Would you be willing to write an exporter?

[ReindeerFloatilla]

Hi there. There is now a .nod/nad Noesis plugin that has been created. I've uploaded it here.

https://www.moddb.com/games/vampire-the-masquerade-redemption/downloads/nod-noesis-plugin

It currently imports/exports .nod and imports .nad. However it does not export. Would you be willing to write an exporter for .nad? It would greatly benefit the modding community as we could now create custom animations for the game.

[rfsheffer]

Hey! You seem to have figured the whole thing out since you were able to import the NAD files. Exporting them back is just reversing the process unless I am missing something. I remember having trouble with the inverse binding pose matrix that was stored in the data and not being able to figure out exactly how it was structured. I assume you figured it out with your importer. So your goal is to get animations back into VtMR I assume. So the best process here would be to get the data into Blender which would be great for editing and be able to export it back to the game's native formats. So some tool for Blender would be very ideal. I am happy to hear there is still some momentum around VtMR modding. It is always in the back of my mind and wouldn't mind helping out but I keep thinking about how great it would be to bring VtMR to a modern game engine like Unreal. Build some map converter, then all the assets like meshes, textures and FX, then the gameplay code which is in java? Anyway, I can dream. Let me know what is keeping you from exporting back to NAD and I will see what I can do to help. Cheers!

[ReindeerFloatilla]

I'm not the programmer of the importer plugin it was someone who is currently uninterested in finishing it. I'm fairly certain the importer figured out the inverse binding pose matrix.

Right now we use Noesis in conjunction with Blender. I wrote a tutorial for doing it with .nod we just need it for .nad. I would love some kind of simpler exporter solution but for now this is at least better than using Milkshape. https://www.moddb.com/games/vampire-the-masquerade-redemption/tutorials/how-to-import-models-from-blender-into-vampire-the-masquerade-redemption

I'd rather stick to the Nod engine as opposed to working towards porting VtmR to Unreal. I want to create a custom singleplayer chronicle for the game but would need custom animations for some of the more ambitious ideas I have.

[rfsheffer]

OK so my thinking is you guys would be better off with a blender plugin that can import and export NOD and NAD data. I will deprecate this project "nod_nad_to_fbx" and start a new repo soon for the blender plugin. Wish me luck in getting this all working properly, I already have the models importing into blender directly using a custom plugin.

[ReindeerFloatilla]

This is so exciting. If you can get exporting working I would be forever in your debt. I would also write a tutorial on how to do both meshes and animations

[ReindeerFloatilla]

If you want to easily test I recommend replacing Christof.nod and Christof's idle animation chris_stand_util. Place them in vampire the masquerade redemption\3D\models and \anims respectively. Then go to multiplayer and select LAN and you should see the replaced model/animation over Dark Ages Christof.

The engine is similar to Quake in that you can place files in the same directory structure as the .nob files in the root of the folder. The game will load them first. You can also open .nob with 7zip.

[rfsheffer]

Thanks for the tips, you will have to be patient with me while I work on this. Hopefully, it isn't too complicated.

[rfsheffer]

Progress report: Way further than I was before. I have the skeleton in and bound to the mesh. I will be starting the process of importing NAD animations next. Once I am happy with all that I can start exporting back to NOD / NAD.

I do have a question tho: Where in the VtMR modding community hanging out these days? Are people still playing and making multiplayer campaigns like the old days?

[ReindeerFloatilla]

Are you a Tremere? Because you are an absolute magician!

Right now we hang out on the PlanetVampire discord. Planetvampire as a website went down earlier this year. There's a successor site called PlanetVampyre with a new forum that we've been using. There's also talk about making a new VtmR wiki.

https://clinchnet.com/planetvampyre/ https://discord.com/invite/kCNFRzabAk

I've been personally working on preserving and archiving lost VtmR mods since PlanetVampire went down. I've managed to upload hundreds of stuff to moddb. I've also been trying to make my own custom player skins. There are some creators currently working on making custom multiplayer maps as well. I hope to make a custom singleplayer chronicle one day.

[ReindeerFloatilla]

Hi there. Are you still working on the project? Do please let me know at your earliest convenience. We're just hoping to get to work on importing some animations into the game.

We're also currently working on a new forum as the host of our previous one was unreliable. Will post a link here eventually.

[rfsheffer]

Yep, still working on it. My next stage is to import the NAD data. Once that works then I just have to reverse the process to create an exporter. I haven't worked on it for a couple of weeks because I am really busy with my job, closing out projects for the year. I hope to get some time to work on it this week.

Cheers!

[ReindeerFloatilla]

Nice to hear. Can't wait. I have so many ideas for random poses for Christof.

[ReindeerFloatilla]

Hey. Just checking in are you still working on this project?