[Rampage]

I just had this idea.  (Probably mentioned before too.)  When you make a shield mesh in trueSpace and convert it to POF, the converter automatically integrates the shield into the mesh as... shield rather than a subobject.  Bobboau mentioned in this PCS overview document that whenever the converter converts a insignia chunk, it turns it into a subobject.

I'm no coder, but I think what we CAN do is make the insignia similar to the shield, so that the converter recognizes it as an insignia chunk and sets it aside from the other subobjects, the same way it does with shields.

It's just an idea.  If you don't like it or someone else has mentioned it before, please throw tomatoes.  

Rampage

[NecroBob]

what might this be used for?
(sorry, it's not clicking, I'm on my 4th shot of espresso\swill)

Bob

[Rampage]

What I mean is that so far we had trouble creating insignia for our strike craft.  What PCS does when converting shields is that it does not make it a subobject but instead as its own chunk.  If you glue a face to a light and name it "insignia", PCS will make it into a submodel instead of the insignia chunk.

What I'm proposing is that maybe Bobboa, Kazan, and/or someone else can manipulate PCS into making insignia into - insignia, like it does with shields.

It's just an idea.

Rampage

[LAW ENFORCER]

I dont get it..... ???

[Joey_21]

I think what he means is he doesn't want the glued insignia to be a subobject when converting COB to POF (because subobjects can be destroyed. ie: turrets, rotating parts on gas miners, etc.) If PCS would convert that part of the COB as the insignia then it would prevent them from getting destroyed... at least, that's what I'm getting out of it.

Good idea if this is the case.

[LAW ENFORCER]

??? I have never had an insignia destroyed.... And wouldn't that be a little silly - the industrutable coat of paint...


(hummm I have a cunning plan!)

[LtNarol]

You can't destroy insignia submodels, not unless you go out of your way to stick them in the table entry.  

[Rampage]

I think Joey came infinitely close to my idea but didn't touch it completely.

When we put the shield submodel into our model hierarchy in trueSpace, we glue it to the model as sibling.  When PCS reads a subobject by the name of "shields", it will now set it aside as a special case.  It will convert it to its own chunk rather than to a submodel.  (You can't see "shields" under the submodel list, can you?)  Now I want the same thing done with insignia.  You make the plane in trueSpace, glue it to your model as sibling, and convert it using PCS.  Right now, PCS can't recognize "insignia" as a special case, like it does with shields, so it converts it into a REGULAR submodel.  I want PCS to recognize "insignia" as a special case and imported it into the POF aside from the other submodels, so that it WON'T show up on the submodel list.

[LtNarol]

this really belongs in fs modding or fs general

[Rampage]

Originally posted by LtNarol
this really belongs in fs modding or fs general

Negative.  I'm petitioning for a source code improvement in PCS.

[Joey_21]

Originally posted by LtNarol
You can't destroy insignia submodels, not unless you go out of your way to stick them in the table entry.  

I suppose so... but insignias shouldn't have to be submodels anyway. They belong in their own chunk.

[Rampage]

Originally posted by Joey_21
I suppose so... but insignias shouldn't have to be submodels anyway. They belong in their own chunk.

YES!  He finally broke the laws of mathematics and touched the asymptote!

The problem is, PCS doesn't know how to put insignia into the insignia chunk, so it integrates the insignia subobject into the submodel(s) chunk.

[LAW ENFORCER]

Ah ok so it wont radicaly change or improve things it will just make them more orginised and easy to understand (since you wont have 'rouge' stuff in the list...

or am I still missing it?


I dont see any problem with what I said there by the way