Made a new bandit skin for you guys

[Mojo (DayZ) 66]

I was bored for a few hours and ended up making a new bandit skin (if you go to the BI forums you can actually see me asking "are you serious you have to hack the P3D to get it to work? I just wanted to make a new texture, not a whole-new RVMAT!" [give me a break, I haven't made Arma models/skins in half a decade ;)]).

Anyway (and no, you don't have to edit the P3Ds, thankfully Max Power reminded my stupid ass of hidden selections after about five hours of me wanting to put my fist through the f'ing monitor), it looks pretty good for a bandito, using hidden selections to swap the camo:

Of course, it looks even better if you actually do hack the P3D, unfortunately, but maybe I just can't figure out how to use hidden selections to swap out the shemagh [like I said, five years]:

Basic design focus was on giving the bandit a hodge-podge collection of items that look scrounged together. A faded Flecktarn vest, perhaps from German intervention in Zombie-plagued Chernarus, a Flora camo combat jacket, based on the idea that Chernarus, like Belarus, might be a few years behind Russia in camo usage, still using the camo, and the kind of flat olive/khaki combat fatigues you might find from raiding an army/navy surplus store (with some well-worn patches and holes). The shemagh, which might or might not be usable with hidden selections (srsly, five years), has been replaced by a paisley bandana in scary red, the universal face-hiding colour signal for stay the fuck away from this guy (I didn't want the bandit to be overly green, either, the point was to move him away from tactilol into more outlaw territory).

The radio on the chest is now a cell-phone, just to make them a little more low-tech and grubby, and the boots similarly have the soles rubbed shiny from walking and are flecked with mud where the ground can't grind it off.

I had to put little skull and bones flags just to work with the normals and ambient shadow maps, where they're rendering flags in those positions. Not my ideal choice, but it was necessary to keep it from looking too weird.

All of it has some little texturing details that you can't really see in those pictures, such as a linen texture base on the bandana and fatigues that you can see eg. here: http://i.imgur.com/tlNhx.jpg so it doesn't get too boring and flat to look at.

Anyway, just wanted to give something back to the mod team for giving us a wonderful experience and the game a lot of us thought a lot of other games were going to be (ahem, STALKER) and give the player base a bit of a shiny pearlescent coat while the devs work on getting all the cylinders firing.

[rocket 16567]

Unfortunately, backpacks only work on ArmA2OA/PMC/BAF units (and even then not all of them).

[skjold 1]

Looks good, i always was slightly put off by the fact that the bandits are US soldiers uniforms, in a Soviet-ish country?

On another note, does the bandit skin even work nowadays? All the bandits i have encountered in the last 2 days have been PMC skin. (and about 5 of them died with bandit kills rewarded)

[Mojo (DayZ) 66]

Unfortunately' date=' backpacks only work on ArmA2OA/PMC/BAF units (and even then not all of them).

[/quote']

It's the KSK rifleman, though -- same as the bandit model now, just a different texture. It should have all the model's functionality, shouldn't it?

[alienfreak 6]

Looks good' date=' i always was slightly put off by the fact that the bandits are US soldiers uniforms, in a Soviet-ish country?

On another note, does the bandit skin even work nowadays? All the bandits i have encountered in the last 2 days have been PMC skin. (and about 5 of them died with bandit kills rewarded)

[/quote']

1. The Bandits do not wear US Uniforms.

2. You also use a lot of US made weapons in the mod.

3. He could have looted it somewhere. Even I have a suit of ACU at home for paintballing.

4. I do not think so. If -36000 humanity doesn't make you won I do not think the limit is -50000 ^^

[Mojo (DayZ) 66]

Unfortunately' date=' backpacks only work on ArmA2OA/PMC/BAF units (and even then not all of them).

[/quote']

It's the KSK rifleman, though -- same as the bandit model now, just a different texture. It should have all the model's functionality, shouldn't it?

Indeed, I just tested it, and here he is (the hidden selections version) w/o ALICE pack, picking up the ALICE pack, and standing and wearing it:

Huzzah. Had me panicking for a minute there Rocket, wondering if I'd used the wrong model.

[rocket 16567]

Fantastic. If you're okay with your work being included, please send me the file to dayzdevteam@gmail.com along with the name you want credited as.

