[Solved] Swarm of bats (model request)

[Arathorn]

Hey!

If someone has the will to do it, I have a request for my map that could become a great asset for you to post on Hive as well!

It would be nice to make a "swarm of bats"!

I’ve tried the doodad model, the carrion swarm, and some models on Hive but none are convincing : / (too small, too fast, poor animation, etc.)

The idea is to recreate in Warcraft 3 a model/power like the one in the Battle for Middle-Earth games.
See the images attached below to have a better understanding. It would work as a "spying" unit and provides few buffs.

Let me know if you're interested in it and if you have any questions, thanks!

 

[A]mun]

What version are you on?
If 1.31+ you have access to very powerful special effect natives.
But since you wanted a unit, does it have to have attack and would you be okay with the carrion swarm converted into a unit model?

 

[Arathorn]

What version are you on?
If 1.31+ you have access to very powerful special effect natives.
But since you wanted a unit, does it have to have attack and would you be okay with the carrion swarm converted into a unit model?

Yes I'm playing on the latest version.
I'm not using that much special effect natives but yes I get what you mean, it's true (I'm mostly coding in GUI tho).

Yes I need as a unit to control it and move it around! Looking back at the Carrion Swarm ability effect/model, it's actually not that bad indeed...
I guess we would need to:

• remove the green wave effect
• texturize the bats a little so they're not so black, and improve their visibility
• Change a bit their animations to make it look like a bit more like a "stationary" swarm. They currently seem to move very much forward and very fast
• Maybe few other things I don't think of right now

 

[Arathorn]

Still pending if anyone is interested

 

[Jaccouille]

Cheap job, just a stand animation, no real death animation, I just made them disappear.

 

[Arathorn]

Cheap job, just a stand animation, no real death animation, I just made them disappear.View attachment 476935

Merci beaucoup Jaccouille !

Bats look pretty good in play, that's what I was thinking
And they remain surprisingly fairly easy to select.

It already looks good, it's enough for my map, and it's already very nice of you to have done it, but here are some ideas if you'd like to improve the model a bit more (and maybe post it on Hive if you want to?):

• add/keep a little spell effect (team colored?) with the bats to make them a little easier to see.
• It's already quite correct, but the hitbox could be slightly improved/enlarged to make it easier to select the model.
• Add a death animation, even a very simple one, such as a small spray of blood/explosion/crushing. It could easely be only an effect at the center and not even for each bat.
• Add attachment points to the model (chest, overhead, origin) so we can play some effects on it.

Anyway, thanks again!

 

[Fleck]

Merci beaucoup Jaccouille !

Bats look pretty good in play, that's what I was thinking
And they remain surprisingly fairly easy to select.

It already looks good, it's enough for my map, and it's already very nice of you to have done it, but here are some ideas if you'd like to improve the model a bit more (and maybe post it on Hive if you want to?):

• add/keep a little spell effect (team colored?) with the bats to make them a little easier to see.
• It's already quite correct, but the hitbox could be slightly improved/enlarged to make it easier to select the model.
• Add a death animation, even a very simple one, such as a small spray of blood/explosion/crushing. It could easely be only an effect at the center and not even for each bat.
• Add attachment points to the model (chest, overhead, origin) so we can play some effects on it.

Anyway, thanks again!

Seems simple enough to do. And I might use it in my map too.

Changelog:
Added teamcolor to model
Renamed Origin to Origin Ref
Added Overhead Ref, Chest Ref, Hands Ref, Weapon Ref, Head Ref
Added Collision Box
Added small spray of blood/explosion/crushing on death

 

[Arathorn]

Seems simple enough to do. And I might use it in my map too.

Changelog:
Added teamcolor to model
Renamed Origin to Origin Ref
Added Overhead Ref, Chest Ref, Hands Ref, Weapon Ref, Head Ref
Added Collision Box
Added small spray of blood/explosion/crushing on death

Awesome, very nice changes!

I'm glad if it can be useful to your map as well!

I would say only the Death animation seems a little bit off. It just leaves a small blood puddle on ground. I was imagining more of a blood explosion at the model center in air. I believe such "blood explosion" model already exist in game.
(Fixed it by creating a special effect on chest at death with Objects/Spawnmodels/Orc/Orcblood/BattrollBlood.mdl)

I'm attaching a Bats sound for the model as well if you're interested.

 

[Fleck]

Here you go again, it's probably best the model natively do it instead of trigerring it. I added Objects/Spawnmodels/Orc/Orcblood/BattrollBlood.mdl and splatsound to the death animation and changed the original bloodsplat to match the blood color of BattrollBlood and made slightly bigger. Good call on that, I forgotten the Troll Batrider.

 

[Arathorn]

This Swarm of bats model comes close to perfection, what else can I say?

Congrats and thank you all for the very nice job!

I hope this model will be useful to others!

 

[Jaccouille]

This Swarm of bats model comes close to perfection, what else can I say?

Congrats and thank you all for the very nice job!

I hope this model will be useful to others!

Well if it may be useful to others, might as well upload it in the model resource?

 

[Fleck]

Well if it may be useful to others, might as well upload it in the model resource?

Go for it

 

[Jaccouille]

Done : BatSwarm Unit