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I think this is being discussed for the core game and maybe some day it is included. For now if you want some order, just download the Unofficial Patch and only copy the fms folder in the archive into your TDM directory to get a better listing!

Story: Build Time: Thanks: Download: In the in-game downloader, when it's back up* or at the following locations: Dropbox http://darkmod.taaaki.za.net/fms/lhl.pk4 http://fidcal.com/darkuser/missions/lhl.pk4 http://www.southquarter.com/tdm/fms/lhl.pk4 *right now the mission server is down, which means you will need to manually download and install this mission. Download the pk4 file from dropbox above, and place it in your folder called LhL inside your "fms" folder in your TDM install directory. Let me know if you run in to problems! Gallery: Hints, Tips, Walkthrough, Spoilers(!):

After editing some objectives, now I'm getting this console warning pop up any time I check the objectives in game. I've never seen it before. Everything appears to be working though. I have not edited the tdm_objectives.gui file and it is intact in the tdm_gui01.pk4 folder in TDM. It references DestroyDelay here. onAction { set "gui::DestroyDelay" OBJECTIVES_DESTROY_DELAY; set "gui::CloseGUI" "1"; set "cmd" "updateObjectives"; } but I have no idea what I could have done in my fm to give it issue. [EDIT] I get this warning in other missions now, not just mine. I reinstalled TDM and I still get this warning. Is this a 2.12 thing?

Is that the name of your book? I looked up the word and it could easilly mean a 100 different things. Young Writers Association? --- Maybe you could make some kind of modules that other game designers could use in their game.

Hey its been some time, I just wanted to make you guys aware, that i have been secretly at work, on the side, on a total remake of the systems from delightfyl. I post a few videos below, the new systems are really really powerful and stable! No idea what i will do with this yet... The effort to make a full game is really expensive and i am distracted and creatively bankrupt. Without outside help i will never make a game like this evermore.

