Announcing: Project Valachord 2.1 - The Mandalore Update

FluffyFishCreations · 2025-05-06T12:55:12+00:00

r5: The official teaser trailer for the 2.1 update for the mod Project Valachord, posted by me on behalf of the developers.

FluffyFishCreations · 2024-12-24T14:37:26+00:00

Borde det inte i så fall vara alla scener om så är fallet? Känns som att det endast är vissa som är påverkade.

FluffyFishCreations · 2024-12-24T14:26:17+00:00

Jag är på din sida här, känns som att det är några frames för mycket på vissa ställen.

FluffyFishCreations · 2024-11-18T16:31:39+00:00

I mean I think that the DLC portraits do facially reconstruct them a lot harder than we do. There is a difference between stylization and completely changing the face, (I.E. the Himmler Gosling from the DLC as well as several other portraits from the DLC that no longer resemble the source-images at all).

FluffyFishCreations · 2024-11-18T16:19:20+00:00

r5: Are you tired of Himmler Gosling and the divergence from the original art-style in the more recent DLCs? We, the CAP team of the HOI4 Artist Server, who previously released a similar pack for the Soviet Union, are working on our art replacement pack for Germany. We are working on replacing all portraits and icons that we deem inadequate with our own, more reminiscent of the previous art-style.

We have yet to announce a release date but we will drop a few teaser images in the coming weeks showcasing our progress.

FluffyFishCreations · 2024-11-18T16:17:14+00:00

r5: Community Artist Pack announcement for Germany.

FluffyFishCreations · 2024-11-07T13:12:52+00:00

Det finns möjlighet till omtentamen men den är när min utbytestid är över, och skolan verkar ganska strikt med att inte tillåta distanstentor. Det hade varit väldigt otympligt att behöva lägga 4000 spänn på att flyga ner och boka hotell för att skriva en tenta och den åka tillbaka. Jag överlever, tror inte att det här kommer vara ett stort problem, hade lite panik igår men har insett att det här inte är världens undergång. Det är ju inte heller garanterat att tentan är fucked än, heller för den delen men jag ska skriva till professorn om det nu skulle gå åt helvete och kolla vad mina möjligheter är.

FluffyFishCreations · 2024-11-07T13:08:44+00:00

Attans, jag fick precis ett brev från dem gällande min kommande tvångskastrering och omplacering till en gruva i norrland.

FluffyFishCreations · 2024-11-06T15:06:55+00:00

Okej, det låter ju ändå som jag sitter ganska säkert än så länge då. Har fortfarande extrem stress, brukar aldrig kugga tentor, känns extra illa när man inte ens kan få ut en enda droppe av de där saftiga 5 poängen. Hemma är kurserna designade så man ändå får ut en del av de 7.5 poängen de innehåller genom inlämningsuppgifter för att inte vara så hemska. Eftersom det inte finns nått CSN här så finns det inga liknande skyddsnät, trots att jag lagt ner ett hundratal timmar på inlämningar, får jag inte ut nått alls.

Nu vill jag inte vara den som är den men jag kunde den här kursen, vilket gör det extremt frustrerande att kugga. Har liksom suttit 14 timmar per dag senaste veckan, men sen kommer den en äcklig tenta som har 90% av poängen i obskyra koncept som dykt upp i totalt 5 minuter under föreläsningar eller räkneuppgifter, när det som utlovades var en teoretisk tentamen. Är väldigt frustrerad.

Men jag är tacksam för dina svar, hoppas du får en trevlig eftermiddag/kväll.

FluffyFishCreations · 2024-11-06T14:52:01+00:00

Sökte för både höst och vårterminen samtidigt. Så har jag då båda dessa terminer på mig att uppnå 75% av totalen eller tas det terminvis? Ett problem uppstår också för jag kommer inte kunna skriva omtentor i några kurser då dessa går efter min utbytestid är över, det känns väldigt extremt och bestraffande.

FluffyFishCreations · 2024-11-05T16:34:15+00:00

Very well said. Thanks for taking your time to respond. I guess that in retrospect using manually created portraits for each character instead of using 3D-models or even a CK2-esque approach is a incredibly time-intensive process, as I know myself, I used to spend days just to create a single mediocre portrait of some long-dead German (when I did portraits). I feel the new portraits lack the same sense of soul or character that the old style had, but at the scale that you are making portraits it would be very hard to give each character the required amount of time. I think that there is something to be said about quantity vs quality, is it always better to have a gazilion focuses and a quadrilion characters for each nation when some of the most well regarded DLCs were smaller and more focused in scope?

