Introduction

I've noticed that a lot of people here are suffering from a client crash bug after using Noggit SDL 1.3 - 1.4 for editing Blizzard ADTs (modifying existing game content). I did not know about this bug when we worked on the new version, so we have not even looked at it yet. And yes, I plan to get back to it when / if we work on noggit again.

How to avoid or fix it.

The reason for this bug is actually quite simple. Blizzard's editor called WoWEdit does not always fill up all the chunks with all 4 texture layers. There is a mistake in Noggit's code that makes it save grouneffect data to the layer which does not even exist. The easiest solution for the problem is not to work on original game content and create your own custom maps with 4 layered adt templates from Steff's modding pack. However, I doubt that this solution will satisfy everyone because sometimes we do need to change some original maps. In order to make Noggit edit these maps properly you need to prepare the ADTs you edit for saving with Noggit. You simply need to pick up 2-3 textures that does not exist on this ADT, select a huge brush with no pressure and lowest transparency and paint your ADTs until they have all the chunks filled with 4 texture layers. I know that many of you tried doing it but it did not work. Here is another problem. For proper model saving Noggit has to save a bunch of adts around your real edited one. So, every time you fix bugged adt Noggit saves more and more corrupting them. I think that the solution is quite obvious. You just make a listfile (manually) of all the adts you really need + 1 row of adts per each side and remove everything else. Your map should work fine now. Here is a quick example.



P.S. Make this sticky please.

I noticed that some attachments are gone from the forum. So, some tools are now obviously gone as most of them are not hosted externally, or the links are expired. Please, have a look at the problem.

Hi there everyone, just wanted to show you some more of our progress with Skarn, hope you enjoy. This is Part 1 of our progress more coming soon!

I will update this thread with annotations, explaining what certain things are as i currently don't have time ATM.
Please also note that we are only showing certain parts of zones, not all images show completed work and most are concept examples.

We are recruiting please check the recruitment thread!

Take Care and Enjoy

Love Drikish (Co-Owner of Skarn)
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New World Map



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I will be showing canyons here from previous Topic, the new stuff is below!





[youtube:1p14sbq0]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2L0FQrRhjBM[/youtube:1p14sbq0]









































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Thor'zain Pass - Raiding Environment























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Gehenna - Starting area for the Fallen (Satyr)

The Basic Lore :
General:


The Fallen are an evil, demonic race, re-forged from the bodies of fallen heroes in Demalyr (Deh maul yur). With the power of the Fire of Saimon, life is able to return to the body, but we a single, corrupt intent...to kill all. With the recent attack on [world's name], the Fallen have grown much weaker due to their failed attempt. Seeing this as an opportunity, the living called upon the power of the [ancients, creators, titans, etc] to strike down the Fallen once and for all. However, they underestimated to power of King Saimon, the leader of the fallen. He has now appointed a select few of the Fallen (the player) to scout out the world above for a final invasion, while he stays to fend off attackers. They now have a simple mission: To destroy life entirely...but not without wrecking havoc first.

Origin:

The Fallen came to be thousands of years ago , when only humans existed on [world's name].They were created by King Saimon, who was trying to achieve immortality. What he found was immortality in its only form-death. He was tortured for days by demons never heard of, and imbued with terrible hatred, despair and power. As he spoke his last words, he cursed those who he hated to die a terrible death, much like himself. When he died, he was dragged through the ground, and his soul was torn apart and corrupted. Every bit of his remains were absorbed by those he cursed, which killed them all. They were summoned by the now-cursed King Saimon, who now ruled over Demalyr. King Saimon’s power is held within the fires of Demalyr. With all his emotions and destruction in the fire, it is capable of returning life to the dead, thus creating more Fallen. The only way to destroy Saimon is to extinguish the fires of Demalyr, which I said to release all his corruption into the world. No one knows what will happen then...
 


(Powers, in this case):

The Fallen are capable of massive destruction. Their power is fed by the anger and despair of others. They worship no one, except a little honor towards Jethax Harabat, and a bit rogue like. However, they must no work together in order to sustain Demalyr.


Appearance:

The Fallen look almost identical to as they did when they were living, with the exception of their bodies being corrupted by the Fire of Saimon. While they look similiar to as they did when alive, the have no knowledge of their previous life at all. All memory has been replaced with the desire to kill the living.

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THIS ZONE HAS NOT BEEN FULLY TEXTURED

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Fallen Models - only a few here...
















