Making Seasonal/Timed Props

[Diggis]

Yeah, there are 3 different options:

Day and Night
Time of Day
Time of year (which is actually not tied to the year, but to an assigned number of days before it repeats.  365 days, makes it repeat each year)

I'll say this to you David, as I'd say it to anyone else... Did you read the tutorial Smoncrie posted?  It's in the first section. 

[RippleJet]

I'll say this to you David, as I'd say it to anyone else... Did you read the tutorial Smoncrie posted?  It's in the first section. 

I'm pretty sure David read the tutorial before asking his question...

He was asking about effects, and unfortunately my take on it is that they cannot be timed.
Effects are referred to by their Visual Effect Name, not by a Resource Key Type.
Thus you cannot use a RKT4 to time them...

I'll say this to you Shaun, as I'd say it to anyone else... Did you read what David posted? 

[BarbyW]

Some effects can be made as timed props. I did it with a fountain effect for the Maison de Maitre so it was on in the summer and off in the winter. I'm not sure how many others can be modded though.

[RippleJet]

Some effects can be made as timed props. I did it with a fountain effect for the Maison de Maitre so it was on in the summer and off in the winter. I'm not sure how many others can be modded though.

I guess David needs to do some testing then...

Maybe the Time of Day property can be used with any props, regardless of them being RKT4 or not...

[BarbyW]

All I did was to take a copy of the Small Fountain A from the simcity_1.dat file and add the appropriate timings to it. This is the exemplar information - the exemplar is in BSC MEGA Props swi21 vol01.

[dedgren]

Shaun, my great friend- LOL!  Actually, I had not read smoncrie's tutorial (and thank you for pointing me at it), but as was subsequently noted, I was particularly wondering about "effects" props, as I have gotten pretty good at fiddling with the normal kind.  I had this nagging thought that I had read somewhere that effects props have additional limitations, such as not being able to be made ploppable.  Anyway, don't ever hesitate to apply the mallet to me- chances are that I have probably overlooked the obvious.

Tage and Barby:  You folks are the greatest.  Over the weekend, I'll spend some time with what you've come up with and let everyone know what I've found.


David

[RippleJet]

I'm looking forward to what you find out, David!

Shaun, my great friend- LOL!  Actually, I had not read smoncrie's tutorial (and thank you for pointing me at it)

Lucky you, Shaun!

[dedgren]

If folks have been watching over at 3RR, you've seen these.





The first pic is the normal state.  The game's "SmallFountainC" effect prop makes a nice ground hugging steam plume.  The second pic shows the eruption state.  "SmallFountainA" makes for a nice small geyser- I'd guess with a max eruption height of about 25 or 30 feet/7.5 to 9 meters, which is a pretty nicely scaled RL size.  Here's a Yellowstone geyser of comparable eruption scale for comparison.


Great Fountain Geyser, YNP  1997
Used under Creative Commons License [linkie]

I plan to do a short tutorial over the weekend, but will note that Barby (BarbyW) nailed it.  Of course, what else would we have expected?


David

[RippleJet]

I plan to do a short tutorial over the weekend, but will note that Barby (BarbyW) nailed it.  Of course, what else would we have expected?

I think she's tried most you can accomplish by now... ...and even most things you cannot accomplish!

[BarbyW]

 

[thingfishs]

(This topic hasn't been posted in in a long time, but as my question relates to the tutorial posted by smoncrie at the beginning of this thread it seemed the most appropriate place, please move it if it's not )

I have been following smoncrie's tutorial on making seasonal props but have hit a wall. I am making a seasonal vineyard, I went though the steps for step C (For Time of Year Changes Only...) put it in game, nothing happened and then I thought, "I haven't told it what to do at that time". There doesn't seem to be the info that I'm after in there. I'm guessing it's just an 0 somewhere for off or something; or equally likely I'm missing something else entirely, but in game the vines are present all year round.

One thing I did find confusing in the tutorial was the first step in each part of section C:
      "Right-click on the left side of reader's main window (the part that
      is displaying the exemplar) and select "add property".  Another
      property window will pop up."

For me it's the right side of reader's main window that gives me the option of "add property", the left side displays a long list of other commands? Also when you go through the process on the right side (which is how I did it), does it matter which item in the list is highlighted when you click? (because you can't right click in the window without selecting something, it seems).

Also ripplejet indicates in the second post that the (at that time) upcoming "X Tool" may be better for the job. Is this the SC4Tool? Is there a guide to using it for this process?

thanks.

[Andreas]

Creating seasonal props with SC4PIM works pretty well indeed, but you still have to apply some manual steps. Ideally, you should have prepared a regular prop exemplar file for the prop that you want to make seasonal, and an existing seasonal prop from where you can copy the needed properties. Put both in a folder and start SC4PIM with this folder only, so you don't get loads of unneeded files in the list, and open both files in a new tab (press CTRL while clicking on the list entries).

Assuming you already have created a prop exemplar file for your new seasonal prop, the first step is changing the Resource Key Type 1 property into a Resource Key Type 4 property. This is as simple as right-clicking and selecting "Convert to RKT4". Now you need to copy the properties for seasonal props from the existing seasonal prop exemplar file: "Simulator Date Interval", which usually has the value 16D (365 days), "Simulator Date Duration" (if you choose equal time ranges for all four seasons, this would be 91 or 92 days), and "Simulator Date Start" with the month and day when the prop should show up the first time. You can enter the values both in decimal and hexadecimal format, SC4PIM will convert them automatically to hexadecimal values.

