Fan Mission: The Heart of Lone Salvation by Fidcal, Baddcog & Bikerdude (2010/04/02)

[snobel]

A consultant from the Inventor's Guild would probably tell you that it's better to make machinery out of metal (But of course wood makes good sense in that particular room.)

 

Is it not possible to mark something as not receptible to arrows? Not very polite, if the player attempts what I did, but maybe better than a dead end?

[Fidcal]

Yes, not quite that simple but possible. Would need a bit of work.

[Mr Mike]

Well I usually don't like to ask for help in finishing a mission but someone needs to put me out of my misery.

 

I've pretty much scouted every area of the estate but I still can't get in the pump room, the cells or get the heart.

 

 

From what I understand I have to get the Heart first? But I wasted my only fire arrow on the case and have been all over waving around the slow match lol. What do I do?!

 

 

Thanks in advance.

[Neb]

You need to visit the pump room. The key should be in the housekeeper's room I think.

[Tels]

Never thought of that! That's the amazing thing about a virtual world is things can happen in ways that the author cannot anticipate. In fact I can't think of a solution anyway. Maybe a timer on the door then pull out the arrow...

 

Technically, movers should just break arrows, but I never got that quit to work...

[Mr Mike]

 

You need to visit the pump room. The key should be in the housekeeper's room I think.

 

 

Are you sure? I've looked and scouted everywhere that I can think of.

[Fidcal]

Yes that's right. Someone said it got knocked down. Have you KO'd an AI just outside? I can only suggest you search around.

There is a wood board on the wall. Should be about 4 keys on it. See if they are on the floor or knocked out into the corridor. If absolutely no sign then I can only suggest you enter noclip in the console and fly through the pump room door.

[Springheel]

Ok, I've been to the pump room, but I'm still stuck. I found a

hatch key under a stone there, but what hatch does it open? I can't find anything (I've already been through the hatch to Martha's room). I'm also stuck on getting incriminating evidence against Edridge...in the sleeping woman's room I opened a chest that contained all kinds of paper that I thought would be it, but I can't frob any of them.

Am I in the wrong spot? I haven't been able to play for about two weeks, so it's possible I forgot something obvious.

 

I also just had my first FM crash, when I closed the drain with the water pouring down in the bath. Wanted to see the bath fill with water as I heard it does.

[Xarg]

Ok, I've been to the pump room, but I'm still stuck. I found a

hatch key under a stone there, but what hatch does it open? I can't find anything (I've already been through the hatch to Martha's room). I'm also stuck on getting incriminating evidence against Edridge...in the sleeping woman's room I opened a chest that contained all kinds of paper that I thought would be it, but I can't frob any of them.

Am I in the wrong spot? I haven't been able to play for about two weeks, so it's possible I forgot something obvious.

 

I also just had my first FM crash, when I closed the drain with the water pouring down in the bath. Wanted to see the bath fill with water as I heard it does.

 

 

From memory, the evidence is a diary, a book to be more precise. The hatch key should open something in the pump room, tried looking for a hatch in a corner with a lot of boxes in it? Could be wrong though, been a few weeks.

 

[Fidcal]

That is correct. But the clue is hard to read as it's the worst scrawl. It says

"Crates hides it all. Key too."

I actually ran out of fonts to be different for all characters.

 

A clue to the location of the evidence is

in Lord Edridge's bedroom

 

 

Evidence push:

In the housekeeper's room.

 

[Springheel]

Oh, I didn't realize it was in the

same room

.

[Springheel]

it crashed once in the upstairs bathroom, opened the plughole, turned the water on, closed the plughole, crash to desktop

 

I had the exact same thing happen to me.

[Springheel]

Bah, I've gotten quite frustrated trying

to drag Sam to safety. He keeps falling into the pit of water, and once down there nothing I can seem to do will get him out; the ragdoll just keeps flopping around and getting stuck. I'm quite willing to cheat to get him past it at this point, but I can't even get him out of the water using noclip.

Am I missing something?

[Fidcal]

Yes, the readme (also quoted at the start of this thread!)

 

BODIES: You need space to shoulder a body as well as drop one so you may need to drag into an open area before trying to shoulder again with the 'use' control.

[Fidcal]

That crash with the

plughole

- it's basically just triggers and targets but there is a stim and response setup which was the only way I could test to be sure it was closed. I wonder if the problem lies there? It goes without saying that in scores and scores of testing and playing over maybe two years I've never seen that crash on either of my own machines.

 

What happens if you close it first then turn on the water?

[Springheel]

Finally got to finish this mission. Reminded me very much of an original T1 mission, despite the occasional glitch. A grand achievement, and well worth playing again later.

 

I wound up getting caught by the front stairs, and had to burn through two gas arrows and all my flashbombs to survive. Not very stealthy, but I finally got what I came for.

 

I thought the

mechanism for lowering the heart (the big log) was awesome.

 

 

There were a couple issues that I wondered about, however. What was the significance of

the archer going on break? I never did find a way to the parapet. I was kind of expecting a lit area to cross where the archer could see me,

but I didn't find that either.

 

edit: nm...don't know how I missed that the first time. I just found all kinds of areas, full of guards, that I never even saw the first time around.

 

Also, was there any significance to the

weird blue skull in Martha's room?

