14 réponses à ce sujet

[Shadooow]

Hey,

Im atm considering to move from NWN1 to NWN2. I know nothing about this game except the rulesets and a rumours(from NWN1 members) that is heavily bugged, imbalanced and not suitable for a PW. And its heavy HW dependant although its graphic is no mirracle - and this is what kept me away from NWN2 for a long time since I have massive fps dropdown after a few minutes in game (but Im willing to buy a new card if neccessary).

I would especially like to make a PW. I am atm working on a PW in NWN1, but I become tired of the limits in the custom content and while there is NWNX, I struck at the problem that many of the features are client side which is a problem to change. Also the playerbase dropped to the minimum - what is a NWN2 status in this?

First at all, I guess I dont have all the game's expansions. I dont even know how to find out, but the updater has SoZ skin. I guess that having all expansions is standard, right?
Tried to update the game, and its year when I was doing this last time, and it says no more updates: Is this game no longer supported as NWN1 is? Do Obsidians make new patches anymore?

Now, to the improvements, I looked into essential add-ons topic and Im scared. I realy dont want to try each of the GUI change to figure out it suits me or how does it change the game. I saw there is at least five options for same thing like spell fixes. Is there some community-approved one-click package that contains the most useful fixes and improvements? Something like my unofficial patch I made for NWN1? Something tells me this community is fragmented same like NWN1 is. That would be really shame.

Modifié par ShaDoOoW, 19 février 2013 - 01:16 .

[Arkalezth]

NWN2 has bugs, as many games do, but it's perfectly playable and you might play it for a long time without ever noticing any relevant bug. I've heard that it was very buggy at the time of its release (I got it a couple of years later), but it's been six years and several patches since.

I'm just a player and generally not an online one, so I can't say much about technicall stuff, but I played on a PW for a year and tried a few more and I never had any problems, so I guess that makes it "suitable for a PW". As to your question about the size of the player base, I haven't checked it out in a while (a big PW was created not long ago), but I wouldn't expect more than 200 players or so overall.

Don't expect a new patch or any official support at all. Unfortunately, there isn't any unofficial patch per se. Kaedrin's PrC Pack fixes a lot of bugs, but it also introduces new content and changes some things for balance purposes... which you may or may not agree with. I've personally haven't used it much lately. As you said, there are a few spell and feat fixes mods (IIRC, some of them also add "improvements", which again, you may dislike), but I don't know if they're up to date, or if compatibility problems may arise if you install several of them at the same time.

[kamal_]

If you really are interested from a technical/script perspective in nwn2, the best person to speak to is painofdungeoneternal (whom I know also posts on the nwn1 forums).

As far as community size, a few months ago I saw a website that listed the number of PW's and total online players for both nwn1 and nwn2. NWN1 had more PW's and more players, but the average number of players per PW was about 20% higher in nwn2. I don't really follow PW's, so I don't know if that was due to a few highly populated PW's in nwn2 bringing their average up, or a bunch of abandoned nwn1 pw's that were still online bringing nwn1 down. In any case, neither has a huge playerbase.

NWN2 complete with both expansions and Mysteries of Westgate (a "premium module" in nwn1 terms) is available on good old games
http://www.gog.com/g...ghts_2_complete

There are no new patches. 1.23 is the latest. There was a legal fight between Atari and Wotc which prevented any further work.

NWNX4 is the NWN2 version of NWNX, if that's important to you.

There is no "one click package" for single player. For PW's they set up what they want the rules to be. The official campaigns have some bugs, but you're unlikely to notice and you seem to mostly care about PW's anyway. Like NWN1, there are plenty of single player adventures that are better stories than the official content.

I built what's probably the largest single player campaign for nwn2 using an Intel Core 2 Duo, 2 gigs of ram, and an ati 4770 video card. The video card was less than $100 when I bought it years ago. I could play with that setup at 1680x1050 resolution without issues. High shadow detail levels (which can be turned down) are the major cause of low fps, as the shadows are dynamic, moving around with your torch will cause shadows to move appropriately.

One of the things with an nwn2 PW is they generally can't be as large in terms of area number as an nwn2 PW. This is because nwn2 allows terrain sculpting in addition to tilesets, and sculpted terrain creates larger file sizes. People use the sculpted terrain for exteriors (or giant multi-level caves and such), but there's no technical reason why there couldn't be an exterior tileset (none have ever been made). There is also a 2gb limit on module size. Finally, high quality nwn2 areas take longer to produce because they need more detail to look comparable to official content than nwn1 areas (there are more placeables in nwn2 areas than comparable nwn1 areas, etc).

