12 réponses à ce sujet

[OldTimeRadio]

I ran into a problem a few years ago wherein I made some server-specific custom content for a PW which overrode a certain CEP creature model which they had used extensively to build with but which really didn't fit their needs.  What they wanted turned out to be a simple reskin/remodel of that CEP-specific creature appearance but I naively forgot that nothing overrides hak content. 

 

So, here I had this model and texture and a had a server full of people (including DM's) who really wanted it, but the only way to get that model into the hands of the players was to add a whole 'nother hak to the mod with my content in it.  Because the server admin was largely unavailable, had inherited the mod from someone else and they were afraid of losing players by adding a new hak (a valid concern), this delicious piece of custom content cake went uneaten, but definitely not unwanted.

 

And that was a suck situation to be in for everyone involved, though no one was really at fault.  It was just a sort of catch-22 based on the way certain forms of content take precedence over others and considerations PW admins have in an environment where every player is valued highly.  The problem also has little to do with CEP, itself, outside of the fact that many worlds were built with/around the content it contains and many worlds only use CEP if they use anything at all.

 

So, it occurred to me, what about bringing the content directly to the players and having them inject their own CEP haks with the new (overriding) content, if they want it?  Seems like a good deal for everyone.

 

The problem is the ease with which they can do that.  I'm looking for something which makes the process of hak injection as painless and as easy possible for players.  I've already pulled up some leads in the Omnibus but I'm wondering if one of you doesn't already know exactly what I'm looking for.

 

Thanks!

[leo_x]

I wonder if this might be a good use case for cep2_custom.hak?  If not... I don't know of any such tool, but you could easily make something pretty slick with nwn-lib or pynwn (or some other ERF library).  Even writing one from scratch wouldn't be that difficult.

[kalbaern]

I don't see how a custom hak would impact the player base very much, especially if in this case its pretty small. If the download was made available a few weeks ahead of the server switching over, there will always be a few grumbles, but at the same time, posting a few screenshots showing the "whys" helps.

[meaglyn]

I don't think changing the player's version of a common resource is the right thing to do. If the override is good enough or not module specific then why not send it to AD to get into the next CEP release. Then the players get it when they update CEP.  Otherwise, I think it should go in a module specific hak.

 

Changing CEP files for one module the player may use puts those changes in any other CEP module.  That could break or effect other modules.

[kalbaern]

Just had a thought. I know you can post load haks for a server (after launching the server and loading haks, other haks can be added to the module that players don't need), but can the reverse be done? I.e., some way for the clients to post load a hak that would swap or override content?

[OldTimeRadio]

@leo_x - At the time, I did come across the cep2_custom.hak as a solution but for some reason it wouldn't have worked in that specific setup.  It might not have been added to the module, originally- I can't recall.  Thanks for the suggestions- I had some company over last night so I didn't get to do more snooping but those are good leads- thanks!

 

@kalbaern - For lack of a better way to put it, the example I'm talking about is one where, as I describe above, the PW isn't really being maintained well but people are still playing it.

 

@leo_x & kalbaern - Lemme put it this way, there are some PW's out there that have literally been handed from person to person to the point where the person running it isn't a DM or a modder or anything like that, they're just a player who convinced the last PW maintainer to pass the module to them when the last crew was shutting off the lights.  So not only can there be an "absent landlord" syndrome thing going on where the actual maintainer isn't logging in much but there's also, sometimes, a "hands-off" approach where the person running the PW doesn't necessarily understand much about actually maintaining or upgrading their server and is hesitant to.  I tend to enjoy playing/cruising around on weird little out of the way servers and I run into situations like that (or similar) pretty frequently.  Just to put it in persepctive:   On places like this, something as simple as adding text to a blank merchant shingle which customizes it for that merchant on that PW is, like, a big deal.

 

@meaglyn - Valid concern but in the case that I'm thinking of, I don't doubt that most of the people were playing only that server.  It's not uncommon for people to pick a PW and just sort of roost there, exclusively.  And, yeah, the content was way too specific to make any sense in CEP, even though CEP tries to cater to a broad base of players.  This was well beyond even that.  I've never produced any CC that wasn't available to everyone in the community (this is just how I roll), so if I ever thought it was something that more than a single server would get enjoyment out of, I would certainly upload or release it in some fashion.

