Kexikus 994 Posted October 19, 2016 So, now that I'm finally back to modding I decided to complete a mod that I started quite some time ago but never finished because it requires editing of KotOR models and I've never done that before. But now I grabbed gmax and nwnmax and gave it a shot. Sadly that didn't really work, which is why I made this thread hoping that somebody can help me. Thanks to Quanons quick tutorial I was able to get the model into gmax without problems and to see if everything is working I wanted to just export the original model without making any changes. So I selected the AuroraBase and hit "Export Geom only". That was followed by a pop-up warning saying that a sanity check failed. I decided to ignore this and went ahead with the export (which actually worked) and then used mdlops to get the .mdl and .mdx file. I placed those in my Override folder and launched TSL to see if it worked. Now, the model I used (which is also one of those I want to edit in the end) is 222TEL15.mdl. This is the skybox/backdrop for the cutscene of Carth/Cede arriving for the Battle of Telos and includes a star background as well as one texture for the planet Telos and a second one for the atmospheric glow. With this "new" model, the stars were missing and the "sky" was completely black. Also, only the atmospheric glow but no planet was visible. Thus I assumed that the failed sanity check was more important than I had hoped. I went ahead and opened the sanity log file which told me that several vertices need to be welded. Since I don't really have any experience with 3d models I probably screwed something up in my attempt to fix that, but I'll describe it anyway. I checked which objects got this error message and in gmax converted them to editable meshes so that I could access the vertices. Then I selected all the vertices for an object and welded them. This probably worked since I got no error message. And after I did that to all objects, I once again exported the model by selecting the AuroraBase and pressing "Export Geom only". This time I got no "sanity check failed" message and the model was exported. After creating the .mdl and .mdx I put them in the Override and launched the game again. Sadly everything got even worse since the skybox/backdrop now is completely black and I'm out of ideas on why this keeps happening. I would assume that I'm doing something wrong in the process of exporting the model, but I have no idea what and wasn't able to find any clues online either, so any help would be very appreciated. Thanks Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
DeadMan 103 Posted October 19, 2016 I may be wrong, but I thought that MDLOps can't properly convert area models and you need to use kAurora for that. Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Sithspecter 909 Posted October 19, 2016 Alright, what you're running into here are limitations from the tools we use. The issue is that the tools we use are essentially a one-way-flow. Meaning, you can create areas in 3DSMax with lightmaps and everything, and export them to binary files through a modified NWMax and KAurora, but the tools can't take the binary files and produce a complete ASCII file. Likely, there are important properties of these meshes that are being lost as soon as they touch MDLOps. You can try importing it with MDLOps 0.6a, which retains a few more properties. But I suspect there may be lightmaps involved, which none of our tools can successfully import from the game. The sanity check basically determines if a mesh has 2 vertexes occupying the same location, but shouldn't have a large negative effect on the game. Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Kexikus 994 Posted October 19, 2016 I tried the KAurora method, but that changed nothing on the outcome. The model still looked the same in-game. So I fear it comes down to what Sithspecter (and Quanon via PM) suggested: It's probably a lightmap issue... which is kinda annoying :/ If that's the case I think it might be easier to just use placeables to add the stuff I want to add. Or are there any major downsides to that? Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Sithspecter 909 Posted October 19, 2016 You could probably add the model in the layout and vis file, if you can produce a model with the correct look. Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Kexikus 994 Posted November 1, 2016 After only two weeks I figured out why all of this did not work... and it turns out that the reason was simply my stupidity. To be more precise: I had exported this model (222TEL15) several months ago so when I found the 222TEL15_ascii.mdl file I figured that this would be what I created with mdlops and what I should work with. As I described before this resulted in a (mostly) black model when put back into the game. So today I decided to simply try another model I want to edit anyway. So I went ahead and extracted the Peragus skybox and it turns out that KotOR Tool creates ascii versions of the model when batch exporting them and when using those the model appears black ingame. But when you just export .mdl and .mdx manually and then use mdlops to convert it to ascii before loading it to 3ds Max (I assume it's the same with gmax) the model works perfectly. And that took only two frustrating weeks to figure out... Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Fair Strides 509 Posted November 1, 2016 Don't quote me, but if you take the mdlops.exe and the icon from your local setup and copy those to your KT folder, KT should use that updated version instead. Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Sithspecter 909 Posted November 1, 2016 Don't quote me, but if you take the mdlops.exe and the icon from your local setup and copy those to your KT folder, KT should use that updated version instead. 2 Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Fair Strides 509 Posted November 2, 2016 Don't quote me, but if you take the mdlops.exe and the icon from your local setup and copy those to your KT folder, KT should use that updated version instead. *sigh*... You a**hole. Couldn't quote me for truth, but had to quote me just because I said not to... Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Sithspecter 909 Posted November 2, 2016 *sigh*... You a**hole. Couldn't quote me for truth, but had to quote me just because I said not to... Quoted and put in my signature. And that's a very nasty name! Wash your mouth out with soap, sir! But I can verify that statement... Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Darth Apathicus 1 Posted July 21, 2017 Hi i'm new to all this. I was able to take the mdl file into gmax with nwmax, but when i try to export it everything goes "fine", i select the aurora base, export geom only, it pops the sanity check failed, click yes and then it finishes, but the new mdl is nowhere to be found. Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
bead-v 251 Posted July 21, 2017 You need to use nwmax.exe to run gmax instead of gmax.exe. That'll make it actually write out the mdl. You'll probably run into issues after that though... Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Darth Apathicus 1 Posted July 22, 2017 You need to use nwmax.exe to run gmax instead of gmax.exe. That'll make it actually write out the mdl. You'll probably run into issues after that though... Thank you very much i will try it that way 1 Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
