I Fought A Bear's Earthshaker Totem

I Fought A Bear

As soon as I got back from TI3 I wanted to try my hand at my first Dota 2 item. I'm pretty obsessed with rocks so I thought I would go with an Earthshaker totem.
One of the problems I'm running into is coming up with an interesting base to hold up the totem while maintaining a minimal number of tris because I've just about hit my budget with the totem by itself. I can keep optimizing especially around the rope but with totem at 488 tris and my budget at 550 I'm running out of space.
I'm totally up for any ideas!

The rock will have runes that show up when Earthshaker activates his totem, the cracks in the rock will also illuminate.





Thanks for the dropping by on this thread guys, I could really use the help

I Fought A Bear

So it looks like I'm either having a human error or Earthshakers model available for download is slightly bigger than the one in game. Is there any way to compensate for this issue or do I just try guessing the scale until it fits properly?

Sukotto

Yeah...I think you just have to compensate for that by scaling the items down a bit, guess and check really.

I Fought A Bear

Here's an example of the scaling issues, you can see how his belt that goes around his belly is larger in game than it is in maya, it even casts a shadow.

I Fought A Bear

Thanks for the quick reply Sukotto! Here we go :[

Frump

Yeah there are often scale issues with the models, so it could be that.

Forgive me if this is insultingly obvious suggestion but make sure you delete history and freeze transformations before skinning. That is another common cause for scaling problems on import.

As for how he holds on to his totem, I wouldn't really worry about it. When in doubt add wraps.

Great work on the rock.

Starmony

Just went through this and scaling down to about 91% worked for me

Neox

can't you import te original .mdl files with maya? this way you make sure, you really have the latest character to work with.

I Fought A Bear

Thanks for the help you guys! Here's the latest AO and Normal bake without any painting yet, there's a bunch of artifacts but for a test bake it came out pretty good. Do you guys think the totem could be scaled up?

BrontoThunder

The bake looks good!

It's tough to say whether or not it should be scaled up because the thickness of it seems perfect but it's a bit too short. Can we see a side-by-side with the original weapon?

I Fought A Bear

Here's a comparison, I think it looks small because on the default totem the ends are bigger... not sure.

Destijl

Yeah, especially after resizing the totem from its initial size it's going to feel strangely small. In the end though, unless you plan on modifying default animations you're going to be restricted by the dimensions of the original model so as to avoid serious clipping issues.

I Fought A Bear

So as a quick update, I'm getting the hang of these masks and everything you see here is just testing them. I have a better idea of how this whole process works and I want to say thanks to you guys for helping me through this. Textures still need a lot of work but it'll get there.

Chaseingames

Looks good man! I'm kinda having a hard time reading the rock and significance of it. Maybe a harsher stone type like obsidian or something. Make the strap/rope more separate. Think that'll really help. Can't wait to see the set man!

I Fought A Bear

Fixed the normal mapping issues, now to make the rocks look more like rocks... Chase makes some good points. I'm going to see what it looks like with high spec.

VotaVader

Looks really nice! I'll be looking forward to a higher specular on the rock. I think it would stand out more.

On another note, how do you make it so the item uses another texture (i.e. shows the runes) when it's activated?

I Fought A Bear

Ok so I added a bunch of spec and made the base rock color a very dark green to help associate it with obsidian just a little bit, still playing around with different colors but keep hitting me with suggestions guys!

VotaVader

It looks so much cooler now! And it has more contrast. How do you get the item to display a different texture (i.e. the runes and red markings) when it's activated?

I Fought A Bear

Here it is, hit me with everything you've got! Also I'm out of polys.

BrontoThunder

Dayum!

It sits a bit awkwardly on the holder thingy but that doesn't matter too much!

mihalceanu

looks great man:)

Tenji

I'd love to see how you UVW unwrapped that thing, nice work!

danidem

make a it a lil bigger! looks great!

Tvidotto

danidem wrote: »

make a it a lil bigger! looks great!

bigger!

I Fought A Bear

So here it is, bigger, shinier, and less awkward the way it fits into his shelf. Frump gave me a bunch of awesome feedback off forum that I thought initially wouldnt work but I proved myself wrong with those changes he suggested haha.

Also... I have no idea what to call it, suggestions?

Jalcober

Love it!

Chaseingames

RockShards of something dota/character related. Shards of the earth, dunno why but I'm thinkin shards

I Fought A Bear

How about "The Heart of Nishai" ? It's the area earthshaker was born. I'm just looking at dota lore haha

I Fought A Bear

Hey you cool guys! Here it is on the workshop!


http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=172914209

Sukotto

Came out great! Congrats on your first item!

VotaVader

Hey man! Congrats on your submission. I still would like some tips on how you got the item to show alternate textures when abilities are activated. Is there a tutorial somewhere where that's explained? Thanks.

turtlesheep

saw this on workshop. liked it, good job!

I Fought A Bear

Hey Vader, the glow comes from the red channel of Mask 1, it's all listed in the Dota 2 mask guide PDF.

http://media.steampowered.com/apps/dota2/workshop/Dota2ShaderMaskGuide.pdf

VotaVader

I Fought A Bear wrote: »

Hey Vader, the glow comes from the red channel of Mask 1, it's all listed in the Dota 2 mask guide PDF.

Ahh, Ok. I'd never quite understood how that channel was used. So is that map just tied to some predetermined hero abilities if you put it in the hero material, or can it be assigned to any ability? For example, I want to change the color of Sven's cape when he activates God's Strength. Would that be possible?

motionblur

Starmony wrote: »

Just went through this and scaling down to about 91% worked for me

Thank you very much for that info. I just ran across the same issue and thought it was because I was using C4D instead of Maya.

How come the official download models don't have the correct size? It's weird... :poly141:

BTW - for anyone wondering: 80% scaling seems to be the original Size