Things that could be improved

[VanishedOne]

I suspect that a sprint mechanic along the lines of the original suggestion would be often used for running blackjacks: reduced time for the AI to react, and you'll be moving slowly afterwards anyway because you need to hide the body. Then there are uses like dashing over Gatehouse-style pressure plate traps. It could change the tactics of the game quite a lot.

 

As for any version that limited running in general--typically in Thief/TDM being slowed is a penalty for having a weapon ready. It's set up to favour running and hiding over standing and fighting, despite the downsides of running RPGista cites. Making running harder presumably could make direct combat relatively more attractive.

[demagogue]

Caltrops on the cheap would be a model to which you attach a damage s/r, give it some entity def that AI already notice, and maybe the stim destroys it. All that are things mappers can do.

[stumpy]

if you do subtitles then people will complain that you should have sound speaking instead of subtitles.

gui_message entity could be used for subtitles, as it places a readable message on screen for a certain amount of time.

or you could just have a permanent gui_overlay and turn on/off subtitles with visible 1/0 although it might break some maps that use custom gui_overlays if they were placed at the same layer.

[Taquito]

-Something that bothers me a lot and may improve gameplay is the ability to move and hide below tables. Most tables in the game are just slightly lower than the crouch camera position. Tables are a great way to hide since they produce shadow unless the room is well lit.

 

Edit: It was already suggested and yes it can be done yet not implemented in most missions.

 

-We also need more closets, lockers or wardrobes with openings or decorated glass doors for the player to hide and be able to see what's happening outside without getting noticed. This was already done in some missions with closed closets but I it seems some missions creators don't play much with it. Probably cause you can only hear and not see outside.

 

I think both of these options could improve the gameplay a lot.

 

 

-Another controversial suggestion is to just slightly open a door clicking the use button once and clicking the use button twice to open the door completely. This could be useful when peeking before moving between room or in case as I mentioned before in a closet, locker or cabinet.

Edited August 26, 2015 by Taquito

[Destined]

-Another controversial suggestion is to just slightly open a door clicking the use button once and clicking the use button twice to open the door completely. This could be useful when peeking before moving between room or in case as I mentioned before in a closet, locker or cabinet.

 

You can interrupt the movement of doors by hitting the use button. It will just not resume the same moving direction, but will go in the opposite direction. I.e. if you open a door and hit the use button, it will stop. When you use the door again, it will close. If you then hit "use" again, it will immediately stop again and then you can open it from that position. It is a bit cumbersome, since it requires a lot of hitting the use button in a row, but it can be done.

[wesp5]

I have another suggestion which I don't know if it has already been mentioned in this huge thread: I'm really getting annoyed sometimes that everyone is knowing that I am a thief! I mean this might be okay for guards, but why do civilians outside or in a tavern recognize me instantly for what I am? Wouldn't it be much more realistic to have areas or characters that react neutral to the player unless he actually gets caught stealing something or hurting someone?

 

P.S.: I just filed bugtrackers for my suggestions to make the map closable with the use and frob key, for the issue about the wooden chest and door sounds being the same and for snuffing out small oil lamps the same as candles.

Edited August 26, 2015 by wesp5

[demagogue]

Wesp, that functionality (not being recognized as a thief until you are seen committing a crime) is already handled by a rough team relations system. It's just that not many mappers use that system, and usually try to set up some pretext for every person finding the player instantly suspect, such as a curfew or other setup.

[wesp5]

Wesp, that functionality (not being recognized as a thief until you are seen committing a crime) is already handled by a rough team relations system. It's just that not many mappers use that system, and usually try to set up some pretext for every person finding the player instantly suspect, such as a curfew or other setup.

Ah, that's a shame really! I imagine a mission in which you move in a big tavern stealing stuff here and there without being noticed, but not being chased at all until you are seen. Or some big dancing event or similar, like e.g. the ball in Dishonered. Or do missions like these already exist?

Edited August 26, 2015 by wesp5

[Destined]

I have another suggestion which I don't know if it has already been mentioned in this huge thread: I'm really getting annoyed sometimes that everyone is knowing that I am a thief! I mean this might be okay for guards, but why do civilians outside or in a tavern recognize me instantly for what I am? Wouldn't it be much more realistic to have areas or characters that react neutral to the player unless he actually gets caught stealing something or hurting someone?