There's not as much custom content for nwn2 as there is for nwn1. There are various reasons for this. NWN2 content needs higher poly counts and higher texture resolution to look comparable to regular content, so it's more difficult to produce. Initially the content production tools weren't free (blender and gmax have fixed this for placeables), but the animation tools still require expensive paid software if I remember correctly. Finally many of the talented nwn1 content producers chose to remain with nwn1.

[painofdungeoneternal]

It's like herding cats, but the cats are friendly.

You should see 2da.zips for xp1 and xp2 in your data directory if you are fully updated. If not, getting the complete game via gog.com or the like is a good idea.

For a PW, first thing you need is NWNx4, xp_bugfix and skywings NWN2 client extension. The never launcher betas I've released include the nwnx4 plugins from about december in a subfolder, you'd have to update them, but should help get you started. Mostly it's skywings work, and you will have to check each to get the latest version in that folder.

There are actually numerous spell fixes, but generally all actual fixes are shared and rpgplayer1 is the source of all those fixes. ( Many are included inside 1.23 patch itself ). The scripting forum has a list of all the content. TonyK also did the official AI, it's based on jaspere's I believe, but you should get his support files and final fixes since the devs missed some stuff.

Kaedrin has the best class pack and fixes, and includes rpgplayer1's fixes, I would suggest using his work. ( He should have actually done classes for the official game, but the whole legal mess really messed that up, he's amazing. ) He has pulled all his content source files due to one stray PW claiming it can re-release his content in shoddy condition, but if you email him, he will send a PW the source files, and help you get started.

I have my own scripting system, actually includes kaedrins content prior to the above issue ( waiting til that clears up before I release more ), latest version is on the nexus. Includes ALL scripts used on my PW, warts and all. It's more of a complete rewrite, with a complete doxygen reference, and all the functions you will need neatly organized and tested. ( Includes just about every idea found on the NWN1 and NWN2 scripting forums, plus features from php, basic, C++ ). Also has a chat system, custom UI, reworked spells and feats, dm tools, reworked AI is being developed. It's in progress, but at this point very little code touches the official and all code is vetted for PW use, and in use on a few PWs. Does not include training wheels, so you kind of have to know the technical side to a degree. ( My focus is not on this or other things at present, but on Never Launcher, so you'll have to sort out any bugs/issues yourself or with the community in it, until i get back around to updating it. I have not even gotten my PW back up yet after it's server failed. )

I would join a PW like Sea of Dragons, to check it out and also download the haks they are using. They actually are using the same hak's as I was on my old PW, which helps players since you can server hop.

Not feeling so good at present, or I'd hunt down links for you. I would hop into nwn2cr IRC channel for more help ( stickied thread has info ), and lurk there, that is the best spot to get advice and help when you are getting frustrated. Dark and Akavit both use some of my code, and hopefully can help get a system set up for you. Might even be a good idea to join a PW team like theirs initially just to learn a bit about NWN2. Also skywing is there, so if you can document a game or server crash, or a bug, or provide a crash log, and no one else in the channel has a solution -- he might actually add a feature to xp_bugfix which solves the issue -- he's an amazing resource for the community.

Modifié par painofdungeoneternal, 19 février 2013 - 04:07 .

[MarshallV]

 Feel free to visit http://www.nwn2legends.com where you can get tools designed for PW's such as Spawning, Quests, Loot, and more.  All fully documented with step by step youtube videos on how to install and use.  Check out http://www.youtube.c...lV?feature=mhee which has my playlists including one way to setup NWN2 PW's using NWNX4, mySQL and NWN2.
Cheers,
M

[Tchos]

If NWN2 were as buggy as some people make it out to be, there is simply no way I'd be playing it. I went through all three of the main campaigns and experienced a grand total of one major bug -- a hostile NPC aggroed a friendly during a cutscene, and failed to finish his conversation -- which was fixable with the console. The only other bug of note that I can think of is the "rubber-banding" that can happen sometimes, where you move somewhere, but then you snap back to where you started. That's mostly eliminated by using click-to-move instead of WASD or click-hold-direction to move.

As for system demands, I've been playing it all this time on an Intel Core-2 1.8GHz with 4 GB RAM and Vista 32-bit, with a graphics card that was almost, but not quite state-of-the-art about 7 years ago. I play with all shadows on (which I highly recommend if you can handle it), at 1920x1080 resolution, highest settings in the graphics tab except for antialiasing, which I don't use, while in the advanced tab the 3 shadow quality options are set to medium. I get excellent frame rates in all interiors, while exteriors with their day/night cycle and larger size drop it down a bit (but still better than Saints Row 2, which I find unplayable), except for very cluttered areas like the Samargol marketplace.

