Zone Tripper

I actually did open the safe. I just did it before opening the gate. I think it's because that pop-up message for that area fades quickly enough that I didn't get to fully read the part about needing to opening the gate first. I was able to open the safe with no problem; the clicks were just less audible, but not by that much. In my mind, I was practicing how to open locks under noisy conditions.

One more post about this and I swear I'm (probably) done. Upon replaying the training mission again to look for hidden things (just found the gas arrow, very good, that one), I have these comments: In the object handling section, the crate in the corner with the hat on it, and rings underneath: because that crate is movable and the rings are so small, most of the time I wind up selecting the crate to move and the rings just kind of spaz out on top of it or fall off. Perhaps that crate should not be movable or the hat and rings should be moved to another area. In the jump and climb section, I never saw the text pop-up about crouching on ropes and ladders to slide down them until this playthrough. I guess it's because when I miss the rope and fall into the canal, I just sort of explore the rest of the map instead of trying the rope again. And when I go back, I do it by climbing the vines to the balcony and swinging back on the rope. I don't think I even noticed that ladder in the corner before. Even though being underwater is very laggy for me, it might be useful to have some specific reason to go underwater, if only to let the player experience how to move around in it and the breath-meter. There's the text pop-up, but practical experience would be useful. Sort of a minor issue, but in the hidden area of the archery section, where the guard walks back and forth, one of the textures for stone walls has a visible seam on it (http://imgur.com/T9s9HOG) which made me think, "Aha! There's obviously a hidden door right here! I'll just press one of these bricks, and... okay, maybe this one... no... hmmm..." That texture and seam are repeated a couple of times elsewhere. I think the end of the lockpicking section could use a little something at the end. I felt pretty accomplished getting through all of those doors, but at the end of it all there was just this on/off switch. I felt like a master thief picking all those locks; it'd be nice to have a little treasure at the end, even if it's hidden. Or maybe turning off that machine reveals a secret somewhere else. Unless of course there is something there that I just didn't notice. And this mission has no objectives, but why not have some? There are plenty of hidden treasures and things like finding the ten health potions and various arrows. Maybe even have a new optional objective pop up when you, say, find that first health potion. It could be argued that optional objects appearing in the middle of missions is something that a new player would need to learn. I think it'd be an enjoyable challenge to some players and a good way to let people know that there's more to this map than meets the eye. I know that when I play a map and I swear that I've cleaned out every bit of treasure, only to find out at the end that I missed 300 or so, it makes me think that the map maker has cleverly hidden some things that I've missed. If anything, having different objective levels would train the player in... objectives.

In regards to chedap's post, I also didn't realize that I could carry bodies until I was playing my third fan mission and kind of discovered it by mistake. I even read the bit of text that said that putting a body down will alternate between it landing face-up and face-down. My reaction was, "What are you talking about? All I can do is drag these guys." I think it might just be another frob vs. use issue. Not really understanding that while I was learning the basics is probably responsible for most of what I failed to grasp at first. I also had an issue with trying to snuff out candles, for similar reasons. Once I understood that (and mapped "use" to the Tab button for convenience's sake), a lot of my issues were solved. It might also be helpful to have some combat against spiders in the tutorial. Maybe it's because I gave up on the melee tutorial, but once I started playing fan missions with spiders in it, I was left wondering what to do. I would swing my sword almost at point blank range, while crouching, and nothing seemed to happen. I sort of need to swing my mouse up while hitting the button to do any actual damage. To me, that seems more like a special attack to use against another swordsman. A basic swing should do at least something to a critter, but maybe I'm doing it wrong. I also had questions like, do I need to crouch while fighting a spider or can I just look down and swing (it seems that you need to crouch)? Experimenting with how do all of that while in the middle of a mission led to a lot of deaths. Learning in the tutorial how to fight all creature types (undead, and elementals, if they exist yet) would be very helpful. Yes, swinging on ropes could use a more basic example. One where a player could quickly get back to it if they fail or just want more practice. I like the current rope as a more advanced example, but I have to admit that, upon failing and either landing in the water (which reduces my framerate drastically) or smacking into a wall, I wasn't all that motivated to climb my way back up just to try again. If I could quickly access the rope again, I would have gotten more practice with it. And chedap mentioned a few hidden items that I didn't find, so I guess that they are just the right amount of tricky to find. I love the fact that I enjoy playing (and replaying) the training mission. Those hidden bits and other things to discover really helped to make this tutorial immersive and professional-feeling. That, and playing St. Lucia as the first mission, really made me go, "Whoa, these guys are good! This IS Thief!"

