[MDL Format] "Alternate Second" Question

[Retera]

Hello; I made a model that has the following animations:
Attack
Attack Alternate
Attack Alternate Second
Attack Swim
Attack Swim Alternate
Attack Swim Alternate Second
Death
Death Alternate
Death Alternate Second
Death Swim
Death Swim Alternate
Death Swim Alternate Second
Decay Alternate Bone
Decay Alternate Second Bone
Decay Bone
Decay Flesh
Decay Flesh Alternate
Decay Flesh Alternate Second
Decay Swim
Decay Swim Alternate
Morph
Morph Alternate
Morph Alternate Second
Morph Swim
Morph Swim Alternate
Morph Swim Alternate Second
Spell
Spell Alternate
Spell Swim
Spell Swim Alternate
Stand
Stand -2
Stand Alternate
Stand Alternate -2
Stand Alternate -3
Stand Alternate Second
Stand Swim
Stand Swim Alternate
Stand Swim Alternate -2
Stand Swim Alternate Second
Walk
Walk Alternate
Walk Alternate -2
Walk Alternate Second
Walk Swim
Walk Swim Alternate
Walk Swim Alternate Second

My goal for this model is this: It is a Dragon Turtle in its normal animations, and then for its "Morph" a murloc runs up from the distance and climbs on its back on a little platform that is like the shooting part of a catapult combined with a murloc hut. (This platform appears via scaling up from 0 size inside the turtle, in a cartoony way.)

Then, for Alternate Second, the model is a Murloc and catapult riding on a Dragon Turtle. However, its "Attack" animation is still the Dragon Turtle punching stuff with its head (deliberately). Then, when it does "Morph Alternate" to change to its "Siege Mode", sunken-ruins-looking shields deploy over the sides of the turtle and it goes to "Alternate Second" animations with the shields deployed. Then, its attack "alternate second" is the catapult firing with the murloc waving its arms.
It has some general animations like the murloc jumping in some of these forms as the "-2" versions.

I already made this model, but now that you know what I'm working on here is my question: I implemented this model into the game with "Chaos" from a dragon turtle with this model into the "Alternate" form with the murloc rider, and then "Bear Form" to switch to "Alternate Second." However, the animations are kind of buggy. The Turtle will play "Morph Alternate", then "Stand Alternate", instead of "Stand Alternate Second," until you give it a move order, then it will usually flip to "Walk Alternate Second" and "Stand Alternate Second" while it walks around. The problem here is the intermittent "Stand Alternate": you see shields deploy, see them disappear, then see them magically reappear when you move around the unit. Worse yet, if you try to morph back with the bear form ability, it plays:
"Morph Alternate Second"
"Morph Alternate" <-- this means you see shields redeploy as it morphs back (bad)
"Stand Alternate" <-- the shields that just wrongly redeployed disappear again

Some guy said for my mod "The Dragon Turtle plays the shield deploying animation, but then reverts back to its regular animation. It should have an “alternate” set of animations so that it continues to have the shields deployed while walking, standing, and attacking." I totally respect this guy's point of view, but I'm troubled by how much time I spent making this model and all of its animations and the fact that the game engine doesn't handle it properly! I have "alternate,second" flags set for the shield-deploy unit type. Does anybody know what else I need to do to get this model to work?

Thanks in advance,
Retera

Edit: Attached a picture so that you guys can see some of what's going on with this model!

 

[Kyrbi0]

You made a Dragon Turtle that carries a Mur'gul in a Cartoony Hut with a Giant Catapult, mixed with a Terran Siege Tank?

I love you. Somebody fix this, please.

 

[PurgeandFire]

Well, judging by this:

...there's no animation order, they are all picked randomly based on how rare they are. Animation order is achieved through other tags like, first, second, third and so on.

http://www.hiveworkshop.com/forums/2414238-post4.html

I'm not quite sure whether "second" is serving the purpose you want it to serve. If I were you, I would use a different animation tag and trigger the animation change if necessary (Event - unit starts the effect of an ability... Unit - Add animation properties). I suppose this may not be the answer you are looking for since you posted in the modeling section, but it would be the route I'd take.

 

[Retera]

That's an interesting point about "second"... I just assumed because buildings upgraded from "Stand" to "Stand Upgrade" to "Stand Upgrade Second" that alternate animations might work the same way.

I've no complaint with using triggered systems to make it work, as long as it does work to its full animated extent. The hard part there might be making it play morph animations? I suppose that shouldn't be that hard to trigger, but it seems like a shame to redo something that typically worked in simpler models.

 

[WhiteDeath]

Have you tried instead of stand alternate, stand alternate second, morph, morph alternate and morph alternate second to change the animation names to stand upgrade fist, stand upgrade second and birth, birth upgrade first and birth upgrade second?
Also the morph animation might glitch if the unit is stuned while morphing - the morph will stop and the murlok will suddenly disappear.
I think that a more efficient way to make this model is to remove the third form with the shields, making it have only one alternate animation. Than you create two attachment points where the shields should be, and a separate buff model for the shields, just attach the shields with a trigger or an ability.
By removing the second alternate animations you will reduce the model's size.

 

[Kwaliti]

You sure you set all the tags in the Object Editor for the units properly?

 

[Retera]

Yeah, I sure think so. I was using "alternate" not "alternateex", but that's what the Troll Berserker does.

I discovered that if I used "Upgrade" and "Upgrade alternate" (as opposed to "alternate" and "alternate second" then it starts to work properly during morph in ONE of the two directions. I honestly haven't the faintest idea why, but that's a step forward.

 

[Rao Dao Zao]

You might want to try "... Second Alternate" instead of "... Alternate Second". I remember having an issue with tag order once, I think it was Decay Flesh and Decay Bone along with Alternate versions. It would only ever play Decay Bone until I rearranged the tags.

Can't guarantee it'll work, but WC3 moves in mysterious ways.

 

[Kyrbi0]

^This guy's an MDL genius; listen to him. : )