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[ColorsFade]

Tchos wrote...

The one I'm more concerned about is the one I see most often, where "it's" should be changed to "its".  For instance, "it's" is never used as a possessive (it means "it is" or "it has" and nothing else), so you should never see "it's own".  It should always be "its own".

The one that gets me riled up the most is when people use "loose" and they really mean "lose". 

Their and they're. Effect and affect. etc. 

If there's a bad grammatical error in my mod I'll shoot myself. 

[Tchos]

CF: It doesn't affect me as much when I see the wrong "loose/lose", because it's comparatively rare, in my experience.

Iveforgotmypassword wrote...
I've been criticised for the language in my modules being too modern

Personally, I prefer to see fully modern English in fantasy works, like you use.  The way I see it is that they're not speaking "English", they're speaking Common, and it's being "translated" to us as English.

So, the way I write it, commoners speak informally, nobles and the well-educated speak formally, and if I were to have knightly orders or certain religious orders, they would speak somewhat archaically as part of their distinction.

[Dann-J]

Tchos wrote...

The one I'm more concerned about is the one I see most often, where "it's" should be changed to "its".  For instance, "it's" is never used as a possessive (it means "it is" or "it has" and nothing else), so you should never see "it's own".  It should always be "its own".

There is one instance where "It's" is correct as a possessive:



For example, "Cousin It's hat".

My particular bugbear concerns module authors who write dialogue that makes my character sound like a 1950s American child. I absolutely refuse to allow any character of mine to begin a paragraph with the word "Wow" or "Neat". Does anyone other than Beaver Cleaver actually talk like that anyway?

[Tchos]

Dann: I stand corrected!

On that note, would you object to beginning a sentence with "Neat," if the person is responding to the question, "How would you like your scotch?"

And for the former, "Give me a word that's both an ambigram and a palindrome."

Modifié par Tchos, 05 décembre 2013 - 06:51 .

[Eguintir Eligard]

So the prologue will be it's own vault submission and we won't have to wait 4 years to see if you finish your campaign or abandon it and leave us with nothing like more than half the early NWN2 authors, right?

[ColorsFade]

Eguintir Eligard wrote...

So the prologue will be it's own vault submission and we won't have to wait 4 years to see if you finish your campaign or abandon it and leave us with nothing like more than half the early NWN2 authors, right?

That's certainly an interesting idea that I have given thought to. Not because I'll abandon the project (certainly I have no intention to, but one can never command the future). Andy and I had this very conversation in his journal thread I believe. 

I'll look at it. I need to come up with some kind of "ending" for the prologue if I release it this way - a static image and a conversation so people know it's "The end" of this part of the campaign. 

It would be good to get it out though, and maybe get some feedback. 

[Eguintir Eligard]

Believe me if I was doing a campaign long enough like my first one, the chapters would be seperate. Gives people a chance to get interested in your work; or to poo-poo any bad habits in your work before you repeat them in a camapaign that takes weeks to play. Gives you a stopping point as well for this "unforseen future". Plus people do leave the community when the releases are silent for too long.

[andysks]

Well, I remember this conversation. To be honest the release in chapters is always a consideration.
What EE says is true, although it involves only the side of the player. You got to think of yourself as the builder as well. For example, when I thought of releasing as chapters, only the thought of making them existing in the same campaign, but not released together made me dizzy. All the companions... all the resources etc.

One thing that will help you decide, is giving it for some testing as you said before. I am always available. PJ and Arkalezth gave me some good advice for my prologue, and it helped on the decision of not releasing it at that moment.

Another thing that will help, which was really important for me, is to begin work on chapter 1. You will see that the work flow will be faster, plus you will get a clear idea of how the story progresses after the prologue. Really many aspects become clear.

And lastly, if you decide to release the prologue, don't rush it. I was so close to do it, before the beta testing, because I thought it was bug free. Guess what... testers will always find something, because they don't play with the mind of the builder .

[ColorsFade]

The resource aspect of releasing in chapters doesn't bug me. I moved everything over to the campaign folder the last two days and now the only things in the module folders are the areas. It's a clean way to do things and it will make it easy to for future releases. Players should just be able to update their campaign folders, add in the new modules, load the last save game and move on.

