I see what you're saying Orcslayer, and err... dunno really (so much for my 'expertise' :)
13 bones for a human made of 1k polys is indeed a bare minimum, you can't save more than that.
A single surface system might indeed be the answer, and although I haven't got much experience with them, the amount of time to manually tweak vertices seems (in particle engines & grass systems, etc) to be worth the effort and keeping FPS up - as opposed to this hellish surface count problem with Blitz (or dx7 or whereever the problem lies). But combining a SS system with bones and animation, don't ask me. Not there yet ;)
You should check out what the GrumpyOldMan did, not sure if you can still download his demo, but 200 characters marching with massive FPS counts is pretty impressive. Check this thread:
http://www.blitzbasic.com/Community/posts.php?topic=62559
d.
13 bones for a human made of 1k polys is indeed a bare minimum, you can't save more than that.
A single surface system might indeed be the answer, and although I haven't got much experience with them, the amount of time to manually tweak vertices seems (in particle engines & grass systems, etc) to be worth the effort and keeping FPS up - as opposed to this hellish surface count problem with Blitz (or dx7 or whereever the problem lies). But combining a SS system with bones and animation, don't ask me. Not there yet ;)
You should check out what the GrumpyOldMan did, not sure if you can still download his demo, but 200 characters marching with massive FPS counts is pretty impressive. Check this thread:
http://www.blitzbasic.com/Community/posts.php?topic=62559
d.