Educate me about sprites

[GSG-9]

I only need to know what variables are counted as sprites. Ty in advance. :chuckball:

[LegacyWeapon]

Basically anything graphic that is not terrain.

[GSG-9]

So... units and doodads are sprites? Note that I'm not just asking what are sprites, I'm looking for stuff that adds to the sprite limit. I need to know since I'm trying up extended terraining.

[BSTRhino]

In StarCraft a sprite is a free-standing set of images that can move in its own direction. So, units and weapons are sprites.

All weapon trails need to be sprites, the reason being they are not moving with the weapon sprite, that is why things like valkyries were known to greatly contribute to the sprite limit. The spines of lurkers are also sprites, since they do not move with the lurker's weapon. Weapons that show up as "normal hit" in Arsenal III (Zealot/Zergling/Scarab explosion/Spider mines/etc), which is mainly the melee weapons and a few others do not take up extra sprites, their animations are just made part of the melee unit. The firebat is kind of a funny one because its weapon takes up three invisible sprites, that's because of the arrangement of its damage.

However, unit shadows, movement glows and death explosions are still part of the same unit sprite because the position of all of these are anchored to the same sprite. Unit trails (I'm thinking the templar here) again need to be individual sprites though. So a templar moving creates a new sprite every 4 pixels or something.

Doodads are a bit funny, because not all doodads are sprites. Some doodads are made as part of the terrain tiles, like bridges. The best way to tell if a doodad is a sprite or if its just terrain tiles is, if you can hide behind the doodad, it's a sprite. Also, generally animated doodads are also sprites. There might be some doodad map tiles that are animated by colour cycling, I'm not sure, but these ones will not be sprites.

Sprites are an interesting topic for me because of my work with them when modding. I was really surprised to find that map makers knew about sprites too.

[GSG-9]

So having two marines takes two sprites? How come in this tutorial>>> http://www.staredit.net/index.php?tutorial=104, it points out that the max sprite limit in SE is 1024... But the unit limit is 1650 (in the editor). So why do the editor allow it? Or am I missing something? Damn, I'm confused. What's the max sprite limit again? And what happens to the game if the max limit has been reached? :bonk:

[BSTRhino]

The sprite limit in the editor is 1650. I think the tutorial must've got it the other way round.

If the game hits the sprite limit, then it just doesn't create sprites. That means, no more units, no more weapons, no more spells unless they're like the Zergling claws or Zealot psi-blades and take no sprites.

[JarquaFelmu]

Ya, more than once in a blood/madness map i've run up against that 'no more sprites' wall. It really sucks if you have to rebuild and army and nothing's coming. lol.