First of all, I just want to say, as a long-time Thief fan and someone who is new to The Dark Mod, this training mission is both a fantastic tutorial as well as a showcase for all of your hard work. I've spent a few hours in this mission and even though it's just for training, I totally get the feel like I'm playing a Thief game. Jaw-droppingly good. This is my new favorite game. That said, I do have a few comments about his map. Is there a section devoted to listening at doors? Maybe I missed it, but I didn't notice one and then I tried it on a fan mission and was pleasantly surprised to find out that it worked. After reading the introductory book in the center of all the rooms, the first door I went through was the object handling section. There, when I tried to read the instruction book, I picked it up. Whereas the first book stays put, this one goes into your inventory and you have to specifically use it. I get that that might be the point - showing that you "handle objects" such as books - but I was confused as to why this book was behaving differently from the first one that I just read. It might be better to have that book stay put and have some other book to read in that area. Having the object with all of the instructions behave differently was confusing. It might also be useful to have some scrolls and notes to read. When I eventually played Tears of St. Lucia, I didn't immediately realize that some scrolls had more than one page of text. Books having a folded corner is pretty much a standard indicator in games, but I didn't recognize the graphical method for scrolls (and somewhat with the notes with loose pieces of paper) when I first saw it. The lockpicking method was new to me, as is mentioned in the text. It took me a while to figure it out and get the feel for it, but I suppose that's the point of this tutorial. I initially thought that you had to stop during the silent pause in between the lock tumbler sounds, but it's more like you have to stop just at the moment when the sound stops. Looking back, it's plainly written in the instructions, but it took a while before it "clicked" with me (pun intended). Maybe saying that you need to click right at the end of the sound, rather than the start of the silence, would make it more obvious. I was also a bit confused about frob vs. use. Trying to unlock and lock those doors resulted in lots of fruitless clicks, or me closing doors when I was trying to re-lock them using the keys. Again, that's the point of having a tutorial, and I eventually worked it out, but maybe a more direct explanation is needed. It was kind of frustrating before I "got it". It also took a bit of time to realize that I had to use different lockpicks. I'm a bit embarrassed to admit that it took some time to notice the red and green flashes when using the wrong and right equipment (even though, again, it is mentioned in the instructions). It might be useful to spell it out when unlocking the doors. "Use the triangle pick here." "Use the triangle pick, then snake pick on the second door." "Now use the triangle pick, then the snake pick twice." "For the treasure door, we're not going to tell you what to use. You'll need to figure it out for yourself." I might just be really bad a sword fighting, but I haven't won a single match yet. Admittedly, after dying ten or so times in a row, I just sort of gave up and went to go do some more sneaky things. I can't specifically fault the map for my lack of skill, but that was my experience with it. Maybe I need to pratice on a dummy first. Whenever someone kills you, they get about one word out before the scene cuts out and you respawn back at the start. It'd be nice to hear what they say. In the stealth section, just before the tile floor part, when you get the pop-up about collecting moss arrows, it reads, "Go through the partially door behind you," I'm assuming it's supposed to be "partially open door". As has been mentioned, the pop-up only appearing one time - and briefly - caused me to miss some things. In the jump and climb section, I didn't know know how to reach the exit, because I missed the part about shooting a rope arrow up to the crate above me. So I didn't realize that I could use rope arrows on vertical surfaces, and I just backtracked to the beginning. At the end of the objects and handling section, where you can push a crate, pushing a crate with a candle on it causes the crate to move, but the candle stays still and will even float there if you push the crate completely away from it (if you touch the hovering candle, it will fall to the ground). It's probably more of an engine issue than a map issue, but since that room is full of crates and candles, I had it happen to me. This is probably a "feature not a bug", but in the section where you need to knock the chalice off of the pillar with a rock, you can just mantle up onto one of the large vases along the wall and then jump up to the pillar and grab the chalice. I felt kind of sneaky for doing that, which isn't a bad thing in this game, but maybe you want to force the player to knock it down.