Void Saints: Nova log

SharkyNebula

Void Saints: Nova is a total conversion for Naev that adds a reimagined Novaverse. It can be found at codeberg. This is a development log.

SharkyNebula

Log for adding Abomination to Void Saints: Nova.

12/16/25 Tuesday
Remodel of Abomination landing gear, engine block.

12/17/25 Wednesday
Rework of house colours for Abomination. UV unwrapped Abomination and baked colours.

12/18/25 Thursday
Unwrap of Hail Chaingun, Radar Missile. Added matworks textures to these weapons and added the weapons to the asset library. Remodel of Fusion Pulse Cannon (Single and Double).

12/19/25 Friday
Made Mini Fusion Pulse Turret. Remodeled Abomination cockpit and added supports to engine block. UV unwrapped Abomination and baked colours.

12/20/25 Saturday
Drew House emblems in Procreate.

12/21/25 Sunday
Created Decalmachine decals from House emblems, applied to Abomination, rendered new sprites, changed metal around turret to be darker, rendered new sprites again, prepared Naev graphics.

12/22/25 Monday
Added Naev ship resources, created an Abomination tech level, added it to Tidal and generated collision data to make the ship flyable without errors.

SharkyNebula

Log for adding the Caravel and Xebec to Void Saints: Nova.

Around March 2025
I remodeled the Caravel and made it less pancake. I used a curved steel beam as the basis, and modeled a mechanically complex (for me) double strut to connect to the nacelle. Three Skyboat cargo containers were placed on top and a single large flare engine was used to replace the original triple. The blue decal on the original was expanded into geometry to imply that it was the ship's bridge.

There were three configurations conceptualized for the amount of armor covering the nacelle: one where it was fully covered, one where it was just connected with struts and one where it was just connected via the glowstick. This was in addition to the steel-beam-only front end used for the Xebec. However, in the end these degenerations were only used for the Xebec, as the Family Caravels needed that space to display their house emblems.

12/22/25 Monday
I added the remodeled dual Fusion Pulse Cannon to the Caravel and the house emblems to it. The new Landing Hexes from the Abomination were added to the bottom, and the main body was texture painted with panel lines. I rendered the Auroran and Family Caravels (5 total).

12/23/25 Tuesday
I remodeled the Fusion Pulse Battery and added it to the Pirate/Ronin Xebecs. I rendered the Xebecs.

12/24/25 Wednesday
I processed images for the Caravel and Xebec, made spritesheets and added them to the total conversion.

SharkyNebula

Log for adding the Aurora Cruiser and Heraan Seraph to Void Saints: Nova

Around March 2025
I gave the Aurora Cruiser a minor remodel and split it into four variants: the Gjencha (baseline), the Fruncheck (spin and chin hangars), the Thamgiir (chin hangar and weapons spine) and the Gjinchar (lightning-bolt-shaped weapons spine for extra weapons). This involved lots of parts in different collections that can have their visibility toggled on and off.

29/12/25 Monday
I used a ranked preference revealer to sort what stats I might potentially give to the Seraph. Then I went over the concept on the VSN: Monolith spreadsheet and assigned perks to the ship based on that. The Seraph ended up with this profile:

Seraph Profile:

Cruiser, Size 7
Armoured Hull (high armor, low shields)
Active Core (high cpu, low cargo)
Drifter Engine (low acceleration, cargo bonus)
Heraan factional inherent outfit (Shields, Shield Regen, Boarding Bonus +10%)
Seraph perks (sum +25):

Maneuver
Speed: +2 (Flat)
Accel: -1 (Flat)
Turn Rate: -1 (Flat)
Reverse Thrusters: +1 (Boolean)
Defences
Shield Capacity +4 (Flat)
Shield Regeneration: +2 (Flat)
Shield Down Time: +1 (Percentage)
De-ion: +1 (Percentage)
Missile Jamming Chance: -1 (Percentage)
Resources
Energy Capacity: +3 (Flat)
Fuel: -1 (Flat)
Crew: +2 (Flat)
Slots
Gun Slots: +2
Turret Slots: +4
Launcher Slots: +2
Fighter Bays: +2
Structure Slots: +4
Utility Slots: +2
Time
Landing Time: -1 (Percentage)
Jump Time: -1 (Percentage)
Jump warm-up: -1 (Percentage)
Electronic Warfare
Detected range: -2 (Percentage)

I rendered the Seraph after adding the Heraan decal and added the stats in game.

30/12/25 Tuesday
I migrated the colour schemes of all the old files onto the new consolidated Cruiser model and reworked some house colour schemes. The Tekel scheme was particularly garish. (pink and yellow, like a candy shop)

The decals of the Empire and various houses were added to the model, involving the shrinkwrap modifier on the spinner and lots of lightning bolts were placed on flat surfaces.

31/12/25 Wednesday
I unwrapped the Cruiser and baked these colour schemes so that they can be swapped on and off by overwriting a file in a folder. Texture painting was done and metal textures were added, upon which the diffuse maps and texture painting was overlaid.

I decided which houses would have which variants:

Aurora - Gjencha (auroran weapons), Fruncheck (firebird)
Dani - Gjinchar (long range)
Heraan - Thamgiir (close range)
Ronin - Gjencha (federation weapons)
Moash - Gjinchar (close range)
Tekel - Thamgiir (long range)
Vella - Fruncheck (phoenix)

01/01/26 Thursday
I rendered the Cruisers, processed the images and added them to the total conversion.

02/01/26 Friday
I had to re-process the spritesheets for the Caravel, Xebec, Fruncheck, Gjencha, Gjinchar and Thamgiir to eliminate some errant white pixels on the edge of the sprites. They were very distracting.

SharkyNebula

03/01/26 Saturday & 04/01/26 Sunday

Spent these days stat-blocking the 13 IDA variants. Reworked the turn rate gradient in the Total Conversion in the process.