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So, what are you working on right now?


Springheel

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They say no one has ever escaped from this City Watch precinct. This is unsurprising when one considers that those who commit misdemeanors find themselves facing advanced security systems. For those whose crimes are...of a more severe nature...there is simply no chance of getting out, unless it is to meet the hangman's noose or his guillotine.

 

 

 

 

2VV17Jb.jpg

 

 

 

 

My instant reaction to that screenshot: "Niiiice..."

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Re-posting with a quick update.

 

(I was having a bizarre issue with dmap crashing when I added the central grate. Creating func_statics out of the grates didn't help, so I made them all into a single .ase model. It was this change that for some reason let dmap finish and thus allow for this screenshot.)

 

They say no one has ever escaped from this City Watch precinct. This is unsurprising when one considers that those who commit misdemeanors find themselves facing advanced security systems. For those whose crimes are...of a more severe nature...there is simply no chance of getting out, unless it is to meet the hangman's noose or his guillotine.

 

 

 

 

3geBrJV.jpg

 

 

 

Edited by Dunedain19
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I have a WIP where objective is to assainate every NPC guard servant etc. Its opyional but will provide alternate access to different locations depending whose lives you spare.

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despite these just being virtual representations, rather... depressing. They were born, lived through childhoods, have parents and other family whom they care about.

 

 

Uh...no, they don't actually have any of those things, because they're not actually people. :huh:

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I find the thought of other humans being killed, despite these just being virtual representations, rather... depressing. They were born, lived through childhoods, have parents and other family whom they care about. To end that in just the whim of a moment feels heart-wrenching.

 

Well, it's a matter of taste. There is definitely a place for death in a grim setting like TDM's. But when it comes to wholesale slaughter, then I guess my words above are the reason why I don't think much of shooter games, and yet those are wildly popular the world over.

Try to imagine your name is Rodion Raskolnikov.

 

rodion_romanovitch_raskolnikov_by_switch

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Uh...no, they don't actually have any of those things, because they're not actually people. :huh:

Why do you say that? They are fictional. But that doesn't mean that a real person can't be like that. Too many people behave stereotypically and employee cliché habits, thoughts, behaviours. One way or another it happens. Or otherwise a combination of such characters into a prototype character. Later one that after careful revision becomes a full-scale quintessence of the best traits.
It depends widely on the approach of the creation obviously, the mood, the depth of the story. But essentially when a character that can no longer be distinuished by criteria of real/fictional - means a success of the author. Granted if the audience is of the same opinion. And if that's the goal.
Edited by Anderson
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"I really perceive that vanity about which most men merely prate — the vanity of the human or temporal life. I live continually in a reverie of the future. I have no faith in human perfectibility. I think that human exertion will have no appreciable effect upon humanity. Man is now only more active — not more happy — nor more wise, than he was 6000 years ago. The result will never vary — and to suppose that it will, is to suppose that the foregone man has lived in vain — that the foregone time is but the rudiment of the future — that the myriads who have perished have not been upon equal footing with ourselves — nor are we with our posterity. I cannot agree to lose sight of man the individual, in man the mass."...

- 2 July 1844 letter to James Russell Lowell from Edgar Allan Poe.

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Why do you say that? They are fictional. But that doesn't mean that a real person can't be like that. Too many people behave stereotypically and employee cliché habits, thoughts, behaviours. One way or another it happens. Or otherwise a combination of such characters into a prototype character. Later one that after careful revision becomes a full-scale quintessence of the best traits.

 

 

Why do I say that digital AI aren't born, don't have childhoods, and don't have families that care about them?

 

 

I assume you're looking for a more complicated answer than, "because they don't"?

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Working on something small to take a break from the big WIP. Custom particles are nice, but can only be appreciated in motion.

Magical.

 

 

Why do I say that digital AI aren't born, don't have childhoods, and don't have families that care about them?

 

 

I assume you're looking for a more complicated answer than, "because they don't"?

You have good intuition.

"I really perceive that vanity about which most men merely prate — the vanity of the human or temporal life. I live continually in a reverie of the future. I have no faith in human perfectibility. I think that human exertion will have no appreciable effect upon humanity. Man is now only more active — not more happy — nor more wise, than he was 6000 years ago. The result will never vary — and to suppose that it will, is to suppose that the foregone man has lived in vain — that the foregone time is but the rudiment of the future — that the myriads who have perished have not been upon equal footing with ourselves — nor are we with our posterity. I cannot agree to lose sight of man the individual, in man the mass."...

- 2 July 1844 letter to James Russell Lowell from Edgar Allan Poe.

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Springheel, on 07 Nov 2016 - 2:53 PM, said:snapback.png

Why do I say that digital AI aren't born, don't have childhoods, and don't have families that care about them?

 

 

I assume you're looking for a more complicated answer than, "because they don't"?

You have good intuition.

 

 

That was kind of your invitation to explain what kind of answer you're looking for. Are you disputing the point, or are you looking for something else?

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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GSFIRKKo9Ow

 

Working on something small to take a break from the big WIP. Custom particles are nice, but can only be appreciated in motion.

