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[MokahTGS]

It's been a while since I've updated people on the development of Jabberwocky so this update will cover a
few new developments.

The Highland Wilderness World Map
One of the great things about NWN2 is all of the different game play options you have as a builder, and using some sort of fast travel system was always in my design for Jabberwocky.  I finally settled on using the world map travel system but didn't want to limit the player to using it at only specific locations so a different solution to the traditional system was needed.

In Jabberwocky, the player will receive a map item in their inventory that they can use at any time.  Doing so will bring up the world map UI and allow fast travel from most locations.  There are a few exceptions of course.  Players can't use the map item while in combat, and in certain dungeons, and they can't use map while on the overland map.   Many of these restrictions are for bug squashing and for plot reasons, but overall the system itself is pretty freeing for the player.  Once a location is discovered on the overland map, the player can select it on the world map UI.

Making Islands Fly
Jabberwocky has always been a non-traditional module design and I wanted to do something odd for one of the final areas.  Exploiting a toolset quirk and some community tools allows me to create an area that doesn't follow the same rules of traditional area design.

Using the Terra Coppa tool I was able to select sections of an area and raise them individually to different heights.  This has the unique affect of slicing the terrain into separate terraces and it keeps the walkmeshs intact right to the edge of the slice.  Raising the sections high enough (we're talking over 200) you end up with floating
sections of terrain that cannot see the ground underneath.  This gives the illusion of a floating island in a void, which is the feel I'm going for in this area.

The tricky bits about doing this sort of design is using water feature and understanding that once a terrain level goes above 100 in height you can't use the flatten tool.  Water for one of the floating islands needed to be painted separately at the normal ground level and then raised separately with the Terra Coppa plugin.  After the terrain was lifted you can mold it quite well with the raise/lower/smooth/noise tools.

One of the major challenges with floating islands is the bottom of the island.  To accomplish the right affect, custom placeables are required.  Using the MDB Cloner and MDB Tool, I flipped the standard tintable cliff face rocks and created an upside-down version to use as the bottom side of each island.  The result is a look like each island was ripped out of the ground and now floats in a void.  Using RWS Cliffs and other stock placeables completes the illusion.

I've been using the City Hak for quite some time and use it extensively throughout Jabberwocky, but for this area, the sidewalk and brick placeables that come with that pack are crucial to giving a surreal illusion of floating pathways and roads that have been ripped out of their foundations.

The last piece of the puzzle was answering how the player would move around in such a non-traditional area. I wanted the area to have distinct islands that the player would visit, and flying would prove very difficult in an area with an already overly complex walkmesh. In the end, I've settled on using Kamal's Jumping System that will be customized to allow for a catastrophic fall into the void if the player fails a roll. This design keeps things simple and allows the player to play through the area and not fight with the walkmesh.

Jabberwocky as a module is quite huge and has many systems that have proved more complex then originally expected, but development continues.

250x150https://lh6.googleusercontent.com/-zrggv_DKKkk/UO8gHgzgi5I/AAAAAAAADZk/CBIOZ-VDMxs/s912/NWN2_SS_111712_110934.jpg[/img]  250x150https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/-xyWGm8ebFXk/UO8gJmwBcrI/AAAAAAAADaA/HjwBrRhLgQU/s912/NWN2_SS_111912_122154.jpg[/img]  250x150https://lh6.googleusercontent.com/-ERxiC1Oi49w/UO8gKGt23yI/AAAAAAAADaE/mI6-rRO6ebM/s912/NWN2_SS_111912_122214.jpg[/img]  250x150https://lh5.googleusercontent.com/-NMWkBV2f6GY/UO8gKZcUKyI/AAAAAAAADaI/M11qZQaB4l4/s912/NWN2_SS_122912_102345.jpg[/img]  250x150https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/-D6N_v39eG0M/UO8gSkOJcII/AAAAAAAADbo/_XMvoJXH9FU/s912/NWN2_SS_122912_191323.jpg[/img]  250x150https://lh6.googleusercontent.com/-grd6wLvSKnM/UO8gTidw8LI/AAAAAAAADbw/hv965UWZifc/s1024/isle1.jpg[/img]  250x150https://lh6.googleusercontent.com/-OmgYveo-AIY/UO8gTw2vCGI/AAAAAAAADb0/_W93pstPq_U/s544/u_rocks2.jpg[/img]  250x150https://lh4.googleusercontent.com/-Xosq_kkLfjU/UPN2owElPzI/AAAAAAAADc4/SF947rir9vE/s912/NWN2_SS_011213_162337.jpg[/img]

You can see the full Jabberwocky Album here.

Modifié par MokahTGS, 27 janvier 2013 - 04:30 .

[Hellfire_RWS]

That is some amazing area work!

[Dann-J]

Some sort of short-range teleport spell for mages with pathetic jumping skills would seem to be in order.

In the game Heretic II the player could use their staff to pole-vault across gaps they otherwise couldn't jump over. I wonder if Kamal's jumping system could take into account whether the player is holding a staff or pole-arm, and give them a 'pole-vault bonus' on their difficulty roll?

[kamal_]

DannJ wrote...

Some sort of short-range teleport spell for mages with pathetic jumping skills would seem to be in order.

In the game Heretic II the player could use their staff to pole-vault across gaps they otherwise couldn't jump over. I wonder if Kamal's jumping system could take into account whether the player is holding a staff or pole-arm, and give them a 'pole-vault bonus' on their difficulty roll?

There's already penalties built in for wearing armor/shield and having weapons in hand, as well as code to give bonuses for items. It was part of the original Markshire climbing I used. So adding a "pole of vaulting" or a ten foot pole would be no big deal.