I can include it in tonights update. Please also include the details of anyone who it was a derivative work of, so we can include them with credit as well.

[my_shortcoming 8]

It's great to see more pro-active requests/work instead of all the current "Do this!" "Do that!".

Fantastic work Mojo. +1 Rep

[alienfreak 6]

I was bored for a few hours and ended up making a new bandit skin (if you go to the BI forums you can actually see me asking "are you serious you have to hack the P3D to get it to work? I just wanted to make a new texture' date=' not a whole-new RVMAT!"[/i'] [give me a break, I haven't made Arma models/skins in half a decade ;)]).

Anyway (and no, you don't have to edit the P3Ds, thankfully Max Power reminded my stupid ass of hidden selections after about five hours of me wanting to put my fist through the f'ing monitor), it looks pretty good for a bandito, using hidden selections to swap the camo:

Of course, it looks even better if you actually do hack the P3D, unfortunately, but maybe I just can't figure out how to use hidden selections to swap out the shemagh [like I said, five years]:

Basic design focus was on giving the bandit a hodge-podge collection of items that look scrounged together. A faded Flecktarn vest, perhaps from German intervention in Zombie-plagued Chernarus, a Flora camo combat jacket, based on the idea that Chernarus, like Belarus, might be a few years behind Russia in camo usage, still using the camo, and the kind of flat olive/khaki combat fatigues you might find from raiding an army/navy surplus store (with some well-worn patches and holes). The shemagh, which might or might not be usable with hidden selections (srsly, five years), has been replaced by a paisley bandana in scary red, the universal face-hiding colour signal for stay the fuck away from this guy (I didn't want the bandit to be overly green, either, the point was to move him away from tactilol into more outlaw territory).

The radio on the chest is now a cell-phone, just to make them a little more low-tech and grubby, and the boots similarly have the soles rubbed shiny from walking and are flecked with mud where the ground can't grind it off.

I had to put little skull and bones flags just to work with the normals and ambient shadow maps, where they're rendering flags in those positions. Not my ideal choice, but it was necessary to keep it from looking too weird.

All of it has some little texturing details that you can't really see in those pictures, such as a linen texture base on the bandana and fatigues that you can see eg. here: http://i.imgur.com/tlNhx.jpg so it doesn't get too boring and flat to look at.

Anyway, just wanted to give something back to the mod team for giving us a wonderful experience and the game a lot of us thought a lot of other games were going to be (ahem, STALKER) and give the player base a bit of a shiny pearlescent coat while the devs work on getting all the cylinders firing.

A bright red scarf?

Are you serious?

[Guest Suffocation]

Brilliant stuff!

Also a very good idea... I wanted to be a bandit for the fact they are German SF... I mean how badass! but now they look proper "legit" very good work.

[Mojo (DayZ) 66]

Sent, rocket. Let me know if you got it ok.

[alienfreak 6]

Brilliant stuff!

Also a very good idea... I wanted to be a bandit for the fact they are German SF... I mean how badass! but now they look proper "legit" very good work.

So instead of dressing up in camo with a rather blended scarf he now wears camo and a BRIGHT RED scarf?

Sounds like a... major... improvement.

Camo stays. Scarf gets bright red. Totally reasonable :)

[Mojo (DayZ) 66]

A bright red scarf?

Are you serious?

Yes. It was a conscious design decision.

1. It's "bandity"; bandanas are a common visual short hand for gangsters, terrorists, etc.

2. There was an overabundance of green already used on the texture. For the sake of visual interest, the texture needed some variety.

3. There's gameplay considerations at play. The survivor skins are multicoloured and civilian-casual with overlayed body armour. Making the bandits full-on green on the primarily green map of Chernarus would give them a visual-psychological advantage over players playing with the survivor mesh/skin. The red bandana negates that.

4. Red overall visually fits the theme of danger associated with bandit players. Red is recognized the world over as "danger"/"stop"/"warning"/"caution". The colour scheme thus reflects this.

5. It decidedly fits in a lot more in the setting than a dusty desert coloured shemagh.

I considered any of these reasons sufficient to support the design decision on their own.

