H3SW: General Graphics discussion

Some quick thoughts about all the creatures in the lineups.

Knight - Crossbowman is the perfect choice. Fits the game and the faction, hopefully will provide some advantage to the Knight as a class. My only suggestion would be to rename Marksman to Arbalester, which is slightly more fitting, but still very generic. But that's just my 5 cents. Visually, I am impressed with the final result! Great job! Still wish there would be some upgrade to the Peasant, e.g. Militia =)

Sorceress - fawn looks really fitting in this town and the design is quite cool! My only idea would be to add an upgrade Fawn -> Satyr, changing the fur and hair colour from Brown to White, thus making it look even more fitting with the Unicorn, but that is optional.

Wizard - already shared my ideas. Gnome might be okay, but he should look different from the Mage and the Dwarf.

Barbarian - Harpy is cool, even the older one. The new one is great as well, just needs to be slightly more threatening, less pixie like. But it fits the castle well.

Necromancer - Black knight is awesome and looks great, even has some goofiness of the original line up, so definitely a good choice. I only hope that it can be balanced so that Vampires remain badass, but not too OP, they are one of my favs in HoMM 2.

Warlock - this choice is the most questionable in my opinion. No, in terms of gameplay and lore, it fits well, but in terms of style, it's a huge miss. Cacodemon would be more at home with the Heretic. Beholders fit the HoMM 3 so well, because overall style of the warlock was dark and perverted, while in HoMM 2 Warlock seems much more noble. To me, Warlock just screams of Faust and German poetry, romanticism and challenging gods and nature with your own strength. Its creatures are all noble and beautiful, even the Hydra. Beholder either needs a really big redesign or maybe some alternative, but that's again only IMHO

Still, overall - great progress guys! Thank you, SW team, for all the stuff you create!

An update of the both Crossbowmen. Seems okay to me.

They both look really awesome! Even though the upgrade is kinda breaking the pattern from the classic, where nothing much changed, except for the colours. But I think it is for the best in this particular case, adds some variety. Both look really slick!

Though I personally wouldn't mind if some of the upgrades in the mod were simple recolours. I mean, it's already in the game and often. Having some "boring" recolour upgrades will definitely help to maintain the spirit of the old game, where it didn't have to be too creative with its creatures.

Heroes 2 already have Zombie Mutants which allows us some freedom. Moreover, Knight troops are less likely to receive recolored upgrades simply because they are not recolored even in classics.

Yet, in the general case - yes, upgrades with little amount of new elements are intended.

NikitaTheTanner wrote:

Warlock - this choice is the most questionable in my opinion. No, in terms of gameplay and lore, it fits well, but in terms of style, it's a huge miss. Cacodemon would be more at home with the Heretic. Beholders fit the HoMM 3 so well, because overall style of the warlock was dark and perverted, while in HoMM 2 Warlock seems much more noble. To me, Warlock just screams of Faust and German poetry, romanticism and challenging gods and nature with your own strength. Its creatures are all noble and beautiful, even the Hydra. Beholder either needs a really big redesign or maybe some alternative, but that's again only IMHO

Still, overall - great progress guys! Thank you, SW team, for all the stuff you create!

This. Also great progress on the harpy - nice to see how it 'evolves', it could look more threateting, as other members say though. but it really looks professionel

NikitaTheTanner wrote:

Some quick thoughts about all the creatures in the lineups.

Warlock - this choice is the most questionable in my opinion. No, in terms of gameplay and lore, it fits well, but in terms of style, it's a huge miss. Cacodemon would be more at home with the Heretic. Beholders fit the HoMM 3 so well, because overall style of the warlock was dark and perverted, while in HoMM 2 Warlock seems much more noble. To me, Warlock just screams of Faust and German poetry, romanticism and challenging gods and nature with your own strength. Its creatures are all noble and beautiful, even the Hydra. Beholder either needs a really big redesign or maybe some alternative, but that's again only IMHO

I agree with this assessment of H2 and H3 Warlock.

