===[TASK]=== Trees

[Imarok]

15 hours ago, stanislas69 said:

Well hopefully we can disable shadows. At least we can reduce their quality.

I meant adding an option to enable shadows for grass. (I can imagine that could cost quite some performance)

[Stan`]

2 hours ago, Imarok said:

I meant adding an option to enable shadows for grass. (I can imagine that could cost quite some performance)

Yeah I get it, I was actually hoping we had at least an option to disable shadows ^^

 

[Nescio]

14 minutes ago, stanislas69 said:

Yeah I get it, I was actually hoping we had at least an option to disable shadows ^^

[Radagast.]

On 4/5/2019 at 8:08 PM, Anaxandridas ho Skandiates said:

Get well soon old boy! You have a world-wide network of diehard fans - I'll invite you for champagne and a free tour of the alps along with a buddy or a lady of your choice - once we're done hellenizing the Ptolemies.

(I am serious.) 

I can only sign this.
Though I tried to give this virtual engagement a more personal note long ago when I desperately tried to arrange a meeting with forum powers I valued a lot. It was all rejected though despite me offering to travel to France.

But if we really all have a nice friendly gathering one day, or if we ever meet to plan our world peace plots, then I will also offer drinks to all these amazing contributors. (I am no less serious)

The works are all very impressing! not only those by LordGood, but of course he replaces and entire army (and produces shooort great videos that are no tutorial but still have very loud sound that made me feel in dire need of some utilities from the Weasley brothers lal - not to forget these trees that grow as if made for marksmen, tricking interpolation, putting Atlas Cedar on two feet - all at a single day. what a man).

Edited April 10, 2019 by Radagast.

[wowgetoffyourcellphone]

Someone asked me recently how I manage to make the game look so good in my screenshots. One of the major reasons is I refuse to use half of the assets in the game. If I think some tree models are ugly, I don't use them. If I don't think some terrains are up to snuff, I don't use them. I don't care about visual variety, I care about visual coherence. Just a thought.  It's one of the reasons I am so excited about @LordGood new assets here. They're a much-needed update! I'd like to see some of the older/uglier gaia assets updated, definitely! If you would update some of the existing trees , bushes, and rocks that maps already use, then you can automatically make maps look better without touching a single line of map code.

 

Some older stuff that can use updates:

flora_tree_tamarix

flora_tree_fig

flora_tree_olive

flora_tree_aleppo_pine (I like the funky and distinct trunk shapes, shame about the texture/canopy geometry)

flora_tree_pine (a mix of "generic" pine trees)

props/flora/bush (dire geometry)

props/flora/bush_desert_dry_a (I use this one a lot on my maps, specifically desert and snow maps, but the geometry of the mesh leaves a weird "hole" in the middle)

a lot of the "bush" actors in general. Only the small ones are good as-is (like props/flora/bush_medit_sm and _dry, I use those a lot)

A lot of the decorative "stone" actors too. I use geology/stone_{biome}_med a looooot for general spiciness. I hardly ever use the larger stone actors because most of them just don't look any good, lol. 

If some of these can just be updated, then boom, a lot of the maps that use them automatically look a ton better. Same goes for the existing terrain textures. 

Edited April 10, 2019 by wowgetoffyourcellphone

[Nescio]

Do you happen to have a list of assets you think should be updated or replaced?

[Anaxandridas ho Skandiates]

.

Edited April 8, 2021 by Anaxandridas ho Skandiates

[wowgetoffyourcellphone]

An anomaly on the Doum Palm (I believe)

 

Also, I hope you don't mind me saying the Medit Fan Palms seem to have like 20% too many fans, but that's just me.

 

[wowgetoffyourcellphone]

On 4/12/2019 at 6:32 AM, Anaxandridas ho Skandiates said:

I like where this is going!! Indeed a list of 'best stuff to use' is of greatest use to all. But don't forget we need to hellenize some walls and towers and gates. Check out THIS brand new publication from the German arch inst: https://www.ar.tum.de/baufo/forschung/abgeschlossene-projekte/das-dipylon/

And note that the reconstruction corresponds to hellenistic/greek fortifications I posted earlier (sorry for low res, but you get the idea! Game is full of walls and towers lets fix em, no more roman pyramid roofs in hellenistic structures/models)

@Radagast. We should make a map of where "username xyz" lives! Probably some of us could meet for a beer around the corner!

