The good way toward modular spaceship. Hint needed

Development Asset Creation
1

Hi,
I’m here to ask some advice on the good way to implement “modular space ship”. By that i mean having space ships that can swap turrets and some device (like radar, shield and the like). Swapping those would entails to a change of model (that one i need help, i lack experience in the matter) for the part concerned and of course a change of behavior (that one I’m ok).

So right now I’m wondering if i should use the pawn system or the vehicle system (it seems to be oriented toward terrestrial vehicle).

So i would gladly take any advice you have to give me, and any link toward literature pertaining to the subject of “modularity in 3d model”.

I’m completely green regarding the unreal engine. I’ve experience in gameplay programming for 2d game so right now I’m in uncharted land XD.

2

You can use a modular pawn:

3

Thx for your answer, i had seen that part of the wiki but i wasn’t sure it was the best solution for what i have in mind.

4

One approach would be to use sockets. This is assuming you more or less want to stick and remove pieces onto a base mesh.

Lets assume you have a space ship mesh it doesn’t matter what it is. You will need to place bones where you want your modular parts to be (do this in your 3d modeling program). Import your mesh as a skeletal mesh then using persona go into skeleton mode. From here you can assign sockets to the bones where you want you modular parts to be. There will be some work involved in modeling each piece to make sure it fits or you will need to programmatically ensure a proper orentation/translation. Then following this documentation (https://docs.unrealengine.com/latest/INT/Engine/Content/Types/SkeletalMeshes/Sockets/index.html) you can use a blueprint and the attach function to switch parts out as necessary.

Good Luck

5

Sleek thank you ! with order66 answer i had understood that skeletalMesh where the different parts but the “socket” where the missing pieces.
:smiley:

6

It really depends on what you are going to do. If you have any kind of animation using a skeleton on the spaceship the modular pawn would be your choice. It is harder to setup compared to using sockets. However, if you mostly have static parts as attachments or skeletal meshes which are just animated by themselfs, than go with sockets.

7

My ship would have animation (on the ship mesh) and the turret (for example) would rotate to target enemy and have “shooting” animation. i guess since the two kind of animation are distinct i can go with socket.