I am sure this is horribly noobish, but I hope someone can help. When I am making a model for NWN2 (or any 3D game), is it ok to use an object with multiple meshes? Is it ok if they overlap? Part of the reason I ask is that I find that it seems like I can get a lower triangle count if I use multiple meshes rather than trying to make something into one seamless piece. I am just worried that they might be too complex for most game engines despite the lower triangle count.
Thanks!
Silly 3D Modeling question...
Débuté par
Ubai
, févr. 24 2011 07:57
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#2
Posté 24 février 2011 - 08:27
Hellfire_RWS
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Overlapping meshes are fine as far as I know. RWS has used that that technique is several models.
#3
Posté 24 février 2011 - 09:31
Ubai
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Thanks! It is one of those weird questions that I have not been able to find a definitive "yes" or "no" on before. 
#4
Posté 07 mars 2011 - 10:57
BigfootNZ
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Actually it depends 
Once upon a time in a world of 3d gaming long long ago things like overlapping two planes would cause some fugly clipping issues, thankfully they got all that sorted way back when.
Also of note, while I dont know how it translates for NWN2s engine but from what i read in places like the Polycount forums etc, it was made out as universal, is that vertex count is more taxing than poly count to a point. ie you can have a low poly mesh that is actually more taxing for the GPU than a mesh with more polygons since it has more vertexs than the more poly heavy version. Considering verts are stored in a model file and each vert is also stored for UV's while the polyies are created while the games running verts can also have that impact as well increasing a model files physical size.
Also smoothing groups (if your using max) are when run through a model exporter for your game engine of choice all get split along the smoothing group divisions anyway... ie a box set with 6 smoothing groups in Max, with 8 verts and 12 polyies exported into NWN2 actually is exported as 6 individual planes resulting in 24 verts and 12 polyies (exporting the box as a single smoothing group model and letting the normal map do the work of lighting is better, but normals along acute angles like box edges have issues of their own)... UV seams are also effectively broken along their seams the same way when exported, all resulting in rapid increases to vert counts.
Less verts and less polyies = good
Less polyies but more verts = not so good
Few more polyies but equal or slightly more verts = no biggie
Really comes down to taking half a dozen of one and 6 of the other and getting a good balance.
But if you start to think about that sort of thing and look into it more, you end up spending more time thinking about optimizing rather than making anything heh...
Once upon a time in a world of 3d gaming long long ago things like overlapping two planes would cause some fugly clipping issues, thankfully they got all that sorted way back when.
Also of note, while I dont know how it translates for NWN2s engine but from what i read in places like the Polycount forums etc, it was made out as universal, is that vertex count is more taxing than poly count to a point. ie you can have a low poly mesh that is actually more taxing for the GPU than a mesh with more polygons since it has more vertexs than the more poly heavy version. Considering verts are stored in a model file and each vert is also stored for UV's while the polyies are created while the games running verts can also have that impact as well increasing a model files physical size.
Also smoothing groups (if your using max) are when run through a model exporter for your game engine of choice all get split along the smoothing group divisions anyway... ie a box set with 6 smoothing groups in Max, with 8 verts and 12 polyies exported into NWN2 actually is exported as 6 individual planes resulting in 24 verts and 12 polyies (exporting the box as a single smoothing group model and letting the normal map do the work of lighting is better, but normals along acute angles like box edges have issues of their own)... UV seams are also effectively broken along their seams the same way when exported, all resulting in rapid increases to vert counts.
Less verts and less polyies = good
Less polyies but more verts = not so good
Few more polyies but equal or slightly more verts = no biggie
Really comes down to taking half a dozen of one and 6 of the other and getting a good balance.
But if you start to think about that sort of thing and look into it more, you end up spending more time thinking about optimizing rather than making anything heh...
#5
Posté 07 mars 2011 - 02:29
Ubai
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Thanks very much, those are all very helpful replies! I made a flintlock pistol model as one continuous mesh and it had a much higher poly count than one I had made using separate meshes, It also did not look as nice, that is what got me thinking about all this.