Complaint From Players The player must pick up candles before extinguishing them, and then the player must remember to drop the candle. The player must drag a body before shouldering it (picking it up), and the player must remember to frob again to stop dragging the body. The player finds this annoying or easy to make mistakes. For players who ghost, some of them have the goal of returning objects back to their original positions. With the current "pick up, use item, and drop" system, the item might not return easily or at all to its original position. For example, a candlestick might bounce off its holder. (See player quotes at the bottom.) Bug Tracker https://bugs.thedarkmod.com/view.php?id=6316 Problems to Solve How can the "pick up" step be eliminated so that the player can directly use or interact with the item where it is in the game world? How can so much key pressing and mouse clicking be eliminated when the player wants to directly use an item? How can candles be extinguished and lanterns toggled off/on without first picking them up? How can bodies be shouldered without first dragging them? Solution Design Goals Make TDM easier for new players while also improving it for longtime players. Reduce tedious steps for common frob interactions. Make it intuitive so that menu settings are unnecessary. Do not introduce bugs or break the game. Terms frob -- the frob button action happens instantly. hold frob -- the frob button is held for 200ms before the action happens. (This can be changed via cvar: 200ms by default.) Proposed Solution Note: Some issues have been struckthrough to show changes since the patch has been updated. Change how frobbing works for bodies, candles, and lanterns. For bodies: Frob to shoulder (pick up) a body. Second frob to drop shouldered body, while allowing frob on doors, switches, etc. Hold frob (key down) to start drag, continue to hold frob (key down) to drag body, and then release frob (key up) to stop dragging body. Also, a body can be dragged immediately by holding frob and moving the mouse. For candles/lanterns: Frob to extinguish candles and toggle off/on lanterns. Hold frob to pick it up, and then frob again to drop. Frob to pick it up, and then frob again to drop. Hold frob to extinguish candles and toggle off/on lanterns. For food: Frob to pick it up, and then frob again to drop. Hold frob to eat food. For other items: No change. New cvar "tdm_frobhold_delay", default:"200" The frob hold delay (in ms) before drag or extinguish. Set to 0 for TDM v2.11 (and prior) behavior. Solution Benefits Bodies: New players will have less to learn to get started moving knocked out guards. With TDM v2.11 and earlier, some players have played several missions before realizing that they could shoulder a body instead of dragging it long distances. Frob to shoulder body matches Thief, so longtime Thief players will find it familiar. Second frob drops a shouldered body. Players still have the ability to both shoulder and drag bodies. Compatible with the new auto-search bodies feature. Dragging feels more natural -- just grab, hold, and drop with a single button press. There is no longer the need to press the button twice. Also, it's no longer possible to walk away from a body while unintentionally dragging it. Set "tdm_frobhold_delay" cvar to delay of 0 to restore TDM v2.11 (and prior) behavior. Candles: New players will have less to learn to get started extinguishing candles. With TDM v2.11 and earlier, some players didn't know they could extinguish candles by picking them up and using them. Instead, they resorted to throwing them to extinguish them or hiding them. Hold frob to extinguish a candle feels like "pinching" it out. Once a candle is picked up, players still have the ability to manipulate and use them the same way they are used to in TDM v2.11 and earlier. For players who ghost and have the goal of putting objects back to their original positions, they'll have an easier time and not have to deal with candles popping off their holders when trying to place them back carefully. Set "tdm_frobhold_delay" cvar to delay of 0 to restore TDM v2.11 (and prior) behavior. Solution Issues Bodies: Frob does not drop a shouldered body, so that might be unexpected for new players. This is also different than Thief where a second frob will drop a body. "Use Inv. Item" or "Drop Inv. Item" drops the body. This is the same as TDM v2.11 and earlier. This is the price to pay for being able to frob (open/close) doors while shouldering a body. Patch was updated to drop body on second frob, while allowing frob on doors, switches, etc. Candles: Picking up a candle or lantern requires a slight delay, because the player must hold the frob button. The player might unintentionally extinguish a candle while moving it if they hold down frob. The player will need to learn that holding frob will extinguish the candle. The player can change the delay period via the "tdm_frobhold_delay" cvar. Also, when the cvar is set to a delay of 0, the behavior matches TDM v2.11 and earlier, meaning the player would have to first "Frob/Interact" to pick up the candle and then press "Use Inv. Item" to extinguish it. Some players might unintentionally extinguish a candle when they are trying to move it or pick it up. They need to make sure to hold frob to initiate moving the candle. When a candle is unlit, it will highlight but do nothing on frob. That might confuse players. However, the player will likely learn after extinguishing several candles that an unlit candle still highlights. It makes sense that an already-extinguished candle cannot be extinguished on frob. The official "Training Mission" might need to have its instructions updated to correctly guide the player through candle manipulation training. Updating the training mission to include the hold frob to extinguish would probably be helpful. Similar Solutions In Fallout 4, frob uses an item and long-press frob picks it up. Goldwell's mission, "Accountant 2: New In Town", has candles that extinguish on frob without the need of picking them up first. Snatcher's TDM Modpack includes a "Blow / Ignite" item that allows the player to blow out candles Wesp5's Unofficial Patch provides a way to directly extinguish movable candles by frobbing. Demonstration Videos Note: The last two videos don't quite demonstrate the latest patch anymore. But the gist is the same. This feature proposal is best experienced in game, but some demonstration videos are better than nothing. The following videos show either a clear improvement or that the player is not slowed down with the change in controls. For example, "long-press" sounds long, but it really isn't. Video: Body Shouldering and Dragging The purpose of this video is to show that frob to shoulder a body is fast and long-press frob to drag a body is fast enough and accurate. Video: Long-Press Frob to Pick Up Candle The purpose of this video is to show how the long-press frob to pick up a candle isn't really much slower than regular frob. Video: Frob to Extinguish The purpose of this video -- if a bit contrived -- is to show the efficiency and precision of this proposed feature. The task in the video was for the player to as quickly and accurately as possible extinguish candles and put them back in their original positions. On the left, TDM v2.11 is shown. The player has to highlight each candle, press "Frob/Interact" to pick up, press "Use Inv. Item" to extinguish, make sure the candle is back in place, and finally press "Frob/Interact" to drop the candle. The result shows mistakes and candles getting misplaced. On the right, the proposed feature is shown. The player frobs to extinguish the candles. The result shows no mistakes and candles are kept in their original positions. Special Thanks @Wellingtoncrab was instrumental in improving this feature during its early stages. We had many discussions covering varying scenarios, pros, and cons, and how it would affect the gameplay and player experience. Originally, I had a completely different solution that added a special "use modifier" keybinding. He suggested the frob to use and long-press frob to pick up mechanics. I coded it up, gave it a try, and found it to be too good. Without his feedback and patience, this feature wouldn't be as good as it is. Thank you, @Wellingtoncrab! And, of note, @Wellingtoncrab hasn't been able to try it in game yet, because I'm using Linux and can't compile a Windows build for him. So, if this feature isn't good, that's my fault. Code Patch I'll post the code patch in another post below this one so that folks who compile TDM themselves can give this proposal a try in game. And, if you do, I look forward to your feedback! Player Complaints TTLG (2023-01-10) Player 1: TDM Forums (2021-03-13) Player 2: Player 3: TDM Forums (2023-06-17) Player 4: TDM Discord (2021-05-18) Player 5: TDM Discord (2023-02-14) Player 6: Player 7: Player 8:

The Black Mage ============================================================= Title: The Black Mage Filename: black_mage.pk4 Authors: Grayman, Jack Farmer Testers: datiswous, joebarnin, Shadow, Amadeus, madtaffer, wesp5 Release date: 24.12.2021 (version 1) - 05.03.2022 (version 2) - 23.12.2023 (version 3) Version: 3 (available via in game downloader) ============================================================= Grayman - Mapping, scripting & text for briefing video JackFarmer - Additional mapping & scripting, drafts for readables, conversations and in game comments Amadeus - Revision & editing of all readables, conversations and in game comments Dragofer, joebarnin, datiswous - Troubleshooting ============================================================= Voice Talents (in alphabetical order): AndrosTheOxen - Worried father / Counsel Lester Morlan (fincancial advisor to the lord) Bikerdude - Sami "Sausage" McNulty (the castle's chef) BoyLag - Percy Lockhard (the castle's chronicler) Goldchocobo - Robert (the son of the worried father) / Colton (a fallen Builder) Jedi_Wannabe - Friend of the worried father / Bennett (a fallen Builder) Malasdair - Lt. Godric (chief security officer) New Horizon - Lord Ewan Davenport (the Black Mage) Purgator - The Thief ============================================================= Paintings: New paintings provided by OGDA Grayman avatar painting created by Zerg Rush ============================================================= Assets: New kitchen equipment models provided by STRUNK ============================================================= Geometry: Selected cave architecture orginally created by Bikerdude & Dram for "Blackheart Manor" and later modified for "The Gatehouse" (rearranged with the orignal authors approval) ============================================================= Sound: Wind_rusting trees sound (main menu) taken from freesound.org produced by funwithsound "Madrigal" (briefing video) performed by Anthony Holborne Pub audience sound (briefing video) taken from freesound.org produced by yap-audio-production Footsteps sound (briefing video) taken from freesound.org produced by Nox_Sound Stand up from chair sound (briefing video) taken from freesound.org produced by kupp2 Tape-deck-startup sound (phonogram recording) taken from freesound.org produced by soundjoao Short metal scrape sound (phonogram recording) taken from freesound.org produced by Timbre Chains sound (phonogram recording) taken from freesound.org produced by arnaud-coutancier All other new ambient and sound fx recorded and produced by JackFarmer sometimes with altered sound effects/ambient sounds orginally produced by Gigagooga ============================================================= Video: Story board and sound arrangement by JackFarmer Briefing video produced by SirSmokeALot ============================================================= Known bugs: If you quicksave too soon after killing a fire elemental (within 4-5 seconds), the quickload crashes. (2.09 and 2.10) ============================================================= Production notes: Graymans's son gave this work in progress to the Dark Mod community according to grayman's will in June 2021. After discussions with Dragofer, I overtook this mission in June 2021 and started working on it in September 2021. Since I didn't know what else Grayman had planned, I made up my own story from the end of the briefing. The voice actors did an incredible job. Everyone I asked immediately agreed to complete this work of Grayman. This has now led to a fabulous eight voice actors taking part in this mission - from England, Ireland, Canada and the USA. ============================================================== Let's raise our glasses in Grayman's honor. Otherwise I wish you all happy holidays. Take care of yourself, your loved ones, and all of your friends.

