PotC Build Mod Ship Cleanup

[Pieter Boelen]

Just for the sake of it, I put the added detail of the Caravel2 on the CursedCaravel too.

 

[Seb]

Being a ghost ship doesn't mean you don't deserve eye candy :urgh

 

[Pieter Boelen]

Exactly my point! While the newly added detail doesn't have the cursed colour scheme, I reckon that isn't much of a problem and in a way does break the monotony of the green quite nicely.

 

[Armada]

Since we seem to have done away with the yellow-and-blue for the British Royal Navy, maybe we can give that paint scheme to, say, Portugal?
Then for Spain...? Maybe yellow-and-red? That would match with the Fleuron's paint scheme, indicating her to be a Spanish ship and then the original Poseidon can be the French version.

If we associate yellow/blue with Portugal, won't the Dauntless and Interceptor look Portuguese? :blink:
Also, I modified Surprise1 to use a yellow/blue skin to make up for the loss of the original HMS_Surprise's rather nice texture when she was changed to the Indy.
I think that texture should be in the Build, but I'm not sure. Can you confirm that RN_Surprise is yellow/blue and not yellow/black?
To me, it's a nice way of paying homage to the original HMS_Surprise, so I'd say it's worth keeping that texture.

Anyway, instead of yellow/blue for Portugal, how about plain wood/black with extra lines being light blue or white? That kind-of resembles the PO_Manowar look, while appearing more modern.

As for Spain, red/black with yellow stripes would look fine, as long as the red is distinctively brighter than the French red, perhaps.
For example, FR_Victory (as it's currently called) and Superbe1 use a pretty dark red, so a brighter red will stand out more for Spanish ships, in theory.

When it comes to the FR_Fleuron texture, what can I say? I designed that texture to be faithful to images of a model of the ship, so the whole point is that she remains French.
Using her for Spain too should be fine. Maybe use the standard Poseidon for Portugal, at least?

Another thought for the clean-up that might help us decide on what to keep and what to lose is that maybe we should only keep those ships for which we've got a specific reason to keep her.
These reasons could be anything from "good model" or "good texture" or "game-play value/fills a gap in the ship line-up".
Basically, I'm thinking all ships and especially all re-textures should add something to the game rather than just "be there".

Absolutely agreed, as long as we consider the 'variety' factor, too. The last thing we want is to whittle the ships down to the point where they become too common.
I assume you're planning to use the clean-up Excel file for this, right? That would be the easiest way to go about it.

Speaking of variety though, I reckon we'll need to start fine-tuning the encounter chances once we've decided which ships to keep/drop.
I was planning to go through each ship class (e.g. all Battleship models) one at a time, post their encounter chances,
and then we can ask people who actually play the game how common/rare they think the ships are and should be. Does that sound like a good idea?

Stock Game Battleship models: All four have got different figureheads and detailing.
If we use the Battleship5 additional detail with the Battleship4 skin, we manage to keep everything.

Stock Game Brig models: All five (if we include RN_Brig44) have got different figureheads, which is pretty cool.
Brig1 and Brig2 are pretty generic, while Brig3 and Brig3_44 both seem to have a colour scheme similar to the US black-and-white.
However, there is also the US_SloopofWar47 which is based on the same brig hull, with an even more obvious US colour scheme and yet another figurehead.
Do we need to keep all of the above? And what about the Brigantina? I recall liking to use that ship many years ago when I still played the game.

Stock Game Caravels: I suppose we can keep both original skins, since they're going to be in everyone's game anyway so there's no download size won by losing them.

Stock Game Corvettes: Corvette1 is the newly re-modeled version by Armada, which has a griffin figurehead.
Many of the original corvettes have got a panther figurehead. So which corvette skins do we want to keep? We've got rather a lot.
My choices would be:
Corvette1 is a nice stock game texture
Corvette2 is rather generic and I don't really care about keeping this one
Corvette3 has a weird colour scheme; drop this one
Corvette4_44 has a vaguely US colour scheme; use as US ship for real or drop this
Corvette5 has beautiful detailing; keep this one for sure!
Corvette5_44 has a vaguely RN colour scheme; however, RN_Light_Frigate also uses the corvette hull (Armada's updated version), so drop this

I think I'll go and adapt the other corvettes to Armada's new model and see how that turns out. I'll try to keep using their original figureheads.

