[Import] Imported model appears in World Editor but not in Cinematic/Game

[Zanzuru]

Problem: I've imported a custom model of Warcraft III Reforged from Hiveworkshop (Fandral Staghelm, Link: Fandral Staghelm, Author: Vindorei), I imported everything correctly, as can be seen by the attached file that follows this post and is in the "Spoiler" icon.

Spoiler: Imported Model

At first I thought the problem was that I've imported first in the original map and haven't imported at the campaign sequence of maps, then I did it, in both cases (original map and campaign's) the model is correctly imported.

However, when I start the game, during the cinematic, the model don't appears, not a green box, or nothing, but in fact the original hero model that I repleaced by Fandral's (which is the Hero Keeper of the Grove), to a better understaing a image will be attached at the bottom of this post as well and in the Spoiler icon that follows.

Spoiler: Model in Game/Cinematic

I've tried to discover the problem, but I've found only these two posts here in Hive: Models showing up in editor BUT NOT IN GAME, which I think is more related to my problem, but sadly had few replies and it appears the problem wasn't fixed and Models, but I think isn't the exact problem I'm facing, and both posts are from 2011, which means they're heavly outdated to the curent ordeal I'm fighting against.

Summary of the problem: The imported model works during World Editor but when the map is played the imported model doens't appears, but the original model repleaced during the customization of the unit.

It is my first post, so I took some base on the rules Hiveworkshop put at first glance when entering this forum, but if anything is ill putted please correct me.

I thank any help in advance, a good one to all.

___________________________________________________________

"Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law"

 

[PurgeandFire]

It might be worth trying to switch the "Mode" in the Asset manager to "HD" for those specific files you imported (you'll see that the mode is listed as "SD" in your screenshot for all those files).

I'm not 100% sure if that is the culprit, but the model you're referencing seems to require the HD shaders (so it doesn't appear in SD modes), so it is worth trying to configure that to match.

 

[Chaosium]

Do you play the map directly from the game or by using the test map function of the editor? Because the latter doesn't work for campaign maps

 

[Zanzuru]

It might be worth trying to switch the "Mode" in the Asset manager to "HD" for those specific files you imported (you'll see that the mode is listed as "SD" in your screenshot for all those files).

I'm not 100% sure if that is the culprit, but the model you're referencing seems to require the HD shaders (so it doesn't appear in SD modes), so it is worth trying to configure that to match.

Thank you, I've changed every imported part of the model and the model itself to HD and now it works in WE and during Game/Cinematic, but I've now other problem, I don't know if I still can use this post to show it or if I need to create a new one with this new problem, but either way, here it goes:

Now when I try to run the map which have the imported model or it opens but freezes immediatly after opening or it doesn't open at all and a Warning appears (probably the Warning that means something is corrupted or crashed).

I don't know it the problem is with the model or it is just a bug, but any help will be apprechiated, thanks again for help me with the 1st problem!

 

[PurgeandFire]

Thank you, I've changed every imported part of the model and the model itself to HD and now it works in WE and during Game/Cinematic, but I've now other problem, I don't know if I still can use this post to show it or if I need to create a new one with this new problem, but either way, here it goes:

Now when I try to run the map which have the imported model or it opens but freezes immediatly after opening or it doesn't open at all and a Warning appears (probably the Warning that means something is corrupted or crashed).

I don't know it the problem is with the model or it is just a bug, but any help will be apprechiated, thanks again for help me with the 1st problem!

Glad to hear that helped! And yeah it is fine to carry on with questions in this thread if they're related!

One question I have: how do you know it worked in-game/during the cinematic if the map freezes after opening? Did it only start freezing after other changes you made?

 

[Zanzuru]

Glad to hear that helped! And yeah it is fine to carry on with questions in this thread if they're related!

One question I have: how do you know it worked in-game/during the cinematic if the map freezes after opening? Did it only start freezing after other changes you made?

Right after I changed the model to HD and tested it in Cinematic, everything worked fine, but when I closed the World Editor and try to open it back again it just crashes or freezes, and this problem keep happening, I tried to open the map again before sending this answer, but it still shows the Warning and appears to be corrupted

Now I've confirmed it isn't a one model problem, I've downloaded the Vulgar Homunculus model too, and the exact same problem happens, I'm beginning to think it is a problem with my WE...

 

[PurgeandFire]

Right after I changed the model to HD and tested it in Cinematic, everything worked fine, but when I closed the World Editor and try to open it back again it just crashes or freezes, and this problem keep happening, I tried to open the map again before sending this answer, but it still shows the Warning and appears to be corrupted

Now I've confirmed it isn't a one model problem, I've downloaded the Vulgar Homunculus model too, and the exact same problem happens, I'm beginning to think it is a problem with my WE...

