Beam Weapon Modding

[vonfrank]

Is anyone aware of a comprehensive beam weapon modding guide available anywhere?

There seem to be so many options for the visual elements of a beam weapon within a ship's hardpoint, and it is difficult to figure out what each one does.

For example, here are the relevant entries in a beam weapon property that control it's appearance:

Code: [Select]

ForwardPhaser1.SetPhaserTextureStart(0)
ForwardPhaser1.SetPhaserTextureEnd(0)
ForwardPhaser1.SetPhaserWidth(0.300000)
kColor = App.TGColorA()
kColor.SetRGBA(1.000000, 0.200000, 0.200000, 0.500000)
ForwardPhaser1.SetOuterShellColor(kColor)
kColor.SetRGBA(1.000000, 0.200000, 0.200000, 0.500000)
ForwardPhaser1.SetInnerShellColor(kColor)
kColor.SetRGBA(1.000000, 0.800000, 0.800000, 1.000000)
ForwardPhaser1.SetOuterCoreColor(kColor)
kColor.SetRGBA(1.000000, 0.800000, 0.800000, 1.000000)
ForwardPhaser1.SetInnerCoreColor(kColor)
ForwardPhaser1.SetNumSides(6)
ForwardPhaser1.SetMainRadius(0.060000)
ForwardPhaser1.SetTaperRadius(0.010000)
ForwardPhaser1.SetCoreScale(0.500000)
ForwardPhaser1.SetTaperRatio(0.250000)
ForwardPhaser1.SetTaperMinLength(5.000000)
ForwardPhaser1.SetTaperMaxLength(30.000000)
ForwardPhaser1.SetLengthTextureTilePerUnit(0.010000)
ForwardPhaser1.SetPerimeterTile(1.000000)
ForwardPhaser1.SetTextureSpeed(25.000000)
ForwardPhaser1.SetTextureName("data/phaser.tga")
I'm trying to make phasers that look as 'screen accurate' as possible and it is proving to be a difficult task. If anyone has any suggestions, tips, documentation on each of the above functions, or even values that work well for them, feel free to share them here.

[King Class Scout]

SFRD was working on a standardization set for ALL it's mods back in the day.  it was partially enabled and set up as part of our slated last releases right before tiq passed.  a lot of the emphasis had gone into Torpedo appearance and upgrading beam damage to cope with modern ships at the time, and I was working to compile a color standard set myself for beams (which I didn't get to complete because of my crash)

I believe our standardization sheet is on here, and still available.

[KrrKs]

hm, SDK just has this to say:

Colors: Here you can specify the colors for the phaser effect.
Sides, Main radius, Taper radius, Core scale, Taper ratio, Taper min length, Taper max length, length texture tile/unit, perimeter tile, texture speed, texture name: These all specify how the phaser should look. Most of them are somewhat self-explanatory, so it is recommended that you just experiment with these values.

From my Memory (So most likely wrong  ):

• Texture start and end control the ingame length of the texture, i.e., over how many game units it is stretched
• Width: No idea anymore. IIRC the actual with is controlled by the radius parameters. This might be the glow radius
• Shell and Core colours: IIRC Core colours control the actual beam colour, e.g., inner one yellow, outer orange for 24th century Fed phasers. The Shell colours are used as 'glow' and illumination source around each of the core components.
• Num Sides: The angles of the beam glow, i.e, how smooth/round it looks. Six is perfectly fine, unless you are watching the receiving end of an oversized beam.
• Main Radius and Core Scale: AFAIK the radius of the outerCore and the scale (do'h) of the inner core. I.e., a Core Scale of .33 means that a third of the beam is the inner core, the rest outer core (colour).
• Taper stuff: No Idea. But likely used at the ends of the beams, where they need to widen or narrow down to hit smaller craft
• LengthTextureTilePerUnit:  Maybe this controls what I thought texture start and end are?
• TextureSpeed: Controls how fast the beam texture 'moves' from the origin along the beam.

But the SDK is right, the best thing to do is experiment with those values to find out what looks good.

[King Class Scout]

another thing we need to fix is the "burst" textures on ships like the Baz variants on TMP and JJ ships.  As one of the few without an aftermarket graphics card, my burst textures tend to become completely invisible after only 2 or 3 play sessions without turning the computer off completely for a full cache reset.  I have too many TMPs with these beam textures to hand tweak the whole lot.  I also have a custom "wave" tile for my own ships that, while a continuous piece, tends to blank out to a completely straight plain beam very quickly.

[Lurok91]

Jimmy and I did A LOT of phaser/beam/projectile script modification in the SPMod to make more canon than the original game scripts. Might be worthwhile checking out 

[CMDR CHESS]

OTher than the Phaser.tga I have pretty good setting on the hardpoint to help, I hope. Look at attachment.