2.6 The Graphics tab

This tab lets you add graphics and sounds to the units. One important detail to note here is the use of angles.

Units have graphics facing different angles but, in order to save space, the game mirrors angles to reduce graphics. This means that unit graphics have five angles: south, south-west, west, north-west and north, with the east versions being mirrored versions of the west ones for a total of eight angles.

Let's go over the fields in this tab:

• Internal Name and Sprite Name are used to identify graphics but not by the game, in favor of the "Sprite'' number.
• Sprite Number of the .slp file that stores the graphic. This file can be in a .drs file, the drs folder of the mod or a local mod folder.
• Layer Order in which graphics are drawn, the higher the value, the more on top of other things. This makes units show the outline when going behind a building but not its shadow.
• Transparent Pick Whether the graphic should respond to clicks. This makes buildings clickable only by clicking the actual building, not the shadow or the range indicator lines.
• Replay Delay The time between repeating an animation. Mostly used for idle units so they are not constantly moving.
• Frames per Angle Every angle in the .slp file should have the same amount of frames, reflected here.
• Animation Duration In seconds.
• Sequence Type Whether the game should use different angles or loop the animation.
• Mirroring Mode Whether the game should mirror frames to make the other angles. For eight angles, this field should be 6.
• Sound A sound to be played with the animation. Used for dying units or flames. weapon hits are done below.
• Forced Player Color Only used for birds.
• Unit Speed Multiplier Set to 1 for all moving units and 0 for buildings.

Deltas​

This section controls additional graphics displayed with the main one. Its main use is to display shadows, flames or snow over buildings.

Each additional graphic is added with an offset of where to place around the main one and the option to display it only in certain angles.

Angles and sounds​

The final part tells the game how many angles make up the graphic and gives the possibility to add sounds to the animation linked to certain angles (not used as far as I know) and to sync them to a specific frame. This is where the sounds of weapons hitting are programmed to sound as the weapon moves in the animation.