Brainstorming getting a Flail to work

[RGMage2]

@ fore

 

https://rapidshare.com/files/1119857030/SteelFlailGauntlets.nif

 

New Flail Chain Mace file, this time with steel gauntlets. I put gauntlets on both hands to avoid the male/female body mod compatibility thing.

 

The grip is a problem for rigging. The handle is rigged to the WhipRoot and the WhipRoot as you can see does not extend too far beyond the hand. If we pull the mesh too far away from those bones it throws off the deformation. As long as the mesh is more or less centred on the bones then it is fairly easy to control the deformation.

 

I've tried a bit of a compromise. I moved the grip down but not as far as I would have liked. If you rotate 90 degrees on whip1 it is not going to look very nice. I would suggest you limit the rotation of whip1 to 40 degrees and get the rest from whip2. Or better yet, ignore whip1 and start the animation on whip2. For me repositioning the WhipRoot would be the easy solution but I will see if I can come up with a better way of rigging it.:)

 

@ Striker879 I like the idea but I think everyone will be happy with whatever way fore decides to do it

 

[jamochawoke]

Hey guys, I'm sorry I haven't kept up with the thread. Been super busy with school.

 

But I did find a video of a man using a normative "water sprinkler" type flail everyone thinks of and not the big peasant types you normally see on YouTube.

 

Here:

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yuocXJrjZ_U

 

The handle is usually a bit longer and the chain a lot shorter.

 

What I would suggest is extending the first whip bone out and then perhaps only using the first 3 bones after that for the flail animation (rigging the head of the flail to the third node) and then having the rest of the whip bones be used for a whip if someone wanted to make one. Just because the bones are moving doesn't mean you have to rig something to it :P.

[jamochawoke]

Here's another flail fighting video of the type we're working with:

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=59kx8WVkOr8

[fore]

Here is a usable version of onehandfastforward (renamed to walkfastforward.kf, so it can be used without a real weapon): walkfastforward.kf.

 

There is still a small curve I would like to avoid. This animation has turned much harder than expected, because you can easily see each mistake just following your character in 3rd person. But I would now rather go on with what everyone is much more interested: attacks. :dance:

 

Your new gauntlet chain mace works great again, RCMage. Yes, the first chain link looks a little distorted as you said, but it can hardly be noticed in the animation. And since I didn't understand in your post, if this issue will eventually go away, I simply left it for now.

 

However, the chain is just too long. If the character runs over flat ground, The bottom spike almost touches the ground. But if it's going uphill, or even sidehill to the left, the head will be covererd in the ground. I hate to say this, but at least 2, rather 3 links are too many.

 

@Striker: realistically, holding the chain when running would be correct (and would also avoid this length problem). But besides (probably) being really hard to make rigging and animations work together (is this right, RCMage?), there is one big problem: there will allways be some animation sequences which look very nervous.

 

For example: if you make the idle holding short, you will see this in between combat moves. Not very realistic. If you keep the idle long, but make walk and walkfast short, you will have this up and down when you move a little bit and stop, move, stop., .. Not very good either. :( That's another reason why I want to continue with attacks. There I don't need to make this decision. But your guys input is very welcome.

 

@jamochawoke: thanks for the video examples. And although I asked for them, I can't really use them, since I'm only adapting the existing onehandanimations. So I simply have to imagine how the head flies in certain situations, and aminate that.

[Striker879]

Ya fore, after I suggested it but gave the 'how to implement in-game' more thought I realized it wouldn't be something easily done. The runfastforward would need to first start with a flipping motion as the ball was collected into the hand and then at the end of running have the ball drop to the end of the chain. Considering (at least with my limited animation knowledge) that the running animation needs to begin and end with frames that can be easily repeated to give the seamless effect it's a no go. Watching those videos gave a pretty good appreciation for what facing or using a flail must have been like. I'm surprised nobody got hurt shooting them. In the second video there seemed to be less twirling the mace head before the attack and more straight forward swing and hit. Probably closer to the vanilla animations. Edited September 30, 2011 by Striker879

[jamochawoke]

Uh wow you've done a lot of work!