Agreed with all of the above; keep the ships you proposed to keep.
However, I'm with Hylie on Corvette5_44; that's a fairly nice texture, and can still be used by a nation other than Britain. Maybe Portugal?
And why not use Corvette2's texture for the FastMerchantman? It looks better IMO, because it's not so dull and grey.

I didn't edit the Yachts, as well as the Xebecs, the manowars, the schooners, the schnyavas, the warships, and probably a few nation specific ships... And this work is stopped for and undertemined period of time

Since the last pack, I keeping having so much IRL priorities that I can't work on that at the moment ...

Searcher's life...

Eventually, I'd like to try and give most of the remaining stock ships the same treatment as I gave the Corvette.
That is, a hull upgrade and extra details modelled on using Maya. So, you're work will be continued either way.

 

[Pieter Boelen]

If we associate yellow/blue with Portugal, won't the Dauntless and Interceptor look Portuguese? :blink:
Also, I modified Surprise1 to use a yellow/blue skin to make up for the loss of the original HMS_Surprise's rather nice texture when she was changed to the Indy.
I think that texture should be in the Build, but I'm not sure. Can you confirm that RN_Surprise is yellow/blue and not yellow/black?
To me, it's a nice way of paying homage to the original HMS_Surprise, so I'd say it's worth keeping that texture.

Indeed the HMS Dauntless is still quite blue, which I do like. The HMS Interceptor though has a vague blue tint, but looks close to black-and-yellow to me.
Indeed the RN_Surprise does still have a hint of blue in her as well.

Anyway, instead of yellow/blue for Portugal, how about plain wood/black with extra lines being light blue or white? That kind-of resembles the PO_Manowar look, while appearing more modern.

Sounds pretty good to me. Anything we can decide on is welcome by me; I was just brainstorming.

As for Spain, red/black with yellow stripes would look fine, as long as the red is distinctively brighter than the French red, perhaps.
For example, FR_Victory (as it's currently called) and Superbe1 use a pretty dark red, so a brighter red will stand out more for Spanish ships, in theory.

Agreed. So Spain will be bright red and France dark red, then? I think that adding some good measure of bright yellow to the Spanish ships should help with them being different from the French ones too.

When it comes to the FR_Fleuron texture, what can I say? I designed that texture to be faithful to images of a model of the ship, so the whole point is that she remains French.
Using her for Spain too should be fine. Maybe use the standard Poseidon for Portugal, at least?

But if we use the FR_Fleuron for France AND Spain, that confuses things more, doesn't it? I suppose we can keep things as they are then with the RN_Poseidon, PO_Poseidon and FR_Fleuron even if it doesn't entirely match our established colour schemes.

Agreed with all of the above; keep the ships you proposed to keep.
However, I'm with Hylie on Corvette5_44; that's a fairly nice texture, and can still be used by a nation other than Britain. Maybe Portugal?
And why not use Corvette2's texture for the FastMerchantman? It looks better IMO, because it's not so dull and grey.

Please see here for some more detailed notes of mine on the corvettes: http://forum.piratesahoy.net/index.php/topic/18160-corvette-v2/page__view__findpost__p__412422
The Corvette5_44 does have a pretty nice weathered look, which could work pretty well with the concept of the FastMerchantman being a former Royal Navy ship that has been decommissioned and adapted as merchant ship instead.
The Corvette2 texture is also not bad at all. Nothing wrong with having some textures that are generic without being limited to one nation only.

Eventually, I'd like to try and give most of the remaining stock ships the same treatment as I gave the Corvette.
That is, a hull upgrade and extra details modelled on using Maya. So, you're work will be continued either way.

That'll be quite a project!

 

[Armada]

Indeed the HMS Dauntless is still quite blue, which I do like. The HMS Interceptor though has a vague blue tint, but looks close to black-and-yellow to me.
Indeed the RN_Surprise does still have a hint of blue in her as well.

The Interceptor still isn't quite right, is she? That texture has never looked exactly like the film ship, but the model is slightly off too, so that doesn't help.
So are we agreed on keeping RN_Surprise as yellow/blue? It just adds more variety and looks quite nice, to me.

Agreed. So Spain will be bright red and France dark red, then? I think that adding some good measure of bright yellow to the Spanish ships should help with them being different from the French ones too.

Yellow stripes or something would certainly help to distinguish the ships, yes.

But if we use the FR_Fleuron for France AND Spain, that confuses things more, doesn't it?