I would like to recommend adding "Warning: Skin names cannot start with numbers, as it will cause models to appear black in-game."

I couldn't help thinking of another realism related suggestion, don't know if it was discussed before but it seemed like an interesting idea. If this were to be changed on existing lights by default, it would have minor gameplay implications, but the sort that make missions easier in a fair way. So... electric lights: Like the real ones of the era, they're implied to use incandescent light bulbs... the kind that in reality will explore and shatter upon the smallest impact, and which like real lamps are encased in glass or paper. In any realistic scenario, shooting a broadhead arrow at a lamp or even throwing a rock at it would cause it to go through the glass and break the light bulb inside. Is it wrong to imagine TDM emulating this behavior as a gameplay mechanic? Just as you can shoot water arrows at flame based lights to put them out, you'd shoot broadhead arrows at electric lights to disable them... you must however hit the glass precisely, there's no room for error and it must be a perfect shot. As a way to compensate for the benefit, AI can treat this as suspicious and become alert if seeing or hearing a lamp break, or finding a broken lamp at any time if that's deemed to provide better balance. A technical look at implementing this: Just as broadhead arrows can go and stick through small soft objects such as books, they should do the same if you hit the glass material on a lamp, while of course still bouncing off if you hit metal: Lamp glass would need a special material flag that sends a signal to the entity upon collisions but allows arrows to go through, unlike glass in other parts of the world which is meant to act as solid and changing that everywhere would break a lot of things. When pierced by an arrow, the lamp should immediately turn itself off while playing a broken glass sound and spawning a few glass particles. The glass material should be hidden if the model is a transparent surface, or replaced with a broken glass texture in case the glass is painted on a lamp model without an interior... obviously this would be done by defining a broken skin for the entity to switch to. This does imply a few complexities which should be manageable: Existing lamps supporting this behavior will need new skins and in a few cases new textures, the def must include a new skin variable similar to the lit / unlit skins in this case a broken skin. Any electric light may be connected to a light switch, we don't want toggling the switch to bring the light bulb back to life... as such a flag to permanently disable triggering the light from that point on would be required. For special purposes such as scripted events to reset the world, we should allow an event to unbreak lamps, setting their state back to being lit / unlit while re-enabling trigger toggling. What do you think about this idea and who else wants it? Would it be worth the trouble to try and implement? If so should it only be done for new lights or as a separate entity definition of existing ones, or would the change be welcome retroactively for existing missions without players and FM authors alike feeling it makes them too easy?

In this hypothetical scenario Embraces Group puts you in charge of the creative team in charge of creating a new Thief game. You don't have to do any coding or any of the complicated boring bits and what you say goes. What would the games plot be? Would it be a sequel? prequel? reboot or maybe something else? What new features would be in the game that we haven't seen before in Thief or The Dark Mod? Can't think of any more question right now but I'm sure you'll have your own interesting ideas beyond anything I've asked.

My new mission, A Night in Altham, is available. We are already up to version 2! @Dave the Tafferfound an problem that deserves a fix, so here is version 2: https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/y4r1dmziuq6clh2im3qz1/altham2.pk4?rlkey=m3cv5v6v70lxbc9xha61nuxoj&dl=1. I will ask @nbohr1more to update the databases. Thanks to JackFarmer (alpha testing and custom ambient music) and the many beta testers (jaxa, Shadow, wesp5, Cambridge Spy, thebigh, datiswous, Mezla, MirceaKitsune, Melchior, Acolytesix, TheUnbeholden, prjames, Bergante). Thanks to @peter_spy for his beautiful Builder Compound assets. This is a large mission, so be ready to take some time. I recommend that you do named saves occasionally (I actually implemented auto-saves for this mission, but it was causing crashes on Linux, so I removed it). This mission has a lot of keys, so it implements a key management mechanism. Keys are removed from the game when no longer needed. This includes when you use a key to open a door, or if you pick a door/lock that also uses a key. Most keys are automatically removed, but there are a couple that aren't (for example, if they open up more than one door). In a certain area, this mission uses the Keyhole Peek feature of TDM. Typically, this is when you lean forward (F key) into a door keyhole and you can see into the next room. But in this case you don't lean into a keyhole. It's a hole of another kind. It's an unconventional use of something that isn't used a lot in TDM; hopefully the mission context will make it clear when to use it. The mission does not use Keyhole Peek for regular doors. Be aware, there is a known problem on Linux, where the peek feature can cause a crash. Peeking is not required for mission completion. This has been tested on TDM 2.11a and the current dev build of 2.12 (dev16854-10518). Scary things warning: Difficulty settings make a difference. Things that are affected by the difficulty level: Enjoy!

