Seperating mods from bug-fixes

I think we should consider offering alternative files for those who only want bug-fixes in the nextinstallerversion of the Co8 patch (IE dialogues in which theprisoners do NOT mark Verbobonc on the map, dialogue for mona that does NOT mark Hickory Branch on your map, and a version of whatever file it is that triggers the moathouse respawn, that does NOT trigger the respawn, and leave the rest of the game as is.) just like we do for desperate housewives now.

That way the people have the choice, and the modders don't have the task of separating fix from new content.

 

The easy way out of this is to simply consider Allyx's Toffee version of 3.0.4 to be our 'bug fixes only' release. It contains the moebius .dll and only one new content mod to my knowledge - Burne's Puzzles. It of course doesn't contain near the bug fixes of the current release, but for the few people that are abhorred at the prospect of playing our added content, that's what they should use.

 

Alternatively, I've prepared a small fix that will disable the Verbobonc, Moathouse respawn and Hickory Branch mods for those that want to use it for thier 5.0.0 installs, I haven't disabled Livonya's added content, or the burnes puzzles quest, as they'd require a bit more work than just replacing a few files with their original versions.

Anyone that tries this out, bear in mind, I've not tested this, but there shouldn't be any problems, just make sure Co8-5.0.0 is the last module you ran bfore extracting this to your root DIR.

 

Ah, I'm getting sick and tired of this "separate bug fixes from the content" requests and stuff...

This was asked and discussed a hundred times before, sometimes in a nice form, sometimes in an impudent "you-owe-it-to-us" form. The real trick here is that this is a really long and tedious process, and at the moment no one wants to do this because it's likely that it'll take a bunch of months and will still yield an incomplete result. Keep in mind that many bug-fixes are tightly intertwined with the new content, sometimes even on the DLL level, and separating the two is merely impossible unless we take out both the content and the related bug-fix.

In my opinion, if you don't like the idea of something in the Co8 mod, just don't use it (don't do the quest, don't use the item, etc.). Otherwise, if you want the content and bugfixes separated that badly, take your time, learn to mod the game, and offer your newly attained skills to the team ("Guys, I want to volunteer to help you split the mod content from the bug fixes", you know). What? Do I hear you telling me that it'll take many months, if not years, to learn how to mod? Well why, yes it will, and that's how it works. There's no easy way to mod ToEE, it's a hard and tedious process, and that could be a part of why many of us just don't feel like redesigning our mod in order to make two packages (bug-fixes and content) instead of just one (bug-fixes + content), especially considering that most people will want to use the combined package anyway.

Sorry if I sounded way too irritated, but I think these requests are getting a little over the top by now. Maybe we should actually make a new sticky that would say "Do not make requests about separating the new content from the bug-fixes unless you want to offer your help in this respect"?... (just kidding) :\

@ Allyx: About offering alternative files in the next installer: I'd like to note that this will most likely not solve our problem with the requests - remember, you can only disable certain features with alternative files in an easy way (e.g. Verbo-mod, the Hickory, etc.), while other changes such as the new weapons, new armor, certain new quests, will require a lot more work.

- Agetian

 

Oh, I know that dude, I wasn't about to bend over backwards to disable all the new content, I mean the Burnes puzzles mod was added before I even joined Co8, it's just that "most" of the complaints about the fact that there is new content in the game, stem from the game ballance being disturbed by these 3 mods in particular as they are the largest new content mods in the current Co8 mod pack (+ CMF 5.0.3). Adding these files to the DH option (renamed to "new content removal") in the installer was about as far as I was going to go with this project.

 

@ Allyx: Yup, I know, and I agree with this - certain things could be made optional that way, if it's simple enough.

- Agetian

 

Nah, you read the tutorials and then open Notepad. Its easy!

O and ToEEWB helps too

 

@ Salk: We're by no means forcing anyone to try anything that's downloadable from our boards, so sure - it's entirely up to every person to choose what exactly to download and play, if anything. It's impossible to satisfy absolutely everyone, there will always be people who don't like something - that's just how it works. I'm sorry that you haven't found what you were looking for (the bug-fix packages), I guess you'll have to wait until someone volunteers to do a thing like that, or just play something else.

Since this topic has already been covered (yet again) and since I'm aware that this topic of the discussion is known to cause disturbances on the board, I'm closing it before it turns into something worse than what it is right now (it's good to say "enough" here, I guess).

- Agetian