Heavy Infantryman Line Animations

[Vyncyn]

Your stuff looks really good Vyncyn! I'm glad you're working on it. The end of the swing here looks like it slows down instead of slamming to a stop against some poor enemy pancake. That might be fixed somewhat with timing and weapon blur, but it might have to go down farther in the last swinging frame too. (Also, the level-3 HI is called an Iron Mauler--at least these days.)

I know the ingame-unit is called iron mauler, but the images for the old sprite are still labeld as siegetrooper. I can change the names though.
I think those are the frames you are talking about (added the outline of the weapon blur to make the motion clearer)

iron-mauler-attack-3.png (1.34 KiB) Viewed 5317 times

iron-mauler-attack-4.png (1.2 KiB) Viewed 5317 times

The frames are obviously based on the shocktrooper animation, but since the size of the Iron Mauler is different so there migth be some errors.
Just so I understand your suggestion correctly: Do you mean I should move the flail a few pixels down(and maybe to the right) in the 3rd attack frame?

Also I had another thought about the animation yesterday:
The shoulder guards in the base frame (see below) aren't very good for animating. The one on the left site seems pretty immoveable with the spikes and everything. I don't think he could raise his arm for attacking. The right shoulder guard is more movable, but unnecessary so, as he doesn't move his shield as much.

iron-mauler.png (2.34 KiB) Viewed 5317 times

iron-mauler-new.png (2.31 KiB) Viewed 5317 times

It might be necessary to swap his shoulderguards like I did in the -new image. I know the new shoulderguards still need a reshading, but you get the idea.

Edit: I finished the shading for the new shoulderguards. The old ones still look better imo, but this should do better for the animation.

iron-mauler-new.png (2.07 KiB) Viewed 5298 times

[Eagle_11]

Spiked shoulderpad for the rule of cool, spriter's thought there prolly was the spikes would face towards the opponent during flailing, thus being scarier for the opponent that would like to come near enough to stick an blade through his helmet opening, which seems to be his only weak point besides the sheer weight of the armor and vulnerability to electricity.

But i agree 2. looks just as good and should be far easier to animate as you dont have to factor in the spikes.

well, you can think he chugs a few potions of ogre strength before donning that armor and gets casted multiple 'haste' spells on to move at all, seeing he aint of the adeptus astartes or damn sigmarines.


edit: the new frames look definitely better, keep going and doing.

[Vyncyn]

This is as far as I got today.

attack 1-6, defense 1-2(last 2 frames)

iron-mauler-complication.png (10.9 KiB) Viewed 5257 times

As you can see they are nearly finished. There are a few problems with the shading, but even at the slowest speed it's hardly noticable in game. I'll maybe have to change the flail placement in the 3 frames that aren't completed yet, though the movement is already more exaggerated than the shocktrooper. And once again, if you find anything that needs fixing, tell me and I'll try to change it.

[Gyra_Solune]

I think perhaps the team color ought to be a little more prominent and obvious? I'm not sure where they'd fit on the design, perhaps covering the shield totally like you had for the level 1, or maybe instead like a pennant or a plume around the unit's head or so? It's a little hard to pick it out otherwise. But as a whole it looks really cool and bulky and imposing as it ought to!

[Vyncyn]

Finished the last frames

iron-mauler-attack-2.png (1.62 KiB) Viewed 5223 times

iron-mauler-attack-3.png (1.84 KiB) Viewed 5223 times

iron-mauler-attack-4.png (1.66 KiB) Viewed 5223 times

And the movement as a whole (unfortunately without the correct timing for each frame)

iron-mauler_gif.gif (9.5 KiB) Viewed 5223 times

I think perhaps the team color ought to be a little more prominent and obvious? I'm not sure where they'd fit on the design, perhaps covering the shield totally like you had for the level 1, or maybe instead like a pennant or a plume around the unit's head or so? It's a little hard to pick it out otherwise. But as a whole it looks really cool and bulky and imposing as it ought to!

Well, the base images aren't from me so I did not want to change it too much. Anyway here's a version with TC on the shield

iron-mauler-TC.png (2.07 KiB) Viewed 5223 times

If it looks better I can change it in the animation as well

[Eagle_11]

Yes looks better to keep tc on shield after lvl1, be sure to check with wesnoth rcx tool to have no rogue pink pixels left that dont teamcolour.

I think the shield could move a little bit during defense, kinda trying to duck to cover his head behind it.

[Vyncyn]

How does it look now?

iron-mauler-defend-2.png (2 KiB) Viewed 5197 times

iron-mauler_gif-defense.gif (3.35 KiB) Viewed 5197 times

Edit: Just saw the hand in one of the attack frames looked really weird, here is the fixed version. TC seems to be fine in every frame

iron-mauler-attack-5.png (1.99 KiB) Viewed 5190 times

[Eagle_11]

Cool, but what happens at his other shoulder during last frame of defense gif could be perceived weird, i know its supposed reflect the perspective so but.

what about the lvl 2's ?

[Vyncyn]

Cool, but what happens at his other shoulder during last frame of defense gif could be perceived weird, i know its supposed reflect the perspective so but.

what about the lvl 2's ?

Made the shoulder movement a bit less extreme

iron-mauler-defend-2.png (2 KiB) Viewed 5170 times

I'll start working on the level 2 next week when lvl 3 has been completely fixed. I already have the defense animation for lvl2, but I'm too busy this week to start working on the attack animation.

[Eagle_11]

Thats better indeed.

Looking forward to you making the rest later.

[Vyncyn]

Got a bit of sparetime left so here is the attack animation I got so far

shocktrooperx.gif (6 KiB) Viewed 5039 times

and the defense animation

shocktrooper-defend-1.png (1.72 KiB) Viewed 5039 times

shocktrooper-defend-2.png (1.69 KiB) Viewed 5039 times

You can still comment on Shocktrooper and Iron Mauler, but I won't be able to work on them till next week.

[Flameslash]

The defence frame looks good to me. It's difficult to comment on the attack animation at this stage, but the movement looks right.

Semi-relevant; I had a go at the attack frame for the new Pikeman, which was, let's say heavily inspired by the old one. I know it's not great, but I think the better base frame with the worse animations would be better than the better animations with the worse base frame. If the developers disagree, that's fine, but I'd be willing to have a go at the rest of the Pikeman's frames if this kind of thing is welcome.

Pikeman himself, for reference.

pikeman2.png (1.6 KiB) Viewed 4991 times

[beetlenaut]

I personally agree that animation should have a lower threshold than base frames, though none of the other art directors seem to have felt that way.

While this sprite doesn't look too bad, it doesn't match the new unit closely enough, even by my standards. The pauldrons, gloves, and boots have all shrunk a lot and the unit is a lot less shiny than it was. This would be noticeable even in an animation I think. Also, having the back hand slide up the shaft is not the correct motion; if anything, the front hand should slide down. (You can often just copy the motion from an old sprite, but the new pikeman's grip is different than the old one, so the arms are going to have to be in different positions.)

[Flameslash]

Fair enough. I don't have the talent to do anything other than adapt the old frames, though.

[doofus-01]

Hi Vyncyn,

How does it look now?

With the caveat that a looping gif on the forum isn't necessarily the same as "in game", I think it looks a bit too much like his shield is sliding on a track. If you could do a slight redraw of the shield so that it was rotating to face us a little on the second second defense frame, I belive it would look better.

But before that, maybe the shield can use more of an edit. I understand the reason for TC'ing the shield, but it kind of loses its massive metal look. Maybe a more prominent leading edge would help?