q2 models

[beanstorm]

Is there a reason why custom player models don`t work on all servers? 

[Paril]

Depends.. can you be more specific?

They work on the client end at all times, but this of course depends on if you have it or not.

-Paril

[[BTF] Reflex]

If you have the skin/model in baseq2 it would work for vanilla, dm, mutant etc..

but,

if you had a different version of it in a mod folder,  like if you were playing railz, wodx, ctf etc..
it would use the one in those folders.

All I can think of

[beanstorm]

Sorry, I meant,  why cant players with models download switched on  see a custom model on all servers. Railz for instance. Seems fine on mutant.

[Paril]

Oh I see!

You're confusing the client with the server.
Clients in Quake2 don't directly communicate with each other. Basically, this is how player model downloading works:

When connecting, you're sent a configstring that contains all clients' userinfo. From here the engine builds a list of models and skins that he needs, then tries downloading them from the server.

If the server doesn't have the player model "horse" from Client 1, Client 0 can't download it (can't download a non-existant model!)

-Paril

[QwazyWabbit]

Sorry, I meant,  why cant players with models download switched on  see a custom model on all servers. Railz for instance. Seems fine on mutant.

Custom models must exist on the server so a client can download them. As Paril stated, a client doesn't get a skin just because another client has it. Quake 2 also separates downloads according to game mod. This was to allow custom mods to use unique models and textures without having the client accidentally overwriting them when downloading models and textures with the same names. Servers always keep the stock and modified skins and models and textures under their baseq2 tree.

Player skins are downloaded to to the client's quake2/moddir/players/ where moddir is the mod folder for the server to which the client is currently connected. If you want to see a skin in all mods you need to copy or move the player skin folder into quake2/baseq2/players/ tree. Once it's under the baseq2 hierarchy it will be available to the client in all mods and modes.

This also made client maintenance a bit of a pain because a map or skin downloaded in one mod was re-downloaded in another mod when it came up on that other mod server. If you played a dozen mods, you had a dozen copies of the same custom maps and skins if those mods all used them.

So:

quake2/baseq2/*   <---- server custom files reside here and will be sent to clients that need them, including player skins and maps

quakeq2/moddir/* <---- the tree the client puts them in  (moddir is usually the name of the mod, e.g., lox, wod, weapons, xatrix, lithium, chaos, dday, etc.)


BEWARE: Some maps have the same names but are actually different maps for different mods. Moving maps into the base tree can cause "map differs from server" errors in those cases, which will cause a client disconnect. The best way to manage maps is to make sure the ones you are moving into the base are not duplicated there already. If you find a duplicate name, check that the files are identical length and/or same MD5 sum or otherwise are identical before overwriting or deleting them. Whatever you have left in the mod trees after collecting files into the base tree is unique to each of the mods.

[beanstorm]

Ok, thanks guys. I understand now.