ÆRDEN ~ new streets!

[Dantes]

So fantastic work step to step. °-°
Epic...   

[TheTeaCat]

Sorry for not posting about how my jaw drops each time I see an update.

Incredible scenes,modding, just about everything really is... .

Love the walled city, looks very medieval, but there is one thing that bothers me about it.
In my opinion the placement of the docks inside the walls would be wrong from a defensive point of view. Unless you had some sort of sea gate that would allow ships through, it would be the most vulnerable part of the city. It would be better to have the docks outside the walls with a gate that access the town that way. Please remember this is just my point of view though.

Otherwise I'm speechless with what you have done so far, I'm off to make a cuppa and peruse your MD from the start once more.

Hope 2016 is all that it can be for you! Happy New Year!

Regards
Derry

[romualdillo]

Love the walled city, looks very medieval, but there is one one that bothers me about it.
In my opinion the placement of the docks inside the walls would be wrong from a defensive point of view. Unless you had some sort of sea gate that would allow ships through, it would be the most vulnerable part of the city. It would be better to have the docks outside the walls with a gate that access the town that way. Please remember this is just my point of view though.

I thought exactly the same, but several cities have this kind of shape, too. Most of them solved the problem with defensive towers along the docks, or blocking the access with commercial buildings and controlling traffic through doors.

Hamburg:


Emden:


Stettin


Observing the images, there are always some kind of structures in front of the harbour's mouths to control the access.

On the contrary, Spanish cities had always their harbours out of the walls

Sevilla:


Barcelona:


I think there were several ways to defend a city. Everything is possible.

[vortext]

Yep quite a few Northern European cities had ports within their walls, especially if it sat along a river, which is the case here. I did at one time consider building the city around the river, but that actually proved more difficult to pull off ingame. However, you did hit the nail on the head Derry as I observed the same problem - i.e. it was quite open - and have actually rectified it in the new design. I didn't want to give it away just yet though, so here's a sneak peek. 

[romualdillo]

Looks good!!! 

[TheTeaCat]

Looks very good

The inner wall looks just right where you have it now

[art128]

I have to agree with Derry, the new inner wall is perfect for the harbor.

[11241036]

The new inner wall looks promising. Also, impressive castle and it's a very good idea to scatter some smaller farming settlements all over your map.

The fact that you are using dirt roads inside your walls bothers me somehow, however. I don't have the knowledge to judge this, but I think cobblestone roads would be the more appropriate choice there. As I believe, roads are a crucial aspect for the economical development of a city; therefore, once it is raining for three days, dirt roads would become impassable, especially for horse carriages, due to being muddy.

[Nanami]

Really nice there!

[Girafe]

It reminds me the fabulous history of Paris during middle age.

Keep the good work, 

[mgb204]

No car zots! Of course there are no cars, they haven't been invented yet!

The last few updates show off an amazing medieval recreation, for me your work is amongst the finest there ever was. So much detail and quality it's hard to know what to point out, so I'll just say I love what you are doing instead .

[kbieniu7]

Oh, dear. Your details are just overdetailed 

[Mandarin(a)]

Wonderful work: so realistic, so "muddy" 

[vortext]

Wow, okay! I did not expect this many replies to the replies (and a sneak-peek). Moreover, there have been a few more interesting issues raised and since the MD is already in reply mode, lets have another round! 

I was wondering how could I have passed your last update without commenting, but I think it was during my back problems, and I had no humor to sit and comment. Sorry!!! 

The last updates are mindblowing. It's interesting how different Northern Medieval cities looked to Southern ones. Normally German-styled ones look fantastic in SC4, while Mediterranean ones look "fake". Looking at your MD I've discovered It's a matter of space: too wide streets make historic Mediterranean cores look strange. I'll think about it... 

Please continue your great work, because it's inspiring!! 

No worries, as I said before your health is more important. You're right historic districts tend to be crammed, however, I'm not too sure though if your observed difference between North and South city cores holds true. While Northern European city centers tend to be arranged around a square, there're typically numerous narrow streets and back alleys fanning out and around it. This is hard to replicate in SC4 indeed, especially if you like to keep it all functional as well. The fixed street width, or rather the grid, is something which forces you to get creative - hence I use a lot of overhanging props.   

