Lucky_Strike

If tests reveal no serious issues I might complete the CMRT set (other troop carriers, incl russkie lend lease stuff) and then maybe follow up with other the WW2 titles. Though it needs beeing understood that the ani file swaps is an all or nothing affair. Majority of animation files is shared among both nations infantry, whether they ride a half track or not.  So if you dislike my (main) infantry animation swap mod, then don´t waste time on this!
Otherwise any help testing the half track riding mod is highly appreciated! 😎

Hehe, I was going to post a screen grab of the block from the mastermap so you could see roughly where the chimney goes but I see you're one step ahead. I'll post this which is (inexplicably) the factory that was in use ...

Ain't it cute ... don't get this, when they already had a better sized factory/chimney combo ... I do think the scale overall of a lot of the buildings on the Berlin master maps is just too small, lots of it looks too dinky like some small town rather than a capital city. What you're doing, in contrast, is light years ahead. It just feels so much more like a city in ruins.
😎 Great organisation and process, really shows in your maps. Almost a shame to destroy it, but I absolutely admire your determination to get this right. Course you know you're gonna have to tackle Cologne and Aachen amongst others, at some point 😉
Re the chimney height - I was going by the height of the buildings directly around it. Most are 4 or 5 storeys and it looked just over twice their height. Given the buildings are mostly large townhouse/apartment and office style I reckoned room height 2.5-3m so I got about 30m. A substantial chunk of the Reichstag was missing by 45, but comparing those images we have suggests the chimney height was below the top of the remaining dome by a few metres, which gives us a height of around 35-40m. The ones on the other side of the Spree look about the same so I wonder if they had some regulations regarding height.
With both your aerial photo and the other contemporary photos I think you can situate the chimney in about the middle of that block. Shame the factory is at an angle, but like I said that's something we can't change at the moment.
Do you think you can clip me a section of your latest map where you have the Brandenburg Gate so I can get the scale of it right to fit into your map. I'm considering making the model ready ruined, or at least roofless, as that'll probably be easier than trying to add all the extra textures for intact and ruined. Don't really know yet will have to see what I can do re the middle section.
 

It´s on Mark´s and mine to do list already. We´ve some ideas but due to the odd nature of FH/trenches we got to be real creative for achieving a noticeable improvement. FH/Trenches are not vehicle types, so no way to add similar to pillbox individual pixeltrooper positions (soldier/leader/gunner). So we got to work with the geometry but not deviate from original too much, size and shape wise. Also proper map preparations (ditch locks) got to be made and combined with any improved geometry. But we´ll see. What ever comes from it will likely be just scenario maker assets and of no great use for older maps, unless beeing prepared and adapted by the map maker. So that´s the plan.....
Re HT and grenadier stance test tweaks it should be mentioned that the animation file swap applies to any other pixeltrooper using same weapon class (K98k rifle) likewise. It´s a generic class and there´s no dedicated to half track crew member ones unfortunately. For this example (K98) it means ANY other K98 guy will never go up to stand and always shoot and reload his gun from kneel stance! From playing my infantry animation file swap mod you´ll know already. Any other stances remain uneffected unless tweaked by ani file swaps as well. 😎

Oh nice one mate

New of the day
 
After a long moment of talking about I present you for Chrismas my Wrecks vehicles for CMBS
16 russian 16 ukrainian and 11 civilian wrecks I dont include any decals that everybodys can use his own textures and created himself the impacts.
I dont include this time the Usa wrecks to follow the actualities for the moment, later if this mod is a succes I will working on the Usa.
I am not an expert to make some clips, but you have here an overview of all vehicles that will be present in the mod, I see that I have to resize some civilian one,  next step will be for CMRT I hope to be on time before Christmas enjoy !
 