Looks and sounds fantastic Spooks!

 

Was this the smaller mission you were originally hoping to release before Halloween?

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That was kind of your invitation to explain what kind of answer you're looking for. Are you disputing the point, or are you looking for something else?

No intention to ask you for more of an answer than you felt answering. No disputes that I'm looking up to.

After all it's a rethorical matter. Fictional characters have fictional births, fictional childhood and fictional families. Up to everyone on their own to come up with allegories considered to be properly dignified.

"I really perceive that vanity about which most men merely prate — the vanity of the human or temporal life. I live continually in a reverie of the future. I have no faith in human perfectibility. I think that human exertion will have no appreciable effect upon humanity. Man is now only more active — not more happy — nor more wise, than he was 6000 years ago. The result will never vary — and to suppose that it will, is to suppose that the foregone man has lived in vain — that the foregone time is but the rudiment of the future — that the myriads who have perished have not been upon equal footing with ourselves — nor are we with our posterity. I cannot agree to lose sight of man the individual, in man the mass."...

- 2 July 1844 letter to James Russell Lowell from Edgar Allan Poe.

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Uh...no, they don't actually have any of those things, because they're not actually people. :huh:

They don't of course. It won't be the same as actually mowing down pedestrians with a machine gun in real life like a GTA character - we have our conscious minds to detach the virtual from reality. But it's a tasteless way of entertaining because of what it represents.

 

My excuses Deadlove, this is just my own opinion on a certain approach to media entertainment.

 

 

Working on something small to take a break from the big WIP. Custom particles are nice, but can only be appreciated in motion.

Outstanding creation, these colour palettes in the lighting are a real trademark of yours.

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Looks and sounds fantastic Spooks!

 

Was this the smaller mission you were originally hoping to release before Halloween?

 

Considering I started working on it on Halloween day, I don't think there was much hope in that :laugh: but yes, more or less. I was tossing some ideas around before then but now I have a bit more impetus with a nice story I came up with (which I'm already thinking of changing but oh well, what's important is that mapping's getting done!).

Edited by Spooks
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My FMs: The King of Diamonds (2016) | Visit my Mapbook thread sometimes! | Read my tutorial on Image-Based Lighting Workflows for TDM!

 

 

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Working on something small to take a break from the big WIP. Custom particles are nice, but can only be appreciated in motion.

 

The clustered lamps give me the Dishonored vibe with outsider shrines and little spots like that. Definitely digging the different colored lights, I just think that makes for a much more interesting and diverse scene.

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Modeler galore & co-authors literally everything

 

 

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My take is besides servants, armed guards don't stop til you're dead. They deserve the same...I've learned taking 2-3 well placed broadheads in exposed unarmored places in elite guards followed by one good slash will take them down.

 

The stealth in TDM is difficult, so is the combat. Why not capitalize on that aspect too?

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They don't of course. It won't be the same as actually mowing down pedestrians with a machine gun in real life like a GTA character - we have our conscious minds to detach the virtual from reality. But it's a tasteless way of entertaining because of what it represents.

 

 

This is an interesting topic! I run a tabletop roleplaying games for friends and I've bumped into this "death and suffering of fictional characters" thing, too.

 

Often, the game master will want to present the players with certain kind of atmosphere or moral decisions. Some kind of decision, which is not a no-brainer, and could be done either way, but would have interesting consequences.

 

Let's take the prisoner dilemma. The players fight bad guys and down them without killing them. The players decide it is safer simply to snap their necks and proceed without any problems. The moral dilemma wasn't at all a dilemma in the end, because the players are sociopathic towards the inhabitants of the fictional world. Decision becomes a simple game term risk analysis, where less enemies is less enemies, which is better than criminal act of murdering defenceless prisoners. If you don't get caught, everything is allowed, and moral dilemmas do not actually exist. It is just entertainment.

 

But why is that? The fictional world exists for our amusement and not the other way around as it sometimes feels with real world.

 

Now, in theory, for immersion purposes, I think a TDM FM would "feel" more interesting if this "entertainment sociopathy" could be avoided. Apparently, some players have higher capacity to avoid "entertainment sociopathy," than others, and I think they are the kind that enjoy higher immersion while playing.

 

But what can the FMA do about it? What good is a sad story, if the player cannot empathically relate to the poor victim NPCs, because they are fictional and their victimization is just a plot element generated for the amusement of the player?

 

Best stories always touch emotionally, but how can you do it if the story-consumer is unempathic towards the fictional world?

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Clipper

-The mapper's best friend.

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I also played a lot of pen and paper RPG in my time and in the beginning have been an "entertainment sociopath" myself. But especially in RPGs the game master has great opportunities to show the players their consequences. This may be some small comments and rumours the players encounter later on, e.g. the players are asking the innkeeper what's new and the answer is "Haven't you heard?! The was a bunch of bandits slaughtered in cold blood. The guards are looking for the people who could do such a gruesome thing.". Or when they get captured themselves, the bandit overlord might not be as lenient with them, if he somehow learns that it was the players who killed his men (this is especially possible if the players are very open about killing some bandits for example to get celebrated by the town they helped). If they hadn't killed, he might simply spare their lives and only take their possessions. However, this example requires an ongoing story and ideally not too great deviations in locale. One thing, that makes conveying consequences in such groups difficult is, that many groups are travelling all over the land. This is one reason why I currently prefer playing in one big city, where you can have long intrigues and clearly see and feel consequences rather than do your stuff and move on no matter what happened after that.

