[peterv]

will the Orion textures be baked in a single texture?

[TrashMan]

A single texture for a ship over 1km in length?
Nah, that would just look bad when you flew close.

[Hades]

A single texture for a ship over 1km in length?
Nah, that would just look bad when you flew close.

It actually doesn't when done right. The new Colossus has two textures for the main hull at 2048^2 resolution (one for the greebles, and one for the hull) and it doesn't look bad at all when flying close. Esarai's Phoenix Rising has one hull texture and it doesn't look bad up close either. Want me to go on?

[TrashMan]

Capital ships with a single map for their hull look worse to me... I cannot judge the Colossuss since it's not released yet.

[Nyctaeus]

Please, tilemap it. Tilemaped ships are more friendly for modders and easier to modification.

[MatthTheGeek]

* MatthTheGeek slaps Betrayal with an unoptimized Karuna *

Tilemapped ships are terrible in term of performance. Tilemapping is outdated and ugly.
Seriously, you will achieve both a better performance ingame an a much better look with a real UV-mapping.

[General Battuta]

I believe some ships use tile-UV hybrids, but in general, please go for a UV. Tilemapping is terrible.

[Dragon]

Reskining UVed ships is more difficult though.
Hybrids are not really a good idea, since they're neither as good looking as UVed ones, nor as easy to reskin as tiled ones.

[blowfish]

Capital ships with a single map for their hull look worse to me... I cannot judge the Colossuss since it's not released yet.

Tell that to this (technically two maps but that's not the point).  Anyway there aren't that many uvmapped capital ships out right now to judge on - maybe the Lucifer and the Hatshepsut (how can you say that looks worse???).  The Colossus is going to be baked anyway, so it probably won't look quite as good as a decent uv'ed texture can.

[Dragon]

What resolution the textures on that Hades have?

[TrashMan]

I believe some ships use tile-UV hybrids, but in general, please go for a UV. Tilemapping is terrible.

That depends on the textures you have available for use.

Besides, UV mapping a massive warship is a lot of work, and the results are not much different...but that depends on the warship in question and how it should end up looking, greebling, shape and other factors...the difference is usually visible only on some parts (unless you deliberately want every part of your ship to have a different plating)
I'm sorry, but I just don't see a full UV map worth the time investment, especially given the amount of stuff on my to-do list.
If this was a RTS where you can't zoom in close and fly 5cm away from the hull surface..then I'd UV map everything (for example, all my ship for SOTS are UV mapped). But then again, the ships would be easier on the detail then too.

Hell, if someone wants to UV map the Archangel, be my guest. I will send over the 3D Max model and everything.

[pecenipicek]

Reskining UVed ships is more difficult though.
Hybrids are not really a good idea, since they're neither as good looking as UVed ones, nor as easy to reskin as tiled ones.

if you are lacking in any memorable skills as a texture artist, then yes, reskinning properly uvmapped ships is more difficult. Tile mapping shouldnt ever be used anymore.

[Dragon]

if you are lacking in any memorable skills as a texture artist, then yes, reskinning properly uvmapped ships is more difficult.

Unfortuantely, I'm lacking even non memorable skills when it comes to making textures. 

[MatthTheGeek]

Besides, UV mapping a massive warship is a lot of work, and the results are not much different...
[...]
I'm sorry, but I just don't see a full UV map worth the time investment

If I cumulated all the time I spent lagging because of tile-mapped ships, I would have learnt to UV already.

[Droid803]

You should get a new computer bro.
Cause retail ships are tilemapped.

[Dragon]

Retail ships have low resolution tiles (mostly 256x256), while new ones are ussualy about 512x512, with shine and normal maps (and often also with glow).

[MatthTheGeek]

You should get a new computer bro.
Cause retail ships are tilemapped.

Which is why we HTL them, and we make HTL with proper UV-mapping. Or at least recent HTLs are.

[Droid803]

Makes them a ****ing ***** to retexture since noone ever gives me the source (or gives anyone the source for that matter, the only person that I've seen do that is Vengeance)

I guess it cuts down on the number of ****ty retextures though

[MatthTheGeek]

Easier retextures aren't worth the optimization.

[Droid803]

Yeah, I just wish people wouldn't hoard the source files to themselves and force us to recompress DDS files half a billion times.
Look at how some of the mediavps textures have suffered because of that (ungh).
Makes stuff look like ****.