Solved Fixing the Build Mod Ships

[Pieter Boelen]

The very latest would be the best. At least Build 14 Alpha 9.5 Patch 4 I should say;
possibly the just-released Build 14 Alpha 10 WIP file even.
From what I can tell, the recent game versions are very playable and they contain all the latest ship-work.

 

[Suraknar]

Thank you,

Got the files and all, due to RL work I will not be able to do anything with these until the weekend. More to come on the week end.

Cheers!

 

[Pieter Boelen]

Thanks a lot, Suraknar! We're in no particular hurry though; take all the time you need.

 

[Seb]

Once the september buzz will be behind me, and once i'll be correctly reinstalled for a new year of studies, i'll keep going on my "ship remasters" project, it is just sleeping at the moment but as soon as i can, i'll take them one after another descending the ships list from A to Z but as it only concerns the hulls this shouldn't be a problem tough I can't open some of the ships with the TOOL. All those good ol' ships surely deserve some refreshing work.

 

[Doober]

At the risk of sounding dumb, what is the ship remasters project? Is it overlapping work with any of the issues that I listed above? I would hate for you, Suraknar or myself to duplicate efforts on anything.

 

[Pieter Boelen]

Seb has been adding some more details to some of the ships, mainly the starting ships,
such as the Lugger1, Barque1 (or Barque2 with the Alpha 10 WIP), Barque4_47, BritishWarship.
He added those as additional "_deck.gm" file through the TOOL though, which shouldn't interfere much.
I hope.

 

[Seb]

I hope too =)

 

[D4V1DXxX]

I have been retextured edinburg.renamed Edinburg and made a new ship(renamed edinburg)and made a new ship called Shadow.Need someone who knows with walk editing to made for shadow and edinburg.

You can find shadow in my ftp folder named as "Shad.rar"

Thnx!

 

[Pieter Boelen]

Nobody has made a walk file for a ship in a long time,
except Thomas the Terror and he's too busy with skinning and questwriting.
I already pointed you to the information you need to do it yourself though.

 

[D4V1DXxX]

Yeah but i dont get the program......

 

[Pieter Boelen]

Well, get it then.

 

[Armada]

Pieter, I've just finished updating the ship clean-up list which you started a while ago, so that it now reflects Patch 5 plus Xmas pack plus ENS (so far).
Please see attached and let me know what you think about the changes. I've reduced the number of ships marked 'Drop' by quite a bit, but hopefully I've nailed all of the leading offenders.
Feel free to adjust it as you see fit; it's a work in progress.

View attachment Ship_Cleanup_List.7z

 

[Pieter Boelen]

Here's some comments of mine on your ship cleanup list:

bermsloop263: Is the same as the normal one, but the small hand-held cannons fire as well, making her stronger than the other one.
Currently only available from Vanderdecken. We might be able to drop her, I suppose.

Brig_16_Gun1_18 and Brig_20_Gun1_18: These are stock game models with modified rigging. I don't think they're particularly bad, but they're not brilliant either.
Brig_20_Gun1_18 is based on the schooner. Maybe we could make it use the schooner3_44 texture and remove the schooner3_44 itself? That way, we keep the custom rigging and texture, but don't have two seperate ships.
Brig_16_Gun1_18 seems to have a dull Royal Navy paint scheme, but RN_Brig_16gun uses the same model and rigging with a similar, but brighter colour scheme. Can remove te former and just keep the latter, right?

gaffboomgaleoth: She didn't use to beep. We could keep her if we drop the added detail.
But I suppose she isn't brilliant enough, so we could just remove her altogether.

Lineship4: Another semi-Royal Navy paint scheme; we've got enough of those. But the textures of the other lineships aren't brilliant either.
I think we should keep Lineship47 at least, but I'm not sold on any of the others. Maybe also Lineship1, simply because she is the original Black Pearl.

Lydia4: Indeed a weirdish colour scheme. No need to keep, since we've already got three others.

NL_Batavia2: I like this texture. I'd prefer if we could keep her somehow, though of course Pgargon did make a nice proper Dutch fleut model already.
I do wish that more of the new Dutch ships would use Thomas the Terror's Dutch colour scheme, like this ship. I quite like that.

