[Colonol Dekker]

Having dipped my toes into modding a fair bit way back when Squadwar was in its prime and before derelict had been released, the only way of free modelling was to use truespace V 2.x or if you were lucky enough to have v3.x .  Even then, uv mapping was dependant on lithunwrap or other paid mapping software.  Texturing relied on demo versions of paint shop pro etc and table editing was done on notepad.   

I was idly thinking how much more is available to the newer younger Modders who've been born since hlp was founded and I wonder what we would've achieved had we as a pre scp user base had access to the same amount of quality freeware. 


(Edited to correct autocorrelation fails of initial post)

[Nyctaeus]

3D: Blender is highly recommended, but there also Sketchup and Wings3D. I recently talked with Moonred - Author of HTL Nemesis and HTL Warlock and he still use Wings. In fact developers added numerous useful features for Wings, so it's still powerfull tool. In my opinion, only Blender is equal competition for Maya and ZBrush.
2D: GIMP is obvious choice as it has majority of Photoshop functions, but before I acquired my PS license I used Paint.NET with thousands of plugins. I found it better than GIMP due to it's very powerfull kit of plugins and it's just easy. Microsoft should drop Paint 3D long time ago, and support further development of Paint.NET as it would be excellent rival for Photoshop. Current basic version has unfortunately very limited kit tool.
Tables: Notepad is, was and will be always the best .

Only Blender from free software is as good as their paid equivalents. And in fact, equal only to Maya. I never worked with ZBrush as I'm too poor to acquire a license , but as far as I know it's excellent. In case of 2D software options are in fact extremely limited. While I make textures in Photoshop, Substance Painter 2 is without any doubt absolute king of texturing 3D models. Just see GTF Hydra ! Photoshop is excellent to pair up with Substance Painter.

TL;DR
If you have money: Blender/Maya -> Substance Painter 2 [for basic texturing] -> Photoshop [for adjustments and texture conversion]
If you don't have money: Blender/Wings 3D -> Paint.NET [basic texturing and conversion] -> Gimp [normalmaps]

[Spoon]

Tables: Notepad is, was and will be always the best .

Notepad++ you surely mean? If not, wtf are you doing?

[Colonol Dekker]

Tables: Notepad is, was and will be always the best .

Notepad++ you surely mean? If not, wtf are you doing?

Absolutely this.

Sums it up perfectly.

[Nyctaeus]

Tables: Notepad is, was and will be always the best .

Notepad++ you surely mean? If not, wtf are you doing?

Absolutely this.

Sums it up perfectly.

Lel... Do I really need somekind of super-hyper-advanced text editor to copy and paste things o___O?

[wookieejedi]

Tables: Notepad is, was and will be always the best .

Notepad++ you surely mean? If not, wtf are you doing?

Absolutely this.

Sums it up perfectly.

Lel... Do I really need somekind of super-hyper-advanced text editor to copy and paste things o___O?

Yes Especially when you can use custom FSO language syntax highlighting! But if regular notepad works for you then that's cool, too 

[AdmiralRalwood]

Lel... Do I really need somekind of super-hyper-advanced text editor to copy and paste things o___O?

Notepad++ is super-hyper-advanced now?

[BirdofPrey]

Lel... Do I really need somekind of super-hyper-advanced text editor to copy and paste things o___O?

Notepad++ isn't particularly super advanced, but it does have a MUCH better UX. 
Syntax highlighting is super useful, it detects brackets, so is easier to quickly parse minor mistakes (mis-formatted elements on't be highlighted the same, and you can more easily see when you haven't closed an element properly), and when you select text it also highlights other instances of that.

The line numbering can also be useful at times, as well.

On a side note, I don't have my custom syntax highlighting anymore, does anyone happen to have a copy of highlighting for the tables I can steal?

[wookieejedi]

Lel... Do I really need somekind of super-hyper-advanced text editor to copy and paste things o___O?

Notepad++ isn't particularly super advanced, but it does have a MUCH better UX. 
Syntax highlighting is super useful, it detects brackets, so is easier to quickly parse minor mistakes (mis-formatted elements on't be highlighted the same, and you can more easily see when you haven't closed an element properly), and when you select text it also highlights other instances of that.

The line numbering can also be useful at times, as well.

On a side note, I don't have my custom syntax highlighting anymore, does anyone happen to have a copy of highlighting for the tables I can steal?

I think it' still on the forums? http://www.hard-light.net/forums/index.php?topic=91323.0

[AdmiralRalwood]

For notepad++, here and here.

[BirdofPrey]

Thanks

[Nyctaeus]

Gosh... It was an irony with this super-hiper-advanced

Anyway, yup - I don't need anything but classic Notepad for table editing. It has copy, paste and replace and all that I need :]. More advanced tools are useful especially for outside-FRED mission editing. My bro has numerous tools, including custom-made message and event generators but it's like black magic for me. For basic tabling Notepad is absolutely sufficient.

[wookieejedi]

Gosh... It was an irony with this super-hiper-advanced

Anyway, yup - I don't need anything but classic Notepad for table editing. It has copy, paste and replace and all that I need :]. More advanced tools are useful especially for outside-FRED mission editing. My bro has numerous tools, including custom-made message and event generators but it's like black magic for me. For basic tabling Notepad is absolutely sufficient.

Right on, whatever works best for you!

[Colonol Dekker]

The leaps and bounds blender has made is mind blowing too, consider the ships that Dark had concept art of, they would have been possible with it back then.