My feelings on the Star Wars mod.

(Always drink responsibly and never let your friends talk you into climbing a frozen flagpole naked. Thank you.)

Lol, thanks for the ode to the bot code problem, that was a tough one. Anyhow, we are now "all systems: GO!"

Turns out culling won't be a problem in either the SP or MP game.
The collision hull, however, will

Shane, Joining the DS per code will work, where the dockport solution is preferable imo. Like Gtrout suggested, make 3 objects: One ball with 2 dock ports (say 110 km) with a dockport at 90 and 270 degrees and a 1 km wide stripe of surface texture around the middle.

Then 2 hollow half ball shells (say 115 km) with a bit sliced off the flat side (say .5 km), with a dockport in the center of the concave surface. When you dock the 2 shells to the ball per pog you would have an object of of 115 km diameter with a 5km deep, 1 km wide trench.
(for the 2 shells you can use exactly the same model and just flip the dockport Z orientation 180 degrees.)

For the MP game it would not be unnecessary to split the trench surface scenery textures: you never know when one of the (several) players are going to be looking at (or traversing) the trench from which perspective and distance. (so, it would be a real mess to create the trench scenery dynamically via server client events and use lots of bandwidth.)





Iwar2 Multiplayer Fan Site

*edit*
If you're not familiar with Bud Light radio spots, please go here and listen to a few before re-reading this.
budlight.whipnet.com/
*/edit*

Lol, I wasn't familiar with them. Now I feel, I'm on the same level with "Mr. Drive Range Ball Picker Upper" ?

He does it on a tractor which is probably about as loud as the old PC I use for compiling. But, I have to get up and walk from one PC to the other while he gets to ride from ball to ball [V]

Yeah, I'm a real unsung hero!





Iwar2 Multiplayer Fan Site

Those were great commercials.

Thanks for the advice everyone. I'll put the DS together in sections, and post the results when completed. That's certainly the best plan, and also allows me to 'junk up' the trench a little (but not to the level of the arcade game )

Edit: SecondChance; Resizing the DS is not a problem. Do you have information on the diameter of the 'dish' (the primary planet-killer weapon)?

<font size="1"><font face="Book Antiqua"><font color="black">"Never before in the history of the world had such a mass of human beings moved and suffered together. This was no disciplined march; it was a stampede-- without order and without a goal, six million people unarmed and unprovisioned, driving headlong. It was the beginning of the rout of Civilisation... of the massacre of Mankind."
--H. G. Wells The War Of The Worlds</font id="black"></font id="Book Antiqua"> </font id="size1">

No, I'm afraid I don't have any documentation specifying the super-laser dish diameter. I think the one you've got might be a little big. But, there's lots of pics out there. You should be able to extrapolate from a few measurements.

I do, however, have some info on the trench. In case you didn't already know this; the trench with the exhaust port that the rebels flew down was not the equatorial trench that can be seen from astronomical distances. It was one of several minor north polar meridional trenches that divide the top hemisphere into twelve segments of longitude (I assume symmetry for the lower hemishpere). This trench is depicted in the film as being approximately 1/8th the total circumference of the Death Star. And the trench run itself was at least 49km long. The measurements also put the trench width at roughly 74 meters wide.

The 160km diameter measurement is not perfect, but it is the most consistent based on reliable evidence. But a lower limit for diameter has been established at 131 +/- 38km. The Death Star must be at least this big.

Here's all the info in gory detail. With tons and tons of pics.
www.theforce.net/swtc/ds/

And here are some pics that I thought might be helpful for detail and texturing. I hope they're useful to you.


MajorTom, those are Tie Fighter blasts.


Notice how the model is designed to be cut to different heights. Oh, and the top section rotates.


You can just barely see the dish in this shot.


Nice detail shot of the dish.

btw Shane, with something this size, I think some artistic license is in order. It doesn't have to be perfect, anything you do is going to look awsome anyway.

mailto:second_chance@cox.net
The Ultimate Guide To Modding: I-War 2 - Edge Of Chaos (on hold during SW MP mod)
cartoons.sev.com.au/index.php?catid=4
.

In case you didn't already know this; the trench with the exhaust port that the rebels flew down was not the equatorial trench that can be seen from astronomical distances. It was one of several minor north polar meridional trenches that divide the top hemisphere into twelve segments of longitude (I assume symmetry for the lower hemishpere).

I didn't know that (and wondered why the trench in the pics was so damn wide).

Ugh... that really opens up a can of worms. While Flux will probably display a DS with a lightly-detailed main trench, sub-trenches will be a problem; the model will most likely exceed Flux's capabilities (at least on my rig).

So, if the DS model cannot display the minor trenches... what use would it serve? Is there any reason to build the DS at all? I'm no slave to cannon, but a difference like that would grate on me.

Maybe cut the detail on the main trench and build only one minor trench (with decent detail)? I'm open to suggestions...

<font size="1"><font face="Book Antiqua"><font color="black">"Never before in the history of the world had such a mass of human beings moved and suffered together. This was no disciplined march; it was a stampede-- without order and without a goal, six million people unarmed and unprovisioned, driving headlong. It was the beginning of the rout of Civilisation... of the massacre of Mankind."
--H. G. Wells The War Of The Worlds</font id="black"></font id="Book Antiqua"> </font id="size1">

It might be worth taking some time to figure out how the LOD system handles a put together object. Does it measure from the center of the main object (which is a long ways away on this model) or does it measure to the edge?

Do all pieces get the same value? Perhaps the smaller (or even equatorial) trenches only exist at the higher level of detail. At farther LOD they are invisible and are represented with texture detail on the large model.

If LOD is done with distance to edge of an attached piece, then once the player drops into a trench, it should be at max LOD. And perhaps that is the LOD level with real turrets etc. All other trenches would be far away, and so have no geometry at all. Or very little.

If LOD is all done from the attached center, then I would recommend abandonding the attachment strategy. And keeping all the pieces seperate. Gosh, a model like this... well, you can see why there are none in EoC! (but I glad to see it attempted). I can just imaging doing a raid through a city scape like Corusant.

-Gtrout