RN_Indiaman: I wonder if we could get away with using HMS Endeavour this early in the Jack Sparrow storyline. At least it'd be a more iconic ship and therefore look more interesting.
But then why would the biggest ships in the Caribbean need an escort from a Cutter? :wacko:

"SP_BattleGalleon_Weathered"; needs shortening?
Absolutely agreed! This was from when we thought we might still get the original texture, but we don't have that and I don't think we need it either.

Battleship4: How about we keep Seb's retextured one and drop Battleship3?

Cutter2: Do we want to keep any of our cutters? I'm not too fond of Cutter1 and Cutter3_18, but I reckon Cutter2 looks pretty nice.
As noted, she's also used as the starting ship in the Jack Sparrow storyline. But could we use any other small custom high-detailed ship model for this purpose?

FrigateNKSup: Let's indeed make this ship use the frigate3 texture. On that subject, how many retextured frigates do we need?
The _44 ones don't look overly special to me and frigate5_46 looks rather similar to RN_HeavyFrigate, so we could drop one of the two, right?

LightBrig1: We could drop this since we've still got RN_LightBrig. However, then we'd only have a RN version and no generic one. Would that be a problem?

Lineship5: I wonder if we could use a different ship in the Bartolomeu storyline for this.
It's used as an important large French ship that needs to be sunk, if I recall; don't we have any high detail ships we could use here instead?

HeavyLineship1 and 2: Why do we want to keep these again?

There's some retextured ships listed as "Unmodified Stock Game Ships".

I'm thinking maybe we should change some of the ships used at various points in the quests to use the newer detailed models.
That'll provide some eye candy for the storylines and also potentially allow us to remove the ships currently used where they're generally low-detailed.
For example, why do we need to use "HMS_Indefatigable" when we've got so many high details Royal Navy ships?
The Indefatigable is supposed to be a frigate, so could we use Bellona1 instead? That's a nice frigate-like model!

 

[Hylie Pistof]

Random thoughts while drinking my first proppa cup 'o coffee.

Lineships: You only like lineship47 because she has some green paint on her. Other than that, these ships are rarely seen in game.

Lydia4: Got 3. Need4?

Batavia: These ships are common in game. They are frustrating because they have no crew and messed up walk files. They are unusable to me as a player and I don't want them around. At least make them rare instead of common.

RN_Indiaman: It's a repainted Amsterdam! Well, it is an extremely rare ship in game.

SP_Battlegalleon: Name"s too long and it is no longer weathered.

Battleship4: They both have cabins now.

Cutter2: I hate those things! Early in the game I can't hit them and they just sail in circles around me shooting my ship to splinters. :2guns Later on they can't hurt me but I still can't hit them. :twisted:

LightBrig1: That is the one I've been trying to get ropes to show up on. With no luck.

Heavylineship: The figurehead on Heavylineship1 is worth keeping.

Indefatigable needs to go. The name is spelled backwards on one side.

Ahh. Good coffee.

 

[Armada]

bermsloop263: Is the same as the normal one, but the small hand-held cannons fire as well, making her stronger than the other one.
Currently only available from Vanderdecken. We might be able to drop her, I suppose.

I didn't know about her being a Vanderdecken ship. Any particular reason for that?
I absolutely hate the ship's textures, so I'd rather do something about that to bermsloop163. It's a historical ship type so we need to keep at least one.

Regarding Brig_16_Gun1_18 and Brig_20_Gun1_18, I agree with your ideas. These two seem to have no clear purpose at the moment, anyway.
Gaffboomglaleoth has no place either, and is very odd-looking, to me.

The lineships are a slightly different story. While we could reduce the number of paint schemes, surely we should be careful not to lose too much variety.
Plus, I did recently go through and review a lot of ships' encounter chances, including making some more associated with certain nations.

NL_Batavia2: I like this texture. I'd prefer if we could keep her somehow, though of course Pgargon did make a nice proper Dutch fleut model already.
I do wish that more of the new Dutch ships would use Thomas the Terror's Dutch colour scheme, like this ship. I quite like that.

