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Stellaris Dev Diary #186: Necroid Ships & the Art process

Hello everyone!

My name is Fredrik Toll, and I am the Art Director for Stellaris. For this week's dev diary, we wanted to give you an insight into the development process of creating the ships for the Necroids Species Pack.

Let’s dig right into it!

Designing a new Ship Set
After settling on the theme, the first thing we do when embarking on designing a new ship-set for a species pack, is going through the core ideas of the species pack with our internal team of concept artists. In this case it was centered around the theme of death, and the various species who have cheated it. After the brief, we had everyone write down their association and ideas for this theme to know what everyone is thinking. This allows us to align more what it’s all about, share ideas, and inspire each other. By doing that we are able to highlight what is more important and what does not fit with the theme.

After this we do a search for visual reference to use in the concept process. These can be anything from patterns, statues, tiny objects, to buildings, whatever inspires us visually in connection to the theme. We look mostly for shapes, but also materials. Architecture is usually a great source of inspiration, they have great shapes, and a scale suitable for ship details. We try to avoid using other existing ships as reference since we want to develop something original, not just a variant of others, though they can still be a reference, if only to show what we don't want.
For Necroids we looked a lot at Art Deco and brutalist architecture, tombs, pyramids, as well as skulls, fossils and many other things. After reviewing and discussing the references we start sketching, going wide, anything goes. Sometimes they align a lot with our references, other times ideas come from nowhere, it’s all part of the process. This leads to a whole lot of Ship designs ideas. Here are a handful of those.

01_initial_concepts.PNG


Ultimately we settled on these two references as our direction. They felt like something far away from existing ships, as well as fitting well with the theme.

02_chosen_direction_01.png


02_chosen_direction_02.jpg


Developing the Style
These ships are only the start though. Once we have chosen one of the styles we did in our initial look development. We have to flesh out what those mean. These are just side-views, they do not tell you everything you know, in fact, opinions of how to interpret it can differ significantly. So we need to figure that out, as well as adapting it for the demands of the game, such as having sections, having turrets etc.

Usually we start with the Cruiser, since it’s a good mid-size ship close enough to all ships sizes that it’s relevant for all designs. You also have a fallback option, if it turns out that it looks too big, you can just use it for the battleship. If it turns out too small it will be the destroyer or corvette. Here you can see a few of the concepts from the process. It looks pretty straightforward, but it takes a lot of back and forward before we nail it down.

03_refinement.PNG


Creating the Concepts
Once you have the style narrowed down, it’s time to make all the actual concepts for each and every ship. Even though the style is figured out, each ship is a bit unique and each of them present new challenges, and new parts of the style to figure out. The civilian ships are different from the military ships. Each of the military types ships has a different size, and the style differs significantly from the corvette to the juggernaut. Each of the civilian ships has a very unique design and they have more in common with some stations than they do with each other. The construction ship and the mining station often share traits, as do the science ship and the research station.

Here are two different examples.
The science ship for instance, has a much more high tech appearance than the other ships. The process is made easier though from the work we have done on previous shipsets. Some standards have been set, the science ship for instance usually has a more “cool” appearance with a more streamline almost racing type ship. This helps us know where to aim, and apply the style on that.
Sometimes it's pretty straightforward – Let’s take the example of the Science Ship. First we start by making a couple of rough versions, then choose one of those versions, then make some more versions based on that one. We then continue the process by once again choosing one of them, refining the details to finish the design, and in the end we create an asset sheet. The asset sheet is for the 3D artist to model, and know where to apply which material. It speeds up their work a lot and makes sure everything is consistent.

04_science_ship.PNG


05_science_ship_result.PNG



Another example would be the construction ship. They are very bulky, usually described as a cargo hold with engines, and a bridge. Here we made some initial concepts. One of them we felt looked like a good idea for a transport so we got that idea for free.

06_contruction_and_transport_ship.PNG


There are so much more we would like to show. But as you can see here, there are several hundred images in this process.

