QUOTE (Delphi @ Sep 1 2010, 04:12 AM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Also, DarthKev, before you get your hopes up, I'm still going to be compressing the Alexander into 250 x 250 per frame. Otherwise it's just not playable because of the immense size on screen.

No worries, I understand. I'll make it up through my already planned massive ships in HOTS. At any rate, I'm realizing more and more how making only a few ships really big can really improve the gameplay quality of a TC. After all, bigger ships are bigger targets. They're also frightening to fight against because of their intimidating size. Lastly, having a lot of smaller ships that are actually warships gives a sort of bird's-eye view quality to flying around and fighting.

I'm still making massive ships, though.

There isn't a sprite size limit, but there is a cap on the resource file size, unfortunately. If wishes were horses and both Mac and Win Nova ran .rez files, we wouldn't have that issue, but Ambrosia has stated they have no plans to back-port Mac Nova over to running a .rez format.

QUOTE (Delphi @ Aug 31 2010, 11:14 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Not really too much. The primary idea is that the majority of humanity is using the same nuclear propulsion technology, but there are some prototype ships that have specialized engine types. I considered using blue, but then the NDC ships all look monochromatic, so I tried green on a few ships, and that just looked weird. So far, orange seems to be the most comfortable in-between for both races, but like I said, you'll see the occasional exemption.

Ah, well, that makes sense. I think flames should be kept realistic (green flames are the hottest of flames, thus your ship should probably be going at insane levels of speed if that's the case), though for a little variety maybe some redder flames (a la the RAGE Gunboat) would be cool.

QUOTE (Delphi @ Sep 1 2010, 03:31 AM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>

I'm going to be pushing the boundaries of the Nova engine over the new couple of days, testing ships with massive numbers of turning frames. I rendered the Monolith over again with 120 frames, and turns as smooth as butter, even through its lumbering and sluggish by design. If I can apply the same to the absolutely dauntingly massive Alexander, then the quality of the animations will finally catch up with the quality of the new texture graphics.

I'm expecting a crudload of beautiful graphics to result from this. Just hope Nova doesn't crash in massive fleet battles because it can't handle your ships' epic quality.

Well, Nova started life as a TC that pushed the boundaries of the original EV engine... perhaps we're about due for Matt Burch to go one more? One can hope?

QUOTE (krugeruwsp)

There isn't a sprite size limit, but there is a cap on the resource file size, unfortunately. If wishes were horses and both Mac and Win Nova ran .rez files, we wouldn't have that issue, but Ambrosia has stated they have no plans to back-port Mac Nova over to running a .rez format.

Do you happen to know what that file size limit is? Are we talking about the size of just an individual plug-in, or the sum total of all plug-ins and data loaded?

(Fortunately, I think I remember a number like 72 MB or something, and the Alexander is, I've discovered, actually only 2 MB, up to 4 once the sprites have been redone.)

QUOTE (king_of_manticores)

Ah, well, that makes sense. I think flames should be kept realistic (green flames are the hottest of flames, thus your ship should probably be going at insane levels of speed if that's the case), though for a little variety maybe some redder flames (a la the RAGE Gunboat) would be cool.

I've never used it, but I have a bumper sticker printed in red text that reads, "If this is blue, you are going too fast!"

Haha, it's funny because it's nerdy. :laugh:

QUOTE (king_of_manticores)

I'm expecting a crudload of beautiful graphics to result from this. Just hope Nova doesn't crash in massive fleet battles because it can't handle your ships' epic quality.

Don't worry, that's kept well in check with the way that the battles are planned out. The NDC is the type to send out one massive ship and then support it with a large number of smaller craft. You'll never have more than one Alexander on the screen at a given time, and never really more than two or three large cruisers. The only one that's fairly plentiful is the Monolith, and it's a decent manageable size at 125 x 125.

The ideal middle-of-the-road fleet battle in Delphi would probably be comprised of one or two Monoliths, possibly one heavy cruiser or carrier, and four or five smaller craft, such as destroyers, corvettes, or fighters. There are some fairly spectacular large battles later on, but ships like the Alexander are still in very limited supply, so most of the fighting will occur between medium-size vessels.

By the way, just on a hunch, I measured the Monolith's original OBJ file, and with the modifications I made, it now fits inside a box with the ratio 1:4:9.

/nerd joke

QUOTE (Delphi @ Sep 1 2010, 12:01 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Do you happen to know what that file size limit is? Are we talking about the size of just an individual plug-in, or the sum total of all plug-ins and data loaded?

(Fortunately, I think I remember a number like 72 MB or something, and the Alexander is, I've discovered, actually only 2 MB, up to 4 once the sprites have been redone.)

I don't think there's a limit to what Nova can load, just expect long startup times. Of course, an individual plug-in has a max limit of 16 MB, but as long as you don't exceed that limit for individual plug-ins I think you'll be fine.

QUOTE (king_of_manticores @ Sep 1 2010, 11:59 AM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Ah, well, that makes sense. I think flames should be kept realistic (green flames are the hottest of flames, thus your ship should probably be going at insane levels of speed if that's the case), though for a little variety maybe some redder flames (a la the RAGE Gunboat) would be cool.

Actually, last time I checked, blue flames were the hottest. The only time I've seen green flames was when I was burning something that wasn't really meant to be burnt. (It was a hunk of glossy, printed cardboard if I remember correctly.)

Starsword's right. Last I knew the only natural colors of fire are red, orange, yellow, and blue. Maybe white, too. After a simple Google search I found this Wikipedia page detailing some of the other colors like purple and green and what chemicals are used to make them. You'll notice some chemicals burn in the same colors as the natural fire colors. I believe that's due to those chemicals either having a similar structure to materials usually found in fire or being the chemicals usually found in fire.

