Tiles that could use improvement

[ontoclasm]

I've seen a number of people wondering which tiles to work on, so I ran through the monster tiles and picked out the ones I think could most use attention. This isn't exhaustive, obviously -- if it's not on this list, it's just because I think the existing tile is fine, not because a new one wouldn't be welcome. For more stuff that might need changing, check out the wiki.

I'll expand the list to include floors and so on eventually.

Feel free to suggest additions for the list (but make sure to check how it looks in trunk - quite a few tiles have changed already) or ask me any questions you might have!

e: updated as of 1/4/2015

Need a completely new tile:
Bennu (use the phoenix tile -- a mediocre tile used for the wrong monster)
Shard shrikes
Spriggan riders (they ride wasps now)
Tiamat (she doesn't wear armour anymore, just a cloak)

Need major improvements:
Holy swine
Small abominations
Nergalle (Hot pink sorcerer)
Giants (They all have weird noodle arms; minotaurs included in here)
Azure Jelly, Dissolution
Alligator and baby
Large abominations
Black bears (invisible)

Less critical:
Basilisk
(Hell) Hog
Other bears
Worms
Hound, wolf
Warg
Quokkas & porcupines
Both wasps
Iguana

Iron imp, shadow imp (Still use the old, "cute" imp body)
Ufetubus
Efreet

Golden, iron, pearl, and bone dragons
Wyvern

Plants

Angel, daeva, profane servitor
Cherub
Ophan

Ball lightning (It's a reference to something I think?)
Elementals and golems (Possible exception: air elemental)
Insubstantial wisp

Spriggan air mage (note: they fly)

Tentacles of all stripes (this would be a lot of work)

Derived skeletons and zombies
Crawling corpse & macabre mass
Curse skull
Death cob
Drowned soul
Shadow wraiths & eidolons
Flying skull
Ghoul
Unborn (not a deep dwarf any more; it's just a weird lich)
Vampire mage & knight

"Guardian eye" (one of the machines in Tukima's wizlab)

Azrael
Joseph
Jorgrun (hard to see)
Geryon
Harold
Mara
Maud
Norris
Sojobo (easy to mistake for a normal tengu)
Vashnia (hard to see)
Xtahua

Basically all the monsters in /vault/

[Galefury]

Maybe also relevant:

https://crawl.develz.org/wiki/doku.php? ... es:missing
https://crawl.develz.org/wiki/doku.php? ... mprovement

Unfortunately both pages are outdated.

[Bloax]

Hm, that kraken looks great, except for that mouth.

suddenly


Edit: And how's this jelly? (Green doesn't seem as threatening as red, and even though it's deadly in the early game - so is everything.)


I should probably make it cut off less badly, but width is the big problem.

[Jabberwocky]

I think the current Wiglaf tile is nice. It conveys the stupid looking hat part of his discription well. Any replacement tile should have a hat which is at least as silly looking as his current one.

[jwb]

Crocodile (Bizarrely tiny)

It is a lot less dangerous than an alligator though, which I'm not sure makes all that much sense. Maybe rename it "caiman" in the same go.

Unseen horror (Iconic, like the tmons)

I rather like the current one. It's a good thing IMO that it doesn't look all that scary when not invisible - after all, it isn't.

[ontoclasm]

The jelly should probably stay red so as not to confuse people, but that looks great for a shape. You're right that the bottom's kinda sharply cut off, though.

I don't mean that Wiglaf or the UH should be redesigned, just redrawn - the current UH is a blinding shade of hot pink, and consists of a perfectly spherical body and tiny, janky-looking tentacles, while Wiglaf is pillow shaded and wears his glorious hat two pixels to the left of his head. They just need to be reshaped and given better shading, basically; that's the case for several things on the second list (but feel free to redesign them if you want).

[Bloax]

Well if that isn't much better already.

Edit: Perhaps a bit overkill, oh well:
Edit: Better eye:

EditEdit: Cutesy version:

[varsovie]

My god! Can you give him this eye pls?

