WIP Re-Adding the AoP Battleship

[Grey Roger]

This is the battleship from AOP:


If we want this back in the game, I'll need a bit of help sorting out the flags. It could probably do with a retexture, too, but I can deal with that. This scheme seems to be some sort of mixture of various national schemes - black lower stripe, brown middle stripe, white in between, with French blue plus gold fleurs-de-lys round the top of the stern. It shouldn't be too hard to sort out a yellow-black version for Britain and a version with light brown hull or black and red stripes for France.

 

[Pieter Boelen]

If we want this back in the game, I'll need a bit of help sorting out the flags.

I think we've had her in the game before, which means that possibly a version with the required "penn" locators still exists.
If I remember, I'll see if I can find her in my old mod archive. Would save you the trouble of sorting that out.

On the other hand, it is not hugely complicated and for a single ship can be done in a few minutes.
See here for some details: Tutorial - General Guide to Locators | PiratesAhoy!

 

[Grey Roger]

It's certainly been in the game before, in Build 13. That's what prompted me to try to resurrect it - it was quite a nice looking ship and an alternative to multiple textures of "battleship1". It showed up as Tomlison's flagship during the Greenford counterattack; it was "battleship3" then, whereas "battleship3" now is just yet another retexture of "battleship1".

 

[Pieter Boelen]

It's certainly been in the game before, in Build 13.

Then it was probably also in Build 14 Beta 1 or maybe even Beta 2. The big ship cleanup was done somewhere around that time, not before.
I'll see if I can find her with penn locators already included. We may be lucky....

 

[Armada]

It shouldn't be too hard to sort out a yellow-black version for Britain and a version with light brown hull or black and red stripes for France.

Black and yellow or red stripes probably wouldn't suit this ship, considering it's a lot older than Napoleonic vessels. A brown hull with a blue upper section might look better, so even just removing the white stripes on the paint scheme shown above could be an improvement.

Then it was probably also in Build 14 Beta 1 or maybe even Beta 2. The big ship cleanup was done somewhere around that time, not before.

It looks like I'm to blame for this ship being dropped, according to this thread...

Battleship4: are you sure we want to keep this? I modified its texture for use on a Battleship1 hull recently, so we could remove the model but keep the hybrid texture, maybe? The model does have a serious problem with size proportions, seeing as the deck is mostly empty and the cannons are tiny.

The issues with proportions still stand, however, I still have a bunch of assorted models we were given ages ago (possibly by @craiggbrown) that include some enhancements for this ship. It might be worth using those, if I can verify there are no problems with them.

 

[Grey Roger]

Black and yellow or red stripes probably wouldn't suit this ship, considering it's a lot older than Napoleonic vessels. A brown hull with a blue upper section might look better, so even just removing the white stripes on the paint scheme shown above could be an improvement.

There are a lot of colour schemes in "Colonial Powers", not least because a few ships which appear in "Revolutions" and "Napoleonic" also appear here - "HMS_Bellona", for one, as I found out during a playthrough of "Tales of a Sea Hawk". The Sovereign of the Seas, alias "Manowar1", also has a Nelson-style colour scheme. Some other British ships have the older yellow/black scheme. And some have the brown/blue scheme you mention. Likewise, some French ships have a similar brown/blue scheme while some have black/red, and not even just those which extend into later periods.

I did a bit of Internet-hunting a while ago to see if I could find a definitive answer to which colour scheme the French Napoleonic ships should use, and the answer is that there wasn't one. At Trafalgar some ships had red hulls and some had cream - it was up to captains to choose their ship's scheme. My guess is that before the Nelson scheme became standard in the Royal Navy, the British did likewise. And certainly, standardising a scheme for "Golden Age" and "Colonial Powers" British ships is going to be a difficult job.

 

[Armada]

There are a lot of colour schemes in "Colonial Powers", not least because a few ships which appear in "Revolutions" and "Napoleonic" also appear here - "HMS_Bellona", for one, as I found out during a playthrough of "Tales of a Sea Hawk". The Sovereign of the Seas, alias "Manowar1", also has a Nelson-style colour scheme.

True, it's a bit of a mix of old and new in that period. Perhaps we could do a bit of cleaning up to at least remove any Napoleonic paint schemes from periods they don't belong in, though I understand this wouldn't be a quick job. I'll have a look through the ships in the latest build and see what could be done, and we can discuss this in a new thread.

