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Things that could be improved


Berny

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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?

While I agree that snuffing out small oil lamps will not critically affect water arrow usage, I don't like the idea to place books on lamps. Honestly, what thief would do this when he can either blow out a lamp or snuff it out with his fingers? The risk to have the book fall off or be recognized as alarming is much too high and in-game item manipulation would be even harder to pull off. Maybe a small extinguishing cap that has to be used from the inventory could be addd to snuff out oil lamps if you want to make it harder than snuffing out candles.

Edited by wesp5
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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?

 

 

 

I didn't say it would make water arrows useless, but it would make them MORE useless if you can simply put out fires by other means.

 

You could argue that it's not important for water arrows to be valuable, and in individual missions that could be true. Some missions have no tools at all, so the rules are flexible from mission to mission. However, in a general sense, if you're going to give the player the option of buying tools, you should try and make sure those tools are useful. It's also arguable that the water arrow is the most iconic tool in the Thief/TDM setting, which gives it a special importance.

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It's also arguable that the water arrow is the most iconic tool in the Thief/TDM setting, which gives it a special importance.

I'm not aguing that, but we are only talking about small oil lamps here, not about torches which are used much more often! Most of the time oil lamps are indoors in smaller buildings where splashing around with a lot of water does not make sense anyway, because guards would notice the stains ;).

Edited by wesp5
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Why on Earth are you getting so far into this? Water arrows put out lights. Some lights are designed to be put out with them, some are designed to be switched off, and some are designed to be on permanently. It's a mechanic that allows mappers to decide how an area is played, where the player will be able to go. Electric lights mean "you can't put this out without a switch", oil lamps mean "you can put this out with a water arrow" and candles mean "you can put this out for free if you can get near it." The differing types of lighting are the absolute foundation of the game. The inability to snuff oil lamps is a contrived mechanic to necessitate resource spending, not an oversight by a dev who thinks it's impossible to put out an oil lamp by hand.

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Electric lights mean "you can't put this out without a switch", oil lamps mean "you can put this out with a water arrow" and candles mean "you can put this out for free if you can get near it." The differing types of lighting are the absolute foundation of the game.

You probably left out the torches on purpose which for me are the real type of lights you need to put out with water arrows! The oil lamps are a group inbetween and it just breaks the game world consistency that you can't snuff them out. Keep it like it is, if you want, but this thread is about improvements, and for me and some others not being able to do so destroys the immersion a little bit which is so great in TDM! Also from a logical point of view, water arrows are all about snuffing out lights from a distance. No thief would fire an arrow at a torch right beside him instead of putting it out with his foot or something. Gameplay elements are fine, but when they are too obvious recognizable as such the game is not yet perfect ;)...

Edited by wesp5
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No thief would fire an arrow at a torch right beside him instead of putting it out with his foot or something.

 

 

No thief would fire an arrow at a beam right beside him instead of tying the rope around it.

 

No thief would fire an arrow at a tile floor right beside him instead of taking his tap shoes off.

 

etc

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some others not being able to do so destroys the immersion a little bit which is so great in TDM!

I think we got off on the wrong foot here. You're right, man. I say we go the whole hog, remove the ability to hide in shadows entirely. I mean, slightly darker corners are hardly going to hide the shape of a grown man. That super ruins my immersion. Gameplay balance? Psh! Sacrifice it all for 'mershun I say.

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You probably left out the torches on purpose which for me are the real type of lights you need to put out with water arrows! The oil lamps are a group inbetween and it just breaks the game world consistency that you can't snuff them out. Keep it like it is, if you want, but this thread is about improvements, and for me and some others not being able to do so destroys the immersion a little bit which is so great in TDM! Also from a logical point of view, water arrows are all about snuffing out lights from a distance. No thief would fire an arrow at a torch right beside him instead of putting it out with his foot or something. Gameplay elements are fine, but when they are too obvious recognizable as such the game is not yet perfect ;)...

 

As I said before: If you're so bothered by not being able to extinguish oil lamps without water arrows, why don't you just change them in the def file of your game? That is the great advantage of an open source game: you can take it and change it, if you think that is an improvement for you. That way the whole discussion here is moot: People who want to extinguish them by hand, can change that, people who don't, don't. Problem solved (at least in my opinion).

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No thief would fire an arrow at a beam right beside him instead of tying the rope around it.

 

No thief would fire an arrow at a tile floor right beside him instead of taking his tap shoes off.

