Deco Fireplaces and Chimneys!

What would be really cool is a ventilation hood that could attach to the ceiling in my basement.

 

@Scottie

Well it's nice to see an old school builder. I went through the "new" generations training when I was getting my Bachelor's in Game Design and everyone hated the fact that I used a mouse over a tablet for my art. So I understand where you are coming from when you say your Old School. Mind you I sucked it up and bought the 22 inch Cintiq, helped speed up my flow. Typically I will start with concept, then move into z brush, use zspheres and dynamesh to get exactly what I'm looking for before sculpting. Qremesh to reduce the polygons and keep the detail, then build a low poly over it. Sometimes vertice by vertice in Z brush, or export to 3ds to build over. Either way I am in 3ds a lot using the "Suturing" method. The mapping that you can export from Z brush isn't horrible, but it does require manual adjustments so Photoshop is my next best friend. Do you ever adjust the map and model as you go? That tends to be my favorite practice, lets me make things seamless when it is a realistic art style.

I love the toon coloring style of wizard 101 and a lot of the models are pleasant to look at. I am very surprised that it's only down to you few to make all the assets and characters but the artwork and models so far are great. I would love to get my hands in this and make a slew of vibrant pieces/ areas for the game. I am hoping that you guys get to focus on more of the plant life, basic world assets and creatures. Give it all some "sprucing" up. XD.

""For reference I would like to see more of a lighting/ coloring scheme similar to Enslaved Odyssey to The West. Just so everyone knows where I'm coming form when I talk about colors or vibrancy.

 

I know.You want to film yourself sitting on the rug drinking a cup of hot chocolate. ....Right!!!

 

Chimneys - made from stone and "wood"??
(Btw. the German word for chimney contains already the word stone - Schorn"stein" - as the material from which it had to be made in the past.)

And again we have these endless item name chains, which nobody can translate in an at least stylish way, because they are already longer than some sentences.

So for
Stone & Wood Chimney Floor Extension
I am forced to translate to something like
Große kunstvolle Schornsteinetagenerweiterung aus Stein und Holz
or even longer in single words (the long word is just a chained connection of chimney, floor, extension and does not exist in reality), which is plain and simply unusable in my eyes.
The same as with so many other items.
Why do the designers of such great graphics for the items jump to technocratic, if it comes to name those items? Where is your fantasy? Do you think players like these names, which do not even fit into the list view of the bank or a container?

*Salute*
Olahorand
The Rebel Duke

 

I would personally love to see that happen, but unfortunately, I was also involved in the decision to put those kind of submissions on hold until we could create an "offsite submission pipeline" that actually let us receive assets that we could incorporate in less time than it would take us to make it from scratch ourselves... The main problem was that the tools and process we had to let folks submit, let us test, comment, and approve, and then let us try to turn them into use-able assets for our project,...weren't robust enough to really streamline the process enough to make accepting, critiquing, and approving assets actually feasible from a time/resources-used perspective... We could see what needed to be done, but were (and still are) stuck in a mode of not having the resources needed to get those tools (and the pipeline process in general) massaged enough to make it a winning proposition...

This made me sad because it was really cool to see the stuff the folks in the community were willing and able to create, but in the end, I had to agree that we just weren't set up to handle that process effectively with the tools we have, the headcount we have, and the time we have...

Scottie ^_^

 

Heh! This is all so true! ^_^ But I can say that, since these things come in sets of six different pieces for one "type" of chimney set, we've got to come up with some nomenclature to distinguish one piece from another within the same set, while simultaneously distinguishing ALL those pieces from a different set of six similar pieces... Add to that the fact that the name should signify, to some extent, what each piece "does" (is used for in the set), which tends to make it even more complex... Last (but not least) when these pieces are named to go into inventory, Richard insists we name them in a way that is both functionally clear AND that sounds somewhat "normal" if NPCs need to use it in their conversations...

It's not an easy problem to solve, I assure you! ^_^

Scottie ^_^

 

Oh yes,...I purchased one of the very first 19" Cintiqs when they first came out, right off the display table from the Siggraph held in San Antonio in 2002... I simply couldn't use a Wacom Pad (something about the separation between my hand and the drawn line)..so I was desperately waiting for a touch-sensitive monitor... When I finally saw one appear, I snatched it up immediately... Back then it cost me $4, 300.00 of my own money !!!! (Origin felt it was too "experimental " to cover those costs at that time)... Worth every penny to me...

Indeed! Little adjustments here and there,...back and forth...

