Spring RTS Engine

I want fans on the little wing stubs, should the fans be models or textures?

I want it to look smoother and prettier, but I'm not sure if I should make the model more detailed or if a good texture would make it look just as good.

I'm thinking about putting a big cannon inside the bottom portion and having the bottome open up and big cannon/laser of doom opens up a la huge gunship.

I also was thinking about a huge intake on the front middle portion but again, I'm not sure. After trying it out I think that texturing a big grate would look better.

So in general how important is the model compared to a good texture. Could you make the greatest looking unit off of a cube?

In general any other tips you can give would help.

If spring allows for alphatransparency, use a single square plane to make the fans, if not use a round model such as an 8 sided cylinder, cut it in half, then take half of the slices out of the flat circle thats left.