Joined: 09 Mar 2008 Location: Osaka (JP)/Hong Kong/Germany
Posted: Wed Mar 04, 2015 5:22 pm Post subject:
All the good maps in RA2 always remind me of AoE maps... for some reason.
Minus the airports and oil derricks and all that, of course. _________________
Mao Zedong wrote:
Our mission, unfinished, may take a thousand years.
On that note, has anyone figured out why sometimes trees leave the light blue smudge/shadows on explosions? Is it just an unflushed sprite cache or something to do with certain trees -- ie. is there a fix?
The maps looks bland and some of them looks imbalanced.
You're not OCD are you?
I'm a big fan of irregular maps, where the advantages and disadvantages to each starting position are not the same -- it doesn't mean anyone is screwed, just means they have to adapt to the surroundings... QUICK_EDIT
Joined: 10 Dec 2012 Location: I'm too busy conquering the world!
Posted: Thu Mar 05, 2015 2:51 pm Post subject:
No, but it could use some more details. What I mean by imbalanced is that some ore fields are close to others and some are far away from the starting position. Of course mappers can make great maps that are irregular but is fair to all starting positions. _________________ Mod Leader and founder of World Domination
No, but it could use some more details. What I mean by imbalanced is that some ore fields are close to others and some are far away from the starting position. Of course mappers can make great maps that are irregular but is fair to all starting positions.
You're thinking much too specifically...
Many of the starting positions on my maps have a clear drawback, and you'll find that one thing forces the game to be more dynamic, having to overcome your terrain while dealing with the enemy.
Thing is, where you see ore being farther as a hindrance, you didn't stop to compare all the other attributes, like difficult terrain slowing any tank rushes, or more space for forward defenses or even large sections of map around the base that are inaccessible to the enemy. There's always pluses and minuses.
In my eyes, a player with access to more ore deserves to be more exposed, a player with a bottleneck for tank rushes deserves to be accessible by long range weapons or even naval strikes, and so on... the balancing factors just aren't identical across each position.
Maybe other players would disagree with where I have drawn the lines, but I think they'd be happy with the diversity and the intention of that diversity. QUICK_EDIT
This is what happens when you aren't on the ball...
3 AI vs me on power structure x, 1 hit me with a tank rush team, another sent an air strike, and another chronosphered in a team exactly where my tanks weren't ready...
By the time I pulled back a handful of grizzly, some ifvs and about 10 rocketeers, it was too late, the last enemy grizzly just took out my war factory before dying
It is very bright compared to the other structures. Also the lack of shadows is visually.. blemishing (so this will be much better in-game opposed to Final Alert)
The roof texture looks like it was done with the MS Paint spray can. Last edited by Phrohdoh on Wed Mar 11, 2015 7:23 pm; edited 1 time in total QUICK_EDIT
Joined: 22 Nov 2010 Location: Iszkaszentgyorgy, Hungary
Posted: Wed Mar 11, 2015 5:38 pm Post subject:
FA2 does not render shadows, so you don't know that. _________________ "If you didn't get angry and mad and frustrated, that means you don't care about the end result, and are doing something wrong." - Greg Kroah-Hartman
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Past C&C projects: Attacque Supérior (2010-2019); Valiant Shades (2019-2021)
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WeiDU mods: Random Graion Tweaks | Graion's Soundsets
Maintainance: Extra Expanded Enhanced Encounters! | BGEESpawn
Contributions: EE Fixpack | Enhanced Edition Trilogy | DSotSC (Trilogy) | UB_IWD | SotSC & a lot more... QUICK_EDIT
Call this another freebie Civilian bit... I'm still working on the tower, sunshine/roughness, and of course damage frames.
Consider this a great base to modify for your own needs, I don't see the WW water tower to be useful for a "city", it belongs in a farm town only. I'm trying to flesh out the urban stuff so we I actually have interesting cities with proper neighbourhoods.
BTW I did the tower in Solidworks, since I use that to design my racecar parts, I'm far more adept in that than any 3d studio type software. I can texture and shade well enough to simplify post-processing in photoshop/psp/shp builder...
