[Dota 2] - Death Prophet - Tomb Spectre Set

ChaosWWW

EDIT: The submission is up: http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=111342288



The basic idea behind this set is to play on the theme of constant death and rebirth by making Krobelus literally emerging from a coffin. I completed a rough sketch that nails down the design I'm going to go for.



The coffin design was very rough in the above sketch, so I created another image of just the coffin.



I am replacing the skull with the rose emblem pictured in the overall concept, I just didn't bother changing it for the coffin concept.



Model of the coffin. Using pieces from that to begin designing the set. Not too much to show right now, but later today I will hopefully make some good progress modeling several pieces on the character model.

RossC

I think the concept's awesome, but rework the concept on the hair. Dota 2 doesn't really too heavily on alpha textures for hair. Trust me it'll really make things easier in the long run if you can lay down a good idea on how the model of your hair is going to be laid out. Think more big bulky sculpts of hair rather than individual strands. Reference other Dota 2 Hero models for a idea, I think your general hair concept can work if you model how clumps of those individual strands (think Templar Assassin).

Spudnik

Cool idea! For the coffin, I think you can go even lower poly. Any edgeloops that don't change the silhouette have to go. Unfortunately, the poly budgets are pretty tight :S

ChaosWWW

Update: Did some preliminary modeling.



I don't like how blocky and large the chains look, and I am heavily considering using a textured plane approach to the chains to give them a smoother look. I'd like to know which you would think would work better, though. I could theoretically make the modeled chains a bit smoother but not a lot (maybe 6 - 7 faces around the chain at most, with 3 across instead of 4). Also keep in mind the LOD version would have to be more reduced.

Other notes: Planning on smoothing out the spikiness at the bottom of the model, I still have quite a bit of tris left in the budget to do that. Going to plan a more optimized design for the hair as suggested in the thread.

ChaosWWW

Update: Worked a bit this afternoon.



Deciding to go with planes for the chains, high poly is blocked in. Hair is in progress and will probably be refined later today. A lot of work has been done to integrate each piece well with the vanilla armor, which is slightly tricky for a design that deviates this heavily from it.

ChaosWWW

Detail of the hair.




Tomorrow I will add details to the blocked in models and add finish modeling the other pieces. Going to start thinking about texturing soon.

ChaosWWW

Mostly done with the low poly. Surprisingly not pushing the poly limits for most pieces, might add more geometry in some areas. Focusing on UVing now.

ChaosWWW

Haven't updated in a while because I took a bit of a break, but back with textures!





Want to paint more details into the diffuse (for example, add a deeper blue where the hair intersects with the head), fix the blending of the seams in the diffuse and make the normal map pop a bit more. Since this hair has similar properties to the default hair, I'm probably going to stick very close to the mask 1 and 2 from Valve.

ChaosWWW

Basically done with the texturing now. Need to do rigging and the masks.



I'd appreciate critiques if you have 'em, it feels like I've been talking to myself recently.

Managor

The Beads on on her neck seem somewhat off. I love the hair style though.

ChaosWWW

Well, I'm FINALLY back after almost a month, and I'm going to try to complete this despite the crippling workload I'm getting from college now.

Don't have anything to show, but having some problems uploading the model into the Dota 2 Model test. I'm probably too tired to be trying this right now, though, so I'll try to report progress tomorrow. Just announcing that I am alive again.

ChaosWWW

Well, wrapping up the process of fully rigging and completing the texture maps for all of the pieces of armor. So far I have two done and imported into Dota 2.



I have a question about the submission process that I hope someone can help me with. How exactly do you submit all of the pieces of armor into a "set" when uploading to the steam workshop? It seems like individual pieces are the only option.

Also, a small thing to note for people watching the thread: The wood for the body actually bends unrealistically, similar to the dress. I feel like this is justifiable due to the mythic nature of the Death Prophet, but I'd like to know what other people think and if it would be better in their eyes if it was stiff.

ChaosWWW

Alright, (almost) final update. Have everything in an uploadable state, but have a few questions about creating the preview images and some final testing before submitting:

1. Is there a way to preview all of the items together? I kinda need that for preview images.

2. Is there a way to view the high poly model before uploading? Just want to know if that works. In a similar note, is there a way to see the portrait with your items?

Thanks.

ChaosWWW

FINAL UPDATE: It is submitted! It's been a fun ride and a nice learning experience.

http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=111342288