Custom 3D Models and Mods Compilation

[Aquila-SmartWargames]

In the course of dozen playthroughs and experiments with Blender/CM2 Tools (http://community.battlefront.com/topic/118928-combat-mission-modding-tools/) several assets were created which I want to share with the community:

Big Cargo Ship

 

BF109

 

Radar Station

 

Downed Blackhawk

 

Fire Truck

 

Ambulance

 

Barricade + optional Smoke/Burn Stash (Wreck, an invisible alternative is created by 37MM)

 

Barricade (three sizes)

 

Humvee V3 Woodland (Randomized Gear)

 

Humvee V3 Desert (Randomized Gear)

 

Humvee V2 Geardo Desert (Permanent Full Gear) 

 

AFRICAN UNCON (now also including conventional African Forces conversion by 37MM, original work by MikeyD) 

 

Falklands War Scorpion, Scimitar, and Argentinian LVTP-7 conversion

 

Makeshift VBIED

 

Humvee Wreck

 

Uncaged M2 Stryker

 

Marines to Army Special Forces or Navy SEALS conversion skins (including work of mjkerner, Combatinfman, Blimey)

 

BMP1/2 to BMD1/2 conversion (with corrected hatches)

 

Desert KAMAZ Skin

 

Marines frankensteined Armored MTVR Skin

 

New Syrian Special Forces and Woodland vehicles (based on the work of various modders)

 

Syrian Winter Mod (just terrain and partial "winterization" of vehicles, created for a Hasrabit Campaign playthrough)

 

PK Pickup to PK UAZ conversion

 

Russian Forces (original work Euroscape + various modders)

 

US Army & Marines Woodland Forces (original work Euroscape + various modders)

 

All these mods and many more can be found in this Dropbox:
https://www.dropbox.com/sh/1tviryry89g6py7/AAAJpSvGH6u1iEx4WzwVLSnJa?dl=0

Credits to modders, 3D-Artists, and Battlefront.

For better quality footage and more information about 3D custom models check out the recent videos & descpriptions here:

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCeK7fSyoEE8aorVLlVfNcAQ

The custom flavor objects have a "crate1" box placed into their center. Click it to interact with its placing. Zoom into the model if difficult. There are some FOV issues with bigger flavor objects can perhaps fixed by making the original "crate1" box bigger in Blender/CM2tools. Combine flavor objects with "visible/invisible" wreck objects to give them obstacle characteristics.

Good free library of 3D models you could use for importing. .max does not work with Blender. There are others.
http://www.cadnav.com/

Tutorials on Blender and CM2Tools can be found here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lkbTOSIrNV0&feature=youtu.be
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MXVAMaELSao&feature=youtu.be

The main intent was to explore the possibilities of this method. As I see this as accomplished I´ll step back now and hope it will motivate others to get into it. Prior getting into custom CM models I had absolute zero experience in 3D modelling, Blender or whatever but found my way into it in a short period of time and once you figure out the specifics it is not that difficult. Give it a try.  Anyone interested in custom CM models can reach out on Discord.

Happy wargaming.

Edited July 18, 2019 by Aquila-CM

[Mord]

HOLY MUTHER #$%^&# @#*^!!!! A SHIP?! A HELICOPTER?! UNREAL! INCREDIBLE! That's beyond anything I ever thought possible! GREAT WORK, man! I am blown away! Truly a massive evolution in mods! I am running out of exclamation points!

 

Mord.

Edited July 18, 2019 by Mord

[Mord]

The radar station gave me chills. These are just beyond words. The vids dropped my jaw on the floor. This is friggin' next level stuff. You have floored me.

 

Mord.

Edited July 18, 2019 by Mord

[Sgt.Squarehead]

Magnificent.....You sir, are a fekkin genius! 

Huge thanks for your help with our 'Heaven & Earth' project. 

PS - @The Steppenwulf, @JulianJ, @MOS:96B2P, @sbobovyc.....Have you guys seen this stuff? 

Edited July 18, 2019 by Sgt.Squarehead

[Glubokii Boy]

holy smoke, man !!!

looks amazing...

[JM Stuff]

Holy crap !! I see a lot of HOPE for futurs mods !!!

I love really the "unknow vehicles" wiht armour plate this let me thinking about the Bakan with the Croatian Army in the 90' also the wrecks are interresting...welcome Aquila-CM 

[Aquila-SmartWargames]

You can use these to basically replace any mdr object in the game including flavor objects or vehicles. This means you can "fire and drive" flavor objects basically like shown here with the cargo ship:

This was just a quick test done replacing the BMP2 amphibious APC with the Cargo Ship. It doesn´t make much sense realism wise with such huge ships but could open some options for combined arms including armed forces supported by naval boats (torpedo/gunboats, destroyers). By shore marsh tile placement you could "lock out" the amphibious vehicles from coming to land and other solution for full naval action would be of course to mirror the terrain tiles i.e. turning land into water and vice versa. I`ll upload the ship for bmp testfile to the dropbox.

When replacing flavor objects its important to keep the draw distance of the original in mind. Replacing the crate1.mdr with the blackhawk isn´t a good idea as it will go invisible to quick. The biggest draw distance is provided by flavor objects such as "street (traffic) lamp" and "shelter" etc. It can also be an alternative to better replace an unimportant vehicle (taxi) and give it a destroyed condition, as vehicles have excellent draw distances.

When replacing vehicles with custom flavor objects (or other mods/vehicles), the associated .lod files also have to be replaced too. A quick fix is simply getting this done by creating copies of the main .mdr file and then add -lod-1 to -lod-4 to them. Not all require 4 of them, I think infantry even can have 5 lod files but I always do 4.

