Discovery Gaming Community

Is the data for length X width X height available anywhere in a form that's easy to access? In the past I have used unarmored hull + largest normal shield to determine mass, but I would like to supplement that data with dimensions to determine actual "presence"

Not to my knowledge. You can pull the information out of the model files using FLTool, but the values might not entirely be accurate. Take the AI Drone for instance - those annoying antennas to the side make the visual model a lot larger, but aren't hitboxed.

Maybe dimensions of the hit box would be better

Researching into this some more and it seems that this data can be extracted from the hardpoints in the CMP. There's at least one windows prog that will dump hardpoint location from a CMP into a text file, and also a Perl module that will create an array of them, could probably do it directly once I learn the CMP encoding.

However the Freelancer models are not consistent in terms of hardpoint types or placement. Like, there is usually a forward headlight on the nose that is useful for establishing the length of a model, but some ships dont have that hardpoint, or its inside the ship and not on the nose, etc. Similar problems with thrusters make it impossible to establish nose-to-tail length consistently. Wing span and ship height are even more impossible.

Any thoughts on establishing dummy hardpoints in the models for front, rear, top, bottom, and left/right? Once the data is in a form that can be extracted, it can be used to model things relative ship size, which can be used for things like ship classification, balance comparison, and so on. If FLhook can also read this data then some of it can automated in-game too--"ship too wide for docking ring" based on actual model data, that kind of thing.

Hardpoint data won't really help, since the hardpoints can be outside of the model (HPMount on big ships for instance, is usually below and in front of the ship). The only right way to do this, is to extract the data from the SUR file directly, using the min/max X, Y and Z coords of the various vertices in the file. Good luck getting that done however, I have no idea how to pull it off. But if you can, it gives you a box wrap of the model's hitbox.

Personally, I just look at the person in the cockpit for an idea of size. When I first did this, even the Starflier was bigger than I expected.

You could take a photo and estimate the ship using the pilot graphically, perhaps? It's not a neat or precise solution, but it'll probably get you numbers indicative of an approximation of size and such.

harald belker - DA designer left some referrence data

the bretonian destroyer is 80 meters long - from there, we can easily measure each ships dimensions.

' Wrote:Hardpoint data won't really help, since the hardpoints can be outside of the model (HPMount on big ships for instance, is usually below and in front of the ship).

That's why I suggested creating dummy hardpoints specifically for measurement. Those can be placed where they make sense for the model, and we are not overloading some other hardpoint so we know they are accurate.

Here is an example using the Bret dessie. One new hardpoint called dummyFront that is aligned to the nose and another called dummyRear that is aligned to the tail.





The off-sets for the hardpoints show 70m to the tail and 55m to the nose, so we are able to determine right away that the ship is 125m long. Similar hardpoints can provide width and height. This can then be used programmatically and it is good enough for almost everything and requires nothing more than arithmetic.

Also the data is in three dimensions so we can make a rudimentary polygon or ovoid if we need to calculate rudimentary volume. That is one-line calculation, a lot easier than calculating volume from triangles which is what the sur provides.

I am willing to do the dirty work of going through and add these to each model.

edit--resized original pics, browser cache may show old ones

' Wrote:Also the data is in three dimensions so we can make a rudimentary polygon

example using all 6 extreme points to the bret dessie

front by the nose = 0, -5, -55
rear by the flying tail = 0, 10, 70
top heavy turret platform = 0, 14.5, 47.5
bottom under the chin = 0, -52.5, -45
left by the lower side turret = -31.5, -41, -42.5
right by the opposite turret = 31.5, -41, -42.5

Then added the vertices to MS3D and created triangles



Pretty good representation of the ship's "presence" in space.

Ursus you might consider joining the Dev team,this would help a lot in balancing I hope. Really great work.