PS. Oddly FA renders one of the low/high palette dark grays as light gray on my old-age home, the game renders it fine.
I was inspired by a thread I saw with the super large bunkers... they were based on the WW bunker, I used solidworks to make this one, I added a bit of nazi fortress feel to it, with some elements befitting a middle-ages castle
Yea the size works well, and although it's more rocky/darker than the WW bunkers, I haven't yet added any dirt or softened highlights to make it look weather worn yet either...
In the meantime, I'm going to make a few more interesting structures with solidworks that would be very difficult to draw.
Grey, two barreled tank destroyer reminds me harkonnen devastator from D2K.
It's been a looong time since I've played that haha
I didn't use any one thing as the basis for the design, the Germans/French/Russians all experimented with a similar body forward design, and the soviets did produce a similar "beast killer" in single barrel, but looked way too primitive for a relatively "modern" RA2 interpretation.
I wanted something that looked purpose built for tank fighting, with a low target profile, and following the theme of allies having better guns, but the soviets having better armor.
I'm still tweaking the allied tank destroyer, but they take a slightly different approach, with a longer gun (therefore longer range) and a much more triangular body to deflect bullets, instead of more armor. My inspiration for that was the WW2 Jagdpanther (if I uncovered the tracks you'd see much more similarity) with elements of modern battle tanks thrown in.
The Mouse is another hybrid, the silly double sized gun turret on the later T-34's and various early tank designs that were never really successful. The Mouse's purpose in the lineup is to be a German equivalent to the Apoc, or a melee tank, relatively quick with high durability.
The Germans ALSO get the Leopard, which I will have to update at some point, that one is fast like the Grizzly, with a long range version of their gun. It's a kind of premium fast tank, great for parking on top of cliffs to support a rush of mixed armor, or keeping them in reserve like cavalry... QUICK_EDIT
The German tank destroyer looks much more interesting in-game than you'd think looking at the plain voxel... but one of the things I'm doing lately is using cuts or grooves to give them texture by normals lighting. And I want to show off the angles of the upper body, something that excessive texturing hides (my previous one was heavily textured)
Also a peek at the new Apocalypse, been meaning to update it for a while, the WW one didn't look menacing at all haha
So did some random cutouts of the bunker model, then added some new broken slabs at angles. Followed by a back-and-forth between Photoshop and SHP Builder...
debris.jpg
Description:
I added some passages and rooms underneath to show through in the collapse
No offense to your intuition but those maps look very unpleasant to play on, lack any sanity in their design and are far from Westwoods style as some others here seem to think. The random map generator seems to have more sanity with resource placement, minus the occasional hiccup. QUICK_EDIT
No offense to your intuition but those maps look very unpleasant to play on, lack any sanity in their design and are far from Westwoods style as some others here seem to think. The random map generator seems to have more sanity with resource placement, minus the occasional hiccup.
I'm not offended, but I find it's people (like you) that demand symmetry are the reason so many maps are uninspired. Sure they have some variety but so many feel like you're pacman, the same old routine with the same old geometry. I'm not saying tournament style maps with equal everything are always bad, they have their place, but everyone already makes those. Far fewer map authors have an eye to making good irregular maps.
If you played my maps you wouldn't change your mind though, because you obviously like formulaic maps, and you'd find a million excuses why mine are unfair or something... no matter which starting position you get.
Life is unfair, suck it up. Everyone gets some kind of advantage too, or even several. The point is that you never know which advantage or disadvantage you inherit, so you can't cherry pick your house for your map, nor can you predict how you'll have to play... that uncertainty keeps you on your toes, or deeply upsets you. I can't change that QUICK_EDIT
Ok downloaded new VxL viewer, much better than the old one, by the X/Y/Z axes for the shifting are wrong, Z moves up, Y moves sideways, and X moves forward... other than that much better than the 1.7x I had.
Because most soviet units are gray or predominantly anyway, and when they are the sickly greenish tone, the flat surfaces highlight to shine too much...
The Rhino is a perfect example, it's a yellow-green body, but you can't visually see any colour in the game aside from the remap areas.
