2013 February, Adventure Building Challenge

[Legacy_meaglyn]

               

jackkel dragon wrote...

More shenanigans have occured in A Rare Vintage, and while I don't think I finished the module I do think I'm stuck until the next patch unless I missed something. Aside from learning that a fully charged Wand of Sleep is the most overpowered item a level 1 wizard can have and the wonder of the Wild Woods tileset, I have a few comments and bug reports:

Too much, huh.  I didn't get to replay it with that crutch added.  I'll drop that to a few left over charges. 

There were supposed to be more bandits and the leader a bit tougher. I dropped that because the lack of  henchman. If they all fall asleep that's probably to easy. But if the leader hadn't he'd have killed you a
few times. Respawn puts you right back there so it's pretty unpleasant if you haven't saved  '>

The Bad
- Bern's conversation has one of his lines in a PC response node at one point, I believe. In addition, the journal doesn't seem to update after talking to him.

 
I'll look at that conversation. It was originally intended to include speaking parts for Sir Mandis (as henchman).
That may not have worked right without him. 

There's no journal entry there. Just a pointer to the bandits. Since they are just farther into the are I didn't think it needed one. But you seem to? I could add one there.

Out of curiosity, did you meet the drivers on the way up? If you hadn't (or if you don't tell the Count you did) then a bit more of the Manor would have been needed for the plot.

- Can't figure out what to do after brutally murdering all the hostile bandits with Sleep+Coup de Grace. I think I found what I was sent to find, but I have no means of telling the Count this.

If you got Garvin's letter and the next journal entry it should say something about the merchant and returning to
town.  If you didn't then you are stuck and we'll need to talk some more.

This is another place I need to fix in the absence of Sir Mandis. He was supposed to reward you for the count and
head back to the manor to report and make sure Bern/Timon (whoever survived) actually returned. And send you off back to town to keep going.  But since he's not there you have to go by the comment in the journal. I'll add a
too his conversation back at the manor so if someone does go back they'll get pointed in the right direction.

- This is probably my own fault, but I can't figure out how to progress in the sidequest at the roadside inn. I found the spirit, but have no idea what to do with his/her/its information.

PM'd a response to this to avoid too much spoiler. 

The Good
- While unpolished, the module is fun to play and manages to challenge a level 1 wizard without lording over the fragility of level 1 characters (that and the aforementioned Wand of Sleep is easy to get with just the starting Summon Monster I scroll, and all the mindspell immune enemies are in a sidequest.)

That's a good point. I'll see if I can make that a bit less overbalancing.

- I tend to prefer areas that are only as big as they need to be, but the port and manor manage to be interesting and well-designed despite most of the space in those areas being unimportant to the plot. The Wild Woods areas are closer to my arbitrary preferences, plus show off a wonderful piece of CC I somehow never saw before, and are also well designed.

You'll see the town again if you play the next month's entry (assuming it materializes). The town should get more and more full of life as time goes on, and have fewer doors to nowhere...

I was really impressed with Wild Woods, too.  I'd never used it before. 
 

- Dungeons are just as big as they need to be, no more. This is always a plus in my book, but I feel kinda bad mentioning it because it shows how few things I can say that are entirely positive...

Overall, pretty good module considering the time contraints. Not like that weird Legends of the Deep thing. '>

Hey, I'll take what I can get '>  This was my first "completed" module aside from the hermit's chalice practice module I made. 

jackkel dragon, you deserve a big thanks for playing all of these and providing such useful feedback. Be careful or you'll be inundated with beta test requests '>

Cheers,

Meaglyn
               
               

               
            

[Legacy_PLUSH HYENA of DOOM]

               Tarot - You're the second one to notice this mysterious Area Trans box I've NO knowledge of putting in the Crystalfields... I'm going to have to go and have a root about, see what it is... (And as for the Aurelia character, I saw her more as the Doctor (Who) than Holmes but, certainly the intention was that she, as an NPC, is really the main character and the PC is very much the assistant who happens to be better at blatting stuff and finding abusive ferrets in unlikely places.

Given that I essentially put Black Book together in four days and had to cut quite a few elements out, I'm surprised it holds together as well as it does. The intention (one of them) was to create a simple, narrative, like reading a story, only an interactive one on a screen.