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Gehenna Zone -



World Boss



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High Definition Fully Custom Textures on world objects





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The Drow Prison Raid/Instance



















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Orc Starting Zone Preview









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The Human Kingdom







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Skarn - GM External/Internal Custom Console

Information - WoWGM.exe activates the GM console in your WoW.exe and allows you to acces most debug and graphic functions.

Short list of feaures:

1. Rendering normals what is very usefull while m2 or wmo development.
2. Wireframe mode
3. Gamespeed control
4. Time control
5. Pathfinding rendering
6. Hide/show m2s, WMOs, Character models, Footprints, WMO and M2 textures, Water, 3D/2D shadows, particles, lights, WMO portals, terrain, fog, groundeffects, screenglow etc.
7. Most GM commands also work in the console.
8. Changing  farclip, nearclip and other graphical settings.

It’s not the full list of functions. I named only the working and finished ones. WoWGM.exe was made by our programmer Tristan.

Hello, Modcraft. Today I want to make a short presentation of a zone that is going to be a part of Skarn project. Our project is dedicated to building a fully custom world, however this zone is emerald-dream based. It's fully implemented to the rest of our map. We've fixed all the unfinished parts of the terrain there. The screenshots you see are early WIP. I still don't like the results of my work, so the zone is going to be reworked. I plan to make my own custom groundeffects and some models. Thanks to all Noggit developers for providing us with such an awesome worldbuilding tool. Thanks to Cromon for his SharpWoW light editor which helped us very much with custom light creation.  If you're interested in watching our progress, check our threads here from time to time. If you want to join the development, please pay attention to our recruitment thread in the Recruitment section.  

Best regards, Skarn team
 :!:  Attention! The video is outdated and doesn't have any custom lights and most edits. We will update it soon.

===UPDATE===





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[youtube:2c74i494]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2L0FQrRhjBM[/youtube:2c74i494]










































Imgur Gallery: http://skarnproject.imgur.com/

Introduction

This tool will allow you to make model edits to World of Warcraft's M2 files.
Example:

Downloads

Blender 2.62 Windows x32
Blender 2.62 Windows x64
Blender 2.62 Mac OS X
Blender 2.62 Linux
M2Mod4 (Mirror)
M2Mod3 (3.3.5a)


It works around M2I files. M2I stands for M2 Intermediate, and is a file format that was developed for this tool, and contains only the data relevant to that which we want to edit, which is meshes, bones, attachments, and cameras.

The core steps to making a mod are:

Convert the M2 to an M2I.



Import the M2I into Blender.
Make edits.
Export the M2I from Blender.
Merge the original M2 with the modified M2I to produce the final modded M2.

If you don't use Blender, you'll have to write your own import/export scripts for the M2I files. Included with the main package is documentation on the M2I file format so you can do this.

You may edit meshes however you want. You can edit vertex weights, vertices, UVs, subdivide, split, extrude, sculpt, etc. Just about anything that Blender will let you do to the mesh you can do safely without worrying about breaking the model. As long as you export a triangulated mesh, the tool can take care of the rest. You can even edit bone positions, attachment positions, and cameras. Under the hood, M2Mod rebuilds the skin files from scratch, and this lets you edit the mesh however you want with few limitations.

special thanks to Trollpaxton who shared the source code for his M2 mod tool which served as a great reference point for this tool, especially with fixing animation offsets.
special thanks to the wowdev and source peek wikis and whoever edits those pages with the reverse engineered file format information needed to make something like this possible.
thanks to everybody on Darknest who makes mods.
thanks to everybody on Darknest who uses mods.

Common Questions and Tips

Q. What is an M2 file?
A. An M2 file is the 3D model file format created by Blizzard and used by WoW. It has gone through several revisions over each release of a new WoW expansion. This current version of M2Mod is made to work with Cataclysm version M2s, which happen to be the same version as those used in Pandaria (for the most part anyway).

Q. What is an M2I file?
A. An M2I file is an intermediate and slimmed down format for making edits to M2 files. It makes importing and exporting from 3D software easy because it doesn't have all the extra data that has no place to belong within Blender.

Q. How come I can't use M2Mod with the Pandas?
A. This race is not supported yet.

Q. What version of Blender should I used with M2Mod?
A. Currently M2Mod only works with Blender 2.62, I've been too busy to bother with keeping the M2I import/export scripts up to date.