07_all concepts.png


Ship modelling
After we are done with the concept art for all the assets, they are sent to the 3D artists. Figuring out a design in 3D while you are building the ships is very time consuming, so the idea is that the concepts are clear enough that the 3D artists can mostly trace the concept. There is still a fair bit that needs figuring out as you are building the ships, but the concept art does save an enormous amount of time.

That being said, sometimes the concept artist uses quick 3D models in the concept art phase. Figuring out a design purely in your head is very hard. So making a rough model of your idea, then doing some paint-over on top a screenshot can save a lot of time. The difference is that these models are not fit to use in game, since they are not modelled properly or economically.

Usually we have a 3D artist join the team in the concept phase though. As soon the first ship concept is finalized and the style is set we build that ship, and start working on the materials. We do some concept work for the materials as well, but you only really get a feel for it when you can move the camera around, and see how the lighting moves across the hull of the ship.

The Final Results
Then follows several months of 3D modeling, once done, we rig them for animation, export them to the game, and add particle effects. And finally, here are some examples of the finished ships:

08_necroid_station.png


09_necroid_cruiser.png


10_necroid_juggernaut.png
 
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Either that or you're talking complete nonsense and people are disagreeing with you, but that just couldn't be the case, right? By your logic, if you don't like the notifications, fix your problems yourself and stop looking at them ;)
 
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Guess what, AI issues are deep-set in the code.
Fixing a single issue means reading through what is probably hundreds of lines of code, isolating the problem, and then fixing it, and likely re-writing hundreds of lines of code to actually be able to run now that the issue has been fixed.
Then give the poor bastards time.
We've got already the confirmation to not expect "something" ( solutions about popular issues like the crisis-AI, the military AI, the performance etc. ) accompanied with the Necroids-DLC, because this time, it would be "too risky". On top of this, it was just followed by a non-committal and pretty illusive maybe ( in terms of corporate language ) to get "likely" said "something" "sometime" after the Necroids-DLC, but only "when" Paradox does anything and makes progress in said "something" ...
When we will get any informations about crisis AI, military AI, performance, and other popular issues?
We don't want to deploy something too risky along with the species pack, but when we make progress in something it's likely to find its way to a public beta branch sometime after that.
So, plot-twist: To "give the poor bastards time" isn't really the problem, especially since Stellaris is already on the market since 4,5+ years, but on what Paradox uses its time.

Fix the problem yourself if you're so much better at it than them.
Then, like I said... Fix it.
It's simply Paradox job. Point. So, we've either to deal with Paradox unwillingness or with Paradox inability to do its job. Back such a stance ( unwillingness ) or such a level of competence ( inability ) for what-ever reason(s), but don't forget how this is combined with an ongoing wave of DLCs that keeps rolling in the meantime.
 
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Then, like I said... Fix it.

Are you serious?

Did you know this unexpected thing? Game developers are supposed to... make the game work! I know it's hard to believe, and guess what, they are even payed to do exactly that! Incredible!

So, when the game is just a gigantic pile of trashed features, people get disappointed, a little bit upset, because they spend money into it.

It's not for the players to fix the games issues, it's the devs job, can you understand this simple thing? So, yes they are humans, nobody ask for a perfect game for tomorrow, just that they do their job and fix the issues highlighted by the community for more than 2 years instead of milking them with useless and beautiful shipsets.
 
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Ah... Yes, there is none if this, too busy with shinny things
If the "community ambassador" in another thread is to be believed - there is. But, as always, it's all in a mythical internal beta with rainbow and unicorns, while all of us are "stuck" with external alpha for an indefinite period of time.
 
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If the "community ambassador" in another thread is to be believed - there is. But, as always, it's all in a mythical internal beta with rainbow and unicorns, while all of us are "stuck" with external alpha for an indefinite period of time.

Yes, I really want to believe him when he say they are working on "something" but the very elusive way they speak about it (Eladrin, MrFreak) looks more than a way to buy time as you say, vagues promises :/
 
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I think those are nice ship models and I wonder if there is a possibility that we can have independent ship models packs in the future, no species, no cities, just nice and stunning ship models.
 
