Alien Tank designs ideas and proposals

[Majki-Fajki]

Okay, I have visited TODO page for modelling. You need 2x2 alien tank unit. Any ideas for it's design? I took quick sweep on Deviant Art and you can find many useless stuff, many ideas in general.

Currently I can't see in Wiki any kind of gathered ideas for this unit. So I'm starting a thread for that.

I guess we can go in two general directions. Tank per se and walker.

Nice design for tank, very alike Tau Army from Warhammer 40K. Not sure how many tris it would need, a lot of curves.



Or something like walker, similar to those from "War of The Worlds" by Spielberg:


It could be sweet to combine armor with "meat" parts.

Just few minutes on Deviant art.

EDIT
I have no idea how to make it below 1000 tris, but awesome design too

[H-Hour]

Are you offering to make the model or just discussing it? Concept art is nice, but modellers volunteering their time usually prefer to work on their own designs. Apart from the general specs, I don't think we'll be forcing a particular design on a modeller.

That said, I think the third would be my favourite, perhaps with more of the deep purple color we have on our UFOs/alien base material.

If you are offering to make it, you can go above the 1000 tris. Our soldier models are nearly 2,000 when you add heads. For such a big unit, I could see getting up to 1,500-2,000. Just try to conserve where you can.

[Majki-Fajki]

Well, I'm not offering YET Trying to research you and your game first to see if I'm skilled enough to help :p

Design should be taken care of by separate person - modelers usually work on conceptual art. Since you don't have conceptual artist (Am I wrong?) we need to use someone's else work. Modeling is a different skills area than creating designs.

Walkers are awesome, but someone have to animate them later. Walking, rotating, animation of explosion - tons of skills are needed.

[Flying Steel]

Modeling is a different skills area than creating designs.

Perhaps but you are just as likely to find this creative design skill in a modeler as a painter, so why have the middleman then? Where 2D art is truly needed is in texture maps and gui graphics IMHO.

For concepts, what is mainly useful is a list from the primary developers (those with commit access and who are still active on the forum) of general requirements/preferences as to how the end result needs to look in order to qualify for inclusion in the game. The list can be very short and vague or long and detailed depending on the preferences of the primary developers.

[H-Hour]

For concepts, what is mainly useful is a list from the primary developers (those with commit access and who are still active on the forum) of general requirements/preferences as to how the end result needs to look in order to qualify for inclusion in the game. The list can be very short and vague or long and detailed depending on the preferences of the primary developers.

Trying to develop a clearer and more comprehensive list.

[Majki-Fajki]

Great, really great job. If there is any accepted by main devs design, it's needed to be there (a pic).

[Flying Steel]

Great, really great job. If there is any accepted by main devs design, it's needed to be there (a pic).

No it doesn't.

Because first of all, the concept art itself has to be compatibly licensed, you can't just go randomly pulling other folk's IP off of deviant art and expect to be able to make derivative works from them legally. Uploading those pics to the wiki would be a bad and risky idea.

Secondly a pic is just one possible idea. What could be more helpful is written down per-unit visual design requirements so artists know what aspects of the design are must-haves for inclusion and by omission what features they are free to play around with.

[Nutter]

Or something like walker, similar to those from "War of The Worlds" by Spielberg:

I know what you were trying to say but the delivery on that sentence just made me gag.
And not just because there's no noteworthy similarity in the first place.

Aesthetically, I think getting a rough idea of what the artists are supposed to be making and then starting from scratch would be a far better approach.


Personally, I'm thinking low profile hexapod mech with either a heavy or repeating plasma weapon mounted on a segmented tail right now.
I'd have suggested a particle weapon but I think those are cover piercing so they might be too big an advantage. Though, on the other hand, AI gets its very own crysalid!

[TrashMan]

I' making a floating alien disc-tank. Like in the original X-Com...

[Kildor]

And how it will be float? Don`t forget, this Universe does not have Antigravitation.

[TrashMan]

Well, it should.
Flying suits without it would be silly (especially given the weight of armor and weapons)


But you can always make something like a hovercraft I guess.

[headdie]

with alien tech inspired engines you should easily be able to produce the thrust, its just a mater of controlling flight on a platform with highly variable geometry

[Nutter]

Well, the moon landing happened with a computer weaker than what you find in a typical washing machine nowadays and the game is set seventy years into the future so fly-by-wire ought to work.

[TrashMan]

Dude, the alien armor is supposed to be very heavy and their ships are large, unaerodynamic bricks, that don't even show a slightest hint of VTOL capability. Even with anti-matter engines, trying to land those craft or keep them howering would be grossly ineffective.
Something like harvester?
That's like a howering 747..at least (since a 747 isn't armored)
And jetpacks have a huge problem wiht fuel, exhaust, mobiltiy and weight.

Anti-grav seems the only practical solution. Playing the "it's not realistic card" is pointelss given the sentient, psychic virus.

[Nutter]

Why do I get the impression you always bring up that fucking virus when you want to shoehorn something else in.