2nd attempt; space armarda

[A Viking Yeti]

I hope this mod comes out in PTW also, but isn't there a way to have some ships act like pirates and capture other ships? I could be mistaken, but if this mod's being made for C3C also (or exclusively ), that's an idea (although, I think since this is an intersystem ship, I believe, it might not work with your game). Just a thought.

As for the attack animation, I think the spark would looks cool, maybe to show various debris in space being heated up by the microwaves. If I get around to it, I might do a second attack animation, being the x-ray attack. If the ships hull were mainly made of metal, wouldn't microwave bombardment generate strong electrical currents in it and severely heat it up? Seems like you would fry all the people in side... Along with the electronics and anything else on board made of metal or not heat resistant (i.e. nuclear reactors+microwaves=bad situation for enemy crew)... I bet it'd be entertaining to watch though ...

What weapons does your turret ship use anyway (rail-gun, conventional, etc...)? BTW: looks really good though.

 

[Smoking mirror]

Here's two versions of the turret ship death animation. I'm trying out some post production effects, the "wobble death" flic has a whirlpool effect applied to it in order to show the vacum arond the ship suddenly being filled with superheated reactor steam. Does it look better or worse than the unedited version? The orriginal flic is about 150% this size, and may be used as a Super-turret-ship unit, perhaps spawned by a great wonder.

I realy want to use conquests to make this mod, as it give the tools to make almost a whole new game, with the "treasure" generating buildings and enslaving units.

As to pirates, in CIV conquests you can enable any unit to "enslave" the enemy, giving a 1 in 3 chance of creating a preselected unit. I'll have to make a generic ship, mostly girders and superstructure, that looks like one of the bigger ships has jetisoned its sub-structures and shielding or a smaller ship has had bits of salvage added to it. It'll be called "captured hulk" or something like that and will be created when ever a pirate raider enslaves the enemy. In conquestes there is also the posibility of sacraficing captured workes in your capital for extra culture. Perhaps I can rewrite the text so that its more like adding their DNA to you workforce, would make a good victory option for one of the aliens. The spaceship victory can also be rewriten, perhaps a project to build the first intergalactic ship.

 

[Smoking mirror]

Oh yeah, the turret ship uses particle weapons, probably visible light lasers or xray lasers. I have to find the disk that has the animations for the probe and satelite and then I'll post all three units. With the pringles/armoured defender/raider ship, and a set of different colour swapped shuttles (to represent workers and settlers) we should be able to do an early alpha test (have to do a basic set of graphics for terrain and cities etc though). The idea is to get a basic version working so more people can see the potential. Once we have some more units and helpers we can start building towards a fuller version.

For the turret ship and most other ancient age units I'm going to do two run animations, an Ion drive and a fussion rocket animation. Fusion rockets will require acess to a gas giant and will give any unts so equiped an extra movement point. This will make the outer solar system just as usefull as the inner despite its low food value. For later ships I will also polly add a antimatter drive animation, which will add a further movement point, and extra attack points, to manufacture antimatter you will need access to a red dwarf sun, (as hotter suns will have a radiation "death zone" around them which will stop unshielded ships from aproaching (impassable to wheeled)and will also cause disease, as jungle or flood plains does in civ III which can be negated by the radiation shielding city improvement).

 

[Sword_Of_Geddon]

I'm curious as to why you picked Space Folding technology. Its interesting, but theres several other Far-Future Faster-Than-Light scenerios I've seen as well, Jump Gates being my favorite. Your thoughts Smoke?

 

[Smoking mirror]

I'm curious as to why you picked Space Folding technology. Its interesting, but theres several other Far-Future Faster-Than-Light scenerios I've seen as well, Jump Gates being my favorite. Your thoughts Smoke?

From a purely game play point of view wormholes/space folding tech is a good mid game solution. I want to try a large or realy big map with smallish solar system islands, so to go from having it take 20 plus turns for reinforcements to arrive in system to having reinforcements instantly available (although only a few at a time) will give players some challenging tactical decisions.

I'm not sure of the difference between wormholes and jump gates, surely they both open a tunnel of null space between two points, which a body can pass between? Two other options are subspace (read variant universe, with altered natural laws) travel or altered state travel (see earlier posts about modified states of matter and tachyonic travel).

Altered state travel will be era two, with actual tachyonic travel being somewhat of a dead end of research. Subspace travel will be final era tech.

 

[WildWeazel]

If they were very powerful, yes they would hurt. Although, microwaves are probably the best option (metal ship and wiring+microwaves=a whole lot of sparks )... I had honestly forgoten all about the attack, but what would microwaves 'look' like out in space? I.e. what should the attack effects look like?

You could make a the dish shimmer and glow and then make showers of sparks like fireworks bursting from the enemy ship and little bolts of electricity shooting across it. Maybe a little too complicated, but it certainly fits the "prime consideration"

 

[A Viking Yeti]

That does sound cool, but I'm not sure I could do all of it...

