Alright so for the sake of documenting the build and getting some feedback along the way I decided to finally create
a thread in here.

Unfortunately, I have to split the documentation into two parts: One for the lost progress and one for the rebuild.
You see: Failing hardware, bad backup practices and a couple wrong clicks can lead to a lot of frustration. In short: I lost a lot of progress and had to restart the project from a very early backup.

Anyways, let's go!


First time rendering the project after about 3 days of building. It's basically just the rough hull using the method described in my tutorial. The overall shape is based off the Plan B cruiser but it is much larger and bulkier. The engines were undersized at this stage, I had to redo them.


Some weeks later and this is what we got. The engines are properly sized to seem believable. The entire side is now armored in placeholder wool and the rough base of the superstructure is visible as well. I also changed the turret placement. The front of the ship now features additional cutouts to fit the large railguns.


Changed the color scheme temporarily. You can see that the front of the ship is now more detailed, but it doesn't show everything on the renders. We got some rocket pods, cannons, antennas, pipes and whatnot. Some beacon blocks are used to light up the darkest areas and make things look more interesting.

This is also the stage of the backup I had to use to rebuild the lost progress. I will now switch to renders from december of 2017 to more accurately represent the building progress and not cause a whole lot of confusion. The renders of the "deleted version" of the ship are at the end of this post so you can compare.

I started by redoing the turrets for an easier start. I haven't touched the game for over a year and felt that I would get used to building again by setting smaller goals.
First off we have new rocket and railgun turrets:




Then I went on with the rebuilding progress. I used old screenshots and renders as reference pictures to locate where I put some detailing. The interior and superstructure are completely gone... just like the hangar area on the belly of the ship.


I changed the color scheme to white and replaced most of the old turrets with the new ones. I also changed the details used in the small cutout on the side (where the glowing vents are)


The new railgun turrets are in place and some of them now have a smoother base that connects to the hull better than the colums that the others are sitting on. I also filled the entire front of the ship with a variety of weapon systems and detailing.
I also started with the superstructure. It is slightly wider this time but the subtle change results in a much larger interior and more possibilities to try the new blocks.


More detailing around the superstructure and completely new engines. The armor plating ontop of them is subject to change. I created some smaller turrets and put them on the top of superstructures and to the side.


This is the current state of the build. More detailing around the superstructure and the back. I added the wings but I don't know if they really fit that well. I'll probably cut them down a little bit to be less of an eye-catcher.
I also fused the armor plating ontop of some smaller engines with the rest of the armor plating around the superstructure to tie the back section together a bit better. I also rearranged the turrets on the armor plating above the primary engines.


Here is a render offering some more angles of the current state of the project.

That's it for now. I hope you like it so far!

Click here for the "old version"