Aldarisvet's sprite whitesmith

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Aldarisvet
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Aldarisvet's sprite whitesmith

Post by Aldarisvet »

Hi everybody.
Let me present here some sprites made by me.
Well, actually these are sprites from my campaign and I post this for creating some interest to my campaign, because I just released part 2 of it with 5 new scenarios.

1st line:
Level 1 khalifate skirmisher called Zarif, upgrades to Monawish and futher. For part 1 of campaign.

2nd line:
Level 2 and 3 khalifate skirmishers. For part 2 of campaign. Called Quickblade and Flashblade, reflects fact that khalifate hero was assimilated by Wesnothian culture to the moment of part 2.

3rd line:
Fully animated saurian unit called Visionnaire with teleportation ability, 4-7 range attacks and without melee attacks. Totally 61 pictures, here I put just 4.

4rd line:
Level 2 and 3 female hero with healing ability, lightbeam and magic sword. Called Healer Battlemage and White Battlemage. For part 2 of campaign.

5rd line:
Level 2 and 3 main hero with ice blast, shadow blast and and magic sword. Called Battlemage and Shadow Battlemage. For part 2 of campaign.
Attachments
zarif.png
zarif.png (18.6 KiB) Viewed 10038 times
Last edited by Aldarisvet on October 1st, 2015, 10:46 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Midnight_Carnival
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Re: Aldarisvet's sprite whitesmith

Post by Midnight_Carnival »

Ok, your humans all look ok to me, some of them quite good in fact.

Your Saurian is the one who interests me the most.
He is a quite a powerful unit but he looks like a very basic one. Higher level Saurians normally have that trademark lizard-bling. Perhaps if you already have all the animation it would be too much trouble to redraw them all, but I personally feel that your Saurian looks a bit too simple and a bit too much like a mainline unit. Perhaps adding a halo or aura effect to the unit would help, then you wouldn't need to change any of the animations ;)
...apparenly we can't go with it or something.
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Aldarisvet
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Re: Aldarisvet's sprite whitesmith

Post by Aldarisvet »

Midnight_Carnival wrote:Ok, your humans all look ok to me, some of them quite good in fact.

Your Saurian is the one who interests me the most.
He is a quite a powerful unit but he looks like a very basic one. Higher level Saurians normally have that trademark lizard-bling. Perhaps if you already have all the animation it would be too much trouble to redraw them all, but I personally feel that your Saurian looks a bit too simple and a bit too much like a mainline unit. Perhaps adding a halo or aura effect to the unit would help, then you wouldn't need to change any of the animations ;)
Thank you much for you interest to my sprites!
I call units created by this style - 'half-custom' units. They are deliberately based on sprites of mainline units. For me canonical 'half-custom' unit is a main hero from mainlaine campaign 'Descent into Darkness'. At first level he have a body of an ordinary level1 mage, but head/hair from other unit and a sword in hand. At level2-3 he have a body of necromancer and same head and sword. I am not an artist to create something original and also I do not want go far from core wesnothian style. So this is the way to create units sprites for me. If this way is used in mainline, I think I could use the same method.

About that saurian. Well, it is based on level1 Saurian Augur, just with crest on the head from Saurian Soothsayer and with stone instead of staff. I use this unit only in one scenario of my campaign in which Silver Mage temprorary grants (by storyline) these enemy saurians ability to teleport, guiding the process of their teleportation. So this is not intendend to be permanent real saurian unit. I know that in Wesnoth only Silver mages can teleport. I just wanted to see how AI will play using lot of units with teleportation ability. That is quite fun, I like the result. It is all about tactics, finally.
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Midnight_Carnival
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Re: Aldarisvet's sprite whitesmith

Post by Midnight_Carnival »

:)
I went the opposite route and started making stuff so different from the cannonical Wesnoth style that it would have only worked in a umc in which I did all the art. People hated it.

