Portrait Packs

Discussion in 'The Temple of Elemental Evil' started by Gaear, Oct 5, 2009.

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  1. Gaear

    Gaear Bastard Maestro Administrator

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    Some guy at the Codex is complaining about portrait packs for ToEE :yawn:, which reminded me that we've always intended to release portrait packs for the Co8 5.x generation mods, so: what artwork sources would players like to see as portrait packs?

    Initially I would assume Royo, BG, and IWD. The source material for these is available at SP, so they would be easy, but are there any others? If so, please list what they are and provide links to where the source material can be found.

    Related question: would players like the packs to replace the Co8 custom portraits while retaining the original ToEE portraits, or what configuration exactly? There is effectively no limit to the amount of portraits we can have now, so they could probably just be added to the existing portraits, or they could replace them partially or wholly, depending on if you want to have a 'pure' portrait pack or not. (e.g., you could install an IWD portrait pack that completely replaces the ToEE portraits - both original and custom - so that it appears to be an authentic IWD game ... as far as PC portraits go anyway.)

    The base portraits for the modpack are not going to change from what they are now in order to maintain our 'genuine ToEE' (not hybrid CRPG) asthetic. Hence the portrait packs for those who want to use something else.
     
    Gaear, Oct 5, 2009
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  2. Sitra Achara

    Sitra Achara Senior Member

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    I'm rather partial to the JA2 portraits :)

    [​IMG]
     
    Sitra Achara, Oct 6, 2009
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  3. Gaear

    Gaear Bastard Maestro Administrator

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    I don't have JA2. Can you provide the original portraits yourself (I'll scale/crop them and all that) or a link to where they may be found?
     
    Gaear, Oct 6, 2009
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  4. Ranth

    Ranth Established Member

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    What is JA2?
     
    Ranth, Oct 6, 2009
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  5. Sitra Achara

    Sitra Achara Senior Member

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    Jagged Alliance 2 - one of the best turn based tactical games (in a modern setting). Has some RPG features too, and some hilarious characters.

    Also, the amount of modding the game has had since release is astounding - realistic backpacks, deadly sniping mechanics, full auto, intelligent AI retaliation, suppressive fire, ridiculous amounts of gun porn, etc. The bastards even got ahold of the source code :)

    As for the portraits, I've actually done most of the portrait conversion, but currently it overrides the new Co8 portraits. I'll probably publish it myself sooner or later.
     
    Sitra Achara, Oct 6, 2009
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  6. erkper

    erkper Bugbear Monk Supporter

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    Sounds good.

    I don't see any particular advantage to replacing portraits with the packs - more choices is always better than fewer choices, right?
     
    erkper, Oct 6, 2009
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  7. Emirkol the Chaotic

    Emirkol the Chaotic Proud Polytheist

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    Scry's got a whole bunch of new portraits, including lots of female ones, including a green skinned female one for GA82.

    Give us the word and we can work this out with you.
     
    Emirkol the Chaotic, Oct 6, 2009
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  8. GuardianAngel82

    GuardianAngel82 Senior Member

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    Now I feel obligated to use it. Hmmm...what color are the nipples? ;)

    On another note: I thought Jagged Alliance ROCKED! But not so much the character portraits.

    Would it be practical for to pick and choose from various portrait packs, and...ahem...maybe not use some of those already provided?
     
    GuardianAngel82, Oct 6, 2009
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  9. Gaear

    Gaear Bastard Maestro Administrator

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    I would like a standard to apply across the board so this can remain as stress-free as possible. Let's decide from among these three possibilities:

    1. Replace all portraits
    2. Replace only custom portraits
    3. Replace no portraits

    It would not be practical to pick and choose from different sources for one pack, no. That would involve a subjective decision on what's 'good' or not. If it's limited to a single source, you get the IWD pack, the BG pack, etc., with nothing left out and nothing arbitrarily thrown in. If anyone has to get so in-depth that they have to have different sources in one pack, they can create their own.
     
    Gaear, Oct 6, 2009
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  10. wizgeorge

    wizgeorge Prophet of Wizardy

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    I'd say add some custom portraits,especially female, to the exsisting pack. Hell, I could add 50 new portaits in a day but it's not really neecessay. It's easy to add a new portrait, so a massive undertaking really isn't needed. If someone wants a few specific pics, they can do it themselves or I can. No need for a big project.
     
    wizgeorge, Oct 6, 2009
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  11. Gaear

    Gaear Bastard Maestro Administrator

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    If you mean add to the vanilla and custom portraits we have now, there are no other custom portraits available to us at this time. We don't want to add portraits from other games to the mod itself in order to maintain thematic consistency and not formally infringe on copyrighted material.

    Other people struggle mightily with self-modding the portraits btw, so providing easy-to-install packs is a service to them. Sticking with themes (Royo, IWD, etc.) makes it easier for us and exposes us to less potential criticism for the perception of being arbitrary.
     
    Gaear, Oct 6, 2009
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  12. Sitra Achara

    Sitra Achara Senior Member

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    Come to think of it, Arcanum portraits could be good too. It has all the races too, IIRC (except maybe gnomes and halflings, and female dwarves, hehe).
     
    Sitra Achara, Oct 6, 2009
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  13. wizgeorge

    wizgeorge Prophet of Wizardy

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    The old portrait packs where removed a year or so ago so what are you proposing? Make new ones as a seperate download/addon, ala Royopack, IWDpack,etc. One big pack called misc? What's the plan here?
     
    wizgeorge, Oct 6, 2009
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  14. maggit

    maggit Zombie RipTorn Wonka

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    I think I still have my self-converted IWD and BG portraits for TOEE. I can upload them somewhere for you, however you'll have to change the names because they replaced the 5.0.0 custom portrait pack. Still this should save you some time spent on resizing and converting.
     
    Last edited: Oct 6, 2009
    maggit, Oct 6, 2009
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  15. Gaear

    Gaear Bastard Maestro Administrator

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    Separate packs would be best, I think. And yes, RoyoPack, etc. And they would be built for the 5.x series (not 5.0 series). They would probably function like a TFE-X add-on pack.

    I already did all the IWDs (1 & 2), but upload the BGs somehwere by all means. :)
     
    Gaear, Oct 6, 2009
    #15
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