So fantastic work step to step. °-°
Epic...   

Step-by-sometimes-frustrating-step indeed!  Thank you!

Sorry for not posting about how my jaw drops each time I see an update.

Incredible scenes,modding, just about everything really is... .

Love the walled city, looks very medieval, but there is one thing that bothers me about it.
In my opinion the placement of the docks inside the walls would be wrong from a defensive point of view. Unless you had some sort of sea gate that would allow ships through, it would be the most vulnerable part of the city. It would be better to have the docks outside the walls with a gate that access the town that way. Please remember this is just my point of view though.

Otherwise I'm speechless with what you have done so far, I'm off to make a cuppa and peruse your MD from the start once more.

Hope 2016 is all that it can be for you! Happy New Year!

Regards
Derry

Happy new year to you as well and thanks for the kind words!

I thought exactly the same, but several cities have this kind of shape, too. Most of them solved the problem with defensive towers along the docks, or blocking the access with commercial buildings and controlling traffic through doors.

. . .snip. . .

Observing the images, there are always some kind of structures in front of the harbour's mouths to control the access.

On the contrary, Spanish cities had always their harbours out of the walls

. . .snip. . .

I think there were several ways to defend a city. Everything is possible.

Thank you so much for posting these pictures! Love them!! 

Looks good!!! 

Thanks!

Looks very good

The inner wall looks just right where you have it now

Thank you!

I have to agree with Derry, the new inner wall is perfect for the harbor.

Thanks, was a nice moment when I remembered these walls!

The new inner wall looks promising. Also, impressive castle and it's a very good idea to scatter some smaller farming settlements all over your map.

The fact that you are using dirt roads inside your walls bothers me somehow, however. I don't have the knowledge to judge this, but I think cobblestone roads would be the more appropriate choice there. As I believe, roads are a crucial aspect for the economical development of a city; therefore, once it is raining for three days, dirt roads would become impassable, especially for horse carriages, due to being muddy.

Yes you're right cobble stone would be more appropriate. As I said before I'm not too fond of these streets in a city setting either, hence I plastered the city ground with terrain paints for the mosaic!    Thanks!

Really nice there!

Thank you!

It reminds me the fabulous history of Paris during middle age.

Keep the good work, 

Thanks!

No car zots! Of course there are no cars, they haven't been invented yet!

The last few updates show off an amazing medieval recreation, for me your work is amongst the finest there ever was. So much detail and quality it's hard to know what to point out, so I'll just say I love what you are doing instead .

he, I should make no-carriage zots. .  Thanks for the kind words!

Oh, dear. Your details are just overdetailed 

There's no such thing as overdetailing!  Thanks!

Wonderful work: so realistic, so "muddy" 

Muddy is exactly what I'm aiming for. Happy to read that comes across! 



To conclude today another sneak peek. Started work on demarcating the aforementioned hunting grounds from the fallows.

[Framly]

I'm a silent follower of your project! Very inspiring

[belfastsocrates]

It just gets better. I love this MD, it's so unique and the attention to detail is marvellous to see.

[kbieniu7]

I say nothing, cause it's going to became boring with saying "oh" and "ah" every time a picture arrives

[kelis]

I love your work, you know that I'm a big fan of your work. I love the history in every update and I really enjoy watching and reading these updates... once again the last update was perfect ! It would be nice if some day we can see the entire walled city from above.

I was wondering about your terrain mod. I guess you've made your own version using different textures, right ?
It is possible share with us (or at least with me  ) your terrain mod ? I think it could fits perfectly with my region...

Bedankt mijn vriend en groetjes 

[Nanami]

MMP details really catch me here... Never realize that SC4 can actually do medieval era european stuffs..

oh also is that dirt road actually a road or an MMP?

[vortext]

Hi there folks, it really has been a long time since last update, hasn't it?! It might be the longest time between updates yet, and consequently this update might quite possibly have turned into the longest to date. So, time for an admittedly long overdue update, and in a tradition of sorts April always seems to calls for a briefing on current affairs (see previous editions here and here). It's going to be lengthy read though, with very few pictures, so for convenience here's the break down;

• Ærden & related projects
• SC4Viewer
• SAM WRC
• BAT

Yes indeed, this update has it own table of contents, it's that long a wall of text!   

