New from Tiller

[Yogi the Great]

Musket & Pike:

The Seven Years War

John Tiller Software is pleased to announce the release of The Seven Years War, the latest title in the Musket & Pike series. The Seven Years War highlights the European battles of this global war, featuring not only the battles of Frederick at places like Rossbach, Leuthen and Zorndorf, but also Ferdinand's battles such as Minden and Bergen.

Seven Years War includes 78 scenarios ranging in size from small actions to full engagements. Scenarios are able to be played as stand alone actions or in the campaign engine.

[rommel222]

Greetings Yogi the Great,
Thanks for posting. Nice to see new modifications to infantry: no attack columns (march columns only and gutted defensive fire if attacked), no forming square(3rd rank can about face while rank 1 & 2 face forward for defense against cavalry charges), no skirmishers, virtually no light infantry (only Austrian Grenzer units). Looks to be really good representation of the period for linear tactics.
See the PDF:Designer Notes
http://www.johntillersoftware.com/Muske ... rsWar.html

Definite MUST HAVE!

[rommel222]

Greetings to All,
Checked with JTS support and there is no 3D View for terrain or 3D miniatures.

3D might be released as patch some day or perhaps someone will mod[&:]

[Capitaine]

3D has to be really well done to be worthwhile. A lot of original Tiller 3D graphics are deplorable. I use mods for both ACW and Nap campaigns. But the game still has to allow for 3D in order to mod the 3D I imagine. Don't know if 3D capability is coded into 7YW.

[TheGrayMouser]

ORIGINAL: rommel222

Greetings to All,
Checked with JTS support and there is no 3D View for terrain or 3D miniatures.

3D might be released as patch some day or perhaps someone will mod[&:]

Thats too bad but wont stop a purchase from me. Its part of the "newer" P&S engine which was released without 3d but it was added in a later patch.. Assuming the code is there it likely would just need the graphic BMP "sheets" for the terrain ( likely easy to cull from other tiller games, then of course the units which would require someone with some degree of skill..) Likely the most pain in the ass part would be assigning the graphical flag# in all of the OOB's for every unit!!
Still enjoy Matrix own Horse and Musket engine... too bad the developer never followed thru on newer titles. Its becoming a little of an eyesore on newer monitors but the game paly is rock solid.


Oh, appears there are some hints of the next Tiller P&S game, perhaps, in the development notes hehe...

[Agathosdaimon]

i like those tiller 3d graphics, i think i only ever like to play the tiller games with the 3d miniatures graphics - without this, the feel of the period it is set in is lost a little and everything looks like just a ww2/cold war setting

[zakblood]

while i have always said, eye candy is just that, sometimes a plain old looking hex war game now days for me, does look like a throw back 20 years, it would have to have a epic AI and be priced well with plenty in it, for me to take the plunge so i guess it's again each to there own and how they like to play and look at the game in question, not a fan, but also not really played many of his either, the very bland and nothing apart from nato counters kind of puts me off, still not knowing and never wanting to learn nato ones either.

i prefer what both Jason Petho & Crossroads are doing on this scale and engine etc which includes the 3d none nato parts

[sdc]

ORIGINAL: Capitaine

3D has to be really well done to be worthwhile. A lot of original Tiller 3D graphics are deplorable. I use mods for both ACW and Nap campaigns. But the game still has to allow for 3D in order to mod the 3D I imagine. Don't know if 3D capability is coded into 7YW.

It is - just add in the same 3D files from one of the Napoleonic or the Renaissance title, and you can mod from there. I'm on the credits in 3 different places including the graphics areas - and just did it. I had the suspicion it probably was going to work because it happened exactly that same way when I was doing some work on their Squad Battles series not too long ago.

[sdc]

ORIGINAL: Agathosdaimon

i like those tiller 3d graphics, i think i only ever like to play the tiller games with the 3d miniatures graphics - without this, the feel of the period it is set in is lost a little and everything looks like just a ww2/cold war setting

You haven't seen my Cold War stuff, then... (kidding -well sorta -- I mean I go for a different look in those and re-did the recent Gold updates because frankly, they looked too samey to me (which I guess is a little ironic).
- the dual artist amalgamation stuff I don't think worked as well, but they wanted to use some of the work that they had already paid for - it won't be exactly the same as that going forward in the series, also keep in mind, that in a perfect world there'd be enough space on the counter to pull off a decent looking silhouette (maybe something like the GMT or older SPI Civil War titles - but with the limited amount of pixels I wouldn't even bother trying to. Also ideally, if someone says get me another set of larger 2D graphics (not saying that it will ever be asked for -- but, it can be done on my end pretty easily).