[Bloax]

Edit:

Well this ought to clarify it a bit: /
Also have a fancier Erolcha tile: /

Also, holy toe could just be "Holy toes". Because personally I find the row of toes hilarious.

[Galefury]

I think it's funny that the unseen horror is pink. Should stay funny IMO. I agree that the current tile is pretty ugly.

The jelly looks fine.

I don't like the ogres. Slightly less ugly Erolcha and vegetables-for-hands ogre mages? No thanks. Also note that Erolcha is actually weaker than an ogre mage.

[Bloax]

Vegetables-for-hands ogre mages?

That's not hard to fix.

[Kate]

Blessed toes and spirits don't ever spawn (and are reasonably likely to get removed, I think), so bear that in mind before putting a bunch of work into tiles for them.

I'm not sure what "guardian eye" refers to, Tukima's wizlab just has "strange machines" (that cast blink other).

[ontoclasm]

The tiles are called "guardian-eye"; I vaguely remember them being in Tukima's but frankly don't remember:


Perhaps they also fail to exist?

[Kate]

Looks like those are indeed the tiles that the strange machines use, no idea what the name difference is about.

[ontoclasm]

Probably ill-advised to be spriting at 3 am while watching Stargate, but here's a possible lorocyproca:

[roctavian]

I have a set of tiles for various J enemies partially completed -- my abusive work schedule and lack of internet keeps the progress slow, but I'm using a tasteful amount of semi-transparency and trying to differentiate different Js by shape more.

I do like that new Invisible Horror; personally I think that the Jelly should fill in a 32x32 space a bit more, but I do think it is nice looking.

I have a giant amoeba completed, a death jelly mostly completed, and some good ideas for Dissolution.

[Galefury]

Resolve to dissolve!

Also: We come from slime, we turn to slime.

<3 Dissolution

[Bloax]

I think that the Jelly should fill in a 32x32 space a bit more

Well, it is practically harmless past D:7, so I made it small to portray that.
Also have a less grasshands ogre mage:

[ontoclasm]

I think that'd still blend in with normal ogres a bit too much; the tattoos are pretty subtle and the jazz hands are gonna vanish into a busy background. Maybe something more dramatic? Erolcha is looking great, looks like she's been dieting


The UH looks much better, but what's up with the lower tentacle? It looks like he's carrying a hammer around

You guys rock, by the way. Keep up the good work. Looking forward to seeing Dissolution, he's basically the best unique.

[Bloax]

Looking forward to seeing Dissolution, he's basically the best unique.

If you listen closely to the entrance of the dungeon, you might hear the dying out sound of a voice as it traveled through the dungeon.
And if you listen even more carefully, you might make out that it says "I hate that."

[Bloax]

Butterflies!

Butterflies everywhere!

[Bloax]

triple posts r bad kids mkay

Air mage:
Or without that air thingy:

For bonus points, it'd be wonderful if the character tile could be moved up by some two pixels or so, and with this above the bottom of the usual 32x32 box:


What are you talking about Bloax:


Render cloud on top of character tile, move the character tile up by two pixels.
???
Profit

[Bloax]

Holy quad-post!

How's this octopode edit?
Obligatory: Edit:

Edit:
Ice/Stone (Statue) octopodes, wee!

EditEdit: An edit of the new orb of fire (which is sexy as hellfire):

[Bloax]

No comments at all?

And thus we're up to five posts in a row;

[ontoclasm]

The octopodes and butterflies look great; I'm not so sure about the cloud. Maybe it's just my pixel art elitism showing?

What's the blue orb for?

[Bloax]

An Orb of Cold, because obviously stacking up on rF+++ is not enuff!

The cloud effect really is just a wacky thought I had that IMHO would make the game just that little bit sillier. (I mean riding on a cloud, oh come on.) :p

The reason that it isn't pixel artsy is because for one I'd have a nightmare doing partially translucent pixel art, another would be so that it blends in seamlessly.
..And for yet another reason, I have no idea how to draw clouds (the end result here is another miracle).

[XuaXua]

Zombie turtles are in. Now needed: skeletal turtles.

