[request] sacrificial knife

[Nescio]

The prop used by infantry and female citizens to slaughter domestic animals looks like this:

Spoiler

As you can see it's a dagger designed for stabbing people. Cavalry is even worse: they use full-size swords.

This is how a sacrificial knife (μάχαιρα) looked like in reality, at least in the Greek world:

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It would be great if someone could model them to replace the currently used prop.

[Stan`]

All animal killing was sacrificial ?

[Genava55]

At least a knife not a dagger:

https://www.pinterest.com.au/pin/335940453439160489/

https://www.pinterest.com.au/pin/335940453447051027/

https://www.pinterest.com.au/pin/335940453446548736/

[Genava55]

By the way, that the same for any civilization. Nobody uses a dagger to cut animal parts if they have access to a knife.

Same for the Celts:

http://www.arbre-celtique.com/etude/02-societe/sciences/outils3b.jpg

Edited September 24, 2020 by Genava55

[Nescio]

25 minutes ago, Stan` said:

All animal killing was sacrificial ?

“All” is too strong a word. However, domestic mammals were generally killed in much the same way as is still done under Jewish and Islamic law today: say a few words, slit the throat in a single move, and let the animal bleed to death.

Regardless, daggers are weapons for stabbing people, not tools for killing animals.

[MrLux]

The form from those vases makes me thing of those butcher knifes use to break bones and cut tendons.

I'll take a moment to look into it this week, so that will complete my round of types of models by doing a 'weapon' prop.

Spoiler

 

[Nescio]

Those ancient knives are not unlike (modern) machetes:

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[MrLux]

Nothing fancy. A knife machete to cut and splash. 79 triangles.

butcher_knife.xmlbutcher_knife.dae

Textured with the tiny texture called props_tools. Don't know if it's an artefact or not.

Comparaison in game with the present knife

Spoiler

 

[Stan`]

How many triangles is the existing one?

[Nescio]

@MrLux, whilst one is strictly enough, more are welcome, so if you fancy a bit of extra work, feel free to model a few variants, e.g. with varying curves, lengths, thicknesses.

@Stan`, maybe rename the existing prop? https://code.wildfiregames.com/D3015

[MrLux]

@Stan` The knife model is 78 triangles.

@Nescio Variants but for the same utility, knife for vilagers, or variants to use other types of weapons ?

I then to lose a lot of time doing research and it's indeed hard to be historically accurate. So if you have other exemples, I'll be glad.

[Nescio]

Variants as in slighly different shapes (meshes) for the same weapon (prop). For instance, xiphos.xml has five variants, kush_nubian_mace.xml 5×3=15. It doesn't have to be that many; one is enough, three would be nice, five is great. It's a minor detail, meant to avoid repetitiveness in game. Besides, mass production did not really exist in antiquity, every knife would be slightly different. The knives in the stelae of the opening post and the pottery @Genava55 posted all follow the same design, but are not exactly identical. You don't have to do research or reproduce them exactly, some artistic licence is fine. Basically a few variants of the one you made would be nice. It's up to you.

[Sundiata]

Some examples of Kushite bronze knives (Kerma Period, but probably ok enough as a reference for Napato-Meroitic models as well), and a collection of corroded Meroitic iron objects, including some knives:

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Meroitic iron knives, as well as spear tips, arrow heads, axe etc:

 

[Genava55]

Gallic knife, 1st c. BC, Tavant

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Gallic knife from Bucy-le-Long, 5th or 4th c. BC

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[MrLux]

Ok, great. Perfect ref pics, thanks. I

I'll take care of that.

[Nescio]

More examples of knives:

• Great Britain:
  • https://www.britishmuseum.org/collection/object/H_1958-0704-2
  • https://www.britishmuseum.org/collection/object/H_1975-0701-2
• France:
  • https://www.britishmuseum.org/collection/object/H_ML-1348
  • https://www.britishmuseum.org/collection/object/H_ML-1595
  • https://www.britishmuseum.org/collection/object/H_ML-2514
• Italy:
  • https://www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/247082
  • https://www.britishmuseum.org/collection/object/G_1982-0617-63
• Greece:
  • https://www.britishmuseum.org/collection/object/G_1919-1119-47
  • https://www.britishmuseum.org/collection/object/G_1920-1122-2
  • https://www.britishmuseum.org/collection/object/G_1975-0730-20
• Syria:
  • https://www.britishmuseum.org/collection/object/W_1913-1108-32
• Iran:
  • https://www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/32572

[MrLux]

Chop chop !

Knifes done. Variants and texture and actor.

Dae and actor: knife_tool.rar

blend: knife_tool_blend.rar

Atlas screenshot of a collection of the knifes, cause I don't know how to instantiate a specific variant. Some strange reflection in the model, maybe because the texture as a high specular.

Also it might have some problems with where the unit handle the weapon. I don't know how to test that. But I tried to keep origin point of the models as close as the knife, original, one.

 

Spoiler

 

[Sundiata]

Cool...

[Nescio]

Thank you, they look nice!

On 9/25/2020 at 1:04 AM, MrLux said:

Also it might have some problems with where the unit handle the weapon. I don't know how to test that. But I tried to keep origin point of the models as close as the knife, original, one.

What you can do is put your meshes (e.g. knife_01.dae) in the correct location (art/meshes/props/weapons/), insert them as variants in the (existing) art/actors/prop/units/weapons/knife.xml file (cf. xiphos.xml), open Atlas, select a female citizen or infantry, switch to the actor viewer (bottom left), select the attack_slaughter animation, and click “Slow”.

By the way, in the future, could you upload files as a .zip? .rar is a proprietary format and not available on all operating systems.

Also, how do you want to be credited (see gui/credits/texts/art.json)?

[MrLux]

I'll test them later then.

No problem for the zip format. I'll reupload the files later too.

[vladislavbelov]

How many polys? Which materials are used? And why do we need so many small and so similar elements? For example #2, #4 and #8 look mostly the same with a usual camera distance.

[MrLux]

Hi.

Everything is in the discussion. However here is the resume: 78-79 triangles by models, for each 5 models variants. Same as the actual knife used. Material is the base_spec.xml with prop_tools.dds as the texture.

#1, 2# 4# #6 and #11 are the uniques models. Variation was a request and I agree on the loss of detail at camera distance & angle. I would say it's a matter of taste to add all of them. At this scale, and given the poly constraint, it would different but not better to exaggerate more the different shapes.

Per request, the zip archive.

butcherknife.blendknife_tool.7z

[vladislavbelov]

2 minutes ago, MrLux said:

#1, 2# 4# #6 and #11 are the uniques models. Variation was a request and I agree on the loss of detail at camera distance & angle. I would say it's a matter of taste to add all of them. At this scale, and given the poly constraint, it would different but not better to exaggerate more the different shapes.

Unfortunately variation affects performance. And I'd prefer to have at most 3-4 different knifes that are significantly different.

[MrLux]

Okay, I'll rethink the silhouettes.

How do I instantiate a specific variant in the atlas ?

[Nescio]

38 minutes ago, vladislavbelov said:

And I'd prefer to have at most 3-4 different knifes that are significantly different.

For comparison, the falcata.xml uses 5 variant meshes, gladus.xml 6, xiphos.xml 5, and kush_nubian_mace.xml 15, and I daresay their shapes are more similar than the 5 knives in @MrLux's screenshot. Besides, those other weapons are used by only a few actors, whereas the knife is used by the slaughter attack animation of all infantry and female citizens.

I don't know how much it affects performance, though I wonder whether it's significant in this case.