Spring RTS Engine

Yup, newer stuff tends too be alot cleaner than tanks, ships etc from only a few decades ago:

Type 45 destroyer



Type 42 destroyer

note the radar domes

smoth wrote:optics lasers and antennas are tiny. Radar can be behind protective domes.

Yes, it's covered in a dome but in my opinion the dome with radar underneath still counts as an archetypal greeble. It's not the same as everything being hidden under flat armor plates of the main hull.

Example with a lot of stuff on it that isn't so small:



Edit: then of course there's a good counterexample:



The "no sticking out parts" stealth look is of course on the rise these days so you could argue that in the future everything will be flat as hell, although I personally find that it looks cool at first but when the novelty wears off its a pretty boring look so I hope not. And with making futuristic designs everything is pretty much equally silly, who says there would be "tanks" at all etc.

Yeah thats why i posted it

the radar is called samson btw, the arm rebellion has begun!

really cabbage your own military has a tracked vehicle (i believe its an ARV of some sort) called the Samson

choo choo

If one goes with the steaelth look, I think it's a must to try and have cool animations that show weapons and maybe other stuff folding out when used.

Ok guys, the Diplomat is finally done.

Fire up UPspring and have a look at the beast

*Zip Contents*
cor_vroc_final.max (3dsmax master model)
corvroc.S30 (Spring game model, UNSCRIPTED)
corvroc_1.dds (1024x editing master #1 RGB+A)
corvroc_1_512.dds (512x in-game texture)
corvroc_2.dds (1024x editing master #2 RGB+A)
corvroc_2_512.dds (512x in-game texture #2)

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http://www.mrd.str8-6.com/files/cor_vroc.zip
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Moving parts ect..
bay = X 0 (closed) X move +11 (open)
gantry = X 0 (stowed) X -90 rotate (launch mode)
clamp1 = Z 0 (locked) Z +90 rotate (pre-launch)
clamp2 = Z 0 (locked) Z -90 rotate (pre-launch)
STROBE_RED = trigger during launch cycle only, if possible
smokemit = Particle/flash for rocket ignition

Now somebody had mentioned that I need to make the rocket as a separate model as well for while its in flight, any details as to anything extra I need to do for this to work?

CA'd. May tweak some stuff later.

Now somebody had mentioned that I need to make the rocket as a separate model as well for while its in flight, any details as to anything extra I need to do for this to work?

Yeah, a couple of things:

1. Since you're going to want to hide the rocket that's part of the model immediately upon launch, the origin of the rocket on the model and the origin of the rocket projectile should be the same, if at all possible.

2. Insofar as I know, the origin of the missile projectile is where the smoke effects actually start. It usually needs to be to the rear of the missile to look good. I seem to recall that it can look for the "flare" piece, too, but I don't remember, and I just use the main origin.

Warlord Zsinj wrote:I can understand the logic behind not wanting to put it into Gundam.

But Star Wars pioneered and popularised the concept of the 'used future', and I don't think you would have the "decimated", "crippled" and "ravaged" world of TA without first seeing things like Star Destroyers with all sorts of guts on it's outside (Rather then the crisp Metropolis scifi that had been the mainstay of futuristic designs up to that point), and watching Solo bash at the falcon to get it working.

A quick look at most of the scifi around definitely conveys that feeling. It is popular because we like to see it, because it looks good, and (in my opinion) it feels right, and sets the mood appropriately. Not just because it's the 'star wars theme'. It's like saying the use of an electric guitar should be kept to the blues, because they were the first ones to popularise them.

What I'm suggesting here is not that it looks like the insides of an engine. I was just saying that there should be more mechanical detailing then you have seen on some of the other tanks that Mr.D has done. As with the camo, I think the detailing needs to indicate the different function and usage of this vehicle compared to a front-line tank. Just more vents, more wires, more latches and rotors, etc, then you would have seen otherwise.

*bit out dated, but whateva*
The comparison or greeble in space on battleships and greeble on land tanks are very different things. The ships in starwars have shield generators, and those take the damage, as opposed too conventional armor. They can afford to put the venerable parts outside the hull, anything that gets by the shield would be liable to gut them anyway, as such in Return of the Jedi when they destroy that super bug star destroyers shied generators and a lone pilot was able to fly his single ship into the bridge, and I assume a battleship would have much more firepower at its fingertips (I feel like such a loser for remembering that...).
A tank, on the other hand, needs to fight other tanks without the shield (at least in Spring). If a Very Heavy Tank had a bunch of its venerable on the outside, a single lucky flash could take it out. As for the real tank example, much of the greeble was human hatches, bags, and other items that couden't be fit into the inside of a tank and robotic tank would have no use for. A missle launcher, on the other hand, could have as much damn greeble as it wants. In both real life and spring, if the enemy gets close enough to shoot any more then a pea shooter at it, it wouldn't stand a chance. No use equipping it with close range armor when it has nothing to fight back withat that range and moves at a snails pace.

No defensive weapons, even more reason to armor it up.

MLRS.

Why have armor when you can shoot and scoot?

Yeah, it's defensive weapons are other units with armour. It would be more cost effective to spend more to armour frontline units and have them act in a dual role of escorting ranged units and frontline fighting.

Just relating it to BA stats I guess, because it has near 4000 hp in BA, thats about as much as the Reaper and Bulldog.

Its not going in BA is it? In CA it has 1100 Hp.

But i guess you arent working for us...

In fact, in CA, there is no diplomat. So we'll probably give this a re-spray paintjob and stick it on arm. So we'll ensure its used, its a good model.

it has a place in xta forever.

Zpock wrote:Screw performance, it's moving little details like that who breathe life into the model! We could make all units into f***uing 6 sided boxes with a 16x16 texture and then there would be performance (except pathfinding etc would let you have like 10% more units anyway).

Cant we just have multiple LOD models? Then we have performance and high poly counts. It is nice to allow lower-end computers to play along too.

sure, do you make the los models?

lol rez?