 

You should also consider, that your appearance is a guy dressed in dark clothes and a hood, that wears a bow and quiver on his back and a sword on his side. I don't know if you would trust such a person, if you meet him on the street. I know I wouldn't...

But if you assume the thief has no weapons and is dressed "normal", I agree. You might want to look into the mission "Not an Ordinary Guest". In this you have a sytem, where guards are initially not hostile, but if you enter certain areas get suspiciuos and finally hostile. I haven't played it until the end yet, but it is a very nice mission.

[wesp5]

 

You should also consider, that your appearance is a guy dressed in dark clothes and a hood, that wears a bow and quiver on his back and a sword on his side.

I though about this too, but in the medieval setting one could think he is a hunter or similar. The guards probably would know better though...

[Destined]

That is true for the bow, but the sword might still be odd for a hunter. Granted, it is a shortsword, but you would hardly mistake it for a hunting knife. Anyway, as demagogue said: It is possible and if you are free to use the relation system as much as you like for your missions, but it has not seen as much usage as it could have. I myself also want to use it, as son as I build a city mission, but I have trouble finding the time to finish my current WIP and still think about a couple others all the while.

Another point, why I suggested, you might want to take a look at "Not an Ordinary Guest", I just remembered: The author not only used the relation system, but also had a "suspicion meter", where you could see, how suspicious guards are around you.

[Springheel]

for snuffing out small oil lamps the same as candles.

 

 

Why should you be able to snuff out oil lamps? IRL the whole reason oil lamps are preferred to candles is that they don't go out as easily.

 

Or do missions like these already exist?

 

 

There are plenty of missions where you have characters that don't immediately consider you hostile. NHAT, Business as Usual and Inn Business are three off the top of my head.

[esme]

 

Why should you be able to snuff out oil lamps? IRL the whole reason oil lamps are preferred to candles is that they don't go out as easily.

Yes, but irl they are also controllable so you can turn them off

[wesp5]

 

Why should you be able to snuff out oil lamps?

How does the player extinguish candles? Probably by pressing the wick with the gloved fingers of his hand. The same should work for the small oil lamps shown!

[SteveL]

How does the player extinguish candles? Probably by pressing the wick with the gloved fingers of his hand. The same should work for the small oil lamps shown!

 

How does the player extinguish candles? Probably by pressing the wick with the gloved fingers of his hand. The same should work for the small oil lamps shown!

Maybe, but an oil lamp can get very hot! From a practical perspective we need to offer mappers big and small light sources that can be extinguished by expending limited resources (water arrows). Torches, fires and oil lamps fill that role in TDM. We certainly wouldn't change the default behaviour even if we thought of another option, because it'd break the gameplay in maps.

[Destined]

 

Maybe, but an oil lamp can get very hot! From a practical perspective we need to offer mappers big and small light sources that can be extinguished by expending limited resources (water arrows). Torches, fires and oil lamps fill that role in TDM. We certainly wouldn't change the default behaviour even if we thought of another option, because it'd break the gameplay in maps.

 

I agree. Turning off lights should use limited recources in general. Or the author can use switches. But if people want oil lamps to be extinguishable by frobbing them, it should not be that difficult to implement. I would have to check myself first, but I think if you want to do it, you could look into the def-files: The candles entry should have the "extinguish" part somewhere. You could just copy and paste it to oil lamps. If you do that for the def files in your game folder it should also work for your own game, without changing anything for other players. But I believe, it might make a couple of missions quite easy.

[VanishedOne]

You can interrupt the movement of doors by hitting the use button. It will just not resume the same moving direction, but will go in the opposite direction. I.e. if you open a door and hit the use button, it will stop. When you use the door again, it will close. If you then hit "use" again, it will immediately stop again and then you can open it from that position. It is a bit cumbersome, since it requires a lot of hitting the use button in a row, but it can be done.

There's a cvar - tdm_door_control I think - which lets you hold down the frob button and open doors with mouse control. I think it's off by default for a reason, though; for one thing, if memory serves it has trouble with double doors.

