RTS buildings and units

Smirnoffka · Jun 2008

Hey guys, I'm working on an RTS project with a few guys and I the lead (and only) modeler at this stage. I'm really going to use this to work up my (abismal) skills, and would like all the help I can get. I have seen some guys go from shit to awesome on these boards from the advice of you guys and I thought, hell, why can't it be me. Anyway enough chatter.

My first building is a basic (token) power generator. Going to be used to just get the engine displaying everything the way that we want. Sitting at 179 tris, and I don't know where to go from here. Yeah there is some stretching, will work on that tomorrow.

Here are some shots from xnormal

And construction shots...

High Poly

Texture

Glow

Normal

Spec

Cheers guys

Wilex · Jun 2008

Cool, Makes me want to mess around with Xnormals. Im curious as to how texture maps are handled in an RTS. Would you combine several buildings textures together until you get a 1024 or 2048 map to reduce the ammount of texture calls.

I think it could use a different hue for the texture. The grey and blue reminds me of gears of war. Something to define the race or team/faction of the building would be cool.

Ghostscape · Jun 2008

The wear is so huge on that that it is messing up the scale - that looks like a foot tall accent light, and not like a building.

where are the windows/doors? Adding things like that will add a strong sense of scale. Remove the big chips (seriously, those chips would be man-sized).

Figure out where you'd want to put team colors and overlay them onto the texture. I believe the EA RTS games (C&C/LOTR/whatever else uses that engine) use an alpha mask to mark where the hue shifts should be, so you get a full range of lights/darks, and can paint dirt/wear onto a teamcolor strip easily.

Michael Knubben · Jun 2008

I agree with the above comment. As a 1m high portable power-generator, it works very well. Nothing really sells it as being a large-scale structure, including the absolute lack of entrances and windows. The size of the damage on the edges just adds to the illusion of it being very small. Also, some parts of the diffuse just feel needlessly pixelated, which certainly doesn't help with the scale.

edwardE · Jun 2008

Adding some microscopic noise will help sell the scale - try pulling back some of the bigger chips and lighten them up a bit so that they look more like erosion instead of deep gashes in the surface (think of chipping paint compared to a hole in the wall) - unless you're going for that shot-up look.

However, it should be noted that being an RTS, there would be other units in the area to help ground the scale. Quad/fan up those big N-siders on the sides!

Smirnoffka · Jun 2008

Points well noted. To be perfectly honest I am not sure what the scale is, but looking at it now the chips do tend to pretty large. Will work on it later this evening.

As for the N-siders, it was just the end of a default cylinder. It it *wrong* to leave it like that? I thought the game engine just read it is triangles anyway. Thanks for the comments!

Also, the idea for this is it was a building that is self sustained and can't be entered. Thats why I haven't put in any windows or doors, but I will definely take a look at that.

Wilex · Jun 2008

Yes, quad those N-gons the game engine won't triangulate it nicely at all it will probably explode it. No faces with more than 4 sides ever. I guess i didn't see them at first lol.

Smirnoffka · Jun 2008

Next on the agenda for this little project was a land based vehicle. I will get back to the power station at a later stage, but I want to do this one nicely.

Anyway, the idea here is to just make normals in crazy bump. Is it common or accepted practice to do that in a low polygon model, because I found that trying to bake normals from a high poly in these really low poly items just causes a shitload of smoothing errors, and nothing looks nice.

185 polygons, btw.

Concept by another member of my team, William Li

Sage · Jun 2008

I think these would look more like a building if it it longer. Seems too fragile to be a generator as is. Looks cool though.

jogshy · Jun 2008

Do you plan to use alpha testing to avoid those hexagonal wheels?

Mark Dygert · Jun 2008

Yea, you could go with nice 12 sided cylinders or maybe 8 for the wheels. No need to go pre-PS1.
The top of the turret needs to be smaller because the sides are not sloping at all.

Loving that generator, looks great.

Spark · Jun 2008

Working on alot of RTS's myself ( Age of Empires 3/Warchiefs/Halowars ) I would suggest that you refrain from beveled edges and utilize the polys saved to help the larger silhouette shapes. Also, for your glow map, you might think about having a 32x32 texture, and just have floating polys for the areas that you are going to have glow. This saves you the cost of wasted space on the texture ( hdr maps are expensive ) and really not add to much to your overall polycount. One final note, do not get FPS close, as believe me I know you will want to see how things look like you are standing in front of it..pull back to your maximum range..see how the shapes are holding up, and go into your minimum range and again see how things look. Never get any closer and you will be good, good luck in this and keep posting..ohh people already gave pretty much what I would say on the car.

Spark

Smirnoffka · Jun 2008

Awesome crits guys!

Spark, as you have worked on so many, what are some of the restrictions I can be looking at in terms of polycounts, map sizes, ect. I was just thinking in terms of size on the screen and the amount of one unit that will be on screen at any one time. Eg, grunts = small = lots of them so then I keep polycounts and tex sizes low (128). Also, what sort of benifits do you find from Normal mapping and stuff, and is it really worth it. We are using Ogre, and not being a programmer I have been led to believe that the material system is actually quite good, with alot of support. Thanks for the critiques guys, really helpful

!

Smirnoffka · Jun 2008

More updates on the land vehicle.

