The side count is simply much too low. There is no way 12 sides will follow the curve of a subdivided cylinder. You need more sides, something like 24 or 32 would suffice. There are other tricks or baking rules to follow such as trying to keep your UV shells as straight as possible(if possible) as this helps with…
Thanks ill have to keep digging up more info, some of the video tutorials I've seen have either been like super technical and I'm left like "whatttt?" or others i feel aren't specific enough to whatever situation I was dealing with at the moment. I scrapped the low poly models and went with 32 sided cylinders instead. I…