Now with full transparency support! Add your own holes at texture level (save texture as DXT5/BC3).
Roadmap:
1. Banner mesh - done. I think it's great as it is, not going to polish it any further.
2. Textures - done. Not great, not horrible. I don't use vanilla banners myself, so the goal was to make something acceptable, not something amazing.
3. Map banner mesh - not done yet. Actually just one, because with FISH&CHIP / Heraldic Map Banners by Lav you only really need one. I'm planning to fix the UV mapping and make sure the other side of it looks normal (in vanilla 1 side is mirrored and looks stupid).
1. Banner mesh
Inspired by "Banner Standardization Pack" by yellowmosquito (but not using any of its meshes in the end) I created a new mesh for the banner.
You can use it for:
- banner mesh
- arms mesh
- banner scene prop
Here's how it looks like:
My main philosophy with this was - if it looks good on a texture, it must look good on a banner.
I wanted to minimize the necessity to test how banners look like in game - now what you see is what you get, no surprises.
So, most of all, the mesh has been stretched a bit, to conform to 2:5 banner texture ratio. Now what you see on the texture is what will be on the banner, no extra stretching, as long as the texture is 264x660 for the wavy part and 264x20 for what's rolled up (or 132x330 and 132x10 respectively, if using low-res 1024x1024 textures like the ones from yellowmosquito).
Second of all, it now rolls onto the wooden roll, instead of stupidly hanging directly downwards from it. This fixes the weird crease that distorts the texture when banner is drawn into a tableau. It should also make it clip less with the banner pole, if anybody decides to make the material more wavy (or if we get wind and physics one day, though I doubt it).
Finally, the back side is no longer flipped. If you have text on your banner, it will look normal, readable, instead of being mirrored for god knows what purpose.
Oh, and I managed to lower the mesh complexity, apparently, even though it has exactly the same geometry as vanilla. Maybe vanilla had some broken invisible faces? Who knows.
2. Textures
Initially, I haven't planned on touching them - you can just use the ones made by yellowmosquito, right?
Well, yes, but they are kinda flawed. Especially now, with the improved mesh, we can make them better, especially the seams in the area where banner starts rolling up.
Here's the list of improvements:
1. fixed the bad seams as mentioned above
2. realigned the textures so they appear centered in those green circles above heads of agents in battles (especially for Sarranid ones it was a pain in the ass, because they are huge, and even centered perfectly still have some details out of the circle, so I partially gave up on those - whoever created the original Sarranid banners, really didn't understand the assignment...)
Important details out of visible area:
Horrible alignment:
For best alignment in those circles over the heads of soldiers in battle, I advise also tweaking the game_troop_label_banner tableau - in vanilla the positioning is
but I found it better to use
instead.
You should also consider this tweak and this tweak.
3. bumped up the resolution from 1024x1024 to 2048x2048 - enjoy HD
4. all of the above also includes the default banners, faction banners, standard lord banners and also unused sheet of banners (which due to devs being sloppy, is marked as g in module files, but f in texture files)
5. removed duplicates and mixed things up a little bit - some banners were identical or almost identical, so I created new ones or recolored this and that (used some color and pattern ideas from banner pack by Somebody there, besides my own "creativity")
I'm releasing 2 versions of the textures - with and without my changes. Here's a list of what I changed (I'm gonna refer to Sarranid sheet as f, and unused sheet as g, we gotta settle on some common naming convention):
• default banners have 2 variants - unchanged (paint on wood) and on cloth (same patterns and colors, but look like standard banners)
• Swadian flag made brighter, so the lion is more visible
• banner a01 (normally used by Klargus) recolored, as it resembles the faction banner too much
• b13 was a lower quality duplicate of e06, changed to banner inspired by work of Somebody
• b19 was a lower quality duplicate of e07, changed to crow, similar to Rhodok faction banner, but very different color
• c14 was a low quality copy of e03, replaced with unused banner of kingdom_7
• d14 and f20 were swapped, as d is a Khergit sheet, and yet d14 is a recolor of Sarranid faction banner (and f20 is a horse, so it fits)
• e10 had its lion flipped to face left, because it was rubbing me the wrong way facing right
• e21 was swapped with g14, because this one is usually given to Rhodoks, and having a dragon like that didn't fit
• g04 was really plain and lame, changed to banner inspired by work of Somebody
• g12 was a lower quality duplicate of e10, changed to banner inspired by work of Somebody
• g18 was a duplicate of e11, changed to banner inspired by work of Somebody
• g21 replaced with my own creation, because it looked too similar to original e21/new g14
Download includes:
- textures with my design changes and without (even those without aren't copies of vanilla, they needed to be adapted, so it's not like they're OG or anything)
- DDS files, XCF project with all flags and position templates to make more (open in Gimp), and also PNGs (as previews and as source without lossy dds compression for people who can't use Gimp for some reason...)
Finally, if you don't like my textures, you can use the old ones by yellowmosquito (get them from Web Archive). They are compatible with my meshes.
I don't think they are good enough, but they do work.
Or just make your own textures, I sure did. The whole reason I'm not making the vanilla banner textures any better is because I won't be using them anyway. I have my own.
3. Map banner mesh
Work in progress.
Download
https://www.mediafire.com/file/ftvnqvzi2gmxnhl/Better_Banners_by_Erundil_v2024.08.15.7z/file
Don't panic about the size - the archive is big, but a lot of it are materials I worked with, and PNG previews. There are also variants, out of which you're supposed to choose one, not both. Total size of meshes and textures that will end up in your game is only around 25 MB.
