New Industries Needed.......

[rodea2007]

Hey Rodea, What do I need to do to get the warehouse you sent me to work? It had no kfm file with it. Slider

Don't worry, I will make it for you, and make them can animated 3 levels

[bobby]

Hi guys, Excuse my ignorance, but I'm still new at this stuff. I appreciate the sheds/warehouse from Snoopy and Rodea, but neither had a kfm file with it. I got the nifs and dds files, but I don't know what I need to do to construct a kfm. I am assuming that I need one for one of these structures to work in the game. Snoopy, you said that your sheds were derivatives of the distribution center, which I have. Can I use that kfm file and just change the name of the nif? Questions, questions. Slider

Ignorance excused. You do not need KFM files for everything you know, as all the KFM does is control animations, So if the Items do not have an animation you do not need a KFM file.
There are a lot of items that do not use animations and the nif will work fine
as long as you put the right code into the xml file.

The shed from snoopy is a derivative of the Games Original Furniture Factory to which I had converted to a Distribution centre for one of my maps and snoopy had removed the wood and chairs from the nif. So you could use the KFM file for them if you want but you don't actually need them. Rodea will say you do, but tell me do you really sit there and watch 1 item or are you to busy running your trains and building tracks. The only time you See the Build-Up is when you actually place a Station or annex or build an in-city industry, Most animations for the build up happen when you are looking somewhere else on the map or just happen to be looking at the right place at the right time.

So the KFM for that derivative shed by snoopy is either the distribution centre or furniture palnt and is for the saw spinning, timber moving and dust generated.
So for another building use its not really needed.

The other Files used are mainly for the Build up animations where the building goes from a Level 1 to level 2 and then finally to Level 3. To which you would only see that happen if you watched the building the whole time to see it happen.
As with the building being modified the build up files are not needed as all you would see is the original building change size then revert back to the new building again.

[snoopy55]

Bobby is right, there is nothing to animate on these sheds, so there is no reason to make KFM and KF files for it. My apologies for not writing up an XML for it, but with so many of them and the fact that they are to be skinned by you, it is a bit hard to do. If they are out-of-town, they need Industry and Report DDS's, which follow your Event files. Names are needed and icons.

If you go to the Wiki at this point: media/index.php?title=Railroads:Scenario_Information_-_XML_Reference#RRT_Industries.xml you will find the description of each line.

Below is a XML for Sheds in general, with some notes included. If you need further info on how to do it, ask.

[Osiris1975]

For my current map, I could use an airport that would have Tourist as output.

[snoopy55]

I have a possibility, just do not be in a hurry, I'm a bit behind in things as it is........

[Osiris1975]

No worries, I'm going through all the growing pains of a first time map-maker so I'm not going to need it any time soon. I may just adapt some other industry to provide the tourist production until something more solid is available.

[Renothian]

On the map I'm working on that Snoopy finally got me in the right direction on, I'm trying not to use any default stuff but just things from here, BB's, but I don't see an oil well of any kind, is there a well of some kind I can use anywhere?

[bobby]

On the map I'm working on that Snoopy finally got me in the right direction on, I'm trying not to use any default stuff but just things from here, BB's, but I don't see an oil well of any kind, is there a well of some kind I can use anywhere?

Most people use the Games Standard Oil Well and use the Refineries from the Building blocks.
As yet there is no Oil Wells done as building blocks.

[snoopy55]

Well, there actually is a different one worked up, but it does have a problem having to do with the placement of the wells:

oilwell_working.jpg

One of us needs to find out what keeps the wells from sinking into the ground. Other than bad contractors!

BTW, they do actually move..........

Anyone want to mess with it?

[Renothian]

I wish I could build my own industries from scratch or modify existing ones but I'm a long way off from that... but if I could this would be my kind of industry, a liquid oxygen plant with lots of tanks and pipes... cool...

plant-oxyswing.jpg

plant-nitroswing.jpg

Actually, I found the fromagerie (milk processor) has similar tanks and pipes already on it, if the building could be made a little more modern, like those tanks and pipes in place of the stacks on a modern factory... just a thought...

[snoopy55]

Hmmmmm. Go thru the Industry BBs and get names of the buildings you might want to use that way. That should not be to difficult. I think

[Grizzly]

I would like to offer 2 suggestions regarding new industries. First, I recently used the lumber_company industry from the ACWR map (which I really like) as a Peat Moss bailing plant for my Canadian Pacific map. I reskinned the wrapper on the lumber bundles and put Canadian Peat Moss labels on them. It makes a nice site, but the annex (crane) is not animated and does not load the bundles. I don't think the annex loads lumber in ACWR either, since it is a nif file and not a kfm file. The ACWR map uses a forklift as the annex which is also a nif file and not animated. It would be nice it someone could make a lumber_company_annex.kfm file that keeps the animation of the sheep farm loader, but loads the lumber bundles. I think Rodea2007 has animated the crane to load containers in his West Sumatera game. Maybe it could be modified so it would load the lumber bundles in the ACWR map. I could use the same file for my peat moss annex. I realize this may not be easy, and may be the reason no one has done it. Or maybe someone has done it and I just don't know about it.

