[KyadCK]

On IRC Varsaigen has been asking for ideas on how to scar, damage, or otherwise maim ships for the use of derelict ships or what ever else someone decided they could be used for.

Heres my question: if enough different damaged ship models were made (4 differently damaged herc II's for instance), would it be possible to randomize what model is picked when starting a misson with that craft for AI?

The idea is that while the graphics have been greatly improved (and look incredible!) every single fighter, sentry, and cap ship look brand new every mission, with never a scratch on them let alone lazer scoring and the like, and it would enhance the realism of the ships taking damage and being repared as is a common occurance in war.

[FreeSpaceFreak]

I imagine that they wouldn't launch anyone in a fighter with enough damage to be modelled in - for texture damage, you can use texture replacement in FRED.

[Fury]

Texture replacement is probably the most convenient way of going with it. The problem in long-term is that texturing of a ship is not guaranteed to be identical in the next mediavps version. Long-term solution might be the materials system that The E has been devising, IIRC it should allow decals such as scarring, then let shaders handle rendering of decals.

[KyadCK]

decals seem a more appropriate solution i guess, i just figured a little something like scratches, dents, marks, anything to make them look used, would help improve realism just a little more

[Fury]

Decals would obviously be dynamic and appear where a ship has taken hits in in a mission. It wouldn't be an indication how used a ship is, some are obviously brand new while others have been through countless battles.

I believe shaders could be used to render some damage on ships hull regardless of how much damage they've taken. But the problem is how to tell shaders how much damage a mission designer wants to give a particular ship. Of course, a different problem entirely is to create a shader capable of doing just that.

Until such is possible, texture replacement is the best way I believe. But therein lies few small snags. Adding dirt and damage to original textures should be easy enough with little effort, until you come across a ship that doesn't have proper UV mapping but instead uses tiling in its textures.

Another issue is that if you have three sets of textures; brand new, light damage, moderate damage. And a mission which uses all three for all ships, it significantly increases texture count FSO needs to load, in worst case scenario you just doubled memory used by textures, excluding shine, normal and glow maps since those should be shared. If not, then it'd triple texture memory usage.

Texture replacement is great tool to have some variety, but using it in this scale might be bad idea because of significant increase in memory required. Limiting use of texture replacement to ships where mission designer wants to emphasize that this ship has been through a lot should be fine and probably very cool to have.

[Black Wolf]

I reckon that this might be better served by some kind of future, potential damage decal system. Memory draw is going to go up by a lot if you have to start loading multiple versions of every single skin, and for such minor changes, would it be worth it?

[EDIT]Pointsniped.

[FSW]

There was an old Volition game called Red Faction, which featured a real-time terrain destruction process called Geo-Mod. Imagine that!

[headdie]

There was an old Volition game called Red Faction, which featured a real-time terrain destruction process called Geo-Mod. Imagine that!

Its one of those features that was popular in a certain era of game design, MW3 also had deforming terrain and one or two others might have had it

[karajorma]

There was an old Volition game called Red Faction, which featured a real-time terrain destruction process called Geo-Mod. Imagine that!

It's advisable not to ask the SCP for Geo-Mod as a slap to the face often offends.

[NGTM-1R]

I imagine that they wouldn't launch anyone in a fighter with enough damage to be modelled in - for texture damage, you can use texture replacement in FRED.

Depends. We often fly in them. It doesn't appear to degrade performance badly.

[IronBeer]

There was an old Volition game called Red Faction, which featured a real-time terrain destruction process called Geo-Mod. Imagine that!

It's advisable not to ask the SCP for Geo-Mod as a slap to the face often offends.

Not asking for it, but just imagine how cool it would be if ships could deform in real-time: a beam rakes across the hull of a destroyer, leaving a permanent gouge in the hull, bombs and torpedoes leave craters, massive impacts expose entire decks...

We'd probably need an entirely new game engine to do full damage and deformation, but a decal system is cool too. Devil's in the details, though- start slapping a lot of extra scar and pockmark decals to a ship, and things can start getting cluttered, especially if the decals clash with busy ship textures. Plus, you have the issue of increased memory use over time.

One-liner: nifty idea, but has challenges in implementation.

[Dragon]

It was once implemented, but it was buggy.
Unfortunately, it's gone now, but if you know an experienced coder with a lot of time, he could try to rewrite the decal system and reintroduce it.

[Fury]

Eh. The decal system was nothing more than applying damage effects on hull where weapons were impacted on. The method was buggy indeed but also a bit inefficient. Material system and shaders will handle this much more efficiently once they are ready. How buggy it'll be remains to be seen.

[Parias]

Not asking for it, but just imagine how cool it would be if ships could deform in real-time: a beam rakes across the hull of a destroyer, leaving a permanent gouge in the hull, bombs and torpedoes leave craters, massive impacts expose entire decks...

We'd probably need an entirely new game engine to do full damage and deformation, but a decal system is cool too. Devil's in the details, though- start slapping a lot of extra scar and pockmark decals to a ship, and things can start getting cluttered, especially if the decals clash with busy ship textures. Plus, you have the issue of increased memory use over time.

One-liner: nifty idea, but has challenges in implementation.

Star Trek: Bridge Commander (and to a similar extent, Klingon Academy) had systems like this - in Bridge Commander you could literally 'carve off' engine nacelles or entire chunks of a ship if you put enough effort into it - when I was bored, I'd carve smiley faces into the saucer section of a Galaxy-class just for kicks. Klingon Academy also had a 'ginsu' system which visibly opened chunks and scars in a ship as you damaged it, and let you utterly destroy certain components from torpedo fire. And those games are incredibly old by today's standards.

Of course those games were probably built from the ground-up with those concepts in mind, so yeah - getting the FS2 engine to play nicely with its own deformation system probably wouldn't be easy at all.

[Davros]

Are the coders being beaten severely enough I wonder
the materials system does seem to be taking a while

[MatthTheGeek]

Go code it yourself.

[The E]

Are the coders being beaten severely enough I wonder
the materials system does seem to be taking a while

No, us coders are not beaten at all. We do, however, subject people who demand stuff in such an insolent way to stern glances, kickings, and the occasional ban.

[Zacam]

what The E said, if only because he said it a lot nicer than I.

[Davros]

No, us coders are not beaten at all.

Not even with a rubber chicken ? thats disgraceful behavior

[Zacam]

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