Just started animating crossbowman:

That will be enough for v0.8 beta, nice work. Now we need only Death and Shoot animations.
I don't speak about polishment because the static concept of the Crossbowman was not final (unlike Upg. Crossbowman which is much closer to completion). Upg. Crossbowman can be animated freely.

A final improvement of the Harpy.



In fact, the Harpy was already complete when Docent Picolan suggested that variant for 2nd level. The only required fixes were the slight adjustment of the wings and general increase in size so it won't look as weak. It didn't need to be a hybrid of old Harpy (looking like a female pro bodybuilder with lots of dirty pixels) and the new feminine one, it just needed a careful fix.

I admit that I also could fix the testosteroned variant, but I would waste a lot more hours on it with a questionable result. For now, the Harpy seems to be balanced enough, with its size being in an acceptable range of level 3-4 special fighter (not tank, like the Iron Golem, or shooter, like the Crossbowman).



Barbarian lineup:

Spoiler:

Harpy in H2 bestiary:

Spoiler:

The Faction Lineups and the Creature Animation threads are updated accordingly.

Current situation with the Dervish lineup.



In desperation after fruitless efforts of sorting things out with the Scorpion, I decided to try another idea for the Dervish using the draft of the Manticore by Docent Picolan. I was not successful in adding the tail because the creature already looked complete. The suggested attack option will be the poking style (somewhat similar to a Zombie) with the possible employment of teeth, or a lazy punch with a claw.

With the increased weight of black color the lineup gained much more uniformity. The upgraded line already seems to be looking much more harmonic, yet still I'm confused with Medusa and Genie, who were never designed to be in the same faction.

I don't know a possible solution to this without changing the colors of canonical creatures (Nomad, Medusa, Genie). Everything draws me toward this decision someday, because from the point of design, mixing all H2 neutrals together could never be a perfect idea.
So that, my suggestion is to leave things like this for v0.8 beta, and wait for the people's impressions.

x2:

Orzie wrote:

Current situation with the Dervish lineup.
I don't know a possible solution to this without changing the colors of canonical creatures (Nomad, Medusa, Genie).

You can always mount upgraded Nomad (Raider/Налётчик) on a black stallion for gaining yet much more uniformity.

Still, that doesn't solve that problem in case of un-upgraded lineup.
An upgrade for the Nomad, called something like Raider, is possible in future, however.

Besides, too much black will create an impression of a regular army, which is unlikely because this cliche is used for the Knight. It's good to have balance.

The harpy is still too small imo. Wings enlarge her, but they seem like glued on, dont quite fit for me. So I dont like the result. (Colors of the feathers and fur(?) also dont match)

I can try to modify the manticore to fit better. About other neutrals.. My solution is to make acolyte belt green to fix medusa problem and to make upgraded genie a bit more green (like in my draft).
Or just make normal genie with a shade of blue more close to the nomad's details..

Quick look:

Slight changes, like the colour of the Genie, for example, are not so bad really! So, overall I like Ragoons' ideas. Glad to see possible presence of Manticore, but sad to see the Scorpion go away. Maybe the tail can be brought back if the Manticore is reworked somewhat? Just my 5 cents.

In terms of design, I have bigger gripes with Thieves and Rogues looking so Medieval European, when everything else has some sorta Oriental feel to it. Maybe the hood can be changed to a turban for the upgrade? Or something like that, not the same as the Acolyte. Colour wise it fits well, but not theme wise, at least not visually.

P.S. Yeah, the Harpy is still scrawny IMHO. Maybe I am wrong, but she doesn't feel as strong as other 4 level units. Probably level 3 is more like it. I actually really liked the new buff version by Ragoon, since it looked really powerful and unique. Even though I understand the desire to have pretty girls in the roster.

Sadly, NikitaTheTanner - we cant make new design too much diferent from original one.
Possible solution is that they arrive the dervish city in carts. Other is very slight change in design, little inspired by assasins creed:

IMG:

What I changed is I made boots more spiky, more desert and a little longer chest piece.
It is really the only thing we can do about it, double, because it is animated already too (boots and chest piece is easy to add there).

