs to be adjusted as it is only on one side of the road, while it should be on both to create road shoulders..

    6. While the fences may be accurate, the AI simply cannot handle path-finding with extended object barriers, and they won't jump over. You need to have multiple gaps in the fence 3-4 meters wide for the AI pathfinding routine to use it. Anything narrower will be ignored.

  14. Posted

    I am not making any decisions on future modifications to this map until ArmA2 is released, and the tools necessary to make it compatible with it (if necessary). From what I have seen the ArmA2 map contains a lot of terrain similar to Schmalfelden, and I suspect my map will fall into disuse (for reasons like small size and lack of A/F).

    The changes you are asking for are not difficult, but would still require more than 6 hours of my limited time, time I feel is best used for other maps I am working on. I suggest you petition the makers of whichever sound mod you are using to provide options or control over the ambient sound effects, as Schmalfelden is not the only map where this is a problem.

    If I do decide to update the map, I will seek input at that time.

  16. Posted

    There is no map update at this time - just information where I am in response to inquiries.

    I am stuck.

    In final testing with squad on squad action the lag around both the old and the new compounds is horrific. It is not noticeable with just a friendly squad following me around. It's as if when the program has to start processing actions required in a firefight, it no longer can handle the load. The hard drive runs constantly at this time, although there are no visible slow loading LODs or textures.

    It is apparently not a graphics problem - turned everything down and decreasing the view distance does not help at all. Retesting the squad on squad action with all the buildings and walls removed results in very smooth action. So it appears that there is something in Opteryx's and/or my objects which is gumming up the program - at least with the map in it's current condition. (Note I also tested some demanding missions on my Schmaldfelden XHV just to make sure it wasn't just my computer crapping out on me and there was no problem).

    So I need to do some serious fault isolation procedures to determine what object(s) are the culprit. This will unfortunately take even more time.

    On the positive side, in the last 2 months I've logged over 100 hours of work on creating new objects and textures, improved the configuration file, improved the ability of the AI to navigate in and out of the qalats (wider openings and AI pathways), improved the sat map and of course added the offending buildings and walls.

    Here are images of the blighters.

    arma2009-05-1022-23-58-84.jpg

    arma2009-05-1022-24-28-70.jpg

    arma2009-05-1022-24-43-48.jpg

    arma2009-05-1022-25-52-75.jpg

    arma2009-05-1022-26-42-28.jpg

  17. Posted

    I'm just too close to the BIS border

    True. You lose the sat map around the edges of the map. This lost area appears to be 1/2 the size of your segment. So if you are using a 512 pixel segment you lost about 256 pixels.

    Must admit I've never seen the problem with the colors like that though....:confused:

    Remember Visitor uses the lower left hand segment to create the endless border around the map. This will get rid of the alternating striped areas around the edge. You need to create the paa file by hand and put it in your layers folder before you binarize the map.

    If you want to get rid of edge problem there are 2 solutions, neither which is easy.

    1. Change your heightmap and push your coastline farther away from the edge of the map. Of course this will force you to rework the sat map around the shore and relocate any objects.

    2. Place your island on a larger map. Create a new 10,240 map (10 meter cells, 40x40 texture size). Use the Change Canvas size tool of your graphics editor to make the height map, mask and satellite image 10,240x10,240 and import.

  18. Posted

    In my struggle to create convex objects in irregular shaped objects like rocks, I noticed that the BIS rock MLODs shadow LOD's often are neither closed nor convex. Per the Wiki they have to be. How can this be? I get all kinds of problems with the objects I make if the shadow LODs are not convex.

    Also, how important is actually bothering with creating the shadow LOD's, fire and view LODs if in fact the system falls back to resolution or geometry LOD if these are not present? (per the Wiki). What impact does having or not having these LODs have? Does it slow the game down or speed it up?

    And finally, what is the real definition of "convex" in modeling terms. I know what it means in layman's terms, but it has to be a bit more complicated other wise I won't be having such difficulties. A definition describing the necessary relationships & positions of vectors and/or faces with each other in an object might clear it up for me.

    Thanks!

  23. Posted

    Use can use the "pond.p3d" object for creating lakes and rivers. However, one cannot swim in them nor do they cause the player to drown. Boats will ride on top of them. They just look like water. One good thing about them is that they do not have waves, which isn't realistic on a river.

    A work around I was experimenting with was to create a very deep trench at the bottom of a river. You couldn't see it, but if a player tries to walk across the bottom of the river, he fell to the bottom of the trench and was killed.

    When creating a river or a lake with the Pond, you can increase it's size to 500% of original. Be sure to overlap the objects a lot, or boats will fall to the bottom occasionally. Use the SetAbsoluteHeight script in V3 to get them all at the same level.

    As far as road creation in V3, simply lay the roads on the mountains and use smooth roads script. You need to experiment with the settings. Moving average at 25 is good for normal terrain, but not so for mountains. Lowering the value to 11 or 12 will give you smoother results in mountains. If you want a constant grade use the Simple Average, or Slope settings. You may need to tweak the elevations around the grades a bit in Buldozer to eliminate the saw-tooth effect of the elevation changes.

    These did the trick for Razani mountain roads. There is no need to attempt to create the road elevations by hand if you use the smooth road script.

  24. Posted

    As for the razmisc error, it might be Nick using a same class name or p3d as me because I've not used any of those objects.

    I do have ruin.p3d in the the razmisc file - but why would your map be calling it's use? Especially since you are saying you didn't use the ruin object? Weird.

    The obvious solution is to delete the razmisc.pbo

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