I am having alot of trouble with this one. First off, I am finding it hard to work colour into the diffuse, but its looking very bland and boring as it is. Also, the normal map doesnt seem to be turning out as it should, which is also very annoying. Any tips or crits would be awesome! I changed the wheels and sloped the top of the turret.

Diffuse

Normal Map

Kawe · Jun 2008

that normal map isn't doing much. might as well fake it in the color texture since I doubt you'll notice any difference from a RTS point of view. also it doesn't seem to be using much of the UV space really. or well.. it is the same UV map but ya.. it isn't doing much is the point. I don't think it is worthy of a normal map.

Smirnoffka · Jun 2008

Hi guys,

So I decided to make a high poly and bake an object space normal map instead, and already the results are obvious. Quick 2 minute bake here. Comments are welcome

Normal:

AO:

Wip:

Cheers

Spark · Jun 2008

Hey Smirnoffka, really the polycount is dependant on the amount of items on screen, and you engine, but try to set yourself a set limit for buildings ( 2000-2500 polys ), vehicles (1000-1500 polys ) and characters ( 500-1000 polys depending on size ). As if you have a group of 6 characters in a sqaud, that can easily be between 2000-6000 polys and will easily be a hit if you have 30 of those units x 8 players and so on. Also, double check your objecjts transform, as your normal doesn't look correct and I think if you reset your xform you will be good ( normals should be in the blues/pinks/and purples)
Hope that helps.

Spark

SHEPEIRO · Jun 2008

agreed with above, youd be better served by bevelling those edges and having no normal map, it would look cleaner, and youd be able to use better maping.

have a look at how metals are drawn in good textures, how to fake lighting effects by drawing it in, youll be able to make a nice little car with no use of expensive fancy effects just goood old art

sorry for the shameless self promotion =P , but heres something i made a fewyears ago, a 512 map colourmap only

Smirnoffka · Jun 2008

Good points, all of them. I really need to learn to paint metal, so thats the route I'll be taking.
I'd still like to play around with normal maps just for testing, but to begin with I suppose it would be best to work up my painting skills

Thanks all, great crits!

Smirnoffka · Jun 2008

I took into consideration the polycount/normal map thing, and as a team we have decided that we would still be using normal maps ect, so the polycounts can be higher, as this isnt going to cause as much of an issue as we had at first though. Thanks for the advice Per! Also, spark, this is an object space normal map, like johnny and EQ used on their FPS entries (http://boards.polycount.net/showthread.php?t=53944 and http://boards.polycount.net/showthread.php?t=53731 ), and I am led to believe that because there is no deformation, it won't be an issue using these maps. If I am totally wrong here, feel free to correct me

. Anway, enough chat.

Made the high poly and new low poly side machine gun. Let me know what you think!
Normal

AO

Keep in mind, these are unaltered bakes just to get the idea, will have to perfect them.

And from Xnormal.

Cheers guys

And thanks for the crits!

SHEPEIRO · Jun 2008

well if your gonna do it like that at least fix the bad UV'in the gun is much higher res than the body, and the body should be using nearly half of the res you have...

Smirnoffka · Jun 2008

Roger.

SHEPEIRO · Jun 2008

i think you and your team need to look at this
http://boards.polycount.net/showthread.php?t=50986

Smirnoffka · Jun 2008

Yep, most certainly do. Those are mad awesome, and I will continue to improve my diffuse skills with those in well and truly in my inspiration folder. Bookmarked!

Smirnoffka · Oct 2008

Okay, mah-assive bump, but we've changed direction, and with alot on my plate at the moment at work, I haven't really progressed much. Now, we are looking at taking it back (eg token roman era), so I started by making a basic roman legionnaire.

I really need a good nudge in the right direction when it comes to texturing metals, as most of this guys armour is a reflective metal, and I have had a couple of dismal attempts. Been looking here http://www.itchstudios.com/psg/art_tut.htm but still am massively struggeling.

Images

Cheers

Baddcog · Oct 2008

I think I agree with what some other people been saying.

I think the normal map is just wasted. The objects are small, view won't be close, and most likely they'll be in one position? So you won't notice the normals while moving around and seeing how light reacts.

Also you've got jaggy edges on the body normal which tends to make it look worse.

I think just a really well done diffuse and maybe some more polys would be the best bet.

just saw your new post

the metals should have really tight/sharp specular.
So when you paint the highlights paint it in the very middle/highest spots and make it a small but bright highlight.
Almost white, but I like to leave a little color under it in most cases.

Smirnoffka · Oct 2008

More work done on this guy. Crits are welcome!

The metal took me forever :S

almighty_gir · Oct 2008

the lightsources are a bit off on the metal, i would probably darken the back, and just have the front highlighted, as well as having the highlighting on the spaulders a little more to the front.

at the moment it's kind of like, unsure where the light is actually coming from.

Smirnoffka · Oct 2008

Here is the finished dude, well, I'll call him finished.

The shield was an afterthought, that why it has such horrendous texture distribution, but I cannot be bothered trying to fix that now, I need to move onto other things.

Crits still welcome of course

Hes sitting on 344 tris, should be low enough to have plenty of them running around on screen at once.

Cheers

Edit:
Yeah, the helmet leaves much to be desired, but it will do for now. I'm going to try and rig and animate him now.

RTS buildings and units

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