Obsidian Conflict Forums

I have a scene where shells destroy a whole neighborhood block. The houses get hit by shells and explode. The physics of having the houses explode would be too much for the engine though, so I have to make them into prop_dynamics. Only problem is I'm not sure if you can make animated prop_dynamics without bones. How did Valve make the sawmill scene in ep2 then?

Anybody got any ideas?

They use some Maya plugin. There's actually plenty of software around to make that kind of animations (never used one tho).

Well I'm using reactor physics simulations in 3dsmax. My question is how to import the animation into Source. I can't find any information on how to make prop animations without using bones. I could always attach bones to all the separate pieces of debris but that would probably use too much resources when viewed.

Maybe try decompiling one of the ep2 models to see how compiling it works? Might also check out the valve wiki page for cinematic physics + its discussion

Each broken piece needs a separate bone. While this is a nuisance, it is definitely workable. I also think I might try out this Blast Code Maya plugin they used for the ep2 scenes.

If it's worth the 2000 bucks for you, you may do that :p

The one they used for CZ (singleplayer part done by Ritual, now dead) was free, I don't remember it's name.

You need a plugin or something that would autobone a non-bone animation. I would think that Valve have written something like this for themselves to get their blast code generated crap in. Unless blastcode does this already. I could have sworn I had been able to make a non-boned animation in max.

I figured you could make a non-boned animation but I never really tried it. If I have to use the bones it shouldn't be too hard. I can make the animation then tie bones to each piece. As long as I keep it to a small amount of debris it shouldn't be a problem.