ToEEFE 4.00 wishlist & beta versions

Since this is a 'wishlist and beta' forum I think we can have a little debate here.

What do people think of this? I suggest it be the default behaviour of the game, not just an option: it 'fixes' the issue so perfectly I can't think of any reason NOT to use it all the time (people who don't want to loot their NPCs are still free not to do so, and NPCs will still pick up loot like money and jewels along the way as they always did). Certainly (with testing) I plan to make it the default for KotB, and build the NPCs accordingly: people are quite entitled to dispute that idea, of course.

 

Well, I basically think that it may be the default behavior but only in case we're 100% sure that it doesn't break anything in the game. As you can see, Drifter's implementation of the Humble NPCs had some downsides which prevented other features of the game engine from working correctly. Unless we can prove that Spellslinger's fix makes the Humble NPCs perfect without breaking anything else in the code, I have no objections towards making it the standard behavior. Or maybe just suggesting it as the option that's enabled by default in the front-end, with a possibility of disabling it at any time (there will probably be people who still won't want to use it ).

- Agetian

 

I rather like it personally, and I think it's a much more elegant solution than Drifter's. However, unless I'm missing something, wouldn't the same old Livonya argument of total NPC autonomy still be valid here?

p.s. - I was wondering what all this talk of 'Spellslinger's Humble NPCs fix' was in the other threads . . .

 

As far as NPC autonomy goes, we would still have:

- NPCs looting independantly (just not stupid things)

- Liv's implemented capacity to buy stuff from your NPCs

we could then add the ability to move stuff in and out for upgrading and replacing.

What we could do is implement a redo of the mobs of all the stuff that could be bought (their basic starting equipment) and make it all NO_TRANSFER (a bit fiddly, but we are talking about checking one box on ToEEWB for each item, and there aren't that many items) and then remove that by script when the NPC reaches a level one higher than where they started. If that sounds complicated, I think I did something similar for Ronald, he wouldn't hand over his gear until he had been with the party long enough to gain a level: I certainly intended to, whether I carried it through I can't remember. Anyway, it would prevent Liv's concerns that people would recruit Elmo etc for thier magical gear, strip them then send them away.

I think thats a very legitimate concern but then, other than Elmo, Otis, maybe Rufus, and Thrommel of course, there are very few NPCs who come with interesting gear worth stealing: so we wouldn't have to do that much scripting. And if people really want to be that cheesy, they can always send Elmo off to die in battle at the Deklo Grove (or wherever) like they used to.

Personally I think our role is to improve the game-play, not assist in cheesy behaviour. Being able to take your NPCs stuff to upgrade it improves things (ditto them not selling it), but otherwise I think NPCs should have an element of autonomy. That was the original intent of the game, however badly it was implemented.

 

Actually the Kap'n has let me know privately whats going on with the maps... but anyways:

Sorry here too, I broke a cardinal rule: don't talk about stuff you haven't played. I don't use humble NPCs (except in brief spurts to relieve NPCs of items that need crafting / upgrading) so I was unaware of this, I assumed NPCs still looted their share of money / gems. I'd hate to see that go, that was the one tiny part of it all that worked.

Well, there goes my whole argument up in smoke. My own fault. Dang, dang, dang.

 

Don't worry about it, Ted, I didn't know it either since (I have to come clean here ) I haven't used Humble NPCs personally either.

- Agetian

 

Here's a subversion release of ToEEFE 4.00beta4.1 - a special edition that has some extra code that may prevent the sometimes-occuring 0004 error for some people. Once again, it may work, but it may as well cause some extra problems or cause 0004 in other cases. I really need some feedback on how well this version works, because depending on what you say, I'll either be releasing 4.00b4 or 4.00b4.1 as a final release in case no other bugs pop up. The executable name here is toeefe_test.exe to avoid confusion with the more stable releases.

- Agetian