Pausing a model mid-way through animation

[darwin]

I have downloaded the SkyLight.mdx model that makes a sun-like beam in the sky. I want to use this model during a cinematic, but I need to pause it part way through it's animation. I can pause it successfully by changing it's animation speed to 0% (after assigning the model to a destructible.)

Here is the problem: I don't want the player to have to watch it for 10 seconds until it reaches the point in the animation I want to pause it at. But if I have it off screen and pause the animation it doesn't work. The destructible, even when paused, seems to start playing at a random point in the animation sequence when I restart it. Worse, it seems to depend on whether the player's camera is pointed at the destructible or not.

In short, I cannot pause the animation and then play it during the cinematic because it will play from a random point (sometimes completely off camera). I cannot create it as a unit during the cinematic because the animation is slow. I tried editing the model to just freeze it at an animation point (i.e. setting the sequence of the stand animation to 40000 to 40001. This works create in the model editor, but in game the model comes up missing and won't play in the editor or during testing.

I am completely lost and frustrated.

UPDATE: Here's part of the problem: the model appears to start at a completely random point in the animation. I playtested it and just cut to a camera aimed at the destructible. I then just hit "restart" and looked several times. Sometimes it started further in its animation, other times earlier. I didn't even know it was possible to make a model start at random points in an animation.

UPDATE 2: Another piece of the puzzle: when I open the skyLight.mdx model in the war3ModelEditor and then immediately save it, the model breaks. Just opening it and saving it again will make the editor not recognize the file in the editor or in game. I tried opening and closing the footman.mdx to see if my editor was broken, but that worked fine. I'm frankly out of ideas...I have an unpredictable model in game and an .mdx that cannot be edited. I think I'm screwed.

 

[Alright]

I think you need to have the model be edited so the animation stays where you want it to be, maybe try spawning it manually with a trigger and see what happens. If it's random as it continues to be, then you might want to get someone who's an expert with modelling to edit.

 

[darwin]

Thanks, Alright. I did spawn it as a unit and sure enough it spawned at random times in the animation.

I can do some small editing (adding attachments, etc.) but there's something wrong with this model. I open it, do nothing, save it, and it no longer works in the editor.

Maybe someone with more modelling experience can help.

 

[Zwiebelchen]

Have you tried converting the model to MDL before opening and saving it? Some parts of the MDX file get messed up in Magos. You can then convert back to MDX after saving.

 

[Wietlol]

Is it not possible to do with "Animation - Change unit's animation speed to 0.00% of its original speed"?

 

[darwin]

I had not tried converting it to .mdl! That worked nicely.

Wietlol, I can set it to 0% animation and that does pause it, but since it appears to start at a random point I don't have any idea where it will be paused. Now that I can edit the model, I'll see if I can fix that.

 

[LordDz]

Use animation - Play Animation, wait x milliseconds and THEN pause it?

 

[darwin]

Use animation - Play Animation, wait x milliseconds and THEN pause it?

When you play the animation it appears to start at a random point. Unfortunately, this means that: random time + x milliseconds = random time. I'm afraid there's no way for the model to be predicted as it is. Luckily, thanks to the help I got in this thread, I was able to convert the model and play with the sequence animation and made a paused version of it by truncating the stand animation sequence.