Monday 20 December 2010

Rocket/Bazooka Class Combo

Try A Rocket Up Your Beeper  
It may seen like a mistake to select a bazooka/rocket class in the game because all you really get is a rocket launcher and some rockets but in reality it is a great idea and very helpful.  Once you have selected the class (number 6) and spawned, press G or what ever key you have set to drop your primary weapon and throw away the bazooka.

Yes, throw it away, leaving you with a secondary weapon.  The allies have a nice little M1 carbine and the axis have what can only be described as an automatic pistol.  These two guns are highly accurate.  The M1 can be fired very quickly with lots of left mouse button presses and the bullets go where they are aimed at.  The axis pistol fires all of the magazine as long as you hold down the left mouse button - and delivers an amazing set of hits if your accurate.

Now the best part, when you run over a dropped weapon such as an enemy primary gun (rifle, machine gun etc) you will automatically pick it up.  This gives you two weapon options - each with their own ammo.  Once you pick up another weapon take time to reload it.

When you are in a gun fight now you can select either weapon, but notice that your secondary gun has limited ammo so use it wisely.

EDITED UPDATE:  Keep the weapon until the rockets run out or you need a better primary.  I have found the game is more fun rocketing other gamers up the wazoo on many occasions!

Saturday 4 December 2010

Day Of Defeat Source : Tutorial 5 - Transparent Smoke

Stop Smoking NOT WORKING

When playing the game some people throw smoke grenades to obscure your view.  It is possible to remove the actual smoky effect my editing the appropriate file.  In this case it is the particle_smokegrenade.vtf file.
  1. Download GCFSCAPE. It is here
  2.  Download PAINT.NET. It is here.
  3. Download VTF PLUGIN FOR PAINT.NET. It is here.
  4. Install GCFSCAPE, PAINT.NET and the VTF PLUGIN (comes with instructions).
  5. Run GCFSCAPE.
  6. Select Open. Go to C:\Program Files\Steam\Steamapps.
  7. Select Day Of Defeat Source.gcf - which contains all of the game materials.
  8. Navigate to root/dod/materials/particle in GCFSCAPE.
  9. Drag that folder to your location C:\Program Files\Steam\Steamapps\USERNAME\Day Of Defeat Source\Dod\Materials\particle - this puts the necessary file in your game folder.
  10. Run PAINT.NET and open the particle_smokegrenade.vtf file in the Particle folder.
  11. Edit the file in PAINT.NET.
  12. In order to remove the smoke use the eraser tool in PAINT.NET with a large brush size.
  13. Save the file.
  14. Run Steam and DOD Source, select a class in game that has smoke grenades.
  15. Throw a grenade and see if you can see any smoke - nope it's all gone. 


What is happening is you are throwing smoke but you wont see the effect now, but of course the effect works for everyone else.

Thursday 2 December 2010

No Scope Practice - Step 1

I Really Have Lost The Nack 
I am really quite confused.  In Old DOD you can no scope quite successfully after lots of solitary practice.  I know this because I have done it and know the technique I use works.  The maps on that DOD are not that large and the sniper rifle bullet is engineered in the game to just go until it hits something, even the edge of the map.  All you need to do is get used to shooting without a crosshair.  Sounds easy but does take a lot of trying and failing.  You need to get very good at hitting your mark close up and then slowly trying to move about and do it and eventually put on more distance.


In this post I will describe with screen shots my progress in DOD Source up until now.
  1. Create a new game in DOD Source.  Don't try this on a live map with players or even online.  Give yourself a chance.  Start up a map from your list that is a colour map.  One of the orange maps will do.  If you don't have an orange map then go online, connect to a server playing one and the map will be downloaded to your computer.  Why? Orange maps have nice textures on the walls with lines that make up squares and intersections.  
  2. Select one of the sniper classes and move very close to the orange wall.
  3. Scope the sniper rifle and place the crosshairs on one of the intersected lines.
  4. Shoot the intersection.
  5. Shoot the lines near the intersection until all of your bullets hit where you aim.  Why?  No point being a sniper if you cannot hit what you aim at while scoped.
  6. Turn around and shoot at intersection at a distance again until you hit what you aim at scoped.
  7. When the bullets run out empty the pistol in a similar way at close distance then join the other team and select their sniper class.
  8. Do steps 3 to 7 again a few times, even when your bored with it.
  9. Now with a fresh sniper rifle lets try unscoped.  Go very close to an intersection and scoped the rifle to see where the crosshair meets the intersection.  Unscope quickly to see the position of the rifle barrel.  Now shoot and see where the bullet went.
  10. You might find that the bullet did not hit its target in the place expected.  The gun has a natural sway so the aim can be of a little even at close distances.
  11. Move to another intersection and do the same again.  Try to see how the gun barrel sits when you shoot to give you a visual impression of how to hold the sniper rifle in order to hit the target.
  12. Keep doing this until you use up a few clips of the rifle.
  13. Now try doing the same but without scoping the rifle, just go near an intersection, and shoot.  It is important to not be moving while shooting - this will be tried later.  If you find you are getting better at this unscoped shot, trying it crouched, prone, standing.
  14. It is now time to increase the distance from the intersection, just a little at a time to see what distance your shots are missing  more than hitting at - this will give you an idea of your maximum range.
  15. Vary the distance close and further until you are just really good at it.
  16. Now to add in movement.  So far you should have tried this without moving around.  Get close to the wall again and shoot an intersection, move to the side and do it again at another one and so on along the wall.  Spend time trying to do this - slowly at first and then quicker as you get better.  Try both directions as well to make sure you are okay at left and right.

