My feelings on the Star Wars mod.

Originally posted by EricMan64

I would stay away from planets and moons for this because ships exploding in planet atmosphere is one of the engine limitations that we just cannot work around. We want to be able to fly into the trenches of the DS.

Like I said above we would need one without an atmosphere. If it were possible to make one without an atmo, can you think of any reason why we couldn't child attach "Trench Sims" to the surface of it?

As for the 'central core' I agree that it doesn't need to fill the inside. Who cares if the DS is actually hollow. The reason I suggest having an object in the center that everything docks to is that it would be useful to have a single object that the player always targets when selecting the DS and it is responsible for the hud image.

A central core is ok, but I would still prefer a design that we can build (and cull) dynamically as the player aproaches and moves around.
Just like "Who cares if the DS is actually hollow" you can say: "Who cares what the other side of this thing looks like" (as long as I'm not there yet)
A dynamic approach would reduce the models load on the engine by roughly 50%. (and even a lot more when the player is very close to the DS).

Also, it would simplify the entire process if everything were docked to the same object.

Why? From the pog perspective I can't see any reason not to just child attach the sims without even having dockports What was your thinking behind that?

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A central core is ok, but I would still prefer a design that we can build (and cull) dynamically as the player aproaches and moves around.
Just like "Who cares if the DS is actually hollow" you can say: "Who cares what the other side of this thing looks like" (as long as I'm not there yet)
A dynamic approach would reduce the models load on the engine by roughly 50%. (and even a lot more when the player is very close to the DS).

The thing is, we aren't really arguing over dynamically creating the sections of the DS. Both the core-object method and the skin-only would allow for that without any real advantages or disadvantages to either solution. In fact, I've always assumed that the main purpose behind the sections would be for dynamic culling or at least LoD switches.

Why? From the pog perspective I can't see any reason not to just child attach the sims without even having dockports What was your thinking behind that?

Sorry, my fault. I should have said 'Also, it would simplify the entire process if everything were docked to/child sim attached to the same object.' At this moment, I don't consider the docking vs. child sim attachment question to be much of an issue. Neither of them create too much of a difference in my mind, so it might as well just be whichever way Shane feels like doing it. Sorry again for the miscommunication.

To me, it just feels like having some sort of a control object (we've been refering to it as a 'central core') would be the best way to do this. You need to have a consistent object that doesn't ever get destroyed because it would be the object that the player targets creating the illusion of targetting our massive object as a whole. To me, a single object that everything else attaches to also makes the most sense because you don't have to worry about figuring out which objects you would attach the new piece to or even find a handle. I also don't think it's a good idea to have a complex system of 'this attaches to this which attaches to this which attaches to this'. It could get very complex very quickly, and if using child sim attachments, you could easily end up with an object that is its own grandpa . I don't want to have to find out if this mess would create a problem in the flux engine.

I wholeheartedly agree with that last paragraph.

As well as the idea that not only will each section have it's own LOD switching, but each section can be culled as needed. At really close range you could cull 75% of the sections since they can't be seen around the curvature of the sphere anyway. But mainly it's that last paragraph.

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Originally posted by EricMan64

I also don't think it's a good idea to have a complex system of 'this attaches to this which attaches to this which attaches to this'. It could get very complex very quickly, and if using child sim attachments, you could easily end up with an object that is its own grandpa . I don't want to have to find out if this mess would create a problem in the flux engine.

I was just thinking about your Asteroid fields.
You are speaking from experience on this aren't you?

Ok, we can do it from a central object if thats easier for Shane too

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It doesn't really matter to me, but I felt the core object gives us something to destroy easily when we decide to make the DS go bang.

<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">

when we want to make it go bang!

Ohhhh Boy, that will be fun!

The code for a mega cool explosion is already floaing around in my head.
We could make a movie of the humongous explosion with all the pieces flying around and put it in the mod, so when you push the "movies" button on the main GUI you can watch it blow up!

Should we do that? Or, only have the movie as a cutscene when the player is at a safe distance?

(because as a player you may very well not have the time to stop and watch it happen)



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