Save the prop exemplar file, and you're basically done already. If SC4PIM doesn't let you copy properties, you can also use the Reader, where you can apply the same steps, with the minor inconvenience to convert the hex values manually, and creating the Resource Key Type 4 property manually as well (as described in one of the postings of this thread). SC4Tool isn't really designed for this kind of modding, though, but you should be able to copy and edit properties with it as well, if you like.

[thingfishs]

Thanks for that Andreas

I don't completely follow you though, this is my first time playing around with any of this stuff (not to mention windows itself), and there's many terms and so forth that I'm still struggling to get my head around. What I edited previously was the .desc file with reader, but in PIMX/SC4PIM (that's another confusing thing, it seems to be called different things by different people), I can't see where I access the .desc.



If I right click on the model file nothing happens. I know this is simple stuff but at this point the term exemplar being thrown around so freely is making my head hurt.

What I have are vines (gmax>PIM) in three states, spring/summer (green), autumn (yellow), and winter (bare). I know this can't be achieved with one prop but my understanding is I just have to place another prop on top and adjust them accordingly. But in this case I have three props, do I put all three on top of each other and adjust them? Sorry for the confusion, once I get my head around the basic flow I'll be fine.

(I also apologise if these answers are already here somewhere, I really just need some direct guidance here)

[Andreas]

Well, if you never used SC4PIM before, you should read BarbyW's excellent user guide first. It has loads of screenshots and explains every single step how to make a prop out of a model file and do some basic modding. Sure, it's quite a lot to learn, so take your time - but I assume most of your questions will be answered after going through the process.

[cogeo]

Take a look at my Spirulina Farms pack (LEX and STEX). It contains some props (the tubs) that change over yearly cycles. There are two kinds of tubs, the small ones which display two models each (and switch them) and the large ones which display more than two models; this actually requires making multiple prop exemplars, each one visible during certain periods of the year (of course you need to stack them in LE)

[thingfishs]

Thanks guys,

I'm still not getting much of this. I loaded your spirulina farms into the SC4PIM cogeo but didn't really know how to learn from it.

I've followed the relevant sections (I think) in Barby's user guide:

"To make a basic growable lot" and "Making changes to the exemplar properties (otherwise known as Modding a lot). "

But I'm still not seeing how this helps make it seasonal, please excuse my denseness. I've turned the model file into a growable LOT, Then I have recomputed it as an agricultural field, (leaving the filling degree and lot size alone for now) and saved it. Now what? Is there another section in the guide relating to making things seasonal?

I also tried following your earlier advice Andreas (convert to RKT4 etc) but couldn't work out how to copy the properties from the previous exemplar. Also in Barby's guide it said that I could right-click and choose the tileset but I was presented with that command.

thanks.

[cogeo]

There are no seasonal farm-fields actually, there are just farm-fields with seasonal props.

To make seasonal props there are some properties in the prop exemplar which you have to set. The tutorial explains things very well. The properties you have to set for props that change yearly are: (I have also added my own explanation)

- Simulator Date Interval: the duration of the cycle in days. Set it to 0x0000016E (=366).
- Simulator Date Duration: how long the model is displayed (or the alternative model is displayed).
- Simulator Date Start: month and day to start displaying the model, eg for 1st of March set it to 0x03, 0x01.

Then you have to set the Resource Key Type 4 property (RippleJet describes it in detail in the previous page in this thread). If you reference one model (8 bytes), it will be turned on and off periodically, if you reference two models (16 bytes), the models will be alternated. So if you only have two models to display, the 2nd method is preferable, as you need to make only one prop exemplar. If you have more than two models, you have to use the first method, make as many prop exemplars as the number of models, and set the Simulator Date Duration properties so that when the 1st model disappears, the 2nd one is displayed and so on (of course you have to stack them in LE).

[thingfishs]

okay, thanks a lot for that rundown cogeo, with repetition comes learning

(in regards to learning this stuff I am my own worst enemy: I excelled in english & art at school not maths and science, and as a result I'm unduly intimidated by numbers. But with a little patience I will get it, thanks again for your help)

Still not home though. I'll list step by step what I'm doing.

1. I've rendered the vines in gmax and turned them into props with the PIM.

2. I've opened them in reader and with the aid of the tutorial and your previous comments cogeo, I have set the simulator start, duration & interval properties.

[At this point I'm just using two of the three versions, Autumn & Spring/Summer - hereby A & S/S. They both have interval set to 366 days. Currently they are set to the Southern Hemisphere seasons but I know that will have to be changed to whatever it is in SC. So the S/S one has it's simulator start set to 09,1 (then automatically changed to hex) for September the 1st) The A one has a start date of 03,1 for the 1st of March. S/S has a duration of 183 days and A has a duration of 92 days.]

3. Then I have opened them in the SC4PIM and dragged the model files (one at a time) onto the Ordinary Prop/ Other Ordinary Prop bit. Then I right clicked and selected "convert to RKT4"

4. I've opened them up in the LE and placed the two modified props on top of each other on a grass LOT.

The result...



They are not yet changing at all and for some reason appear as they do above. What am I missing?

[cogeo]

If the Simulator Date etc properties and RKT4 are set correctly, it should work.

Don't know. Maybe send me the propfiles and the lot along with the (exported) models, to take a look.

(guess some mod will have to move these last few posts to another thread, it's going beyond the scope of this tutorial thread)