No offense to your intuition but those maps look very unpleasant to play on, lack any sanity in their design and are far from Westwoods style as some others here seem to think. The random map generator seems to have more sanity with resource placement, minus the occasional hiccup.
I'm not offended, but I find it's people (like you) that demand symmetry are the reason so many maps are uninspired. Sure they have some variety but so many feel like you're pacman, the same old routine with the same old geometry. I'm not saying tournament style maps with equal everything are always bad, they have their place, but everyone already makes those. Far fewer map authors have an eye to making good irregular maps.
If you played my maps you wouldn't change your mind though, because you obviously like formulaic maps, and you'd find a million excuses why mine are unfair or something... no matter which starting position you get.
Life is unfair, suck it up. Everyone gets some kind of advantage too, or even several. The point is that you never know which advantage or disadvantage you inherit, so you can't cherry pick your house for your map, nor can you predict how you'll have to play... that uncertainty keeps you on your toes, or deeply upsets you. I can't change that
Speaking of your maps...that eroded river is not fair at all...
West player has convenient short range to ore on both sides of his base but north and east player should either move MCV (wastes base building time) or else expand as ore miner traveling distance will set them to major disadvantage against west player in economy. West player can rush both with resources gain far faster than they can get cash.
Bad map design. QUICK_EDIT
Speaking of your maps...that eroded river is not fair at all...
West player has convenient short range to ore on both sides of his base but north and east player should either move MCV (wastes base building time) or else expand as ore miner traveling distance will set them to major disadvantage against west player in economy. West player can rush both with resources gain far faster than they can get cash.
Bad map design.
You're right, the purpose was to force base expansion and make defense difficult... but that's a pretty small map overall. A well placed mlrs, howitzer, diablo, or v3 can shoot right across the river. AA weaponry also won't stop a committed air strike either.
The player on the left also can't land rush the other two positions, and if you play 1v1 then you will likely end up top vs bottom left, separated by water.
The top player does have other advantages like being able to use a navy to aid in land defense, with a shielding peninsula limiting the posibility of their navy being wiped out.
Still, it's a fun map to play against my AI on, there's not much ore on the right, so you end up fighting over the middle, which leaves you exposed to the lefties
You do realize I have a variety of maps, not all of them suitable for tournaments or 1v1...
You do realize I have a variety of maps, not all of them suitable for tournaments or 1v1...
I do realize but they all seem to share same flaw, ore placement is so wildly uneven it ain't funny, result is that, players having learned map, will always pick the one good spot just to sucker others as sadly resource fields don't randomly change on every map load to truly further your idea of genuinely uncertain outcome games.
Maybe if players could not learn maps to keep your 'uncertainty' idea.... Besides players see the map in loading anyways skewering that too.
Non-symmetrical maps are good thing but ore is not something to place entirely randomly or you disrupt the flow of the game by favoring.
Perhaps you should organise the maps under gamemodes so players don't have to learn by trial and error what are equalish maps when they want a good match than skewered 'lol fun' match from the start. QUICK_EDIT
I figure people playing competitively will pre-select maps they know are fair, or select ones skewed to one house or side only in conjunction with another map skewed the other way...
So I don't think the element of map surprise is an issue, especially when someone has to get used to the economics of my mod in the first place. It's very different, most things are more expensive, and many structures use far more power than before.
The ore placement isn't as random as it seems, I've gone back plenty of times to add ore or derrick to a given player spot to balance. But I do like having shared resources to fight over, or at least make them vulnerable areas.
If a spot has a really good naturally defensive topology, I usually handicap them with less ore, so it's harder to turtle. The key being, whether you're offensive or playing defensive, you have to be aggressive.
Alternately you may have a large area that's nearly impossible to defend, so the position might get a wealth bonus to help keep up.
To be honest though, most of my maps have a 200-300k in ore scattered around at the start, the last map I posted Kidney Lake has gems scattered in the forests for example. _________________ http://www.moddb.com/mods/scorched-earth-ra2-mod-with-smart-ai QUICK_EDIT
Taking a break from units to clean up the AI a bit...
