32 sides is more than enough to get a smooth and bakeable mesh, but i did one with 40 and kept the edges smooth "for bake" 32 sides here using double smoothing technique.
This is the result with 64 native edges. Should bake fine and I can delete the edges down to 32. Could I go with something like 128 native, delete every 2nd loop(giving me 64) and then delete every 2nd loop after that giving me a final 32 for the low poly?
Your cylinder needs to be able to support The extrude. 32 sides used. The extruded "half" cylinder, was cut in between two segments, to keep the curve.
You could start with a 32 sided cylinder. Or model it flat and bend it with a modifier. Last tips is to use a proxy mesh and skinwrap your object to the proxy mesh
Seems there's been an influx of people doing the cylindrical shape with indent type thing...next time instead of using an 8-sided cylinder, I'm going to go with 32, lol.
Thanks for the input, @sacboi I kept the cylinder at 32 sides, but it seems after more meddling that a higher count would be better. Regardless, it is always these initial cuts that block me from moving forward.