Cavespider

[Paedie]

I wanted to try to make a unit and I remembered that the cavespider is IMHO a bit wierd locking, so I tried to make a new one, here is the results.

Obviously the other frames are missing but I wanted to hear what people thinks and if it is a idea that is worth continue working on.

[megane]

Looks very nice; the current one seems a little cartoony to me, and yours is much more realistic, and therefore more creepy. However, it's a little dark -- try putting it in game and checking if it shows up well on all backgrounds -- and the mandibles seem very straight, you might want to curve them a little bit.

[Viliam]

It looks very very ugly. Please have mercy with the arachnophobic players... If I ever see anything like this animated, I will scream and run away from the computer.

OK, I am joking a bit... but when I imagine this monster attacking a humanoid unit of the same size, I feel uneasy. Maybe the realism should be reduced somehow; for approximately the same reasons we reduce the graphical realism of fighting, etc. Well, I would like to hear the opinions of others about this topic -- if I am the only one with such feelings, then please ignore me.

And from the technical point of view... it is important to see it against the background. Especially the cave terrain, where it will appear most frequently.

[Paedie]

Here it is with a cave and grass background. Maybe it needs to be a bit brighter, I'll make some changes and post a new one later.
Is there a guide somewhere that shows you how to get a unit into the game so I can test how it looks?

[megane]

It's a spider the size of a horse. It's supposed to be a little creepy. xD

To see my units in-game, I just put them in place of existing units; i.e. go to Wesnoth/images/units/monsters, rename the current cavespider, and put yours in its place.

I think they'd show up just fine in a cave, but you might put a few more highlights so that they blend less with the background, and so that, if on a light background such as snow, they don't look washed-out.

[Dragon Master]

I wouldn't want this to replace the current cave spider, but it would be good variation. To me your version looks less menacing and more "you can't see me 'cause I'm flat". Which leads to my next topic: the spider looks a bit like gravity is 3 times stronger on him.

Let's talk anatomy. Spiders do not have bendy tubes for legs, they have long sections of seperate "pipes" let's say. When you make insects, imagine that they are composed of seperate plates, like armor. The two short legs in the front should curve inward and be more like mandibles. Some giant fangs would be nice too. Oh, and eyes. Also, even though some spiders have fur, your unit looks fuzzy enough to hug. Also, the colors are close, if not like, a tarantula. Although that's cool, it looks rather bland in Wesnoth. We don't need photorealistic units, so go ahead and make it have a cool design on it.

[megane]

I thought it was supposed to be a tarantula; maybe it could be a Giant Tarantula, as opposed to a Cave Spider; no web attacks, but faster than a normal one (most tarantulas chase their prey instead of catching it in a web)?

If so, it should indeed sit kind of low to the ground, and would be quite furry. The mandibles would still be the main thing; a tarantula's fur might be disarming, but it has some nasty-looking fangs.

[Paedie]

Thanks for all the replys

The spider was modelled after a tarantula so I guess it would ba better to call it that.
I think I will raise it a bit more from the floor, make the colors brigther so that it is more visable in a cave and try to make it more "cartoonish", then I will try too "remarket" it as a giant tarantula instead of a new cavespider. Maybe someone can use a giant tarantula for something in there senario.

also, I tested the unit ingame and it looks like it's floating in the air, have to fix that too.

[Zhukov]

I'm liking this. The current spider has always struck me an a bit ridiculous. The eyes on it especially.

Anyway, here's a quick hackjob to remove the opacity tricks and make it a tad more wesnoth-ish.

[rubber.piggy]

This spider is unreal, I laughed the first time I saw the other one.

[Eleazar]

I don't think there will be a problem replacing the cave spider with somethng that looks more turantula like. However, the perspective is quite different from most Wesnoth units (a problem with the old spider). Try comparing it to one of the mounted units, and you'll see you need the angle to be much more from the side, instead of nearly top-down as it is now. More contrast between the highlights and shadows will help it match the unit style. It's not neccesary to give it big cartoony eyes.

[Oreb]

Zhukov's looks alot better, and is a better change than the original.

I just want to see if it still does the floating thing when the rings are added.

[JW]

The unit is too black. I cannot distinguish any shading on the creature. Take a look at how Zhukov used highlights on his Steppe Orcs for a good example of how to create good shading

[Jetrel]

Jet sez: The cave spider is a very powerful unit, in-game. We could use a new rendition of the unit that is considerably larger that the current one.

By and large, I did not see a lot wrong with the old cave spider, with the exception of the fact that he had big, cartoony, but most importantly unspiderlike eyes. That, and the perspective issues.

[Eternal]

Hmm...
Since zookeeper liked it, I'll post my spider here. How do you like it?
Recolouring is a must... I think. Maybe a few tweaks to fix this and that, but do you like the main idea?