If you like Thomas' textures so much, I might be able to merge his work with some of pgargon's new ships.

RN_Indiaman: I wonder if we could get away with using HMS Endeavour this early in the Jack Sparrow storyline. At least it'd be a more iconic ship and therefore look more interesting.
But then why would the biggest ships in the Caribbean need an escort from a Cutter? :wacko:

That's an interesting one. Indeed, the Endeavour seems too big to need an escort that small, but the current ship is... just not as impressive.
We might need to give that one some more thought.

For Battleship4, and 3 for that matter, I don't think we should remove either one.
The textures aren't bad, BUT Craiggo has done some extensive detail and texture work on them lately, which I will eventually put in the game.

About the Cutters, just how essential are they to the game? They give the player a different choice other than a Lugger, for example, but they're nothing special.
I agree that Jack needs a better starting ship. I'm sure that could be arranged, given our nice choice of new and detailed small ships!
Might be a difficult choice, though. Most of our new ships are navy ones.

FrigateNKSup: Let's indeed make this ship use the frigate3 texture. On that subject, how many retextured frigates do we need?
The _44 ones don't look overly special to me and frigate5_46 looks rather similar to RN_HeavyFrigate, so we could drop one of the two, right?

Again, it all comes down to national significance. It might be a better idea for you to look at what I've done in ships_init.c, and that should make eliminating ships easier.
Or, we could alter the clean-up list so that it shows every nation the ship is affiliated with. That would make things easier at a glance.

Lightbrig1 would be good to keep, just to have something other than the RN version. It's more generic for other navies, too.

I don't know what to do about Lineship5. It's not a bad model by any means, but then again, it's hard to replace with a ship of similar size from the same period.

HeavyLineship1 and 2: Why do we want to keep these again?

In their current state? I'm not sure they're worth it. Once I introduce Craiggo's work, however, we've got more detail and some astounding textures for them!

About the ratings in the clean-up list, I think we need to rethink them a bit.
In my opinion, the most of the re-textured stock ships are no more valuable than the stock ships themselves, and in some cases, for example, you've suggested that we remove some.
I tried to change them slightly, but couldn't figure out how. Seems you originally restricted the ratings to only the five used, and I don't know how to remove that restriction. :?

I'm thinking maybe we should change some of the ships used at various points in the quests to use the newer detailed models.

Absolutely agreed, as long as we don't go too overboard.
The Indy, for example, is a difficult one. Bellona is not a good match, because she has more guns than RN_Warship (HMS Justinian), and that's the wrong way around.
From what I gather, the real Indy was 'razéed' from 64 guns down to 38 guns, but re-rated as a 44-Gun 5th Rate, making her a very strong frigate.
Now, I know it may sound like a completely outrageous idea, but there IS a ship which matches that description, which is bigger than a normal frigate, and rather like a 'ship of the line'... the Warship model.
What's more, the Warship even resembles the 'Grand Turk', which is the ship that played HMS Indefatigable in the Hornblower TV series. See a photo here.
Thinking about it, it wouldn't take much adjusting to the rigging and details, and a texture wouldn't be hard to make... what d'you reckon? Have I lost my mind, or is this actually a good idea?

RN_Indiaman: It's a repainted Amsterdam! Well, it is an extremely rare ship in game.

No it's not. This ship just looks like a distorted Corvette, but the Amsterdam is more customised.
Either way... not a pretty sight.

LightBrig1: That is the one I've been trying to get ropes to show up on. With no luck.

What's the problem? More 'fal' locators, or something else?

 

[Pieter Boelen]

I didn't know about her being a Vanderdecken ship. Any particular reason for that?
I absolutely hate the ship's textures, so I'd rather do something about that to bermsloop163. It's a historical ship type so we need to keep at least one.

It's exactly the same ship but with more cannons than the regular. We can't fairly have her in the game WITHOUT being a Vanderdecken model.

Regarding Brig_16_Gun1_18 and Brig_20_Gun1_18, I agree with your ideas. These two seem to have no clear purpose at the moment, anyway.
Gaffboomglaleoth has no place either, and is very odd-looking, to me.

Only purpose is rigging variety, I suppose.