 

@fore

The videos will hopefully show you how the ball moves when swung (there's a bit of overlap with how they are swinging them and the Oblivion vanilla animations as well).

 

I wanted to make one request though... I've replaced some of the 1hpowerattack animations in my mod Vanilla Drops with some animations that look A LOT better, and still flow seamlessly with the Vanilla 1hpowerattacks. I was wondering if you could do those? I think it's only 3 animations I replaced.

 

After today I can look at the rigging that has been done so far and perhaps can get in to what I was talking about on Sunday regarding the length of the chain and the ball head. I just need to reload up my Blender installation. I'm... decent at rigging so I think I can help. Easier to show than explain right? lol

[RGMage2]

https://rapidshare.c...5/Flail_Test.7z

 

The new file contains the Flail and the invisible blunt weapon and a 1^st Person skeleton.

 

I ran into a problem with spikes to infinity. While testing the invisible dummy blunt weapon to test the animation as a onehandfastforward and I got the spikes on the flail in first person, The problem was the 1^st Person skeleton.

 

I redownloaded Coronerras' Maximum Compatibility Skeletons figuring I had neglected to install the 1^st Person skeleton. Turns out Coronerras' 1stperson skeleton does not have the whip bones.

 

I added the whip bones to the 1^st Person Skeleton and included it in the download. This fixed the spikes but I was unable to get a new 1^st person animation working.

 

Changes to the flail - removed three links and changed the rigging so whip8 bone is no longer in use. Added a section of chain to the handle to wrap round the hand as seen in the video. Added a small blade to the lower part of the handle as an attempt to justify the position of the grip. I don't know if it looks right or not, you guys can let me know.

[fore]

I won't make videos about every new animation, but this is the first attack; onehandattackright.kf

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RX7tD4H8Mq4

 

Bear with me. I have 2 big problems:

• I only add chain mace movement to the existing onehand animation, which is not at all designed for our weapon. So I have to find a way to swing the head around the players body, without him injuring badly. :) This is really tough, especially at the beginning of the animation.
  
• I try my best to visually smooth out the head's curve. I guess it would be much better to use splines, but Blender doesn't have them. (Is there someone with 3DS experience who can comment on that?)
  

 

Others than that I hope this move appears somehow realistic, and I can go on.

 

RGMage, your work is outstanding, and always right at the point for me to continue. I think it really looks good now, as one can see from the video. I'm also amazed that you found the cause of that spikes to infinity in the 1st person skeleton. I had mentioned this problem in one of my previous posts, but with your 2nd mesh it seemed to be gone. Graet, you found the cause. This is now the 2nd time I see a situation where 1st and 3rd person elements influence one another (the 1st incidence was the speed of animations). Amazing.

 

What do you mean with "I was unable to get a new 1st person animation working" ?

 

jamochawoke, I'll see what I can do with your animations (remember, I originally only promised 4 attacks? :tongue:). WHere are these animattion coming from? Are they free?

[jamochawoke]

They're from the Nexus. Looking at them again I replaced 3 of the Vanilla 1 hand attack power animations and I believe 1 or 2 of them are from Reira. I can't remember the 3rd one... I'd have to go back and look at my work logs again hahaha. :/

 

And fore... that animation looks better than I had ever hoped. You are amazing!

[RGMage2]

And fore... that animation looks better than I had ever hoped. You are amazing!

I have to agree, the animation looks great. You are amazing.:yes:

 

 

 

What do you mean with "I was unable to get a new 1st person animation working" ?

I tried to do a simple 1^st person of the onehandedfastforward. I wanted to be able to move between 3^rd and 1^st person using your animation and my 1^st person animation. Of course I had the 90 degree rotation error which I corrected by rotating the bip01 NiTransformInterpolator. That did fix the rotation of the animation, but the camera was then facing the wrong direction. I tried a few things but I could not figure it out.:( I do not have your experience with doing these things so I am hoping this will not be a problem for you.