 

 

A comment for future reference: I can understand the reason for all the keys, but I was slightly annoyed that I couldn't drop any of them. Once a particular door was opened and I knew I didn't need the key anymore, it became a bit of a chore cycling through two dozen of them.

 

A couple weird things: I had at least two bodies move/mangle, yet one that I put on a bed did not move. Also, there were several places where I saw

a weird circular glow pulse for a second. I saw it at least three times, once outside on my way back to the start. At the beginning I actually thought it was some kind of weird ghost effect

that was part of the story. Now, I'm not so sure.

[Fidcal]

The archer's break (this is in the info and map so not a spoiler)

I think by now you've realized you can rope up from outside instead of the other route. It is possible to ghost past the parapet archer even on expert with two guards but it is difficult so for those who prefer, they can wait for 2:00am.

 

 

There was no special significance to

the skull other than that I wanted to support the story that she could get out and wander around at night and being 1. sensory deprived, and 2. demented, she might collect strange items. Possibly when I first did that I was unsure how sinister/evil she might be but later I preferred the player sympathy bit. The skull does of course hide some loot as well as evoking and supporting the wierd spooky atmosphere of that room.

 

 

The problem with dropping keys is the danger of accidentally losing a vital one and then it's mission end. This is why I have suggested we have a second inventory, a kind of backpack, into which items could be moved when the player thinks they are no longer needed or accessed by hot key (lantern, spyglass, maps, compass.) In practice, in this FM, I found the most likely object of a type was the last one obtained. So by scrolling through the types scroller I was usually on the one I want reasonably quickly (also why we now have the inventory scroll is 'backward' from update 1.01 so the last item obtained is the first you see when type scrolling.)

 

I have also seen those strange light glows mostly in the back alleys and do not know their source. I saw this just once also in No Honor somewhere. Maybe it's a fog artifact.

[aidakeeley]

I have also seen those strange light glows mostly in the back alleys and do not know their source. I saw this just once also in No Honor somewhere.

 

I saw what you might be talking about in the first mission of No Honor:

 

 

I figured it was one of those lights that bleeds through walls if you don't do something about the radius; I see you guys talking about them around the forums sometimes when advising each other about mission-building. There is alight on the other side of that wall.

 

...

 

...a second inventory, a kind of backpack, into which items could be moved when the player thinks they are no longer needed or accessed by hot key (lantern, spyglass, maps, compass.)

 

Love this idea (another 'No Fun' is the cycling-thru Springheel brings up)!

 

BTW, am I missing the menu-based hotkey setting for the spyglass? Maybe I need to put it in the cfg? Let me know, please. Tried "z" which according to the many cfgs seems to be bound to "zoom", but it didn't happen.

[Fidcal]

No, I can't see that picture clearly but I think that is a light leak through a wall. The ghost lights that Spring and I are talking about are brief patches in the middle of an area. In Heart I have seen this most often in the alley at the foot of the clock tower but away from it in the centre of that area where there are no lights. They kind of disappear when you look at them.

 

I don't think the spyglass is in the menu so set it in Doomconfig Here are my two key binds for the spyglass. You only need one of them. They do the same thing. But I got used to page up and down keys in Thief so I set both...

 

bind "PGDN" "inventory_use Spyglass"

bind "PGUP" "inventory_use Spyglass"

[aidakeeley]

Thanks, Fidcal.

 

I've become quite the spyglass-using, shadow-lurking sneaksie of late and am glad to be able to put it in a bind!

[Springheel]

The problem with dropping keys is the danger of accidentally losing a vital one and then it's mission end.

 

The chance of that is extremely low, however. You'd have to have the vital key selected in inventory, accidently drop the key into your hands without realizing it, and then accidently drop or throw it without realizing it. The chances of those things all happening in order are probably the same as killing yourself by accidently shooting a fire arrow at close range, or accidently dropping a mine and stepping on it.

 

On the flip side, making them undroppable means every single player has to scroll through a huge list of keys.

[Fidcal]

I'd forgotten about the grabber. I was thinking an accidental hit of the drop key while a key was selected in the inventory and it might slip away anywhere and the player wouldn't notice. Does everything drop into the carry position? Or if not I guess keys and other important items could be made so. All keys are undroppable by default I believe. I don't recall setting any keys to be undroppable. So as you say, that is much safer.

[Springheel]

Does everything drop into the carry position?

 

Everything in inventory, yes.

 

Back to the map, I had another question that occurred to me--there were several occasions where I opened a door and ran smack into an AI on his way through the door, but I hadn't seen him before. Were those AI set to dormant or something? Or were they triggered by opening the door?

 

What methods did people use to get in on their first attempt? I wound up

going through the stream to the well and climbing up that way. Then I used a rope arrow up into the privy.

 

[Fidcal]

There are a few AI that are set to dormant but nothing triggered by a door. If you run straight into an AI through a door then it is just chance I think.

 

I'd be interested too to hear which routes people took. There are the two main routes but a few variations on them. I'd also be interested in player routes once they got inside the main building as there are about three ways in and variations on those.

[Diego]

A little adventure in this mission I forgot to share

 

 

When I found the secret lever for the skeleton part I suspected I could get trapped inside and pushed the crate (the ones I used to reach the lever) to not let the entrance close again. "It worked.. Now let's try to pull this guy out of this hole" It took me a lot of spoilers to understand I *had* to get stuck in there and use that item.