This is step 1.  No enemy to shoot, just practice.  I suggest at least a few weeks of this an hour or so a day.  Why so long?  Easy.  If you try this too early without building up some skill level you will look like a complete moron on an online server.



Wednesday 1 December 2010

Universal Crosshair - Its A Boring Game Though

I found this scanning forums and have added it for those who just want to be boring.  It is the universal crosshair made by pro-hax and is here.  I tried it out today 01/12/10 and found it actually put me off the game.  I am a good sniper "no scoper" in DOD original and found this actually put me off trying no scopes.  I tested it on some servers I am on regularly now for a few hours and gave up.  There is no real feeling of being a good player with this but I am going to stick to my guns and make sure that all this stuff gets out there.  Below is my desktop at the centre - the software overlays itself centrally on top of any windowed game.  So to make it work you must play DOD Source windowed.  This works for many games so that is why it is universal.





Thanks to pro-hax for this although belated.  I will try and make my own version soon - looks like it is programmed in VB or C++ using Direct X   Unfortunately the term pro-hax has taken over so I cannot identify the author.  Genius has such anonymity.

{UPDATE: I have written a version of my own 80% complete using Visual Basic Express 2005.  It makes a large crosshair of a colour chosen from the colour picker but also can place an image in the same place which means I could make my own image files for very detailed cross hairs.  I have chosen Cyan as the transparent colour.  I will work on this in January again and perhaps complete it.}

On a personal note I found that the sniper un-scoped in DOD Source is placed at a different location compared to DOD original and has much more 'sway' in your own movement making no-scopes quite difficult.  My admiration to all of the real no-scopers in DOD Source which I hope to become a member of in a few months.

Day Of Defeat Source : Tutorial 5 - Changing The Size Of The Chat Box Text

Player Chat Box - Changing Text Size

While looking over some forums I found some of INsane's Posts from a few years ago.  They are a bit complex and take some time to understand but I have found useful information there.  To that end I have taken a copy of INsane's edited file ChatScheme.res which is here.  This file contains the settings for the player chat box you see on screen when players are typing messages to each other.  INsane has already made some changes to the file so the chat box is different colours making it stand out more when you use it.

I have added a change to a section of the file in "ChatFont".  I always found the text in the box to be too small for my eyes to see properly and so have increased the size of all the text to 24.  The default is 12.  That means my text is twice as big as normal - for easy reading.  Below is the section which is also included in the file.

"ChatFont" // Just the chat font only
{
"1"
{
"name" "Arial"
"tall" "24"
"weight" "700"
"yres" "480 599"
"dropshadow" "1"
}
"2"
{
"name" "Arial"
"tall" "24"
"weight" "700"
"yres" "600 767"
"dropshadow" "1"
}
"3"
{
"name" "Arial"
"tall" "24"
"weight" "700"
"yres" "768 1023"
"dropshadow" "1"
}
"4"
{
"name" "Arial"
"tall" "24"
"weight" "700"
"yres" "1024 1199"
"dropshadow" "1"
}
"5"
{
"name" "Arial"
"tall" "24"
"weight" "700"
"yres" "1200 10000"
"dropshadow" "1"
}
}



The name = font name, tall = font size.

Ensure the  ChatScheme.res file is copied into C:\Program Files\Steam\Steamapps\USERNAME\Day Of Defeat Source\Dod\Resource.  This file will them be used instead of the game defaults.

Day Of Defeat Source : Tutorial 4 - Making Custom Sniper Crosshairs

Let's Clear Up Somethings

When you play as a sniper in DOD Source you are given a basic black crosshair with the usual circle area to snipe from, with the majority of the screen blacked out as if you are a real sniper.  In this tutorial you will see how to change the crosshair and also remove the blackout area, making it easier to hit and also spot the enemy players.  Below is a sample image of the basic sniper view.



We will turn this view into the image shown below.



