Dwarves Aglarond 0.1.2 released !

[jda]

When is Aglarond 0.2 going to be released/come out/uploaded? Any approximate date...?

That, God only knows! And the Devil's keeping it secret too.

[ultifd]

When is Aglarond 0.2 going to be released/come out/uploaded? Any approximate date...?

That, God only knows! And the Devil's keeping it secret too.

No comment.      
Just keep on working on it. 

[jda]

Just keep on working on it. 

Don't worry. I am.

[jda]

Hey, Archmage, how's progress on the Outrider's armature?
'Cause I was working on its texture (teamcolor) and realised that mesh is severely messed up! 
It's really very bad, unfit for public release (and it is the current model!  ).

Anyways, I started a new blend, appending the rider and the rhinox models to it. And that's all there was now from the previous blend of wciow so ... all that wierdnesses (no offense, wciow, it's probably good but we're not used to working like you and your blend's messup our heads and work bad! ) should be out of it!

So, the model's fixed (the .tga is coming too), all we need is a new armature to redo the anims (yes, in the case of the outrider, I'll likely jump ahead of time and do them for 0.2 ). If you're still working on it, here's the current .blend: http://www.mediafire.com/file/zzi4nygwzki/r4.3-outrider.1.blend

If you're NOT working on it, let me know, so I can give it a go, ok?

Thanks.

[-Archmage-]

I seem to remember working for a couple hours on the armature for the Outrider, and then some thing happened, I realized parts of the hands were connected to the body, and I started to realize how much trouble it would be for me to fix it since I'm terrible at unwrapping things...

Before I download and get to work, can you tell me everything you fixed, so I know I'm covered?

[jda]

Well, I didn't thoroughly look at it...

I did get rid of an ugly effect that was deforming the rider when I grab/moved it (either in object or edit mode). I don't know what caused it. Adding the object to a new .blend file simply got rid of that.
That allowed me to replace the rider on the middle of the rhinox, instead of too far ahead as it is in the current 0.1.1 release of the faction.

I also did fix that problem with the hands. The problem was simply they were too close to the body (and the fingers of the hands turn inwards to the center of the body). I simply rotated both arms to the sides, being careful that the whole hands were brought out by that, while at the same time, preventing any part of the legs to come along.

There might be other "bugs" around. So maybe I ought to look at it thouroughly before you pick it up again...?  
If you want, you can just look at it yourself and tell me if something needs fixed.

EDIT: Oh, I also removed double vertices, after I cleared the rider's hands away from the legs.

[-Archmage-]

Downloading.

[wyvern]

I think this mods great, especially the outrider. I was just wondering if the future version is gonna have a heavy dwarvish cavalryman with a battleaxe or something.

[ElimiNator]

Is has guys with battle axes.

[-Archmage-]

Jda, I think I'd like to change the outriders weapon, he should use a different kind of spear, or some type of halberd........I also have other thought about weapon changes..........

[jda]

I had/have doubts about the outrider's weapon myself. However, that spear was what wciow gave it to start off and to be changed, well, here are my thoughts about it:

1. Another spear? Hadn't really thought of it. Still, that will be, to me the most peaceful of all changes... Why? See next point:
2. A weapon other than a spear will (almost) definitely mean a range 1 mellee attack instead of the current range 3 "mellee" (I read somewhere attacks up to range 3 are still considered "mellee"). Now that range change would have an important impact on the unit's balance. We could boost up the attack damage to compensate for the loss of range; however, cuttting range on an unit that is greater than size 1 also has other impacts (a size 2 unit may not manoeuver around as easily to get to the enemy as a size 1).
3. That being said, giving the outrider a weapon other than a ranged one (a spear, a long chain with a spiked ball on the end, possibly a bow or a sling) is tricky and in this particular case I think utterly silly! See why bellow:
4. The outrider carrying a battleaxe (though it would apparently look awesome would simply NOT work ingame! Why? Simply because the rider can not use it along the side of the rhinox (that's what you were thinking of, hey wyvern?). In Glest, the attack is ALWAYS struck to the front of the unit (NEVER to the sides, back, or whatever). Can you imagine the rider leaning almost impossibly forward to strike a blow with his axe AHEAD of the rhinox's head?
5. The rhinox has THREE HUGE HORNS on its head (and they got to be and can get to be even bigger again)!!!! WTH would you want to give it any other weapon for a range 1 attack?!?!?!?!?!?!?!? THAT is the Outrider's perfect range 1 weapon!

So... what's your take on it, Arch?
If you just want to give it another range 3 spear, yeah, go ahead, why not?

EDIT: On "other weapons changes" (for other units?), post your thoughts!

[-Archmage-]

I'm going to give it a brutal halberd which he can swing and jab with, don't worry it's a large halberd, the swing will probably be range two.
May I proceed?