Well, I don't know about adding new difficulties, that seems like a lot of work. A hack way of getting the same effect, and which I use, is to create a simple .cfg file with the required changes and then execute it in-game (e.g. a text file called brutal.cfg then, in-game "exec brutal"). You could redefine the modifiers for, say, the hardcore difficulty, which are usually tdm_ai_hearing_hardcore "1.5" & tdm_ai_vision_hardcore "1.005" to something higher, although I don't know if they are capped or how to interpret those values. There are other cvars that might be useful, but I have never tried them. tdm_ai_sndvol seems useful. You'd have to test the changes in-game, probably in the Sound & Blackjacking map. For this, there are some very useful commands to see the sound direction, propagation, and values, but I can't remember them right now. There's an important caveat here, and why messing around with this stuff should be done at your own risk. I have found that some cvars go back to their default values as soon as you load or die, while others seem to stick around. Modifiers to the player's height (like pm_normalviewheight), revert to default if you load, but modifiers to the player's speed (pm_walkspeed) don't. And I know this because I have a .cfg file named halfling.cfg, and you can imagine what it does. To avoid this, I have a "default" cfg to restore the game to the normal values if (or when) something goes wrong (it's basically a copy of the Darkmod.cfg, but with a different name, and I only use it for this purpose.)

I wonder about the alternative models for the arrows. Have they been used in other missions too already? I really like them, maybe I could extract them to my directory to use them in general for the game?

After playing various Dark Mod FM’s, I become hooked to the game, like I was with Thief (and its FM’s). So, like I do to all games I love, I tried to find ways to improve it. Since my first contact with DM and after playing T1 and T2 with the fantastic “HD Mod”, it became apparent that graphically, TDM struck me strange. Of course, it is clearly a BIG improvement over T3 and it’s not worse then Thief 2014 -- if you remove all those post processing effects, the textures are actually very bad for today standards – but it could be a little bit better. So I started to change a texture here, a texture there, whenever I found a texture that could be improved. Initially, I made this for my own amusement, while i was playing, but as the changes increased, I started to think I it would only be fair to share it with the community. As a note, I really appreciate the amount of work done by the contributors to TDM. It’s amazing how an open source project of a game whose genre is unfortunately condemned to target a niche player base could attract so many talented people to work together and create what essentially is the Thief 4 we never had. So this is in no way a mean to disrespect the contributors and their work. What changed and how Currently, around 530 files were changed. The changes end up in one of the following categories: NOTE: “texture quality” noted below is subjective and represents only my point of view. Again, It is in no way a mean of disrespect for the original author and its work. The texture is good but is in a low resolution – upscale it using AI image enhancement methods. The texture is poor and low res, with poor AI upscale results – try to replace it using various free PBR or raw Image sources (1) or create my own. If necessary, adjust the image using (colors, saturation, contrast, …) The texture has a good resolution and its not quite good but can be improved – improve using gimp (ex: on textures with bur, use sharpen, noise reduction or/and other features) (2) The texture depicts an horrible stew – change it to a decent and delicious stew, because my Portuguese roots forced me to do it. Additionally, specular and normal maps were added to some textures. (1) Free textures and PBR sites already discussed on this forum (texturehaven.com, 3dtextures.me, cc0textures.com and so on). (2) Finding the right texture is not always easy. I always tried to follow the same “feel” and appearance of the original image, but i confess that this is not always the case. Again, very subjective. New version 2021.01.08 * Around 170Mb of textures processed Some tree barks enhanced Stucco change more enhancements on doors, paint paper, fire places, ground textures, curtains .. and much more Screenshots and Comparisons It’s obviously undoable to show the comparison for all changed textures, so keep in mind that the following screenshots are just a very small example of the whole project. Also, very important, keep in mind that there is so much you can do with screenshots and in game the differences are much more clear than what is shown below. Sir Talbot's Collateral https://imgsli.com/MTI2NDE https://imgsli.com/MTI2MzY https://imgsli.com/MTI2Mzc https://imgsli.com/MTI2Mzg https://imgsli.com/MTI2Mzk https://imgsli.com/MTI2NDA WS3: Cleighmoor https://imgsli.com/MTI1OTE WS1: In the North https://imgsli.com/MTI2MTY https://imgsli.com/MTI2MTc WS2: Home Again https://imgsli.com/MTI2MjM https://imgsli.com/MTI2MjQ https://imgsli.com/MTI2Mjc https://imgsli.com/MTI2Mjg https://imgsli.com/MTI2Mjk https://imgsli.com/MTI2MzE https://imgsli.com/MTI2MzM New (version 2021.01.08) Briarwood Manor https://imgsli.com/MzUwNDY https://imgsli.com/MzUwNDg https://imgsli.com/MzUwNTE https://imgsli.com/MzUwNjc The Builder's Influence https://imgsli.com/MzUxNjM https://imgsli.com/MzUxNjQ No honor among thieves: forest https://imgsli.com/MzU0ODE https://imgsli.com/MzU1NTQ https://imgsli.com/MzU1NTk How to install 1) download the pk4 file from here 2) drop it on your TDM game folder (where all the other pk4 files are) 3) Play! Uninstall Just remove z_TDM_HD.pk4 file from your TDM install folder. Disclaimer If you are a purist, please don’t use this texture mod. Don’t bash it for not being “exactly the same as the original ones but hires”. If you find some texture that is copyrighted, please let me know and i will replace it. Fell free to suggest changes, but please don't make requests. Understand that i am doing this while playing and if i start feeling that i'm working instead, i will probably start to loose my interest. PS: I really don't know if this is the right thread to make this post. Let me know if i need to change it to another thread.