[MokahTGS]

The pole vaulting scenario has already been accounted for...

[rjshae]

Very nice! I really like floating rocks; they give it a true fantasy feel.

[I_Raps]

Time to trot out the grappling hand from Hordes of the Underdark.

[MokahTGS]

 Here's a sneak preview of the Highland Wilderness worldmap:

150x150https://dl.dropbox.com/u/9882100/NWN2/Jabberwocky/jw_worldmap_s.jpg[/img]

Modifié par MokahTGS, 22 janvier 2013 - 03:05 .

[Dann-J]

kamal_ wrote...
There's already penalties built in for wearing armor/shield and having weapons in hand, as well as code to give bonuses for items. It was part of the original Markshire climbing I used. So adding a "pole of vaulting" or a ten foot pole would be no big deal.

It just so happens that I created that 'ten foot pole' a couple of days ago. I noticed a bunch of references to lances in the tlk file, so I cloned a couple of spear models, stretched them out a bit (courtesy of the MDB Tool), and cloned two of the rapier guards as additional parts for the weapon model. The lance entry was already in baseitems.2da - all I had to do is reactivate it and clone the weapon parts with the right names.

Although any attempt to vault with it would probably result in it being left behind with the point stuck firmly into the ground.

[drechner]

Those are some fantastic looking screens! Great job! Truly unlike anything I've seen done in NWN2 up until now.

[Tchos]

Looking very good! I was looking forward to this one even before I knew it would include such things as those floating islands and platforms. All the better!

[Obadiah]

Looks... impressive.

[PJ156]

They are very nice areas indeed, as Drechner says they are pushing the boundaries of the toolset which is a very fun thing to see someone doing.

Just out of interest how did you get the pictorial toolset icons?

PJ

[Tchos]

PJ: I know you weren't asking me, but that looks like Grinning Fool's Usability Tools plugin.

[MokahTGS]

Tchos wrote...

PJ: I know you weren't asking me, but that looks like Grinning Fool's Usability Tools plugin.

Right on the money.

[painofdungeoneternal]

looks amazing

[PJ156]

Tchos wrote...

PJ: I know you weren't asking me, but that looks like Grinning Fool's Usability Tools plugin.

Thanks Tchos and MGS does that work okay with the power bar, there is some crossover functionality there.

Peter

[MokahTGS]

I use both, as well as the Sin plugin...no conflicts.

[Morbane]

fancy

nice work mokah

sometimes the calandar doesnt equate to very much

except when jabberwocky is heard

[Dorateen]

Could be used for flying citadels for a Dragonlance module.

Harumph!

[MokahTGS]

Gyre and Gimble In The Wabe
Lewis Carroll spent a lot of time on the subject of meaning, especially when it came to wordplay.  Quite often in his writings you can see that he pushes the reader to find meaning in everything and find worth in some of the simplest things.  Jabberwocky is full of nonsense, but is still an epic story of good verses evil.  Unfortunately, building a module around all this nonsense can make design choices that much harder.  When I began the design of Jabberwocky, I wanted to take each line and unfold the adventure throughout the poem as if the player is journeying through.  What would such a place look like?

50x150https://lh6.googleusercontent.com/-TSCnTFrG1Hw/UQS2YcsIMjI/AAAAAAAADdk/2KPAsw1O68A/s236/slithy_tove.gif[/img]

When choosing how to proceed with the world and creatures that would make up this module, I made a decision early on that I would not rely on custom content that didn't exist as this would delay development and ultimately frustrate me.  In the poem, the Slithy Tove gyre and gimble in the wabe and it's all nonsense, but as of all of Lewis' writings there is meaning inferred.

In other writings, Lewis Carroll described the word "slithy" to mean something lithe and slimy and "toves" are something like badgers, they're something like lizards, and they're something like corkscrews.  As you might imagine, this could prove problematic for the toolset, and leaning heavily on a custom content creator was not really in the cards so I would have to make a design compromise.  Eventually I settled on the Yuan Ti models from the SoZ expansion as my base model for the Slithy Tove creatures.  They certainly fit the lithe and slimy and they are the closest creature to a corkscrew that I can find.

Creating Lore From Nonsense
I wanted to give the world of Jabberwocky a lived in feel as a place that exists whether the player is there or not, so every design piece will have bits of back story and lore.  The Slithy Tove are no exception.  

Deeply spiritual and usually non-aggressive, the Slithy Tove keep to themselves deep in the woods and ancient places of the world.  They are naturally attracted to areas of ruin and prefer wetter, greener climates.  

Slithy Toves tend to worship nature and the older places in the world.  Only experienced hunters traveling deep into the tulgey forests ever caught glimpses of the Slithy Tove in years past.  Recently, they're movements have become more erratic and aggressive, coming into contact with more travelers and caravans.  The ranger core of the Highlands are concerned that something has gotten them agitated and are seeing more hostile incidents.

As players explore the highland wilderness they will need to keep an eye out for these creatures of nonsense.

250x150https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/-Da6wCvYpHI8/UQS2ZOBmB1I/AAAAAAAADds/aJ14jheKbDs/s800/NWN2_SS_012613_202807.jpg[/img] 250x150https://lh6.googleusercontent.com/-m0wsEytxzX0/UQS2349mYiI/AAAAAAAADd0/dgP7vyeyTtE/s800/NWN2_SS_021911_183836.jpg[/img]

Modifié par MokahTGS, 27 janvier 2013 - 05:31 .

[Tchos]

I'm behind your Yuan-ti implementation, but in your description above, you sometimes use "tove" as a plural, and other times "toves" as in the poem. I'll be interested to see how miserable and flimsy the the borogoves will be.