[Vengence]

I am currently working on a new ship for my own mod and it has a big fighterbay.  This is a big bay from which not only will fighters will come out of but I plan on it also being a player starting position if I were to make any SP style maps. I would like to ask how much detail would you like inside of the ship?

Here are some screens:





My new ship, the Typhoon (NOT TYPHON) is a 3km long cruiser class for my mod. For those of you into FS2 scaling, my mod goes differently. It goes from Frigate-Corvette-Destroyer-Cruiser-Heavy Cruiser-Battleship. The destroyer I have only has a basic fighter bay with no interior. The Typhoon cruiser has a large internal bay those entrance is modeled out. Because of mesh intersections I cannot go any deeper than this so a large bay door was made. Any suggestions for this?

[Mustang19]

 

Beautiful.

So, 3km long cruiser? Is this going to be based on some alternative universe or just normal FS? If it's the former, very interesting. FS ships are rinky-dinky compared with most SciFi universes and it would be interesting to see ships that large. Just don't know how you'll keep the poly count reasonable while having a fleet of ships that size.

Even high-poly models usually have very simple hangar bays. You don't even get to see the inside of the ship; just the hangar doors and, at most, a few windows or props. Have you played Wing Commander Saga? Their Wellington hanger is just a tunnel with a mule (those car-looking vehicles you see on aircraft carrier decks) thrown in for scenery, plus a ladder and probably a few other frills. Noone is expecting anything fancy. However, if you're willing to, it would be cool to have a good, detailed hanger for a ship of that size. For example, some carrier models have fighter racks and weapons piles. Again, noone is expecting anything super-complicated.

[Vengence]

Well yeah but I never made something like this and I heard someone once complaining that FS2 hangars are all drab and boring .

[Mustang19]

True. WC1 has more detailed hangars. The idea is that you're never shown entering/leaving the mission through a hangar, it's all through subspace jumps. This didn't change until SCP came around, and even still noone pays much attention to hangar detail.

If you don't want to waste too much time and polies on the hangar bay, take some cues off of Tachyon. Very blocky, angular space stations that still look good because of nice texturing.

If you ever need FREDing help with your campaign, let me know. It'd be nice to play around with those beautiful models. 

*/me kicks himself*

[Vengence]

If I ever finish it  . It may just get a boost but I am unsure to post this new request.

[Warp Shadow]

Well most of the time you're going to be looking at that door so it needs some more detail. Dry some magnetic clamps holding it together, a motivator unit on each site to move them, airlock cycles even. Any of those would be good. For purely aesthetic appeal maybe some indented sections so it looks like the door has a frame and plates. The rest of the hangar is still viewable through side, top, and rear views however and shouldn't be neglected. A catwalk and some airlock alarms for the top maybe, perhaps a winch. For the floor level you could have some re-fueling/re-charging tanks/batteries and some ammo stockpiles [all held in place]. Some signs of the crew that maintains the fighters could be a homey touch too like a station with a space suit or oxygen tanks, a tool thing [for torches and generic wrenches], a towing vehicle or some platforms/doors. Also don't forget the architecture. I doubt the hangar was built as a solid metal box. It had to be assembled. Supports in the walls, framework, seams in the plates, multiple levels, reinforcing anything really. Of course, don't actually add ALL of those things or else the game will suffer a painful death from overgreebling. Just some ideas to get your imagination started!

[Vengence]

I wouldn't want anything to prevent the ship from leaving  . Some greebling on the door and alarm looking things. I can't remember if FS2 supports alpha transparency for the scaffolding inside though.

[Jake2447]

Is this going with the same mod as the Titan?

To answer you question, maybe the inside should look like the bays in WC2, kind of like a stable for ships.  It doesn't have to be super-detailed, but  having a basing hanger-like interior would be nice.  Like mustang said, take a look at WCSaga, as I thought the Wellington hanger was simple, but well done.

[Vengence]

this hangar isn't long enough. Although you can fit many of my fighters in that exit space and have them leave at the same time there isn't much there for a stable. Mostly a launching platform or an exit. And no it is not with the Titan. The Titan was made for FS2 storylines, this model is meant for my own original story.

[Nuke]

most firghter bays tend to be rather small and undetailed. but id like to se sorta what you have in the infinity combat prototype. a big honkin bay that you can fly around in and maybe even a repair bay you could dock with to repair and rearm. and perhaps a wet bar too

[Vengence]

Its not that big. You won't crash around like crazy in it but dogfighting in there is out of the question. The bay ends at that door. If possible I might be able to extend the bay farther so that you can actually dogfight inside maybe but that will kill the polygons. Mission specific models?

[Darius]

Those fins really do add a sense of style to that ship. Have you seen the anime Sekai no Senki? I've been dying to play around with some Abh-styled ships, but haven't really seen anything close to it till now.

[Vengence]

No I haven't seen it. I don't know if these fins should qualify as a powerful sensor array or power collectors. Either way it was inspired from a ship from Tachyon: The Fringe

[Oddgrim]

very cool ship , the bay looks fine for me .. can't wait to see it textured! 

[Nuke]

you could probibly get away with detailboxing it. then you can add as many polies as you want tithought fear of slowing down the game when your not in the bay.

[Vengence]

I don't know how to make detail boxes  . And the bay is rapidly rising in polygons as well as the ship.

[Mustang19]

That's really all you need. Remember that you can make something look a lot more detailed with a good texturing job. I'd recommend checking out the Hecate's fighterbay- about 8 polies.  You're already very much "ahead of the game" with the level of detail in the pic above; not a whole not more is neccessary.

Perhaps have two releases, a LOD version and a "full" version, for people with faster computers. As it is, most people run MediaVPs with 70FPS anyway, so processor loads come second to eye candy.

Tachyon ship? Let me guess... Persephone?

[Vengence]

I think, I remembered that Galspan ship and imagined what my ship would look like with those fins and I liked the idea.

[RazorsKiss]

This one?  I think the Persephone is a cruiser, so yeah, you're right Mustang

Hey, that's my cup o' tea Looks nice, btw.  Perhaps the fighterbay could be detail boxed?  How does detail boxing work with LODs?

[Nuke]

I don't know how to make detail boxes  . And the bay is rapidly rising in polygons as well as the ship.

i beleive the process is simple. put in a typical 8 poly fighterbay

then model all the detail interior parts, like the fins and any beams and stick em all in one subobject.

i think pcs2 makes it easy and lets you just select detail box in the subobject editor, you then just enter 2 vectors for the 2 opposing corners of a cube. from this the game can determine a box. and you will see the detailed fighterbay when you are in said box.

you might want to also consider animating those doors.