yeah the empty room took me by surprise at the end of the game(i managed to turn off the music tho). so who was jamming to the music? i managed to hop into the window of the empty room by stacking a crate. My attempt to do the long jump from the starting apartment didn't fare well...

Yeah the problem is that the entity list makes DR freeze for a couple of minutes with some extremelly large maps. During the freeze it takes over the mouse, so you can't use it in other applications. With the keyboard I can still do everything outside DR. Also I cannot copypaste text in the searchbox in the entity list. That gives an error.

The Dark Mod 15th Anniversary Contest! To celebrate our 15th year, we are holding a fan mission contest! The Dark Mod project trundles onward for it’s 15th year in a row. In that time we have improved our game engine in countless ways and have grown to over 170 missions! To celebrate our perseverance and the years of improvements to come, we are hosting a contest to mark 15 years since the 1.0 release! Now is your time to demonstrate the mission design that best exemplifies your personal style and capabilities! Please consider entering this event! Unlike most recent contests, there is no defined theme and we are simply going to score based on our standard metrics of Story, Gameplay, and Visuals with our standard weighted scoring: Max Possible = Total Votes * 5 (Outstanding) TotalMaxPointsPoss (TMP) = AllCategoryVotecount(ACV) * 30 Full Weighted Score (FWS) = (Gameplay score*3 + Visual score*2 + Story score) / TMP Contest Submissions should be provided before October 16th so that players can start playing and celebrating on the 17th! The players have been keen to relay that they would like really creative missions so it may be worthwhile to examine our “Community Unusual Contest” to get an idea about the wild range of possibilities we offer to designers. Also, since the contest submission is in October, there will probably be an increased desire for Horror themes. The Dark Mod 2.12 was just released so including new 2.12 features is strongly encouraged. Finally, it might be nice if authors name their protagonist Corbin to match the included missions. ( None of the above suggestions are requirements for the submissions. ) Please post your intention to enter in this thread. Thank you! The Poll on this is to demonstrate the intended design used in the mission release threads.

I've been involved in the TDM community now since before we had a game, since way back when we were arguing over lock picking methods lol Finally, I'm finished with Briarwood Manor - my first Fan Mission for The Dark Mod. I've been hatching this for a year so I'm wrapped it's finally done. Briarwood Manor Crowind - made the Briefing for the mission: This is the HD version. Briarwood Manor is a old manor house built and added on to over the years which gives it it's design. The family part is the original home, and two other parts were added on later. Inspiration came from an image in the TDM Editors Inspiration thread. Available through in-game downloader. - available also in the link below. Update Version 1.93 - Fixed a few issues that surfaced, and added a sign to the Armory because people were missing it and thinking the mission was very thin on resources. Remaining Issue: - DO NOT BE SEEN BY THE STEWARD AT ALL! Update Version 1.91 - Removed an erroneous LARGE file that had accidently been in the mission blow the mission size up dramatically other assorted bugs fixed that were pointed out by the Community. Thank you Also replaced the missing script file that controlled the Drop Key which I accidently deleted. LOL Update Version 1.9 - Fixed a bug caused by roof projecting into the sleeping maids room upstairs. Update Version 1.81 - Fixed a bug caused by a faulty newspaper readable that I couldn't fix, so I converted it to a static model that is no longer frobbable. Update Version 1.8 - Fixed a problem with a patch that somehow got misaligned in the previous version of the level creating a ceiling shadow. Update Version 1.7 - Fixed some brush splitting, and a problem with the stairs. Also fixed a readable problem, and a few other minor problems. Added little more detail around the woodshed. Update Version 1.6 - Fixed problem with Crowleys Diary, and a screwed up shadow in the old well. Update: Version 1.5 - Resolved the problems with the Steward and the Dropkey. They should never be a problem again. Unless you decide to hit him, then you are going to break him from his route lol. Fix an sound issue, and fixed a problem where the player could get into places he shouldn't until the right time. lol Improved the performance for the garden area. It should be playable for low end PC's now. If you get stutter issues, drop your video settings, especially the LOD setting. With LOD set to Very Low, Fog will be gone, and detail will be dropped a lot at a distance. The higher you raise your LOD the more you get. ie at LOW LOD Fog comes back. Experiment so you get a setting your PC is happy with. You can use the console command com_showfps 1 to see what FPS you are getting. 30 and above are acceptable. Enjoy. Update: Version 1.4 - Resolved (partially the drop key issue - save before you go into Stewards room, fixed many other minor problems picked up by Abusimplea. Added a new room, made the map a bit more open, solved some of the difficulty issues people had. The map should now be ghostable. I hope. Should be added to the in game downloader within a day or so depending. https://drive.google.com/file/d/1I_-ZJDGUtK7P4-b5zsGsEcYAH0vYdgnw/view?usp=sharing If you download from this link, top right arrow pointing down, is how you download it. Click it. A few things to note: 1+ Hour of gameplay - Easy Difficulty is intended for new players. Hard/Expert for most of the TDM Community. This is a challenging map for new players. Use your tools Features a custom intro (above) and a few custom sounds, and some voice acting. Warning: This mission is not for low end PC's. The house is fine, but the garden will make lower end PC's grind. The map has been made sensitive to LOD settings. So if it's grinding you're PC drop you're LOD settings for it, then you can return them to normal once you've finished. On my Medium PC gtx 760 with Normal LOD I get 30 to 60 fps in the garden. I upgraded to GTX 1070 and get pretty good 60 fps in the garden. Briefing Video made by Crowind and I can't thank him enough. He did an amazing job of this. I was so lucky to have him do this. Cast: Voice Actors (Intro) : 1St Merchant: Crowind, 2nd Merchant: Mykel19XX Corbin: Goldwell Voice Actors (Mission): Corbin played by Goldwell, Morgan Crowley played by V-Man, Giles MacCadie (Steward) played by myself Thank you to my Beta Testers: Cambridge Spy, OldJim, V-Man, Jaxa, duzenko and Bikerdude. Cambridge Spy and OldJim did most of the hard grind in finding problems, so thank you both so much. If you are stuck or need help, fastest way to reach me is message me on my youtube channel (link bottom of this post). Use the resources you were given and you should have no problems. Otherwise post spoiler free in this thread. TIP: Don't be seen by the Steward, or he might glitch out. Credits: Crowind put my briefing text into a more thiefy style for Goldwell to voice. He also helped with refining the trailer for the mission. Bikerdude (did the coal door for me and let me use his moonbeam method) and sorted the performance side of things out and thereby taught me how to do performance., grayman for providing a script to handle the drop key (Abuseinplea for fixing it from bouncing) and grayman for solving some conversation problems. EHR+ or showing me how to do the double secret door and Fidcal for his Fidcal's A-Z tutorial for Dark Radiant. Without this starting point I would not have started. Changes 1.2 to 1.93 - Added a second way to get into the building - Dining Room and Parlour doors now pickable, to make it bit less linear - Electric Light in Lobby dropped it's luminosity from 240 to 220 Little bit darker. - Door on the landing (catwalk) is now unlocked - Spider no longer walks down to the ladder, or clips into the floor. - Opened up the level more so you can choose more how you want to tackle it; except for family rooms (top of stairs) - Fixed a graphical bug with the back stairs caused by TDM upgrading to 2.06 - Added some plants around bottom of garden wall alongside cart. I don't like seeing planes meeting. lol - Made some changes to the fog in the garden. - Fixed a problem with the newspaper that was allowing the no frobbing bug to occur. Enjoy Neon PS: Why does TAB key no longer tab? It drops to the bottom of the page. I have to say I hate this editor.