Another time (I played a thief myself and was "earning" some money) I overheard a conversation in-game, where the people I was stealing from were talking about how they finally got enough money together to get through the winter (which they most likely didn't after I was there). All in all it is possible through small dialogues to convey to the player, that their actions might have consequences. This, however, will only work for people who care for such things.

 

For the case of TDM this might be possible through journals or conversations to make the AIs more "alive". Give them a name and use the name in said conversations/journals and the guy you just downed was not "Guard 1" but rather "Old Johnny, who will retire next week", which gives them some background and make it easier to empathise. Still, people who think "This is only a game, anyway" will not be affected by it. I agree, that the best stories reach you in more than a "this was a challenging mission" way, but I think it is very difficult to nigh impossible to touch people emotionally that just want to play the game and not think about consequences it might have for the in-game world.

At least for campaigns, you can additionally show the consequences in gameplay (which will make it less empathic,but more systematic) by, for example, increasing the number of guards, because there is a murderer on the loose. Maybe slightly increase guards on places, where there are valuables, because a thief has been spotted in the area. This, on the other hand, depends on how used to thefts and murders the City is (and I think it is quite used to it). Personally I think the City is used to "small murders" like a guy gets robbed and killed rather than a whole mansion of people guards as well as "innocent" people getting slaughtered. The "murders having consequences" was also one thing I liked about Dishonored. With higher chaos you saw the consequences with more rats/weepers. In TDM you can do the same with more or better equipped guards, or more zombies in a graveyard mission (as there are more corpses due to previous murderous behaviour), or something similar.

 

I am sorry, if this post is a bit unsorted, but I sometimes remembered something that would fit to one paragraph, that worsened the transition to the next paragraph or was more similar to some following thought than I thought...

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That sounds like ring of Gyges dilemma:

http://oregonstate.edu/instruct/phl201/modules/Philosophers/Plato/plato_dialogue_the_ring_of_gyges.html

where virtual reality is world of no consequences (save game) and almost unlimited power, even without cheat codes.

But on the topic of table top rpg I see more reasons to behave in sociopathic manner if game world have less intuitive rules of mundane life, and it shows best in so called horror settings. When player is confronted with i.e. walking skeleton in fantasy setting, he most likely will ask "-do he have sword?", but in the world where strange things (vampires, Cthulhu) are hidden behind modern society, and player exactly know what will happen in any particular situation -he will be genuinely confused by undead and try to rationalize it, fight against a very concept of such a rule braking. So "sociopathy" is in this case newbie player disease where he don't have grasp of all carefully balanced nuances in a web of relations between human beings. It is a learning curve issue and FMA have to flesh out world fast enough so player won't get bored because he don't have narrative tools to recognise surroundings.

 

 

"Old Johnny, who will retire next week"

Don't you know it is a death sentence? :)

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Let's take the prisoner dilemma. The players fight bad guys and down them without killing them. The players decide it is safer simply to snap their necks and proceed without any problems. The moral dilemma wasn't at all a dilemma in the end, because the players are sociopathic towards the inhabitants of the fictional world. Decision becomes a simple game term risk analysis, where less enemies is less enemies, which is better than criminal act of murdering defenceless prisoners. If you don't get caught, everything is allowed, and moral dilemmas do not actually exist. It is just entertainment.

 

 

Humans have the ability to feel emapthy for fictional characters, there's no doubt about that. Who would watch dramas if that wasn't the case? However, there is no reason to mix up fiction and reality.

 

When I see a character I enjoy get killed on Game of Thrones or Walking Dead, I can feel sad that I won't see that character's story continue; I can feel empathy for the characters who remain and mourn, but I also know that the character didn't really exist--they never existed and no violence actually happened.

 

It's like walking through a haunted house. I enjoy the feeling of fear, but it is tempered with the knowledge that nothing you're seeing is real and you're not actually in real danger. If someone said, "People shouldn't go in that haunted house because there are real monsters in there", we would look rather strangely at that person.

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I completely agree that mixing reality and fiction is not a good thing, and I have not proposed it in any way, nor did I interpret anyone doing so.

 

What I was after was how to get that extra impact into the fiction to help immersion, and hopefully even yield a tear shedding empathic response. In GOT and WD the scripters really have a knack of getting that extra impact into the field.

Clipper

-The mapper's best friend.

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All this GOT talk is making me wish for a Winterfell mission.

 

Too bad Mount and Blade doesn't have the same map format as TDM:

 

http://media.moddb.com/images/mods/1/22/21191/winterfell_redone.jpg

Please visit TDM's IndieDB site and help promote the mod:

 

http://www.indiedb.com/mods/the-dark-mod

 

(Yeah, shameless promotion... but traffic is traffic folks...)

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