Fair point. No Poseidon for Spain, then. They're already spoilt for choice with custom ships, anyway.

Please see here for some more detailed notes of mine on the corvettes: http://forum.pirates...post__p__412422
The Corvette5_44 does have a pretty nice weathered look, which could work pretty well with the concept of the FastMerchantman being a former Royal Navy ship that has been decommissioned and adapted as merchant ship instead.
The Corvette2 texture is also not bad at all. Nothing wrong with having some textures that are generic without being limited to one nation only.

Those other notes of yours look good to me. Really it's just the national textures that need sorting, and then what to do with the merchants.
Here's a thought I've just had: why not use CorvFrig2_50 as a Spanish light frigate? It almost looks Spanish to me, and mostly fits our idea of red and yellow.
As for the merchants, how about using the Corvette5_44 texture for a British version, and Corvette2's texture for the other nations besides Holland (which already has a Dutch texture)?
I know that means adding a model, but since we're removing several Corvettes, I guess that makes up for it.

That'll be quite a project!

Well I should have mentioned that it's a long term endeavour, but you're right, it will be huge!
If I can pull it off though, the results could be quite something. Imagine all the low-detail stock ships looking like new!

 

[Pieter Boelen]

The Interceptor still isn't quite right, is she? That texture has never looked exactly like the film ship, but the model is slightly off too, so that doesn't help.
So are we agreed on keeping RN_Surprise as yellow/blue? It just adds more variety and looks quite nice, to me.

Agreed on the Surprise; she's fine as she is.
Would it be possible to have the Interceptor match the colours of the HMS Dauntless? Alternatively, I'm still rather partial to Kazeite's original colours, even though those were not quite movie-accurate... :?

Those other notes of yours look good to me. Really it's just the national textures that need sorting, and then what to do with the merchants.
Here's a thought I've just had: why not use CorvFrig2_50 as a Spanish light frigate? It almost looks Spanish to me, and mostly fits our idea of red and yellow.
As for the merchants, how about using the Corvette5_44 texture for a British version, and Corvette2's texture for the other nations besides Holland (which already has a Dutch texture)?
I know that means adding a model, but since we're removing several Corvettes, I guess that makes up for it.

Petros, who made the CorvFrig2_50, always was mainly into Spanish and Portuguese ships, so that works for me.
I was thinking of using the Corvette5_44 texture for the regular FastMerchantman and dropping the NL version altogether. That would leave us with only one, but at least it'd look pretty good.
The NL texture doesn't match the other Dutch textures at all, so I wouldn't really mind losing it.
Same for the NL_Battleship, though your point does stand that it's the only re-texture of battleship2. On the other hand, I don't see much of an issue with just having one battleship2-based ship and the others based on battleship1.

Well I should have mentioned that it's a long term endeavour, but you're right, it will be huge!
If I can pull it off though, the results could be quite something. Imagine all the low-detail stock ships looking like new!

Does sound wonderful as far as I'm concerned; definitely a valiant effort!

 

[Captain Armstrong]

I didn't edit the Yachts, as well as the Xebecs, the manowars, the schooners, the schnyavas, the warships, and probably a few nation specific ships... And this work is stopped for and undertemined period of time

I am not sure if the xebec has been made less common already, because I modified my shipsinit.c file, and have yet to download patch 7, but I think they should be very rare, and maybe some types removed? xebecs were unheard of outside of the mediterranean and maybe the baltic.
Also how do people feel about the stock schooner model? with the Hannah and Enterprise ingame, and The Prince de Neufchatel on the way, could she be removed or at least have a scaled down role? I guess she isnt the worst of the stock ships, but she seems to be sized strangely when compared to the brig and the high-detail schooners and ships. I mean there are ships that need a clean up far more, but i think it her role could be taken over by high detail ships soon. (the Hannah as the merchant schooner, the Enterprise as the standard armed/ war schooner, and the Prince as the advanced american war schooner.)

The shnyavas share the same hull, so i think they look strange too, but maybe thats just me?
stock warships I think should be replaced by the Centurion and St. Albans, but obviously they arent in game yet. still I dont think it would be worth improving them if they are to be phased out.

Anyways, thats my ramblings on what I think could be replaced/removed. I just think it would be best to use as many high-detail models based off real ships as possible, I think they improve the atmosphere of the game alot. plus added realism looks better too

 

[Seb]

Well I should have mentioned that it's a long term endeavour, but you're right, it will be huge!
If I can pull it off though, the results could be quite something. Imagine all the low-detail stock ships looking like new

Indeed, thats quite an effort! That's what I had in mind when I started, refresh and improve those good ol' stock ships, to make 'em more compatible with the new standards!

