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[Dri]

I remember Alex saying he wanted to improve the look of shields and they are a very important part of combat in Starsector!

As of right now they're basically a flat colored bubble that wiggles slightly. I was thinking high-tech ships could feature a sort of interlocking hexagon look, mid-tech could be the sphere shield but have geometric designs shimmer across it and low-tech could be similar to how it is now just with more "snazziness".

Also when a ship's flux gets near it's max the shield could look like it's starting to dim and blink unstably. When something hits a shield it could also cause ripples or waves the surge across the shield. Just some ideas... we got better looking missile trails so hopefully this can become a trend of going back and improving on old gfx.

[Debido]

Behold! ShieldAPI.setRadius(float radius, java.lang.String textureInner, java.lang.String textureRing)

(yes you can use fancy interlocking hexagon patterns in mods.)

You can also not only set the inner and outer colour using the json styles, but dynamically change them via code in combat if you like.

I imagine you'll start seeing this stuff very soon from mods.

[Dri]

The power of mods is great but I was hoping for an official update as for some reason I don't like pumping Starsector full of mods. (strange because I have no issue with loading up on mods in other games such as Skyrim)

[Cycerin]

You're certainly missing out if you play a lot of Starsector but don't bother with mods.

[PixiCode]

Behold! ShieldAPI.setRadius(float radius, java.lang.String textureInner, java.lang.String textureRing)

(yes you can use fancy interlocking hexagon patterns in mods.)

You can also not only set the inner and outer colour using the json styles, but dynamically change them via code in combat if you like.

I imagine you'll start seeing this stuff very soon from mods.

Like he said OP, not only can you use fancy interlocking hexagons but someone's already done it in a mod, but it's only for a faction's shields. ((Templar Knights))

[Debido]

The templar shields aren't shields...they look like shields...but they're not...shields...they are a great deal of magical hax and shaders and coding wizardry.

In modding circles we call them contour shields for the past few versions, they've been around for a while, but DR's shaderlib made something really great looking.

[ahrenjb]

I've never really liked "textured" interlocking hex type shields. I think they're distracting and played out. Subtle, nebulous bubbles are superior in my opinion. While the current shield graphic looks great, the overall art quality and beauty of the game has kind of left it behind, and it's maybe the most distracting graphic currently in. It doesn't seem to mesh as well as it used to. Something fainter, subtle, but that reacted in a clear visible way when hit would look nice I think.

[Thaago]

+1 on faint and subtle. I think the current shields are fine, but maybe I'm just used to them.

[Dri]

Well, I'm not looking for super vibrant, in-your-face effects but I am hoping that they can be made a bit more impressive and detailed.

[Alex]

... and now, I totally want to work on them. But it'd be highly irresponsible of me to do that right now, so I most likely won't We do manage to sneak in various visual improvements here and there, though, so hopefully shields will be one of them eventually. It's just a bit of a bigger undertaking, so I'm not sure there'll ever be a good time to devote that much time to it. We'll see, though.

[Debido]

@alex: have you seen the rather pretty shader ripples in Starsector plus when projectiles hit shields? It really helps sell the feeling that they're absorbing energy/damage, that they're dynamic and react to the speed and damage of incoming projectiles.

[Dri]

Do it, Alex! You want to so do it! Nah, heh, I don't at all expect something like this to be worked on for some time yet - especially since you have a massive post-patch worklog to chug through.

But yeah, I really do hope you'll find time to work on new shields in the future.

[Aklyon]

@alex: have you seen the rather pretty shader ripples in Starsector plus when projectiles hit shields? It really helps sell the feeling that they're absorbing energy/damage, that they're dynamic and react to the speed and damage of incoming projectiles.

Those are very nice indeed. Then again, shaderlib looks fancy in general when its working.