Remove or replace socketed weapons effects

[Gordius 6]

I would like to change the effect given to weapons after they have been socketed with a damage type modifier (for example Chunk of lava). I simply don't like having my character carrying a sword which looks like a burning stick or with green\white smoke pouring out of it, the effect after socketing with a Magic crystal is OK though. Is there some way of either removing the effect or replacing posion, fire and ice effects so they look like the magic crystal effect?

 

I have looked at the scripts in C:\Program Files (x86)\Deep Silver\Sacred 2 - Fallen Angel\scripts\shared and the effects in C:\Program Files (x86)\Deep Silver\Sacred 2 - Fallen Angel\scripts\particle but couldn't find what I am looking for.

 

Any suggestions?

 

Thanks in advance.

[Gordius 6]

Hello again.

 

I am happy to spend time trying to find the answer to my question myself but I am new to MODing so I do not know where to start looking. Maybe someone could tell me if it is likely to be a script or a graphics file to edit/replace/rename. If you can help at all, even a clue I'll look for and try to do the rest. Trust me I have spent hours looking for a clue myself but wothout success.

 

Thanks.

[Vishanka 236]

I hope it's ok to revive such an old thread.

I'm still searching for a way to disable these effects.

I was able to disable the particles of the Poison Effect and the trail of this Frost Effect by disabling the contents of the fx_wpn files in the scripts/particles folder.

However, the Frost Effect puts a white layer over the weapon that does not disappear by disabling the particles, and also the magic effect didn't disappear by editing the fx_wpn_magic.particle file.

At the moment I'm just putting a poison modifier into every weapon to get rid of the effect, but maybe there's a better solution than mine

[Lindor 438]

22 hours ago, Vishanka said:

However, the Frost Effect puts a white layer over the weapon that does not disappear by disabling the particles, and also the magic effect didn't disappear by editing the fx_wpn_magic.particle file.

At the moment I'm just putting a poison modifier into every weapon to get rid of the effect, but maybe there's a better solution than mine

It may be that this effect does not come fromdmg type, it's just how the weapon looks by default. Compare it with some other standard weapon with ice crystal socketed, then you know for sure.

If that is the case and you want to change the look of the weapon, then do the following:

Spoiler

 

1. search for the weapon in blueprint.txt. looks like atherton ice glaive, id = 2464
2. from there, get the itemtype ID. for atherton e.g., it's itemtypes = {9522,},
3. search for that ID in itemtypes.txt and look at what surfaces there are applied, e.g. for atherton it's
   • surface0     = { mgr.surfGetID ("glaives-a1-1_l"), mgr.surfGetID ("glaives-c1-1_l") },
4. Now you can either:
   1. change these two surfaces in surface.txt
      • If you do that, be warned that all objects using these surfaces will change
   2. or you can create two new surfaces in surface.txt and use them in the itemtype.txt entry
      • If you do that, make sure the name you choose is not already used

For that you must understand how surface.txt and .dds files work. Let's take a look at the atherton entry:

newSurface = {
  name         = "glaives-a1-1_l",
  texture0Name = "maps/weapons/1h/l_glaives-a1_d.tga",
  texture1Name = "maps/weapons/1h/l_glaives-a1_sg.tga",
  texture2Name = "maps/weapons/1h/l_glaives-a1_n.tga",
  flags        = SURFACE_FLAG_OPAQUE,
  shader       = obj_d_s_b,
}
mgr.surfCreate(newSurface);

in the scripts, .dds and .tga are interchangeable. .dds files can hold three kinds of data:

• The diffuse maps. This is the base weapon surface
• The glow map. Self-explanatory.
• The normal map. You probably know about normals from school mathematics vector analysis. Normal maps give the illusion of a 3d effect even on 2d surfaces.

Those three are in order how they appear in the surface.txt defines.

