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It'd probably be about as difficult as an expert mission in our single player campaign. That is, robbing a large mansion would take a few hours, you couldn't save, and you'd probably get caught and killed. Players that own property could choose the placement of their guards, so there'd be less secret ungarded entrances to choose from. Guard placement in Thief missions are designed so that people can break in. If players placed guards with the purpose of making sure no one broke in it'd be much harder. You might need to pair up with another thief; one to distract the guards and draw them away while the other sneaks past to steal the loot. Also, much of the player's loot would be invested in the building itself, which couldn't be picked up and stolen, so it would be impossible to completely bankrupt a player with a mass raid.

That's why I'm looking forward to STALKER. I don't know if they went back on this promise or not, but supposedly there will be AI's trying to do the same quests/missions that you are able to do. (this probably doesn't apply to the main storyline quests, but still it's pretty cool that if you sit on your ass the AI will get hired to do your job and you'll be out of luck )

that's not what i mean at all. i just don't want to feel like everything is just happening for my sake (ie nothing much is happening that i haven't triggered). give me npcs that have a job, have likes and dislikes, friends and enemies, get hungry, get thirsty, get tired etc. give me animals that go hunting, eat and sleep and possibly procreate. give them all a group AI that reacts to certain events and changes their behaviour. i want the illusion of a living, breathing world that actually reacts to things i do (or other npcs/animals do) like you would expect. you still need plot-strings and drama of course (ie missions) but those things aren't mutually exclusive. kind regards gleeful

I can see both sides of this issue. On the one hand, I agree with Odd that there is really no good reason to including things like invisibility potions, other than the argument that "it was in Thief". Thief did have blemishes though, and we shouldn't feel obligated to reproduce everything in the game. In fact, we've already made plenty of improvements. On the other hand, I can see the argument that we are trying to capture the same stealth experience that was in the Thief games, and we want to appeal to the fans of that game, who come with a preconceived set of expectations. I guess it comes down to whether or not the issue in question is critical to the "Thief experience". Water arrows and flashbombs are an intregal part of that experience, where invisibility potions and craymen may not be. Obviously it's a very subject thing, however, so that's where we're running into disagreements. edit: back to the bandages...there's no reason we couldn't include both...we already have multiple means of healing (potions and food), so we could always include bandages as an inventory item similar to food, that heals two or three points of health after use. FM authors who are anti-magic (or just tough) can leave the potions out of their missions and rely on bandages only.

You generally have to do this anyway. Parts that require breath potions have to be really special bits, like a once only thing, like for a major goal, that allows you to get back and forth another way once you do it the first time, or a special but unnessecary secret. All other water areas have strategically placed air pockets. The good missions place them in "realistic" ways and positions, which means you have to make several half hearted attempts as you go back and forth making sure you can see an airpocket coming up before you reach your halfway point and commit to the rest of the journey.

I never used a forum before so please forgive my lack of edict ... is this the correct place... Can the dromed darkloader and other such tools be integrated into a DARK MOD STARTSMART that direct you to either one tool or another. Not having to hunt for one tool to view 3d models and one to pack you missions would be great. Having the FM mission loader, game dromed(like) reskining tools, and all other cool Tools all integrated into a single package so you can: build levels play others levels, and do all that funky FM making you and I love to do. Or are the tools all going to be loose separate little programs. could there be at least a shell that runs several plugin programs. with help integrated some

Well, whatever you say Spring We all go for the old "hold the arrow with a finger" while knocking it, and after that the rest just holds it in place. You gots to make sure you don't put your fingers to close, though - otherwise you inadvertently knock it off! Anywho, like I said, from an aesthetics POV, ignoring archery coaching and so on, I do prefer the upright bow. I guess the whole shooting while crouched isn't exactly realistic, either. Having said that, we have a boxing-day shoot, with insane targets. This year, we had to shoot through a slitted wall, and the highest scoring item was completely hidden. One member knelt down and nailed it every time I guess oDD's right, though - it'll be nice to have actual campaigns, with variations from one to another. I just hope that people do make campaigns, not just single missions, though. </FishFace>

Personally, I'm all for good innovations, and a gun like a flintlock is a good innovation. Dunno if we should use it in the campaign, but we ARE creating a Toolset in which fans can create their own missions. So not including something on the basis that some people are against guns is just dumb. I am truly sick of FPS but if it's a giga slow reload flintlock, I'm all for it. Especially if it's in the design of mechanist crap. I'm with oDD on this one.