Anyway, if that was your intention then go for it, you do it very well.
Can I suggest you look into making female and different skin toned versions of regular mainline units perhaps? When/if you have time of course.
...apparenly we can't go with it or something.
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Aldarisvet
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Re: Aldarisvet's sprite whitesmith

Post by Aldarisvet »

Well, I have a quite practical approach in question what sprites I need to create.
First of all I want my scenarios to be untypical and original from tactical point of view. For example, the map of one of my scenarios looks like an ocean of forest with occasional clearings of grass. And you with a group of mages have to fight here versus Woses. Imagine it? Often slow in standart maps, woses are much faster here than mages, who can move through forest 2-3 cells per turn, whenever Woses can move 4 cells. And more important, Woses are invisible in forest :lol: So this is a quite original challenge, because you even dont know where is your enemy. Have to strictly hold line to survive, of course. After you have some tactical Idea, it needed to be linked with storyline. For example, if tactics concerns some special ability of your hero, you have to explain, why this hero got that special ability. Only after this you can start creating sprite. For example, In Chapter I of my campaign main hero is a just a peasant with a necromancer staff. Well, the whole storyline of my campaign is about that staff, but creating such sprite was quite easy. Only I had to create the topping of staff for level 0 of my hero, the toppings for level1-2 where simply taken from level2-3 mainline necromancer.

I can show now a bit more sprites I created for some heroes in Chapter III. I think I have original system with heroes in my campaign. Often in campaign you have 1-2 main heroes who are going through all scenarios, from level1 to 5 or more, often with rpg-style upgrade system. So in later levels they are going to be overpowered or have too much different special abilities, or they are simply stop developing. I have totally other approach. I split my campaign into chapters and in each chapter every hero have totally another unit line, so sprites for this unit changes. For example, in Chapter I elvish hero Gorandor is just an orginary core fighter who can progress either to Marshal or Champion. In Chapter II Gorandor is core Elvish Lord who progress to High Lord. And for Chapter III he would be 'half-custom' level3 unit Rider Lord who progress to level4 Outrider Lord. I just changed head of core Elvish Rider tooking head from Lord. Quite simple, but I like the result. It is understandable that he is the same Gorandor from Chapter II. Same about campaign hero Zaryal. In Chapter I it starts as 'half-custom' level1 khalifate skirmisher of type Zarif who progress to core Monawish and Mighwar types. For chapter 2 I created two original images, he is a skirmisher with magical sword, level 2 and 3. And in chapter 3 he would be mounted too, some frankenstein work with khalifate horsemans, he have level3 and 4 types called Whirlblade and Stormblade, but he have same head so it is understandable that he is same Zaryal from previous chapters.
gorandor&zaryal.png
gorandor&zaryal.png (14.4 KiB) Viewed 9751 times
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Aldarisvet
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Re: Aldarisvet's sprite whitesmith

Post by Aldarisvet »

Today I am glad to present a new half-custom unit and variations of it.
It is Silver Archmage, level4 Silver mage.
I know that in some UMC campaings they use Golden Mage as level4 for Silver Mage but well... just recolouring is not enough.
Also silver must be still silver.
So:

Male
silver_archmage.png
silver_archmage.png (2.28 KiB) Viewed 9673 times
Female
silver_archmage+female.png
silver_archmage+female.png (2.33 KiB) Viewed 9673 times
Main male hero called Velendar
velendar_silver_archmage.png
velendar_silver_archmage.png (2.66 KiB) Viewed 9673 times
Main female hero called Solaevin
solaevin_silver_archmage.png
solaevin_silver_archmage.png (2.32 KiB) Viewed 9673 times
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Aldarisvet
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Re: Aldarisvet's sprite whitesmith

Post by Aldarisvet »

Some more half-custom units. Hope you will like it. I am sure these could be in demand in UMCs.

Level 0 orc.
level0orc.png
level0orc.png (1.74 KiB) Viewed 9611 times
Never seen someone tried to create level0 orc. This unit could use both sword and bow, but without fire arrows, 4 - 2 melee (blade), 4 - 2 ranged (pierce). Could upgrade to Archer or Grunt. Possibly to call him 'peon'.

