GWX Skin Pack

[P_Funk]

Originally Posted by JScones

Remember, SH3Cmdr is now copying up to 1.5 GIGAbyte of files into SH3. My loading time doubled to just over one minute when I installed the skins pack.

For me that has become a problem. Since I'm on a family computer I have a certain... lack of available disk space (I'll admit that I'm a real pirate that way) and I had well what I thought was a good enough buffer of about 1.5 gigs and then I installed this masterpiece or... rather attempted to unzip it and then wa told I hadn't the space to do it.

Now I'm assuming that there aren't really gigabytes worth of skins here but really the same skins being shuffled around. If thats true then it would be so much more convenient if say a new SH3 Cmdr release could make it so that you only needed one copy of any skin to have it accessible to the date system but have it so that you can have a text file that directs SH3 Cmdr to the file to be copied.

At the moment I'm off to see if I can find some more disk space.

[ichneumon]

Originally Posted by P_Funk

... Now I'm assuming that there aren't really gigabytes worth of skins here but really the same skins being shuffled around...

Nope, there really are that many skins.

Most merchants only have two sets of skins. They start the war with colorful civilian paint schemes and these are slowly replaced by gray drab paint schemes.

Warships change skins about 6 times during the war on average, less if they enter the war during the later years. The typical Royal Navy sequence is to be painted a dark bluish gray at the beginning of the war which is slowly replaced by medium gray during the first few months of the war. In late 1940 some ships used camo schemes similar to WWI dazzle patterns. In 1941 the Royal Navy started using more colorful disruptive patterns on larger warships and the blue and green triangles of the western approaches concealment schemes on convoy escorts. By 1943 the disruptive and concealment patterns were using more greens. In 1944 the Royal navy swithched to a simpler standardized paint scheme of a rectangle painted on the hull. For convoy escorts these were green rectangles and the rest of the ship was white. For fleet destroyers and capital ships these were blue rectangles and the rest of the ship was a light tan. So these are not just the same GWX skins being moved around but are completely new skins that change as the war progresses.

I was sensitive to the amount of disk space required for this and I sacrificed some hisitorical accuracy for more efficient skin replacements. Each paint scheme had its own start and end date which gets very complicated to keep track of as the replacement sequence is designed. To minimize how many times files are replaced I sometimes had to shorten (or a few times extend) the life of a paint scheme by a few months. I tried to get the most variety out of the fewest skin replacements possible.

If you are short of disk space I would recommend leaving out the capital ships. You don't see those very often and so would miss them the least. That would save about 1/4 of the disk space needed. If you still need more space I would leave out the destroyers which would get you down to about half the space needed. That would leave you with just the merchants and escorts which are by far the most often seen in game.

[P_Funk]

Thanks for the lengthly reply but I dug around and deleted some irrelavent game that wasn't SH3. SO the skins are in and I'm happily beginning a new patrol.

But seriously. That is ALOT of skins. I didn't know it was THAT extensive a mod. Truly commendable.

Cheers mate.

[Reverie]

Does this mean that I won't see pith helmets in the tropics using GWX ?
Seriously, these skins, and the broadcast / radio mods would be a GREAT addition to the subsim Bonus Mods DVD. I also see it as an enticement for supporting Subsim. Remember, you can lead a sub to water, but you canta make it sinka.
Lastly, and perhaps the most crucial...who is Victoria Silvstedt ?

[P_Funk]

Okay so I had to delete the mod sadly. It turns out that the extra textures cause my game to run so slowly that I can't even move the map around without getting a 45 second hang. Thats likley due to my 512 of RAM but nevertheless, I can't live without my GWX.

Its just too bad.

[ichneumon]

Originally Posted by P_Funk

Okay so I had to delete the mod sadly. It turns out that the extra textures cause my game to run so slowly that I can't even move the map around without getting a 45 second hang. Thats likley due to my 512 of RAM but nevertheless, I can't live without my GWX.

Its just too bad.

There is no way this can be due to the GWX Skin Pack. It does not increase the number of skins for any ship and it does not increase the file size of the skins (compared to GWX without the skin pack). The only difference it makes in performance is how long it takes to launch the game. Once launched your game should run just the same.

[P_Funk]

Originally Posted by ichneumon

There is no way this can be due to the GWX Skin Pack. It does not increase the number of skins for any ship and it does not increase the file size of the skins (compared to GWX without the skin pack). The only difference it makes in performance is how long it takes to launch the game. Once launched your game should run just the same.

Its odd then that when I used a different install of SH3 Commander, where the only difference was a lack of the skins, that the game instantly wasn't laggy. I don't want to disagree with you but my observation is that with the skins it runs slowly and without them its as it ever was.