[jda]

Hum... the weapon itself will naturally fit the dwarves... It's the range 2 thing... (I was considering doing a range 2 infantry later on; not too sure on it though).

Well, I know your animation will look good. And I guess the range 2 swing is already pretty good for the outrider (as for gameplay sanity). You could possibly even do a double attack (like the Norsemen Valkyries): a swing followed by a jab.

Stil (I was thinking as I was writing), yeah, give it the halberd and do the attack anim you think best (as long as it's at least range 2)!
(as you're giving the outrider the weapon, I think you'll be the best choice for the attack animation, agreed?)

[-Archmage-]

Hey, I've got other stuff to do, and I'm done with the outrider's rig, but I haven't even started the Outriders animations, although I have him posed for a standing animation.
Maybe you'd like to take a crack at him, just call your animations jda-"action", or something like that, so I don't forget to make new actions, when/whether I do some anims for it, whether I make some anims or not depends on whether you're satisfied with your work.

[jda]

K, I'll have a shot at those anims then, once you get me your rig and I get some time ... Though I really think you should probably have a better idea of how that halberd you're giving him should be used than myself but.. I can give it a try.

Talking of the halberd, have you done it already?
How about its texture? Is it textured already? Will you texture it? Should I?
BTW, here's the new rhinox texture (with added teamcolor): http://www.mediafire.com/?rzznmn0m4zu (I did not change the rider's .tga which btw already did have teamcolor, but not noticeable enough IMO)

[-Archmage-]

Nevermind my last post, when I wrote that post I was planning to have all that stuff done in 10 minutes, but about 2 minutes after that post, something got all screwed up and I spent another hour fixing it. I've got it rigged now, but some of the vertex groups aren't very good, can you fix it yourself, or do you want to wait till I do it?

Uhh.........you should texture the halberd, I'd do a terrible job.

BTW, you'll have to add the texture yourself since you already have it, and when I give you the .blend it will be better, because I won't have to send the texture with it.....I'm terrible at explaining things......you understand right?

[jda]

Nevermind my last post, when I wrote that post I was planning to have all that stuff done in 10 minutes, but about 2 minutes after that post, something got all screwed up and I spent another hour fixing it. I've got it rigged now, but some of the vertex groups aren't very good, can you fix it yourself, or do you want to wait till I do it?

Uhh.........you should texture the halberd, I'd do a terrible job.

BTW, you'll have to add the texture yourself since you already have it, and when I give you the .blend it will be better, because I won't have to send the texture with it.....I'm terrible at explaining things......you understand right?

Understood you fine! (I think!  )
Yeah, send me what you've got, I'll try and fix whatever.

[-Archmage-]

I'll send it too you later, remind me.

[wyvern]

Sorry but I got another thought, what if the rhinox could have a charge skill with it's horns, It could be ep based and recharge whenever the outrider moves, set ep requirements in the negatives for movement.

[-Archmage-]

Ok, and here it is!!! ......oh wait, not here, it's somewhere below actually......

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HERE I AM!!!

[ElimiNator]

Ok I download it a bunch of times! TY 

[jda]

Sorry but I got another thought, what if the rhinox could have a charge skill with it's horns, It could be ep based and recharge whenever the outrider moves, set ep requirements in the negatives for movement.

Yes, it is a good idea. I'd thought of that too, a charge attack much similar to the one the Indians bull has.
Still, adding one more attack will rise balancing problems (nothing major but they will arise) so before doing any such thing I'll have to have the time to consider the implications.
And there's still a lot to fix on what is done already before I go into that.
But thanks for the feedback!  

Ok, and here it is!!! ......oh wait, not here, it's somewhere below actually...... :cheesy

Erm... the rider doesn't look very healthy:

Code: [Select]

[img]http://img51.imageshack.us/img51/2325/outriderarch.jpg[/img]When I said I'd fix whatever I wasn't thinking you'd add up to the bug list... Still, no biggie, I'll just copy that armature to a good copy of the objects and assign the vertice groups from scratch. Oh, and the halberd too!

Thanks, the armature looks good and so does the halberd! 

[-Archmage-]

Dude, that deformation happens when you move the model away from the armature in object mode, just put him back up where the armature is, and he'll be reformed into a dwarf.

Thanks for the compliments!

[jda]

I didn't know that.  
Still, I did not move it away from the armature, someone had already done that for me! I simply rotated the view to show the deformation better.

BTW,
@ ultifd (or anyonelse who may want to do it)
Have you played any more with the dwarves? Have you tried playing them against magic and/or tech (or playing one of these against the dwarves)?
How do you think they balance out?
(I know there's still a good length to go about this but haven't gotten any feedback on and I'd love to. Balance really is the thing that different players will feel more differently, so the more feedback I get on this, the better! )

[-Archmage-]

someone had already done that for me! Tongue

Well, I didn't, I put it back once, maybe it decided to piss me off and do it again while I wasn't looking.