I did a bit of Internet-hunting a while ago to see if I could find a definitive answer to which colour scheme the French Napoleonic ships should use, and the answer is that there wasn't one.

I won't dispute the French Napoleonic scheme again; what we've got now works well enough alongside the British ships.

 

[Pieter Boelen]

@Armada, maybe you can double-check the model file for this one and upload it if it's OK?
If not, let me know, because then I should look up the Build 14 Beta 1 version instead....

 

[Grey Roger]

True, it's a bit of a mix of old and new in that period. Perhaps we could do a bit of cleaning up to at least remove any Napoleonic paint schemes from periods they don't belong in, though I understand this wouldn't be a quick job. I'll have a look through the ships in the latest build and see what could be done, and we can discuss this in a new thread.

Don't remove any ships, please, or what's happening to the ex-AoP battleship here will probably happen to the removed ships again later.

But some ships such as the Bellonas could be restricted to "Revolutions" and "Napoleonic". On the other hand, some others would need to be retextured as they do belong in "Colonial Powers", e.g. "Manowar1" and "Frigate1" (that one even appears in "Golden Age of Piracy").

I won't dispute the French Napoleonic scheme again; what we've got now works well enough alongside the British ships.

My point there wasn't to re-open that dispute but to put forward the idea that there was no standard paint scheme, captains had their ships painted as they saw fit. Before the Nelson chequer scheme became Royal Navy standard, maybe the British did likewise. In that case we don't need to do anything to ship models.

 

[Pieter Boelen]

Don't remove any ships, please, or what's happening to the ex-AoP battleship here will probably happen to the removed ships again later.

We never remove ships unless we are agreed here to do that. At the time, we were agreed.

 

[Armada]

@Armada, maybe you can double-check the model file for this one and upload it if it's OK?
If not, let me know, because then I should look up the Build 14 Beta 1 version instead....

I might only have an AOP-configured version without pennants, but I'll have a look anyway.

Don't remove any ships, please, or what's happening to the ex-AoP battleship here will probably happen to the removed ships again later.

"Remove" was the wrong term, sorry. I meant changing the periods certain ships can appear in. And as Pieter said, any changes would need to be agreed upon, anyway.

My point there wasn't to re-open that dispute but to put forward the idea that there was no standard paint scheme, captains had their ships painted as they saw fit. Before the Nelson chequer scheme became Royal Navy standard, maybe the British did likewise. In that case we don't need to do anything to ship models.

Although that was probably true, I still can't imagine any ships would have used the Nelson chequer before it was actually introduced. To be clear, I'm not saying that is the same thing as a yellow and black paint scheme, but the point is that we previously repainted older ships in yellow and black on the false assumption that all British vessels were painted that way after around 1600 or so. That means some ships in the game don't look as colourful or interesting as they could do, and to me that's disappointing.

However, if no-one thinks this is worth addressing, then I won't investigate it any further.

 

[Armada]

Here are the modified Battleship3 files: AOP_Battleship1_Enhanced.7z

They're from AOP, so there are no pennants and the model is named Battleship1. Some extra parts might have reverse lighting, but it's worth a look.

 

[Grey Roger]

Although that was probably true, I still can't imagine any ships would have used the Nelson chequer before it was actually introduced. To be clear, I'm not saying that is the same thing as a yellow and black paint scheme, but the point is that we previously repainted older ships in yellow and black on the false assumption that all British vessels were painted that way after around 1600 or so. That means some ships in the game don't look as colourful or interesting as they could do, and to me that's disappointing.

However, if no-one thinks this is worth addressing, then I won't investigate it any further.

Some ships don't look all that colourful anyway, but that for me that just adds to the variety. The different schemes and ship design styles to be seen in the middle three periods contrast with the uniform styles and paint schemes of "Revolutions" and "Napoleonic".

If the Wikipedia article on the Nelson Chequer scheme is to be believed, the main difference between this and older schemes was that the gunports were painted black, hence the chequer. That only really shows up if the ports are closed, which in the game they're not. (Though it does mean some ship textures could do with being changed so that their gunports are black rather than the same shade of cream as the hull.) And even then it wasn't compulsory so some captains changed it.

