[Klaustrophobia]

Awsome model, but isn't the re-positioning of the hangar entrances going to cause problems when putting it into existing missions?

i really liked the spinal hangar.  i don't want it to go away

[Husker]

No one said you have to update your copy of BP.

[Klaustrophobia]

once the next release is out we'll probably have to.

[Aesaar]

Alright, a lot of stuff happened at the start of November, which delayed pretty much everything (including my schoolwork).  A November release is unlikely.  And a December one would probably be late December, after my exams.  We'll see.

There is no way this is going into freespace blueplanet at war unless i can find a way to wave its triangles to 40000, which i find impossible. 

It's may not possible.  The ribs alone are 32k triangles.

very true hopefully there is a lod as some of the newer models don't have lod's

If they don't have LODs they're incomplete. I'm pretty sure this will have LODs.

I don't really see the point in having more than one lod level for a ship of this size.  Making acceptable ones that avoid visible transitions at intermediate distance would require editing textures, and increasing the amount of textures the game needs to load is hardly a performance improvement.  More polygons onscreen is less performance intensive than additional textures.

I've already got one lod model made, it looks hideous at ranges less than 10-15km or so, and it's 30k polygons.  There might be a second one for extreme ranges, but it would look even worse.

That does sound pretty bad. I assume this was made in 3DS Max?

The vast majority of it was made in Wings3D.  Some detailing was done in max, as were the glow maps.

Awsome model, but isn't the re-positioning of the hangar entrances going to cause problems when putting it into existing missions?

Darius is making a sweep of the AoA missions in which it appears, fixing possible issues.  Already found one, actually.  Hangar middle deck needs to be removed since the Boanerges doesn't fit in it because of its shield mesh, which I hadn't considered.

i really liked the spinal hangar.  i don't want it to go away

Too late.

[An4ximandros]

Awsome model, but isn't the re-positioning of the hangar entrances going to cause problems when putting it into existing missions?

Darius is making a sweep of the AoA missions in which it appears, fixing possible issues.  Already found one, actually.  Hangar middle deck needs to be removed since the Boanerges doesn't fit in it because of its shield mesh.

Couldn't you make the Boanerges spawn outside the hangar? Or shrink the things?

 It's sad to learn that it wont have many LoDs...

 Guess we know which ship Yy_MasterInfraLife_yY will use to troll us.

[majorvader111]

There is no way this is going into freespace blueplanet at war unless i can find a way to wave its triangles to 40000, which i find impossible. 

It's may not possible.  The ribs alone are 32k triangles.

God Damn it 

[Hades]

here's a thought: remove the ribs since they won't be hugely visible in sins

[majorvader111]

here's a thought: remove the ribs since they won't be hugely visible in sins

yes but will that leave gaps in the model

[Droid803]

then...fill in the gaps.

[majorvader111]

then...fill in the gaps.

How, i can't model for s**t

[blowfish]

Awsome model, but isn't the re-positioning of the hangar entrances going to cause problems when putting it into existing missions?

I'd be more worried about major changes in the turret configuration and loadout But like An4ximandros said the missions will be rebalanced.

[-Norbert-]

The turret "problem" can be lessened to a degree via tables and FRED and they don't require pathing, unlike the hangar entrances.

[Hades]

You don't have to model in the gaps. They'll be small and fairly hard to see at the scale of Sins. You can literally remove the ribbing and be fine, seriously.

[majorvader111]

You don't have to model in the gaps. They'll be small and fairly hard to see at the scale of Sins. You can literally remove the ribbing and be fine, seriously.

oh you will see the gaps, definitely when the ship is being built, the gaps will be highy visable

[SaltyWaffles]

I always thought the naming convention of FreeSpace (as in Greek mythological figures) is unsustainable and thought Raynor was a good change that could be linked to BP's expanded universe's history. Is Erebus just a codename or is it gonna be a retcon?

I have to admit, as good as the name sounds (though Raynor sounds awesome already), I feel like there's a bit too much of Greek theme-naming going on for the GT(V)A. It's starting to feel bland, even though the names themselves are fine/good. Raynor is refreshing; it's original (as far as ship-naming goes), highly distinct from other sci-fi verses (even in SC, there aren't any craft, vehicles, or weapons named anything like it), and it sounds great without going into the well-trodden path of Greek/latin (at least as far as how the word sounds). Taking every name for each class of ship in the navy from Greek Mythology seems excessive (and tempting fate, given how much bloodshed and tragedy it contains).

As for the model itself--I'm not quite sure yet. It's obviously great (no doubt there), but my first impressions aren't the kind of instant-drool I had for the new Chimera, Diomedes, and Bellerophon. Still, Aesaar has made several of my favorite ship models already, so I trust it to be excellent work regardless of my personal tastes, should I not come to love it.

EDIT: Seeing that there appear to be performance obstacles to deal with in the model (too much detail of various kinds), it makes me wonder if Aesaar is trying too hard to make the model look as amazing as possible by taking advantage of the recent advances in tech/high-end computer performance--in other words, raising the bar from, say, Bellerophon/Chimera-quality to something significantly higher, rather than avoid raising said bar to account for scaling up the size of the model. Making a much larger ship look just as good/detailed as a smaller one already means an inherent increase in the performance cost of the model, right? So raising the standards along with the scale seems like a recipe for crippling performance problems--or do I have a critically flawed understanding of this whole thing?

[An4ximandros]

E'rry body stop panickin'! I got this:

Ribs -> Texture Detail ; Hangar Gap -> Close it (Gate Texture + 6 sided prisms for the "platforms")

The guns will have to go super lo-poly, maybe even as far as making the side-gap single barrel ones a tri or quad prism.

For the big guns... errr... Release the Shivans!

[Aesaar]

EDIT: Seeing that there appear to be performance obstacles to deal with in the model (too much detail of various kinds), it makes me wonder if Aesaar is trying too hard to make the model look as amazing as possible by taking advantage of the recent advances in tech/high-end computer performance--in other words, raising the bar from, say, Bellerophon/Chimera-quality to something significantly higher, rather than avoid raising said bar to account for scaling up the size of the model. Making a much larger ship look just as good/detailed as a smaller one already means an inherent increase in the performance cost of the model, right? So raising the standards along with the scale seems like a recipe for crippling performance problems--or do I have a critically flawed understanding of this whole thing?

The problems are with majorvader111's Sins of a Solar Empire mod.  My ships are made for FSO, and I'm not about to start making concessions so they'll work in Sins. 

They need to work in FSO.  If they don't work in other games, it isn't my problem.

[majorvader111]

The problems are with majorvader111's Sins of a Solar Empire mod.  My ships are made for FSO, and I'm not about to start making concessions so they'll work in Sins. 

They need to work in FSO.  If they don't work in other games, it isn't my problem.
[/quote]

No the problem is sins in general, the game has a 40000 triangle limit which is hardcoded in. which i am starting to get s**ted of with.

[Aesaar]

No the problem is sins in general, the game has a 40000 triangle limit which is hardcoded in. which i am starting to get s**ted of with.

Oh, I didn't mean it was your fault.  I know it's Sins' polygon limit.  Really stupid.  Even HW2 doesn't have that, and it's 4 years older.

[Husker]

HW2 does have a limit; you can have a 50k poly fighter, but how many of those can you have before it lags the crap out of a computer. I love Blue Planet, but the very first mission has me running 60 fps before anything's onscreen. It can get down to 30-ish I think in a lot of the bigger battles in AoA and WiH. I'd rather not have my laptop melted too much. A little optimizing will be very appreciated.