The way I'd think of doing it would be to take a low-res image from the AI's point of view, and then obtain the contrast at the edges of the thief - between him and anything behind him. If the contrast is very low, then you can lower the value for being seen, if it's high, then raise it. This should probably be factored in on top of the lightgem calculations, otherwise it'd be too difficult to actually hide anywhere. This would mean that hiding in deep shadow would afford some protection, even if you where brightly sillhouetted. Likewise, this could mean that if they are in medium brightness, then (as long as the wall behind them is of a similar colour after lighting) they get a bonus. The problem I foresee is that it will be very difficult to inform the player that, even though their lightgem is pitch black, anyone who looks at them from angle-x will see them perfectly. The other problem is that this will be darn difficult! If you think about your own sight, you can see anyone if they're in deep shadow yet sillhouetted even faintly. If this idea is taken up, it's gonna have to be tested thoroughly to make sure it's not impossible to complete any missions! Perhaps other AI things might have to be taken into account to, to balance the realism of this with other elements, e.g. moving tends to make you extremely visible IRL.

HAhah Oddity, yer the greatest! I agree with sxotty. If there were more than 1 way to accomplish missions, that'd be amazing. It would obviously require hella more work and planning, which I'm not sure is what this team needs at this stage.

I know. I'm thinking about a hallway in Thief 2's first mission I think it was. 2nd floor. Rows of doors down a hall. Very bright lights/sconces making it a bright hallways engine-wise; not candles or torches. I'm sure we can think of other parts of T2 where bright lights (not flames) were used. Having only dim candles, torches and flames can get monotonous. The lighting shouldn't always be set to a romantic mood light. In the end, this tool is for FMs. There will be missions built that incorporat bright lights.

Personally I also always liked the fantasy elements. I also like missions where the fantasy elements are not so strong and to me it doesn't really matter if I shoot out a torch with a water arrow or something else. Well, I like shooting the bow, but the water arrow doesn't feel so fanatasy while playing it. I think if a well balanced game is made which contains a "realistic" gameplay that could be quite interesting. Oddity would also probably like that, though we have different opinions on what "balanced" means.

Didn't mean to suggest any of the arrows will be removed. They'll all be there. But FM authors may choose to disallow them for their own missions, and use alternative equipment (pebbles, poison darts, etc) instead. Of course, the alternate equipment is something we probably won't be doing until after the initial release.

I was curious about how the blackjack will be implemented. In TDS you cant KO someone with a sword out while you can still do it in T2 if he doesnt see you. In other words how difficult is it to KO someone? The second question is about Garrett's body movement, I recently reinstalled TDS and replayed a couple of missions-only to discover one of the things that seemed to annoy me before, your movement seems rather sluggish and disconnected to the game world, how's it working out so far in D3?

Bahaha, aww man. You guys should not of mentioned the whole belief that saving every 5 footsteps is cheating. Now i'm gonna feel really bad when I do it. I must confess that I tend to use the quicksave key pretty often, but that's only because it's available to me. If i were forced to (or at least given the option to, at the start of the game) vaule my save points, I'd feel much better about completing the level. This is important, especially in a 1 plyr game. At the same time, you don't want it to become annoying. Balance is everything yeah? Another thing I'm wondering is how hard do you think it would be to integrate an option for co-op missions into your editor? Is that adding a whole new element of difficulty, or is it fairly straight forward?

Very nice... a new batch: 1) if u are on a higher level (say a balcony or roof), will the cpu look for u there? 2) will the cpu set traps for you, or call a massive search (forcing you to flee the area), if they are aware of your presense? if they actually spot you for 100% 3) will cpu go and find a torch if there is one nearby, and bring it to search for you? that element of gameplay from TDS always gave me a rush, cuz i knew i hadda to get the funk outta dodge when i saw the torch light coming... 4) will the cpu have any trained animals to aid them at all? ( like the big ass grey dogs in Robin Hood PRince of Theives, haha or how about the hell hounds in Willow??) 5) i think it would be nice if you created additional elements which might draw a guards attention to you, such as a few birds that flutter off when u approach them, or a dog that barks, and/or follows you. ALso, while we are discussing A.I., would it be at ALL possible to integrate NPC characters that might become involved in either helping you or fighting for you on certain missions? One thing that always slightly bothered me is that there are so many people in the game, but you dont' ever really get a chance to know any of them well enuff. I realize it makes things a little more complicated storyline wise, and technically, but would be a pretty cool addition to keep things interesting.

