Wall Worm Forums

One more thing: The same bitmap in the material editor needs to be piped into the Opacity slot of the standard material in order for the VMT exporter to set the $translucent flag.

Version 5.0.42 released on 11-29-2020

   * Entities: Updated the Entity function in Max 2019+ to force any entity with a parameter named "radius" to be stored as an integer and to include a new function to display that radius with a radius helper in the scene. Note that this change breaks compatibility with entities that have the type of a radius set to a string value.
   
   * Startup: Removed the notice about having recently updated Wall Worm.
   
   * Startup: Added information in MAXScript listener when starting Max to show startup impact time of Wall Worm.
   
   * WWMT: Updated the function for exporting MDL with the FBX option to use the Material name instead of the Bitmap filename.
   
   * WWMT: Updated the FBX export to honor Use Local Origin as World Origin if exporting a WWMT that meets these conditions: Has $staticprop turned on and only has one mesh assigned to model.
   
   * UI: Added backward-compatible support for newer versions of Max to properly resize rollouts when the command panel is resized.
   
   * CSGO: Fixed VMF Exporter not being able to launch game in CSGO with compiled map. Added these launch parameters that are now required to launch CSGO from outside of Steam:  -insecure -hijack
   
   * MACROS: Added a new macroscript that will try to get missing TGA files in scene from VPK; this is helpful when opening a scene from another user that has loaded VTFs into TGA files from the VPK but those TGA files are not on your current system. Only looks for missing TGA files that happen to be in a path that includes "sceneassets\images". Command to use: macros.run "wallworm.com" "FetchMissingTGAfromVTFinVPK"
   
   * Get Brush By ID: Fixed Get Brush By ID from causing a MAXScript error if a brush element of a concave brush is missing from the ID values embedded in it.

I am about to release an update to Wall Worm with this change. Below is a MAXScript that you can run before updating to store the current values that will be affected:

/*
struct WallWormEntityDataTypeHelper (
--values stored as strings that will be converted to floats in a custom attribute update and we need to store it because
stringsThatWillBeFloats = #("radius"), --make array in case we add more in future
/*
This script will embed entity parameters that are strings but will be converted to floats in a custom attribute update.
This is necessary because when a custom attribute parameter type is changed, it's current value is not kept (converted) but reverts to parameter default value.
*/
function storeCurrentValues = (
local updatedEnts = #()
for ent in ::WallWormHelperOps.entities WHERE isvalidnode ent do (
local ca = ::WallWormEntityOps.getEntCA ent
if ca != undefined then (
for p in stringsThatWillBeFloats do (
if isProperty ca p then (
local v = (getProperty ca p)
if classof v != float then (
setUserProp ent (("wallworm_entity_store_"+p) as name) (v as string)
append updatedEnts ent
)
)
)
)
)
if updatedEnts.count > 0 then (
selectionSets["Entities that Stored old values"] = updatedEnts
)
),
function retrieveOldValues = (
if ::WallWormHelperOps.entities.count > 0 then (
local paramsToCheck = #()
for p in stringsThatWillBeFloats do (
append paramsToCheck (datapair p (("wallworm_entity_store_"+p) as name))
)
for ent in ::WallWormHelperOps.entities WHERE isvalidnode ent do (
local ca = ::WallWormEntityOps.getEntCA ent
if ca != undefined then (
for p in paramsToCheck do (
local storedVal = getUserProp ent p.v2
if storedVal != undefined AND storeVal != "" then (
if isProperty ca p.v1 then (
--do a try because we cannot guarantee the string value can be converted to the data type
try (
setProperty ca p.v1 (storedVal as (classof (getProperty ca p.v1)))
) catch (
format "ERROR: Could not set % to % in %\n" p.v1 storedVal ent
)
)
)
)
)
)
)
)
)

::WallWormEntityDataTypeHelper = WallWormEntityDataTypeHelper()

To use this

• click Scripting > New Script
• Paste that code into your MAXScript File
• Click Tools > Evaluate All (CTRL+E)
• In the MAXScript Listener (F11) paste this code and then hit ENTER: ::WallWormEntityDataTypeHelper.storeCurrentValues()

Now the script will store the current values.

To retrieve the values after you update Wall Worm, you can then run this command in the MAXScript listener:
::WallWormEntityDataTypeHelper.retrieveOldValues()

IMPORTANT NOTE: You must run this code before updating to Wall Worm 5.0.41+ on each scene that you want to preserve the radius values of entities. If you do not have entities that use the radius parameter (or the radius was already defined as a float in the FGD you are using), you do not need to concern with this script.

I'm going to add an update to WW soon that has a visual helper for the radius of some entity parameters (like for env_soundscape and ambient_generic). The problem is that to do this correctly, I need to make sure that the parameters for these functions are float values. Unfortunately, due to the way the FGD files are written, the radius parameter for some entities (ambient_generic, for example) were stored as strings instead of floats. In my update, these will convert to floats. But here is the catch--the update to Custom Attributes that changes a parameter type does not allow the current value to propagate. This means that any existing scenes will get the default value applied to all ambient_generic radius values.

I can write a function that can embed the current value that can later be retrieved into the updated entities, but it must be done on a scene BEFORE updating to the version of WW that has these entity updates.

I want to try and get an idea about how many people this will affect as well as how many scenes. I need to know if it's worth my time to built this function.

Can you retry installing Wall Worm now you are on latest version of Max 2018?

Additional note about this: A WWMT Helper is actually just a Text shape with a piece of data attached to it in something called a Custom Attribute.

Can you see if adding simple Text shape objects into the scene replicates this for you?

Thank you for the information. I will look into this tonight and test on 2019.3.

In the meantime, do you have access to 3ds Max 2020.3 ? That is the preferred/recommended version for using WW at this time.