I'm still squashing bugs from the first play-through and figuring out how I want to do things going forward though.

I think the single biggest thing I can do from this point forward is to never go back and alter an encounter once it is tested and done. Specifically, never alter scripts once they work. If I have to alter scripts that affect other parts of the campaign, I'll just write new scripts and leave the old ones working. Because retroactive fixes are turning to be the biggest thing destabilizing this mod right now. I'm finding things broken that, at one point, were 100% fully functional and completely and thoroughly tested ,but because I altered a script or some such, they don't work now.

I really want to make it compatible with Kaedrin's, for those who wish to play that way, and I want to get the spell fixes in because I think they're important. Once that is done I'll be ready to pass it out. I've gone through and eliminated all the debug printout statements from scripts, so the chat window should be clean. It's almost there.

I really need to do one more play-through to ensure things operate the way I think they should. Then it needs to go to a tester or two. And then it could be released.

[Tchos]

ColorsFade wrote...
I think the single biggest thing I can do from this point forward is to never go back and alter an encounter once it is tested and done. Specifically, never alter scripts once they work. If I have to alter scripts that affect other parts of the campaign, I'll just write new scripts and leave the old ones working.

That's why there are so many legacy systems left in my own campaign.  I tried many different approaches for certain things over this long process, and came up with much better ways of doing things, but left the old ones in there, because parts of the module rely on them, and I don't trust myself to be able to find every single place where I used one of the old ones.  It's messy, and potentially confusing for anyone who wants to open up the thing and see how things were done, but it's necessary.

[ColorsFade]

Well, it looks like I have Kaedrin's PrC working. I was able to start a new game and all the classes and feats were there. I had to merge my spells.2DA with Kaedrin's and that was it. I now have my own HAK for my campaign's 2DA files. That gives me two HAKs - one for loadscreens and one for 2DA files.

Reeron's looks like it's going to be a bit more work. I'm trying to figure out what I even need...

[ColorsFade]

http://theoatmeal.co...ics/misspelling

Too funny

[ColorsFade]

Journal Entry

Well, it figured to happen: I got the flu. I haven't been sick since '09. 
I've still managed to get the prologue basically done. It's more polished than I thought. There are intro screens, and a closing screen so you know you reached the end. I'm almost done with my 2nd play-through. Pretty happy with the pacing and I think I have the XP tuned correctly for the levels I want. If there's an issue, I think I give away too many healing potions....
I'll know by Saturday if this last play through has any more bugs. So far only one, and I was able to fix it, thanks to having everything in the campaign folder now. 
I'm anxious to get started on Scornubel and the associated quests for Chapter 1. There's so much going on. And every day I dedicate some thought time to inventing new quests for the city and surrounding areas, and I've come up with some stuff I'm really excited to implement. It should be fun. I'm hoping Scornubel ends up being a really interesting city for players. 

[Dann-J]

There's no such thing as too many free healing potions in an RPG.

Unless your halfling companion who carries them all is groaning under their weight. Even then, that's not the fault of the potions - that's the universe's way of telling you to get a bigger companion.

[ColorsFade]

LOL, I like you're thought process DannJ.

One thing I figure: If, like me, you play on Hardcore, spending a turn to use a potion is not always a gimme... It does provoke an AOO, after all.

The one thing the potions do is allow you to skip attempting to rest after a fight (provided your spellcasters aren't out of spells and you really feel like you need to rest to get new spells). And the Wandering Monster system is working... I really wanted to rest in one area to regain spells. I got interrupted four times. Eventually my wiz got all her spells memmed, but I was done trying to rest. Another time, I got interrupted once, but on the next rest attempt we got the full 8 hours. I really like that system.. it makes it so resting isn't automatic.

So far it seems fairly well balanced. There aren't a lot of really hard fights. But if you're careless... you can get beat a bit.

The prologue has been a wonderful learning experience. I can make errors here and it's not catastrophic. Learned so much... about area design, encounter balance, etc. Fun toolset. Can't wait to make the rest of this.

[Dann-J]

I've found that giving companions healing kits can be better than giving them healing potions. If they see that you're injured they'll often use their own healing kit on you, which is something they can't do with a potion (although watching a companion try to force a potion down your throat while you're in combat might be amusing). Everyone in the party becomes a cleric!