... anyways more to the point, all of our 3D artists pretty much dropped the ball. I wasn't even supposed to have done any of the artwork myself, although it did not work that way. If I had had more time to work with Joe on this, I am pretty sure I could have pulled it off. I was going to go for a little larger scale than they were previously using -- like say maybe comparable to 25mm figures on a table whereas before in other titles by JTS it might have looked like 10mm or smaller. And that was really all about the detail and resizing I was able to get. I will have to see if I have an image of some of the figures somewhere and post them. Personally in actual miniatures I am probably more of a 6mm player... but that doesn't really count when talking about computer graphics.

I sort of joke that I might have to learn to work within 3D (and who knows, but maybe it will happen) ... not for awhile though, as they got me doing other things (other than art or graphics coordination too).

[DonCzirr]

I would like to see the 3D work continue.

Usually - I am a die hard NATO counter fan but for Civil War and earlier I like 3d as it gives a table top miniatures feel.

I have Campaign Leipzig with mods from Philippe at Bay - and it is a most pleasing visual experience for me.

I also like the zoomed out view with the NATO counters for broader planning.

[sdc]

I would too, however we did not find a reliable 3d artist; the last one we were on literally only sent over about 3 files and then disappeared for months.
I will say that they were pretty good files - but not anywhere near enough to build anything with and sell it.

Ok - why do I only have 3 posts? I couldn't figure out the password for my other 2 accounts (trauth116, and I think trauth), and when I merged accounts last night ... this was the one the system kept (1st World problem).

For what it is worth - I agree with you - it does give that feel (miniatures), and I think the overall diversity is pretty important (of course, it still didn't happen this time).

I imagine one could come up with something pretty good by using the 3d material that exists and fits (which extends to beyond JTS' own material.).

[Agathosdaimon]

thanks for your replies - you know i was looking at the files for campaign leipzig and campaign waterloo yesterday and i see that the graphics for units is some i could do in photoshop- i do digital art, i just dont have the time at the present, -however the little pixel graphics from those existing tiller games would not be hard to alter surely, they are so low in pixel count - i might try out making some though later today if i have a moment

[Agathosdaimon]

here is a little go i had at making prussian infantry - at least one tiny fraction of the pictures

[sdc]

Looks like you got the concept down pretty well. I'll have to post what I had elsewhere, as my account I guess has not been active long enough or something.

Basically as a Graphics Coordinator, it was my responsibility to re-size what I was provided. Keep in mind I only got artist credit because I had to do repair work - at any rate I did some tests on some of the material that I had been given running it out of Tiller's other title in that same series at the time, just to see how it would look, especially when compared to what else was out there.

The artist I was working with, at that point was Joe Amoral, their long time artist, and one of the things I encouraged Joe was not to worry too much about doing them small - getting them small was my problem to worry about.

What you got above looks pretty similar to what we had ... although a lot of what was hoped to be done was to work with various 1:72 scale figures (not even all necessarily exactly from the period -but ones that you could adapt to it).

The figures are one thing, the terrain, that is another ... see the ultimate goal is to take advantage of 24 bit graphics (ideally 32 bit with a transparency layer but the 24 bit anyone can add right now).

[zakblood]

(trauth116, and I think trauth)

if you had contacted support, they could have sorted out your accounts and made them all into one, and gave you your password back even

[Agathosdaimon]

ORIGINAL: sdc

Looks like you got the concept down pretty well. I'll have to post what I had elsewhere, as my account I guess has not been active long enough or something.

Basically as a Graphics Coordinator, it was my responsibility to re-size what I was provided. Keep in mind I only got artist credit because I had to do repair work - at any rate I did some tests on some of the material that I had been given running it out of Tiller's other title in that same series at the time, just to see how it would look, especially when compared to what else was out there.

The artist I was working with, at that point was Joe Amoral, their long time artist, and one of the things I encouraged Joe was not to worry too much about doing them small - getting them small was my problem to worry about.

What you got above looks pretty similar to what we had ... although a lot of what was hoped to be done was to work with various 1:72 scale figures (not even all necessarily exactly from the period -but ones that you could adapt to it).

The figures are one thing, the terrain, that is another ... see the ultimate goal is to take advantage of 24 bit graphics (ideally 32 bit with a transparency layer but the 24 bit anyone can add right now).

thats interesting, that the initial pieces being done at a higher scale - i am not familiar though with what the 24bit graphics capability means or would mean though, i would think that you could just use the terrain from the napoleonic games already.

so are you still working on any of this?

it was fun to make the little image i did - tempted to do more, but there is alot to do and doing all the multiple sides

what scale were the images being made initially at?