As I saw with the corvettes, you've knowledges I don't have, and you did a great job on those ships! It's very nice to see and quite couragous!

And who knows, I might have some time again in the future

 

[Pieter Boelen]

We'll definitely have to adapt the ship encounter chances once we're through with the ship clean-up. Since there's a lot of re-textures of stock game ships, they tend to be quite common in the game.
However, we'll be removing a whole bunch of them, which hopefully balances things out a bit to start out. We should definitely lose some xebecs as well.

Your point about the schooners is an interesting one. Both the Enterprise and the Hannah are US designs and are therefore currently set to be US only.
Of course that does severely limit them being used in encounters. The exception is the pirate version of the Hannah, which can randomly be used by pirates too.

 

[Armada]

Would it be possible to have the Interceptor match the colours of the HMS Dauntless? Alternatively, I'm still rather partial to Kazeite's original colours, even though those were not quite movie-accurate... :?

I can certainly try to match the colours. They're meant to use almost exactly the same colour scheme, anyway.

I was thinking of using the Corvette5_44 texture for the regular FastMerchantman and dropping the NL version altogether. That would leave us with only one, but at least it'd look pretty good.
The NL texture doesn't match the other Dutch textures at all, so I wouldn't really mind losing it.
Same for the NL_Battleship, though your point does stand that it's the only re-texture of battleship2. On the other hand, I don't see much of an issue with just having one battleship2-based ship and the others based on battleship1.

Well why not simply use Corvette5_44 as FastMerchantman's texture, and Corvette2 as NL_Merchantman's texture, and rename the latter to FastMerchantman2, or something?
That way, we're neither gaining nor losing a model, and only dropping low-quality textures. And we get to keep a variety of paint schemes for the ship.
Isn't that what you wanted, anyway; at least two textures per model, for variety's sake?

If you want to do away with NL_Battleship, I suppose that's OK.
All I'm saying is that Battleship2 and Couronne1 would be the only two remaining ships of that kind of design (with the long bow shape)...

Anyways, thats my ramblings on what I think could be replaced/removed. I just think it would be best to use as many high-detail models based off real ships as possible, I think they improve the atmosphere of the game alot. plus added realism looks better too

I certainly do want to see more proper custom ships in the game, like yours and those from PotBS. They really do improve the atmosphere of the game!
However, what I don't want to happen is that we end up replacing every stock ship with a brand new one, because that would almost ruin the atmosphere, in my opinion.
What I'm aiming for with the upgrades I'm planning is to refresh the stock ships that we think are here to stay. Those are the ones which could pass off as 'realistic' ships, such as the Corvette.
Some stock ships, like the Warship class, could definitely do with being replaced with one of the new PotBS warships though.

Indeed, thats quite an effort! That's what I had in mind when I started, refresh and improve those good ol' stock ships, to make 'em more compatible with the new standards!

As I saw with the corvettes, you've knowledges I don't have, and you did a great job on those ships! It's very nice to see and quite couragous!

And who knows, I might have some time again in the future

Thanks for the support, mate! I'd love to have your input on future projects if you get the time.

 

[Hylie Pistof]

I'm for having 2 fastmerchantman ships, but I don't think they should have figureheads at all. I recently had a fleet of the Neptunus and 2 fastmerchantman and that was an impressive combination.

More new ships are nice but more upgraded stockers is nice too. That's what I've been doing since May.

 

[Pieter Boelen]

I can certainly try to match the colours. They're meant to use almost exactly the same colour scheme, anyway.

Sounds great! Alternatively, maybe Legendary Spider would be interested in working on these ships once the Pearl-based ones are done.
On the other hand, he's also got the Beta 2 trailer project in the works...

Well why not simply use Corvette5_44 as FastMerchantman's texture, and Corvette2 as NL_Merchantman's texture, and rename the latter to FastMerchantman2, or something?
That way, we're neither gaining nor losing a model, and only dropping low-quality textures. And we get to keep a variety of paint schemes for the ship.
Isn't that what you wanted, anyway; at least two textures per model, for variety's sake?

