19 réponses à ce sujet

[rjshae]

With the overland map, it's pretty convenient to represent a city or town as a choice of places to visit in a conversation. Unless part of a city or town is being used for a combat encounter or some sort of unusual animation or effect, it strikes me that building an external area for a city or town is not all that productive. I.e. it just seems like a decorative scene to set the environment rather than something useful. I can see the benefit of having some back alley areas for use in random transit encounters, but a market square might not be value added.

What do you think?

[kamal_]

The decorative scene can still be useful, it gives a sense of size and scale that just clicking on something on a map can't (like the OC map). External areas also mean you don't have to go back to the OM to walk from the tavern to the store (which would jus be silly). External maps also strongly help set the feel of the city, take Samarach vs Westgate. If you don't need those things for your story, then sure. Or even make the external area of town an OM itself.

None of the places in SoZ felt like cities, because there was no "there" there. The gnome camp was bigger than Samarach.

[Lugaid of the Red Stripes]

When designing any element of a module, I keep the following three things in mind:
1. Plot - driving the story forward, showing change.
2. Exposition - laying out the intricacies of the game world, settings, personalities, social dynamics, economies, etc.
3. Game play - giving the player something interesting to do.

A good module element does all three at once. So maybe you just need a town to house a couple of vendors and quest givers, but don't let that tempt you into reducing everything to it's bare functional necessities. Through some ambiance into that town center to show what life is like there. Switch around some placeables and NPCs to show the effects of the unfolding plot. Exploring cities is also kind of fun, and it helps immersion to layout exactly how all those merchants relate to each other, how the different sides of town fit together.

Of course, once you actually build the town exterior, you'll figure out something interesting to put in it. I always end staging a massive battle in any town I build, but I guess there are other options.

[nicethugbert]

You could use an OM to build huge cities. But, the purpose of an OM is to house random encounters. What random encounters are so interesting that it's worth an OM?

The OM adds an extra area transition to each area transition the PC will make as he travels from neighborhood to neighborhood, and an extra 2 area transitions for encounters. I hate area transition times. I used a rogue in SoZ so I could avoid encounters so I wouldn't have to endure area transition times. I still enjoyed the OM because it added life to the world and gave my rogue some rogueing to do. But, I did limited fighting on it.

[kamal_]

nicethugbert wrote...

You could use an OM to build huge cities. But, the purpose of an OM is to house random encounters. What random encounters are so interesting that it's worth an OM?

The OM adds an extra area transition to each area transition the PC will make as he travels from neighborhood to neighborhood, and an extra 2 area transitions for encounters. I hate area transition times. I used a rogue in SoZ so I could avoid encounters so I wouldn't have to endure area transition times. I still enjoyed the OM because it added life to the world and gave my rogue some rogueing to do. But, I did limited fighting on it.

There's no reason you can't have the encounters directly on an OM. It's just SoZ didn't do that.

[rjshae]

kamal_ wrote...

The decorative scene can still be useful, it gives a sense of size and scale that just clicking on something on a map can't (like the OC map). External areas also mean you don't have to go back to the OM to walk from the tavern to the store (which would jus be silly). External maps also strongly help set the feel of the city, take Samarach vs Westgate. If you don't need those things for your story, then sure. Or even make the external area of town an OM itself.

None of the places in SoZ felt like cities, because there was no "there" there. The gnome camp was bigger than Samarach.

Right now I'm just using a common conversation at the exit to each interior city locale as the transition, rather than going back to the regional OM. Hmm, I suppose an outdoor city area could be useful for mob confrontations, large ceremonies, a chase scene, or a door to door search. But mostly is just seems like decoration with a lot of travel, unless there is some type of city-wide conflict going on. Thanks.

Modifié par rjshae, 12 mai 2012 - 05:15 .

[M. Rieder]

I have always enjoyed external city maps for the sense of continuity they provide. For me, a game world seems more realistic with fewer disjointed transitions. One critique I had about the OC was that it seemed to be a series of disjointed instances, whereas in SOZ, I felt more continuity due to the overland map. Similalry, if a city has an exterior map linking loactions, I would feel more continuity than if it were linked with conversation nodes. Furthermore, one of the advantages of NWN2 is the visually appealing exteriors that can be created. I always enjoy seeing a well-crafted exterior area. Add some nice music and some interesting NPCs and it can be quite enjoyable - more than just a utility to transition between shops and government buildings. Maybe you area accosted by muggers, maybe you fall down a sewer grate, maybe you witness a crime and are given the option to intervene or assist - anything can happen in a city.

[nicethugbert]

kamal_ wrote...

nicethugbert wrote...

You could use an OM to build huge cities. But, the purpose of an OM is to house random encounters. What random encounters are so interesting that it's worth an OM?

The OM adds an extra area transition to each area transition the PC will make as he travels from neighborhood to neighborhood, and an extra 2 area transitions for encounters. I hate area transition times. I used a rogue in SoZ so I could avoid encounters so I wouldn't have to endure area transition times. I still enjoyed the OM because it added life to the world and gave my rogue some rogueing to do. But, I did limited fighting on it.

There's no reason you can't have the encounters directly on an OM. It's just SoZ didn't do that.

How would you do that if your entire party is just one character on the OM like in SOZ?  Are you refering to a SOZ OM or a psuedo OM such as a regular area with scaled terrain and placeables to give the impression of a large region?

