Spring RTS Engine

KDR_11k wrote:I definitely think it needs more panels, that shape just doesn't look believable, like you modeled a tank and ran a smooth modifier over it. Metal being "molded" like that looks just plain wrong. Probably needs straighter edges too (or if not straight at least more regular curves).

It's relitively easy to give metal that smooth molded look. There are some advantages to it too, it would make it more radar resistant, and it would improve reflective angles for projectile impacts. I can't call it realistic... as it's not really economical to mold metal shapes that large, and it lacks any sign of machinery, which would require increadibly precise internal designs (unlikely, not impossible).

That all being said, it's a style, I like it, because it doesn't look like every other tank model I've ever seen.

KDR_11k wrote:I definitely think it needs more panels, that shape just doesn't look believable, like you modeled a tank and ran a smooth modifier over it. Metal being "molded" like that looks just plain wrong. Probably needs straighter edges too (or if not straight at least more regular curves).

hmm the style i'm going for is streamline art deco which is all about curves, but perhaps these curves should be made from smaller panels as can be seen in

srsly. trust me on this. if you put the teamcolour on anything other than a grey the colour 'leaks' through the teamcolour and poisons it.

put. it. on. grey.

if you put it on a light colour, the teamcolour will turn out some hideous pastel shade.

put. it. on. DARK. grey.

Nit-picks:

It should have hatches for the crew, some little dots to suggest observation ports, exhaust ports, etc.- enough minimal detail to suggest a really functional object. But as Pxtl pointed out, you have a long way to go here before it's really in-game. 'Course, it's a tank, so it's not like animation's going to be a problem.

It needs some airbrush work on those panel lines for the front "headlight covers" and on the rear "vents" to make them pop out a bit better and look wholly 3D- right now, they just look like airbrush lines, and don't have enough contrast to look like a real break in the surface, imo.

I'd do the treads, too, personally. Even a quickie's a good idea, players will notice them being just black, even from high up (yet even simplistic circles with minimum airbrush shading will be fine).

Other than that minor whining, it's coming out very well. The metal feels a lot more real at this point. Getting rid of the camo looks much nicer and will look much less noisy at a distance.

Oh, and KDR's right, you'd never really make a tank like that. The design examples you're looking at all use very ductile metals in thin sheets that are easily formed (i.e., bullets would go right through 'em), but meh, who really cares.

It's visually interesting, and it'll probably be nice in-game. I miss the exhaust tubes, though, they gave it a lot of flavor that will be obvious when the object's in motion, and would provide an excuse for the occasional smoke-puff, etc. But if I were you, I'd just concentrate on getting it to the in-game stage.

Pressure Line wrote:srsly. trust me on this. if you put the teamcolour on anything other than a grey the colour 'leaks' through the teamcolour and poisons it.

put. it. on. grey.

if you put it on a light colour, the teamcolour will turn out some hideous pastel shade.

put. it. on. DARK. grey.

it is! the green in the pic is the teamcolour, not the underlying texture.

can easily change the teamcolour to whatever i like to preview.

Argh wrote: It should have hatches for the crew some little dots to suggest observation ports, exhaust ports, etc.-
enough minimal detail to suggest a really functional object.

Definitely, I didn't really think of that when i made it.
Originally it had some observation ports but i didn't like them much, maybe i'll add them back on the texture.

I'd do the treads, too, personally. Even a quickie's a good idea, players will notice them being just black, even from high up (yet even simplistic circles with minimum airbrush shading will be fine).

Yep, planning on doing a tread eventually.

Oh, and KDR's right, you'd never really make a tank like that. The design examples you're looking at all use very ductile metals in thin sheets that are easily formed (i.e., bullets would go right through 'em), but meh, who really cares.

yeah, i realise it's not very practical from a tank perspective, but more for a design perspective so it'll stand out compared to the other team...

this team will have all completely armoured streamlined shapes in a light coloured metal,
where the other team will be very angular with its structural elements visible in its design (think da vinci diagrams)

It's visually interesting, and it'll probably be nice in-game. I miss the exhaust tubes, though, they gave it a lot of flavor that will be obvious when the object's in motion, and would provide an excuse for the occasional smoke-puff, etc. But if I were you, I'd just concentrate on getting it to the in-game stage.

yeah i miss the exhaust too, although i was never happy with how they looked, originally i had the chimneys pointing straight up from the back which looked nice, but conflicted with the turret's movement.
maybe i'll figure something out.

[quote="thesleeplessyeah i miss the exhaust too, although i was never happy with how they looked, originally i had the chimneys pointing straight up from the back which looked nice, but conflicted with the turret's movement.
maybe i'll figure something out.[/quote]

could do something like this...

That looks much better. Esp. considering there are real tanks with such a design.

Or even that:

The BT-7 tank's exhaust looks ugly. Looks like 2 .50 calibre MGs

Inspired by the rocket tower from onslaught, 574 tri's including the rockets, one rocket is 78 tri's.

The details on the top should be done in the texture, and the rocket has a few too many polies on the cylinder (you could get away with knocking it down to 7 or 6)

5 even... also I'd only use the tips on the turret model.

stop saying I should model it in ds specs and start saying it's cool

Their point about the launcher-->tips and the top details are correct. You can easily suggest details like that with a texture. All of that together will save 60-100 triangles or more, which is a pretty big increase in the speed that this will render.

As for the rockets... while you can make 5-sided columns look "round" from edge views, they will never look "round" from any front views. But they're projectiles- you'll never ever see them clearly, they're moving too fast. I'd honestly recommend remodeling the projectile versions.

Overall, though, it's a nice clean turret, nothing fancy. My only real concern is that it has no way to rotate upwards, so I hope it's not supposed to shoot at aircraft.

Guessmyname wrote:The details on the top should be done in the texture, and the rocket has a few too many polies on the cylinder (you could get away with knocking it down to 7 or 6)

I disagree completely. Rockets will only be seen for a couple seconds at a time, and depending how they are used you'll rarely see more than a dozen on screen at once. Unnecessary detail is one thing, but they should use enough polies to give them the shape you want them at a minimum.

74 tri's is next to nothing.

Perhaps, but it's always a good idea to keep poly counts low where they're not needed. If nothing else, it gives you consistency. Sure you could have 'low' poly projectiles at just below 100 polies, probably even with 64x64 textures (which is probably a bit large... probably. Not an expert there) but if you take a screenshot alongside other units, the FPS-quality bullets etc will look out of place and show up the apparently lower-poly units; whilst the units may have higher counts and texture res, they're also much, much bigger, meaning the polies and pixels will be spread out more and making them look lower-quality in comparison.

Well, that saves 50 tri's, which is about 10%, I dunno, guess I'll learn to do that kind of stuff in the texture later, my textures suck, so I don't really know what can be done with a texture and what can't, and I just tought it could use some more detail.

About the rocket tips, I agree, but I don't think I'm going to use it in spring, just see it as a normal model, which is not going to be used in spring, or any other game.

Also, about the targetting up, I thought about that, I made it like a rts model should be, that means I'm not going to model things you're not going to see from a (semi)top view, saved quite some poly's.

It's not so much that it can't rotate upwards, it's more that it will clip through the base when it does (which will be visible from top down).

Plus, you're forgetting that Spring's camera is quite freeform; it's quite likely it'll be seen from side on as well.

Homing missiles?

Nah, it was never intended to be anti air

Oh. In that case, so long as no-one sticks it on a cliff, you should get away with it.

a series of half circles on the bottom could make a pivot. as it stands right now it has very limited use. trees are it's kryptonite