This is a totally separate topic, but Battle for Middle Earth II had some interesting things for their Gondor walls, which I think would be good to have for 0 A.D. Namely, there were "sally ports" which were small doors that allowed only allied units through one soldier at a time, while "gates" had greater "bandwidth" and allowed everything and anything through (provided an allied unit initiated the gates to open; the current 0 A.D. gate behavior). I liked this. Also, one could upgrade individual wall sections to arrow towers or catapult towers. I'd really like this for 0 A.D. It would add dimension to siege warfare.

[Stan`]

5 hours ago, wowgetoffyourcellphone said:

Also, one could upgrade individual wall sections to arrow towers or catapult towers. I'd really like this for 0 A.D. It would add dimension to siege warfare.

I wanted to do that using smaller variants in the actor file where you could just garrison a unit on top and it would get smaller but that's a bit of a hack. #2577 (turrets subunits) would be needed for that.

[Gurken Khan]

Just wanted to mention it: I think the 'Tropical Palm' tends to have a leave on the top that seems to awkwardly lie across:

[Stan`]

@LordGood

 

Missing file 'art/textures/skins/gaia/cattails.png' referenced by: 'public/art/actors/props/flora/cattails.xml'

[Stan`]

Thanks for fixing it.

[wowgetoffyourcellphone]

On 4/1/2019 at 12:28 AM, LordGood said:

have a nice alternative to berry bushes, apples and figs

Bro, you should keep going with this. The game is looking so nice now. 

Also, keep experimenting and expanding on your cliff objects. Maybe wider/taller/shaped cliff objects with some nice AO mapping (and match the current cliff textures).

[LordGood]

I've been having to do some serious overtime at work, it's going to be slow for a while

[Stan`]

3 hours ago, LordGood said:

I've been having to do some serious overtime at work, it's going to be slow for a while

Oh, good luck with that !

[LordGood]

fluffy north african forests

[Rolf Dew]

These trees look amazing! Good job! Since they seem a lot more higher poly than the existing trees, could one have an option to toggle between these new trees and the okd ones? That way weaker computers would just use the old trees if they have performance problems.

[Lion.Kanzen]

26 minutes ago, Rolf Dew said:

These trees look amazing! Good job! Since they seem a lot more higher poly than the existing trees, could one have an option to toggle between these new trees and the okd ones? That way weaker computers would just use the old trees if they have performance problems.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Level_of_detail

we need a feature inn the engine for this.

[LordGood]

12 hours ago, Rolf Dew said:

they seem a lot more higher poly than the existing trees

You'd be surprised, the old 'new oaks' (1542-2054) are much higher poly than these holly oaks (472-676). These have a fair few on the carob trees (122-154),  and old oak trees (128-258), but I do believe this jump is much less of a poly issue, since mapmakers tend to heavily clump the old trees to make them look nicer.

[wowgetoffyourcellphone]

Well, let's see 'em dog.  

[LordGood]

10 minutes ago, wowgetoffyourcellphone said:

Well, let's see 'em dog.  

got one more to polish and then an entity template to make

screenie showing just what I mean, new oaks on the left, holly oaks on the right, and easily double the number of the old oaks on top

perhaps wood counts should reflect the poly weight?

[Stan`]

@Bigtiger might have some stuff to show soon

[wowgetoffyourcellphone]

28 minutes ago, Stan` said:

@Bigtiger might have some stuff to show soon

No offense to bigtiger. He has some awesome stuff in his mod. He's done some pretty cool things with decals, for instance, which should be merged with core game, and I like the dead trees and fallen trees, which should also be merged. But LordGood's trees are actually better.  At least, from what I see so far! Oh, and BigTiger's bushes should be merged too. Very nice.

I think LordGood's oaks there finally have the "layering" effect right, to cast some nice self-shadowing and give that fullness expected from a mature set of trees. It's one of the things I like about the "old" Carobs.

Edited June 15, 2019 by wowgetoffyourcellphone

[Bigtiger]

I still have lots to learn when it comes to creating trees, but here are some holm oaks I made. (436 tris)

Spoiler