Embx61 Work in progress

[grammycat]

Kristahpher-there is already a hen coop mod available done by Tom Sawyer.  Using it with kid's fence from the Work Place mod will give you the effect you want.
http://www.banishedventures.com/chickencoop/

[Maldrick]

Looking great @embx61 !

Very excited for all of this.

[QueryEverything]

@embx61 these look amazingly good! 

Will the woodcutters have up to 3 enabled in the code please?  It's rather silly not have the 3 stumps being used

[embx61]

Thanks all

@QueryEverything

Yes, the woodcutter can have up to three workers. Paeng asked for this too a couple of posts ago

@Paeng The Hunter lodge going to be a bit smaller.

If the set is done, hunter, gatherer, tailor, blacksmith, and tavern still to do I will see if I can make another trader.

I have 5 traders so far so designing a another look one I can leave two with that little pasture and move 3 in another design as those traders not bring animals anyway.

[Abandoned]

@embx61 I was wondering if you were still considering changing the name, removing "small" from the village name.  I always think of Discrepancy DS Small Village, it is too similar and your mod and buildings are not really small 

[embx61]

Well, with small I did not intent it to be that the buildings are small but the amount of buildings was small

But with quite a few added I will remove small from the PKM file with the next update.

[embx61]

Hunting Cabin is done besides the build stages and AO mapping

Footprint 5x6 (Vanilla 8x6) so quite a bit smaller.

Next going to be the Gatherer.

[Kristahfer]

@grammycat I thought I had mentioned Tom Sawyers Chicken Coop in the post. Although I did mention it in the text for the Rabbit Hutch, which may have been confusing.

[grammycat]

You did-my apologies.  I replied without reading the rabbit part.

[embx61]

Hunter Cabin, Forester Lodge, Gatherers Hut, Fishing Dock, Wood Cutter are done.
Build stages and AO mapping all done

I compiled them together with the rest as I wanted to see the size of the PKM.

All so far with only the Herbalist, Tailor, Blacksmith and Tavern to go the size is only just under 23 Megabytes

Using only 4 1024x1024 and 2 512x512 textures and 2 footprint textures for sure brings size down a lot.
All the buildings are optimized too. No building has more then 2000 polygons except the Market and Trading post and some are even below 1000.

Footprint of the market is now a paved footprint. It is still just the footprint texture so can be overlaid by roads and ghosted pieces.
All the other footprints going to be very small and most of it will be just transparent with a bit of brown in the middle so players can find the footprints.

I am not good with footprints and most get covered up anyway as the houses are build. Now the outside parts will be just as the game ground texture.
Lots of players fill in the spots with roads *Where possible) and ghosted tile pieces anyway.

Still plan later to add a matching bridge and pasture building as well.


Now the dilemma. Should I just compile it all together in one Mod or still split the production from the other set?
I had planned to do this because I did not want the mod to become too big but as it turns out with even when the last 4 buildings are added it will stay below 30 Megabytes.

Making another set I have to copy all the textures and references but the game will only load one of each as the names are the same so performance wise it will not be different as it not add to draw calls when loading both sets.

Another option is to make it a themed set under a special themed button with the services, houses, storage, food, resources bars under it.
All will be in one place under one button by clicking Community ==> EB Mods ===> Themed Village ===> The toolbar with all the stuff like storage, food, housing, resources, services, etc. with the buildings on those toolbar what fits their purpose.

Let me hear your opinions about the toolbar.
I not planning to do multiple toolbar sets. We have to choose one and stick with it. I am also not plan to lift separate parts out of the mod.
The mod(s) is/are small enough so I see no valid reason the player can not just load the whole thing even when he/she only want to play with one or two pieces out of the set.

So the questions: split the set or not. A themed toolbar or not?

[kid1293]

no split - themed

It may be large but it belongs together.
Definitely themed, same reason.

[embx61]

Thanks Kid.

It does make sense to do a themed set.

The set is still rather small and then all is together under one Themed button.
1 extra click then as it is now for the players is not to much to ask for I think

The benefit will be that all the matching buildings are under one main button under the EB Community toolbar.

Yeah, to do a split is a bit over the top considering the size of the mod (30Megs or even under)
I know I said I would do a split but I did not know then that the Mod would still rather be small considering how much it contains.

just under 23 megs for 19 buildings so far is pretty good if I may say so myself

Working now on a Herbalist I will leave some planting boxes empty so players can put themselves some deco in there
They are rather low so it should not be a problem with height unless the use a rather flat deco piece.

After the Herbalist is done I will do a update.

Because I was able to combine two textures into one, what is always a good thing for performance and changed some footprints it will probably NOT be save compatible unless all buildings build are deleted first. Sorry about that but I will do all I can to increase performance as not every player have a beast of a laptop/PC.

But when I add the 3 remaining buildings some later it should be save compatible as I see no way to combine more textures and do not temper with the footprints again

[Paeng]

So the questions: split the set or not. A themed toolbar or not?

With the size at ~30 Mb a themed set will be fine - if it stays at that 

The "danger" I see is that often those sets will be updated, amended, overhauled - next you look they are 50, than 90, 120 Mb... and become unwieldy, or even bloated.

I know it's a thin line between "useful" and "bloat", as are the different expectations of devs and players - players always want to load up as much diversity as possible, but may be forced to make tough choices (or cuts) when the individual packs become bigger and bigger.

I still feel that a themed set should be kept basic, at a reasonable size.
Later addons, decorations and stuff can always be released as standalone, optional items... which then makes them also usable across other mods, even without the base set...

[Maldrick]

For what it's worth, I think you are approaching this in exactly the correct way.  We have a great many amazing mods available that do amazing and extensive things, but there really aren't any (besides CC) that completely mod the base game and you are doing that while sticking to the basic medieval theme of the game.  And you're doing it in a way that should be lightweight on older PCs.  Perfect, IMO.

I guess that's my long-winded way of agreeing with @kid1293 .  Keep it as a set.  It will be an excellent set to play with alone and as a baseline to add other individual mods and sets to, alike.

I'm also fairly active on the reddit...There has recently been an influx of new players and a lot of returning players.  Many are starting to ask what non-CC mods they should try.  It's a really hard question to answer because there are so many great mods while simultaneously so few single mods that mod everything...Which then opens up dealing with load orders etc to new folks.  When this is done this would be an excellent starter set for someone brand new to modding, IMO.

So, thank you for taking on this project.  Personally, I've not played a lot with your mods because I only just upgraded to 107 before my recent break.  When you get done I plan to do a big one with this, your production sets, churches, etc as well as some others I've been wanting to play with but held off for one reason or another.

[embx61]

Thanks guys

The set stays small @Paeng

I think I covered everything if the last 4 Vanilla replacement buildings Tailor, Herbalist, Blacksmith, and tavern are done besides a quarry and a mine.

If I ever do a mine it will be a small entrance into the mountain just as DS and Tom Sawyer did it instead of a hog of a building.

Quarry I don't know if I do it as it is not really themed anyway. A hole in the ground with maybe a crane and a very small shed.
I will do an experiment later with quarry partly ghosted so it can be dig in the mountain instead of taking a whole lot of flat real estate as the Vanilla one does.

Then of course what is left of vanilla are some roads, the bridge, a tunnel and that is it if I not forgot something (Yeah Stone houses but if I ever do those it will be a separate Mod for sure)

Roads, tunnels and maybe even the bridge I consider addons so will be separated if I ever come to create those.