Level 0 thief based on Ruffian. Later added defend and attack sprites based on Thief sprites.
level0thief.png
level0thief.png (1.73 KiB) Viewed 9611 times
pilferer-defend.png
pilferer-defend.png (1.53 KiB) Viewed 9227 times
pilferer-attack.png
pilferer-attack.png (1.52 KiB) Viewed 9227 times
Same never seen good level0 thief. This unit would have 2-5 blade attack and 6 moves. No backstab ability. But it will have terrain defence type as other units in thief line. Upgrades to Thief. Possibly to call him 'pilferer'.

Mage-thief
mage-thief.png
mage-thief.png (2.95 KiB) Viewed 9611 times
Well this is a special unit for a new hero. Kinda dual-class. Have 7 - 4 ranged (fire) (magical) and also 7 - 3 melee (blade) (backstab). Also he have a skirmisher and backstab ability, but no poison attack. Of course with all these he is level3 unit.
Last edited by Aldarisvet on November 7th, 2015, 10:54 pm, edited 4 times in total.
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Re: Aldarisvet's sprite whitesmith

Post by Elvish_King »

The orc is quite good and easy to read, I think some add-one already have lvl. 0 orcs but yours is also good.
I like the lvl. 0 thief, I can't remember having seen something like this before but I think a 2-5 attack is somehow strange for somebody who advances to whatsthisnumber-3.
The mage looks ok for a lvl. 1 but for me a lvl. 3 has to be somehow bigger...
I can't say anything about the names because I'm not good in inventing them. :P
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Re: Aldarisvet's sprite whitesmith

Post by ChaosRider »

Elvish_King wrote:I think some add-one already have lvl. 0 orcs but yours is also good.
Orcs faction from MWC (also 0 lvls units)
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Aldarisvet
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Re: Aldarisvet's sprite whitesmith

Post by Aldarisvet »

Elvish_King wrote:The orc is quite good and easy to read, I think some add-one already have lvl. 0 orcs but yours is also good.
I like the lvl. 0 thief, I can't remember having seen something like this before but I think a 2-5 attack is somehow strange for somebody who advances to whatsthisnumber-3.
The mage looks ok for a lvl. 1 but for me a lvl. 3 has to be somehow bigger...
I can't say anything about the names because I'm not good in inventing them. :P
Thank for your attention and feedback. Orc demanded some digging in Wesnoth unit database, I took level1 orc-archer from Wesnoth 1.4, eyes from old level3 Orcish Slurbow from there too. And hand with sword from orcish grunt from 1.2, just decreased it. I like this put-it-all-togehter-and-harmonize work, it suits to my character.
Thief was totally easy - hair from 1.0 Wesnoth thief with head&body from Ruffian, and knife is made from Rogue short-sword just by making it thinner. About 2-5, sorry, I meant 5-2, it could be 3-3, but he is losing backstab ability compared to thief.
And about mage-thief, well, his body based just on level2 Rogue, he cannot look like level 1 unit. But you right, may be he do not look like level3 either. Need more larger body, probably I have to recolor assassins body. Or I better just reduce his attacks, not all heroes should be level 3, why not, if he going to recruit level0 thiefs, he is 2 level higher then them with level2.
ChaosRider wrote:
Elvish_King wrote:I think some add-one already have lvl. 0 orcs but yours is also good.
Orcs faction from MWC (also 0 lvls units)
Yea, it is Sea orc and former Level1 archer from Wesnoth 1.4. Sorry, but it is not good enough for me using old mainline units these ways. I prefer some improvements because I am perfectionist. As I see you are an author of this era so may be you would like to use my sprite, if it is suitable for you of course.
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Re: Aldarisvet's sprite whitesmith

Post by ChaosRider »

Aldarisvet wrote: Yea, it is Sea orc and former Level1 archer from Wesnoth 1.4. Sorry, but it is not good enough for me using old mainline units these ways. I prefer some improvements because I am perfectionist. As I see you are an author of this era so may be you would like to use my sprite, if it is suitable for you of course.
Your perfectionist is using that archer from wesnoth 1.4 which fit now for 0 lvls because all now 1st lvl units are bigger/more wide (and if you still do not know it, then listen that a higher level unit is larger in size than the previous levels - most of units in Wesnoth works this way).