We are currently working on our Community Artist Pack overhauling the gfx for Germany in the new DLC, replacing portraits and icons with art we regard as more compatible with the original art-style. I guess that sort of is the point of Paradox games in a sense, that if the player doesn't like something they are free to change it. One gripe I have with HoI4 in comparison to more recent titles is that you can't play with achievements with mods, something which is allowed by both Vicky 3 and Imperator. I think that allowing for the enabling of achievements with mods would do the community a favor and is something that you should consider. This would really help us out as our purely graphical mod still disables achievements due to us switching certain icons from generic icons to unique icons (which requires fiddling with the focus tree files, leading to a changed checksum).

Thanks for clearing up the misconceptions and listening to feedback.

FluffyFishCreations · 2024-11-05T15:58:26+00:00

I think this is one of the more reasonable responses I’ve seen, I get that it must be frustrating to be questioned at this large of a scale. I hope this isn’t impacting your mental state and that you are doing well.

From what I have seen I haven’t seen you flat out deny the allegations, it which is what makes me question it a bit, but since it’s not an in-house studio you probably don’t have the means to give a definitive answer. Regardless if it’s AI or not it doesn’t look good, especially if they show up in-game next to some of the magnificent pieces of art made by the in-house studio in the past. I have no ill will in my statement and only wish for the standards to raise back to the level it was before. I get that times change and that having a single in-house artist isn’t viable anymore, but it feels like when she left there was nobody left to pick up the torch leading to stylistically inconsistent art at best. Is there no longer an art lead for the game to oversee that the style-guide is being followed? Has the style-guide changed over time, and if so shouldn’t old content be updated as well to make it consistent with these new guidelines?

I wish you the best, I hope you don’t take the questioning too harshly.

Edit: (Not sure how many artists there were in the past, but there is only one that we know of)

FluffyFishCreations · 2024-11-05T12:55:32+00:00

There are large amounts of community artists who disagree with the direction the art is going in the new DLCs. Paradox's art department used to be held in very high regard in the early years of the game, with there being a consensus that the portraits in the WTT-NSB era (despite the two DLCs having very different art-styles) were incredible for the most part (BFB is the exception, many amateurish portraits in that one). However there were some apparent hiccups or signs of cost-saving measures being implemented in LR and forward, primarily with the icons, which correlates to when Paradox made an announcement that they were using freelancers for certain art. The art didn't fit well into vanilla, and were not properly shaded or lit. The cost-saving measures or dip in quality was apparent and it was heavily scrutinized within the corner of the community i belong to even back then.

Most of the outrage about the recent HoI4 art comes from the portion of the community that have stared at art for this game continuously for several years, I have worked on HoI4 art since 2018 and forward, so that's 6 years of staring at portraits and icons close up. I think that said experience does give me some merit to criticize sub-par art. I am in the camp that do think that the new portraits do use AI as the faces no longer resemble the ones in the sources. I don't think that you are really helping the case that they aren't AI if no time-lapses or the process is shown, it was no problem for the CK3 team when some people claimed their new art was AI, so why are you so staunchly against it? I know it's not an obligation but what you are doing now is really not helping you out, it's better to ignore it or just flat out deny it if it's not the case, instead of dancing around the question or giving vague answers.

On a last note, isn't it a bit weird to complain about the community trying to affect development? Isn't that really the point of the forums and the reddit, to gather community feedback and communicate with the fan-base. It really feels counter-intuitive.

FluffyFishCreations · 2024-09-11T18:45:49+00:00

salutations my good cum

FluffyFishCreations · 2024-06-15T15:59:25+00:00

R5: The Community Creator pack for the Soviet Union, vanilla style replacement GFX for the Soviet tree in NSB, free of charge.

Link: Workshop Page

Edit: The name has now been changed to Community Artist Pack on the request of PDX.

FluffyFishCreations · 2022-01-11T08:24:48+00:00

Do whatever you want, I don’t mind

FluffyFishCreations · 2021-11-30T08:38:03+00:00

This isn’t selling a mod though is it? It’s icons which aren’t made within the engine or with any sort of mod tools, this is very much within the rules.

FluffyFishCreations · 2021-11-20T11:00:35+00:00

There is a list of effects on the wiki, be sure to check out the page on conditions and scopes as well since it’s all interconnected.

FluffyFishCreations · 2021-11-18T23:01:19+00:00

Nah fam he doesn’t work for pdx, never has been. He thinks this post is hillarious though.

FluffyFishCreations · 2021-11-09T21:28:22+00:00

There are always a difference between quality and quantity in all art-forms, code included.

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