Is it really worth it? Just because of a small hole in the bow.
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Well, look...)))
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Question for Psathe about the bow. If we apply an effect to it, we naturally need an animated version that repeats all the movements of the old one, right?
Then there are two ways: the first is to re-insert it into the hands of all heroes, roughly speaking, attaching it to one of the bones of the hand. Or we can attach it to the bow, but I think we'll have to create several effects for different animations, like with arrows. (I'm not entirely sure). But either way, it's a long and tedious process. The second option is to overlay a complete model, erase everything, and leave only the bow. But in this case, we'll add another N number of polygons, which will further load our game....(((( What other options are there?
Are we really creating problems for ourselves? Or am I missing something? Erased heroes, their textures are not visible, but the polygons are still there, right?
And another question. Sometimes it's possible to disable a mesh in the geometry files, usually the last one, but I don't remember exactly, I haven't tried it in a long time. So, a disabled mesh won't add polygons, right??? But we won't be able to apply effects anymore? I mean, we could dig around in the model and, for example, disable the elephants under the carpets. We can also disable the model of Duncan's horse, I don't remember if I did it or not... Maybe there's something else to look at... Or is the skinning worth it? And will the lighting of these parts of the heroes disappear? I understand that with Duncan's horse, we need the lighting for the mages, and effects don't seem to provide lighting. But the elephants under the carpets are not relevant...
I suggest going with the second option, i.e., erase the texture of the original bow, but not the string... and apply the bow as an effect! This bow takes up very few polygons... so it won't affect the speed at all!
By the way, the swords and shields of some Haven heroes are made in this way, for example, Godric's shield!
A disabled mesh only affects the absence of lighting for the entire model; effects are applied to the bones of the skeleton!
Regarding the transparent elephants, we'll have to take a look... there are some interesting tricks with beautiful disabling, but it doesn't always work!

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