far-trader said:
I'll stick with mine http://www.4shared.com/file/AGGD0Drx/200_Ton_Fast_Trader_.html
7 X 4' beds. Get equipment and console detail, etc.
Deckplan Illustrations: What is the issue??
- Thread starter mechascorpio
- Start date
I'll stick with mine http://www.4shared.com/file/AGGD0Drx/200_Ton_Fast_Trader_.html
7 X 4' beds. Get equipment and console detail, etc.
far-trader said:Gee4orce said:
I think deckplan artists would like some clarification of this statement. If you don't mind
I refer the honourable gentleman to the publication entitled "High Guard".
Case closed.
Seriously, take a look. There are pages and pages of full page deck plans that show little more than the outline of the ship and little to no interior detail. In what circumstances would that ever be useful ?
Good deck plans are like good art - they inspire the imagination. I used to spend ages poring over the deckplans that GDW produced, and from them I could really visualise the interior of these ships. The latest Mongoose plans inspire about as much as looking at a sheet of graph paper.
As noted, knowing which decks are which systems, or where the engines and bridge are, is good. But on a ship the size of the Sylea, that's all we need.
By comparison, the small craft are great. I know the inside shape and outside. The pictures in high guard (which seem very Homeworld to me) are very nice.
Essentially, my 'dream rules' for publishing stuff:
1) ALWAYS an external picture. Using the recent S&P ships as an example, the two that stick most in my mind are the Mercenary Carrier and the Armed Junker. Why? Because I know what they look like.
2) For a Regular Starship or small craft sub 2000 dTons - Deck plans, in full, in the format Mongoose has been using, is fine. You get a real feel for the ship and it's not - yet - too big to be able to see what's going on.
3) For a Capital Ship - one or more 'blocked out' views - much like PFVA63 has done for his 2000 dTon warship Here is fine:
At two or three square milimetres for a stateroom, I'm not gaining anything else beyond a coloured block saying 'this bit is massed staterooms'. By all means provide a deck plan for the 'interesting' bits of the ship (bridge, hangar deck, etc) where action might happen.
4) Ensure that all information is stored in a format that doesn't compress it out of legibility. Vessels in Brian's Warship's of Babylon 5 just about gets away with it for the size of deck plans, but that's because they are entire A4 pages with nothing but a single deck on - and even then, the Narn and Centauri big ships are pushing it. The effort is commendible, but if (like the Victory) the end product isn't readable, what's the point?
Even if they were vector format images, most of the larger ships in Fighting Ships and High Guard would still be useless in the printed version.AndrewW said:
It really doesn't matter if the deckplans are awesome if the format they're being presented in isn't appropriate. The movie Avatar is a great movie at the theater, or even on a large HDTV, but watching a 2nd generation video tape copy on a 19 inch black and white TV wouldn't do the movie justice.
When it comes to the bigger ships like the Tigress, what does the GM really need in their games? Certainly not the 37 pages of practically useless deckplans Fighting Ships gave us. It would have been far better to give us 2-3 pages of schematic views so we could figure out where everything is in relation, then several more detailed deckplans of things like a common crew stateroom, a common officer stateroom, a gun bay, mess deck, the bridge, the brig, various control areas, etc. The Tigress could have used half as many pages, and been 10 times as useful.
AndrewW
Emperor Mongoose
kristof65 said:
It really just depends on your use. There are uses for such plans, even if everyone wouldn't make use for it.
Though I wasn't referring to that, was just saying the bitmaps are generally fine but once they get put into the books they aren't the same quality as the original bitmap.
nats
Banded Mongoose
Being an architect I wouldnt dream of providing a house plan on its own to a client and expect them to understand it or make any use out of it. This is why elevations/sections/perspectives were invented, as well as schematic plans to help explain the intricate layouts of larger buildings.
The same holds true for spaceship design. For small ships in which you are going to be living you want to know how its laid out, how the decks relate, how it looks from the outside and inside, furniture, and possibly also what quality the fittings are and maybe even the colours (this is why safari ship is so nice - its one of he only ship plans Ive seen that actually protrays what the interior looks like past a simple deckplan layout).