The big problem with trying to standardise ships is that most designs span several time periods and are shared between various nations. We'd have to create a whole lot more models of ships to depict different nations in different periods. (We could start by putting the old yellow/black British ships back in the standard install and using them for "Revolutions" and earlier.) Otherwise just leave the ships as they are; the different schemes could be down to captain's preferences and possibly a ship which has recently been captured from an enemy and not yet repainted.

Here are the modified Battleship3 files: AOP_Battleship1_Enhanced.7z

They're from AOP, so there are no pennants and the model is named Battleship1. Some extra parts might have reverse lighting, but it's worth a look.

Thanks! Though part of the problem will be adding pennants and the other part is creating a valid entry for it in "Ships_init.c".

 

[Pieter Boelen]

adding pennants

That does not necessarily need to take very long. It is just a matter of copying all "flag" locators, renaming them to "penn" and changing their coordinates to make them more pennant-ey.

the other part is creating a valid entry for it in "Ships_init.c"

If I remember, I'll try to find the most recent PotC version that I can find.

 

[Pieter Boelen]

@Grey Roger: The most recent mod version I found her in was Build 14 Beta 1 Patch 7.
I uploaded all related files here: http://piratesahoy.bowengames.com/potc/Pieter Boelen/Battleship3.7z

I checked and this does already include pennants and a fairly up-to-date ships_init.c entry.
There even seems to be a custom ship walk file already. So I hope this helps.

 

[Grey Roger]

Thanks for that, and also for the hints in the New Fast Galleons thread. Here's the result so far:

Flags and pennants are indeed correct. The "Ships_init.c" entry needed a bit of revision; it has the ship appearing in "Early Explorers", not appearing in "Colonial Powers", and it's French only. I reckon it's an advanced battleship, not an early one, and anyway one reason I want to bring it back is to use it as the flagship of Silehard's counter-attack on Bridgetown, which is where it showed up in Build 13. So, whereas the normal battleships are set to appear in "Golden Age" (0.3) and "Colonial Powers" (0.2), this one will also appear in those ages but with the values reversed.

Take a look at the second picture. See those ropes starting near the top of the mainmast and going down to the same platforms as the bases of the shrouds? I put those there - the first ropes I've ever added. Having read the bits about ropes in "New Fast Galleons", I went through the various model files for the battleship, checking that every "ropeb" had a corresponding "ropee" somewhere, and vice versa, likewise for the "falb" and "fale" locators which were still present. The "rope" locators went into the 40's so any "fal" locator had 50 added to its number, then it became a "rope". But two "fale" locators in the hull model had no corresponding "falb" anywhere. Taking a guess from the co-ordinates that they were somewhere near the back, I turned one of them into a "ropee", put a "ropeb" onto the mizzen, then started the game and looked for a rope that hadn't been there before. I couldn't remember all the ropes which were there before, but that didn't matter - because I'd only converted one, what I was looking for was a rope on one side of the ship, attached to the mizzen, which didn't have a corresponding rope on the other side. There was one, leading to that platform. I also noticed that the mainmast lacked the support ropes which the other masts have. So I moved the "ropeb" locator to near the top of the mainmast, converted the other "fale" to match it, and the result is what you see there.

Next: retexture it to a scheme similar to other large capital ships of the "Golden Age" or "Colonial Powers" periods...

 

[Pieter Boelen]

Brilliant, @Grey Roger!

I think the main reason why we removed her is because we thought the model was fairly underdetailed and her texture was nothing to write home about either.
So I'll look forward what she'll look like when you work your magic!

 

[Grey Roger]

As you can see from the screenshots, she's certainly not underdetailed, especially compared to the basic battleship types which are pretty well retextures of the stock game battleship. The texture looks pretty, but lots of fleurs-de-lys around the stern mark her as specifically French. Silehard may not have been entirely patriotic, but he joined up with the pirates, not with the French!

 

[Pieter Boelen]

As you can see from the screenshots, she's certainly not underdetailed, especially compared to the basic battleship types which are pretty well retextures of the stock game battleship.

Don't the battleship have mod-added "_deck.gm" files including extra detail?
A lot of the Stock PotC ships do, but I don't remember if that applies to those ones....

 

[Grey Roger]

They do. On the other hand, this one has transparent windows and a cabin.

How do you add those sorts of details? Some of them, e.g. wheel and anchors, are built into this ship already. Others, such as deck guns and windlass, I wouldn't mind adding.