Roadmap:
1. Banner mesh - done. I think it's great as it is, not going to polish it any further.
2. Textures - done. Not great, not horrible. I don't use vanilla banners myself, so the goal was to make something acceptable, not something amazing.
3. Map banner mesh - not done yet. Actually just one, because with FISH&CHIP / Heraldic Map Banners by Lav you only really need one. I'm planning to fix the UV mapping and make sure the other side of it looks normal (in vanilla 1 side is mirrored and looks stupid).
1. Banner mesh
Inspired by "Banner Standardization Pack" by yellowmosquito (but not using any of its meshes in the end) I created a new mesh for the banner.
You can use it for:
- banner mesh
- arms mesh
- banner scene prop
Here's how it looks like:
My main philosophy with this was - if it looks good on a texture, it must look good on a banner.
I wanted to minimize the necessity to test how banners look like in game - now what you see is what you get, no surprises.
So, most of all, the mesh has been stretched a bit, to conform to 2:5 banner texture ratio. Now what you see on the texture is what will be on the banner, no extra stretching, as long as the texture is 264x660 for the wavy part and 264x20 for what's rolled up (or 132x330 and 132x10 respectively, if using low-res 1024x1024 textures like the ones from yellowmosquito).
Second of all, it now rolls onto the wooden roll, instead of stupidly hanging directly downwards from it. This fixes the weird crease that distorts the texture when banner is drawn into a tableau. It should also make it clip less with the banner pole, if anybody decides to make the material more wavy (or if we get wind and physics one day, though I doubt it).
Finally, the back side is no longer flipped. If you have text on your banner, it will look normal, readable, instead of being mirrored for god knows what purpose.
Oh, and I managed to lower the mesh complexity, apparently, even though it has exactly the same geometry as vanilla. Maybe vanilla had some broken invisible faces? Who knows.
2. Textures
Initially, I haven't planned on touching them - you can just use the ones made by yellowmosquito, right?
Well, yes, but they are kinda flawed. Especially now, with the improved mesh, we can make them better, especially the seams in the area where banner starts rolling up.
Here's the list of improvements:
1. fixed the bad seams as mentioned above
2. realigned the textures so they appear centered in those green circles above heads of agents in battles (especially for Sarranid ones it was a pain in the ass, because they are huge, and even centered perfectly still have some details out of the circle, so I partially gave up on those - whoever created the original Sarranid banners, really didn't understand the assignment...)
Important details out of visible area:
Horrible alignment:
For best alignment in those circles over the heads of soldiers in battle, I advise also tweaking the game_troop_label_banner tableau - in vanilla the positioning is
Python:
(position_set_y,pos1,120),
Python:
(set_fixed_point_multiplier,1000),
(position_set_y,pos1,1237),
(set_fixed_point_multiplier,100),You should also consider this tweak and this tweak.
3. bumped up the resolution from 1024x1024 to 2048x2048 - enjoy HD
4. all of the above also includes the default banners, faction banners, standard lord banners and also unused sheet of banners (which due to devs being sloppy, is marked as g in module files, but f in texture files)
5. removed duplicates and mixed things up a little bit - some banners were identical or almost identical, so I created new ones or recolored this and that (used some color and pattern ideas from banner pack by Somebody there, besides my own "creativity")
I'm releasing 2 versions of the textures - with and without my changes. Here's a list of what I changed (I'm gonna refer to Sarranid sheet as f, and unused sheet as g, we gotta settle on some common naming convention):
• default banners have 2 variants - unchanged (paint on wood) and on cloth (same patterns and colors, but look like standard banners)
• Swadian flag made brighter, so the lion is more visible
• banner a01 (normally used by Klargus) recolored, as it resembles the faction banner too much
• b13 was a lower quality duplicate of e06, changed to banner inspired by work of Somebody
• b19 was a lower quality duplicate of e07, changed to crow, similar to Rhodok faction banner, but very different color
• c14 was a low quality copy of e03, replaced with unused banner of kingdom_7
• d14 and f20 were swapped, as d is a Khergit sheet, and yet d14 is a recolor of Sarranid faction banner (and f20 is a horse, so it fits)
• e10 had its lion flipped to face left, because it was rubbing me the wrong way facing right
• e21 was swapped with g14, because this one is usually given to Rhodoks, and having a dragon like that didn't fit
• g04 was really plain and lame, changed to banner inspired by work of Somebody
• g12 was a lower quality duplicate of e10, changed to banner inspired by work of Somebody
• g18 was a duplicate of e11, changed to banner inspired by work of Somebody
• g21 replaced with my own creation, because it looked too similar to original e21/new g14
Download includes:
- textures with my design changes and without (even those without aren't copies of vanilla, they needed to be adapted, so it's not like they're OG or anything)
- DDS files, XCF project with all flags and position templates to make more (open in Gimp), and also PNGs (as previews and as source without lossy dds compression for people who can't use Gimp for some reason...)
Finally, if you don't like my textures, you can use the old ones by yellowmosquito (get them from Web Archive). They are compatible with my meshes.
I don't think they are good enough, but they do work.
Or just make your own textures, I sure did. The whole reason I'm not making the vanilla banner textures any better is because I won't be using them anyway. I have my own.
3. Map banner mesh
Work in progress.
Download
https://www.mediafire.com/file/ftvnqvzi2gmxnhl/Better_Banners_by_Erundil_v2024.08.15.7z/file
Don't panic about the size - the archive is big, but a lot of it are materials I worked with, and PNG previews. There are also variants, out of which you're supposed to choose one, not both. Total size of meshes and textures that will end up in your game is only around 25 MB.
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