You have a point, but that are more or less all the same reasons. To me arrows are meant to reach far away targets! Except for rare cases when you climb down you won't fire a rope arrow right beside you. Normally you won't fire a moss arrow at your feet but some way ahead. Right now in TDM there are no ways to do such things up close except for the candles which break the rule! Oil lamps could become another exception or even better ;), an option could be added to do everything with arrows in another way up close like you suggested above. Taking more time of course or having other disadvantages. I know this would mean changing TDM a lot so it won't happen, but then it was just an idea. I can easily live with how it is right now! I rarely run out of water arrows anyway :)...

Edited by wesp5
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As I said before: If you're so bothered by not being able to extinguish oil lamps without water arrows, why don't you just change them in the def file of your game?

Does that really work so simple? Wouldn't they need to be frobable in the first place which I always assumed was defined in the mission files.

Edited by wesp5
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Does that really work so simple? Wouldn't they need to be frobable in the first place which I always assumed was defined in the mission files.

They'll inherit spawnargs from the entity defs. Mappers' spawnargs will override the inheritance, but mappers have no reason to set "frobable" "0" on something that (in normal TDM) already isn't frobable.

Edited by VanishedOne
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Some things I'm repeatedly thinking about...

 

- louder scream when you're dying

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Does that really work so simple? Wouldn't they need to be frobable in the first place which I always assumed was defined in the mission files.

 

I have not tested it, but since the def-files define all spawn-args and "frobable" is one of them, I don't see, why it should not work. You can just look up the candles in the def-file and copy the "extinguish by frob" part to the oil lamps. Or, if they are in different categories, you can change the category of the oil lamps. would have to chekc myself, but I currently can't, because I am on my work computer...

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I have taken a look at the def-files. In "tdm_lights_static.def" you can find all the oil lamps. If you add a "frobable" "1" somewhere, you make the lamp frobable (who would have thought ;) ). With "frob_action_script" you should be able to set the script, but I have to admit, that I have not found the script you needed here. Maybe someone else can help out here?

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I'm also interested to know how to modify those with the def file. :P

Well, I just took a look at the pk4 files and extracted some that looked like they could contain this but I haven't found stationary oil lamps yet. In which file are they defined? Or did I overlook them somehow? I found some very interesting stuff in the tdm_moveable_lights.def file though. There are torches that can be carried and lit and exstinguished! I can't remember finding any of those yet in a mission, but it gives me the impression that even torches can be extinguished when one is close enough. Also there are several oil lantern that can be carried and lit and extinguished. Are these the base of the inventory lantern or something different? If so, oil lamps that can be extinguished are possible already! Another thing that took my eye in case you really want to continue down this road. Is there a way to light lamps apart from fire arrows and mines going off? Like an inventory item "flint stones" to light a frobable entity nearby...

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I have taken a look at the def-files. In "tdm_lights_static.def" you can find all the oil lamps.

In which archive did you find them? The script may be the one in tdm_moveable_lights.def: "equip_action_script" "frob_light_holder_ext"

 

Update: I found the static lights file now, I must have overlooked it. I added "frobable" "1" and "frob_action_script" "frob_light_holder_toggle_light" to all oil lamps but nothing happens inside the game. The oil lamps are not even frobable! What did I do wrong?

Edited by wesp5
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Well, I just took a look at the pk4 files and extracted some that looked like they could contain this but I haven't found stationary oil lamps yet. In which file are they defined? Or did I overlook them somehow? I found some very interesting stuff in the tdm_moveable_lights.def file though. There are torches that can be carried and lit and exstinguished! I can't remember finding any of those yet in a mission, but it gives me the impression that even torches can be extinguished when one is close enough. Also there are several oil lantern that can be carried and lit and extinguished. Are these the base of the inventory lantern or something different? If so, oil lamps that can be extinguished are possible already! Another thing that took my eye in case you really want to continue down this road. Is there a way to light lamps apart from fire arrows and mines going off? Like an inventory item "flint stones" to light a frobable entity nearby...

 

I believe, the torches defined here are the torches carried e.g. by guards. All lights that are extinguishable must also have a lit form. They can usually be relit when you add a fire stim, i.e. a fire arrow, mine, also lit candles, that you hold to them should work (if I remember correctly). But usually you do not want to do this yourself. Flint stones might be possible (from the top of my head, you would need an area of effect in front of the player, that gives a fire stim somehow), but as I said: usually you put out the lights that you are hidden, not light them...