I got the death animation done; I couldn't do the melting thing like most of the units here, so it explodes (not very large). I shrank the model some, but it's still somewhat large... Also, the explosion is yellow and orange right now, I'll change it to green later.

EDIT: Removed, updated on later page.

 

[Smoking mirror]

That does sound cool, but I'm not sure I could do all of it...

I got the death animation done; I could do the melting thing like most of the units here, so it explodes (not very large). I shrank the model some, but it's still somewhat large... Also, the explosion is yellow and orange right now, I'll change it to green later.

That looks exelent! The yellow explosion is fine, not sure how to get the most of it using the pallette... Can you set the colour of explosions in the 3d program? if you can (though I suspect not) it may be worth trying out white smoke as the explosion, as dark smoke wont show up very well on a dark background.

I've been playing about with the terrain style. I've only modified one of the tile sets, so you cant see the whole picture yet, its just a test to see if I can get the tiles to mix properly.

The deep space terrain (coast/sea/ocean) will be mostly just black/grey with stars while the solar systems will be divided in to solar radiation zones, representing the amount of sun light and exotic radiation falling on a city or unit in that square. Radiation will dictate how much "food" a tile generates as well as how dangerous the tile is. Tiles very near to hot suns will be impassable to unshielded vehicles and will cause "disease".
Tiles near the edge of the solar system will receive very little solar energy but will be safe from "disease".

The tile zones will have different coloured edges and slight overall colour representing thier radiation level.

red zone; (desert) "death zone" very near to hot suns.
Yellow zone; (grassland and also due to hardcoding restrictions the tiles beneath all planets) inner solar system.
Green zone; (plains) outer solar system.
Blue zone; (tundra) periphery space, ort cloud, very edge of the system.

The outer system and periphery space also have a high movement cost to represent the scale of space involved.
here is an example of the effect I'm trying to show, I've not added any background stars yet. I may also make the colours darker but more colour intense (increase saturation);

 

[A Viking Yeti]

Actually, I can make the brightest, medium, and smoke colors anything I want... I guess I should have made it green beforehand. Oh well, I can still make the smoke white.

I like your space idea, but how do you represent more threat for the different terrians.

 

[Smoking mirror]

Actually, I cand make the brightest, medium, and smoke colors anything I want... I guess I should have made it green beforehand. Oh well, I can still make the smoke white.

I like your space idea, but how do you represent more threat for the different terrians.

In the conquests editor there is an option in terrain tab called "disease", you can set the strength of the terrains ability to cause disease (which you could rename "raditation" easy enough, and write a new dialog "sire (or captain) our citizens are being killed by radiation, or scientists say its caused by the Inner radiation zone"). It'll kill citizens just like flood plains and jungle, and even has a chance to kill units that spend too long hanging about (its happened to a few of my workers before). You can also set a tag to say whether it is cured by sanitation tech (or radiation shielding).

A few weeks after the NASA visit to the moon a giant solar flare hit that would have killed all the astronaughts had they been there.

heres an example of how the terrian will look with stars added, see how carefull I'm going to have to be about the edges of the tiles, here the edges are just about becoming too obvious. Its important that they blend perfectly, or the effect will be very patchy.

 

[A Viking Yeti]

Oh, cool. I have to get conquest someday .

BTW: I revised the explosion animation, look at my previous post.

EDIT: I couldn't get the sparks effect to work, I might try for it again, I'm not sure. Anyway, instead I tried a blue beam thing and some glow. Wanted to see your thoughts on it (I can lighten up the beam if it's too bright/solid). I also did an alternate with many pulses being fired and a brighter glow.

 

[Sword_Of_Geddon]

From a purely game play point of view wormholes/space folding tech is a good mid game solution. I want to try a large or realy big map with smallish solar system islands, so to go from having it take 20 plus turns for reinforcements to arrive in system to having reinforcements instantly available (although only a few at a time) will give players some challenging tactical decisions.

I'm not sure of the difference between wormholes and jump gates, surely they both open a tunnel of null space between two points, which a body can pass between? Two other options are subspace (read variant universe, with altered natural laws) travel or altered state travel (see earlier posts about modified states of matter and tachyonic travel).

Altered state travel will be era two, with actual tachyonic travel being somewhat of a dead end of research. Subspace travel will be final era tech.

Jump gates are different in that they are gigantic and expensive to construct. They'd have to be considering the massive size needed to power one. I suggested it because Jump Gates are predessor to Space Folding technology. In many Sci-fi stories and games, Space Folding is considered more advanced than Faster-Than-Light travel!

Basically, if you are going with the Space Folding thing, Jump Gates make a reasonable era two technology. Basically, by that time period, Space Folding is new technology. It requires enormious amounts of power, and hense, the gigantic Jump Gates. Later its miniterized, and Jump Drives are the result...just an idea.

I've also heard of something called Slipstream, but I have no idea what it is.

 

[A Viking Yeti]

So jump gates would be like airports, and jump drives would be like paradrop/air-units (in that the stay at the city until need, then the teleport via jump drive to the bombing location)?