JM 
 
 

just looking at them in Blender makes me headaches already. 🤪😅

Think at least for Berlin map we can get rid of them all. A more generic looking one replacing the Tudor should do the trick I think. Just adding variations most likely won´t help for the game engine´s random swapping. Quite a nuisance and one that BFC keeps ignoring for long time. 🙄

Okay so I've now had a look at the factory model to see if I can use that as a stoke house to go with the chimney - what a hot mess that model is. Looks like it was made as an after thought, quite a lot of stuff not really finished properly and actually a few missing textures as well as some incomplete materials. I have done some repair work, it's still not 100% perfectly functioning, there are issues with the damaged stages since it's missing correct internal textures and I have no idea what needs to be done to make this right. Luckily I was able to repeat some of the external walls for the internal walls so that it at least has windows in roughly the right positions inside.
Since it was aligned at 45 degrees I thought I'd have a go at making it sit square, not a good idea, all sorts of odd stuff starts to happen - walls popping in and out of view, shadows where they shouldn't be, access issues, and pixeltruppen floating in mid air outside the building when supposedly inside. So we won't go there.
As of now we have a factory with a big f*ck-off chimney as a building that can be used (no access to the chimney) and which behaves pretty much as expected bar one or two glitches with destroyed walls and a missing ceiling at the top level - I've done a bit of a Fred Dibna and blown it up a few times, takes quite a bit of HE before it disappears with a mighty big crash ...

I found a few more factories on your map ...


Butted up to a large complex it's quite convincing. The facade and roof will change to match location so you might want to make some Berlin textures; in these images it's using the [germany] tagged set. The brickwork on the chimney itself is a bit over sized at the moment.

Battersea-am-Spree
I'll see if I can fix the missing ceiling/floor and add a broken ladder to the chimney.

Okay so I've now had a look at the factory model to see if I can use that as a stoke house to go with the chimney - what a hot mess that model is. Looks like it was made as an after thought, quite a lot of stuff not really finished properly and actually a few missing textures as well as some incomplete materials. I have done some repair work, it's still not 100% perfectly functioning, there are issues with the damaged stages since it's missing correct internal textures and I have no idea what needs to be done to make this right. Luckily I was able to repeat some of the external walls for the internal walls so that it at least has windows in roughly the right positions inside.
Since it was aligned at 45 degrees I thought I'd have a go at making it sit square, not a good idea, all sorts of odd stuff starts to happen - walls popping in and out of view, shadows where they shouldn't be, access issues, and pixeltruppen floating in mid air outside the building when supposedly inside. So we won't go there.
As of now we have a factory with a big f*ck-off chimney as a building that can be used (no access to the chimney) and which behaves pretty much as expected bar one or two glitches with destroyed walls and a missing ceiling at the top level - I've done a bit of a Fred Dibna and blown it up a few times, takes quite a bit of HE before it disappears with a mighty big crash ...

I found a few more factories on your map ...


Butted up to a large complex it's quite convincing. The facade and roof will change to match location so you might want to make some Berlin textures; in these images it's using the [germany] tagged set. The brickwork on the chimney itself is a bit over sized at the moment.

Battersea-am-Spree
I'll see if I can fix the missing ceiling/floor and add a broken ladder to the chimney.

I did some research into the photo you showed where we could see a chimney near the Reichstag, found some more images that clearly show where it is ...
This from 1928, before the Reichstag was wrecked, can clearly see the chimney top right, it's about 10 storeys tall or so.

There's actually another just over the Spree, just out of shot here but nevertheless quite close.
Still standing in 45, this from the opposite side ...

And another even clearer ...

I couldn't identify the building, there was gymnasium there somewhere ...
Here is the rescaled chimney on a portion of the stock master map - it was kind of there but the scale was a little off 😆

The 'Reichstag' in the foreground ....

... and viewed from the other side.
This section of the BF master map was not as full as it should be. Many of the buildings were too small with lots of mock tudor roof gables! It's clear in the photos that this is a dense city block of mostly 4 and 5 storey buildings, so I added a few to sort of give the impression, but it's stock houses I'm afraid. I think it's just off the edge of your Moltke Bridge map. 

Sorry about that, but I did at least manage to use tossers in a sentence ...

Thanks, probably at the weekend. And yes this one had quite a few textures 🤬
Yes please come back @sbobovyc aka Obi-Wan Kenobi - you're our only hope he says in his best Princess Leia voice!
Yes it must be in there somewhere. Trees at least all behave the same (nearly), and now I know most of their peculiarities I can wrangle them quite well. They're just a bit slow going when there's 300 objects to arrange 🤪 !!!!

I thought the same thing this evening so I'll get back onto them once big chimney is done.

