Icewind Dale: ToEE - Total Conversion

Discussion in 'Icewind Dale Total Conversion' started by Allyx, May 7, 2016.

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  1. anatoliy

    anatoliy Established Member

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    The problem was in data\mes\stat.mes. Removed the file as T+ has newer version and now works great. Thanks @Sitra Achara !
     
  2. Shiningted

    Shiningted I want my goat back Administrator

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    Anatoliy, take a deep breath! The offer was, "separate module without overrides folder". I took this to mean a .dat, such as you have created previously, but without the Temple+ architecture or having to learn all the Temple+ specific stuff which I (and possibly Allyx) don't normally work with.

    Creating a seperate module has an ease and elegance that is very appealing: players will ideally have a ToEE.dat and an IWD.dat and can play what they like.

    Having to download and install Temple+ (and learn to use it) before doing all this is the opposite - it adds a layer of complexity that is basically unnecessary for what we are trying to.

    If you can just roll things into a working .dat (and I suspect you can), great. But if your starting point is just to convert it to a Temple+ module, we could have already done that had we wanted.
     
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  3. anatoliy

    anatoliy Established Member

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    Hmm. I think ToEE vanilla has module variable hardcoded as ToEE.dat. Temple Plus, and more specifically @Sitra Achara, particularly expanded T+ functionality to support separate modules. That was done for SGoS by the way.

    The only thing that can be done for vanilla is to zip maps information to ToEE.dat and replace the original. But all files in "data" folder still need to be put into overrides folder.

    Sitra actually added ability in T+ to have this override folder as dat file. He called it _core folder\.dat. So for example IWD structure would look like:
    \modules\icewind_dale.dat
    \modules\icewind_dale_core.dat

    That can only work in Temple Plus. So yeah - that would be T+ only module.
     
  4. Sitra Achara

    Sitra Achara Senior Member

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    IIRC vanilla toee had a cmd line switch -mod that was similar to defaultModule config in Temple+. I vaguelly recall there was some associated cludge though, like ToEE hardcoded in some internal search paths (possibly for save games).
     
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  5. Allyx

    Allyx Master Crafter Global Moderator Supporter

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    I've never modded with Temple+ because I just don't know how to.
     
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  6. anatoliy

    anatoliy Established Member

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    Question about Orc Cave - should everybody be alerted when starting a fight in the cave? I checked while playing in T+.
    Are everybody alerted in vanilla ToEE conversion?

    I see that in IWD itself they are not, time: 17:22


    It's a problem.
     
  7. Shiningted

    Shiningted I want my goat back Administrator

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    I think that fight goes beautifully, constantly drawing in foes and become more difficult than just 'pick them off one by one'. Kuldahar Pass too for that matter. What problem do you see?
    Well if it can't be done, it can't be done. But let me explain where I'm coming from.

    Just having a .dat has an elegance, as previously explained. Its something to be aimed for.

    However, ideally I would like a single download: one exe to install eveyrthing, then run game. Co8 has that, KotB has that. The file being a .dat looks better, but currently we have basically one file - the .tfm module. It works well atm but could look better.

    The reason I am not in favour of native Temple+ (other than what was stated) is that I am hopeful when we finish - or at least have a decent size release, like the next one is planned to be - is it will pull in a few IWD fans or IE fans or non-ToEE players. For those people, a minimal, easy install is preferable - one single install. Not 'install game, then install Temple+, then configure' etc. I struggled to configure Temple+ for SGoS, and I've been doing this as long as Sitra.

    Regulars will make their own choice how they want to play, of course.

    As you know, Anatoliy, based on SGoS and other ideas I have discussed with you, I don't have an a priori aversion to a native Temple+ module - I just don't tihnk we need to go that way for this. Anyway, I dare say I misunderstood your '.dat' offer, but that is my objection.
     
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  8. Sitra Achara

    Sitra Achara Senior Member

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    I also thought that the constant pulling in of enemies was a good thing, but I acknowledge that it's a departure from the original. (do the IWD caves also play like that in vanilla ToEE?)

    I'll probably tone down the "alert allies" thing a little, as it also causes some unintended behavior in the Imeryd's run as well. I suppose longer-range alerting is something that's better left to manual scripting/editing.
     
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  9. anatoliy

    anatoliy Established Member

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    I briefly looked at scripts in the IWD2 at Shaengarne River map (First Chapter) - it's not continuous but not completely separate as in SGoS either.

    Distant Orcs would not join a combat. But they would slowly approach one. And within some distance engage the battle. Such cannot be done literally in ToEE\T+.

    I would make the alert much less distance between foes, plus probably check distance to PC as well. The distant foes would not be moving towards the PC during a combat. But after a encounter they would slowly approach (not sure how to make slow though) towards a battle (?), not sure.

    This is how it looks ATM:
    upload_2021-9-3_14-42-26.png

    Additionally I would increase all small and medium creatures radius to 25-30 as I did in SGoS to ensure PC would not be surrounded by 10 Orcs.
     
  10. anatoliy

    anatoliy Established Member

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    That's fine @Shiningted. I do not intend to meddle in IWD1-TC project :)
     
  11. hammyh

    hammyh Established Member

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    I can remember how this cave went in vanilla IWD. There are a number of groups of orcs and a pull typically pulls the whole group... and the final group has an ogre. Each group was positioned far enough apart to not alert the other groups, if careful. Party level was 1-2.

    Ofc, in harder settings such as the HoF mode, it is similar but you just kite and use more summons. This would be the only reason that a constant pull would not be desirable...but this very difficult low-level setting is not a thing in ToEE.

    I think the ToEE Welkwood fight with the mass of kobolds would compare. (except the ogre is much more damaging than the kobold leader)
     
    Last edited: Sep 3, 2021
  12. Allyx

    Allyx Master Crafter Global Moderator Supporter

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    @anatoliy That screenshot shows it's pulling in way too many enemies, that's practically the entire cave population!

    As for gradually adding further enemies to a fight, I have in a number of places added waypoints for monsters to walk, while they stand still during combat, if they stray too close to PC's they will be added to the combat if KOS. EG, The first 6 Orcs in those caves all wander around and can be encountered together if you rush them, or split into 2 smaller groups if you hang back at the entrance until the first 3 aggro the PC's.
     
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  13. hammyh

    hammyh Established Member

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    I ran IWD HoF with iwd NPC mod, and I quite enjoyed it, even with this difficulty. The NPC characters were reasonably designed and the dialog was fun enough (as good or even better than BG imho ). Up until maybe level 10 it was pretty hard, but after that it's fairly routine. The interactions broke up what could have been a silent slog, otherwise.

    But really my point is that even minimal npcs add to the flavor of ToEE and it might be very worth considering for the IWD version.

    I'd even go so far as to suggest contacting the authors of the iwd npc and see if they would allow use of a port/conversion of their mod. The dialog takes some artistic effort to create and often the mod authors are thrilled to see their work used, as long as credit is given.

    Just throwing that out there fwiw.
     
  14. Shiningted

    Shiningted I want my goat back Administrator

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    This is a great idea @hammyh, if Al has no objections I will certainly pursue it. IWD is clearly lacking NPC followers, but making them from scratch is too big a task when we already have too big a task ;)
     
  15. Allyx

    Allyx Master Crafter Global Moderator Supporter

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    I know there are some NPC's in vanilla IWD that you encounter mid-dungeon crawl, not many, but they are few and far between.

    I don't object to adding content from already available well written (and popular?) IWD mods, but perhaps do so as an optional add-on pack instead of by default, that is kind of why we have add-on capability in TFE-X
     
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