What about time?  If in a smaller map the party has X encounters then on a larger map they would have many times X encounters as they take days to get from A to B?

[Shaughn78]

I haven't tried it yet, but I think the OLM could make for an interesting city. With triggers and a few special wandering/random encounters a lot of life could be added to a huge area.

The transition issues could be resolved by having access to the individual stores or interiors and blocks and squares from the OLM. Same when leaving the store you could choose to go outside into the merchant square or return to the OLM, turning 2 transitions into 1.

The OLM can do a lot and SOZ barely touched what we could make it do.

[M. Rieder]

I am considering having many small towns and a few cities to visit in TWA3. To ease the burden of area building, I amd going to explore the many prefabs that are out there and customize them. Perhaps this approach will help ease the burden of building.

[kamal_]

M. Rieder wrote...

I am considering having many small towns and a few cities to visit in TWA3.

Danger Will Robinson! That's a lot of content needed.

[M. Rieder]

kamal_ wrote...

M. Rieder wrote...

I am considering having many small towns and a few cities to visit in TWA3.

Danger Will Robinson! That's a lot of content needed.

I think many was an overstatement.  I fully plan to pilfer wherever possible.  I don't intend to make them all myself.  I'll take them and then customize as needed, but your warning is not falling on deaf ears.  I am cognizant of the dangers of scope creep.

[rjshae]

M. Rieder wrote...

I have always enjoyed external city maps for the sense of continuity they provide. For me, a game world seems more realistic with fewer disjointed transitions. One critique I had about the OC was that it seemed to be a series of disjointed instances, whereas in SOZ, I felt more continuity due to the overland map. Similalry, if a city has an exterior map linking loactions, I would feel more continuity than if it were linked with conversation nodes. Furthermore, one of the advantages of NWN2 is the visually appealing exteriors that can be created. I always enjoy seeing a well-crafted exterior area. Add some nice music and some interesting NPCs and it can be quite enjoyable - more than just a utility to transition between shops and government buildings. Maybe you area accosted by muggers, maybe you fall down a sewer grate, maybe you witness a crime and are given the option to intervene or assist - anything can happen in a city.

The problem I had with the city maps in the OC was that the buildings were basically a whole lot of useless occupied space. There was little sense of exploring an environment. Yes a nicely built urban setting can be briefly enjoyable, but I think you need to have a lot of interesting nooks and crannies to discover. The Baldur's Gate settlements felt that way, as if you could potentially find something new and challenging around every corner.

[kamal_]

Iveforgotmypassword wrote...
 The only thing I find to be a hassle is dressing the peasants and making up their outfits etc !

Apep's dynamic commoners
(http://nwvault.ign.c...s.Detail&id=162),you can have your commoners automatically randomize their dress, appearance, soundset, name, hair etc. on spawn.

Modifié par kamal_, 13 mai 2012 - 01:03 .

[kamal_]

Iveforgotmypassword wrote...

I rather like the idea of "dynamic" commoners nice tip ! Only thing is I never spawn them but I could do in the future as it also makes them roam around a bit too without adding a variable.

Thank you, I will investigate

It works when you place them as well. i've used it.

[rjshae]

Iveforgotmypassword wrote...

rjshae... I think it's all up to the builder but I would'nt like to see a city done on the overland map as I'd much rather stroll empty streets than click here for quest, click here for shops, oh look a bunch of robbers appeared etc.

So if you really don't want to have one because it's to much hassle or you believe a city to be a "whole lot of useless occupied space" and only "briefly enjoyable" then right it out of the story, have a merchant wagon or even a camp load of merchants, make there no need to go there or stick in a cutscene saying how you sneaked into mr x's house etc. It's your mod but I do feel that an overland map city would seem rather lazy. It would probably feel as you do about making cities in that it was just done for purpose rather than enjoyment.

I've made 3 cities now and they might take quite a bit of effort and time but there's no hurry so it doesn't matter. Isn't it nicer to roam around something you made than to click and the script fires ? The only thing I find to be a hassle is dressing the peasants and making up their outfits etc !

Well I'm deliberately using an overland map for a region that players may know about, so they would have certain expectations. One of those is that about a dozen cities and towns will exist in well known locations. Hence, it's not something that can be realistically ignored or written-around. As for making exterior maps, it's not a matter of it being a "hassle" so much as the builder (me) can instead spend time on making other interesting areas, such as dungeons, ruins, evil temples, and so forth. I found out the hard way that making a decent quality town, along with all of its interior structures and a realistic population, can take several months. (Maybe I'll post it to the Vault in case somebody wants to use it. Right now I'm cannibalizing the interior areas...)

I think now what I'll probably do is just focus on a couple of cities or towns where there is a concentration of interesting things so do, such as encounters, shops, and NPC interactions, all within a reasonable mapping area. But I definitely would like to create a sense of "exploration", rather than just tedious walking back and forth between fights and stores. Perhaps I can do that by focusing on the cities run by evil governments (or infiltrated by enemy forces) where any encounter can potentially lead to battle?

Thanks.

Modifié par rjshae, 14 mai 2012 - 06:40 .

[rjshae]

Well I answered my own question: it is nice to have at least one of the city areas be located outdoors because it provides the suitable atmosphere. In this case I made it a park with an in-depth clutter of buildings arranged in the background around the park walls. It did take a little more work to fill in all the blank spots on the map, but the environment looks and feels good now. Thanks.

Modifié par rjshae, 22 mai 2012 - 07:13 .