Kharaa Chamber Graphical Syntax

DarkOmen · April 2003

<div class="IPBDescription">Ph33r my "elite" photoshoping skillz!</div> Alright, here's my idea:

I've been playing NS since the second day of it's public release, and I can tell you that the Kharaa Chamber models never seemed right to me, particularly the base of the model. If the chamber were built on a sloped surface, it would be possible to see underneith it... if a chamber were built on a ledge, god knows why the bottom of it's cone shaped body just cuts off, when a chamber is built on a grated floor, and a player can pass underneith, well that looks pretty retarded too. Don't get me started on WOLs! Anyway, I'm not here to tell the devs that they did a bad job on the chamber models, in fact, I think they're great! Unfortunately, in this game, you will often see stuctures piled on top of each other, and I hereby offer a solution to the graphical syntax problem revolving around the base of the chambers.

Here's the deal:

At the base of each chamber, add a couple of root-like appendages. Make them look like fleshy branches, why not.

DarkOmen · April 2003

And... another image!

Wilkins · April 2003

Intresting

Estaran · April 2003

hm... quite interesting... the idea could be worth it <img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/smile.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='smile.gif'>

neonfaktory · April 2003

I thought of popping this idea on the Suggestions and Ideas forum awhile ago - I forget if I actually did. It's a good idea, but my guess (without any special background knowlegde) is that the structures are placed based on the bottom of the model - Implementing this would require some kind of special value to be kept track of that detemmines where to slice the model as the "base". Watch, I'll turn around and find out I'm wrong <img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/wink.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='wink.gif'>.

DarkOmen · April 2003

If it clairifies my idea, I'd like to mention that hitbox changes aren't needed: Just the model would need to change. Players could walk through the tentacle/root things.

Zyndrome · April 2003

I guess this actually can work at todays NS version. Just leave the bones alone and add roots. Cause I guess the collision-thingy is at the bottom bone. But this would may be considered cheating <img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/confused.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='confused.gif'> . Interesting idea though.

enf0rcer · April 2003

hrm.. well i'd have to advise against adding polys to this. I mean when they are stacked u dont want high poly objects that you see ALOT. Thats just my 2 cents

Ollj · April 2003

soo many epoly you just see in hivesight that will make stacked towers look more ugly.

Maus · April 2003

Aye, I thought of this a while back too. I've shelved it though, to be resurrected if I make alien chamber replacements, because you'd have to be careful to not go overboard with the polycount.

RotA_Plague · April 2003

Well I believe someone already said this, but you can just make a model replacement for it and it would work. Another problem is in the rare cases where you can go below something, it would look odd.

MalambisBZ · April 2003

Would be cool if it could be done properly.

ArgOnatH · April 2003

remember kids, the HL engine dies at 12,000 polys! now i dont want to see u getting into trouble

Pariah · April 2003

oh i just remembered something...bit off topic but the SC team (svencoop)'s coder has been digging into the HL code and found that it IS possible to make models adjust to lay on an incline correctly...so if somone were to die on a ramp...they would be laying on the ground but at the same angle as the ramp...in this case an O tower would appear to be sloped on the ramp