The extinguish part is generally necesserary, if the light should be extinguishable, e.g. by a water arrow. The water stim causes the torch to be extinguished. So these are the extinguishable lights you see in basically every mission. For the "manually" extinguish part, you have to add a new stim (i.e. frob) to cause the script. As I said, I am not sure, which script this is. The "frob_light_holder_ext", might not work, because of the "holder" part. I think this script is meant for the player to actually carry the candle (hence the equip) and then hit the "use" button to extinguish the flame.

I think, I have just found the part you need: Relatively at the beginning you have an "entitydef light_extinguishable". There it is defined, what happens with extinguishable lights. And you have a "stim/response" part, where different stims are defined: water and gas extinguish the flame, fire lights it. Here you would have to add a STIM_FROB (not sure if this is the right term), to extinguish the flame.

But it is indeed strange, that you don't even the the frob highlight...

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atdm:moveable_candle_default has no holder model, but it still uses the tdm_light_holder scriptobject and frob_light_holder_ext (as equip_action_script, but presumably that's for moveable lights...?). It doesn't have STIM_FROB response spawnargs. Of course, a frob response would work, if frobbing was working.

 

Edit: actually, no S/R stuff is showing up in DR at all for that candle. Maybe it's on the attached flame... Yes, it is. Water/fire/gas responses.

 

Edit2: oh, I think I misunderstood about the holders (because of 'In_Holder' in the entiy hierarchy). However, the standing oil lamps also use the tdm_light_holder scriptobject.

Edited by VanishedOne

Some things I'm repeatedly thinking about...

 

- louder scream when you're dying

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Just did a quick test:

Just added "frobable" "1" on the entityDef atdm:lamp_oil_standing_lit and placed it in DR. The spawnarg appeared not immediately, but after restarting DR. It also worked in TDM. Maybe you just need a restart.

 

Still not sure about the stim-response. I tried using this to create a new response:

 

"sr_class_4" "R"
"sr_type_4" "STIM_FROB"
"sr_state_4" "1"
"sr_script_STIM_FROB" "response_extinguish"

Did not work (still not sure about the STIM_FROB). Maybe tomorrow I will look and play around a bit more. But right now I am getting too tired... Or someone who actually knows how it works shows up and explains it. BTW: Maybe we should move this to another thread. This has gotten a bit off topic.

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Well then, on the subject of Stim/Response and things that could be improved:

1) Applying stims when melee attacks hit: I asked about this on NDRQs recently, and the solution involved a custom script performing its own trace. In a quick test I also couldn't make the cliché'd holy sword for the player by putting a stim on the shortsword--meaning something like a swingable torch with a fire stim would also need scripting. Mappers could explore such options more easily if stims could be applied via a successful melee hit, perhaps using something like this in the def_melee:

"applyStimType"                         "STIM_HOLY"
"applyStimMagnitude"                    "10"
"applyStimType1"                        "STIM_FIRE"
...


2) From what I can glean by reading old threads, making response effects activate or not activate depending on a stim's magnitude was proposed but, as far as I can see in DR, never implemented (short of writing custom response effect scripts). Also, giving the player and AI a STIM_FIRE response to take damage was proposed but rejected, since without a magnitude test every flame would present a hazard.

 

The drawback comes when you want e.g. something like TG's fire mages wading through lava: since the player and AI aren't set up to take damage from STIM_FIRE of any magnitude, the usual way to associate damage with fire is to add a STIM_DAMAGE or make a trigger_hurt. True, a lot of potential uses also have ad hoc solutions (e.g. a powerful undead type harmed only by proximity to the holiest of relics: a mapper could make STIM_HOLIER on a per map basis), but certain potential cases, like an entity so fiery that a water arrow doesn't extinguish it but immersion does, could benefit from a magnitude test.

 

3) Might _SOURCE be useful as a counterpart to _SELF? For example, when making traps that specifically do something to the entity that springs them. Edit: http://bugs.thedarkmod.com/view.php?id=4209

Edited by VanishedOne

Some things I'm repeatedly thinking about...

 

- louder scream when you're dying

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Just added "frobable" "1" on the entityDef atdm:lamp_oil_standing_lit and placed it in DR. The spawnarg appeared not immediately, but after restarting DR. It also worked in TDM.

Of course I don't want this to be possible only in newly created maps, but in all the existing ones as well. Will this work by changing the def files alone?

Edited by wesp5
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Default def files are in the game's pk4s. Changing those changes all maps that just use the defaults.

 

Alternatively, you can always change anybody's map you want in DR. It's the easiest way to shrug off the author's intent and get whatever gameplay you want. ;)

What do you see when you turn out the light? I can't tell you but I know that it's mine.

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