Our general color palette "vibrancy" is somewhat constrained by the fact that many of our assets need to be purchased online, from repositories of "generic" fantasy offered through the Unity Store and other such places... As such, to avoid too much re-working of assets, we've chosen not to try for a degree of saturation that would take us too far outside those boundaries in most cases...

Scottie ^_^

 

Alright! I was finally able to get the last of the assets for this current round of fireplace sets! As I mentioned earlier, we have two sets you can craft for yourself (Stone Fireplace and Wood and Stone Fireplace) which are both more rustic, crudely-made, and slightly more diminutive looking compared to the rest,...and then we have six more sets composed of a large and average size of each "style" (ornate stone, ornate wood and stone, and ornate cast iron. Like the great hearths in the game, each has their own set of fire and sound effects that you can turn on and of, and each has numerous surface areas that are horizontal and can accept having other deco objects placed on top of them. Here are all the sets laid out for your enjoyment!


And here's a quick close-up of both large and small sets of the ornate cast iron fireplace and chimneys! The biggest difference between these and the others is that they are more elaborate looking and filled with the fine details expected from ornamental cast iron work, but lack the smaller shelves found on the square chimney configurations (though there's extra shelf space on the main chimney segments that fit on top of the hearth).


Placing the larger, more elaborate "ornate" styles inside of smaller house spaces (such as those found in the row houses and individual cottages) show off how they've been made to match carefully to the ceiling in most cases. And though the larger ones certainly make the room quite close and cozy, standing beside one of these things really lets you admire the details and height of the mantel. Of course, if you'd rather have more floor space, the smaller ones will be available too!

When I shoved both of these in this room so you could compare and contrast the styles, there was a thunder storm raging outside... Below you can see, aided by a sudden flash of lightning, these same two styles using the "angled" chimney configuration instead, to make it appear as if the chimney recede back into the wall... Using the additional extension pieces of any chimney set, you could easily make it appear as if the chimneys are built on the outside of the house to continue this illusion!



As I demonstrated in an earlier post, any of these styles will come with extension pieces that allow you to build you chimneys from floor to floor. In the image below you can see the average height floor extension for both of the styles shown above. There are slightly taller version of these as well for every set, that will fit a bit better in houses with higher floor-to-ceiling height in some larger houses. Again, because not all houses are made with exactly the same height measurements, you'll find that there will be occasions where the pieces won't seem to fit perfectly,...but for the most part, these pieces work fairly well in many circumstances.



In the initial post I showed the most rustic stone fireplace set being used in-game as deco, so I figured I'd show you all the rest, now that they've been hooked up masterfully by Rick! The three styles on the left are the ones for purchase (and these aren't even the largest size of them!), and the slightly smaller one on the right is the second type of in-game craft-able one (wood and stone) Seeing them all side by side all nice and functional warms my heart. You can even see how the iron grate for the ornate cast iron version causes the fire to cast cool looking light patterns on the floor!


Well,...that's all on these for now... We may end up making extra styles, sets, and additional props related to these later on... I hope you guys find these as fun as I do!

Scottie ^_^

 

I want me a crafted fireplace! When will these be out in game and / or store?

 

LOVE this! Now we just need Christmas stockings!

 

Amazing work, Scottie! I definitely want to get my hands on these!

Love the iron fireplaces. The top piece would work for a "hood" for my smelting and blacksmithing stations, if it can be hung without the fireplace (or on top of some other stand). I'll have to play round with this once they become available.

Thanks for all the awesome work!

 

They will be in our next build so that our QA folks can test them, and then (if all goes well) they'll hopefully become available to the public for crafting and for sale in time for our next release (R34)!

Scottie ^_^

 

That's a super cool idea!!! I'll present this to them as a possibility! Imagine if it was something that you could set on top of the very edge of a table or mantel (like a nail is nailed in the top) allowing it to look like it "hangs down" in front of it,... and THEN imagine that it would act like a bag container that you could fill with in-game goodies for your friends to take if you invited them over to your house during the holidays!! There could even be several different styles and colors!!! I LOVE it!!!! ^_^

 

Awesome, I'm so looking forward to this!

 

I been pushing for Stocking for years! Hope it happens this year!

 

Yes Yes!! AND if it is hung up over the Holiday's perhaps Santa British might find his way to dropping a reward in it on xmas day...or New Brittany Day...or what have you.

 

Or chunks of coal! ... I jest of course - although I'm sure some crafters out there would enjoy having a jet black (or grinch green) stocking stuffed with it. Great idea on the stockings Selene.

 

Is there a vendor on QA that has the recipes for craftable chimneys?

 

i got them in owl's head

 

Where? I looked and only found the fireplaces.