[Taquito]

There's a cvar - tdm_door_control I think - which lets you hold down the frob button and open doors with mouse control. I think it's off by default for a reason, though; for one thing, if memory serves it has trouble with double doors.

 

 

Interesting. The idea of just slightly opening a door with the first click and then completely opening with two clicks is mostly for role playing purposes and as a tool for storyline in furure missions. As an automatic way to peeking in a room before getting inside.

 

This could also lead to making the AI noticing if a door is being opened fully. It could then force the player to sligthly open the door first with one click, use the lean key to peek first to see if no ones there and then a second click to completely open the door. It could also be vice versa by adding the functionality of slightly opening a door enough to lean inside with two clicks.

 

 

BTW Oil lamps are not as easy to extinguish as candles and extinguishing them with fingers is not recomended. You shouln't get your fingers close to the fire of an oil lamp.

Edited August 26, 2015 by Taquito

[wesp5]

 

But I believe, it might make a couple of missions quite easy.

I don't think so, I only noticed this because it made little sense from a logical point of view. I rarely use water arrow but rely on timing instead...

[Springheel]

 

 

 

 

This could also lead to making the AI noticing if a door is being opened fully. It.

They already do if the mapper sets it as important.

[HMart]

How does the player extinguish candles? Probably by pressing the wick with the gloved fingers of his hand. The same should work for the small oil lamps shown!

 

I agree is very easy to extinguish an oil lamp just by blowing on it, i know because i did it on a real one, you need to blow with force tho, more than you would on a candle. You could also put a hand in the glass cover opening, till the flame consumes all the oxygen inside, than it will automatically extinguish, this take time tho, could be a nice gameplay device, want to extinguish oil lamps need to wait for some seconds.

 

Thinking about this what about giving the player the option to put a object (for example a book) over the oil lamp till it extinguishes, this has two benefits imo, one makes use of the fantastic object manipulation in TDM ( that so many mission makers hardly use) implements a totally new and fun imo stealth mechanic, instead of clicking a button and puf, you need to work some more, this also gives the challenge of making this without tipping over the lamp and making noise.

 

A new collision mesh would have to be implemented for this tho, one large enough that the book can stay put on the lamp without falling over, you could have two collision meshes on the same object, one more faithful to the object shape that collides only with the world geometry or static objects, so the lamp don't float on the air when on the floor for exemple, and another larger (a box shape) that collided only with movable objects so it detected the book on top of it.

 

Don't know if any of this is doable only tossing ideas out there.

Edited August 28, 2015 by HMart

[Springheel]

Realistically, there's no reason you can't smother a torch flame with a vase or put out a campfire by stamping it out. But the more flames you let players put out with other means, the more useless water arrows become.

[the_deep]

Realistically, there's no reason you can't smother a torch flame with a vase or put out a campfire by stamping it out. But the more flames you let players put out with other means, the more useless water arrows become.

Agreed. The best solution is often the most elegant one. A thief stays out of the light and puts out the flames from a distance. Extensive object manipulation can swiftly become a mess, which is why I think I'll avoid the mechanic as much as possible in any missions I might make, even if many players expect to able to stack crates and pick up candles and carry them around.

[HMart]

Realistically, there's no reason you can't smother a torch flame with a vase or put out a campfire by stamping it out. But the more flames you let players put out with other means, the more useless water arrows become.

 

Is not because i wrote that idea, but Springheel i'm not seeing how it would make water arrows useless, you can say is more convoluted and theres also the matter of should guards be suspected of a book on top of a lamp? And also the matter of who will code this? So theres more realistic reasons to not do what i suggested then, it could make water arrows more useless, imo that is a non issue, using arrows is a faster process so i'm seeing people with enough water arrows using them instead of wasting time, trying to stack a book (or other object) on top of a oil lamp, it could be a option only for someone with no other option. Does this also make the game more easy, imo not, just the time it takes to stack a book on top of a lamp without tipping it over or without being caught by a patrolling AI, should be enough to make players think twice before using this option.

Edited August 28, 2015 by HMart

[Taquito]

The use of water arrows rely mostly in the mission creator. Placing the light sources in hard to reach places and so. Or making it impossible to cross a room without using one.