Q. How do I extract original M2 files?
A.
It is possible to extract original M2 files from model.MPQ, but if Blizzard has released an update that patches those M2 files then that patch data will be stored in one or more of the the wow-update-base-x.MPQs. So to extract a fully patched and up-to-date M2 (which you should always do before you start editing, because only the up-to-date M2s will have new animations and what not):

1. Grab Ladik's MPQ Editor.
2. Run it.
3. Go to File->Open MPQ(s) With Options ... [Ctrl+Shift+O].
4. Browse to WoW's data folder (might be at C:Program Files (x86)World of WarcraftData) and multi-select model.MPQ and all of the wow-update-base-x.MPQ files (but don't select any custom user-made MPQs you might have).
5. Hit Open.
6. Another window will show up, and select Patched mode (and optionally check Read-only mode) and then hit OK.

Now you can just drag and drop the files from the MPQ onto your computer somwhere
Q. How do I use the M2I import/export scripts with Blender?
A.
1. To install the scripts, copy the included "scripts" folder to:
%appdata%BlenderFoundataionBlender2.62
(or you can copy them to Blender's install folder as well)

2. Once they are there, they will have to be enabled from within Blender, so open up Blender and go to:
File->User Preferences and then go to the Addons tab
and then enable Import-Export: Export: M2 Intermediate (.m2i) and Import-Export: Import: M2 Intermediate (.m2i)
Then click Save As Default so the scripts will always be enabled whenever you open Blender

Now you should be to import and export M2Is from File->Import->M2 Intermediate (.m2i) and File->Export->M2 Intermediate (.m2i)
Tip: Always treat M2 files and their SKIN files like a single file. If you copy or move an M2 between folders or MPQs, always bring it's SKIN files along with it; an M2 won't work without them.

Tip: M2I is designed and tested to work only with character M2s. It may or may not work with other kinds of M2s used for items or environments or doodads etc.

Tip: A working knowledge of using Blender and making 3D models is required. I can't teach you how to use Blender. Take the initiative to teach it to yourself

How to update v3 WotLK model edits to v4 Cata

and how to update models when a minor patch comes out

This is a guide for model editors who want to update their old model edits that they made for WotLK to Cata.
In this document, I use the terms v3 to refer to WotLK and v4 to refer to Cata.
The M2 and M2I formats have been change with the transition from v3 to v4. M2I's made with the last version of M2Mod will be called v3 M2I's, whereas the current version of M2Mod makes v4 M2I's. Also, v3 M2's refers to the last version of M2 pre-patch 4.0, and v4 M2's are the current version.
Remember that any time and M2 file is mentioned, it really means the M2 file plus it's SKINs files. These files should always be treated as one. So when you extract an M2 from an MPQ, always also extract the SKIN's along with it.

Method 1

This method will probably work in most all cases. It involves just using M2Mod to merge a new original v4 M2 (from art.MPQ) with the modified v3 M2I (or v4 M2I) (from your existing mod project) as you normally would, and then you will get a modified v4 M2 that you can put into a patch.
When using this method, make sure that IgnoreExtras is enabled and IgnoreMaterials is enabled, this will ensure that all the parts other than geometry gets updated to v4. IgnoreMaterials is bugged on some models, in which case you might have to remake your edit using Method 2.

Method 2

If the first method doesn't work or problems arise when you get your modified M2 into the game, then it is probably because there were some changes made to the model from WotLK to Cata (such as bones or attachments were added or removed). This method will let you work around those deeper changes, but it involves a bit more work in Blender. It's a bit tedious.
You will probably never need to use this method because Method 1 basically does all of this automatically, but it is in depth and might help give you a better understanding of how things work under the hood.

1. Extract original v4 M2.
Go into Cataclysm's art.MPQ (or oldworld.MPQ for 4.0.1) and extract the original M2 that you want to modify. This M2 should correspond to the same one that is from your v3 mod for WotLK. We just want to get the base v4 M2 which we will use as a basis to to update the v3 mod to v4.
2. Convert the original v4 M2 to v4 M2I.
As you normally would, use M2Mod to convert the original v4 M2 to an M2I. If you're using v4 M2Mod (and you should be), then a v4 M2I will be exported.
3. Import the v3 M2I into Blender.
In Blender, import the v3 M2I from your previous mod for WotLK into an empty layer. Move the imported model out of the way so we can import the v4 M2I on the same layer.
note: It is important that you re-import the v3 and v4 M2Is with the updated v4 import script because some of the imported per-Submesh properties have changed.
4. Import the v4 M2I into Blender.
On the same layer, import the v4 M2I which you created in steps 1 and 2. Move it so you get the 2 models side by side because you will be clicking back and forth between them.
You should now have the 2 models side by side like this:


 

---
For each modified Submesh in the v3 model, there is a set of steps to repeat.
5. Select the modified Submesh in the v3 model.
do it.
 


