Dark Eldar LP WTP Error

[Jaylo101]

I've just started playing SS again, after leaving it when it first came out due to it being in such a poor condition, when after recolouring all the races in the campaign i have noticed an error in the DE LP WTP file, its completly missing the dark lance weapon upgrade. So when you play skirmish or recolour the campaign one it appears as black, the only working texture is the RSH for the campaign. When you extract the DDS from the RSH you can see the parts of the lances, spread around the texture, that should be in the WTP. I was wondering if there is a fix for it i've missed or if a very understanding person could make a new WTP file from the campaign RSH.

[IBBoard]

I've not seen a fix for the Dark Eldar Listening Point, but having bits of texture missed or overlapping isn't unusual.

Depending on what you want to do then fixing it isn't too difficult. All you need to do is copy the appropriate areas from the DDS file on to the correct layer's TGA. The TGA should be greyscale, so it'll automatically greyscale it for you. The only thing you need to do then is adjust the brightness so that it isn't excessively coloured.

[Jaylo101]

What i've done is copy the parts from the DDS & put them onto my team coloured DDS, also recoloured the bits that needed doing after i moved them over. That solved the problem in the campaign but skirmish uses the WTP & i'm not very good at making WTP's! Incidently, i've also copied over the models & anims of the Farseer & Tau Commander from DC to SS because the Soulstorm ones are so poor, especially the TC's borked wargear.

[IBBoard]

WTPs aren't too much different to RSH/RTX files, it's just a case of layers versus a compiled image. Have you looked at the tutorials on the site?

I would give it a go but I'm generally busy with other things and the last I tried I'd broken something with my version of the Texture Tool while trying to improve it!

As for replacing the SS Tau with the DC Tau, did they not add anything in terms of wargear in SS? Normally the models can be ported between versions but there are certain actions that trigger certain animations that the model doesn't have, which leaves it floating in a stationary pose.

[Jaylo101]

I've copied the animations over as well & hav'nt come across any glitches yet, the WHE & WHM file from "Data\art\ebps\races\tau(eldar)\troops", which covers the ingame model & the wargear screen, & the race_tau(eldar) files from "Data\art\ui\3d_models" which covers the commander screen.

Yes the TC & Farseer has got a few different pieces of wargear but they are poorly done, for instance the cool looking TC helmet from DC has been replaced with a simple looking multi_tracker antenna which has been attached on the model to the same spot as the right missile pod! Also the nice looking plasma rifle from DC has been replaced with a poorly textured cyclic ion blaster that's just been stuck on the side of his arm.

As for the Farseer, well you do lose the nice looking soulstone, but i'd rather have that than look at the plain wraithbone breastplate from SS which has hardly got any visual change at all compared to the DC wraithbone armour which adds a second set of armour extensions on her back plus shoulder armour.

Another factor is that the new wargear pieces only have an RSH file & no WTPs.

[IBBoard]

I did kind of know that the wargear only had RSH files. Danimator made a making TGAs from RSH files tutorial quite early on that might help if you did want to colour them.

As for the equipment, I'm surprised that you don't encounter problems if you try using that wargear. Maybe the "stuck figure" animation only applied to calling animations that didn't exist rather than trying to make parts visible that didn't exist. It does sound like Ironlore made a particularly bad job of the models and textures, though.

[Jaylo101]

Well IMHO, THQ hired Ironlore as they were the cheapest because they were going out of business. Also with Relic having to pick up the pieces post release, with Ironlore not being accountable for anything, there just simply was'nt enough incentive for Ironlore to do a fully A1 job.

[IBBoard]

I never did quite work out why Ironlore were brought in. Not that the Relic textures were 100% perfect (we've got a few fixes on the site for colour clashes) but Ironlore seems to have more clashes and they didn't even make it as a separate mod (it's still in the DXP2 folder).

That's all getting a bit off-topic for the original "the Dark Eldar listening post is missing bits" topic, though