There is much more going on with the flags and shaders, I can't explain that all here.
For your weapon you want to edit the glow map.
If you want to edit those, you first need to know where to look for these maps in the graphics folders. That's why I've done a directory scan with the power of lua a while back:

Then you need the programs to be able to edit those files: GIMP and SageThumbs.

I'm not gonna link GIMP to you, it's free and easy to find.

One final important note: don't open .dds files with GIMP directly. Instead, use SageThumbs to convert them into .bmp and then open with GIMP. Then, after you're done editing, export with GIMP into .dds format again and choose generate mipmaps. Depending on version, you might need a .dds plugin for that.

 

If however the glow comes from the FX even after disabling the particle script, then there's no hope for you unless you're able to do codesided modifications. AFAIK Dmitriy is the only one who ever managed to do that.

Edited February 15, 2022 by Lindor
Reason: So that no one misinterprets my statement and deletes hers/his files

[Flix 5,116]

3 hours ago, Lindor said:

If however the glow comes from the FX even after deleting the particle script, then there's no hope for you unless you're able to do codesided modifications. AFAIK Dmitriy is the only one who ever managed to do that.

This is correct.  The frost particles floating around it can be disabled; the ice sheathe around the weapon has to be disabled via code.  Dmitriy actually did this in his mod, removing the weapon effect but keeping the particles.

[Vishanka 236]

30 minutes ago, Flix said:

the ice sheathe around the weapon has to be disabled via code. 

I'm searching for the location, it's not within the particle or surface.txt, or it has a name that's not distinct.
I also would prefer to disable the white layer instead of the particles for the ice effect

 

3 hours ago, Lindor said:

even after deleting the particle script, then there's no hope for you unless you're able to do codesided modifications

I did not delete the scripts, that could cause problems if anything tries to read them. I just disabled the effect in the code. I'm sure I can disable the white layer if I can find the location where it's added.

[Flix 5,116]

By "code" I mean the binaries (the .dll files), not the Lua scripts.

[Vishanka 236]

Could be a possibility but I don't think so. In the end it will be a .dds layer, but I'll have a look at the plugin_particlefx.dll and perhaps I can find something else but I don't think it's a particle in the first place

Thanks for your help!

[Flix 5,116]

It might also be in shader.zip.

@dimitrius154  When you get a moment could you tell us how you disabled the ice FX on weapons?

[dimitrius154 612]

10 hours ago, Flix said:

how you disabled the ice FX on weapons?

That requires to edit an s2render.dll function starting at offset 0x101d354a. The condition for the shader application is at offset 0x101d358d for the non-Addendum-based s2render.dll, in Addendum-based ones, the entire ice shader segment is cut out.

[Lindor 438]

13 hours ago, Vishanka said:

I did not delete the scripts, that could cause problems if anything tries to read them. I just disabled the effect in the code.

Yeah it will. But that's also not what I meant. I meant deleting the effect. By setting particle lifetime or emission rate to 0 or smth like that.

I'm gonna edit that statement to prevent future people reading this from thinking that deleting the files would be a valid move. Hmm what would be a better word, disabling? Removing? Invalidating? I'm gonna go with disabling for now.

13 hours ago, Flix said:

It might also be in shader.zip.

FX_WPN_FIRE (1+2) and FX_WPN_GLOW. Each in unified and console. But not FX_WPN_ICE nor any other.

[Vishanka 236]

8 hours ago, dimitrius154 said:

That requires to edit an s2render.dll function starting at offset 0x101d354a. The condition for the shader application is at offset 0x101d358d for the non-Addendum-based s2render.dll, in Addendum-based ones, the entire ice shader segment is cut out.

Thank you, it's exactly what I wanted. I like the ice particles but it always was a pity to have that white layer on the weapon as well <3

Yesterday I tried to find the location for the texture of that glow and basic_blur.dds changed the color of the glow, but I could not disable the effect with the texture file alone.

 

6 hours ago, Lindor said:

Hmm what would be a better word, disabling? Removing? Invalidating? I'm gonna go with disabling for now.

Sounds good

And always backup...