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Well, maybe you don't want them to have the rice-sized planet busting bombs...

Or maybe you have bigger plans than powering a planet...

There are always issues when greed is a factor...

-Av-

Ken actually released the star wars models by mistake, if code elves™ actually make mistakes, when he released the XSI source models for the game.

Yes, they've been messed with...  was it Dutch Boy that skinned the ST-AT two legged walker?  Until 1.2? was it? they were too high poly for the engine but that's been fixed.

-Av-

The problem there is there's no real need to fight over it. All you need is a few pounds of it to provide the needs of the entire planet and any off-planet needs for, well. . . several lifetimes.

Let's put this in modern terms...

Have you seen Tiger Wood's wife?  Why on EARTH would this man who has everything go after...   well, you get my drift.

Humankind can not achieve anything without giving up something of equal value...  er, wait...  that's not quite what I meant.  Bonus points if you know where it's from, but what I mean is...

Humans ain't NEVER happy with what they have... 



-Av-

It's a collectable now... 

-Av-

Shhhh...  those are still in the testing stage...  

-Av-

Back to the modelling question.

IF Wall makes a master Grizzly I can crank out vacumn-formed stryene model 'kits' en masse.

HOW MANY PEOPLE ACTUALLY WANT ONE???

I'd love to make and paint up a few of them and send them to George Collins, Andrew Goldman, and Will Stahl.  (I'd make one for Ken but he'd just start adding things to it and before you knew it... well, you know...)   

-Av-

Muzzle velocity, thrusters?  F=ma, inertia  INERTIA for God's sake???

Ahem...

"biometal"

End of discussion.





C'mon, it's all biometal.  

It's all mass to energy and back again with no loss, no real mechanism, and no harmful radiation.  Step on the gas in a Czar and in infinitesimal amount of biometal converts to energy, reorients the space around the ship, and off you go.  The limits imposed were so the pilots can keep their sanity inside something that just moves with no feeling of thrust.  The Chinese ships grasped this concept wonderfully.

Jets are as useless as those prevously mentioned turbines, and would only be a major disadvantage to a war ship on a dark moon.  I'd even go as far as saying that traitor Arkin probably fitted the Grizzly with them so the Golems had something to shoot at from across the map...  

Actually, working for the Government as I do, I can see some General asking "Where's the ROCKETS on these dang things boy?", and some scientist being told to add thrusters just to make the idiot in charge happy.

So, OK, it's got thrusters, maybe to boost maneuverability.  I still say five is still too many but OK, it's got them.  The mechanics of it are they're specks of biometal converting to energy in the form of a plasma discharge...  

As to ordnance, think biometal shells, rockets, and mortars.

Shoot a biometal shell from a biometal ship and the same thing happens.  An infinitesimal amount of the shell's biometal converts to energy, reorients space and the thing takes off.  Terms like 'shell', 'rocket', etc. were just the grunts way of trying to understand something beyond the limits of 50's technology.  That shell is actually a mini-Tank with no pilot, life support, or weapons.

When that shell hits an infinitesimal amount converts to energy and BLAM, you have an explosion.  Again, the limits were such that one ship wouldn't destroy whatever planet or moon you were on.  Remember, humans have to use these things without killing themselves or attracting attention by blowing up Mars...

If an inertia-immune shell leaves an inertia-immune ship and hits another inertia-immune ship what sort of inertia issues would you have?  Hah!  Trick question!  Inertia is on vacation where biometal is concerned...   

The speeds, maneuvering characteristics, and weapon strengths were all taken from Earth standard munitions and ships, so that humans could grasp and effectively use them in quick and vicious dogfights.  This is the same reason they all handle the same despite varying Gravity conditions on the various planets and moons.  The point is to make their handling and performance consistant, so the pilots would perform consistantly.

So there...  

(Read the SKYLARK series for ordnance that is basically metal converting to energy, and how they created various intensity shells that deliberately released only tiny fractions of the full energy available to make them usable...)

-Av-

Spires miss an agile target with the first shot, get in the second shot, and by then you're under the lung.

G66 cheats...   

As said, you'll find different setups depending on what settings you choose, and the whole point is to keep you limited in your wanderings until you advance enough to handle moving into that area.  Greenheart maps use the giant statues to do the same thing.

The whole idea of IA is to learn different techniques, come up with different strategies, and learn to handle more powerful enemies.

-Av-

With God as my witness, my 1.0 Grizzly had nowhere near that many thrusters ingame.  I've posted screencaps of it along with the barrel oddities and people just give me blank looks... 

Somewhere along the lines someone activated things that weren't in the original.  I don't know who/what/when but to me that looks ridiculous...

Golem 1 to Golem 2:

"Look comrade, there goes another Grizzly lighting up the night..."

"Dah, it almost makes me sad to shoot them so easily..."

"Almost..."