Though I wasn't really considering it, I think, as the SERIES progresses, I might just go back, rework them and put up a Vault page of versions with all the omitted stuff created and added... including loads more custom Spleen Creatures, ludicrous whatsit things and the intended music.

Thanks for your (overly) kind review. Henesua's useful advice also noted.

PS:- OBVIOUSLY Starbright's jacket is magical (how's it stay on otherwise?) Check its Item Description to see why it's so farcical.)
               
               

               

                     Modifié par PLUSH HYENA of DOOM, 04 mars 2013 - 05:28 .
                     
                  

            

[Legacy_Tarot Redhand]

               Seeing as Starbright is the PC, you spend most of your time as the player behind her, so it wasn't so much the jacket I was thinking of...:innocent:


TR 
               
               

               
            

[Legacy_PLUSH HYENA of DOOM]

               I suppose that means I have to dust off her equally farcical miniskirt for the second episode...?

PS:- I can find absolutely NNNNNOOO unconnected Area transitions in the final crystal Area; just the one you come in by (which thereafter fails to work, being one way only). You must all be hallucinating OR it just eerily appeared when I e-mailed the Module... Still, I've hammered out a little ending script for Wuffle to use, so all that should be taken care of.
All I have to do now is figure out how to make a simple little script that can be used to just say "Make this conversation/interjection fire only once" that I can stick in all appropriate places... Can't find anything on NWNWiki or in the Lexicon and I've NEVER been able to get the hang of those reeking, slimy little Local Variables. Get the concept, just can't make 'em work. (As I've never created a Module for anyone other than myself, Fifi and a small cabal of dribbling mentals here, it's never been much of an issue before...
Stinking variables... Come here and be hit with an outrageously large brick!
               
               

               

                     Modifié par PLUSH HYENA of DOOM, 04 mars 2013 - 11:04 .
                     
                  

            

[Legacy_jackkel dragon]

               

PLUSH HYENA of DOOM wrote...
 just the one you come in by (which thereafter fails to work, being one way only). 

Is this transition in both the starting area (transition from) and the second area (transition to)? Because area transitions technically move the player to a waypoint, not the transition trigger. It's possible this malfunctioning area transition is the unused trigger by the entry point of the second area.

...You know, I probably should just download the HAKs and open this up myself. I keep forgetting I have the power of the toolset. '>
               
               

               
            

[Legacy_MagicalMaster]

               Is this for a trigger on the ground?

if (!GetLocalInt(OBJECT_SELF, "done"))
{
SetLocalInt(OBJECT_SELF, "done", 1);

<rest of script goes here>
}

That'll make it fire once per module.

Just finished Snow Hunt - played as a Sorcerer leveled up per the beginning of the module.  I thought the story was interesting, though after I finished I realized I could have finished the module in like 10 minutes flat (though since you don't know where your quarry is, it makes some sense).

I found the combat pretty easy - or rather, my henchman did. I pretty much did nothing but use the scrolls of GMW and Flame Weapon on the dwarf with Haste and Imp Invis.  Gave him a shield instead of dual-wielding, so he was running around with 4 attacks per round with a +5 weapon and something like 35-40 damage per hit.  I may have used 2-3 potions, I think?  Was lower on health and didn't want to bother resting yet.

Once I finish the other ABC modules, I may go back and play as something else - maybe try to solo it as a fighter and see how that goes.  Don't even need the scrolls, can use the Scabbard of Enhancement thing.

Final boss lasted I think like 18 seconds?  Henchman hit the boss and got him to like 60-70% hit points.  Missed the next few attacks.  I said "screw it" and hit him with an IGMS.

The store in the lodge ran out of gold to buy things with.  I thought the mounted enemies who had either the enemy or the mount survive and attack was interesting.  Removing the snow was annoying as a caster - it would strip some of my spells so I'd have to recast them and/or go rest.  Didn't try to hit them with a fireball to instantly remove it, not sure if that would have worked.  Generally entertaining hourish.
               
               

               
            

[Legacy_henesua]

               I think MM makes some interesting criticisms. I had much more difficulty as a Ranger than MM had as a sorcerer. In fact I actually had to think about the combats in order to avoid dying which is something I almost never do playing NWN (unless it is multiplayer). BUT I did not use any henchmen and I never rested in my play through - which (since most of my NWN experience is on PWs or with friends in multiplayer) is how I am used to playing.