Second suggestion. If someone is really ambitious, they might try to make a new industry of coke ovens. I worked on coke ovens during my consulting days and they are very interesting and would make an interesting animated industry for SMR. Something similar to the steel mill or smelter industries in SMR might work well, where the coke ovens would be a small battery of maybe 4 ovens with a pushing machine on rails on one side and a gondola car on the other receiving the red hot coke being pushed from the ovens on the other. The coke car would then travel to the end of the battery into a quench tower which would have a plume of steam rise from the top as the 1500C coke is quenched with water. Quenched coke is dumped from the coke car onto a down-sloping brick coke wharf. From the wharf, the coke is transferred by belt conveyor to empty open-top hopper cars or gondolas. The empty coke car would then return to the first coke oven and repeat the whole process. Fire from the red hot coke in the coke car would make an interesting visual, similar to the pouring of molten metal from the steel mill or the gold smelter. Having seen this at real coke making plants, I know anyone would be impressed at the sight. Of course, coke is made from metallurgical coal and used in making steel in a blast furnace. In a game using the industry, coal would be shipped to the coke ovens or coke plant, coke would be shipped to the steel mill, and steel then shipped to an auto plant, etc. Just an idea. For anyone who wants to pursue this, I have attached some pictures of coke plants, coke car, and quench towers that might help with ideas for the SMR industry. - Grizzly

[slider38]

Hi Grizzly, I worked on that about a year ago for the map which I still have in progress. I took the crane from the port annex that Snoopy posted and experimented with that until I got something that worked. Attached is the annex. I was not enamored with the lumber bundle wrapper, so I re-worked the bundle. You will want to work the Annex_Lumber_Bundle_128.dds to something that works for your peat moss. I have included the lumbermill_diff and other files associated with the structure as that is where the crane structure comes from. You will likely need to substitute your peat moss plant files for those, but this annex should get you going. The kf files are all standard to the game.

Lumbermill_Annex.jpg

NifSkope View

Lumbermill_Annex_2.jpg

In Game after loading traincars

One thing that you will notice is that the timing of the appearance of the freight on the traincar and the release of the bundle is off a bit. It is the same as that for loading containers at the port. This was sufficient for my purposes - I mainly wanted to see some action. I really don't know how to improve that timing, but if it bothers you, perhaps you can experiment with it. I wouldn't know where to start. Anyway, I hope this helps move your map along.

[Grizzly]

Slider38, Thanks for the annex. I like the looks of your lumber bundle. I think I remember a new lumber car in Train-cars-are-us that looks like it would work well with your lumber bundle and annex, maybe as well as the car you show above. I have already added that same car in the map I am working on now. I tried viewing the annex with animation in Nikscope. The annex looks nice, but I don't think I had all the right kf files for the lumber mill loaded, so the animation looked odd. I am working on a new map of the US Southeast now and will give it a try in that map so I can see it better. Thanks again. - Grizzly

[slider38]

I dont know if it is supposed to work this way, but when I am testing animation, I copy the kfs into the folder with the rest of my files. As these are standard game files, I did not include the kfs in the zip file, but for testing, you might want to copy those files from SMR's industries folder into the one you are testing from. That's what I would do. It makes them simple to load into NifSkope. The annex does work in my map.

As to traincars, I am using two cars, the games standard version 2 steel car - an idea I got from one of Snoopy's maps,

Lumber_car_1.jpg

and a lumber car that NSRailFan put together.

Lumber_car_2.jpg

[snoopy55]

It will look VERY odd in NifSkope. There are a few animations that have been created that don't work to well in NifSkope. It mainly depends on what program the person used to make them. Rodea uses 3D MAX for his. But as Slider says, as long as they work in the game OK............

[Grizzly]

True, it does look VERY odd in Nifskope. I did copy the standard kf files into the same folder, but on Animation the lumber bundle goes under the car and turns up on its end. I will try it in the game I am working on. If it works in Sliders game it should in mine, too. I really like the 2 cars Slider38 posted. I was using the long car as a v3 car for my latest game already. I reskinned it as a Southern RR car. I will give the other one a try. It looks nice. Thanks guys. - Grizzly

[rodea2007]

The horse from the animated horse was used, but a part was copied from the NIF to place the horses in the corral. Yes, people would look at it the first time, maybe a few more, but they will not sit and look at the horses moving every time they play a map that contains it. It also adds to the load on the computer playing it.


The horses are used in the Stable, which has little room to run, in the TrainCar, which has no room to run, and in the Annex, which, if you decide to make it, the horses can run into the TrainCar.

Almost passed a few years the horse Farm/Horse Ranch took annex, only that time I have not had time to make it, just now I can make a new annex to the horse farm / horse ranch. truth is not easy and as easy as you think to change the cow into a horse, it takes skill to make the horse animated dan can be run in SMR Game. You should be able to provide skin infuluence against the horse so that the horse seemed to move in accordance with the reality. this model so made by merging the existing cattle ranch annex KFs File and the the horse itself KFs. They are in the middle testing, after already I will upload them here

[snoopy55]

Looks great Rodea! Add a small fenced in area to the Annex so the horses don't run away, and a larger fenced in area for the Barn, with maybe a different skin to the Barn, and you have a whole new Industry! The fencing I just converted from Grizzly's work will do it.

Keep up the good work!

[rodea2007]

Ok Snoopy, I will try to make it....