Missing picture from the Syrian Winter Minimod:

Edited July 18, 2019 by Aquila-CM

[JM Stuff]

You seem to manipulate all these tools of the game, like to take your breakfast !

here on the forum you will get a place of first choice and your knowledges will be apreciated and sought...

some good modders will take care of you ... or you will take care of them but I m sure together you will do a good job  hope to see more I have lot of projects, like everybody  ...

[Erwin]

Wow.  Amazing work!  It seems like forever we thought all these graphical things were impossible.

[MOS:96B2P]

6 hours ago, Aquila-CM said:

In the course of dozen playthroughs and experiments with Blender/CM2 Tools (http://community.battlefront.com/topic/118928-combat-mission-modding-tools/) several assets were created which I want to share with the community:    

+2.  Thank you very much.  I've just started to check out all this content and the potential that comes with said content.  Very, very cool.  Thanks again.  When you make the @Mord appear and then also make him run out of exclamation points you know you have created something very cool.  

 

4 hours ago, Sgt.Squarehead said:

PS - @The Steppenwulf, @JulianJ, @MOS:96B2P, @sbobovyc.....Have you guys seen this stuff? 

Thanks for the heads up.  I'm going through it now.................... cool sheet 

[sburke]

I am just speechless. I want that downed Blackhawk and wrecked humvee.., and the cargo ship... and.......

[JulianJ]

Excellent!  Take my hat off to you @Aquila-CMI wanted a ship, because I think port capture scenarios are good, but I only thought in terms of a static one, not a moving vessel!

Brilliant. 

[JulianJ]

Is the barrier an actual barrier that will absorb hits, or is it just a flavour object and not really "there"?

[A Canadian Cat]

11 minutes ago, JulianJ said:

Is the barrier an actual barrier that will absorb hits, or is it just a flavour object and not really "there"?

This is the one down side to creating flavour objects. I always for get if the stop bullets or not. But even if they do it will not be the same as what a real cubic metre of sand would do.

This stuff looks really cool though.

[rocketman]

11 minutes ago, IanL said:

This is the one down side to creating flavour objects. I always for get if the stop bullets or not. But even if they do it will not be the same as what a real cubic metre of sand would do.

This stuff looks really cool though.

You can place some invisible vehicles (it can be done) end to end to have bullets and movement blocked by that BF-109. Waaaaaaaay cooool!

[37mm]

10 minutes ago, IanL said:

This is the one down side to creating flavour objects. I always for get if the stop bullets or not. But even if they do it will not be the same as what a real cubic metre of sand would do.

This stuff looks really cool though.

That's why we have an invisible destroyed (or burning) vehicle in Heaven & Earth.

[A Canadian Cat]

Cool, glad you guys cooked up a solution.

[Glubokii Boy]

Would it be possible to mod WALLS to be invisible also ?

I have not tried to use the invisible vehicle yet but i would imagine that it get somewhat tricky to deploy troops 'close' to the flavoured object (barrier...or whatever) if there is a vehicle placed beside it...It will be sort of a gap beteween the troops and the object...will it not ?

Using walls takes up less space (i belive) and will therefore make it possible to place the troops closer to the flavoured objects one would think...

Also...having the option to use high- or low walls could be usefull thing to simulate different hights of the flavoured objects...

If it works at all to make walls invisible that is...Just a thought.

 

[JulianJ]

@37mmHow do you do that?

[JulianJ]

@RepsolCBRIf you add another alpha channel to the .bmp files (so they are 32 bit not 24 i.e. RGB) it makes things invisible. I've not tried it for walls, but I don't see why it should not work.

[Tashtego]

You sir, are a National Treasure.

[Glubokii Boy]

22 minutes ago, JulianJ said:

@RepsolCBRIf you add another alpha channel to the .bmp files (so they are 32 bit not 24 i.e. RGB) it makes things invisible. I've not tried it for walls, but I don't see why it should not work.

Ahh....cool ! 

Thanks for the answer. 

[Aquila-SmartWargames]

M1 Abrams vs Osa Naval Patrol Vessel:

That ship is rough work but it works. I will upload the complete blender project folder and mdr to the dropbox.

You can basically turn every texture in CM invisible by adding a blank texture. For example the jeeps were designed with 3 randomized spare wheels by using -optiona -optionb -optionc in the editor wich means only ONE will get be displayed. However the third spare got a blank texture so there is a chance that the jeep simply has no spare. As real objects and flavour objects do not collide its possible to combine them to get obstacle characteristics, there are alot of options which just require some creativity. 

Edited July 18, 2019 by Aquila-CM

[JulianJ]

@RepsolCBRIf you are going to play around with walls, could you perhaps do me a favour and see if the alternate numbering that works with buildings works with walls too?

Buildings have alternates eg buildingXXX front (00).bmp    buildingXXX front (01).bmp    are two alternate facades which you click on in the scenario editor. 

I wondered if this actually would work with walls so we could get more choices of texture, but I haven't got round to it. Been rather busy with RL, unfortunately.

Anyway, it would be quite useful to know if you have a moment while you are modding with walls.

[JulianJ]

@Aquila-CMThe patrol boat is pure genius, I love the way it rocks when hit, then sinks - I take it that inside it is an amphibious vehicle?  That is really out-of-the-box thinking and I applaud your creativity.

19 minutes ago, Aquila-CM said:

As real objects and flavour objects do not collide its possible to setup flavor objects with obstalce characteristics, there are alot of options which just require some creativity. 

I don't understand what you mean here - could you explain?