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I would like to use the effect "smoke billow.fx" for my map I am currently working on.
The effect is from Geonosis and is attached to the derelict technounion ship.
I wanted to make it a standalone effect prop like the "hoth_prop_effect" (which is an untextured cube emitting steam).

I am not an XSI modeller.

I already tried changing the hoth_prop_effect.odf by simply attaching the smoke billow effect to the designated hard point and renaming it (and the msh) but it didn´t work.
So does anyone have an idea if this is possible without XSI, and if so, how to do this?

Thanks in advance, del.

I'm actually not sure.
But that's only because I'm too tired to understand what's going on.

I should think so. When you tried to ammend the hoth_prop_effect.odf (cloud I assume) did you change the texture called to underlitesmoke2.tga (the texture used by smoke_billow.fx) and then copy the texture across to your worlds MSH folder along with the correct hoth msh etc? it'd probably be easier to change the hoth_prop_cloud effect and ammend it to your needs, then place it where you wish using Zeroeditor. You shouldn't need to use XSI if I understand your problem correctly.

u could use the tusken camp and just hide the camp under ground .

The hoth_effect prop can be made to work with the smoke effect, no need for XSI; you have already got the right idea, it's done by editing the odf. Make sure everything is named correctly and you have copied all the required assets to the right folders.

You should need hoth_effect.msh, hoth_effect.odf, smoke_billow.fx and underlitesmoke2.tga

If you don't want to (or for aesthetic map reasons, can't) hide the cube under the ground or inside some geometry, you can create an option file for hoth_effect.msh and scale it down so it is as good as invisible (search the forum if you are not familiar with scaling in option files).


Here is the smoke effect attached to a scaled-down hoth_effect prop.

Thank you Saturn V,
it is actually quite easy. The reason why it didn´t work in the first attempt was because i had renamed the odf and msh (because I also wanted to use the hoth effect), and as a result I got an untextured cube with no effect.
But I think there are enough objects with steam efects attached to so i won´t need the hoth effect.
When I just change the effect attached to the hard point and leave the name "hoth_prop_effect.odf" it actually works.

Just one other question:
The smoke effect disappears after a short time. Which means it isn´t emitting smoke anymore.
There are some lines in the smoke_billow.fx file which define life times.
Do you know which one I have to edit to make the smoke billow not disappear?
Well I will experiment around a bit.
Thank you.

Use the particle editor included with the modding kit, but get the update from psych0fred's website.

i wish saturn would release a simple test map with all of his works...as shown above....

d3linqu3nt, did you get the answer?

I'd try to simply erase the lines which contains thte lifetime settings that's what a certain mapper/modder does lol - try it out or maybe set the values to 0 - in all...? that works also some times

Yeah, I tried changing the lifetime lines, but I think they define the lifetime of the single clouds which come out of the cube.
When I remove the lines there is no smoke at all. Don´t know, but I think I somehow increased the duration of smoke coming out. But it still stops after a certain time. But that´s not that dramatic.

And the particle editor is a bit too complicated for me.
I simply don´t understand it.

But thanks all of you for your help.

Have you timed how long the smoke lasts on the Geonosis map ? If it goes on longer, look at the Geonosis assests to see if something causes it to re-trigger or repeat itself.