The two fixes I use are Skywing's Client Extension and Kaedrin's PrC pack. The Client Extension fixes bugs in addition to its other duties, and I wouldn't play without it.

I also find it very stable.  It almost never crashes, and I play a lot.  I sometimes leave it running accidentally for hours when I alt-tab out and do other things, then I come back and resume play as if nothing had happened.

I've seen reports that some unlucky people do experience a lot of bugs, and I can only hypothesise that it may be related to some rare combination of hardware, operating system, and/or system permissions. All I know is that it has been a wonderful experience for me, and I expect I'll be playing it for years to come.

I don't think of the community as fragmented, but rather as a group of individuals with different tastes and priorities. There is no 1-click pack of centrally-approved fixes or mods. You just ask for opinions, read reviews or descriptions of what things do, and choose what you like.

I don't know much about PWs, but I've looked at Marshall's Legends PW plugins (linked above), and I can say that if I were to play on a PW, I would rather play on one that used his plugins.

Modifié par Tchos, 19 février 2013 - 07:53 .

[painofdungeoneternal]

Marshall's stuff is cool, akavit was using it as well.

[Shadooow]

Thanks guy. I guess I start first with a new graphic card and playing the single player. Maybe try some PW, I heard only a praise on Baldurs Gate PW.

As for development, atm it seems an easier to stick with what I do know, but I will see later. Thanks again.

Modifié par ShaDoOoW, 20 février 2013 - 01:20 .

[SkywingvL]

While there isn't official support, the unofficial dev community is certainly alive - for example, the NWN2 Client Extension, xp_bugfix, NWScript Accelerator plugin, toolset compiler plugin (Advanced Script Compiler), etc.

[MokahTGS]

 I would say that the NWN2 community is more unified than the NWN1 community...mainly because we are smaller and if we fight we ****** off people that are helpful. 

NWN2 got a massive bad rap when it was released and atari did nothing to help...in fact they went out of their way to hurt NWN2.  There is no CEP package for NWN2 mainly because it isn't really needed and a massive bloatware package.  There are universal 2DAs that people in the community share and then just use the models they need...it keeps things much more streamlined.

Kaedrin has a massive class/spell/everything package that many people like and it fixes a ton of bugs as well with the rulesets.  As far as building is concerned, you should look at the prefabs avaialbe on the vault.  They will save you TONS of time.  As a NWN2 area builder, who knows NWN very well, I can say that I would never in a million years go back to NWN now that I know what I know...the options for building are just too great to pass up....heck even the simple feature of scaling and tinting reduces your CC load by half.

[Lugaid of the Red Stripes]

For me, the big draw was the sculpted, painted exterior terrain, it's still one of my favorite things to do in the toolset. At the time I made the switch from NWN to 2, the exterior tilesets in NWN weren't all that evocative of a real, living landscape. I've seen some pretty screenshots since, but I could never go back to those flat gridlines and repeating tiles.

As fun as the terrain is, though, it's the conversation editor where NWN2 really outshines NWN. The convo editor allows you to pass parameters on to your conditional and action scripts, and multiple scripts can be attached to each node, with some Boolean logic to sort them out. So instead of making custom scripts for every single quest state or skill check, you just use a generic script, pass on the quest tag or DC, and just keep on going. That also means you can do some really complicated things in conversations, really quickly.

[Morbane]

DOO EEET!!

[Shallina]

For PW, we only got NWN1 and NWN2.

If you are interested in working for a single player module, Dragon age origine and Skyrim have both a very good toolset and lot of possibility as well.

Modifié par Shallina, 20 février 2013 - 11:12 .

[Axe_Edge]

HI, welcome.

This may help with your understanding and endeavors:

NWN2 2DA


And keeping these in mind may help to keep things in order and a little simpler, not that all PWs follow it:

NWN2 2DA Reservations

Modifié par Axe_Edge, 20 février 2013 - 03:42 .

[painofdungeoneternal]

ShaDoOoW wrote...

Thanks guy. I guess I start first with a new graphic card and playing the single player. Maybe try some PW, I heard only a praise on Baldurs Gate PW.

As for development, atm it seems an easier to stick with what I do know, but I will see later. Thanks again.

Remember there are other PW's, that PW has always had the most players, which has led many to not even touch other PW's which are as good or better.

There are some amazing single player modules, that really push the edges of what you can do. ( Bouncy rock's stuff is amazing ) Probably would be good to get some recomendations, especially if you want to see things with an eye to see how others implement things which might inspire you later.

Modifié par painofdungeoneternal, 20 février 2013 - 05:15 .