Anyway, I hope you enjoy it nonetheless. 



So, first of all RL has been plenty busy lately, hectic at times when it threw odd curve balls my way, and it had a significant impact on time available for the forum, developments, let alone actually playing SC4, though I did briefly played around in a new region. However, the bout of activity during OSITM in December last year unfortunately didn't take hold and as mentioned I've done very little in Ærden since. It's not that I lost interest, but the next phase of development requires a good deal of preparation. In particular I'm planning a complete overhaul of this lot set made years ago.



I've already wrangled them out of the old, dat-packed plugins files so now it's a matter of stripping them bare and re-lotting, which in turn requires a bunch of new overlay textures. And speaking of textures, I'm also slowly making progress on the cobble stone road front. I decided on a more simple approach for the diagonal and far street intersections.


Yeah, might need to town down the gradients a bit.

Besides being more convenient to make, I figured it'd also be quite impractical to have the cobble stones running up small side streets in real life situations. Actually realized this recently when the streets in my neighborhood were being repaved (with red herring brick obviously), funny how the mind works like that.




While I was rummaging through the archives looking for the above mentioned lot set, I also came the flash map I made for the first year anniversary of this MD (here). As wonky as it is, it was really fun to make. Moreover, it got me thinking about the presentation of our cities in general.

Whether it's in images or a video, the presentation is always a 'static' experience for the viewer at home. Sure, one can make mosaics to showcase a city in greater detail, and one can even make huge mosaics to show all the rotations, as for example Zack did in this update of his excellent MD.

However, the larger the mosaic, the clumsier it gets to navigate. Wouldn't it be nice if you could actually roam a city online, in similar fashion as you would ingame? If you could share your city in such a way the viewers are able to move around, rotate the view and zoom in and out as they please?

Well, I thought that'd be pretty neat, and thus present you: SC4Viewer. Note: you may need to enable Javascript in your web browser in order for it to work properly.

Navigating is pretty straightforward:

• Hold the left mouse button and move the mouse to move.
• Use the mouse scroll wheel to zoom in and out. Aternatively use the up and down arrow keys to zoom in and out.
• Use the left and right arrow keys to rotate the view.
• Hit the space bar to reset the zoom and bring the image back to centre.

Obviously it's still in alpha, a demo version, work in progress, whatever you want to call it. Point is I've only tested it on my own Windows pc using Chrome and Firefox. Other web browsers and/or different OS may yield unpredictable behavior. Please let me know if you encounter anything strange (e.g. city getting stuck in the corner, slowly spiraling away from the focal point when rotating) and include the operating system and web browser you used.

Also excuse my crappy sandbox city btw (which was an experiment to get a stable R$$ population, for those curious). For development I used city tile pictures because they were easy to align and thus work out the horizontal and vertical translation that needed to happen to emulate the rotation.

However, the same principle should apply to a limited area as well, provided the four images have the same dimensions, and more importantly have the exact same centre point. This has yet to be tested though. . 

Anyway, this has been quite a fun project so far and personally, I see all sorts of potential in it. I'm curious to learn what you think of it.




Another new and note worthy project I've been working on requires less of an introduction.



Yes, those are draggable wide curves for SAM. As of yet Ive done most, if not all, of the basic RUL for SAM2, adding a diagonal roundabout tile and the large corner cul-de-sac as well. I've also done a significant portion of tight road situations, however, the RUL for other networks still need to be covered.

Once that's done the RUL needs to be ported over to the other SAM sets, which essentially boils down to writing a 'search-and-replace' script. And obviously the corresponding textures need to be created as well. So all things considered, there's still a fair amount of work ahead, though large parts of it can be batch processed. 

Moving on still. Indeed, the fact I hardly touched the region this year doesn't mean I've been sitting idle. 




As some may have already noticed I finally starting BATting as well. It started modest with something I felt couldn't be missing from my region, namely peat extraction. For centuries peat has been an important source of fuel, and seeing the large moors in Ærden, it just felt wrong to turn them all into crop fields. So I wanted to model some stuff for peat farm fields:



The little stacks were quite easy in terms of modelling, the large pile on the other hand challenged me quite a bit, however easy it may seem for you experienced batters out there.