I did some research into the photo you showed where we could see a chimney near the Reichstag, found some more images that clearly show where it is ...
This from 1928, before the Reichstag was wrecked, can clearly see the chimney top right, it's about 10 storeys tall or so.

There's actually another just over the Spree, just out of shot here but nevertheless quite close.
Still standing in 45, this from the opposite side ...

And another even clearer ...

I couldn't identify the building, there was gymnasium there somewhere ...
Here is the rescaled chimney on a portion of the stock master map - it was kind of there but the scale was a little off 😆

The 'Reichstag' in the foreground ....

... and viewed from the other side.
This section of the BF master map was not as full as it should be. Many of the buildings were too small with lots of mock tudor roof gables! It's clear in the photos that this is a dense city block of mostly 4 and 5 storey buildings, so I added a few to sort of give the impression, but it's stock houses I'm afraid. I think it's just off the edge of your Moltke Bridge map. 

"BUG" but just missing/incorrect textures. It seems that the normal maps for German senior officer greatcoats are incorrect and show y-straps.
This is for CMFB and CMRT AND CMFI. CMFI seems to not even have normal maps for the base module nor for Gustav Line  module but then finally they shipped with Rome to Victory. But shipped still incorrect. 3 strikes and you're out.
I have never been invited to be on the BFC BETA test team but I recommend that each guy get some "specialty area" to be in charge of. I THINK from grape vine and forum comments, that they all get a loosey-goosey "play the game and report stuff that seems wonky". Put a guy in charge of uniforms. Put a guy in charge of vehicle models. etc etc All the piddly stuff we see that slips on through. MAYBE it does get diligently reported and MAYBE gets diligently fixed but SOME-EFFING-HOW it gets right back in the folders? That is a QA issue somewhere.  eggshells in the omelette. 

I thought the same thing this evening so I'll get back onto them once big chimney is done.

Thanks, probably at the weekend. And yes this one had quite a few textures 🤬
Yes please come back @sbobovyc aka Obi-Wan Kenobi - you're our only hope he says in his best Princess Leia voice!
Yes it must be in there somewhere. Trees at least all behave the same (nearly), and now I know most of their peculiarities I can wrangle them quite well. They're just a bit slow going when there's 300 objects to arrange 🤪 !!!!

No, you don't. But I really should let Mr. Axeman have a night off.
Now, "I wanna ...
 

Good work Mark! 😎 I figured for least mess up of material and texture names one should do a fresh Blender start first. So no working on things in a longer time running Blender session. And off course then having all required textures in same folder as MDR file. I got to have a look at damaged textures as well. There were still some remaining issues but I´m fairly safe we could solve these as well. (..famous last words lol)
Was to be expected. META got to be adapted to any these geometry and position changes as well.  And the right type of ALT-A transforms I guess. Most things work relative to the main objects origin, which is at times hard to predict when doing rotational things. Just experienced this with the 251 half track crew positions recently. In the end I let it be. lol 🙄😅
Looks great! 😎 Fits well in there and in any urban map as well. Yep certain indi build classes are fairly resilient compared to most the other indi types. Think size and maybe class (hard coded) does matter as maybe some META data. Still haven´t found out yet. Unkn1 and 2 triplets are likely hitboxes but still unsure if they´ve influence on a buildings sturdiness as well. If it´s in META at all.
Looks like Nigel got to delay V2 release a little bit more. 😎🍻

I did some research into the photo you showed where we could see a chimney near the Reichstag, found some more images that clearly show where it is ...
This from 1928, before the Reichstag was wrecked, can clearly see the chimney top right, it's about 10 storeys tall or so.

There's actually another just over the Spree, just out of shot here but nevertheless quite close.
Still standing in 45, this from the opposite side ...

And another even clearer ...

I couldn't identify the building, there was gymnasium there somewhere ...
Here is the rescaled chimney on a portion of the stock master map - it was kind of there but the scale was a little off 😆

The 'Reichstag' in the foreground ....

... and viewed from the other side.
This section of the BF master map was not as full as it should be. Many of the buildings were too small with lots of mock tudor roof gables! It's clear in the photos that this is a dense city block of mostly 4 and 5 storey buildings, so I added a few to sort of give the impression, but it's stock houses I'm afraid. I think it's just off the edge of your Moltke Bridge map. 