Ragoon wrote:

The harpy is still too small imo. Wings enlarge her, but they seem like glued on, dont quite fit for me. So I dont like the result. (Colors of the feathers and fur(?) also dont match)

Another fix coming a little later then. The wings were colored to satisfy the Troll's clothing.

Ragoon wrote:

About other neutrals.. My solution is to make acolyte belt green to fix medusa problem and to make upgraded genie a bit more green (like in my draft).
Or just make normal genie with a shade of blue more close to the nomad's details..

Green is not good at all. A much simple and convenient decision is to make the Medusa brown from the very start, with some possible adjustments over the Medusa Queen concept.
The Genie can be recolored to the gamma you suggest, to satisfy the weapon color (light blue). If we are to change the Medusa, the Genie fix can also go well.
The upgrade for the Genie is not required for v0.8 and probably won't be required ever.

Ragoon wrote:

What I changed is I made boots more spiky, more desert and a little longer chest piece.
It is really the only thing we can do about it, double, because it is animated already too (boots and chest piece is easy to add there).

Yeah, that fix can possibly go well.

NikitaTheTanner wrote:

I actually really liked the new buff version by Ragoon, since it looked really powerful and unique.

The v3 Harpy was generally a frankenstein between v1 and v2, with lots of dirty pixels to fix (in comparison with generally clean v2, which was also posted by Ragoon). I suggest being patient and wait for the next iteration from me.
I don't trust v1 Harpy because it originates from the times of Mister Kalu and may have been very well taken from another game. Pretty looks play a secondary role here, yet I must especially point out that Heroes 2 doesn't have generally ugly bulky creatures (unlike Heroes 1).


P.S. Ragoon, ideas for the Manticore are very welcome. You can find the PSD with the lineup in Dropbox.

V1 harpy XD



Orzie, I'll make medusa and queen too.

I've made all lineups/buyable monsters at one place so one could compare/check them better, hope it will be useful for everyone

Very nice! It gives a great overview of our creatures. Great job

Amazing stuff Ragoon! Very clean and it's fun to see every creatures in one place. Hope you can add the upgrades when u have the time just do Lv 1 Up 1, Lvl 2 Up 2....if you wish of course...

Some thoughts:

1)At first I didn't like it, but now I think it's cool that not all units have upgrades. It gives them some personality. The humans are all based on technology, so it make sense that each of them can get better armor, anyway I wish you guys will leave creatures without upgrades...

2)My 3 favorite creatures must be : The tree, the anubis dude, and the death knight. Many units look so good you can't tell the difference.

3) I would switch the lich and the death knight. Or you could do something clever and make them similar in strenght and also in growth ( that would be a cool twist). So instead of having a strong lvl 7 unit, weaker lvl 6 and even weaker lvl 5 you could ballance all 3. Make the dragon a little weaker but boost the other 2 while increasing stats and matching their growth. Is it too radical ?

4)The dervish lineup is very appropriate! Very good balance of creatures!

5)Most new creatures fit right in with the others...but I don't like the satyr. For the sorceres town it doesn't fit...at least I would love to see an animal instead. Something magical but not humanoid...

Ragoon wrote:

I've made all lineups/buyable monsters at one place so one could compare/check them better, hope it will be useful for everyone

Great job! It's even useful for our social media, finally. I'll make minor improvements and prepare the posts.

It's okay that some creatures may be changed in future. Heroes 2 development history also keeps many promo screenshots with outdated content; it just shows the progress and the difference with the release version may also draw some hardcore fans' interest.

So here is what we have for the Harpy.



To be honest, I don't want to change its geometry further, to prevent distortion in body proportions (such elements like the breast are easily ruined upon the extension of the body). All what is possibly left is the color transitions, but it's already in an excellent shape for animation.

Final version of the Lizardman for the beta, if no one has objections. There are still some spots which can be improved, but it's not necessary for the release.

No objections here - he looks great

Simply Amazing. I especially love the new medusa and genies.