If you can coherently and validly and factually (from a critical thinking standpoint) rebut each of those (as I would consider even a single point remaining valid as abrogating any and all other counterpoints), I'll happily remake it to your specifications.

[alienfreak 6]

A bright red scarf?

Are you serious?

Yes. It was a conscious design decision.

1. It's "bandity"; bandanas are a common visual short hand for gangsters' date=' terrorists, etc.

2. There was an overabundance of green already used on the texture. For the sake of visual interest, the texture needed some variety.

3. There's gameplay considerations at play. The survivor skins are multicoloured and civilian-casual with overlayed body armour. Making the bandits full-on green on the primarily green map of Chernarus would give them a visual-psychological advantage over players playing with the survivor mesh/skin. The red bandana negates that.

4. Red overall visually fits the theme of danger associated with bandit players. Red is recognized the world over as "danger"/"stop"/"warning"/"caution". The colour scheme thus reflects this.

5. It decidedly fits in a lot more in the setting than a dusty desert coloured shemagh.

I considered any of these reasons sufficient to support the design decision on their own.

If you can coherently and validly and factually (from a critical thinking standpoint) rebut each of those (as I would consider even a single point remaining valid as abrogating any and all other counterpoints), I'll happily remake it to your specifications.

[/quote']

PMCs look like this:

http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_CjFQem7UIVI/TPXty3ZhwLI/AAAAAAAAB2g/Fugo0imlVU0/s1600/TacticalShirtFromKMart.jpg

Where do you see anything even remotely brightly coloured?

So why do bandits look like this:

http://i.imgur.com/tlNhx.jpg

[Mojo (DayZ) 66]

PMCs look like this:

http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_CjFQem7UIVI/TPXty3ZhwLI/AAAAAAAAB2g/Fugo0imlVU0/s1600/TacticalShirtFromKMart.jpg

Where do you see anything even remotely brightly coloured?

Hope that helps.

By the way, average spot sampling with a 31x31 sample size at the center of the four circled areas yields a B% of anywhere from 81% brightness to 97% brightness.

Average spot sample on the bandana? 38% brightness.

[bodycount 83]

Can you make the bandana black? Or maybe something like this?

[alienfreak 6]

PMCs look like this:

http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_CjFQem7UIVI/TPXty3ZhwLI/AAAAAAAAB2g/Fugo0imlVU0/s1600/TacticalShirtFromKMart.jpg

Where do you see anything even remotely brightly coloured?

Hope that helps.

By the way' date=' average spot sampling with a 31x31 sample size at the center of the four circled areas yields a B% of anywhere from 81% brightness to 97% brightness.

Average spot sample on the bandana? 38% brightness.

[/quote']

Greyish blue shirts =! red bandana.

Just change it to the same colour as the shirts if you want.

Everything is better than red.

[Mojo (DayZ) 66]

Greyish blue shirts =! red bandana.

You didn't comment on hue and saturation. You commented on brightness.

Just change it to the same colour as the shirts if you want.

But that's the thing. I don't want. You want' date=' but I don't.

Regardless, don't sweat it. From what I've seen, hidden selections don't even use the second texture (as explained in my original post), so you're likely [i']not going to see the red bandana, but rather the dusty shemagh.

---

Here's an explanation on hidden selections http://tactical.nekromantix.com/tactical/wiki/doku.php?id=arma2:texturing:hiddenselectionstextures if you're curious Alien.

How it works is when you create the unit, you can tell it to use an alternate texture to the default one. Certain parts work with this (and have to be defined in the P3D model), others don't.

For the parent class BIS_GER, of which the KSK Rifleman is a child, the hidden selection is simply "Camo". Others, such as civilians, may have different parts that you can swap (hat, pants, sweater for example).

As far as I could tell with my limited experimenting (I haven't scripted in the RV engine in years) this only seems to change the body texture (or maybe I didn't select it properly, I don't know).

In other words, unless the P3D model itself is altered (ie: through hex editing or binarizing from a reconfigured MLOD) to use the shemagh/bandana texture, you won't see a difference on the headscarf in game, at all. It will just alter the camouflage on the torso & legs from desert flecktarn to what you see in the first screenshot in the thread.

