Friction maps

All about making tracks for MX Simulator
wheels1758
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Re: Friction maps

Post by wheels1758 »

Hey, im at school, dont have msn :(

If you put the tiles in your track folder, the texturelist should look like track/mud.ppm

If they are in their own folder in the track folder, it should say track/folder/mud.ppm

If they are in your personal folder, mud.ppm

If they are in a folder in your personal folder, folder/mud.ppm

I do not believe the @ is needed, now that i think about it. Once you have the path to what you think is correct, go to the ingame editor, and go to tilemap, then click on the little square and it will scroll through your tiles.

If this doesn't work, let me know where everything is saved, what everything is called, and i will try to figure something out.
cpt_Slow
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Re: Friction maps

Post by cpt_Slow »

the first mud refers to the folder which the file is in. In this example the track is called mud so in a folder called mud. If say the track was called motox it would read @motox/mud.ppm (I think that is what you were getting at wheels but you confused me when talking about extra sub-folders i think this example makes it clearer.)
It is the way in which all files are referenced in this game

EDIT: sorry wheels i posted this before reading your newest post, which is far clearer
jlv
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Re: Friction maps

Post by jlv »

The @ sign is automatically added in this case, so if you add it the game will expect the filename to start with @. I know I should have made this consistent with the other files but I'm stuck with it now for the sake of compatibility.

Also, I wouldn't bother with the mud0001.ppm - mud-1111.ppm anymore. Those were there to make the corners tile correctly but now the decals do that much better.
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Garasaki
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Re: Friction maps

Post by Garasaki »

Well I got it working, much thanks to double D (ddmx) for helping me. The key seems to have been adding the additional lines starting on line 3 of the texturelist. And starting with a fresh texturelist - mine must have gotten flubbed up somehow.

So now I'm riding my track that's purple, blue, and yellow - but it's possible to acheive some pretty sweet effects with multiple traction values used.
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wheels1758
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Re: Friction maps

Post by wheels1758 »

Garasaki wrote:...So now I'm riding my track that's purple, blue, and yellow...
You making rainbow road from Mario Kart? That would be interesting.
giopanda
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Re: Friction maps

Post by giopanda »

hello guys, sorry to bump a thread that is years old but i don't want to start a new one and risk to be insulted for not searching the forum :wink:
i'm working on my first track, as stated in another thread the track is Mantova, specifically i'm looking to replicate the 2009 Starcross layout.
what i want to know is about friction maps of course.
reading this and other threads looks like the painting method in the editor has changed since the opening of this post (i play from like a week so i don't know what has been before).
the track i'm doing is completely made of sand (check this video to see what i mean http://video.mpora.com/watch/mptv_dx1E/), so i wanted to know how to modify the files, i mean i get that in the texturelist there are friction (standard 1) low rolling and high rolling, respectively 20 and 50 if i remember well, but i can't understand how they behave..
i tried to change the friction up to 9 and what i noticed is that higher the value higher the "glue" effect on the bike.
what i can't understand are speed roll values, is slow roll when you actually go slow and high roll when you go fast?
and what i can't really understand a brown organic matter are tiles, what am i supposed to do with them?
in the texturelist there are grass and dirt ppm, plus the tiles i suppose, and just one of those textures has friction values?
why?
everytime i try to understand what's that file my head is about to explode!
it took me 3 days to figure how to edit and customize billboards flaggers and statues (and actually i'm not 100% sure if i'm doing everything correctly) but this thing of friction is driving me crazy.
not to mention decals..but this is another chapter that will come later :mrgreen:
thanx for your help!
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Garasaki
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Re: Friction maps

Post by Garasaki »

It's not that bad - to a degree you are overthinking the tiles.

1) You are right, the painting method has changed - this actually makes it easier. If you want different tractions in different areas of your track, you need to create new tiles (which can be wacky colors, because they will be covered up by the decals so no one will ever see them). Each tile can have a different traction valve. So for instance you could make a red one for deep sand, a black one for lighter sand, a green one for dirt, whatever. If you only want to have 1 traction/resistance value for the whole track, just change the base one and dont worry about adding new ones (I think).

2) The low rolling means the resistance of the dirt when you are moving slow, the high rolling means resistance of the dirt when you are moving fast. Traction and resistance have a close relationship so sometimes you really have to think about what you change. For instance, have a very low resistance is sort of like having low traction. But having high resistance and low traction will result in the bike staying in one spot while the wheels spin (sort of like a tractor pull on ice). So experiment but also try to really think about what you want to change - resistance or traction.

3) Make SMALL changes to the values. The traction changes signifigantly with a 0.1 difference, and resistance changes signifigantly with a 1 difference. So slapping traction up to 9 is going tooooooooooooooo far, and will probably result in really weird physics that are hard to interpret.
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giopanda
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Re: Friction maps

Post by giopanda »

just that?
is really that easy?
oh man sorry didn't want you to waste your time over this :wink:
so it's just a matter of creating colored tiles and paint them where i want them in the editor, like a normal texture?
that tiles and angles thing really confused me..
thank you so much.
i'll play around with values and see what suit best for what i need.
thank you very much!
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jlv
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Re: Friction maps

Post by jlv »

Garasaki wrote:2) The low rolling means the resistance of the dirt when you are moving slow, the high rolling means resistance of the dirt when you are moving fast.
Small correction: the low value is for when the tire isn't compressed and the high value is for when the tire is compressed to the rim.
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giopanda
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Re: Friction maps

Post by giopanda »

jlv wrote: Small correction: the low value is for when the tire isn't compressed and the high value is for when the tire is compressed to the rim.
so is the opposite of what i thought, low value is for when i move fast, so the tyre like float over the ground due to speed, while high value is for when i go slow, and the tyre "sink" into the ground due to the weight and is compressed towards the rim..so that's why low roll has lower value and high roll has higher.
is that correct?
is there a way to know "exactly" how different surfaces behave?
i mean a sort of formula so any trackmaker can add different friction maps in their tracks?
because is not very easy to understand and apply a correct value..
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jlv
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Re: Friction maps

Post by jlv »

If you really wanted to be accurate, you could tie a rope to your bike and a scale and then see how many pounds of force it takes to make the tires slip. The coefficient of friction will be the weight of the bike and rider divided by the force it takes to move it. For example, if the bike+rider is 350 lbs and it takes 525 lbs to slide the tires the coefficient of friction would be 1.5 (525/350).
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giopanda
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Re: Friction maps

Post by giopanda »

jlv wrote:If you really wanted to be accurate, you could tie a rope to your bike and a scale and then see how many pounds of force it takes to make the tires slip. The coefficient of friction will be the weight of the bike and rider divided by the force it takes to move it. For example, if the bike+rider is 350 lbs and it takes 525 lbs to slide the tires the coefficient of friction would be 1.5 (525/350).
just wow :shock:
i think i'm gonna try something else..google could be my friend!
and thank you so much again for the help, i'm here from a week and i'm lovng you guys every day more :mrgreen:
hope my track will come out as much as detailed and close to the real one!
but it's still a long way ahead..
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Garasaki
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Re: Friction maps

Post by Garasaki »

Um.

Why don't you just try different values and see how they feel?

You don't really need a resource to tell you what traction/friction values to use.
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giopanda
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Re: Friction maps

Post by giopanda »

yeah that's what i'm going to do since finding real values is pretty difficult..
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