Also there is a lot 0 lvl units in Wesnoth addons, but you wasnt looking. And this your, his, her... lets be clear, only "YOUR" sprite of unit will be only then when you make it in 100% by your self, each pixel, as for now I see you're using parts of bodies of other units which were earlier made by someone else, so it's not only YOUR unit sprite - so I'll be using it even without your permission because I don't need it.

My previous post was made to show your not found any 0 lvls means you haven't tried to find it.

And "peon" hmmm, where I heard it... in Warcraft.
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Aldarisvet
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Re: Aldarisvet's sprite whitesmith

Post by Aldarisvet »

Well, I was looking for units through all campaigns and some eras. So definetely I WAS looking. Sorry I have not seen your era. Actually I thought Ageless Era would be enough. Or I just not remembered. I would definetely remembered any beautiful custom sprite. Still there are really LOT of eras. Strangely you react on it so way as if something wrong not knowing your era. Then, next point. I really do not like when Sea Orc upgrades to Grunt from mainline. First of all because of simple logic - he have legs as of sea unit, how he can became an orcish grunt? Secondly, and most important, because sea orc is old, another style, bad, even awful sprite compared to modern wesnoth sprites. Same about old level1 archer . You mixed bad sprites and good ones and I do not like it. If that makes you angry because I critisized you era this way... Well I am sorry for this but I have my opinion. I just can add that there are lot of awful sprites (mostly bad made frankenstains) inside same Ageless era, for example, but also there are lot of good.
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Aldarisvet
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Re: Aldarisvet's sprite whitesmith

Post by Aldarisvet »

Hi everybody.

Today I am glad to present new frankesntain portrait, based on Doofus's nothern orc Wanderer portrait. Before that I made a sprite for orcish necromancer based on another doofus's nothern orc - Stalker. I needed portrait for it and found that Wanderer portrait is very suitable for my purpurse. Here is a result.

Orc necromancer sprite
orc-necromancer.png
orc-necromancer.png (1.99 KiB) Viewed 9459 times
Orc necromancer portrait
orc-necr-port.png
orc-necr-port.png (238.96 KiB) Viewed 9458 times
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Aldarisvet
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Re: Aldarisvet's sprite whitesmith

Post by Aldarisvet »

I fully animated level0 orc called peon (25 sprites total). Used old animations from 1.4. However, there was no good/suitable animation for melee for 1.4 archer, so I had to do some original work, still it based on xbow melee attack from 1.4.

Range attack animation
ranged.gif
ranged.gif (3.63 KiB) Viewed 9305 times
Melee attack animation
melee.gif
melee.gif (4.15 KiB) Viewed 9305 times
Idle animation
idle.gif
idle.gif (4.46 KiB) Viewed 9305 times
Death animation
death.gif
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Re: Aldarisvet's sprite whitesmith

Post by doofus-01 »

Aldarisvet wrote:Today I am glad to present new frankesntain portrait, based on Doofus's nothern orc Wanderer portrait. Before that I made a sprite for orcish necromancer based on another doofus's nothern orc - Stalker. I needed portrait for it and found that Wanderer portrait is very suitable for my purpurse. Here is a result.
Not quite what I had in mind when I drew that stuff, but if it works for what you need, then cheers!
Aldarisvet wrote: fully animated level0 orc called peon (25 sprites total). Used old animations from 1.4. However, there was no good/suitable animation for melee for 1.4 archer, so I had to do some original work, still it based on xbow melee attack from 1.4.
The attack animation looks a bit odd here, but may be OK in the game (don't get too caught up in making a pretty GIF). If you want to change something, maybe you could make him less flat - give him a butt or second leg?
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