[WIP] [RFC] Dark Talisman FX effect maybe?

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Hello=)
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Joined: 11 Jun 2009, 12:46

[WIP] [RFC] Dark Talisman FX effect maybe?

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What is it?
Attempt to create FX effect shown when Dark Talisman (Item ID 1244 at TMWA) is equipped, inspired by few other "epic" items. As seen by mage :D

Somehow I've had some fun with "particle engine" as seen on Some Funny Screenies. Then Jesusalva eventually admitted nobody really deals much with that thing. Some time later I've chatted with Ledmitz and he shown his custom updates server, few particle effects and so on. That made me curious... whether I can make FX effect meant to be displayed when Dark Talisman is equipped.

preview-2.gif
preview-2.gif (300.9 KiB) Viewed 5028 times

What's the plan

  1. Idea is to have some visual clue for most powerful players in game, somewhat inspired by Prsm aura and few other items.
  2. It supposed to be unobtrusive enough so it doesn't annoys players too much during normal course of actions.
  3. Should have sane # of particles, low CPU usage and so on. To be OK for MMO part and not to hog CPUs of AFKers too much, etc.
  4. Should blend nicely to arbitrary environments. You never know where next fight is.
  5. Supposed to look powerful and somewhat scary/dark. What do you expect from Dark Talisman?
  6. Supposed to look good enough so I would wear it myself and don't curse things around.

How to give it a try (if preview isn't enough)
A word of warning: it has been initially made against custom update host by Ledmitz at http://ledmitz.gitlab.io/tmw-warworld/ that already assigns graphics/particles/dark-talisman.xml as effect of Dark Talisman.

So with Led's updates it can be as easy as

  1. On connect to TMWA (server.themanaworld.org) choose "custom update host" and enter http://ledmitz.gitlab.io/tmw-warworld/ here.
  2. Put attached dark-talisman.xml as local/graphics/particles/dark-talisman.xml dir below server's updates dir, like you normally do to test local assets override. In Linux full path can be like ~/.local/share/mana/updates/ledmitz.gitlab.io/tmw-warworld/local/graphics/particles/dark-talisman.xml
  3. Connect and equip dark talisman.
  4. There should be FX effect similar to attached example.
  5. Unequip talisman to get rid of effect.

For mainline TMWA it can be a bit more tricky (or easier)

  1. Put attached dark-talisman.xml into local overrides of TMWA resources, like you do for other content testing. In Linux path can be like ~/.local/share/mana/updates/themanaworld.github.io/tmwa-server-data/local/graphics/particles/dark-talisman.xml
  2. Connect TMWA server normally.
  3. TMWA content isn't aware of effect, so equipping talisman wouldn't do.
  4. Instead, use command like /testparticle graphics/particles/dark-talisman.xml to manually throw particle effect in question.
  5. If you've had enough of this effect, change map to get rid of it - or throw some other effect to replace it.

What do I want?

  1. Criticism of this thing. Overall seems players were quite fond of overall appearance of this and Led also said different version of that can be useful for some other spells. I've tested acid-cyan version of that, and it looked really cool, but it doesn't fits this particular usage, failing "unobtrusive" part. But not too bad for short/medium term effects I guess :)
  2. Usability/resource hoggins issues, etc? There was non-animated version of circle but somehow I've not noticed major CPU use difference and ppl told animated looks better.
  3. Driving directions? Anyone intetersted bringing something like this into mainline TMWA as e.g. Dark Talisman equipped effect? Is it nice to change something? Guess something like this can also be eventually okay for rEvolt as well? (plus-minus some paths, I guess).

Technical stuff...

  1. All base PNGs are already in TMWA (and Ledmitz updates) for some time - this thing doesn't relies on any new PNGs, so dark-talisman.xml doesn't relies on any other nonexistent things.
  2. As some maybe guessed it recolored task-specific version of Final portal's inner ring that supposed to be darker/less gaudy. It's easy to recolor for whatever color btw and looks cool while not hogging client resources.
  3. It intermixed with some "menhir-style" particles, though these are colored more to match Dark Talisman nature, doing some scary red-yellowish glow and adjusted to be less obtrusive. One disadvantage is that color somewhat resembles conc+iron pot at once. Any hints on this part?
  4. I've ran some checks on both baseline and Ledmitz content and it worked for me. I've checked CPU hogging and particles count and it seems to be fine, it doesn't emits too much particles.

Edit: reduced crazy preview size by 4x :)

Attachments
dark-talisman.xml
(1.6 KiB) Downloaded 120 times
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