Ahh gotcha, yeah sadly it sounds like an issue that has been going on since 2023 for imported reforged assets in particular:

[Crash] - How to prevent World Editor crashes with imported assets

Hi After discovering the World Editor for Warcraft 3 Reforged last week, I've been making maps and wanted to import custom unit models from the site. It all started well and good. I was able to import the assets, and when I used the models they showed up fine in the Editor, and they also...

www.hiveworkshop.com

It is a bit of a bummer. These were the main two workarounds listed in that thread:

1. [Crash] - How to prevent World Editor crashes with imported assets
2. [Crash] - How to prevent World Editor crashes with imported assets

The TL;DR reason seems to be that once you import some HD assets and then place a unit on the map, it can cause a crash when the editor loads.

The first workaround mentions leaving all your dds/blp files as their default path (e.g. war3mapImported\<blah>.dds), which is essentially the "incorrect" path. That way you can still place the units on the map--but you'll see a textureless white model. Once you're ready to publish the map, you can update all the texture paths to the correct ones, do some play-testing, and then you're good. The downside is that it can get really tedious, especially if you need to make changes afterward (because now the map will freeze when it gets open, so you'll need to work off a back-up). And testing the visuals of your map during creation will be hard since you're just going to have white models.

The second workaround is to just place the units via code instead of pre-placing them in the editor. Apparently that avoids the crash, because the crash seems to happen when it tries to load the model on the map. This can also be a bit cumbersome--as you kinda have to adjust your code for it. But I do have one idea that may make it a bit easier:

1. Let's say you're importing that Fandral model and you make a "Fandral" unit in the object editor with that model assigned. Create a second custom unit in the object editor, e.g. a sheep. It can be anything as long as it uses a model you know will not crash the editor.
2. On the map, wherever you'd place Fandral, place the sheep unit instead.
3. Then in your triggers, on map initialization, "Pick every unit in (Playable map area)" that is the sheep type and replace it with the Fandral unit type.

Not sure if that works (I haven't done much reforged editing), but that might help you take advantage of pre-placing units in the editor without causing your map to crash. It might be worth trying this in a blank map and experimenting with it a bit to get the right workflow that works for you.

Regardless, I recommend that you make a lot of back-ups of your map in general as you're working on it so you can always go back in case you run into some editor woes!

 

[Zanzuru]

Ahh gotcha, yeah sadly it sounds like an issue that has been going on since 2023 for imported reforged assets in particular:

[Crash] - How to prevent World Editor crashes with imported assets

Hi After discovering the World Editor for Warcraft 3 Reforged last week, I've been making maps and wanted to import custom unit models from the site. It all started well and good. I was able to import the assets, and when I used the models they showed up fine in the Editor, and they also...

www.hiveworkshop.com

It is a bit of a bummer. These were the main two workarounds listed in that thread:

1. [Crash] - How to prevent World Editor crashes with imported assets
2. [Crash] - How to prevent World Editor crashes with imported assets

The TL;DR reason seems to be that once you import some HD assets and then place a unit on the map, it can cause a crash when the editor loads.

The first workaround mentions leaving all your dds/blp files as their default path (e.g. war3mapImported\<blah>.dds), which is essentially the "incorrect" path. That way you can still place the units on the map--but you'll see a textureless white model. Once you're ready to publish the map, you can update all the texture paths to the correct ones, do some play-testing, and then you're good. The downside is that it can get really tedious, especially if you need to make changes afterward (because now the map will freeze when it gets open, so you'll need to work off a back-up). And testing the visuals of your map during creation will be hard since you're just going to have white models.

The second workaround is to just place the units via code instead of pre-placing them in the editor. Apparently that avoids the crash, because the crash seems to happen when it tries to load the model on the map. This can also be a bit cumbersome--as you kinda have to adjust your code for it. But I do have one idea that may make it a bit easier:

1. Let's say you're importing that Fandral model and you make a "Fandral" unit in the object editor with that model assigned. Create a second custom unit in the object editor, e.g. a sheep. It can be anything as long as it uses a model you know will not crash the editor.
2. On the map, wherever you'd place Fandral, place the sheep unit instead.
3. Then in your triggers, on map initialization, "Pick every unit in (Playable map area)" that is the sheep type and replace it with the Fandral unit type.

Not sure if that works (I haven't done much reforged editing), but that might help you take advantage of pre-placing units in the editor without causing your map to crash. It might be worth trying this in a blank map and experimenting with it a bit to get the right workflow that works for you.

Regardless, I recommend that you make a lot of back-ups of your map in general as you're working on it so you can always go back in case you run into some editor woes!

Against the good common sense I tried the second workaround you proposed first instead of the second, mostly because I just finished my Introduction map which is only cinematic, and the entire campaign (which I'm planing to have like 8 chapters, 3 interludes and 1 introduction) will cost a high amount of time, which means I'll problably do the first workaround in months from now.

But thank you very much, I tried the second option it worked out fine, the only problem is that I'm not that skillful with triggers yet, so to adapt every trigger I made using this new replacement might prove challenging, so I'll probably just replace all of them by the end of the campaign, when everything is just fine and I just need to replace the models, I'll make sure to have a lot of backups tho.

Thank you very much, this helped me a lot!