Anyway my point:
Since MM was not playing a ranger, druid or barbarian, they probably would have lost the game had the henchman died (or had to use up resources resurrecting the hench).

I think you could take advantage of this, and increase the difficulty for classes who can not track by making the henchman's primary utility as a tracker, and thus tone down their combat ability to almost nil.

This would add another layer of interest for these PCs as well as they would have to protect the henchman - otherwise they lose their guide in a hostile environment.

Anyway, just some thoughts. I enjoyed Snow Hunt, and found it challenging, but I did play a Ranger, a typically fragile melee class who's benefits come in my view primarily from their skills which this module enhanced by giving them the ability to track.
               
               

               
            

[Legacy_Tarot Redhand]

               @PHOD I just opened up the module, went to the Crystalfields area and found it straight away. It is called LastMinuteEnding, is an area transition trigger and is located at 44.22 x 45.73 x 0.0. It is actually a box wire frame shape. It surrounds the waypoint WP_LastMinuteEnding.

TR
               
               

               
            

[Legacy_meaglyn]

               Hi all,  If you are planning to play A Rare Vintage hold off for the first patch unless you want to get stuck. One of the bosses is not dropping something required. Sorry... I'll have a patch up soon.

Cheers,
Meaglyn
               
               

               
            

[Legacy_rogueknight333]

               I have been playing through some of the other submissions and may have some comments on them a bit later, but thought I would respond to some of the commentary on my own (a few remarks may be slightly spoilerish).

jackkel dragon wrote...

There's not much I can think of in the way of flaws... aside from one encounter in the first forest area where enemies can spawn on top of the player, a lot of my problems are with the base systems and not the module itself. For instance, the amount of backtracking to get to the initial safe rest area from some places got very annoying due to the base move speed, but that's just part of NWN (and I really can't complain about that when I have 8 castings of Expeditious Retreat prepared and one of the optional encounters rewards an item with permanent Haste cast on it).

If you are talking about the Crag Cats, they do not actually spawn on top of the player, they just use stealth. As for the backtracking that is actually a feature (albeit one that many players no doubt think sould not be). Players are encouraged to avoid resting frequently, but I wanted to insure that players who got themselves into a bind still could rest if they absolutely needed to. They just need to pay a price for doing so, in terms of some annoying back-tracking (or the literal price of a Rune of Reinvigoration - as for your later comment about actually showing the concentration check so the player can calculate his odds of success, it is an idea, though again using it somewhat exploitatively in combat is more something I am allowing rather than trying to encourage).

jackkel dragon wrote...
Overall, this was a great module and I feel it's a wonderful example of the potential of the Adventure Building Challenge. I think rogueknight333 deserves a medal.

Thank you!

henesua wrote...

I don't normally like Hack and Slash modules because single player combat usually feels tedious to me in NWN. BUT I didn't feel this way in Snow Hunt. Every combat was a challenge, and I had to manage my resources and tactics to succeed...

 
Good to hear, that is exactly the effect I strive to create in combat.

henesua wrote...

One, I was able to avoid fighting the Frost Giants after they started conversation. I think they should attack on conversation abort...
 

They should. I must have neglected to include the conversation-abort script that does that in this case, or else it did not work for some reason.

henesua wrote...
...I had also first thought they were illusions created by your quarry, but was unable to determine if this was or was not the case. Perhaps I missed something. BUT given the skills of your quarry and that one of the trails is intended to mislead you to this cave, I would think that an illusion would make this even more interesting.

Sadly, they are just frost giants your quarry knew were around, and thus steered you towards (he is not that good an illusionist). I think this would have been more clear if you had been playing with the henchman, as he makes some references in conversation to Frost Giant country lying in that direction.

meaglyn wrote...

I finished Snow Hunt...My initial take on it is "Hey, no professionals!"

I will take that as a compliment. Thank you!

MagicalMaster wrote...

Just finished Snow Hunt...I found the combat pretty easy - or rather, my henchman did. I pretty much did nothing but use the scrolls of GMW and Flame Weapon on the dwarf with Haste and Imp Invis. Gave him a shield instead of dual-wielding, so he was running around with 4 attacks per round with a +5 weapon and something like 35-40 damage per hit. I may have used 2-3 potions, I think? Was lower on health and didn't want to bother resting yet.

Congratulations! In my entire career as a NWN builder, you are the first person to ever suggest that any combat I designed might be too easy. If you would like to read through all the comments on my Swordflight modules, many of which blast me for making modules that are too insanely difficult, you will see why I hardly dare make them any harder than I do (though, to be sure, the encounters in this short module are nowhere near as carefully designed or finely balanced as those in the Swordflight series tend to be). It appears you made excellent use of the resources provided, as I encourage people to do.

MagicalMaster wrote...

Once I finish the other ABC modules, I may go back and play as something else - maybe try to solo it as a fighter and see how that goes. Don't even need the scrolls, can use the Scabbard of Enhancement thing.

Not playing with the henchman is one method of making things more challenging, if you want to do that.
I was a little worried that making it so easy to cast Flame Weapon had the potential to make things too easy, given the number of enemies vulnerable to fire damage, but figured that even with that capability more people would lean to finding it too hard than too easy (which so far seems to be the case).

MagicalMaster wrote...
Final boss lasted I think like 18 seconds? Henchman hit the boss and got him to like 60-70% hit points. Missed the next few attacks. I said "screw it" and hit him with an IGMS.

Contrary to RPG conventions, the final boss is not the most difficult fight. I considered beefing him up a bit, but decided not to bother since finding him is the main point, and also because if he were too powerful it would not be logical that he was trying to hide rather than just attacking you the minute you show up in the region.

MagicalMaster wrote...

Didn't try to hit them with a fireball to instantly remove it, not sure if that would have worked.

It wouldn't. Cool idea though.
               
               

               

                     Modifié par rogueknight333, 05 mars 2013 - 04:42 .
                     
                  

            

[Legacy_MagicalMaster]

               

MagicalMaster wrote...

 I thought the story was interesting, though after I finished I realized I could have finished the module in like 10 minutes flat

I take that back.  I can do it in seven minutes flat, including the time to level and build the character. If you want to see a speed run skipping 90% or more of the content and blazing through the main quest as quickly as possible, video is here (quality isn't the best, sorry, need to figure out better FRAPS settings for NWN):

Note: this is definitely not playing the module as intended!

henesua wrote...
 
BUT I did not use any henchmen and I never rested in my play through - which (since most of my NWN experience is on PWs or with friends in multiplayer) is how I am used to playing.

I don't think going for 45-60 minutes or whatever as a level 12 mage really makes any sense.  You'd need to recast your turn based spells four times and even your hour based ones at least twice.  It might make sense in a party where theoretically you only use spells to turn the tide of larger battles, but not solo.  Doing it without henchmen might be interesting (as a sorcerer) - but I fear it would mainly involve more resting.  You either need to use short term damage shields (2.4 minutes EXTENDED) or nuke the enemies (which means even more  resting).  Or try to do something like Webshaman's Melee Mage.

Default summons won't cut it.

henesua wrote...


Anyway my point: Since MM was not playing a ranger, druid or barbarian, they probably would have lost the game had the henchman died (or had to use up resources resurrecting the hench).

How so?  And do you mean without resting?  Based on what I saw, I don't think soloing it as a fighter type would be too bad - not sure why you think the ranger/druid/barbarian is essential.

henesua wrote...

Anyway, just some thoughts. I enjoyed Snow Hunt, and found it challenging, but I did play a Ranger, a typically fragile melee class who's benefits come in my view primarily from their skills which this module enhanced by giving them the ability to track.

How exactly were you playing your ranger?

See, if I was going to play a pure ranger in this mode, I'd probably get Heavy Armor proficiency and go sword and board.  Were you going dex based dual-wielding or?...

Also, what fight(s) did you find the most difficult?  I'd be interested in trying them as something similar to what you did and see whether it was a matter of sorcerers being blatantly overpowered or something

rogueknight333 wrote...

If you are talking about the Crag Cats, they do not actually spawn on top of the player, they just use stealth.

There was one orc encounter that seemed to sort of spawn on players - think it was the last one you encountered in the cases if you went east to west.  If you went west to east I don't think it would have been a problem.

rogueknight333 wrote...

Congratulations! In my entire career as a NWN builder, you are the first person to ever suggest that any combat I designed might be too easy. If you would like to read through all the comments on my Swordflight modules, many of which blast me for making modules that are too insanely difficult, you will see why I hardly dare make them any harder than I do (though, to be sure, the encounters in this short module are nowhere near as carefully designed or finely balanced as those in the Swordflight series tend to be). It appears you made excellent use of the resources provided, as I encourage people to do.

I only brought that up because the module advertised more difficult content, otherwise I wouldn't consider the difficultly to be relevant.  I do wonder if the others are using the potions and scabbards, though.

What would you consider to be the HARDEST type of character/class to do Swordflight with?  I might give that a try.  In general, though, I'm definitely atypical in terms of how people play- I'm a heroic raider in WoW and very much an outlier.

rogueknight333 wrote...

Not playing with the henchman is one method of making things more challenging, if you want to do that. I was a little worried that making it so easy to cast Flame Weapon had the potential to make things too easy, given the number of enemies vulnerable to fire damage, but figured that even with that capability more people would lean to finding it too hard than too easy (which so far seems to be the case).

The fire vulnerability doesn't really matter in this case - even without it that's still a free 13 damage per hit.

rogueknight333 wrote...

Contrary to RPG conventions, the final boss is not the most difficult fight. I considered beefing him up a bit, but decided not to bother since finding him is the main point, and also because if he were too powerful it would not be logical that he was trying to hide rather than just attacking you the minute you show up in the region.

Well, part of the issue seemed to be that his AC mattered more than his HP - so hitting him with spells annihilated him but he would survive more against physical attacks.  If anything I'd up his HP and decrease his AC, I suppose.

Mainly just seemed a complete pushover on both my initial playthrough with the hench and you can see the result in the speedrun above.  I was wondering how he even SURVIVED in the wilderness with him being that weak. And it seemed weird that he didn't immmediately surrender - he knows you're tough enough to survive in the wildnerness and now you're confronting him, which is basically certain death for him if he fights.  Seems he should have tried to immediately run if he knew he was THAT outmatched.
               
               

               

                     Modifié par MagicalMaster, 05 mars 2013 - 07:21 .
                     
                  

            

[Legacy_MagicalMaster]

               Just finished Black Book.  Primary thoughts going through head while playing:

- OOH. Pretty skybox.
- SO. MANY. WORDS.
- Ah, more combat. Time to alt tab again.

To elaborate...

- Very interesting visuals. I've little experience with custom content in NWN, so perhaps I'm easily impressed, but I thought some of the skyboxes and visual effects were extremely cool. The constrast in area styles, making each feel very unique, was also noticable.

- A lot of dialogue, which also happens to be hilarious. I actually read all ten of the books at the start. Some of them were definitely, um, concise, as you put it. The story itself was fascinating and the care you put into making dialogue unique per character was obvious. Nothing worse than every character talking exactly the same.  Hates it.

- Combat was definitely the weakest part of the mod in my opinion. I am not kidding about literally left clicking on a pack of enemies and then alt tabbing (also alt-tabbed for 90% of the "boss" fght). It felt like "ARGH! Not more combat!" constantly. "You WILL suffer through some combat, young man, before you get more amazing dialogue!" For the future, I'd stick to your strengths - cool visual design and engrossing dialogue.  Avoid the combat or limit it as much as possible (or even do something like making sure the player actually has to use a healing potion or whatever - make them feel SOMEWHAT engaged in the fight).

In summary, I loved 50% of the module, hated the other 50%. Which was basically the non-combat stuff and the combat stuff, respectively.
               
               

               
            

[Legacy_henesua]

               

MagicalMaster wrote...

henesua wrote...

Anyway my point: Since MM was not playing a ranger, druid or barbarian, they probably would have lost the game had the henchman died (or had to use up resources resurrecting the hench).

How so?  And do you mean without resting?  Based on what I saw, I don't think soloing it as a fighter type would be too bad - not sure why you think the ranger/druid/barbarian is essential.

I think those classes are essential because Snow Hunt requires you to literally track your enemy.  Without the offerred Ranger, I assume it is impossible to complete the story if you are not playing one. I could be wrong in making this assumption and will let Rogueknight333 respond as I don't have time to play through it again to test. Your speed playing suggests that I am wrong, but when I played through I encountered 2 "can not proceed until you do 'x'" messages and this leads me to believe that if you don't interpret tracks found along the way, you get stuck.
               
               

               

                     Modifié par henesua, 05 mars 2013 - 11:38 .
                     
                  

            

[Legacy_PLUSH HYENA of DOOM]

               Ah, so we're talking about THAT Area Trigger!

Yes, pure oversight on my part. 99 times out of 100 I'm creating a two way Area Transition which thus needs two trigger boxes, one "either end" and simply did that for this one through blind instinct, apparently forgetting it was just one way.

MM - Glad you enjoyed the look of the Module and the characters, etc... In terms of the combat, I feel it's a necessary part of the thing, given that you can't really go through an Undead Animal Invasion and never fight an Undead Animal... The problem with it is that I am used to using my ludicrously powerful Demoness character in my Modules and she basically kills anything that moves near instantly short of something truly horrific and I can set stats and know pretty much to within five seconds how long any given battle will last. Thus I have never tried to balance combat for a less powerful charcter with a less effective weapon before...
Having had 4 days to put the Module together and being back to irritating hospital trips with an Undead mother again afterwards, I had zero time to actually conduct any proper playthrough to see just how the battles would come out. As Starbright and I get to know each other better and I figure out what stats work with what type of creature etc, etc, with regards her ability to blat them, the combat element should become considerably tauter. (Might also let Aurelia have a bit more freedom to use her magic). Also, if and when the "proper" versions go up on the Vault with custom music and other little surprises, it should be a far better experience.
               
               

               
            

[Legacy_rogueknight333]

               

henesua wrote...

I think those classes are essential because Snow Hunt requires you to literally track your enemy. Without the offerred Ranger, I assume it is impossible to complete the story if you are not playing one...

That is not correct. Being able to read the various tracks will help you to understand what is going on, and earn some additional XP, but it is quite possible to complete the module without doing so. I cannot complain that you made this error, though, since I try to include bonus content for various classes in my module (there is probably a bit more special stuff for druids/rangers than for other classes in this particular module, but it is still not essential to plaly one), and generally try to create the illusion that whatever class is playing is the class it was designed for. Looks like the illusion succeeded in your case. 
                                                                                  

MagicalMaster wrote...

...I can do it in seven minutes flat, including the time to level and build the character. If you want to see a speed run skipping 90% or more of the content and blazing through the main quest as quickly as possible, video is here (quality isn't the best, sorry, need to figure out better FRAPS settings for NWN):

Hey, free advertising for my work on Youtube. Thanks.
 
An amusing video. Basically I set up a scenario with the potential, but no necessity, for non-linear exploration. Players who want to can focus solely on completing the main quest and ignore the peripheral stuff. Those who want to explore and do everything and find various goodies as well can do that. I suppose this module resembles an Elder Scrolls game in that respect.

MagicalMaster wrote...

What would you consider to be the HARDEST type of character/class to do Swordflight with?  I might give that a try.  In general, though, I'm definitely atypical in terms of how people play- I'm a heroic raider in WoW and very much an outlier.

Tough to say definitively, since I try to give every class some encounters and situations that play to its strengths and let it do whatever it does best, and others that take advantage of its weaknesses and require some real tactics to win. A pure or near-pure rogue could be very tough if you have scruples about doing some arguably cheesy things like putting gobs of traps everywhere, but if you think cheese is delicious and just what your character sandwich needs, then not so much. Playing a mage (sorcerer or wizard) can be tough in Chapter One (some pretty severe rest restrictions put a damper on spell-casting, and there are plenty of enemies who can easily be almost instant death to any low AC, low HP character who gets close to them), but less so in Chapter Two, when you will eventually be able to find a lot of gear to help you out with these problems. I think though that I will go with druid/shifter as the hardest type of character to play in this series (at least up to this point. Might be a better choice in later chapters when one gets into epic levels and can get the really powerful shifter forms). It will take a while to get any shifter forms that actually do that much for you, and in the meantime you will for many purposes just be an under-leveled druid. For example, being a Druid 7/Shifter 5 (again, if you find cheese tasty, you can slip a monk level in there somewhere - not sure if that would be in the spirit of what you are proposing to do) facing encounters balanced for a Level 12 character would not be that dramatically better than facing the same encounter as just a Druid 7.

I am assuming that you mean the hardest reasonable character build, and are not talking about deliberately gimped characters like sorcerers without enough charisma to cast better than level 1 spells, or something.