 

@kalbaern - I hear ya, but I'm mostly trying to keep it something super simple that doesn't require any thought.  Or, really, anything that requries less thought that a player opening up a specific CEP hak (or haks) and dragging in overwriting content.  Now that I think of it, I think the old ERF tool that the CEP updater was based on might do the kind of merging that I'm thinking of.  I'm going to check on that next, I think.  Basically the user would have three files:  The tool, a bat file which calls the tool with some command line parameters and the hak of material to be merged into CEP.

 

Random Idea: This might also be useful when testing out new CEP content.  Many years ago, there used to be designated CEP beta test servers which were part of the First Order of Role-Players' Guild.  They'd get a full new set of haks to play with.  It might be easier to just say "Okay, here's content that's under consideration for being adding to CEP.  It'll change your haks, obviously, but if you want to test out the content you can inject it into your current CEP installation and see how it plays."  That sort of thing.

[Shadooow]

If you want to avoid additional haks over CEP then the only option is a custom client application which will override the model itself.

 

(This would also need the model of course, that could be packed with app to be unpacked into NWN root folder)

[Gruftlord]

I think the cep custom hak needs the highest/a high priority in a module to work as a propper override for models. I know world of greyhawk used the one on The server side to run some custom scripts the playerbase didn't need. And as a player, i use my own cep custom for fixes to models, retextures and several overrides (like cep compatible facelift Files for zwerkules work)

[OldTimeRadio]

BTW, this is the file I was thinking of, using the -u command.   I can't believe that I forgot this thing existed!  Acaos' version of this, which had wget or curl functionality, IIRC, was the core of the CEP updater.  I can't find it on the new Vault yet, though.

 

EDIT:

Here we go, you can find it in the Omnibus under "ERF Tool Reborn"!

[kuronue bloodlust]

BTW, this is the file I was thinking of, using the -u command.   I can't believe that I forgot this thing existed!  Acaos' version of this, which had wget or curl functionality, IIRC, was the core of the CEP updater.  I can't find it on the new Vault yet, though.

 

EDIT:

Here we go, you can find it in the Omnibus under "ERF Tool Reborn"!

as advanced as the tec has become it is not possible at this time... sorry.

[Bannor Bloodfist]

BTW, this is the file I was thinking of, using the -u command.   I can't believe that I forgot this thing existed!  Acaos' version of this, which had wget or curl functionality, IIRC, was the core of the CEP updater.  I can't find it on the new Vault yet, though.

 

EDIT:

Here we go, you can find it in the Omnibus under "ERF Tool Reborn"!

 

You know, I also distributed a copy of that last, greatest edit by the original author of ERF.EXE with the updates to nwmax as some of the internal scripts for NWMax even the gmax version, require erf.exe to work correctly.  It's been distributed with NWMax for quite a while, long before I ever started keeping it backed up and up-to-date.  Here is a Link

[OldTimeRadio]

Thanks, Bannor!  I assume both perform the basic functionality admirably, with the one I link to having the incidental additional functionality of being able to grab stuff from the web.  Still, having multiple forks of essentially the same tool is useful.  Case in point: Model compilers.  Between the Bioware internal one, the one Acaos distributed with NWN Explorer Reborn 1.63 and the DLA one you (and thank you again) helped put into circulation, just about every use case is covered.

[Bannor Bloodfist]

Thanks, Bannor!  I assume both perform the basic functionality admirably, with the one I link to having the incidental additional functionality of being able to grab stuff from the web.  Still, having multiple forks of essentially the same tool is useful.  Case in point: Model compilers.  Between the Bioware internal one, the one Acaos distributed with NWN Explorer Reborn 1.63 and the DLA one you (and thank you again) helped put into circulation, just about every use case is covered.

Ahhh.  I hadn't realized that Acaos had also added the web access feature to his version.  I wonder what other differences there actually are between them.  (Sorry for such a late reply, I have been away for a while.  Still fighting a nearly dead computer, and no longer having ability to actuallly run gmax or 3dsmax on this piece of crap that I now own.)  All I knew for sure was that the version that I had included with the DLA releases of NWMax had quite a few 'fixes' and/or 'features' added by the original author that had never been released to the vault and corrected some of the bugs that the erf.exe could cause during imports of mdls whereby it corrupted features of the mdl.  Mainly stating that this was a later version of the original erf that had NOT been publicly released, but for which I had received explicit permission to inlude it's release inside of the nwmax suite of tools. 

 

It is truly sad that soooo many folks have entirely left the scene, but I guess you can't expect much from a 10+ year old game that lost complete support from the original creators etc...

 

Ahhh well... back to my little hole in the ground.