I'm not on the coding team, but I can give you some answers: That's very subjective. TDS's AI were actually pretty smart by computer game standards, though some bugs kept that from being obvious. We do aim to make our AI more versatile and more believable, however. Our AI are going to search intelligently, heading for good hiding spots first. They'll poke deep shadows with their weapons to see if anything is lurking there. They'll look over their shoulder once in a while. We aren't specifically supporting day/night cycles, though it is possible to do that with the D3 engine. We have talked about a time-based schedule for AI in a few of our campaign missions though. It is certainly possible.

Looks great! We can use this for dungeon and cave missions.

They might be needed for specific mansion missions but they wouldn't be considered part of the mansion theme.

Aaaa, this thread is on fire, put it out, put it out! You're right, but we're playing a game, not real life. You are entitled to your opinion, but my preference would be to have specific loot goals that are a function of the total loot in the game. I completely disagree. I think finding loot is a critical element of the game. If you took out the loot, then you've taken away most of the purpose of the game. There are missions where your goals are to just pick up some amount of loot and you aren't necessarily there for anything specific. If you took all the loot away, you'd just be wandering around in the shadows for no good reason. I have no complaint about the game having lots of difficulty settings and for people to be able to do what they want. I think IS wanted to do that in TDS, but didn't get around to it. I for one, do not like ghosting or time limits in anything more than a level or two.

This whole nonsense about 'finding the last piece of loot' is gone anyway. How would a thief know how much loot is in a building? WHat kind of thief would say to himeself 'I must get exactly 1000 loot from here or I'm not leaving even if it takes me all night and increases by chances of getting caught. Nope, even if I have 995 loot, I'm going to hang aound for the next few hours looking for another 5 gold coins. The loot objectives are the lowest priority in the thief games. There is almost always something more important to be doing on a level, the loot objectives are just tacked on at the end as filler gameplay (I'm not talking about special loot items here which you know are there and are valuble) We'll be imposing time limits for missions (on hardest anyway -if it was up to be it would be all difficulties) - that adds genuine difficulty, you no longer have thinking time, you have to act on instinct, which will really sort the thieves out from the boys. Like a real thief, you'll want to get in and out of the building as quickly as possible, not loiter around all night. Every extra second you stay increases your chances of being caught. The master taffer not only ghosts, but achives his objectives as quickly as possible. You steal what you see on your way, what you know for a fact is there, and you search the usual places people tend to keep loot, you do not systematically search every single square inch of the map incase you missed one copper penny.

Yes, if you are on the city streets the guards shoud not bother you, but the majority of missions are in mansions or other private areas or buildings, so it's obvious you shouldn't be there and the guards would be automatically antagonistic towards you.

Thanks guys. I hope you enjoy it. There are a few quirks, like when you choose a playstyle, some of the restrictions don't appear until you check your objectives ingame. Just a glitch since the custom objectives were ripped out prior to release and now they're hacked back in somewhat. For ghosting, I also had to allow for 3 bodies to be discovered as there are missions where AI could kill each other and if they discover the body it goes against you. Hopefully 3 will be enough.

rock on man, its all good. i just want to know if you guys got the bow to cock and shoot a arrow yet. or get the sword to swing. so what is your estamet on this bad boys release a year? also the editor. it would be cool to see it this summer but thats just the bear talking. its a good idea to release the editor before your story line so people can play missions made by others while waiting to play the dark mod. latz

You can make space stations and modern day street scenes for all we can do to stop you. :lol: Seriously, though, yeah, if you build it with half a brain you can get fine performance on large open-air spaces and long views with high polycounts. It's really down to how you light it, how many AI you pack in it, and how many pixels of texture you're storing in the RAM as to how it runs. But consider it like this: in the campaign we'll be making ourselves, at least one of the missions is set in a city, complete with rooftop sneaking. Even if certain things are not possible with current hardware NOW, in a year or more, they'll be much more feasible. I urge anyone to check out the videos and builds of the D3 can do it too project at www.doom3world.org (they have their own forum there). It's an interesting project, and is turning up some good stuff!