But we digress... and I'm still digressing. Delphi, I don't get your Monolith joke. What do the dimensions 1:4:9 reference?

QUOTE (StarSword @ Sep 1 2010, 03:34 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Actually, last time I checked, blue flames were the hottest. The only time I've seen green flames was when I was burning something that wasn't really meant to be burnt. (It was a hunk of glossy, printed cardboard if I remember correctly.)

QUOTE (DarthKev @ Sep 1 2010, 03:56 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Starsword's right. Last I knew the only natural colors of fire are red, orange, yellow, and blue. Maybe white, too. After a simple Google search I found this Wikipedia page detailing some of the other colors like purple and green and what chemicals are used to make them. You'll notice some chemicals burn in the same colors as the natural fire colors. I believe that's due to those chemicals either having a similar structure to materials usually found in fire or being the chemicals usually found in fire.

Hmm, odd, I can't recall when I found flames could be green, but I simply assumed at that point that flames could be green if they were hot enough. But you gotta admit, that would be cool.

QUOTE (DarthKev @ Sep 1 2010, 03:56 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>

But we digress... and I'm still digressing. Delphi, I don't get your Monolith joke. What do the dimensions 1:4:9 reference?

I would probably be totally wrong if I was guessing that it was a joke relating to exponents.

QUOTE (king_of_manticores)

Hmm, odd, I can't recall when I found flames could be green, but I simply assumed at that point that flames could be green if they were hot enough. But you gotta admit, that would be cool.

Well in theory, a ship travelling at an extremely high rate of speed using conventional "fiery" thrusters would begin to blue-shift, eventually pushing the red or orange of its contrail into the green range. That would take a serious amount of speed though, as in, near-relativistic velocity.

But yes, it is technically possible for a ship's engine to burn green, or at least for it to appear so.

QUOTE (king_of_manticores)

I would probably be totally wrong if I was guessing that it was a joke relating to exponents.

You're very, very close.

The Monolith from Arthur C. Clarke's 2001: A Space Odyssey had a measurement ratio of 1:4:9, otherwise expressed as 12:22:32. I just found it strangely coincidental that I didn't notice my use of an almost identical ratio until after I had made the changes to the model of my Monolith. Perhaps there are higher powers at work, after all.

Here's the Alexander rendered at the new number of frames and complete with the improved engine glow. It really looks like there's a star burning in each reactor, now.

I'm pretty sure the 1:4:9 is also some sort of ratio that creates a cool fractal or some such thing. Math has tons of crap like that............ And they are all cool!
I really like that bumpersticker, I'd definitely have one, as it would be great for confusing people.
Also, OH DEAR LORD THAT IS A PRETTY SHIP!

I see. My first guess was a monolith or structure in the Bible with similar dimensions. Although, now that we know this, you must put in a special black Monolith Cruiser with little white dots meant to serve as the ACC Europa përs ship.

I assume you can figure out my poorly assembled joke.

QUOTE (Delphi @ Sep 1 2010, 06:31 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Well in theory, a ship travelling at an extremely high rate of speed using conventional "fiery" thrusters would begin to blue-shift, eventually pushing the red or orange of its contrail into the green range. That would take a serious amount of speed though, as in, near-relativistic velocity.

But yes, it is technically possible for a ship's engine to burn green, or at least for it to appear so.

Yeah, I'd agree, and theoretically speeds like that would make a ship too hard to fly in Nova. That would be cool for hyperspace jumping instead.

QUOTE (Delphi @ Sep 1 2010, 06:31 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>

You're very, very close.

The Monolith from Arthur C. Clarke's 2001: A Space Odyssey had a measurement ratio of 1:4:9, otherwise expressed as 12:22:32. I just found it strangely coincidental that I didn't notice my use of an almost identical ratio until after I had made the changes to the model of my Monolith. Perhaps there are higher powers at work, after all.

The first thought that popped into my mind when I was that ratio was "Exponents". I'm not one to read space sci-fi, though, so I wouldn't know stuff like that.

QUOTE (Delphi @ Sep 1 2010, 08:04 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Here's the Alexander rendered at the new number of frames and complete with the improved engine glow. It really looks like there's a star burning in each reactor, now.

That's just beautiful. Quoted for epic beauty.

This post has been edited by king_of_manticores : 01 September 2010 - 11:08 PM

<looks around for a few seconds then sits in puzzled silence>

How'd I miss that post showing the Alexander's new engine glow? :huh: But it's totally AWESOME!!

Hmm, I almost lost my composure there.

As was mentioned above, the absolute maximum for a plug-in file is around 16 megs, but resource files tend to get unstable past 14 from what I remember. David Arthur has a much better grasp of those than I do; it would be worth PMing him. There is no limit to the number of resource files that Nova can load, excepting perhaps system memory available. At the time Nova was first published, most people had at most 256-512 megabytes of RAM. Obviously, that's now chump change for new computers.

QUOTE (Delphi @ Sep 2 2010, 03:04 AM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Holy crap dude, are you joking?

You are going to redefine the series with stuff like that.

QUOTE (Insomniac @ Sep 2 2010, 09:59 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Holy crap dude, are you joking?

You are going to redefine the series with stuff like that.

I'm glad you like it! I personally loved the structure for the Alexander but wasn't 100% sure on the render. I LOVE the new engine glow technique I discovered, though.

I'm performing a few renders for the Enclave Horizon and Ecliptic class cruisers. They're a difficult bunch to render, mostly because their primary hull colors are black and white, with a minor stripe of purple here and there, just like the frigate a few pages back. It will probably take me a few tries to get the light and dark balanced while also adding just enough fleet paint to avoid making them monochromatic.

Anyway, that's why I haven't posted any new pictures.