[rommel222]

Greetings Agathosdaimon,
Nice Prussian infantry minis

[Agathosdaimon]

ORIGINAL: rommel222

Greetings Agathosdaimon,
Nice Prussian infantry minis

thanks Rommel222



I myself could certainly make alot of those little pixel units in my spare time, though i dont know whether there is a quicker process to it - or whether there is some specify way i have to do it - basically i just could go of the templates of figures from Waterloo and make SYW equivalents, but i dont know in what order that is supposed to be done, - it would take a long while given all the armies in the SYW - if they are all covered in the game (i havent got it yet but will when i have money available)

[sdc]

ORIGINAL: Agathosdaimon

ORIGINAL: sdc

Looks like you got the concept down pretty well. I'll have to post what I had elsewhere, as my account I guess has not been active long enough or something.

Basically as a Graphics Coordinator, it was my responsibility to re-size what I was provided. Keep in mind I only got artist credit because I had to do repair work - at any rate I did some tests on some of the material that I had been given running it out of Tiller's other title in that same series at the time, just to see how it would look, especially when compared to what else was out there.

The artist I was working with, at that point was Joe Amoral, their long time artist, and one of the things I encouraged Joe was not to worry too much about doing them small - getting them small was my problem to worry about.

What you got above looks pretty similar to what we had ... although a lot of what was hoped to be done was to work with various 1:72 scale figures (not even all necessarily exactly from the period -but ones that you could adapt to it).

The figures are one thing, the terrain, that is another ... see the ultimate goal is to take advantage of 24 bit graphics (ideally 32 bit with a transparency layer but the 24 bit anyone can add right now).

thats interesting, that the initial pieces being done at a higher scale - i am not familiar though with what the 24bit graphics capability means or would mean though, i would think that you could just use the terrain from the napoleonic games already.

so are you still working on any of this?

it was fun to make the little image i did - tempted to do more, but there is alot to do and doing all the multiple sides

what scale were the images being made initially at?

Put simply the difference between 8 bit and 24 bit graphics just means the numbers of colours that you can use. Off the top of my head 24 bit is like 16.6 million different options, and 8 bit is a lot less.

Scale? Technically speaking - at whatever the artist sent them to me. I then was going to go with a scale that showed more detail than what they normally had. Roughly speaking, was I was maybe going to go with 4 guys standing shooting as line (what would fit in the hex basically), for skirmishers (there are not many- but there are a few) - maybe 2 guys - one kneeling firing, and the other with a gun sort of at ready but not firing. Cav probably 2 figures per hex, and column guys in marching order.

One thing you want to be wary of -is if you ever branch out to the Civil War series -the facing between the two engines are different. The one you are working at - front is to the hex spine in front of where you are pointing, conversely in the other engine (Civil War one) it is the hex side instead.


I do appreciate the advice about the merging accounts - I never did post here all that often anyways, but I imagine I just put in the time, and eventually it happens. I was making the comment more out of sensitivity of -who is this dude with the 3 posts is all .

I'm not actively working on this -but I can get a map file to work in there. They have me on to other, non-art projects there for awhile. I'll try to make the 3d happen for the third title in the series (I'll be doing more than art for that one). I might get a set of map files, and some place holders for the units. The complication is in the assigning of images to the oob files. I did some work to see about resizing and where the best place to add an image in the master file was going to be, but that is about as far as I got before the decision to bring another artist onboard was made.

[sdc]

ORIGINAL: Agathosdaimon

ORIGINAL: rommel222

Greetings Agathosdaimon,
Nice Prussian infantry minis

thanks Rommel222



I myself could certainly make alot of those little pixel units in my spare time, though i dont know whether there is a quicker process to it - or whether there is some specify way i have to do it - basically i just could go of the templates of figures from Waterloo and make SYW equivalents, but i dont know in what order that is supposed to be done, - it would take a long while given all the armies in the SYW - if they are all covered in the game (i havent got it yet but will when i have money available)

Here's the beauty of what you were saying -- there is no order, as the artist you just do them, and a graphics coordinator is responsible for slotting them on to the file, and getting it over to the scenario designer (with labeling as to what unit is what) so they can change around their OOB files to match up. That is, if done in the production process.

What you are doing now, is the entire process yourself. If that is something that you are interested in, drop the support email a line and tell them I sent you over. I assume he has an account here, he does everywhere - Rich Hamilton -usually goes by Rahamy on messageboards.