I looked for the problem through changing one variable at a time and that was the first one I tried. I didn't change a single other thing.

Could it be that the textures are of such a higher quality (ie size) that it slows the game down considerably for those of us who are running it on lesser systems?

I remember that one of the many things that GW did way back when it started was remove a bunch of texture files that were not needed but that when the game had to load them it slowed it down. Could this be a similar effect?

[ichneumon]

Originally Posted by P_Funk

Its odd then that when I used a different install of SH3 Commander, where the only difference was a lack of the skins, that the game instantly wasn't laggy. I don't want to disagree with you but my observation is that with the skins it runs slowly and without them its as it ever was.

I looked for the problem through changing one variable at a time and that was the first one I tried. I didn't change a single other thing.

Could it be that the textures are of such a higher quality (ie size) that it slows the game down considerably for those of us who are running it on lesser systems?

I remember that one of the many things that GW did way back when it started was remove a bunch of texture files that were not needed but that when the game had to load them it slowed it down. Could this be a similar effect?

When you launch the game with the GWX Skin Pack SH3 Commander replaces the GWX skins with skins appropriate for the date of your next patrol. These skins are excatly the same file size as the ones they replace and the number of skins for each ship remains the same. I just don't see any way that the Skin Pack can cause game preformance to be different than GWX without the skin pack. As far as the game is concerned there are no more files to load and the files are all of the same size.

[Rubini]

Hi Ichneumon,

I already ask this on GWX dev forum...as yours news skins are so great and have that alpha channel fixed and also thinking in these small problems for some ppl, then will be great if you make the default GWX skins also with the alpha channel fix. This way even the ppl that can't use SHeCmdr or can't use the skin pack at all also will have fixed alpha channel textures.
Forgive me if this is already on patch 1.03 (I'm not sure about).

Rubini.

[ichneumon]

Originally Posted by Rubini

Hi Ichneumon,

I already ask this on GWX dev forum...as yours news skins are so great and have that alpha channel fixed and also thinking in these small problems for some ppl, then will be great if you make the default GWX skins also with the alpha channel fix. This way even the ppl that can't use SHeCmdr or can't use the skin pack at all also will have fixed alpha channel textures.
Forgive me if this is already on patch 1.03 (I'm not sure about).

Rubini.

I guess you did not see my post on the dev forum but I have already made those files. However, it was decided not to include them in the 1.03 patch. I hope we will be able to include them in the next major update. This will allow me to reduce the size of the next version of the skin pack since many of the early merchant skins will no longer need to be replaced. This file size savings is needed because of all the new ships being added in the next major update! Hopefully version 2 of the skin pack will be smaller or at least not much larger even though it includes the new ships.

[Rubini]

Originally Posted by ichneumon

I guess you did not see my post on the dev forum but I have already made those files. However, it was decided not to include them in the 1.03 patch. I hope we will be able to include them in the next major update. This will allow me to reduce the size of the next version of the skin pack since many of the early merchant skins will no longer need to be replaced. This file size savings is needed because of all the new ships being added in the next major update! Hopefully version 2 of the skin pack will be smaller or at least not much larger even though it includes the new ships.

Great! You have a PM mate!

[JScones]

Originally Posted by ichneumon

I guess you did not see my post on the dev forum but I have already made those files. However, it was decided not to include them in the 1.03 patch. I hope we will be able to include them in the next major update. This will allow me to reduce the size of the next version of the skin pack since many of the early merchant skins will no longer need to be replaced. This file size savings is needed because of all the new ships being added in the next major update! Hopefully version 2 of the skin pack will be smaller or at least not much larger even though it includes the new ships.

That's the plan. With 1.03 out I now need to update the "Outstandaing stuff" thread for 1.04.

This will be added.

[P_Funk]

Originally Posted by ichneumon

When you launch the game with the GWX Skin Pack SH3 Commander replaces the GWX skins with skins appropriate for the date of your next patrol. These skins are excatly the same file size as the ones they replace and the number of skins for each ship remains the same. I just don't see any way that the Skin Pack can cause game preformance to be different than GWX without the skin pack. As far as the game is concerned there are no more files to load and the files are all of the same size.

That is so weird. I never had the issue before installing the skins and after romoving them and only them it vanishes...

I can only go on observation.

I think I'll take another shot at it and see if maybe it was just a weird side effect of something that I don't know about. Its possible that it was a corrupted SH3 Commander file or something.

We'll see.

[_Seth_]

As an ol' skinner, i just have to say: Kudos!! This is excellent!

[danlisa]

Originally Posted by _Seth_

As an ol' skinner, i just have to say: Kudos!! This is excellent!

Nice BUMP _Seth_ :rotfl::rotfl: