Vertical City Tileset

[Legacy_Nevercallmebyname]

               

I've been trying, hitting more of a design barrier rather than a skill or knowledge barrier or maybe a lack of vision for what I actually want to do?

 

The simplest description of what I want to do is terrain tiles for houses that go both up and down multiple levels and can be climbed up and down on the outside. I don't really know why I want this and I don't think anyone else would feel the need to use it either but it is a thing that I want to make.

 

Um... anyway, if you are interested in where this is going and/or have suggestions for what a finished Vertical City Tileset should look like then please tell me because I'm secretly an intellect devourer and your thoughts provide my sustenance... I mean because interest from others is a very good motivator.

               
               

               
            

[Legacy_The Mad Poet]

               

What you are asking for is REALLY tough.

 

For one you can only have one height in any part of a tileset to walk on. That's why there aren't any bridges you can walk under, or spiral staircases you can walk on, or multi-floored interiors.

 

With that said there probably is a way to do 'Something' like that. EG Zwerkules medieval city has some buildings with walkways on the outside of them that wrap around so you can climb up them, but they only go up one story. They can't go up two or three because you would be crossing the same horizontal location on the tileset. 

 

The RLCore Gothic Interior tileset had an interesting approach to this problem by creating a downstairs and upstairs section for the tileset. A little creative building and you could make it look like you went upstairs and still see the downstairs.

 

As for other solution... well... I can't think of any. I'm not a wizard. I'm a poet.

               
               

               
            

[Legacy_Nevercallmebyname]

               

Yeah I wasn't going to have levels on top of levels but more like the multi level areas in a lot of video games, each level will be offset a little so that there's never actually a level directly over another level.

 

I did consider using the RLCore Gothic approach and just area transitioning every time I went up the stairs but then there'd have to be a version for each floor and I just felt that was too clunky.

 

at any rate all I'm actually asking for is an architectural theme to base the buildings on since I myself cant decide. What style of building would people want to have in a multi level version?

               
               

               
            

[Legacy_Proleric]

               

I guess the biggest audience here is for medieval / dungeon style.

 

Give that a tile can only have one level, the next big problem in creating a multi-level shootout is that (traditionally) tilesets use slopes to connect different levels of elevation. So, for example, if you have two peaks at level 2, they are separated by five tiles (2>1, 1>0, 0-0, 0>1, 1>2), which may be a problem for visibility and weapon range.

 

This can be improved by the use of doors. Transitions within area are almost instantaneous. Some tilesets allow doors in elevation walls; also, you can place doors such as the CEP ladder door anywhere, using the AdjustLocation trick. In our example, this reduces the separation between level 2 peaks to three tiles (1, 0, 1).

 

It seems that the same thing can be done using walkmesh steps that rise almost vertically. The only example I can think of offhand are the watchtowers in CEP Rural Winter etc where the player climbs a near-vertical ladder from level 0 to level 1. Perhaps one of our tile makers can comment on whether it's possible to climb more than one level vertically within the same tile.

               
               

               
            

[Legacy_Nevercallmebyname]

               

Are you saying that the way the game is programmed wont allow it?

               
               

               
            

[Legacy_The Mad Poet]

               

One of the best examples of a 'Vertical City' I know of is in the Eberron Campaign Setting. The city of Sharn. 

 

               
               

               
            

[Legacy_Nevercallmebyname]

               

Wow, now that is awesome. A Tileset like that could be used for science fiction or scifi or you could blend the two and use it in a Spelljammer module (and I have wanted to make a spelljammer module). Ok, If I don't see anything better I think I'll be making Vertical City a Sharn inspired tileset.

               
               

               
            

[Legacy_CaveGnome]

               Apparently Neverwinter doesn't like multiple walkmeshes with different Z in the same tile, in fact, you have to do with only one per tile. You can have different height walkmeshes but in different tiles. In the same tile, nothing forbids using one walkmesh consisting of multiple heights zones linked with walking/climbing areas, but your height transition parts must preferably be slopes (very steep ones if you like). Vertical transitions in the same wmesh do work but in an unreliable manner (something to do with the path finding). One way to trick the game engine could be to use placeables with their own walkmeshes to override tile walkmeshes (TheOneBlackRider did something like this with the invisible placeable ramps).


Your goal is achievable (a climbing tower PC demo was done in the past), but no easy task. By all means, give it a try. You will learn a lot in the process.
               
               

               
            

[Legacy_3RavensMore]

               

Removed by poster.  Misread an above post.   '>

               
               

               
            

[Legacy_3RavensMore]

               

One way to trick the game engine could be to use placeables with their own walkmeshes to override tile walkmeshes (TheOneBlackRider did something like this with the invisible placeable ramps).

 

 

Placeables with walkmeshes?  I didn't think that was possible.  They can have pwks, but those either block movement, or they don't.  Anyone like to elaborate on this?

               
               

               
            

[Legacy_Borden Haelven]

               

Mmm, different heights could be on same tile, special tileset doors could be made that look like the top & bottom of ladders. link the two in the toolbox and instant ladder climbing...

 

Mmm 2, The same could be done with rope ladders & ropes for tree houses & caves. Hang on, didn't I do that already with my treehouse tiles? been a while since I looked at them. '>

               
               

               
            

[Legacy_OldTimeRadio]

               

Placeables with walkmeshes?  I didn't think that was possible.  They can have pwks, but those either block movement, or they don't.  Anyone like to elaborate on this?

From the Omnibus, thread entitled "Building Block Paceables".  Post by Robert Babiak, Bioware programmer, circa 2002:

"...placables have a walkmesh, usally made up of non walkable area.  But they can have walkable area also."

 

Here's video of a placeable with a hole I made, for instance.  Just set it to static and make sure it's in the center of the tile- pretty easy with "Adjust Location".  Players see this.  Game sees this (i.e. walkmesh from placeable instead of original walkmesh).  Been about 4 years since I fiddled with it for any length of time but it's possible.  IIRC, it has limitations like....I think you can't bridge a no-walk area with it or something like that.  

               
               

               
            

[Legacy_Frith5]

               

So... one could have an invisible placeable with walkable area that aligned to the height of a bridge on a tileset. The original walkmesh would be for going 'under' the bridge only. However, a trigger at either end of the bridge could spawn in the appropriate invisi-placeable and allow a PC (or creature) to walk onto and over the bridge. As long as nobody was 'under' the bridge at the time, it would function perfectly. In Sp it'd be almost a no brainer to make work. In MP, a simple check for the area beneath the bridge would suffice.

Is this correct?

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[Legacy_OldTimeRadio]

               

@Frith5 - Meh, stuff like this you have to actually play around with to see what the limits are and, most importantly, how it works in a bunch of different scenarios before being able to suppose it would work in a certain one.  I just did it because people kept saying it was impossible.   '>  But I haven't played with it much since.

 

This stuff is static, though.  It has to be set in the toolset and seemingly can't be triggered on the fly.  This seems to have some sweet applications, but I don't imagine any of them are the very dynamic scenario you describe.  As with all things NWN, there are multiple approaches.  I know I saw a video someplace of a NWNX plugin (perhaps referenced here?) which showed some Z change, but I don't know anything more about it.  Going back through the years, I think the most recent stuff I saw involving "Walk Tricks" was something done by MDA (a video, IIRC) and before that there's things you can do where you sort of skip over the area if you're using the keyboard and stuff like that.

 

For a vertical city tileset, I think one of the best tricks isn't much of a trick at all: Instead of having walkways on the outside of something, have them on the inside, like the crater town "Megaton" in Fallout 3.  You still get that awesome "stacked" effect but you aren't nearly as constrained by the walkmesh limitations because you can always expand outward as you elevate.

               
               

               
            

[Legacy_Nevercallmebyname]

               

If multiple levels is going to be too much effort then I think I will just make three versions (bottom, middle, top) and have an elevator feature tile for all levels as the transition. It will feel a bit like the area transitions in mass effect.