Stormwind Screenshots

Hey folks,

We're still working on DoC. We've made some major changes lately, so I'm implementing them before we can release anything, but I thought I'd share some screenshots from the new Stormwind map I'm working on.

Framework for the buildings are new models, but are based on the concept of Morpheus' original pack.

Wow, those look amazing! That fountain is soo awesome!

Finally some news regarding this great project.

The screenshots look lovely, even though Stormwind (especially in the first and third screenshot) looks a bit empty. It'll probably look less empty and more busy with units and stuff, though.

/starts awaiting the next update eagerly

As I understand it, John is making a base Stormwind map which will then be used (and populated) in different missions in the campaign :)

I also praise John for not just copying the WoW Stormwind and going for his own layout, afterall, this is it prior to being destroyed by the Horde in the First War, so it's bound to be layed out a bit differently.

Thanks, folks.

As Xaran stated, it will be more full during actual missions or cinematics and after I give it another doodad pass.

Here's a picture of the new building system that is being implemented, to have faction specific buildings based on team colour. All of these are the same unit, only with different attachments to a base building skeleton model.

Since these are trigger dependent, if no triggers are in the map or the art isn't done for that faction, it uses the default model which is the Azeroth model with TC in appropriate spots.

Below is a picture of the factions that are either done or close to done. Example building is the farm.

Starting from the top left: Stromgarde, Azeroth, Lordaeron, Gilneas, and Alterac.

Looks pretty damn awesome.
But this means building models will take much longer to produce, no?

Only a bit. The skeleton version makes use of the same animations as the normal one, and draws from framework models to actually make the art of the buildings. The variation models are actually made up for wall, pillar, roof arch, door, and roof models that are attached via triggers.

So, each building itself will only take a bit longer to produce, but be able to call on the framework models I've made up for doodad use. This way the models for each faction only need to be made once, rather than specifically for each building.

To keep it manageable, though, I'll only be updating the needed models for each chapter. So, for chapter 1 we'll only have the Town Hall, Farm, Barracks, and Lumber Mill updated to this new form.

For orc buildings, I won't be doing clan specific models, aside from banners, so that will keep the extra work down.

What I'm really curious about here is...
How does selecting the buildings work? The shapes are obviously different. If everything is done via attachments, you won't be able to select everything properly. Or am I wrong? What's the workaround, if there is any at all?

CollisionBox Object that lays out a box the size of the farm's selection square.

Does that work...?
From my experience with collision boxes(at least in Magos' Model Editor), they do... Absolutely nothing.

It does, but it won't work for clicking the building up high, only in the lower area as I've only set the max height on the box to 25.

Also, it does nothing in the editor but does work in game for this purpose, at least.

Ah, I see. Interesting. I guess it's not the most clean and effective method, but I suppose it's the best you could do.

Are the little fenced-in farm area, well, and wooden base parts of the base model, then? If you could select the building by clicking there, I suppose that a lot of problems are solved.
And one final questions; How did you put in those chickens in there? I see one managed to escape, I suppose those are chicken critters with the Locust and Wander abilities, then? How are they inside a building model, though? :O

I'm probably going to move the collision box so that it's more lined up with the farm building itself, to get the tightest effect, maybe give a go at using rotations on a second one to make a sloped roof effect, but we'll see. I'll tweak with it more. For now, it works quite well in-game.

The fencing and little extras are part of the base model, yup.

The chickens are critters, the one who escaped is from a farm I demolished (haven't added the triggers for killing them on death, like I have for the pigs in the pig farms).

They are spawned by triggers on a part of the building which has a walkable pathing map, but is far enough to the side that the peasant won't end up stuck in the pen upon completion of the building. So, to make them unclickable they are spwaned as chickens that have the locust ability, but then are changed through the Chaos ability automatically into pigs that don't, and are invulnerable. The new chickens, at the end, are unclickable but won't walk out of the little pens as ones with the locust ability would, but also won't die from splash damage.

Here's a picture with the pathing visible. Hard to tell, but they do have a path to walk in and out of the little door on the coop.

And since I mentioned pigs, here's the new orc pig farm.

The new farm looks really good.
Got anything more to show us while you're at it?