Thanks Harry. It's cool that it appears for all sides and can be seen right across big maps. I've actually been doing some research on an actual chimney that Nigel showed me a pic of earlier which was a block from the Reichstag - so I'm going to scale it to that one, currently it's over 50m 😆 but needs to be about 25-35m at my guess. I'll post more details below with some pics.
I really don't know what was going on with the original model, it looks like they ran out of time. Anyway it would be helpful if both you and Nigel can look at this one once I get it rescaled and nearer finished, you both know far more about buildings than I do, I'm just the hired help 😝. It's actually quite straightforward adding the big chimney; biggest headache was getting all the original factory textures to load as we had that issue again of Blender ignoring textures with (00) appended to their names - the majority in this case!
Think part of the problem with buildings, and so many of the models, is that the various objects have an origin relative to 0,0,0 and to a single model origin, or just to 0,0,0. This can be shown in Blender by displaying relationship lines. If one tries to use Apply > Location on objects like this they might have their origin reset to 0,0,0 which is very undesirable. I have come across the same problem with trees where each leaf branch has its own origin set relative to a single origin in the model at about 0,0,0. Applying location to the leaves will reset their origin to 0,0,0 and consequentially the leaves with sway relative to the wrong point, indeed in strong wind they actually detach en masse from the tree!  I don't fully understand what we can do with this in buildings, but I'll leave it alone for now, applying scale and rotation only which seems fine.
I suspect that some of the class stuff is in a database in the app itself, x type of building has y protection against HE etc. It probably takes the meta for the physical rendering of the model and does all the calculations based on the databases. Your hit boxes are likely to influence movement and LOS as you've said before being the physical aspects.
Nah, he'll just have to do V3!!!! 🥳🤘 

Sounds like a good plan 👍, plus you can have them smouldering or just sulking. There are plenty of Panther marks that weren't used so it's a great use of them, plus you can always repurpose a later version model to something like a D if you want it to look like say a late G.
Like the way it's sitting on it's suspension as well!

Okay so I've now had a look at the factory model to see if I can use that as a stoke house to go with the chimney - what a hot mess that model is. Looks like it was made as an after thought, quite a lot of stuff not really finished properly and actually a few missing textures as well as some incomplete materials. I have done some repair work, it's still not 100% perfectly functioning, there are issues with the damaged stages since it's missing correct internal textures and I have no idea what needs to be done to make this right. Luckily I was able to repeat some of the external walls for the internal walls so that it at least has windows in roughly the right positions inside.
Since it was aligned at 45 degrees I thought I'd have a go at making it sit square, not a good idea, all sorts of odd stuff starts to happen - walls popping in and out of view, shadows where they shouldn't be, access issues, and pixeltruppen floating in mid air outside the building when supposedly inside. So we won't go there.
As of now we have a factory with a big f*ck-off chimney as a building that can be used (no access to the chimney) and which behaves pretty much as expected bar one or two glitches with destroyed walls and a missing ceiling at the top level - I've done a bit of a Fred Dibna and blown it up a few times, takes quite a bit of HE before it disappears with a mighty big crash ...

I found a few more factories on your map ...


Butted up to a large complex it's quite convincing. The facade and roof will change to match location so you might want to make some Berlin textures; in these images it's using the [germany] tagged set. The brickwork on the chimney itself is a bit over sized at the moment.

Battersea-am-Spree
I'll see if I can fix the missing ceiling/floor and add a broken ladder to the chimney.

It's the curse of humanity to keep producing a never ending stream of absolute tossers who somehow seem to persuade enough people that they have something good to offer when in reality they are just snake oil salesmen ... we never learn.
Anyway let's hope this latest rash of the world's biggest wankers is nearly done so that we can all get some peace for a while.
Yes save your sanity for crunching that metadata!

Spot on thanks  I've installed and playing through an old save of KG von Schroif
EDIT To Add: That does the trick! I mounted up a load of tracks and sent em into the valley of death. overall MG gunners have a greater survivability now and the MG firing tracks are way more of a threat to enemy infantry. I started losing gunners only at close range - like 100m or so.
Off we go - like how the passengers are huddled lower.

Engaging - note how close to the foxholes this track is and note the Soviet soldiers running off. Gunner was nailed not long after but notcied all the gunners made it a lot closer to an enemy position before I started seeing hits.