Nuke question....

[stratr1]

I would like to "enhance" the look of the nuke in BZ2. I am running PB 1.3.6.2 on a Win 7 machine and using the PAK Explorer. Poked around in patch13.pak, went to effects, and got kinda lost in there. Any tips or help would be greatly appreciated, and yes I know to back up files b4 I alter them. I am trying to get the nuke (without using a MOD) to look more realistic, mushroom cloud, more fire, etc..

Again, any advice on what to alter, and more importantly what to change it to would be very helpful!

[Nielk1]

By nuke do you refer to the Day Wrecker dropped from the bomber? Sadly any complex effect changes would not be MP safe. Best you can do and be MP safe is swap textures and sounds.

[stratr1]

Yes I do mean the Day Wrecker dropped from the bomber. What I need to know is what to change and what to change it to. I only play IA games, so MP is not an issue, and I always backup files anyway in case I do decide to play MP.

I used to have a guide that told me what starting color, ending color, radius, light, etc., to get a nice mushroom cloud, and some nice fire, but over the years I have misplaced it.

[Zero Angel]

The bomber object tree looks like this
ibbomb (Bomber Bay) -> ivbomb (Bomber) -> apwrck (Daywrecker Bomb) -> xbmbxpl (Explosion for Daywrecker)

xbmbxpl.odf is the file you want to edit. To test it out place apwrck (the bomb) in the editor and observe the explosion it makes.

Getting it to look exactly the way you want will take a lot of time and experimentation as you will need to play around with the effect and texture settings. A lot of modding experts become good at creating effects but it takes time to develop skill in that area. I know I wouldn't want to create a nuke explosion for as experienced as I am with ODF tinkering, that would probably take an hour of my time. (more time if I knew less about editing effects)

[stratr1]

Wow... ty for taking the time to let me know all that info! One quick question though, when I put apwrck into the editor, how do I make it explode? Also, the PAK Explorer doesn't seem to be saving my changes.

[Zax]

Have you tried using the detonator?

[Nielk1]

NEVER edit a PAK unless you made it. Place your custom files in addon or make your own PAK or folder and add it to the bzone.cfg or make your own cfg and launch it via: "bzone.exe /config myconfig.cfg".

apwrck explodes on contact. It follows the logic of a powerup for most of it.

[Feared_1]

The editor basically pauses the game, so when you place apwrck, it will not explode because it has not moved. Once you close the editor, it should explode immediately. Don't place it too close to yourself

[Red Spot]

Like N1 said, it only xplodes on contact. So place it high enough in the air and play chicken with it once it comes down

[Zero Angel]

As NK1 says, not a good idea to overwrite your pak files. Best to just extract the assets you want, then perhaps save them into a subfolder in the "Addon" folder. Then move that subfolder outside of addon when you want to play multiplayer with others.

[Nielk1]

As a side note, editing a file in the PAK Explorer simply extracts it into your temporary files and edits it there. If you save it, you are just saving to the temporary copy and it will at some point get cleaned out. The file name might even be random, haven't checked.

[stratr1]

Thank you all for your input, I am now able to edit the Nuke successfully! I DO wish I had that guide back now though, so I would know what things to change and what to change them to.

At the moment, I am able to make a huge fire dome like thing around the explosion, can change the radius, etc., but no mushroom cloud yet.

[Zax]

You mean this nuke?

[stratr1]

Well, that is more than I would need, but if I could get a guide on how to do that mushroom cloud, I would be happy!

Even just a small one (mushroom cloud).

[Zax]

Download SRV and poke around learn from but do not steal the assets. bzscrap.org is your friend.