BLAM




I agree that vacu-forming would be the way to go, provided those that want models have the ability to put the pieces back together and paint them up, etc..  I'm thinking that's less of an available skill now than it was in my day.   This is from someone who bought their first Enterprise in 1970 at the age of 8 years old...  who added working landing gear to his Millenium Falcon (rotate the gun turrets to raise/lower) AND a fully detailed cockpit... and then added the two originally missing legs when they showed up in Empire...

For many I think a solid model would be more valuable.

Still, for Wally's part just producing the solid model to begin with would be enough.  After that we could do a lot of different things, as that solid model would unlock a world of possibilities.  I've done vacumn forming and cast resin models...  and I still have my testor mini-airbrush (wonder if that still works...). 

I also vote for model car size, fwiw...  hot wheels size is too small to truly appreciate them.  I'd actually like a Razor sized so I could build a 'working' cockpit...

I LOVE the idea about adding the voice tags...  I can just see my Grizz growling "WHO'S NEXT?" or my Golem rasping out "ANOTHER IS CRUSHED".   

-Av-

Isn't that what I typed?  lol...  gotta love revisionist history. 

(thanks, that's exactly what I meant)

-Av-

Me too...

(I only have the source code, not the original assets.)

Um, seriously?   PMing...

-Av-

(trying to model a Griz "right now" from in game screen snap-shots, which means a WHOLE lot of BEST GUESSES... sure would like to have a 3DS file........................ )

You need to PM me somewhere to send them, that's all...  the rest is easy. 

-Av-

That coke bottle is tiny, and has the vertical divots in it the bottle does, and the coca-cola is raised lettering, so it looks fairly decent resolution-wise.  I'm not sure any CNC will do the little grooves and things in that keychain model but I'd chew them into it to have such a thing...  

Awesome...  I would of course provide my own stock...  and while I mentioned aluminum earlier I'm now thinking ferrous, with a trick magnetic stand.

After all, they're HOVER tanks, right?  What kind of awesome desk display would that make, a Grizzly hovering over the stand???   Ack, I gave myself chills...

-Av-

OK, this is driving me nuts.  Let's say Wally can kick out a decent Grizzly model...  How many of us would actually put up the money for the stock and/or his time/trouble? 

Looks like finding material for sale on the internet isn't really easy, but I did find:

http://www.rigidfoammachining.com/carving-foam.html

They show a block of their maximum density foam that's 16" x 24" x 4" @ $79.50 USD.  Seems to me that would make a bunch of Grizzlies...    4" tall is a good sized table model, or tall enough for a bunch of keychains...

Wally, if you're serious about this and could make me a bunch of toys to enjoy in my senility I'll order the materials and have them shipped to you.  I'd prefer something along the lines of styrene as I have a ton of experience with it, it's easy to paint and add pieces to...   Then again doing them in metal would be awesome AND make for a good master for vacumn forming or molding.

I'm starting to picture a little remote controlled Golem wandering around, maybe with that Dinosaur Toy innards in it that lets it guard...  swap out the sounds for "MOOOOVING" and "CRUSSSHHHING ENEMY"...   

-Av-

"Avatar"

Absolutely unbelievable! When I was perusing this board and saw it SPAMMED all over with that name I'd asked myself it it could be THAT "Avatar".... COW I, COW II, COW III, PFA, etc. etc... but told myself NO WAY, he vanished from the face of BZ way way too many years ago... BUT I tell ya what, you're doin one hell of a good job posin' him!

I have NEVER been accused of posing myself...  the whole concept boggles my mind...     
I never left BZ, it's been a constant friend and companion over the years.


It IS me, the one and the same, as I've found no takers for my offer to switch lives... 

As proof of identity I offer such tidbits as this:

Cow2 map, Team Battlezone bumblers crawling all over it...

Singinius: "Avatar is FLYING around the map on a surfboard!  How do I get one?  I want one!"

Avatar: "Hit CONTROL-B"



Oh was he mad at me!  It took him ages to find a ship since he was pretty new to BZ at the time.

(I was actually in one of Cheeto's 'surfing pilot' ships, found at the very top of two tall spires.  Very cool looking leaning into the turns...)

***

You have a CNC in your basement?  You lucky b*****d...   (that was my best Monty Python voice, how did it sound?)   

All I have is a whole hard drive filled with BZ ships and buildings in .3DS format...



I've looked into emachineshop.com but it's horribly expensive for a single unit...  but still, I could get it in aluminum...     Realistically I figured some day, when spare time comes in a can, I'd just grab some sheet styrene and start making models.  I desperately want a Razor for my Desk at work...  complete with scorch marks and bullet dings...

Pretty sure it was a dream, but I took a quick snapshot...



Can you imagine the firefights on this baby?  And sniping?  lol...

-Av-

(And no, she's not a tiny little woman, it's a REALLY big screen...)

http://www.bz911.com/bzonetest1.wmv

How drunk were you?  That looks pretty drunk... 

-Av-