As you can see the black fog has been lifted completely, the crosshair has been made red and also joined up at the middle to make it easier to see what you are going to hit.

This is a reasonably easy process if the steps are followed well.


  1. Download GCFSCAPE. It is here
  2.  Download PAINT.NET. It is here.
  3. Download VTF PLUGIN FOR PAINT.NET. It is here.
  4. Install GCFSCAPE, PAINT.NET and the VTF PLUGIN (comes with instructions).
  5. Run GCFSCAPE.
  6. Select Open. Go to C:\Program Files\Steam\Steamapps.
  7. Select Day Of Defeat Source.gcf - which contains all of the game materials.
  8. Navigate to root/dod/materials/sprites/scopes in GCFSCAPE.
  9. Drag that folder to your location C:\Program Files\Steam\Steamapps\USERNAME\Day Of Defeat Source\Dod\Materials\sprites\scopes - this puts the sniper crosshairs in your game folder.
  10. Run PAINT.NET and open all of the scope_k43 files in the Scopes folder e.g. scope_k43_ll.vtf
  11. Edit the file in PAINT.NET to make your own crosshair.  The design is up to you.  There are 4 files for each sniper scope.  Each representing a corner of the scope.  ll = lower left, lr = lower right, ul = upper left, ur = upper right.
  12. In order to remove the fog use the eraser tool in PAINT.NET with a large brush size.  This can be tricky but once done the effect is great. 
  13. Save the crosshairs files.
  14. Run Steam and DOD Source, select a sniper class in game.

     
You now have an effective custom sniper crosshair in your game - this makes aiming better if the crosshair works well with you..  Here is a sample of the sniper crosshairs I like to use.  I use the same one for both sniper rifles.  I have left a sample of all the scopes here.  There are also scope_spring files for the allied sniper.

Tuesday 30 November 2010

Getting Back Into Models

I Have Forgot Most Of It

As usual my brain has leaked out knowledge and information I haven't needed in a while so I seem to have lost most of my Blender 3D knowledge.  Great, that was a lot of useful stuff about modelling.

I now need to do some research and read some tutorials on how it works again so I can start on my modelling posts.  My plan is to take the basic player model and make ones with big heads and helmets - cartoon-ish.  It would be funny to see in the game and even more fun to see if the game server would register a headshot with the new model.

As I re-learn Blender I will make posts when appropriate to explain what I have done and allow anyone else to have a go themselves.

Blender 3D is a free modelling program.  I have it installed with my Liberkey portable apps, which is a great piece of kit if you hate installing software.

Monday 29 November 2010

Day Of Defeat Source : Tutorial 3 - Making Bright Colour Player Models

It's Like The Toy Soldiers I Had As A Kid

In this tutorial we will see how easy it is to change the colour of the game player models for allies and axis easily.  This will mean when you play you can see bright players running around the maps, making it easier to spot them.  You can also apply the same idea to grenades that are thrown.  This will work on most servers, but some have sv_pure set on the server to dis-allow custom models and textures.

  1. Download GCFSCAPE. It is here
  2. Download PAINT.NET. It is here.
  3. Download VTF PLUGIN FOR PAINT.NET. It is here
  4. Install GCFSCAPE, PAINT.NET and the VTF PLUGIN (comes with instructions).
  5. Run GCFSCAPE.
  6. Select Open. Go to C:\Program Files\Steam\Steamapps.
  7. Select Day Of Defeat Source.gcf - which contains all of the game materials.
  8. Navigate to root/dod/materials/models/player.
  9. Drag that folder to your location C:\Program Files\Steam\Steamapps\USERNAME\Day Of Defeat Source\Dod\Materials\Models\Player - this puts the game player models in your game folder.
  10. Run PAINT.NET and open one of the files in the American or German folder
    the best ones are the ones that contain the player faces.
  11. Edit the file in PAINT.NET to make your own skin colour. I suggest you simply
    make a filled rectangle to completely cover the entire image e.g. bright green
    rectangle
  12. Save the file.
  13. Run Steam and DOD Source, when playing the team will all be that colour.


You now have an effective bright coloured model to help you if you have bad eyesight or just want an advantage.  Below is a sample screenshot of the game with colour models.  I have left a sample of the American player in green here, and the German player in red here.




Enjoy the fix from me [adct]Glassjaw

Day Of Defeat Source : Tutorial 2 - Making A Custom Crosshair

It's All About The Little Red Dot

You can have found when playing DOD source that the seven game crosshairs provided are just not good enough.  I find them to be quite small so always make one that suits me.  I also like to make them multi-coloured so I can see them better in all maps.

This is a reasonably easy process if the steps are followed well.

