Task List

[WarKirby]

Progress report, see the attached image.

Used a space marine as a base. The weapon is a Heavy flamethrower assembled from various neat looking parts. Transparent glass dome helmet included as standard.

Only issue is the polycount. After a fair bit of optimisation, I've gotten it down to 1695 polys, which is still too much. So, working on it

The unit is fully teamcolored. Seen below is the Hive version. The whole color of the armour and tank will chance with each faction. It's a shame that red is already taken by the mind worms, it's an excellent color

 

[Maniac]

Looks awesome!

I see there's still a head attached to the unit. Would removing that from the model save a significant amount of polygons? I figured the helmet could be non-transparent but shiny/glossy gold or black, like in this movie on minute:second 1:45.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gwtjYW1qmjM

By the way, if you prefer red, I see no problem with using that for all the factions if you so prefer. The flag of the unit's owner always shows, so teamcolour has no functional use anyway.

Perhaps even textures with different armour colours could be made. That way the unit's armour could change colour depending on which special ability it has. That way the difference in graphics would have a functional interface improvement aspect to it.

 

[The_J]

Awesome work .

 

[WarKirby]

removing the head brings only marginal gains which aren't really worth the cost of losing the visual aethetic, I think. It's 71 faces

After much optimisation, I've gotten it down to 1281 polys so far. I'm really running out of things to cut that aren't going to seriously deteriorate visual quality. I've already trimmed away every non visible face, inside of shoulderpads, soles of boots, etc. Reduced the resolution of quite a lot of things. Is that 1100 limit set in stone ?

 

[Maniac]

No. The fewer polygons the better for performance of course as a general rule, but if it can't be further reduced, it can't be further reduced. In any case I'm very happy you've made the model as efficient as possible.

 

[WarKirby]

Helion done: http://forums.civfanatics.com/downloads.php?do=file&id=13488

Picture

Spoiler :

You'll just need the unit folder, not the others, I guess. but I put everything up to be as useful as possible.

 

[GeoModder]

Impressive unit, WarKirby.

 

[Pfeffersack]

Indeed, looks just great

 

[Maniac]

Weeeeeeeeeeee awesome!

Technical question though: you say the unit has 1281 polygons. When I look at the unit however, it says it has 2695 triangles. That may be because the model is in TriStrips rather than TriShapes. Is there a reason you exported it that way?

 

[WarKirby]

it's just how I've always done things. is there a problem with it ?

 

[Maniac]

TriShapes are considered better for performance than TriStrips, and cause no loss in quality whatsoever as far as I know.

 

[Lord Tirian]

TriShapes are considered better for performance than TriStrips, and cause no loss in quality whatsoever as far as I know.

Yeah, TriStrips are actually better in performance, but they increase the polycount. As a rule of thumb, TriStrips are better if the resultant polycount isn't much higher than the count on TriShapes - the optimiser script seems to put the limit at around 33% more polys.

So, for the Helion, the body and the flamethrower are better off as TriShapes, but the head & helmet can be TriStrips, at least according to the optimisation script.

I've ran it, fixed a minor thing (you had the order of head & helmet reversed, making the head invisible, now it's visible again) and added a non-shader version of the model.

Cheers, LT.

 

[The_J]

OMFG, just great .
I hope, i'll also be able to use it somehow.

 

[Maniac]

Thanks!

 

[WarKirby]

Any special requests for cyborg art? Presently I was thinking of just going the full space marine route, notably including the evil-looking helmet, and a bolter in the hands.

 

[Maniac]

Sounds cool!

 

[blade117]

Nice models\skins\whatever else might be required to make something like that.

 

[self biased]

not to be a stick in the mud, but that currently is an IP Violation.

 

[WarKirby]

not to be a stick in the mud, but that currently is an IP Violation.

it's a non commercial use for a fan-made mod. And relic are credited.

 

[self biased]

it's not relic i'm worried about; it's the GW IP police.