When talking about a possible libre version of TDM (https://forums.thedarkmod.com/index.php?/topic/22346-libre-version-of-tdm/) it seems we believe all media/gamedata included in TDM is licensed CC-BY-NC-SA. I am not familiar with how the process of adding new media/gamedata works today; I have seen files uploaded to the bugtracker which developers then commit to SVN, but I don't know if there are other ways. It may be a good idea to implement a process that when new components (media/gamedata included in TDM) are added, the contributor is asked to be explicit about the license (a choice which may defaults to their previous preference, for usability). It won't fix the past, but it may help in the future. This will make it easy for contributors to add future data under a more permissive license if they choose. Libre media can be added and its license can be tracked, rather than assumed to be CC-BY-NC-SA. I suggest looking at how Wikimedia Commons has implemented this: the contributor state the source and license at the time the data is uploaded. This can be done either by providing urls or by saying "It's my work and I choose this licsense". The first step could be to add a way to keep track of each filepath in SVN, author, license, sources. Start by setting the value for each file's license to "(default/legacy CC-BY-NC-SA)". Possible implementations for a user interface for new additions are: * Use our own wiki, which runs Mediawiki (same as Wikimedia Commons). I see several benefits of this, but we also need a way to accept uploads of batches, not just single files. * Look at how other open source projects have solved this. There may be more appropriate solutions available. ... but I'll leave the implementation open. Suggestions are very welcome! If the author of each file already in SVN can be tracked, then it may be possible that the author is willing to give a blanket permission for all their past files in one statement, and all their files in SVN can be updated in one commit. A productive contributor willing to release some of their work under a more permissive license could make a big change. If Dark Radiant would support letting mappers search media/gamedata by license (does it already?), it would make it easier for mappers to create a completely libre mission, which would help facilitate a TDM-libre release. If I understand things correctly. This post does not address all details and it may contain misunderstandings or assumptions, but it's a start. Also relevant: * Is there a compiled and maintained list of recommended or deprecated resources for mappers to use? * https://forums.thedarkmod.com/index.php?/topic/20311-external-art-assets-licensing/

