Osprey88 Posted July 17, 2009 Share Posted July 17, 2009 At what vertex / edge / face count do models start to lag Oblivion on a basic higher end comptuer? (Geforce 9800 or so, 4 gigs ram, etc) I've worked up a very nice model, but before I start going through the trouble of texturing and weightpainting it, I want to make sure I'm not going to have to redo all of this because it lags me to hell and back. Total vertex count will be at around 15 - 20 thousand for the entire model, which as I understand it is a far higher count than a normal oblivion mesh. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
simonp92 Posted July 18, 2009 Share Posted July 18, 2009 It depends on if the model is with other high-poly models. for exsample. if you place it in the middle of skingrad, there would be some lag. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LHammonds Posted July 19, 2009 Share Posted July 19, 2009 It also depends on instances. Is it a unique item in the game or something every bandit / soldier will be sporting? It is also a good idea to balance the amount of detail in the model with the amount of detail handled by the texture and normal map. You can get away with an exceptional amount of detail in the textures if correctly applied to a model's surface. Also take into consideration about edges and the shadows they cast. If you have a high number of polys in an area that can only be seen from one direction and can never cast an outline shadow (such as inside a helmet), it would be wise to remove geometry and let textures handle the detail. If the polys can cast a shadow (such as the round shape of a helmet) then it might be better suited to have a sufficient amount of geometry to pull off the effect rather than just using textures. When in doubt, check what the original developers have done with similar items shipped with Oblivion. But keep in mind that the above items still hold true such as a higher polycount for an armor set than what exists for Daedric (but if unique to just one set, not so much a problem) The amount of geometry on 3D models for rendering is easy to calculate...it is the maximum that your PC can handle to get the best results. But for gaming on a wide variety of gaming systems, it is a fine art and balance between how much detail is put into the geometry, textures and how it will be utilized in-game. Some of the better implementations use a low-poly model, with a medium-sized texture and a large-sized normal map for additional detail...a kind of best-bang-for-the-buck scenario. Good luck,LHammonds Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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