If you like Thomas' textures so much, I might be able to merge his work with some of pgargon's new ships.

To what extent do you think national ships should use the "exact" same colour scheme? Sure British Royal Navy is black and yellow, but there's a lot of different shades and amounts of wood in use.
Should those ships be repainted to use the real same colour scheme? Same for the Dutch ships? I do like it, but is it a good idea?

About the Cutters, just how essential are they to the game? They give the player a different choice other than a Lugger, for example, but they're nothing special.
I agree that Jack needs a better starting ship. I'm sure that could be arranged, given our nice choice of new and detailed small ships!
Might be a difficult choice, though. Most of our new ships are navy ones.

No idea about the Cutter's purpose in the game. I quite like them as a small ship, but that's based solely on how they look and not on how useful they are (I don't play much).
It's just a simple hull with one mast and two sails.

Again, it all comes down to national significance. It might be a better idea for you to look at what I've done in ships_init.c, and that should make eliminating ships easier.
Or, we could alter the clean-up list so that it shows every nation the ship is affiliated with. That would make things easier at a glance.

That'd be rather a lot of work on the list; I'd prefer to keep the list as-is simple for the sake of preventing that.

In their current state? I'm not sure they're worth it. Once I introduce Craiggo's work, however, we've got more detail and some astounding textures for them!

That might offer an excuse then. I noticed they were listed as "keep" in the current list, but couldn't quite figure out why. :wacko:

About the ratings in the clean-up list, I think we need to rethink them a bit.
In my opinion, the most of the re-textured stock ships are no more valuable than the stock ships themselves, and in some cases, for example, you've suggested that we remove some.
I tried to change them slightly, but couldn't figure out how. Seems you originally restricted the ratings to only the five used, and I don't know how to remove that restriction. :?

Check the Data Validation. It's quite easy to remove, really. I did it just to get those drop-down boxes.

Absolutely agreed, as long as we don't go too overboard.
The Indy, for example, is a difficult one. Bellona is not a good match, because she has more guns than RN_Warship (HMS Justinian), and that's the wrong way around.
From what I gather, the real Indy was 'razéed' from 64 guns down to 38 guns, but re-rated as a 44-Gun 5th Rate, making her a very strong frigate.
Now, I know it may sound like a completely outrageous idea, but there IS a ship which matches that description, which is bigger than a normal frigate, and rather like a 'ship of the line'... the Warship model.
What's more, the Warship even resembles the 'Grand Turk', which is the ship that played HMS Indefatigable in the Hornblower TV series. See a photo here.
Thinking about it, it wouldn't take much adjusting to the rigging and details, and a texture wouldn't be hard to make... what d'you reckon? Have I lost my mind, or is this actually a good idea?

A frigate having more cannons than a warship? Didn't see that one coming.
Maybe we could replace BOTH ships? Maybe use the HMS Victory model for the HMS Justinian or something like that?
The Hornblower storyline strikes me as THE place to put those new Royal Navy models to use.

We should definitely remove the RN_SotL in any case, considering we've got now three more accurate English replacement ships!

 

[Armada]

It's exactly the same ship but with more cannons than the regular. We can't fairly have her in the game WITHOUT being a Vanderdecken model.

Point taken. Still, we don't need her any more.

To what extent do you think national ships should use the "exact" same colour scheme? Sure British Royal Navy is black and yellow, but there's a lot of different shades and amounts of wood in use.
Should those ships be repainted to use the real same colour scheme? Same for the Dutch ships? I do like it, but is it a good idea?

Not exactly the same, no. Variety always looks better. What I meant by merging Thomas' work was to just enhance some of the new ships, if they need it.

No idea about the Cutter's purpose in the game. I quite like them as a small ship, but that's based solely on how they look and not on how useful they are (I don't play much).

I don't play the game as much as I'd like to, either, so we need a specialist opinion...
...So far, miklkit has said he hates them for being small targets, so maybe that's a plus side for the player if they use the ship them self.
Not sure how long you'd decide to keep a small ship such as that one, though.

