Sol
Friendship Rank 1
Garlic my beloved
Posts: 46
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Post by Sol on Dec 3, 2022 4:42:29 GMT -5
Hey folks! I want to attempt to add my own npcs to the game so this is the thread for all things character mods.
These are in no set order of release, just ideas I want to mark down.
My first set of mods are going to be my characters from the previous cattails game. Because of the lore currently forming in Wildwoods, these are going to be AU mods and will evolve around or completely ignore the games lore. Emerald (Solo) [Current WIP]- Divorced from Pebble and chased away from his former warlord mentality. The old warrior has gratefully settled into your colony. Pebble (Solo) - Divorced from Emerald the queen has chosen to come to your colony to get a fresh start and heal her worn heart. Emerald and Co. (OC Canon Story)- Emerald, Pebble, and one of their daughters have settled into the outskirts of your colony with nowhere else to go. I can't remember their daughters names at the moment cough Daughter 1 (Leader) - The rebellious leader that fought back against Emeralds reign has founded another colony to the south. Daughter 2 (Med. Cat) - Krampy's apprentice. Silent, but has an ever growing curiosity about everything.
If I get ambitious I may try to do Nil at some point or use them as a break from the others.
Old description. I've decided to work more on my art and do my own style but didn't want to remove this bit <3
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Post by Silverhart on Dec 3, 2022 14:59:13 GMT -5
I don't think you should let your style stop you. If you like the way your characters look you should draw them the way you like! It is really fun to try and replicate the Cattails Style, but you certainly don't need to do that if you don't want to. I'm sure people will love your NPCs either way! As for using references: Using references or copying works is how artists learn, and you should be doing it often. It's totally fine. You just need to make sure you're using references correctly. If you want to heavily reference or trace, you're definitely going to want to find photos that allow you to make works based off them. This site has been very helpful to me in sketching up some new portraits I'm working on. It even links to the original photos so you can double check each one's license before using it (some have some rights reserved). I've also been recommended morguefile.com/ and it seems pretty useful for finding free to use images specifically for artists.
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Blue
Friendship Rank 4
I've got modder's block AAAAAAAAH
Posts: 631
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Post by Blue on Dec 4, 2022 0:58:36 GMT -5
I think you should either go with your own art style, or try to mimic the game's art style. Regardless, nobody is expecting perfection of you-Silverhart and I both tried to mimic the game's art style, but obviously neither of us did a perfect job. As long as you have fun and the mod overall is decent then you're fine, okay? We're just excited for the mod, really.
I guess my advice though, would be to start simple. Take baby steps with poses and pelts. I don't know what Emerald looks like, but if I were you I would start off with Pebble-their pelt is very simple and should be easy to work with. Do some more simple poses, too. I would save Nil for last because of the stripes and horns. And if you want references, well, the portraits in game are perfect for that, whether or not you decide to mimic the art style.
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Sol
Friendship Rank 1
Garlic my beloved
Posts: 46
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Post by Sol on Dec 5, 2022 23:40:30 GMT -5
Thank you guys, it means a lot <3
The thing that's just stopping me from doing my own style is a brain thing, everything needs to be lined up nicely or it feels like my brain will explode lol.
I'll try practicing a bit more beforehand, but work out the coding in the meantime!
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Post by Cat Empress on Dec 31, 2022 21:49:57 GMT -5
you should not care about your style! The NPCs I'm making dont have any art!
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Sol
Friendship Rank 1
Garlic my beloved
Posts: 46
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Post by Sol on Jan 4, 2023 4:56:27 GMT -5
Thank you <3 I'm trying to find a happy medium between the two!
I haven't had much time to work on this yet unfortunately but man I'm excited to!!
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Sol
Friendship Rank 1
Garlic my beloved
Posts: 46
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Post by Sol on Jan 4, 2023 23:36:32 GMT -5
I found a temporary solution to my problem while I test. Ember has a nice tabby pattern sooo for now Emerald is a gray Ember clone xD Would that be... Emberald? Hmm.
I'm still trying to figure out his sprite, I also borrowed phantoms colors until I can mess with them more. But I'm getting dialogue out of the way!! Also tried putting his den down but I can't quite get it to work yet, text doesn't appear but it keeps me locked out. Back to the drawing board.
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Post by Silverhart on Jan 5, 2023 11:34:57 GMT -5
Glad to see you're working on this!
With dens, make sure the "region_coordinate" value in the map meta file is unique. That tripped me up originally as I was copy/pasting a lot of the values from in-game files, and I had that same problem as you where I couldn't enter a den and got no text.
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Blue
Friendship Rank 4
I've got modder's block AAAAAAAAH
Posts: 631
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Post by Blue on Jan 5, 2023 15:10:57 GMT -5
I'm thinking of making a chart for all the different coordinates. Would anyone be interested in it?
Edit: Well I actually did it. Hooray
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Sol
Friendship Rank 1
Garlic my beloved
Posts: 46
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Post by Sol on Jan 5, 2023 19:56:24 GMT -5
Thank you both! I'll be sure to change up the coordinates for the den, and now I can make a proper schedule too! That was one of my main struggles now after art but seeing the chart makes it so much easier to understand.
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Icesong
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Post by Icesong on Feb 4, 2023 21:10:31 GMT -5
I know I didn’t let artwork stop me. My ocs are just very unique in the game to say the least haha.
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Sol
Friendship Rank 1
Garlic my beloved
Posts: 46
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Post by Sol on Apr 16, 2023 22:15:02 GMT -5
Very tiny update. Many things in life going on but here's a neutral expression sketch :3
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Post by Silverhart on Apr 16, 2023 22:26:19 GMT -5
That looks great! They've already got a lot of personality just in the neutral expression.
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Lord Scooter
Blue Heart
Also known as Lord Galax. Scooter is the name of the cat in my profile picture.
Posts: 3,624
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Post by Lord Scooter on Apr 17, 2023 12:44:43 GMT -5
I agree—I love the expression on the neutral face.
By all means though, don’t let the art style hold you back. The most important thing is that you have fun doing it.
I’m pretty proud of how my Scooter portraits have been turning out, but they’re not perfect either (they’re also about the only thing I’ve actually “drawn”, and I’m just tracing pictures of Scooter the actual cat, so I guess I’m almost cheating in a way).
The whole purpose of modding like this in the first place is putting your creativity, and your own unique style in a game, so there really isn’t a wrong way to do any of it. Just have fun!
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Sol
Friendship Rank 1
Garlic my beloved
Posts: 46
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Post by Sol on Apr 18, 2023 2:33:41 GMT -5
Thank you both <3 I appreciate the kind words! I do have fun with it but my impatience does so love to get in the way ^^; I wasn't going to post more individually but this one gave me such trouble I wanted to share it as well. I know 100% I'm gonna love going back and lining these and making them proper :3 edit: Just remembered Ive been replaying into the game more and it makes me kind of glad that I haven't worked too much on these mods bc I think I know where I want to go with the lore and how to tie it in with the game! So very excited for it!!
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