6. Find the mesh datablock name.
Go to the "Editing" buttons (F9) and look at the "Link and Materials" pane. Take a look at the name of the mesh data block that this mesh object is linked to and remember that name.
 


7. Now select the equivalent Submesh in the v4 model.
The equivalent Submesh is the same one that you selected in the v3 model, but in the v4 model.
 


8. Link to the mesh datablock from step 6.
Go back to the "Link and Materials" pane and click on the arrows to change the datablock. Browse to the mesh datablock name you saw in step 6, select it, and then click "SELECT DATABLOCK". The v4 mesh object should now be linked to the modded v3 mesh datablock.
 






9. Repeat this set of steps (from 5 to for every modified Submesh in the v3 model.
When you're done, continue to the next step.
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10. Export the v4 model as an M2I and merge with the orignal v4 M2 to get a modified v4 M2.
This is where things get normal again. Select an object in the v4 Model and go to "File->Export->M2I". Configure M2Mod to load the original v4 M2 and then load the modified v4 M2I and then output a modified v4 M2. Run M2Mod. If everything went well, you should now have a v4 M2 that you can patch and use in game.


Tips:
You don't have to mess with datablock links if you can change the parent/child relationships between mesh and root armature. For example, you can duplicate (shift+D) the body mesh from v3 and child it to the v4 armature (ctrl+P), and then unchild (alt+P) the v4 body mesh from the v4 armature. This has the same effect as datablock linking but takes a few more clicks.
Some v4 models (DraeneiFemale, GnomeFemale, TrollFemale) have had their bone structure or order changed. If you try refit a v3 edit to a v4 armature, the bone weights will be all messed up (you can test this by posing the v4 armature with a v3 mesh). There's no easy way to fix this, but the easiest way is probably to:
1. duplicate your v3 mesh with bad bone weights,
2. delete all it's vertex groups,
3. move it so it's stacked on top of the equivalent v4 mesh (this step might actually be optional, i'm not sure),
4. Optionally, try to rougly reshape the v4 mesh to fit closer to the v3 mesh, this will give better results when performing the Bone Weight Copy.
5. and then shift select the v4 mesh so you have the v3 and v4 meshes selected but the v4 mesh has primary selection,
6. then in the menu of the 3D view go to Object->Scripts->Bone Weight Copy, set Quality to 4 or something, then hit OK.
When it's done, your v3 mesh should have bone weights that match that of the v4 mesh. Try going into pose mode and moving the bones around to see how it deforms.  You might have to spend a little more work weight painting or something to get it just right.
You will have to repeat the above steps for every modified mesh you want to bring over from v3 to v4.

A much more tedious method but one that will preserve the weights exactly would involve analyzing the v3 mesh and going through each vertex group by hand and figuring out it's new name in the v4 mesh/armature, and then renaming that vertex group to the new name. I would not recommend this method because it takes a ton of time and work and strained eyes and might not be all that worth it in the end. However, if someone (or myself) was to write a script/program to automate this, it would probably pay off.

This part of tutorial series is not written by me. The author is Redaxle (M2Mod's creator). However, I will improve this tutorial and write more. I hope it will be usefull.  

Before you go into more advanced model editing, some basics of blender will help.

View movements:

number pad : pre-set view angles
alt+left click drag : basic rotations
alt+shift+left click drag: panning
alt+ctrl+left click drag up or down: zoom in/out
mouse scroll wheel: zoom in/out
Right click on edge of screen will give option to "split area" to activate multiple view points.

Mesh controlls:

Right click: select mesh group
Tab: Enter/exit mesh edit mode(need to have mesh grp selected)
Left click: Select vertex, face, edge
G: grab and move
R: grab and rotate
S: grab and change size
B: area select. Drag box around area of mesh to select.
Z: toggle wire frame mode
Shift+left click: queue up selection
space bar and W:edit options

Hello, everyone. I want to create custom flying camera for my custom races and their starting zones. Does anybody know is it possible? I've heard that there's a tool written by Schlumpf or somebody else, but I don't know where I can find it.

Regards, Skarn.