Maintaining two textures for the FastMerchantman for repaint purposes is not a bad idea, especially since according to Hylie, she's actually a good ship for game-play purposes.
I'll try to come up with a solution that avoids me having to rename the corvette2's texture name; maybe I'll just make the corvette2 use a different texture and have the FastMerchantman2 use that texture instead.
The corvette2.gm file has to be included in the download anyway because she is to use the new hull, so I might as well HEX-edit the thing. I'll try to sort it out tomorrow.

If you want to do away with NL_Battleship, I suppose that's OK.
All I'm saying is that Battleship2 and Couronne1 would be the only two remaining ships of that kind of design (with the long bow shape)...

I certainly don't like the current texture of the NL_Battleship; if a better texture could be done, I wouldn't mind keeping her.
Alternatively, we can remove her now and once somebody decides to do a new NL_Battleship texture, we can always put her back in the game later.

I certainly do want to see more proper custom ships in the game, like yours and those from PotBS. They really do improve the atmosphere of the game!
However, what I don't want to happen is that we end up replacing every stock ship with a brand new one, because that would almost ruin the atmosphere, in my opinion.
What I'm aiming for with the upgrades I'm planning is to refresh the stock ships that we think are here to stay. Those are the ones which could pass off as 'realistic' ships, such as the Corvette.
Some stock ships, like the Warship class, could definitely do with being replaced with one of the new PotBS warships though.

For now, I'm not intending to remove any stock game ship models completely. We may decide to do away with some serious sub-standard ones in the future,
but I think we should keep each stock game hull model in use for Beta 2 in any case.

 

[Pieter Boelen]

I'm for having 2 fastmerchantman ships, but I don't think they should have figureheads at all.

That can be easily accomplished and would prevent too much doubled up figureheads between ships using the same hull.
Just out of curiosity: why would you prefer them without figureheads?

 

[Hylie Pistof]

Well, if one is so cheap that you will buy a used ship and not even paint it, then you are cheap enough to unbolt the figurehead and sell it. Plus losing that weight off the bow will help the handling.

Then two of them offend my sensibilities. They would lose those dangling feet to wave action. These are fast ships and the water pressure would break them off.


I like the fastmerchantman as trade vessels because of their speed. Capacity wise they fall between the light pinnace and the standard pinnace, but are effectively twice as fast. They can do 9 knots with full holds which is almost as fast as a pinnace can go empty.

Then there are the 4 stern chasers.......

 

[Pieter Boelen]

Fair enough; removal it is.

 

[Pieter Boelen]

I think I'll go with this idea for the corvette ships if nobody objects:
FastMerchantman1: No figurehead, using Corvette5_44 skin (looks rather weathered and old, bringing down the thought that she's a former navy ship)
FastMerchantman2: No figurehead, using Corvette4_44 skin (looks rather weathered and old, bringing down the thought that she's a former navy ship)
PO_FastNavy: No figurehead as per now, using Corvette5 skin (the corvette5 is a rather distinct-looking skin, so using that for a quest ship makes some sense to me)

Then we keep:
Original Corvette1
Original Corvette2
FR_Corvette
RN_Corvette (former RN_Light_Frigate renamed to maintain consistency with the other ships based on the corvette hull)
SP_Corvette (former CorvFrig2_50 renamed to maintain consistency with the other ships based on the corvette hull)

 

[Pieter Boelen]

XebecAS (Assassin storyline quest ship) uses the same skin as the Xebec2. I'm applying the XebecCT skin to the Xebec2 and then we can remove the XebecCT and keep the others.
We'll be left with:
Xebec1 and Xebec2 - regular xebecs
Xebec3 - Barborossa heavy xebec
XebecAS - Assassin storyline heavy xebec
SchoonerXebec - Schooner-rigged Xebec

 

[Pieter Boelen]

How many different fleuts do we need to keep? I think we should drop Fleut3; she seems overly bright and the texture doesn't fit the figurehead very well
Do we need the FleutofWar for gameplay/variety of ship class purposes? If so, we should apply the Fleut3_44 texture to Fleut2 and remove Fleut3_44, because the FleutofWar has basically the same texture as Fleut2.
We'd then be left with:
Original Fleut1
Fleut2 (using Fleut4_44 skin)
FleutofWar (using former Fleut2 skin)

 

[Pieter Boelen]

For the brigs, I think we might as well drop both brig3 and brig3_44 since both skins are vaguely US-looking, but we've also got the actual US_Brig47 (former US_SloopofWar47).