Model editing possible ?

:)Hi there alltogether - the few, who stick to REALISTIC spacef(l)ight:D

I've been around a lot of space sims, always looking for something realistic in spaceflying and atmospheric in gameplay. And something that can be continued somehow after finishing the purchased storyline, mean that can be modded and added to.
After looking around the most active communities, Freelancer and ,bursting by activity, FreeSpace 2, I rediscovered my old EOC-discs and was ashamed by my flying abilities, brought down by the too-easy-to-fly game engines mentioned above.

But these games have a big advantage: it'damned easy to start changing things by yourself: editing weapons and ships to your taste, even creating compltely new ones and getting them into game as an addition, retexturing, remoddeling hardware, making new mission and even complete campaigns with cutscenes (rearranged) and briefings... and so on.
This is seems mostly due to BIG communities, which created not only mission- and campaignmods, ship- and weaponmods the dozens to count, all of this rearrangeable into numberless variations of your favorit gameplay, but also created easy-to-use AND (mostly free) to obtain tools and helping programs, which get you started.

Well, this blubbering is all about one question:
Is there a tool around to edit ship models for EOC, their textures, their hardpoints and so on, WITHOUT the need for lightwave or max3ds or all the other moneyintense programs ?[?]

There is.

Firstly textures can be edited using any program capable of using .iff files. You just need to convert the .ftu and ftc files to iff. Then save new textures as iff files. The game can read and use those.

Hardpoints etc. can be modified by hand using a text editor. I did all my original model tweaking by hand. It was difficult, and time consuming, but it worked. Then I got lightwave and it became a lot easier.

Models themselves could not be edited without some sort of modelling program. At the very least you would need some version of lightwave, maya, or 3ds etc. Old ones can work fine though.

I think I will put a link to all the modeling files I use currently. Jasper, of this forum, made an incredible set of tools for access the games texture and 3dmodels. Without them I couldn't do half the stuff I am doing.

I also agree with all you said. If it is easy to get started modding more people do it. So I need to help people like yourself get a foot in the door. Or find easy access to some of the tools I am using. I shall do so very soon.

OK,
found the .ini files for the ships and started changing some bits 'n pieces, but came across one problem:

Is it possible to change the nature of hardpoints without editing the model with a modeling-program ?
i.e. changing a cargo_dockport to a mountpoint_pylon, or an external weapon_mountpoint to a turret-mountpoint just by text editing an .ini, or two, or three by renaming ?

What I am thinking of is i.e by the League "modified" freighter with some turret_fighters as a cheap and "handmade" own battlecarrier, eventually with a few additional assault_cannon_turrets.
(Wouldn' it be NICE to see something like that in a spacebattle?[}]

Yes, you just modify their lws files (lightwave scene files)

The sticky at the top of this thread is full of very valuable information about all aspects of models, textures etc.

However, to just point you in the right direction, Lets take a look at a ship ini file:

[Avatar]
name=lws:/avatars/Truck/setup_player

[CollisionHull]
name=collision_hull:/collisionhulls/truck_hull

[SetupScene]
name=lws:/sims/ships/player/player_truck

[Subsims]

; Dockports
template[0]=ini:/subsims/dockports/universal_port
null[0]=dockport

; Permanent systems
template[1]=ini:/subsims/systems/player/powerplant_truck
template[2]=ini:/subsims/systems/player/life_support_class_1
null[2]=crew


Therre are actually two lws files referenced. The first is for the Avatar, or representation of the ship. That is what you use to actually put the model(s) into the game. The second, referred to at [SetupScene] sets up various systems, mountpoints, weapons etc. For example, looking down a little we see:
template[0]=ini:/subsims/dockports/universal_port
null[0]=dockport

This is telling the game that a universal port, defined in the ini file located at /subsims/dockports/universal_port.ini is located at null called 'dockport', which can then be found in the lws file referred to in the [SetupScene]. There is no positional or rotational information in the ship ini file, because it is all held in the SetupScene. If you want to move around mountpoints or change hardpoints, dockports etc, you need to use that file.


Looking at an entry in the lightwave Setupscene file, we have the following:

AddNullObject crew
ShowObject 8 7
ObjectMotion (unnamed)
9
1
-1 2.9035 15.29271 0 0 0 1 1 1
0 0 0 0 0
EndBehavior 1
ShadowOptions 7

This line
-1 2.9035 15.29271 0 0 0 1 1 1
controls the position, rotation, and scale of the object or null. I believe the first three are x,y and z, and the 4th 5th and 6th control various rotational axis. The final three control scale.

Just for understanding.
I can't change a given "representaion" in the model to something other?

For example, I have something like this

; Dockports
template[0]=ini:/subsims/dockports/cargo_port
null[0]=cargo_dock1
template[1]=ini:/subsims/dockports/cargo_port
null[1]=cargo_dock2
template[2]=ini:/subsims/dockports/cargo_port
null[2]=cargo_dock3
.
.
.
template[19]=ini:/subsims/dockports/cargo_port
null[19]=cargo_dock20
template[20]=ini:/subsims/dockports/unload_port
null[20]=dockport

; Systems
template[21]=ini:/subsims/systems/nonplayer/nps_lds_freighter
null[21]=lds_drive
template[22]=ini:/subsims/systems/nonplayer/nps_autorepair_basic
template[23]=ini:/subsims/systems/nonplayer/nps_capsule_drive
null[23]=capsule_drive
template[24]=ini:/subsims/systems/nonplayer/nps_crew
null[24]=crew

Now I erase some of the dockports and add something new, getting:

; Dockports
template[0]=ini:/subsims/dockports/cargo_port
null[0]=cargo_dock1
template[1]=ini:/subsims/dockports/cargo_port
null[1]=cargo_dock2
template[2]=ini:/subsims/dockports/cargo_port
null[2]=cargo_dock3
.
.
.
template[15]=ini:/subsims/dockports/cargo_port
null[15]=cargo_dock20
template[16]=ini:/subsims/dockports/unload_port
null[16]=dockport

; Systems
template[17]=ini:/subsims/systems/nonplayer/nps_lds_freighter
null[17]=lds_drive
template[18]=ini:/subsims/systems/nonplayer/nps_autorepair_basic
template[19]=ini:/subsims/systems/nonplayer/nps_capsule_drive
null[19]=capsule_drive
template[20]=ini:/subsims/systems/nonplayer/nps_crew
null[20]=crew

; Weapons
template[21]=ini:/subsims/systems/nonplayer/nps_heavy_pbc
null[21]=cargo_dock2
template[22]=ini:/subsims/systems/nonplayer/nps_heavy_pbc
null[22]=cargo_dock7
template[23]=ini:/subsims/systems/nonplayer/nps_turret_cannon_wide
null[23]=cargo_dock12
template[24]=ini:/subsims/systems/nonplayer/nps_turret_cannon_wide
null[24]=cargo_dock17

Would this be possible ?
(Perhaps with taking the matching null numbers for the mentioned dockports ?)

Basically, the ini file says 'What' is to be on the ship, and the lws file says 'Where' and in what rotation that thing will be. The actual names of nulls are only relevant in that they connect entries in the ini with entries in the lws file.

So what you described above may work. However, you can't be certain of the rotation of anything. So you might try to have a weapon placed at the location of a cargo_dock, but if the rotation is wrong the weapons will actually be inside the ship, so you won't see it when you load the game, and thus may get a little confused.

Also, always be sure tht templates and nulls have a consecutive order. If there is a gap, the following templates and nulls will be ignored.