Custom Content and Efficiency

Started by BlueBard, April 29, 2009, 08:49:26 PM

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BlueBard

I've noticed that I take big hits to file size with each new custom group that gets included in an arc.  The larger the group, the bigger the hit.  You take the hit even when you use just one character out of that group, as a boss for example.

I started out thinking I could have a "Stock Characters" group containing many of my one-off characters who don't belong to larger groups.  But my observations about file size and certain aesthetic considerations is beginning to lead me in another direction.

It seems to me that small custom groups are better than large ones in some ways.  A good average group size seems to be 3-4 minions, 1-3 lieutenants, and 1-2 "bosses" to give you the best tradeoff between file size, spawn distribution, and challenge.  You can go higher if it's the only custom group you use in the arc.  You should try to use no more than two custom groups: one for Enemies and one for Allies.

Unique characters that you may want to use for more than one arc probably should belong to their own group to minimize the impact to the filesize.  Also, you don't really want to see a group name like "Heroes Starting With A" in a serious arc.  I will try to put this theory to the test, but feel free to beat me to it.

It also seems to me that the number of costume pieces and customizations has some impact on the filesize.  I'm not sure about this.

One thing I haven't done (yet) is to open the text files to have a look at them with an eye toward figuring out what's going on with file size.

Comments, Observations, Suggestions?
STO/CO: @bluegeek

Bugbear

I've found that if I only use one character out of a group as either a character or a boss, then only that character gets copied into the mission file.  Just make sure that the boss's accompanying group is not set to "Same as Boss" (although I've found that "Same as Boss" actually ends up being "Same as Mission").

Here's a trick to reduce the (file) size of your custom critters:  When you first get to the costume screen, make sure "linked colors" is on and set everything to black/black.  Then turn off linking and design the costume to taste, leaving any unused parts as black.  This helps because black #1 is stored as "0", while some of the other colors can be up to 3 digits.  This does add up.  I've found my customs seem to take about 5k each while chatter on the official board suggests the average is 6.5k.

With my freeze ray I will STOP... the world.