One thing I do know.
I did get the SH4 way working at one time in SH3!
There is a difference I need to check out. I was running the original release with the No-StarForce patch at the time.

Maybe the newer version with no StarForce is the reason?
Would not surprise me if Ubi jacked that ability or the patch allowed it.

On the program to clean files of the Damages stuff?
I asked for help from a member here at Subsim who works with Delphi.
I did cut some stuff in Studio 2006 and it seems it should all work but it is so different from what I know that help is needed.
I'm not giving up. Just asking for help.

Nothing wrong with asking for help. You can't know everything

What was it Jim use to say?
None of us are as smart as all of us?
Or something like that.

Indeed he did and he was right

Like we need to help his head grow larger!!
:03:
:haha:

Just one word short " None of us are as clever as all of us? :03:

Then I didn't do to bad for a Colonist!
:up:

Rgr that matey :salute:

Interesting thread Jeff, I am following it :up:

This is an example taken from SH5, but it works the same in SHIV and probably also in SHIII (never tried in the latter game but I trust what Jeff says :03:)

File: data\Sea\NAMC_Patroclus\NAMC_Patroclus.cfg:


Note the line marked in orange: the Patroclus has not 3D model of her own, but her cfg file is pointing to Rawalpindi 3D model (dat file, or gr2 file in this case, since we are talking about SH5).

Other files found in the same folder (besides the above cfg file):

NAMC_Patroclus_sil.dds
NAMC_Patroclus.eqp
NAMC_Patroclus.sns

All other (sim, zon, val, dsd, etc.) files are shared with the Rawalpindi. The two ships have most features in common, but textures, armaments and sensor outfits can be customized.

The external look of two ships having the same 3D model can be customized as well, to some extent: all you need to do is removing parts you want to customize from the main model, edit them in two or more variants, and storing them in an external library file whose content can be linked to the units sharing the said model through equipemnt nodes/bones and .eqp files. There are not examples of this type of advanced technique in stock SH5, but there is at least one in SHIV.

In general, this method is very useful for dealing with sister ships, similar ship classes and aircraft variants. We refer to it as "proxy-cloning" as opposed to simple "cloning" where you duplicate an unit with all her binary files :yep:

@gap: thankx for the detailed explain!!

A question: do the proxy-cloned unit have a dat file?? If no, how can you call the new texture, you must have a different name, or not????????? :hmmm: :/\\!!

So far it does not work in SH3 as it does in SH4 and SH5.

I know I had it working somehow in the past.
Trying to duplicate it now.

It doesn't. The dat file is the one of the parent unit. Provided that unit materials are set opportunely, textures can be assigned via roster cfg file.
Still taking SH5's Patroclus and Rawalpindi as an example, these are their entries in the British roster:

AMCPatroclus.cfg:

AMCRawalpindi.cfg:


That means that each proxy-copy can have its own texture different from the one used on its parent unit, even if both ship classes are in the roster of the same nation. Also note that, unlike the example above, proxy-cloned units can have a different unit type than their parents; this is another level of customization that I forgot mentioning in my previous post.

All of the above applies to SHIV and SH5. In SHIII though, things might bit more complicated than that... read Jeff's post below:

Fingers crossed and let us know if you remember how it works...

Any news? :hmm2:

Hi All,


I have tried this over the last few days in many different flavors and I was unable to get this to work in SH3.



Has anyone had any success with this? This would be a breakthrough.


I've tried setting the model of a unit I know has the same model, then removing the original .dat file so I know its not using it. I just can't get the ship to show up.


Perhaps only implemented in SH4 and SH5? I do see the 3DModelFileName entry in many cfg files in SH3, but they only reference their own model.



Thanks.

@Jeff

Any further ideas or programmes that could help optimize Sh3 and reduce memory usage?

Yep, I am curious too :yep:

Bump*:/\\!!

I'm quite confident it doesn't work for SH3. The other approach we can use was suggested by Richard, it was to find similar 3d models in the dat files by looking at the hex and then reference just one of them (reference 1 id) instead of rendering the same model over and over again.

I'll admit I don't recall how I had something like that working at one time.
I haven't been messing with it for awhile now also.

But here's a thought I had while working on something else.
Since SH3 Commander can move files and such around by dates?
Why not remove Units that are not in Game at the start of the War and have Commander install them at the proper time?
Also remove Units when needed?

this is subject to mandatory use of SH3Commander