There's interesting side effects to playing free-for-all which I can't really workaround, like spies disguising as player A but trying to infiltrate player B. Still overall it's been fun to see the AIs kill themselves
Joined: 22 Nov 2010 Location: Iszkaszentgyorgy, Hungary
Posted: Thu Mar 26, 2015 1:33 pm Post subject:
The Eldorado looks cool albeit the doors should have a contour, not just a handle. _________________ "If you didn't get angry and mad and frustrated, that means you don't care about the end result, and are doing something wrong." - Greg Kroah-Hartman
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Past C&C projects: Attacque Supérior (2010-2019); Valiant Shades (2019-2021)
=======================
WeiDU mods: Random Graion Tweaks | Graion's Soundsets
Maintainance: Extra Expanded Enhanced Encounters! | BGEESpawn
Contributions: EE Fixpack | Enhanced Edition Trilogy | DSotSC (Trilogy) | UB_IWD | SotSC & a lot more... QUICK_EDIT
The Eldorado looks cool albeit the doors should have a contour, not just a handle.
The sides of that model are pretty flat, they only curve sharply at the top and bottom edge... what did you have in mind? I added another gradient band on the lower edge, and it looks a little bit smoother.
The door sill is supposed to be chromed but didn't want it to stand out too much since it's not that big. The tails are almost exactly level with the upper body, but if I do that I can't give it enough definition as a wing, I needed at least an extra line to give it enough contrast.
Joined: 22 Nov 2010 Location: Iszkaszentgyorgy, Hungary
Posted: Fri Mar 27, 2015 11:25 am Post subject:
Something like how I did the door back on my Bel-Air.
Still great work regardless. _________________ "If you didn't get angry and mad and frustrated, that means you don't care about the end result, and are doing something wrong." - Greg Kroah-Hartman
=======================
Past C&C projects: Attacque Supérior (2010-2019); Valiant Shades (2019-2021)
=======================
WeiDU mods: Random Graion Tweaks | Graion's Soundsets
Maintainance: Extra Expanded Enhanced Encounters! | BGEESpawn
Contributions: EE Fixpack | Enhanced Edition Trilogy | DSotSC (Trilogy) | UB_IWD | SotSC & a lot more... QUICK_EDIT
Joined: 22 Nov 2010 Location: Iszkaszentgyorgy, Hungary
Posted: Fri Mar 27, 2015 1:15 pm Post subject:
Better. _________________ "If you didn't get angry and mad and frustrated, that means you don't care about the end result, and are doing something wrong." - Greg Kroah-Hartman
=======================
Past C&C projects: Attacque Supérior (2010-2019); Valiant Shades (2019-2021)
=======================
WeiDU mods: Random Graion Tweaks | Graion's Soundsets
Maintainance: Extra Expanded Enhanced Encounters! | BGEESpawn
Contributions: EE Fixpack | Enhanced Edition Trilogy | DSotSC (Trilogy) | UB_IWD | SotSC & a lot more... QUICK_EDIT
Joined: 22 Nov 2010 Location: Iszkaszentgyorgy, Hungary
Posted: Fri Mar 27, 2015 3:02 pm Post subject:
Can't really stand Westwood voxel scale, sorry. Esp combined with WW style. _________________ "If you didn't get angry and mad and frustrated, that means you don't care about the end result, and are doing something wrong." - Greg Kroah-Hartman
=======================
Past C&C projects: Attacque Supérior (2010-2019); Valiant Shades (2019-2021)
=======================
WeiDU mods: Random Graion Tweaks | Graion's Soundsets
Maintainance: Extra Expanded Enhanced Encounters! | BGEESpawn
Contributions: EE Fixpack | Enhanced Edition Trilogy | DSotSC (Trilogy) | UB_IWD | SotSC & a lot more... QUICK_EDIT
Fixed up the containers BySc rendered up, still not 100% decided if I should shrink them or not, but as with the other stuff, I made snow frames...
I think they look pretty good scale problems aside... Nooze's garage thing works nicely as the registration office for the storage company... just be nice if it was taller, I may fix that later
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