 

[Sword_Of_Geddon]

Sounds about right my artic-dwelling friend!

I've seen Jump Gates in two different Sci-Fi shows, and one video game.

The first was in Babylon 5, although in that the Gates were really entrances into Hyper Space. Later in the show, they interduced a new ship called the White Star Cruiser, which could enter Hyperspace on its own without a Jumpgate.

In the anime, Cowboy Bebop, Jump Gates are the primary means of journeying threwout the Solar System, although they aren't instantanious.

Then theres the Game Galactic Civilizations(no relation to Sid Meier). In this Giant Jump Gates serve as the galaxy's means of traveling from system to system, until humanity invents the Hyperdrive, which renders them obsolete.

 

[Smoking mirror]

Oh, cool. I have to get conquest someday .

BTW: I revised the explosion animation, look at my previous post.

EDIT: I couldn't get the sparks effect to work, I might try for it again, I'm not sure. Anyway, instead I tried a blue beam thing and some glow. Wanted to see your thoughts on it (I can lighten up the beam if it's too bright/solid). I also did an alternate with many pulses being fired and a brighter glow

Exelent, that looks great. I'd go with the pulse attack but with a slightly less bright glow, Somewhere in beween the two. With the explosion, I'd say that looks prety good for a space blast. For the pallete to work best the yellow part of the blast should be yellowy white fading to pale pink/white, while the smoke should be a kind of pale pink (trust me, it'll look great in game).

Edit; in fact the colours in your pulse attack are just about perfect for alpha blending.

 

[Smoking mirror]

Sounds about right my artic-dwelling friend!

I've seen Jump Gates in two different Sci-Fi shows, and one video game.

The first was in Babylon 5, although in that the Gates were really entrances into Hyper Space. Later in the show, they interduced a new ship called the White Star Cruiser, which could enter Hyperspace on its own without a Jumpgate.

In the anime, Cowboy Bebop, Jump Gates are the primary means of journeying threwout the Solar System, although they aren't instantanious.

Then theres the Game Galactic Civilizations(no relation to Sid Meier). In this Giant Jump Gates serve as the galaxy's means of traveling from system to system, until humanity invents the Hyperdrive, which renders them obsolete.

Yeah, thats what I'm planning, towards the end of the second age the jumpgate/fixed wormhole improvement will become available. It will be able to airlift a single unit a turn from a list of ships specialy adapted for jumpgate travel (not too fat!) and tagged with the "foot unit" tag. Later "helicopter type" wormhole transport ships will be available.

 

[A Viking Yeti]

Exelent, that looks great. I'd go with the pulse attack but with a slightly less bright glow, Somewhere in beween the two. With the explosion, I'd say that looks prety good for a space blast. For the pallete to work best the yellow part of the blast should be yellowy white fading to pale pink/white, while the smoke should be a kind of pale pink (trust me, it'll look great in game).

Edit; in fact the colours in your pulse attack are just about perfect for alpha blending.

I have three main colors that control the explosion: hottest (yellow center), medium (orange between yellow and smoke), and smoke (white). I can make the hottest bright yellow, medium in between that and smoke, and have the smoke a pale pink. However, OpenFX -for some odd reason- likes to make the backround many varying shades of transparent pink... None of which are too bright, but I'll have to be careful, otherwise when converting all the varying background shades (via simple palette editing), part or all the explosion could become transparent. The glow'll be easy...

EDIT: any RGB suggestions would be nice, unless it really isn't that exact (i.e. any light shade of pink will do).

EDIT #2: I have replace the attackalt.gif above with the new, less bright version. Tell me if it's still too bright.

BTW: How will you make the glow from the dish lighten the background in Civ 3? I was never able to figure that out.

 

[A Viking Yeti]

I've posted the new explosion animation below, I'm not sure if that's what you were looking for, but the color in between bright yellow and pale pink is kinda of a peach color...

Now that I look at it, the explosion still looks white, but I think that's only 'cause of the pink background. I could render it on a black background if that would help show the color change...

EDIT: I tried to lighten up the smoke a bit, but the only option was to lighten the entire explosion. It's not that noticeable.

 

[Sword_Of_Geddon]

Looks similiar to a Protoss Death from Starcraft...

 

[Smoking mirror]

I've posted the new explosion animation below, I'm not sure if that's what you were looking for, but the color in between bright yellow and pale pink is kinda of a peach color...

Now that I look at it, the explosion still looks white, but I think that's only 'cause of the pink background. I could render it on a black background if that would help show the color change...

Ah, thats just what I was talking about. Is there a way to make the smoke more transparent? otherwise that is probably the best effect possible.
In game the second to bottom row in the pallette is transformed in to a kind of "anti shadow", which will look like glowing light or partly transparent white smoke, depending on how its done.

Here is a pic of the terrain so far, I think the stars are too bright, and too numerous, but I saved a backup coppy of all tilesets just at the point before I added the stars, so I can easily redo that;