What do you all think of the Llama?

[peteyg]

I did the Llama for Hellcat on the eve of the 0.4.0 release... mostly because the default starting ship at that time was the Plowshare... the big boxy ship that the pirates always fly for some reason. Anyways, I spent like a day on the model, and another day and a half texturing it... so there would be a decent-yet-playable ship for players to start with. I kinda like it, but I am afraid that I may not be the best of judge of its suck-factor.

So I've been meaning to ask this ever since the 0.4.0 release, but what do you guys think? Is it in serious need of work? Does the mesh look way too cheesy? Does the texture need to be reworked? How well does it fit in with the Howard Day (super high qual) ships?

[dandandaman]

shape's a bit odd, but it's cool It adds a little something to the start of the game ... and it looks good too, same quality as howies ships

good work

Dan.a

[richard]

I think it's great. One big problem I have though is that I have no sense of the scale of the thing. I know it fits 500 units of cargo, but I don't know where.

Perhaps the landing pad could include some points of reference? People or something? Hell, just people-sized doors (adequately rendered so we know they're for people and they're not a cat-flap or something ;)

[jackS]

I think it's great. One big problem I have though is that I have no sense of the scale of the thing. I know it fits 500 units of cargo, but I don't know where.

Perhaps the landing pad could include some points of reference? People or something? Hell, just people-sized doors (adequately rendered so we know they're for people and they're not a cat-flap or something

The lack of sense of scale on the landing pad isn't an issue specific to the llama

You could land a 10Km long, death-dealing capital vessel and, as is, it would show up about the same size as an escape pod on the landing pad.

One could imagine a wiggle out where there is a set of different concourses associated with different dock types, one type for each of some number of size classes of vessels - and facilities that refuse to allow docking with vessels of unsupported size classes. This would likely have to go hand in hand with outfitting all larger vessels with "shore vessels" (pinnaces). Otherwise, one could get stuck without the ability to deal with any objects in one's current locale.

With that in mind, one could have a scene appropriate for the scale of the vessel, which would then convey scale (the little hangar bay with the shuttle in it vs. the large vessel seen attached to an umbilical through a window just on the other side of the station's umbilical airlock, etc.)

course, that's just one possible solution - there are likely better ones that one can come up with if one thinks about it longer.

[richard]

Ah, I didn't realise that was the case. Yes, it would be really nice if the bay showed the correct size craft, and that it only allowed in craft that would fit ;)

As for larger craft that dock externally, I guess that the hangar could be replaced by a sort of lobby or something, allowing access to the ship-related stuff (like weapons / accessories, etc).

This is getting way off-topic, but I can't help thinking that once a ship is too big to fit in the hangar it really needs to go to a space dock to have any outfitting done - your average mining station probably won't have facilities available for retrofitting new engines on a capital ship.

[Major]

I think it's great. One big problem I have though is that I have no sense of the scale of the thing. I know it fits 500 units of cargo, but I don't know where.

That´s right, i have also no sense of its scale.

But for doing the textures like those from howard day you can copy some parts from existing textures and paste them on your texture map. With a little bit resizing and scaling it may fit.

With this method i did this:

[pontiac]

I think it's great. One big problem I have though is that I have no sense of the scale of the thing. I know it fits 500 units of cargo, but I don't know where.

Perhaps the landing pad could include some points of reference? People or something? Hell, just people-sized doors (adequately rendered so we know they're for people and they're not a cat-flap or something

The llama is great (model wise and texture wise).
But i must agree with the "where does the cargo fit in" argument.

Code: Select all

*** SEARCHING FOR FREE  CARGO SPACE ***
checking for space in front .... cockpit & weapons found - no space left
checking for space in rear .... engines found - no space left
checking middle section .... space available for cargo
checking dimension of free cargo space ... optical info about free cargo space not significant

Pontiac

[hurleybird]

The Llama is an awesome ship. The only thing that I could possibly think of to improve it would be to add some scorch marks/grime like howie does.

[peteyg]

Oh, it's good to know that the Llama is accepted. : )

I think I will in fact do a bit more work on the texture... smudge marks, detail, and the like. I'll also perhaps add a few faction-specific ones with the help of Major's texture page.

[hurleybird]

Thats cool. Make the pirate Llamas really beat up

[pontiac]

I did the Llama for Hellcat on the eve of the 0.4.0 release... mostly because the default starting ship at that time was the Plowshare... the big boxy ship that the pirates always fly for some reason.

I think that is becasue the plowshare is a 1:1 replacement for the wayfarer which was the most common pirate-ship (at least i have seen it quite often as such).

Pontiac