[Jabberwocky]

alligator snapping turtle skeletons and zombies that don't look like alligators?

[Grimm]

Let's observe thread discipline here please.

[Bloax]

Thread discipline?

DO YOU EVEN LIFT?

[BlackSheep]

The new fog ability needs a tile.

[Galefury]

Also, Blinkenlights.

[Bloax]

Holy damn if this wasn't hard, but here comes the crocodile:

[XuaXua]

Single gold piece could use some help with inept/ravenous mimic combos. Basically, the mimic tile-over makes the gp vanish entirely. Kind of odd if you were auto traveling.

[some12fat2move]

Holy damn if this wasn't hard, but here comes the crocodile

Best quote ever.

[Bloax]

Now that I suddenly decided to do this, have a DJ Alligator:

Which is but a simple edit of the crocodile.

[Bloax]

And so now I decided to bump this glorious thread with three monsters with some improved tiles:


Bog bodies now look more swampy


Plague shamblers are now more bulky and plague-ey?


And a whole bunch of recolors of a (well not artistically I hope) uglier Ugly thing.

[khalil]

The new uglier thing looks great. I love the shading.

[prozacelf]

I kinda like the current cuddly roly-poly ugly things, but that new tile does look better....and, well, uglier. The bog body and shambled tiles look good too, although I imagined both as a bit more gaunt and a bit less hulked out. What do you use to make your tiles?

[Bloax]

I use trusty old Photoshop to make up a black shape with the pencil tool - and then shade it into looking like something with what usually is a hard 1px brush. (Though I do use bigger and softer circle brushes.)
And then I slap one or more gradient maps on it to colorize it. (Note how the ugly things all have either green or yellow eyes/mouth outlines in exactly the same shape.)

also reminder that the two others aren't all that dark:

oh and thanks for the compliments

The plague shambler is bulky because I kind of imagined it would be, what with it exploding into gas and all that. (Though I have to say I was planning a more "bursting fatman" look, but then went with a hulkish look.)

[XuaXua]

I wish I could remember which monster(s) it was, but I think it was Spider / Snake or Shoals: the tile was not distinct enough from the background to be obvious enough. I think it's the darker spider, not the Wolf Spider.

[Bloax]

Are you thinking of the redback?

Also - some small orange brain tweaks:

[XuaXua]

Are you thinking of the redback?

Yes. It is not obvious enough. Either the background tiles should be adjusted (not sure if it's main dungeon or spider) or the redback should be made less blended.

[Bloax]

How's this then?

[XuaXua]

I'd have to see it on the background because the spider itself was fine; probably just needed a hue adjustment or two.

[Bloax]

Well not that I changed the hue, but I made it brighter for some reason and made the back of it more redbacked.

Spoiler: show

Not really sure how to demonstrate it better, unfortunately.

[ontoclasm]

The brain, bog body, and plague shambler look great. Ugly things... I dunno, these are impressive, but the current ones are pretty awesome too. Maybe I'll use yours for Very Ugly Things.

I'm not so keen on the Redback. Redbacks are a real thing from Australia and have really distinctive markings. It's sort of a shame to make them just "a spider with red on it." Also, the existing one does a good job of looking big and hungry, while yours is a little hunched.

[Bloax]

this is why you read into things before you do them

OH, I just realized that it could be used for the player spider form. even though it's kinda big for that but so is a wolf spider so heh
d


And well, I guess the ugly things can be the very ugly things. It's just going to clash a bit since most of the tiles from that time look like they have quite restricted colors and a rather silly semi-comical style.
While I tend to have no restraints and a more grimdark style of things.

[XuaXua]

Well not that I changed the hue, but I made it brighter for some reason and made the back of it more redbacked.

Spoiler: show

Not really sure how to demonstrate it better, unfortunately.

Demo it directly on the floors on which is primarily appears: dungeon standard and spider, whichever those are. Those are the ones where the original isn't as distinct. For some reason, I think it's the orange tile on the fifth row, where your version is least visible; if that's orc, then mea culpa.