  1. Download GCFSCAPE. It is here
  2.  Download PAINT.NET. It is here.
  3. Download VTF PLUGIN FOR PAINT.NET. It is here.
  4. Install GCFSCAPE, PAINT.NET and the VTF PLUGIN (comes with instructions).
  5. Run GCFSCAPE.
  6. Select Open. Go to C:\Program Files\Steam\Steamapps.
  7. Select Day Of Defeat Source.gcf - which contains all of the game materials.
  8. Navigate to root/dod/materials/vgui/crosshairs in GCFSCAPE.
  9. Drag that folder to your location C:\Program Files\Steam\Steamapps\USERNAME\Day Of Defeat Source\Dod\Materials\vgui - this puts the game crosshairs in your game folder.
  10. Run PAINT.NET and open one of the files in the Crosshairs folder e.g. crosshair7.vtf
  11. Edit the file in PAINT.NET to make your own crosshair.  The design is up to you.
  12. Save the crosshair file.
  13. Run Steam and DOD Source, go to options menu in game and select the crosshair.

     
You now have an effective custom crosshair in your game - this makes aiming better if the crosshair works well with you..  Here is a sample of a crosshair I like to use.  It is much larger than the ones provided by the game.  I have left a sample of crosshair7 online here.




Enjoy the fix from me [adct]Glassjaw

Day Of Defeat Source : Tutorial 1 - Making The Game Quiet

Stop Sound In DOD Source Game


This will be a quick game fix that works on all servers because it is a client side fix i.e. on your computer.  The method was thought up by me as far as I know but as always great minds think alike so someone may have also paralleled this method, and if they well done :-)!


  1. Copy your Ambient folder as a backup in case you mess this up.  It is in C:\Program Files\Steam\Steamapps\USERNAME\Day Of Defeat Source\Dod\Sound\Ambient.   If you cannot find this folder in that location you may not have played DOD Source yet.  This folder will have the default game sounds that play during the basic maps that were made for the game, but can also have some extra sounds that you pick up as you play other maps on servers, custom sounds for home made maps.
  2. Run Windows Sound Recorder (Start->Accessories->Entertainment->Sound Recorder).
  3. Click Record button and then stop at about 3 seconds, we are recording silence.
  4. Save the file in the Ambient folder as silence.wav
  5. Copy and Paste the silence.wav file many times, this will make many copies with
     similar names.
  6. Double click on one of the sounds in the Ambient folder such as thunder2.wav.  This will play the sound in your default sound player.  Decide if you hate it - if you do delete it! If you did delete it then
    rename one of the silence.wav files to that name thunder2.wav

    NOTE:: This means that the game will still play the thunder2.wav file for that
    sound effect but it will be simply silence.

     
  7. Repeat step 6 again and again until all of the annoying sounds are gone.

You now have an effective stop sound working on your game with less background sounds.. When you play the game you will find that many maps a less noisy and your ability to hear player footsteps nearby increases, as well as identifying gun fire in the distance.

I have left a sample of silence.wav here, and silence.mp3 here.

An additional method that I was given by Ninja Ski from =FFC=Clan  was to use some game commands that also stop the noises from the game that can be played ad-hoc by other players and server admins.  These are usually funny sound effects and music.  I have always found this annoying so 'bind' the commands to a key.

The commands are::

play test.mp3;snd_mixvol ambient 0

You could bind this to the Z key with: bind "z" "play test.mp3;snd_mixvol ambient 0" 

This is done by editing the file config.cfg  located at C:\Program Files\Steam\Steamapps\USERNAME\Day Of Defeat Source\Dod\Cfg\

 I will discuss binds in a later post as I find useful ones.  I use this nice little sound stopper with my w key (walk forward) and the left mouse button (fire weapon) as well as right mouse button (weapon option).  Here are my binds:

bind "w" "+forward;play test.mp3;snd_mixvol ambient 0"
bind "MOUSE1" "+attack;play test.mp3;snd_mixvol ambient 0" 
bind "MOUSE2" "+attack2;play test.mp3;snd_mixvol ambient 0"

 This means when I walk around or use by weapon I will stop the annoying sounds that players and adimins use.

The game it is achanging

The Game It Is Achanging

 

I have spent the last few weeks playing Day Of Defeat : Source.  It looks like I am going to stop playing old DOD and stick with this one instead.

Why?  Game play on source is better now for some reason.  There are a reasonable amount of servers, excellent maps and a sort of gaming community in operation.  I have done some game editing/tweaks to make the game play better for me and I will put together some nice little tutorials on what I have done and why.

Tuesday 24 August 2010

The start of it all

The Starts Of It All


This isn't really the start of it all, it's more of a continuation of a new idea.  I have been playing multi-player games, one in particular for quite a long time now and have been drawn into it, the game itself but more readily the multi-player game aspect of it.

I am a self confessed game addict [adct].