First take. Simply arrange the small objects into a circle and start stacking them one by one manually. Four layers in I realized this was going to be incredibly tedious. .


Take two. Make a cone and extrude the gaps inwards. Result is somewhat okay, however, the individual slabs are not as square as I'd like them to be. In addition I unwrapped the whole thing to great satisfaction and then applied a displacement modifier. . yeah, that screwed the unwrapping over badly. Lesson learned: collapse the unwrapping before moving on.


Take three. Start with a 8 sided cone, extrude faces outwards, unwrapped the individual slabs, collapsed the stack. Next I applied array, twist and bend modifiers. This turned out quite all right, and moreover, it was really fast in terms of modelling and rendering!

A more challenging aspect of the peat project are the actual excavation ditches, since these will need to be below the ground plane.



To counteract the obvious gaps I simply enlarged the model so they would overlap, which seemed to work quite well.



So, I also though it'd be nice if the side areas blend into the underlying terrain texture, the same way Diggis' grass ponds do. However, that turned into a major disappointment.


Meh. 

Any tips and pointers how to handle underground LODs and transparency are greatly appreciated.

And I actually have one, far more pressing issue for the experienced BATters reading along: is there a way to batch render objects/layers/scenes?

There must be, because I've read multiple people alluding to it, mentioning they were letting the pc batch render while they were at work, or during the night. However, I've not been able to get a clear idea how to go about doing so. And since I want to make functional IR peat farm fields eventually, I'll have to make quite a number of variations and it's clear rendering them all manually will get really tedious, really fast.

For now I really quite enjoy exploring 3DSmax options though, and learning how to think in 3D, so to speak. The next BAT I made is another thing which I long wanted to have, namely a dovecote.

Again for centuries, pigeons were an important source of food and manure, and kept by the hundreds, if not thousands. They were so important, keeping pigeons was actually subject to law, or rather a privilege to be granted. As such dovecotes are typically found around monasteries, castles and manors - not for the common folk! (The peasants actually disliked the pigeons, especially during sowing season as birds eat seeds, and protested the pigeon privilege on numerous occasions. And yes, I'm paraphrasing wikipedia but I thought it was a fun fact).

Consequently, dovecotes vary widely in size and shape. There's no such thing as a prototypical dovecote, though the one I picked to model might come close. 



Initially I choose it because it seemed easy to model in terms of geometry, but then it turned out to be a real existing dovecote and I proceeded to find more reference images. 



It's located on a large manor, and also note the church in the background. The manor house and church were typically near each other, yet located at the edge of, or even outside, the village. But enough with the history lessons, here's my take on it.



The roof and wall textures are my own, however, they're are too clean and crisp to my taste. The same goes for the overall geometry, the perfect circular roof especially. I've since uncovered ways to address all this, and given I only had the faintest idea what I was doing anyway I might just redo it from the ground up one more time. Third time is a charm after all. 

Yay, you made it so far, all 1689 words of it – and I'm only half way done!

Nah, kidding. This is it for today. Note to self: do not let so much time pass in between updates.

Thanks for reading!

I'm a silent follower of your project! Very inspiring

Thanks, that means a lot coming from you! 

It just gets better. I love this MD, it's so unique and the attention to detail is marvellous to see.

Thank you! I hope today's lack of detailed pictures has not disappointed too badly. 

I say nothing, cause it's going to became boring with saying "oh" and "ah" every time a picture arrives

Thanks for stopping by, greatly appreciated! 

I love your work, you know that I'm a big fan of your work. I love the history in every update and I really enjoy watching and reading these updates... once again the last update was perfect ! It would be nice if some day we can see the entire walled city from above.

I was wondering about your terrain mod. I guess you've made your own version using different textures, right ?
It is possible share with us (or at least with me  ) your terrain mod ? I think it could fits perfectly with my region...

Bedankt mijn vriend en groetjes 

Thank you Jonathan! I completely forgot about your inquiry until just now, but yes I made a few modifications to the SV terrain mod. I'll get in touch tomorrow.

MMP details really catch me here... Never realize that SC4 can actually do medieval era european stuffs..

oh also is that dirt road actually a road or an MMP?

Thanks! SC4 can do anything we imagine! The dirt roads are functional indeed.