Color Changing Rocket Trails

Noltron200

L1: Registered
Jun 25, 2012
5
0
So, I'm building a jump map. It has nine different stages each with a different color scheme. I already made a custom rocket trail+explosion for my map as well, however I would like my rocket trails/explosions to change color based on what stage they are in.

Example:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6I2H8VZgPyc

I've played around with the particle systems to know I can use "color light from control point" in the particle editor, but this doesn't quite do justice as the distances are all spherical, and since my map is large, I would have to make a fairly complicated system of control points in order to have the colors change with the stages correctly, so that they don't overlap or leave gaps in corners.

Now I was wondering if there is any easier way to go about doing this in hammer, for instance if tf2 can check if a particle is in a brush and changing the colors based on what brush its in. I'm not particularly familiar with hammer's different entities/brushes and so forth so any help would be much appreciated.

As you can imagine this isn't an essential feature but it would be really cool to have the trails match the color schemes in my map.
 

henke37

aa
Sep 23, 2011
2,075
515
Just use different particles.
 

Noltron200

L1: Registered
Jun 25, 2012
5
0
He is modifing the particles of the rocket launcher, you can't just change them like that.
Maybe a server mod would help out there?

I wanted to make this without any additional necessary resources than the BSP.
I know you can load in pcf files and change the particles_manifest.txt with BSPs alone... I wonder if theres a way to reload particles_manifest.txt, or perhaps a different particles_mainfest.txt per each level? Is this possible? I would need to force tf2 to load a differently named file via a brush or passing through some control point or something. Sounds like it wouldnt work.

But unless I could load multiple particle_manifest.txt at different points in the maps, they would have to be the same particle system. However, it may also be possible to load different particle systems and apply them to the rockettrail particle system at different points in the map. Anyone know if any of these are possible? Or an alternative method?

EDIT: ah also, I was wondering if someone who is good with the particle system knows if I can edit particles so that they are parallel with the walls? I can make it so that they are for the floor and ceiling, but I want another system to be on the walls too :C (note that this edit is a different particle system then the rocket trails)
 
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