Hello I know this game is old but I'm wondering how one would change unit portraits like they did in brood war
like so:

But i want to do do this without modding if possible because i do not intend to add new portraits, I just want to swap the existing portraits for units in maps.

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Post has been edited 10 time(s), last time on Jun 3 2014, 2:02 am by bugmenot.

There isn't a simple way to do this without modding or having strict control over your map.

Option 1: use EUDs to detect the currently selected unit type, and run the "Talking Portrait" action to manually change to the portrait you want to use.

Option 2: use EUPs to change the unit type to actually be the other unit. This would carry over other traits of the unit type such as its weapons and armor, while not affecting the unit sprite itself.

If you could describe your map a bit more, it may make sense to take a different approach as well. Option 1 is probably going to be your best bet, and it may not be as expensive trigger-wise as one might expect.

Well i did look at this http://www.staredit.net/topic/15356/#334499 but what did they use to achieve that scmdraft or a hex editor? Because maybe that is a way?
and also i ment was like when you click on a protoss building in the brood war campaign it shows fenix instead of aldaris. and a zerg building it will show a cerebrate.

Option 3: Just set a talking unit portrait of your choice. Obviously doesn't have detection what's selected, so that's a general override / just used for cutscenes.

Well i might try this later in the future but this game is old and i'm just mapping for something to do so i'm not going to get that advanced but maybe i might later and i dont think blizzard used EUDs they must have used something else but it would've been nice to change the portraits in staredit or scmdraft.

That's what I was referring to with Option 2. You have to calculate the address you want to manipulate and then place the extended unit on the map. It's a complicated and undocumented process that I wouldn't recommend for a task like this.

Blatantly changing unit portraits would require modding, to my knowledge. I haven't really paid close attention to portraits in the campaign, but my guess is that Blizzard hardcoded these changes (like they did with everything else). It may be associated with one of the campaign AI scripts to change those particular portraits to what they were in the campaign, but that doesn't mean you can set any unit to have any portrait.

I'm a bit confused as to what you mean by that. When did the portraits ever change in the campaign? I'm pretty sure the only times the portrait was different from the unit you had selected were when there was an ongoing transmission.

The BW Protoss Advisor changing to Fenix thing? Probably something in the source that literally checks what map you're playing.

I extracted that zerg mission that i had in the pic from BroodWar.mpq and made an scx file with mpq editor i did that by building the scx file from the directory which i extracted it to then played it on play custom and the portrait was the default overmind so Blizzard most likely hardcoded it.

http://classic.battle.net/scc/faq/custom.shtml
Yes they hardcoded the portraits, move along

I don't know if this was from the latest version, but it's relevant. http://www.staredit.net/topic/5402/
This is the closest you are going to get to custom portraits without missing.

How do you use the extended unit death triggers? I could not find it in conditions or actions. I want to be able to do triggers to make you immediately select a unit after having it, and I want to be able to use that method to change portraits. Is there anything I need to download? I just made this account today, and I hope its not too late to ask questions on this thread.

Thx - Stars

If you have to ask, EUDs are likely above your ability, and you can create a new topic if you need assistance rather than revive this 4 year old topic. You can think of EUDs like a programming language. Unless you have fully written code to start with, it's unlikely you'll be able to create a functioning program without learning more about the language via creating "hello world" type programs first.

I would recommend you research EUDs and EPDs more, as there are numerous tutorials out there. While some info may be a bit outdated, the sticky with your intended search term in the description/title is almost universally where you should start on every forum.

Finally, unit portraits are purely aesthetic. It doesn't help or hinder your gameplay significantly and nobody will care that you didn't change the portrait. I wouldn't recommend going the EUD route for pure visuals unless you're going far into the modding world with custom grps and such.