Yes, I would like to find out what the issue is even if the ultimate decision is to use a different library in future. So far I have established that this line in Game.cpp is apparently working (no exception is thrown): // Import the game file into the registry GlobalRegistry().import(fullPath, "", Registry::treeStandard); but this (and any subsequent attempt to getKeyValue) then fails: // Get the engine path _enginePath = getKeyValue(enginePath); I can only think of two hypotheses: It's a timing issue or race condition: the import call is returning but something in libxml2 has not "finalised" the tree so it isn't ready to do XPath queries yet. I don't think there is any asynchronous or threaded code in the libxml2 API but who knows. There's something different about how XPath queries need to be formatted after merging. E.g. perhaps "//game" no longer works, and it has to have some other prefix. Further debugging is therefore needed. Edit: OK, there's definitely something weird going on with encodings. Adding a Registry::dump call into the Game constructor gives me output like this: output error : string is not in UTF-8 output error : string is not in UTF-8 eCrosshairs" ="mU" ���mU="SHIFT"/>< ="ToggleGrid" ="(&#xB3;R"/>< ="ToggleView" ="U" ���mU="SHIFT+CONTROL"/>< ="NextView" ="" ���mU="CONTROL"/>< ="ZoomIn" ="Delete"/>< ="ZoomOut" ="Insert"/>< ="CenterXYViews" ="" ���mU="CONTROL+SHIFT"/>< ="CenterXYView" ="" ���mU="CONTROL+ALT"/>< ="ToggleCubicClip" ="" ���mU="SHIFT"/>< ="ToggleCamera" ="U" ���mU="SHIFT+CONTROL"/>< ="TogTexLock" ="" ���mU="SHIFT"/>< ="DragVertices" ="U"/>< ="DragEdges" =""/>< ="DragFaces" =""/>< ="ToggleSelectionFocus" ="" ���mU="CONTROL"/>< ="ThickenPatchDialog" ="" ���mU="CONTROL"/>< ="ToggleShowAllLightRadii" ="" ���mU="CONTROL+SHIFT+ALT"/>< ="ToggleClipper" ="mU"/>< ="MouseTranslate" =""/>< ="MouseRotate" =""/>< ="MouseDrag" =""/>< ="NewOrthoView" ="" ���mU="CONTROL+ALT"/>< ="SetGrid0.125" ="" ���mU=""/>< ="SetGrid0.25" ="" ���mU=""/>< ="SetGrid0.5" ="" ���mU=""/>< ="SetGrid1" ="" ���mU=""/>< ="SetGrid2" ="U" ���mU=""/>< ="SetGrid4" ="" ���mU=""/>< ="SetGrid8" ="" ���mU=""/>< ="SetGrid16" ="" ���mU=""/>< ="SetGrid32" ="" ���mU=""/>< ="SetGrid64" ="" ���mU=""/>< ="SetGrid128" ="" ���mU=""/>< ="SetGrid256" ="" ���mU=""/>< ="ToggleTextureTool" ="" ���mU="CONTROL+ALT"/>< ="ToggleMainControl_TextureTool" ="" ���mU="CONTROL+ALT+SHIFT"/>< ="NormaliseTexture" ="" ���mU=""/>< ="TexToolGridUp" ="plus" ���mU="SHIFT"/>< ="TexToolGridDown" ="minus" ���mU="SHIFT"/>< ="TexToolMergeItems" ="" ���mU="Y&#x11D;mU"/>< ="GroupCycleBackward" ="ISO_Left_Tab" ���mU="SHIFT"/>< ="GroupCycleForward" ="" ���mU=""/>< ="RevertToWorldspawn" ="" ���mU="SHIFT"/>< ="SavePosition1" ="" ���mU="CONTROL+ALT"/>< ="SavePosition10" ="(&#xB3;R" ���mU="CONTROL+ALT"/>< ="SavePosition2" ="U" ���mU="CONTROL+ALT"/>< ="SavePosition3" ="" ���mU="CONTROL+ALT"/>< ="SavePosition4" ="" ���mU="CONTROL+ALT"/>< ="SavePosition5" ="" ���mU="CONTROL+ALT"/>< ="SavePosition6" ="" ���mU="CONTROL+ALT"/>< ="SavePosition7" ="" ���mU="CONTROL+ALT"/>< ="SavePosition8" ="" ���mU="CONTROL+ALT"/>< ="SavePosition9" ="" ���mU="CONTROL+ALT"/>< ="LoadPosition1" ="" ���mU="Y&#x11D;mU"/>< ="LoadPosition10" ="(&#xB3;R" ���mU="Y&#x11D;mU"/>< ="LoadPosition2" ="U" ���mU="Y&#x11D;mU"/>< ="LoadPosition3" ="" ���mU="Y&#x11D;mU"/>< ="LoadPosition4" ="" ���mU="Y&#x11D;mU"/>< ="LoadPosition5" ="" ���mU="Y&#x11D;mU"/>< ="LoadPosition6" ="" ���mU="Y&#x11D;mU"/>< ="LoadPosition7" ="" ���mU="Y&#x11D;mU"/>< ="LoadPosition8" ="" ���mU="Y&#x11D;mU"/>< ="LoadPosition9" ="" ���mU="Y&#x11D;mU"/>< ="ToggleOrthoBackgroundPanel" ="U" ���mU="Y&#x11D;mU"/>< ="ToggleRotationPivot" ="" ���mU="CONTROL"/>< ="ToggleAasVisualisationPanel" ="" ���mU="CONTROL+SHIFT"/>< ="GroupSelected" ="" ���mU="CONTROL+SHIFT"/>< ="UngroupSelected" ="" ���mU="CONTROL+SHIFT"/></mU><> Whereas with xmlParseFile there are no weird characters and the output just looks like properly formatted XML. I wonder if we have some nonstandard characters in our XML files for some reason.