[x7steelers7x 1]

A bright red scarf?

Are you serious?

Yes. It was a conscious design decision.

1. It's "bandity"; bandanas are a common visual short hand for gangsters' date=' terrorists, etc.

2. There was an overabundance of green already used on the texture. For the sake of visual interest, the texture needed some variety.

3. There's gameplay considerations at play. The survivor skins are multicoloured and civilian-casual with overlayed body armour. Making the bandits full-on green on the primarily green map of Chernarus would give them a visual-psychological advantage over players playing with the survivor mesh/skin. The red bandana negates that.

4. Red overall visually fits the theme of danger associated with bandit players. Red is recognized the world over as "danger"/"stop"/"warning"/"caution". The colour scheme thus reflects this.

5. It decidedly fits in a lot more in the setting than a dusty desert coloured shemagh.

I considered any of these reasons sufficient to support the design decision on their own.

If you can coherently and validly and factually (from a critical thinking standpoint) rebut each of those (as I would consider even a single point remaining valid as abrogating any and all other counterpoints), I'll happily remake it to your specifications.

[/quote']

I like the design you picked. However, maybe there should be a few bandit skins that you randomly get. For instance, maybe one has a black ski mask with rag-torn clothes and camo. Another being the one you made. And maybe even one more with a bandanna on the hair part of the head that doesn't cover the face! Just a suggestion!!

[Mojo (DayZ) 66]

I like the design you picked. However' date=' maybe there should be a few bandit skins that you randomly get. For instance, maybe one has a black ski mask with rag-torn clothes and camo. Another being the one you made. And maybe even one more with a bandanna on the hair part of the head that doesn't cover the face! Just a suggestion!!

[/quote']

To do this would unfortunately require multiple meshes (ArmA isn't the best when handling mesh swapping on players)

The other way to do this is to make all-new models, and just randomize the textures. I've downloaded several free model resources (I hate 3D modelling) and am going to attempt this over the next week.

My design goals are:

1. A bandit mesh.

2. A survivor mesh.

3. Some sort of future-proofed high humanity "ranger" mesh.

Each with four separate textures for torso, pants, boots, and headgear.

Also might experiment with body armour using the backpack proxy, to see if I could make body armour an actual, equipable item (my idea is to jigger the proxy system to use the back backpack model proxy to with three separate meshes: body armor no pack, pack no body armor, body armor with pack.)

No actual design discretion here, or any idea which way DayZ is going (I'm not meaning to step on the dev's toes) but I'd love to see some future-proof experimenting done and, if possible, help improve a mod I've quickly fallen in love with any way I can.

[relentless@clear.net.nz 12]

The red scarf making bandits a little easier to spot is a good non intrusive way of adding a little disadvantage to being one.

[ghost_kage 5]

Looks great Mojo, definitely an improvement and I think it goes with the theme of the mod more than the original skin used. I know some people don't want the red scarf because they won't be as stealthy, but I think Mojo's explanation was fair. The normal survivors have no camo and stand out, no reason the player killers should have overwhelming advantages. On-top of that it looks pretty damn cool.

[romaniak 1]

Fantastic. If you're okay with your work being included' date=' please send me the file to dayzdevteam@gmail.com along with the name you want credited as.

I can include it in tonights update. Please also include the details of anyone who it was a derivative work of, so we can include them with credit as well.

[/quote']

very nice update but just a wondering, are you gonna include the bandit with red or the grey scarf ? cause yea the red one is not really optimal for being stealthy

[shiromikan 217]

As Max said, the red scarf is literally a painted target. I don't know about you, but, I'd never wear bright red clothing on my head (or any part of my body for that matter) if I was worried about being spotted or killed.

[Mojo (DayZ) 66]

It's worth keeping in mind that I play bandit pretty much exclusively. I know exactly what I'm doing (and what I'm putting on my own head), and it's for the reasons Kage noted: I didn't want to give one set of players a stacked advantage at "blending in" over any other.

You want to know what the most effective method of stealth is? Concealment. Use concealment. Position your body behind trees. Place yourself behind walls. Sacrifice some vision to look through that bush instead of around it.

Good field craft could have you wearing Day-Glo orange and covered in LEDs and nobody would be able to spot you.