A frigate having more cannons than a warship? Didn't see that one coming.
Maybe we could replace BOTH ships? Maybe use the HMS Victory model for the HMS Justinian or something like that?
The Hornblower storyline strikes me as THE place to put those new Royal Navy models to use.

Firstly, Bellona is NOT a frigate; she's a 3rd Rate Ship of the Line with a whopping 84 guns (yes, that would normally class a ship as a 2nd Rate, but she remains a 3rd Rate design).
Secondly, I do agree we could replace both ships. But instead, why not use Bellona as the Justinian? She's a closer match than the Victory model is.
As for the Indy, what do you think about my idea of modifying a Warship? We don't have any custom RN ships which match Indy's specifications, so we may as well make one.
Let's not forget, another potential opportunity to showcase the new navy ships might be Legendary_Spider's new USS Constitution storyline, if it goes ahead.
I know he's keen to have plenty of US vs RN battles... :ixi

We should definitely remove the RN_SotL in any case, considering we've got now three more accurate English replacement ships!

Wait, WHAT? And rob the RN of their only 2nd Rate ship? Until we get an actual replacement of 90-98 guns, I don't think so.
Look at how much work has just recently gone into her for the ship pack! She's a whole new ship, with crew and new details and new textures etc! That work cannot go to waste.

P.S. Topic pinned to prevent it getting lost again. No posts since 2009 was a bit shocking!

 

[Pieter Boelen]

For the Victory, I was just going off on us now having the REAL Victory.

Since the HMS Indefatigable is the ship you play most with in the Hornblower storyline (I think), I'd prefer the ship used as her to be the highest detail one if possible.

 

[Armada]

For the Victory, I was just going off on us now having the REAL Victory.

Indeed I have refurbished the 'unique' Victory texture, with colour adjustments and the nameplate, but that's most likely to be used in Legendary_Spider's storyline.
I'm not sure she makes an appearance in the Hornblower series, does she? :?
(... Unless I've missed your point, somewhere?)

Since the HMS Indefatigable is the ship you play most with in the Hornblower storyline (I think), I'd prefer the ship used as her to be the highest detail one if possible.

Then I'll do my best!
Well, seriously, if you want the highest quality, we need a new custom scratch-built ship to portray the Indy.
If someone happens to find the plans for either the REAL Indy after being razéed, or plans for the Grand Turk, then hopefully a modeller would take up the project.
Unless you have a better idea for one of our current ships to use? I might have overlooked one staring me in the face, but you never know.

 

[Pieter Boelen]

Indeed I have refurbished the 'unique' Victory texture, with colour adjustments and the nameplate, but that's most likely to be used in Legendary_Spider's storyline.
I'm not sure she makes an appearance in the Hornblower series, does she? :?
(... Unless I've missed your point, somewhere?)

I meant that the RN_SotL was supposed to be the Victory, but we now have an accurate version of the same ship, even without nameplate.
But as you say, apparently the RN_SotL has a different number of cannons to the real Victory model, rendering my original thought pointless.

The real HMS Victory DOES make an appearance in the Hornblower series, but not until well later after the movies have concluded.
It's in the books and if I recall the old (and VERY good) "Captain Horatio Hornblower" movie too.

Well, seriously, if you want the highest quality, we need a new custom scratch-built ship to portray the Indy.
If someone happens to find the plans for either the REAL Indy after being razéed, or plans for the Grand Turk, then hopefully a modeller would take up the project.
Unless you have a better idea for one of our current ships to use? I might have overlooked one staring me in the face, but you never know.

If we really don't have anything available, we've got nothing available. Too bad.
Could we at least use the RN_Warship as the HMS Indefatigable then and the Bellona as the HMS Justinian?
Or Greyhound1/Sophie1 as Indefatigable and Bellona1 as Justinian to keep the difference in size, but still use the newer ship models? Or something?
I'm not going to suggest any modelers to make MORE Royal Navy ships; if I have a choice, I choose for no more British ships and more other ones.

Isn't Mordaunt1 supposed to be the HSM Mordaunt? Maybe she should have a Royal Navy colour scheme to go with that? And maybe she would then be available for some Hornblower use?
Really, I'm rambling here but maybe there's some use to my sillyness. :wacko: