11 réponses à ce sujet

[Avalon Aurora]

I've heard it is possible to mod the engine in NWN2, and there are a bunch of things I'm curious about.

1. Bodies & Gear: One thing that has always bugged me about NWN2 and the mods out there is that a lot of the character models don't look very attractive, and for nude mods used to give characters more types of outfits, you'll often see weird seams in their skin or bugles around their thighs like their feet are boots, even when not wearing boots. There are also not enough good face replacements, particularly for some of the really ugly faces that come stadard (half-elves in particular have terrible faces). I'd love to see a set of mods that completely replaces the character graphics and wearable gear system and graphics with something more attractive and seamless, that makes it easier for modders to effectively put clothing on the characters, and allows players to customize outfits easier once such mods are created, and allow characters to show skin without it looking weird, as well as allow things like tails and wings to be added more easily.

2. Alternate movement Fly/Mounted/Swim/Jump/Climb/Burrow/incoropreal, 3D mapping: Another thing that has bugged me is the effectively 2D mapping of the game, especially one with nominally flying enemies and stuff in it, in a setting where wizards should have flight abilities by the time they get 3rd level spells, and climbing around 2nd level spells. I'm not sure how hard it would be to program, but I doubt it would be too hard. The harder part would probably be designing graphics for alternate movements (which initially could just have no special animations while functionality is tested and wait for graphics modders to make the movements), and designing levels for the module creators, the level design issues could easily be solved by having a check box or whatever to disallow flight/burrow/swim or whatnot in a level. Still, I'd like to see it possible, as there are a lot of cool things that could be done with module creation allowing it, and regular PnP DMs (myself included) are able to manage players being able to do that stuff all the time. The lack of mounted combat in particular is a serious issue because it breaks the limited balancing of the paladin, and limits some options for overland travel systems. Not having alternate movement modes also limits various iconic monsters, including dragons, bullettes, and kracken. Even the standard elementals are kind-of lamified without flight, swimming, and burrowing. I'd like to note that the person making it possible wouldn't have to be the person who creates monsters and PC stuff that can do it. I've seen some partial implementations being worked on, but they look rather incomplete and round-about, such as turning mounts into a sort of pseudo-item, or making swimming little different from some kind of funny walking animation on the bottom or top of water areas. The biggest issue this should be getting rid of is the ever feared waist-high(sometimes ankle high) fence (which NWN1 was infamous for, fallen logs...). I'd also like to see tumble checks and stuff be able to be used to get around/over objects on the ground like tables, chairs, and chests (perhaps giving items a tumble check variable to go over them, and maybe a balance variable to balance upon them, like going across a tight-rope or log-bridge, if balance skill was added). Swimming would also likely involve drowning and water breathing systems.

3. Destructible/Passable terrain/objects- This seems to be partially implementable in the engine already, although might be challenging for some modders, but the implementation I'm talking about here is more for stuff like passwall spells and portable holes, as well as transmutation spells and giving walls thickness values and such, rather than borders. It would be impossible to make things as versatile as the real PnP, but I could see it possible to create walls that have a variable which allows passwall and use of portable hole items on them to go to the other side. Making it easier and a more complete system for making items and terrain destructible/modifiable would be good, especially doing something for druids like making it so that tree items can be used for certain spells. Incoporeal characters and their movements might also be noteworthy for passing through stuff.

4. Teleportation- there would probably be two modes for this, a tactical mode, where you select a point in-range to teleport to based on the spell's capabilities, and long-range, which would be a form of overland movement where you can select unwarded places you've been within range. There are lots of spells to jump position in the game that don't exist in NWN2, but teleportation might be easier to add than flight/swim/climb, especially since some aspects of cutscenes cause teleportation-like effects.

5. Psionics- is it possible to implement a spell/power point type system and classes (possibly races too?), this is kinda low-priority if we consider NWN2 a Forgotten Realms focused setting, as psionics is rarer in FR, but module makers could easily make modules that take place in Ebberon or other settings where psionics is more prevalent. (along those lines, other weird classes with odd spellcasting systems like artificer and some Unearthed Arcana variant rule system possibilities like spellpoint casters or gestalt characters should be looked at).

6. Paying for LA- there are some alternate rules and DMs who will allow you to pay off LA at higher levels, for instance, you might take a feat with a prerequisite of assimar/teifling 10th level which removes your LA, since the LAs become increasingly costly and pointless at higher levels. Other DM's might allow you to pay it off with experience, but from then on allow you to progress as it you had no LA, but first you have to reach a certain level when the LA is getting silly and the abilities granted by your race are less significant compared to class level stuff and items. Along these lines, also implementing stuff like racial abilities that scale with levels in certain ways (such as the way Raptorans develop their flight) and allowing races with racial hit dice like Nymphs.

7. Shapeshifting and illusions- Allowing characters to disguise themselves (and some modules to factor this in) using spells, such as selecting a new temporary race/gender from a list, possibly a temporary outfit illusion as well. Disguise Self is a 1st level spell after all. Other shapeshifting spells being given lists of forms to choose from might be nice, as well as illusion and summoning spells letting you choose from lists of things to call up. Perhaps there could be a standard form of it for quick-casting, but holding a key would allow you to choose from the list. For instance the standard form of disguise self might allow you to select a target you can see, and then you are disguised as that target, but holding a key while selecting the spell would allow you to choose from a list of race/gender combinations, and then a list of outfits (perhaps robe, armor (light medium or heavy), commoner, traveler, barbarian, or wealthy). Holding down a key while using a summoning spell would let you call up one of several different creatures, rather than the standard one offered, such as choosing from a dog, badger, or monkey. Some other spells might allow this select from list option. Might be a good way to implement the Wish spell. Perhaps prestitigitation as well, some objects might be able to be marked or dirtied or cleaned, or you could use it for entertainment in dialogue.

8. Temp-terrain spells- some illusions and transmutations and conjurations shoud probably allow you to temporarily add terrain objects (or fake ones in the case of illusions) such as walls and stuff that can potentially block or control movement and cover, and perhaps ranged attacks, things like wall of force and such.

9. Dialogue spell use- not sure if this is already there yet, but it might be good to have dialogue based spell use, such as potential to use mind-reading spells at certain points in a conversation (detect thoughts etc.) or charm or dominate spells, much like how you can use skill checks in conversation, with potential for failure and consequences if the attempt is detected, this would be enabled in some conversations involving things like interrogating someone for information. Of course it would have to be implemented by the module builder.

10. Saving people- One of the things that can be frustrating is when you have a character with healing abiilities as your character or in the party, but random NPCs can't be healed of injuries or ressurected like your party members can, or even more weirdly, you can only use special items to heal them in a dialogue tree, rather than your own normal curative spells or potions, which would theoreticaly work better. There are also times when you might find a dying or recently dead NPC that you should theoretically be able to save with ressurection spells if you have them, and I'm not sure if this works with the engine. It might already and just be an issue of various modules and the OC and such not implementing such possibilities for dramatic purposes due to bad implementation of the setting and narrative (like Shandra's death). Not everyone could be saved of course, some targets might be inflicted with special poisons or diseases that the standard spells won't cure, might not answer to people ressurecting them from the wrong gods, might have too low of constitution scores or desire to stay in their afterlife, alignment issues, gods not letting them go, etc. but having a few opportunities to ressurect a recently dead NPC might be nice in a module or two.

11. Languages- Not sure if this exists, but it might be interesting to have characters know a limited number of languages, and if an NPC speaks in one they don't know or a book is found in one they don't know, they might have to either cast comprehend languages or tongues, or find themselves facing only gibberish. The weirdnes sof the speak-language skill might be an issue for the engine though...

12. Reincarnation/Cursed Changes- Allowing the druid reincarnation spells and various other ways of changing race and/or gender by accident or purpose, as well as reversing such. This might also allow for some amusing NPC situations meeting PCs who have changed gender and/or race.

13. Alternate alignment systems (such as 4th ed's one)- allowing you to be unaligned and stuff like that, or turning off alignment standards for classes, or even completely removing the alignment system, or perhaps implementing a yin-yang system or an 'honor' based system (such as for an Oriental Adventures setting).

14. Sanity- for a setting heavy in the eldritch horror genera and dealing with stuff like abberations and some kinds of psionics and stuff, or certain spells and scripted story events, sanity could be an interesting system to implement, perhaps comparable to the spirit eater system.

15. Scrying- things like scrying spells, clairvoyance, and other remote sensing spells, being able to select a nearby unopened room and look inside, or move around a sensor 'summon' that most NPCs can't detect and is incorporeal and able to pass through walls and stuff.

16. Divinations in general- having opportunities to use sites at temples or pools of water or crystal balls and such in some modules to cast a divination spell and as questions in a dialogue form, perhaps costing spellcraft checks and will saves and stuff.

17. Repairing stuff and putting out fires- there are spells and theoretically skills for it, one of the things that allways bugged me in the OC was letting Shandra's barn, and later house burn down, and not being able to stop or repair it in any way. You can't even do something like a wisdom or spot/listen check to detect and try to stop the lizardfolk before they go up and light it on fire, despite getting to see them running along in the background.

18. Fixing the inventory- Perhaps bringing back the NWN1 potential for objects to take certain shapes, and increasing the stacking potential and sorting methods availible, such as being able to sort all gems into one area, or all ores, or all weapons or shields, or have things sorted like they are in shops.

19. Rest spells- things like alarm, rope-trick, mordenkainen's mansion, leomund's secure shelter, and mordenkainen's faithfull hound, for resting improvements and security.

20. Templates- both for module creators and character creation, being able to add some templates to characters or monsters, noteworthy possibilities would be proper half-dragon templates.

[painofdungeoneternal]

Depends on the work you put into it, and your skill level. You have far too much in your list to do it one by one, quite a few of those are topics in their own right. I'll let someone else do the line by line answers. Most of the ones you are not going to be able to implement, are more because there is no logical way you can do it, or they are really module specific ( like scrying ), or just too much work for the result.

We have recreated the skeletons, swimming is kind of done, horses are in progress, but with the right tools anything is possible. There was someone who started putting in martial arts moves he new which i don't think got anywhere. This is all relative to how well you can deal with 3dsmax and cat. If you have those skills, well hellfire is looking for minions and you can help him implement a plethora of things.

Spells are quite a bit easier to handle than combat if you are just doing simple mods. I kind of have a mords mansion in progress, alarm is implemented. Psionics exists ( PRC did that for NWN1 ), templates are not really simple, nor are custom spell books, but doable with scripting of the UI. Fire has been done, but putting it out has not been done. Insanity, well there is a cthulu PW being developed with it's own spell system which handles that. Alignment, just ignore it, 4th edition did not do anything the OC didn't do and you can change the requirements however you wish on classes ( take a look at kaedrins work to see what you can do for classes ). Languages are in progress ( done really except for the books ). Teleportation is great, but the issues are module specific, what happens if you teleport past that door or trigger which the module author put in to make the final arch villain show up. Long range is just a map like in the OC really.

The limits of what we can do, well we have capability with what skywing has done to change how the engine itself works, or those with similar skills to redo how the game itself works. He's done things like replace the script compiler, the networking, resource loading, and even pathfinding to a degree. ( or just made fixes to game breaking bugs that cause the game itself to crash ). The interface is scriptable and editable. Effects are done in a special editor.

This is probably the most moddable game that exists, but what you can do is directly related to your skills, and like any game the engine was built to implement the OC, not to be some sort of Unity type engine. I would suggest looking at the vault for examples of what people are doing, and also to communicate enough so you aren't just recreating what others have already done.

What is going to be modded is directly related to what things bring the most value to the players / end users / you relative to the difficulty of implementing them with the skills that you have.

What sort of modding do you prefer to do? What sort of modding are you capable of doing?

[Lugaid of the Red Stripes]

Destructable/Temporary terrain objects are quite doable, as long as you are using a placeable object to model the terrain, and the terrain only blocks movement. So adding or destroying walls is doable, adding a bridge over a chasm is trickier. You can do it, but basically the bridge has to be premade in a specific spot, and is then is later revealed/enabled in-game.

NPCs can also be resurrected, as long as their blueprints are modified (It's just a check box, and a few other issues that have to be dealt with). classes can also be done from scratch, including removing the alignment restrictions. Alignment shifts are handled by easily-modified scripts, and you can script in whatever new system you want.

To echo pain, you can script pretty much anything you want in this game, but it can be a lot of work, not to script the action itself, but to handle all the unintended consequences of the action. Most walls, for example, serve to keep players within the bounds of the created gameworld, where there's stuff to look at and NPCs to talk to. Once you let them fly, teleport, and portal their way over those walls, then you have to make sure there's something for them to see and do there.

Likewise for the more complicated PC-NPC interactions. If you teleport into a temple disguised as a priest, should the guard say something respectful to you? What if you teleport into the temple disguised as a orc? What if you walk into a brothel disquised as a priest? As a nymph?

If you're planning on actively DMing any adventure you make, of course, then a lot of these issues go away.

[Avalon Aurora]

I'm not really capable of modding, I'm more just curious about what sort of things are in the works, or can be in the works. Partly, I haven't been able to get the toolset to load, and partly I've done poorly in scripting attempts back in the day trying to create custom content for Starcraft, Warcraft III, Escape Velocity: Override, Escape Velocity: NOVA, and one of the RPG maker things, figuring out I'm not good at scripting (I guess I don't have the right kind of logic for it...).

I don't intend all these things to be in the game or make a module with them, I'm just curious whether or not they can/have been done. I have been surfing around the vault and seen various examples.

If people want my help with making modules, I wouldn't mind play-testing, doing voice-work, possibly some texture editing (I have some photoshop skills and experience, but very limited 3D experience and currently no 3D software), helping writing and editing dialogue, planning out dungeon maps and encounters, help with story and narrative development and editing, and some good experience with DMing and playing D&D 3.5 edition, and some experience playing 2nd edition, and very little playing 4th.

Mostly I'm frustrated with how the OC is so restrictive compared to what they were talking about having when NWN2 was still in development, and the fact that it looks like Neverwinter (which is coming out an unknown time in the distant future) looks like it is going to be 4th ed, which I'm not very fond of, and I'm asking about what kinds of things might be in future modules, as well as wondering if someone shouldn't be trying to write a new original engine from scratch for developing D&D games in using the d20 system license for 3.5 edition.

[MasterChanger]

I'm going to try splitting up my responses. I've been getting empty posts (that show text when edited) on some longer posts recently, so let's see what happens...

As Pain (who would be the premier person to handle the scripting on a number of these initiatives) suggests, each of these would be big questions. I'll talk about a couple of them in general terms.

Environment issues: Things like alternate movement, interaction with terrain, and teleportation fall under this category. I agree that this kind of stuff could make the game experience much richer. 
A lot of the animation work is already being done by Hellfire (with script support from Pain) though it's clearly a ton of work. He's doing horse-riding (though not yet mounted combat), swimming, and levitation work, all of it on a very high level of quality. I'd love to see flying creature skeletons (various birds, especially) but that's probably down the road.

How this interacts with obstacles and terrain is more complicated. How does a map maker determine which non-walkable space can be jumped over, or flown over, or swimmable? I could envision a somewhat messy system involving waypoints around obstacles on which you store some information, or perhaps triggers surrounding a crevasse or stream.

Modifié par MasterChanger, 02 août 2011 - 08:18 .

[MasterChanger]

Ha, success! Part 2 continues...

Destroying, bypassing, or otherwise affecting terrain could be more complicated. For placeables that are purely visual, it's common practice to use environmental objects (with walkmesh cutters if applicable) to save on system resources; this means that many areas are designed with most the placeables not "there". I love playing druids and would love to affect terrain, but trading smooth gameplay for more possibilities could be somewhat of a devil's bargain. It's possible that collision boxes or triggers could be used to accomplish some of these ends more smoothly.

Alternate casting systems: a few non-Vancian systems have been created, though to my knowledge none of them are totally polished yet. This involves quite a bit of scripting work as well as GUI design. 0100010 has been working on a custom spellbook system. I did some work on custom quick-casting, but retrieving which spells are castable in which quantities at a certain time was a thorny issue, as I wanted to avoid iterating over all spells every six seconds!

NPC interactions: Anything that can happen through scripting (which is quite a lot!) can happen as part of a conversation. Casting (or fake-casting) spells as conversations is certainly possible (though hostile spells will break out of conversations). Really, many module authors have been much more creative than the OC in the area of conversations.

Languages: check out Pain's system in rolling development. He's put an amazing amount of work into this, considering it from many angles, and it really shows.

Graphical User Interfaces (GUIs) have also been an area that's seen a lot of work recently, especially by Lance Botelle (check out his Fog of War system). This can be for new mini-game aspects, like lock-picking and such, or for overriding existing game aspects, such as the inventory.
I'm sure others will pop in with more responses!

Modifié par MasterChanger, 02 août 2011 - 08:26 .

[painofdungeoneternal]

Avalon Aurora wrote...

I'm not really capable of modding, I'm more just curious about what sort of things are in the works, or can be in the works. Partly, I haven't been able to get the toolset to load, and partly I've done poorly in scripting attempts back in the day trying to create custom content for Starcraft, Warcraft III, Escape Velocity: Override, Escape Velocity: NOVA, and one of the RPG maker things, figuring out I'm not good at scripting (I guess I don't have the right kind of logic for it...).

I don't intend all these things to be in the game or make a module with them, I'm just curious whether or not they can/have been done. I have been surfing around the vault and seen various examples.

If people want my help with making modules, I wouldn't mind play-testing, doing voice-work, possibly some texture editing (I have some photoshop skills and experience, but very limited 3D experience and currently no 3D software), helping writing and editing dialogue, planning out dungeon maps and encounters, help with story and narrative development and editing, and some good experience with DMing and playing D&D 3.5 edition, and some experience playing 2nd edition, and very little playing 4th.

Mostly I'm frustrated with how the OC is so restrictive compared to what they were talking about having when NWN2 was still in development, and the fact that it looks like Neverwinter (which is coming out an unknown time in the distant future) looks like it is going to be 4th ed, which I'm not very fond of, and I'm asking about what kinds of things might be in future modules, as well as wondering if someone shouldn't be trying to write a new original engine from scratch for developing D&D games in using the d20 system license for 3.5 edition.

Most of what you described is in progress, on the vault, and a few things are just things which not going to happen. ( not that they are impossible, just not enough interest relative to how hard they are to implement ).

I would suggest getting kaedrins work, kaldor silverwands OC override, and tony k's AI which are probably the most refined projects at the moment, and seeing what they have to offer. They fix a lot of issues, as well as add a lot of value to the game.

I would also suggest getting on a PW, or trying a community module, the OC is probably the worst example of what the engine can do. Or go try playing SOZ which is a lot less restrictive.

[kamal_]

I'm doing spells in conversation. It has to be written into the conversation though, and it makes conversation writing a PITA because you have to account for every spell that can make an effect (there's what, 6-7 charm spells of various sorts, now repeat for fear effect etc).

Also disguise and whatnot are easily doable (and I have it working in my work) but it has to be scripted for each place it's usable.

Essentially, the community is doing a lot of things that were considered "impossible". Language systems like Pains, swimming, mounts, and many more.

[kamal_]

Putting out fire can be done via script and trigger. It's just a vfx and probably a light after all, plus maybe a trigger for damage if you are in the fire. You can even put out fires via OnDamaged of a placeable such as a torch, allowing you to shoot out torches with water or ice spells or weapons, or lightone via fire damage. You could also script a trigger to adjust hide in shadows skillchecks based on the light's state.

In fact you could even have a fire that burns itself out and is replaces with smoke effects, and those disappear after a while. It's a matter of how much work you want to do to make something like tha happen.

[-Semper-]

Avalon Aurora wrote...

to write a new original engine from scratch for developing D&D games in using the d20 system license for 3.5 edition.

imo that's impossible. wotc/hasbro only licenses 4ed systems to sell the actual campaign set. as a dev you can create your own rules based on the d20 system imitating the 3.5ed or simply license the 3.75ed from pathfinder.

[Kaldor Silverwand]

This is a non-spoiler forum so please be careful about what things you say about the OC.

The torches I use in my campaigns can be lit with torch or fire damage (really cool to light a torch with a fire arrow) and also extinguished. Of course this is to best effect when the places you are exploring are truly dark to begin with.

I have items that allow short-range teleportation in the vault here. I certainly agree with the others though that teleportation is problematic at best because triggers that may be required for the plot could be teleported past and therefore never fire.

Several of the things you are asking for are doable but would require more work on the part of modders to support in their campaigns. Raising the bar for modders only results in fewer mods being released. Unfortunately there isn't an army of NWN2 modders.

Regards

[MasterChanger]

 Whew, it took forever to get my earlier responses to show! 

I also wanted to respond to your first post about bodies/faces:

Avalon Aurora wrote...
1. Bodies & Gear: One thing that has always bugged me about NWN2 and the mods out there is that a lot of the character models don't look very attractive, and for nude mods used to give characters more types of outfits, you'll often see weird seams in their skin or bugles around their thighs like their feet are boots, even when not wearing boots. There are also not enough good face replacements, particularly for some of the really ugly faces that come stadard (half-elves in particular have terrible faces).

Re-texturing bodies can certainly be done. And faces can certainly be done. While some of the older faces (half-elves, sun elves, some halflings) look awful, some of the faces released with MotB (half-drow, wood elves, genasi) and SoZ (yuan-ti) are quite good. There are ways to allow these faces to be used for other sub-races. Also, there are some very  http://nwvault.ign.c...90]high-quality[/url] http://nwvault.ign.c...ail&id=174]head models[/url] released by community members. 

Modifié par MasterChanger, 02 août 2011 - 09:18 .