Update Armor Skins

[Edymnion]

Mentioned this in another thread, thought it might be worth it's own suggestion.

I use almost strictly Standard Armor for my ship hulls because it has a seamless tile. Hull and Advanced Armor have those squares around the edges baked into the texture that makes them stand out as being individual blocks, and I hate how that looks.

The hulls of my ships are standard armor. I use advanced armor only for internal shells around important systems (where I can't see it), and the only hull I've used in months has been brown hull to make furniture out of. I even use Standard Armor for carpets (brown standard looks just like berber!).

Additionally, the colors of Hull are too bright for me, too light. I don't want my ships to be practically day-glo.

I think ideally I would like to see Hull get the current skin for Standard Armor, make Standard Armor have something more akin to diamond plate (like you see on toolboxes), and then change Advanced Armor up into a skin that has multiple armor plates per block that tile together so that you can't see the individual blocks anymore (like Standard Armor).

I guess the short version of this is "I don't want to see the individual blocks of my hull, I want smooth seamless ships. Textures that make each individual block shout 'Here I am, look at me!' are bad, IMO."

 

[JumpSuit]

Reminds me of 7 Days to Die's New Paint Texture changing system :P

 

[Madman198237]

I agree, though aesthetics is a highly personal-opinion-based thing.

I don't really like the look of separated meter-cubed blocks everywhere. It's just sort of...eh.

 

[silverfoe]

pleeeease!

 

[Reilly Reese]

There's a reason they look like that.

It's called variation. You're really not supposed to build ships purely out of one kind of armor but rather use them all if you want it to look good.

 

[Edymnion]

You're really not supposed to build ships purely out of one time of armor but rather use them all if you want it to look good.

I think I got that covered, thanks.

 

[Snowtiger256]

A while back, there was a proposal by the devs to bring in connected textures for certain blocks in game (such as sand, dirt and such, including tiled armor sets like Hull and Advanced armor), and I would think this would make tiled armor look better by making the tiles appear larger and continuous. We haven't heard about this after it was said to be in preliminary testing phase, and IIRC, there were some issues with how the game handled these textures, so it might have been put into the back burner in favor of other, more major changes in the game.

 

[JumpSuit]

A while back, there was a proposal by the devs to bring in connected textures for certain blocks in game (such as sand, dirt and such, including tiled armor sets like Hull and Advanced armor), and I would think this would make tiled armor look better by making the tiles appear larger and continuous. We haven't heard about this after it was said to be in preliminary testing phase, and IIRC, there were some issues with how the game handled these textures, so it might have been put into the back burner in favor of other, more major changes in the game.

Connected Textures MUST be added!

 

[Madman198237]

I think you meant "Hey extremely busy and much-appreciated developers, it would be nice if you could inform us about the status of the connected textures thing, possibly chime in with an opinion, and, even better, possibly add connected textures sometime in the nearish future."

 

[sayerulz]

I'm inclined to agree with this. For a ships hull, I prefer it to look fairly solid, and definitely not like a grid of squares. There are a few instances where I like the grid feel, but for those generally various decoration blocks work just fine.

I personally think that tessalating, rivited plates similar to how aircraft are usually put together would work well for basic hull, standard should be a bit heftier looking, and advanced should feel like solid metal.

 

[silverfoe]

connected textures are already in the works, they mentioned it in a previous devblog

EDIT: well if you don't believe me, look here (scroll down a little): StarMade News - Latest

 

[Cluwne]

Barging in with hot opinions as excuse to be an asshat.
I think it would be better for armor, and by extension for the hull too, to have several textures you can pick from, i.e. seamless, "blocky", hazard stripes, even Tron-like if someone would show interest. Imagine an "AI core" room with it.
It's such a shame that only the standard armor has a hazard stripe variant. Not by a whole lot, but it weights more than hull nonetheless.
I wonder if something similar would look good on crystal armor and various doors, hmm...

Madman198237
I think he meant: "I want those. Could really use them. Pls add asap."
Words cannot express how spineless and pathetic your post sounds.
Please stop treating Schine as if they'd drop dead from a mere ill thought of them. They would have died long time ago otherwise.
The fact that you even think they need to be protected from these kinds of words is an insult by itself. And a more serious one, I might add.

 

[kiddan]

Is it common to coat ships in advanced armour? I usually use a minimal amount to protect systems and maybe a hallway. If I did cover a ship in advanced armour, I'd definitely add standard detail on top to make it look nice.

 

[Madman198237]

Cluwne bugger off or catch the facetious tone.

I don't object to being blunt and honest, I DO object to such statements because they're selfish and pointless. Schine is not going to jump when you say so and ask "How high?" on the way up.