Yeah it would be cool to see some more detailed statistics and it’s a shame they aren’t really captured. Since we are talking about fan mission platforms, where players also make the content for the game, I feel like the best thing we’ve got is you can look at the number of content releases for the games. Keep in mind the graph counts campaigns as single missions - so for example NHAT and TBP both count as 1 mission. A good year for TDM has has approaching maybe 50% - mostly we’re 25-30%. https://www.ttlg.com/forums/showthread.php?t=152494 You could also look at the number of ratings thief missions get on https://www.thiefguild.com/ vs TDM ones, but that is pretty iffy in that you could chalk that up to more awareness of the site in the thief community than TDM Out of curiosity is there a reason a thief player can’t be a new player? I kind of think a player is a player and new players would be ones who are playing the dark mod who weren't? Is there disagreement the base of players most likely to pick up the game are fans of the thief games? They are certainly the most fruitful place to find feedback on the game beyond the sphere of this forum that I have seen. When we were trying to finish up SLL there was a lot of discussion on the forums about how long it had been since there was a release for the game. I am thankful that the stats show at least some stability over the years in terms of releases for TDM, but the trend for all of the games is decline. Not doing anything is a valid response if that’s what the devs want to do - it is not possible to provide evidence that any effort will slow that inertia. As a player and content maker I would just prefer trying to find feedback where it is offered from players who were willing to try the game but ultimately could not engage with it and see if there is anything that can be done within reason to ease them into the game. The game has a lot to offer imo. All those players are potential contributors - contributions in turn attract players - it’d be nice to see the cycle go on as long as it can.

"I am Matthias, a Postulant in training for the Order of the Builder. I have been on a pilgrimage for over a year now and have finally arrived at the end of my journey." Build Time: - About 3 months for version 1, but we are now upto version 1.3 Mapping Team: Evilartist - for letting me convert his D3 map, top man!Bikerdude - map conversion, mapping, textures, sounds.Goldchocobo - mapping, traps, puzzles and sounds.AluminumHaste - textures and general testing.Grayman - scripting of the mirror puzzle.Obstortte - scripting and textures.Mortem Desino - scripting.Thanks:- - Beta testers: Goldwell, nbhormore, Aluminiumhaste, Nbohr1more, Moonbo, SirTaffsalot, Airship Ballet, Snobel, Xarg, MacD11, Oldjim, Cookie and anyone else who i missed of the list. Download:- - The latest version is now available via the in-game downloader. Info: The latest version is now available via the in-game downloader.The mission is fully l10n ready. (thanks Tels)Known issues: This mission will have less than optimal fps at some locations.For very low end PCs I recommend the following settings: V-sync is off, AA is off, Aniso is 4x or lower, advanced settings are simple/default & Post processing of disabled and as a last resort the command line arg ' r_skipFogLights 1 ' (turns off the fog)

It took awhile to get used to the size of this mission. The long loading times didn't help, but after passing a certain point, I get it now. However, I will say this - the AI is crazy on this map. I started, right? And the first thing I see - all guards going ape because some thug cut loose. I sat in the dark corner, for like ten minutes, waiting for them to calm down, because I figured I should look around for loot (I only found some of it much later when I was returning here after finishing the mission) The same thing happened later, when I needed to pass an abandoned mansion. I waited for the epic battle, instead it was a massacre, but like an idiot I saved AFTER I left the tunnel, not before. So I couldn't reload and see if next time the battle will go differently. (Am I crazy or do leather thugs spawn after a moment?) I had to use up all gas arrows to pass that part because they kept trimming the bushes. The evidence part got me confused because I dropped a piece of evidence, but it didn't count, so I dropped everything that said evidence. Only then it counted, but later, as I was still hunting for loot, I finally remembered that I had a vent key and came looking and found yet another piece of evidence?! Finding Smythe was funny, because he kept saying "Show yourself" and the moment I did... I gathered skulls before I was prompted to, but Edgar... I don't get it. edit: Those glasses, tho. Holy crap, I did not expect to see "actual glass" in this game. The hidden room took me ages to find, despite TWO blatant hints. But I was sleep-deprived at the time. There was one snag, and one confusion that I had. The snag was that, when I finally reached the alchemist, the note told me to use the vent, right? But... I couldn't open the second vent in his lab. I don't know which key I was missing for that. So I figured - I could just go back the same way... and game CTD. I walked there again - CTD. I noclipped through that locked vent, killed the spiders, and tried to open the doors to my left (got spooked by friendly guards) - CTD. Only when I walked right and up the stairs did I finally progressed. Not sure what that was about. The confusion, however, came from Builders. I knocked out most of them in the Builder's outpost, but when I dealt with the Mr. Nom-nom-zom, they vanished. I guess they needed that many people to dig him out of the spider outhouse? (Never found the second news flash either) I still somehow missed 3.5k, and noticed that lights kept poking through walls (there is a piece of light pointed at doors leading into the inner garden of Builder's outpost that nearly got me killed a few times) Overall, however, this was an impressive piece of work.

EDIT - You can find a working external script with instructions in this post ---------------------------------------------------------------- Hi! First post in this forum. Greetings to all. I am a long time fan of T1 & T2 and I recently stumbled upon The Dark Mod while looking for some T2 Fan Missions and I immediately fell in love with it. Here goes a heartfelt thanks to the developers for having created this masterpiece and my recognition and appreciation to the TDM content creators and artists. Thanks. Back on topic. A couple of weeks ago I started playing Splinter Cell Chaos Theory. The game makes use of the mouse wheel to increase and decrease the speed of the character and while it took a couple of missions to get used to it, it felt natural from that point on. So much so that after beating the game and launching TDM again my first thought was: this game mechanic should be a must in the stealth genre. You can see it in action in the first minute of this video: I understand chances are this new mechanic cannot be implemented in TDM right away: we are currently limited by the 3 existing speeds / levels of sound (correct me if I am wrong) but regardless, if the development Team would allow us to use the mouse wheel to switch between creep, walk & run it would be a step forward in the right direction, in my humble opinion. Cheers!