My first concept of Vivec had a lot of mistakes and I made new version of cantons (more practical and realistic).
This is version without windows, chimneys, banners, etc. I focused only on design of cantons.
Any idea or feedback is greatly appreciated.
Map
Foreign Quarter
Redoran Canton
Arena Canton
Hlaalu Canton
Telvanni Canton
St. Delyn Canton
St. Olms Canton
That's really good! Only thing I would suggest would be to have all the suspended elements (bridges and these St. Olms stairs), come out of the wall smoothly with an angle, like the original bridges do. That way I feel they'd not only look better, but also they'd feel more architectonically durable. Talking mainly about the large bridges of most cantons and suspended stairs of st. Olms.
Other than that, you deserve a medal :D
I have an idea that wasn't in the concept too, but was talked about before. I know here you focused on cantons, but you could also add some poor Dunmer shacks along the inner side of the wall (or just mark them on the bird's view map). Water near the wall would probably be shallow (for wall foundation), so they could build their shacks sticking out of the water on poles, a bit like here:
A big city like Vivec would definetly get a lot of guerilla architecture like that, hugging the inner wall. Wanting to benefit from living next to the city, but being too poor to afford a canton house.
Great job. These look fantastic.
On Drago's shack point. We could use some of our existing shacks on the waterfront docks you have specified. Only other place I'd make room in the model for them would be near the refugee quarter on that one canton which I now forget (to fit with the refugee theme). Once again, these plans look great.
Thumb up!
Shacks will defiantly fit near main gate area near foreign quoter.
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Also when it goes to walls there could be some leftovers surrounding temple quoter and vivec's palace (pulled down by imperials) Then it will make some sense, it would be weird to plan city with not defended executive/ruler area.
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What I remember arena canton is already done, also the same arena is much bigger to take greater audience, so I'm not sure if could works like that. Also can we leave some connection with telvanni like in originall?
The walls are there not to defend cantons. Cantons are like fortresses themselves. Walls are there to defend the docks, and Vivec's Palace, as well as High Fane don't have walls. What could make sense though, and might look interesting, would be to make the High Fane, well... High. Have its canton, as well as Vivec's Palace stick up much higher than other cantons over the water. That way they'd be very defensive on their own, and it would fit with original Michael Kirkbride's concepts.
Note how much taller the marked canton is compared to the rest.
High Fane is probably a metaphorical name as it is the centre of the tribunal temple and deserved of prestige. Some height raising could be cool, but I wouldn't make it comically tall.
Yeah, not comically tall, just raised above the level of other cantons, together with Vivec's Palace, so that they're more defendable.
I like overall design but have some additional small ideas. First thing is connecting all canton o "ground" level with exception of telvanni. The same it would be nice on second floor (level 2) like in MW.
Also I will add big bridge connecting Telvanni and Arena for better connection and add archer's windows in wall's towers
[Edited]
This is version without windows,...
Oh.. my mistake
And old Roman's idea from this topic
Leaving more room between Ebonheart and Vivec.
That's all.
Really like idea on Dunmer shacks around relatively rich cantons. Beggars, n'wahs, fishers and boatmen need homes.
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With these in mind maybe it would be helpful to increase distance bw cantons and place them more scatter/evenly?
This also can help with FPS on low-productivity PC.
i think if possible there should be smaller, public districts/cantons between the main cantons, like bazaars or greenspaces. not too many, just a few. that way the city would feel real.
Having Vivec's Palace and High Fane higher up than the other cantons would give the feel of one of the old Motte and Bailey castles.
It would also give a very epic feel to walking through the city, having them towering above you. One thing to keep in mind, however, is the sides of them. Having them raised out the water would mean large blank textures on the sides. One possible solution would be to have carvings engraved into them. Another could be to have them built atop a natural rock formation, however this would require a lot of work, and might detract form the overall grandeur.
Tall flat walls look pretty imposing from their bottom, and definetly very defensive. The decorative part is what would be on top of these cantons, where you wouldn't even see the walls.
That being said, they can get murals :D
i liked your previous concept art too, it was great, and is still valid imho
This "It would also give a very epic feel to walking through the city, having them towering above you." true it would give an impression of high importance to the structures and anyone who would walk past would have an idea what the structure probably is. Even from a distance.
Still with Vivec layout the only place you would get this feeling is only at the nearest cantonts to the temple.
These look great so far!
I would recommend making the entrance to the foreign quarter from the outside world a bit more grand though. Perhaps a large bridge structure with two guardian statues on either side of the entrance - each holding a lantern - might make more of an impact.
perhaps the statues of vivec and talos, as they were the ones who signed the treaty...
The treaty was nothing to celebrate for the Dunmer.
Well all the Ordinators are wearing his face, so they still honor Nerevar as a hero and the foremost of saints after, perhaps, Veloth.
the dunmer may not have liked the treaty, but it would make for some great imperial propaganda for talos and vivec to appear on the same level of godhood.
That might explain why they would appear side-by-side in Ebonheart or other areas controlled by the Imperials (although the Imperial Cult might object to the inclusion of any of the Tribunal where it holds sway). But since the Imperials do not control Vivec, I don't think that Imperial propaganda would make much sense there.
I do agree, however, that the entrance to the foreign quarter should be a bit grander. High pillars or other objects on the land-side of the bridge would have to be balanced by a longer bridge so that everything doesn't look cramped. I don't know how much room we have on the map to the south to make that feasible.
What if we made the foreign quarter into two structures so that it didn't obscure the view of the rest of the city? Think two isosceles triangles with the right angle on the outside separated by a wide boulevard, creating an upside-down trapezoid of empty space in the middle through which Redoran canton can be seen (although step pyramid style instead of a true isosceles triangle). If the High Fane, Palace, and Baar Dau are given a different level as has been suggested, they could be seen rising in the distance. Even better would be to shift the foreign quarter to east so it is on the same axis as the High Fane with two bridges to Redoran and Arena cantons, so you look down the trapezoid over the canal between Redoran-Arena and Delyn-Olms onto the High Fane and Palace (and can get to Arena and Telvanni more easily from the main entrance). Then the foreign quarter could function as an extended bridge into the city and as a grand entrance.
I'm hoping the cantons will look more distance and original compared to the triple layer cake in the original game copy pasted however many times over.
imhop i really liked your old concepts, they were so unique and interesting, are you sure you're gonna scrap 'em?