Units Requests Thread

Maybe different levels of missionaries - like "Cardinals" with more influence, etc.
 
Id like to see a an mobile arty and an chinnook heilcoter transport and paratroopers and sam missiles batteries and cruise missles and bombs, lots of bombs to kill people with and and and...

And i wouldnt mind seeing the game in my grubby little hands. sigh
 
The Great Apple said:
To be honest, we really need to know the game "standard" on texture resolutions and poly counts. From looking at other (RTS/FPS) games, the units will probably have several LODs (Levels of detail), which can be set in the graphics options of the game. These LODs may be able to be generated in-game (killing polies from a hi-poly model), or they may have to be done with the unit. Often you get a lower LOD when zoomed out further (so you can see more, but it's so small you wouldn't be able to see the removed detail)

There is a program somewhere out there (I forget it's name), by NVidia, which can be used to lower poly counts of high poly models, and convert the excess polies into bump maps (which I'm not sure if Civ can use). That would probably be good for creating different LODs.

It is also likely that the textures with have several different resolutions. This will almost certainly be done in game, with the highest resolution being the one the creator makes.

To get some standards we're either going to have to decompile some models, or find some way of testing it (or just ask Firaxis - I think they'd tell us). Textures will probably be pretty easy to decomplile, and probably will be 256*256 or 512*512 anyway.

EDIT: And just out of last nights chat


Looks like unit making has turned expensive...
Click to expand...


When you say expensive, how expensive? What would a complete software suite capable of creating units costs? I was seraching around on the web with little success finding a relaible cost.
 
I_batman said:
When you say expensive, how expensive? What would a complete software suite capable of creating units costs? I was seraching around on the web with little success finding a relaible cost.
Click to expand...

We are talking thousands of dollar's here. Of course if you were a student you could get these programs for significantly less. But you are still looking at playing several hundrend to thousand dollars. Last time I seen a price on 3ds Max was $3,195.00 USD and price for Maya $6,999.00 USD. These ofcourse are just rough estimates from a site I trust 3D Buzz
 
Good question! The latest version of 3DS Max on the autodesk website is selling for £3,166.63. That's alot. Alot more than I've got at least.

I may look into seeing if my university has a copy which I can legally use - if not I can buy the student version (being a student, who, fortunetely is studying a course on their list) - £75 for 2 years.

EDIT: Looked at 3D buzz - here is a thread on the subject: http://www.3dbuzz.com/vbforum/showthread.php?t=117964
 
Gaias said:
We are talking thousands of dollar's here. Of course if you were a student you could get these programs for significantly less. But you are still looking at playing several hundrend to thousand dollars. Last time I seen a price on 3ds Max was $3,195.00 USD and price for Maya $6,999.00 USD. These ofcourse are just rough estimates from a site I trust 3D Buzz
Click to expand...

YOUR KIDDING RIGHT?
does this mean that no-one will ever be able to call themselves
"an ameteur civ4 unit modder?"
surely there is a free or divided by a thousand alterantiv here?
I may as well just pack up all my dreams of unit creation in a sack and throw it off a bridge. :cry: :cry: :suicide:
 
Don't worry... yet!

There are a number of things that could make it so you don't have to spend insane amounts of money.

Somebody could come up with a way of importing units into Civ 4, somehow, using a free program, or maybe Firaxis will release some clever widgit which lets us do it for free (for HL2 you could use Softimage - but only for importing things into HL2).
 
There are of course much less reputable and quite illegal ways to get your hands on said software. I won't go into detail because, well, most forums don't allow discussion of it.
 
I'm not going illegal and I have a budget of £0.00, so no unit modding for me, only requests. :cry: :cry: :cry: :cry: :cry: :cry: :cry: :cry: :cry: :cry:
OK, got over it now. I suppose I may think about the SDK, btu as I said, I would only ever want to be an ammeuteure, no thousands of dollars, no organised crime, just happy modding.
 
Well Dom my friend, my request would be that you convert that fine Maccabee unit you created for Civ III.


On a sidenote: sounds like unit making has gotten very expensive.
 
Try to use the less expensive 3D programs or even the freeware ones, and export your models to 3DS. Then, get to know someone real well who has 3DS Max, they can finish off the unit and export it for you. That is, if Firaxis releases an exporter for CivIV to use in 3DS Max.
 
tdpatriots12 said:
Maybe different levels of missionaries - like "Cardinals" with more influence, etc.
Click to expand...

Now that I have a little more time, lemme hash this out fully.

1 - I'm not a modder, but perhaps a simple color change or texture modification could be enough of a distinction between unit types, so this change might be more possible than something more outlandish.

2 - Unit types could follow this sort of range:
-Religious Leader (1): Like "Pope" for Christianity, these would be created as units once you have built your religion's temple and are only available to the founding civ. You only get one (sort of like a special person) and its uses would be; dramatically increasing influence in a target city while ALSO building a Christian (or other) temple in that city without sacrificing himself. He could sacrifice himself to give culture to a city (establish a Papal Residence), or build "The Vatican" which can be a world wonder, etc. This wouldn't really be overpowered considering there could be more than one, and he'd have to be kill-able (killing the leader would def piss off the respective religion at something like a -6 "You killed our religious leader!" level)
-Religious Agents (3): Let's call these using the Christian example "Cardinals." Instead of spreading religion in other cities, they eliminate it. If you use them on your own towns to say, get rid of Islam, they are not sacrificed. If you use them in your opponents cities, they are. Having one of these in a city would prevent foreign religions from gaining any influence there at all (alternative to Theocracy).
-Religious Settlers (5): Continuing the Christian example, these would be "Bishops" and can act either as settlers or traditional missionaries. Any city they found will automatically have that religion's influence and a Temple built with it. He can be sacrificed in foreign cities to build a Temple to that religion within it.
-Religious Missionaries (10): These are the units in game now.

3 - Unit Promotions for these survivable units can range from increasing their movement rate, to the amount of influence they are able to add/remove.

For all this to make sense, temples have to do something that benefits the religion's founder in a significant, but not overpowering way. I'm not sure how this would affect game balance at all, I just would like for religion and conversion to be more useful as a "weapon" than it currently is.
 
Remember that some of us already have 3D Studio Max... so we can help at least... but there's also plenty of stuff that other people can do.

1) People with other 3D programs can create models for those with 3DS Max to convert.

2) People with 2D graphics experience can retexture what models there are and whatever ones there will be.
 
vingrjoe said:
Try to use the less expensive 3D programs or even the freeware ones, and export your models to 3DS. Then, get to know someone real well who has 3DS Max, they can finish off the unit and export it for you. That is, if Firaxis releases an exporter for CivIV to use in 3DS Max.
Click to expand...

that sounds good. How much would it cost all together? (to get upto the stage of uploading them all to this site to ask someone to download them and finsih them off). How much control over the finished graphic would I have anyway (like the texture, animations etc.) just the model?
 
dalek master said:
that sounds good. How much would it cost all together? (to get upto the stage of uploading them all to this site to ask someone to download them and finsih them off). How much control over the finished graphic would I have anyway (like the texture, animations etc.) just the model?
Click to expand...
It could cost as little as £0.00. You'll almost certainly be able to do the textures yourself, however I don't think you'd be able to do the animation.
 
Hey Dom, I might as well make my first request of Civ4 the same as Civ3. Do you have any interest in making another Numidian Horseman? (With javelin throwing attack this time? ;) ).

Just ask and I'll post a picture :)
 
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