It's quite handy if you're a tank melee fighter and your companions are standing safely behind you. They can use healing kits on you as fast as you can take damage.

[ColorsFade]

Journal Entry

The prologue is off to the beta testers and so far the results seem about what I expected. There's some minor bugs, one major one that was easily fixed with an updated script (so glad I moved them all to the campaign folder), and a few issues with placeables, etc. Based on feedback submitted so far I'll be reworking the intro quests a little bit to funnel the player toward the first companion a bit quicker. So far, though, happy with how it's going. 

I started work on the Scornubel exterior areas. The docks are first, since I figured they'd give me the most trouble with terrain and layout. There are so much to these areas... I'm just going to have to take my time and be patient and realize they won't get made overnight.

Bringing a city to life, like this, on the scale I want to do it, is simply a matter of time and effort. I have the Scornubel maps open, all the major landmarks mapped out and I'm going to try and stick to the real designs as much as possible. Obviously there's a lot of room for interpretation with textures and building choices, but I hope to create something that both speaks to the spirit of the city and my own personal desires for design. I'm anxious to bring to life the various taverns and markets and to integrate all the quests I have in mind. I hope to integrate at least one quest for all the major well-known NPC's, from Makikhar the Outfitter, to Thyumdaqr, to Mother Minx and Kaenus Thambadar the Blacksmith. It should be a fun time, but it's going to take a lot of time and effort. 

In the end, however, I think it will be totally worth it. 

[PJ156]

ColorsFade wrote...

I started work on the Scornubel exterior areas. The docks are first, since I figured they'd give me the most trouble with terrain and layout. There are so much to these areas... I'm just going to have to take my time and be patient and realize they won't get made overnight.

Mokah the grumpy strumpet did a very good city dock prefab, that might help get you on your way.

PJ

[andysks]

It's the one I am using for inspiration:). There are quite some dock prefabs on the vault. If you don't like them for some reason, they can help by giving a direction and ideas.
I was just creating a desert town now, and despite not liking any prefab on the vault, to the extent of using it, I took quite some ideas from teper's oasis.

Modifié par andysks, 16 décembre 2013 - 08:00 .

[rjshae]

ColorsFade wrote...

I started work on the Scornubel exterior areas. The docks are first, since I figured they'd give me the most trouble with terrain and layout. There are so much to these areas... I'm just going to have to take my time and be patient and realize they won't get made overnight.

Perhaps the Walkmesh Helper Expansion Pack would be of use for the dock pieces? It has a number of dock-specific walk meshes (beyond those shown). Also, don't forget the boardable ships.

Modifié par rjshae, 16 décembre 2013 - 08:20 .

[ColorsFade]

Hey thanks RJ. I'll have to look at those boardable ships.

It's not the docks or the walkmesh that take so long. It's just terrain, all the buildings, the texturing, etc. Putting together a city is a lot of work. And Scornubel sits in a river, so it's a slightly different dockside experience than some other open ocean things. But I like how I have it working so far. It's just putting in the time to get everything right.

[PJ156]

Screenies please ...

Don't go to large is my little snippet. Break it down into more than one area or you will hit a placeable limit and things will slow down.

Also use colour to your advantage. It is useful in toneing down bright textures and makeing that five texture limit stretch that little bit further,

PJ

[ColorsFade]

I've broken Scornubel down into 4 exterior areas. I don't think any of them is any larger than the docks in NWN2, but I haven't got far enough to tell. I remember reading about a placeable limit. I've been real wary to make anything too cluttered, especially considering the trouble some have had with the toolkit.

I'll post screens in a week or two. Just not far enough along yet to want to show anything.

Every exterior area that makes up Scornubel has about 4-7 buildings that are important to the PC and quests. The rest is filler. One of the first things I did was open the Docks in NWN2 and get a feel for size, buildings, tints, how they were using textures, etc.

The only thing I wanted to do differently from what they did with the Neverwinter docks is add some elevation, some slope, to the whole thing, since it's on a river. I want some landscape rising away a bit. Not a lot, but enough to sort of put some stuff on different levels. I'm not a big fan of "flat" terrain. The world just isn't built that way :-)