So my post was a HIGHLY exaggerated alternative method of asking that both makes more sense and is more polite.

While I understand your reluctance to exercise basic human decency, I strongly disagree with it.

 

[GDPR 302420]

So in other words because you do not like how armor currently looks you want it changed to your personal tastes?

Well I think it looks fine right now, even if it was changed your ship is still going to look like trash when it has a few missile craters and bullet holes in it.

What you think looks good is entirely subjective, I see no reason to change it, especialy considering this is the only thread at all recently to complain about how the current armorset "looks" if at all, so cleary most people are at least content with the current armor looks (else where would be a lot more threads about it)

What would look "good" for armor are entirely subjective, this entire suggestion seems to be wanting Schine to cater to personal tastes rather then an actual reason.

What you think looks good, another may think looks like vomit, you are never going to satisfy everyone as looks are entirely subjective, so armor should be left as is, if more people start to make more threads complaining about it, then I would feel inclined to agree with a need to change its texture, however currently it just seems like a "I want this change because of personal requirements"

Of course, if you are not happy with that still, you can make your own texture pack and make it look as good as you want Edymnion

 

[Reilly Reese]

So in other words because you do not like how armor currently looks you want it changed to your personal tastes?

Well I think it looks fine right now, even if it was changed your ship is still going to look like trash when it has a few missile craters and bullet holes in it.

What you think looks good is entirely subjective, I see no reason to change it, especialy considering this is the only thread at all recently to complain about how the current armorset "looks" if at all, so cleary most people are at least content with the current armor looks (else where would be a lot more threads about it)

What would look "good" for armor are entirely subjective, this entire suggestion seems to be wanting Schine to cater to personal tastes rather then an actual reason.

What you think looks good, another may think looks like vomit, you are never going to satisfy everyone as looks are entirely subjective, so armor should be left as is, if more people start to make more threads complaining about it, then I would feel inclined to agree with a need to change its texture, however currently it just seems like a "I want this change because of personal requirements"

Of course, if you are not happy with that still, you can make your own texture pack and make it look as good as you want Edymnion

Red has a point, it's been...God knows how long since we had community texture packs?

RIP DirtySpace o7

 

[kupu]

I guess the short version of this is "I don't want to see the individual blocks of my hull, I want smooth seamless ships. Textures that make each individual block shout 'Here I am, look at me!' are bad, IMO."

Currently, we have compromised and made both hard grids, soft-ish grids and no grid textures for the 3 different armour types. People made good points for all 3 existing previously.

Historically every community conversation surrounding hull textures has yielded vastly differing opinions on whether hull blocks should be seamless or not. No real consensus has been achieved from the small samples sizes here, i do keep tabs on it though (and even occasionally try small texture experiments). It's something i feel has room for improvement.

A while back, there was a proposal by the devs to bring in connected textures for certain blocks in game (such as sand, dirt and such, including tiled armor sets like Hull and Advanced armor), and I would think this would make tiled armor look better by making the tiles appear larger and continuous. We haven't heard about this after it was said to be in preliminary testing phase, and IIRC, there were some issues with how the game handled these textures, so it might have been put into the back burner in favor of other, more major changes in the game.

Yep, pretty much. Although we really stressed at the time this is not the same as "connected textures" most of you are familiar with.
It just repeats 16 textures over the space of 4x4 chunks, rather than a single texture every block. It doesn't dynamically snap / pool textures.
Currently there are assignment issues with this system but much more pressing issues exist ie; Power Update.

Advanced Amour is a likely candidate for this texture method, should it happen.

 

[kikaha]

i believe another texture pack could solve some wants here...

 

[Kelpaz]

Is it common to coat ships in advanced armour? I usually use a minimal amount to protect systems and maybe a hallway. If I did cover a ship in advanced armour, I'd definitely add standard detail on top to make it look nice.

I build most ships with only advanced armor.
Standard armor is exclusively used for my economy class ships and smaller craft.

I do like the tiling on advanced armor it makes it feel much stronger than standard armor.
The tiling is also good in low light conditions because building with black standard armor in darkness is painful to the eyes.

 

[Daeridanii]

Definitely disagree with this. One word;

variation

Hull may be lighter than you prefer, but some of us use that lightness as a "highlighter," adding variation.
Both hull and advanced armor have edges, but I find that often having an area stand out is extremely useful.
(examples)

But the biggest issue I see is that this would essentially force those who use armor combinations for aesthetic purposes to refit, simply because you don't like how they are currently.
Respectfully, if you find that the current armor textures are completely unusable, making a texture pack seems to be the best way to ensure everyone is happy.

(I should note that I'm not totally against armor-texture changes, just against the uniformity, that (unless I misunderstood your post) that you seem to be looking for.)