For large ships in which you might have to simply describe/move around in occasionally you only really need to know the rough schematic layout and views from the outside. No-one is ever likely to need any more info than that unless they are going to contruct one, and if you do need a detailed plan the referee could very easily draw up a quick local plan for combat resolution or whatever based on the rough schematic plans.
The Mongoose ship plans are a product that makes me wonder what they were thinking. CT mostly covered them far more impressively. CT Traders and Gunboats really gets some badly needed atmosphere protrayed in how the spaceships look and operated, particularly the Xboats. The Mongoose ship stuff is flat, unimaginative and lifeless, even the smaller ships info protrays none of the quality of the original CT plans.
Although admittedly you cant get more unimaginative than the larger CT ships - invariably simple boxes and spheres they are so laughable. CT Fighting Ships must rank as one of my most disliked CT supplements ever the illustrations look so pitiful. Even Braben's Elite game had better looking spaceships and thats saying something!!
The same holds true for spaceship design. For small ships in which you are going to be living you want to know how its laid out, how the decks relate, how it looks from the outside and inside, furniture, and possibly also what quality the fittings are and maybe even the colours (this is why safari ship is so nice - its one of he only ship plans Ive seen that actually protrays what the interior looks like past a simple deckplan layout).
For large ships in which you might have to simply describe/move around in occasionally you only really need to know the rough schematic layout and views from the outside. No-one is ever likely to need any more info than that unless they are going to contruct one, and if you do need a detailed plan the referee could very easily draw up a quick local plan for combat resolution or whatever based on the rough schematic plans.
The Mongoose ship plans are a product that makes me wonder what they were thinking. CT mostly covered them far more impressively. CT Traders and Gunboats really gets some badly needed atmosphere protrayed in how the spaceships look and operated, particularly the Xboats. The Mongoose ship stuff is flat, unimaginative and lifeless, even the smaller ships info protrays none of the quality of the original CT plans.
Although admittedly you cant get more unimaginative than the larger CT ships - invariably simple boxes and spheres they are so laughable. CT Fighting Ships must rank as one of my most disliked CT supplements ever the illustrations look so pitiful. Even Braben's Elite game had better looking spaceships and thats saying something!!
nats
Banded Mongoose
DFW said:
Yeah but the ships look good and looking at many other designs only perhaps IISS Ship Files comes anywhere close to the quality. I know space ships dont need to look cool to fly in a vaccuum but do they have to look like flying bricks? I love the way the Xboat tenders look and can really imagine them at work. I love the Type S scout. And the system defense boats with the jump shuttles - great stuff. And the merchants - wow they are really nice. You have to remember these are the first time these ships were imagined in any real form. This Supplement blew me away I immediately got lost in imagining what it was like to pilot one of those ships and spent quite a bit of time just imagining how the interior of the scout ship would be utilised/fitted out.
Not to sound condescending, but its very easy to say you could do better or as well as, but have you done so?? Coming up with this stuff out of thin air and making it look so good is more difficult than it sounds. Again as a building designer I know - truly imaginative design doesnt come easy but anyone can look after the design work is done and say they could have done it - thats always very easy. Its getting the initial idea and then protraying it well that is where the skill is.
True artists are societies most valuable and most underrated commodity and the world would be a very sad place without them. You just have to look at the MGT core book chargen illustrations to know instantly what I mean
Never slag off good art or design to me unless you can do better and have the proof!
middenface
Cosmic Mongoose
far-trader
Mongoose
I'll see that <drool> and raise you a :shock:
Somebody's been busy
Somebody's been busy
IanBruntlett
Emperor Mongoose
Perfect!
E.D.Quibell
Banded Mongoose
Nice.
middenface
Cosmic Mongoose
Thanks... well as the song says 'You ain't seen nothing yet..'
TravellerArt
Mongoose
Ooh, that is awesome middenface.
middenface
Cosmic Mongoose
3dRed said:Ooh, that is awesome middenface.
Oh cheers, nice to be appreciated.