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I think those are nice ship models and I wonder if there is a possibility that we can have independent ship models packs in the future, no species, no cities, just nice and stunning ship models.
mods exist.
 
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Another DLC? You serious?

Go home Paradox, you are drunk.

How oblivious you have to be to keep going like this?

The game is broken, it has been broken for years and after a break that's what you annouce?

It's EA, ACTIVISION level of dumb. And they try to advertise gambling (loot boxes) in a kid magazine.

Why are the reviews positive on Steam after all this is beyond me.

At this rate Stellaris 2 is more likely than this game being ever fixed.
 
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Another DLC? You serious?

Go home Paradox, you are drunk.

How oblivious you have to be to keep going like this?

The game is broken, it has been broken for years and after a break that's what you annouce?

It's EA, ACTIVISION level of dumb. And they try to advertise gambling (loot boxes) in a kid magazine.

Why are the reviews positive on Steam after all this is beyond me.

At this rate Stellaris 2 is more likely than this game being ever fixed.
it is unfortunate that the game is in such a state that i can't disagree with any of what you said. normally i prefer to avoid insulting the devs even indirectly since I like having a forum account, but the game has been such a bad state for so long that I've mostly given up on politeness...
the game is busted and if paradox thinks people will keep buying dlcs with the game in its current state they need to spend five minutes reading the forum
 
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Great exposition of your art and process. Now, if only the team would put a fraction as much effort into fixing the AI, people wouldn't be overwhelming every dev diary about it.
 
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I’ve deliberately stayed away from these forums since I said “More fixes instead of more pretty stuff” back at the 2.7 launch.

I’m aware that the artists don’t code and that art packs don’t affect bug hammering. I’ve seen the “This is how to write efficient code modders” post which was a little galling ‘cos I tend to optimise Paradox scripting occasionally and when the disappearing scroll bars snafu occurred, modders had to point out where they were needed in your own game. I’ve seen the “Look we can load assets faster” post which is cool.

Some of the things broken in the 17th March release are still broken. Please fix.

Moving swiftly on: @Aerie compliments to you and your team, the new graphical style is awesome! I will be purchasing post release (assuming no game breaking bugs accompany the update, I’ve been burnt before) six questions for you:

1) There is a certain machine ship set one the steam workshop which also has custom meshes for megastructures, is there any chance of this coming to future species packs? Retrospectively to existing packs would be nice, but it’s a big ask.
2) Is there any chance of a fallen empire aesthetic inspired standard ship set for use with scions (so that we can have cruisers etc. inspired by our patron FE’s ships)
3) There’s a few sleek red-blue-white ship designs which show lots of promise, can you leave them on your desk for the next species pack?
4) More ship classes for the grey tempest, Khan, FE’s and crises please. We keep getting new toys (Titans and Juggernauts) the crises and Fe’s especially need something new and shiny.
5) Aquatoids! Can we have them next? and I want leaking water from holes in the hull!
6) Official Machine shipset? Pleeeeeeeeease?
 
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the game is busted and if paradox thinks people will keep buying dlcs with the game in its current state they need to spend five minutes reading the forum

The problem is, people who do not read forum are unaware of these issues. They think it's part of the game, so they will buy DLCs like no-brainers. Only us people who actually think deep about the strategy for our empire realize there's a lot of broken stuff.
 
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Ah, I started playing Stellaris after they removed embassies, interesting. To be fair, many players are still not aware of how effective - too effective, in fact - ambassadors are.

To be fair, embassies were also a very limiting feature in the sense it was hard to have any relations without them, so that mechanic essentially limited the number of effective relations you could have. The ambassadors are more of a deployable bonus to normal Stellaris relations, though they are an incredibly broken one at that and effectively act as a love potion. I once played a game with fanatic xenophile and diplomatic corps, its so exploitable, I never did that again and keep to 1-2.
 
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