Which "genre" of TDM missions do you hope to see more of?

[Bikerdude]

Me? I seem to favour the conventional thieving missions.

 

+1

[RPGista]

I very much agree with the life-like activities of the map population, observing repetitive routes, even if quite complex, is not a good thing for me playing wise, it becomes more like a kind of chess game, not really that need of exploring very cautiously because you are bound to deal with unpreddicatable situations, when invading a place full of people going about their business.

 

I also don't see many assassination missions. It's pretty cool in a mission like Thieves for example to go in there do everything you need to do to be able to find the target, kill him and get out unseen. I do feel more "companionship" is lacking right now to make those missions really tense though, the whole linking of teammates together so they will notice another one is gone, that we were discussing before. If mappers could achive this effect somehow, would be pretty cool and a lot harder to just rain down on them one by one.

Edited November 11, 2011 by RPGista

[brethren]

Not sure if this counts as a "genre" but I would love to see some rooftop missions for TDM.

 

Also, more mage missions would be great - there always seemed to be a real lack of these for Thief. And yes, Lost City/Ancient Civilization/Indiana Jones type missions are always a blast. It's good to get outside The City Bridgeport once in a while.

[Shadowhide]

Me? I seem to favour the conventional thieving missions.

 

I'd like to see any kinds of missions with the following things:

*A break in or other stealth based mission with clear set of objectives.

*A map, which shows enough information so that the player can make intelligent decisions how to proceed with the mission and which equipment to buy.

*It is about thievery. Get in, get the dingus, get out, cause as low amount of commotion as possible.

*Many alternative routes to accomplish the mission. Alternatives with consequences.

*Real life-like AI patrols. AI's have interesting things to do. They should not be robots ever droning the same path tirelessly.

*Simple built in mechanic to increase the map replay-value. (Ie. slight variation between gaming sessions in AI patrols etc.)

 

Many of our current missions seem to have this "You are dropped into an area with no clue of your surroundings. Wander around and find things" -thing. Some missions have very vague objectives set.

 

 

Remember these pretty maps from thief 1? The clear and concise objectives? That is what I crave.

what about some readables contest entries ? TDM need such missions badly

PS

"Remember these pretty maps from thief 1?"

you breaking the law by saying that

you never played Thief 1,so you cant remember it yourself

[brethren]

what about some readables contest entries ? TDM need such missions badly

 

i bet 50 % of players never read readables

 

Make up yer mind.

[Shadowhide]

Make up yer mind.

u learn sarcazm

[pusianka]

your sarcazm is getting boring.

[Shadowhide]

it wasn't supposed to be fun

[Bikerdude]

@Pusianka

 

Dont encourage SH, he is our resident mascot, sorrry oddball.

[DeTeEff]

Then I believe you'll enjoy Not An Ordinary Guest, Sotha

 

That mission will contain (as the best I can do)

 

* Different entry zones.

* Rewards for cunningness.

* Straightforward story.

* Placed in a context.

* A map/layout and possibilities for buying stuff in the beginning.

* Varying patrols.

 

And a great deal of patience for players as the map isn't done yet

Edited November 12, 2011 by Fieldmedic

[Sotha]

@FM

 

You have picked my interest.

 

Just one thing.. Ever after Betrayed, you have been attempting to make something really new and different with your missions. It is, of course, worthwhile to try and break the boundaries. But with these attempts to do things differently, each of the missions have suffered one way or the other.

 

I'm confident that if you focus on the standard TDM stuff that works and really keep it conventional, you *will* have all it takes create best mission for TDM thus far, beating "The Score to Settle."

 

Different entry zones... I'm interested how you are going to implement that? The game presents a clickable gui that teleports the player to the required area?

Varying patrols... You know, before stopping all TDM related projects, I was very interested in making the first mission that used such a thing. Ultimate replayability so that even the mission author would not know where the AI's are patrolling. How were you planning to make it work?

 

I, of course, understand if you want to keep these details to yourself. But since we have similar interests: if you are interested in how I was thinking of implementing the variety thing, drop me PM. I'll gladly give advice and (mental) counsel if you think it would aid your creating process.

 

I wanna see more kickass missions to play for this mod.

[DeTeEff]

Yes, my latest two missions have had a bit too much emphasize on the story and it has been too overwhelming and it has had it's toll on the gameplay.

 

NAOG will be much more "light" on the story and I shall aim for a much better gameplay experience.

 

Not to unveil anything but I can say as much as every difficulty will be an unique experience

 

Haha, I was planning on not mapping any more for a while, but now I'm all fired up on continuing with this beast!

[demagogue]

I was about to say, we've seen different entry zones before with T2 FMs, and they've all used the same approach that Fieldmedic is hinting at. Look at Inverted Manse or Otto's contest FM he spread over 3 days, where you play each day sequentially with a different entry zone for each day. And not just the entry zones were changed; both had the maps populated with different stuff in different arrangements for each version as well IIRC.

[grayman]

Varying patrols... You know, before stopping all TDM related projects, I was very interested in making the first mission that used such a thing. Ultimate replayability so that even the mission author would not know where the AI's are patrolling.

 

I remember that conversation, and that at the end you posted how you were making it happen.

 

Unfortunately, it was a while ago, I've lost track of it, and a bit of forum searching didn't turn it up.

 

Do you have a link to the start of that discussion?

 

I have a mansion map I'm working on with some patrol variability in it, and I wanted to review how it would change if I used your method.

 

Thanks.

[Sotha]

Do you have a link to the start of that discussion?

 

I have a mansion map I'm working on with some patrol variability in it, and I wanted to review how it would change if I used your method.

 

Thanks.

 

Nope, I couldn't find it, lost beneath the heaps of old posts.

 

Basically there are two ways. First one is boring. You have several typical patrol route loops per AI. When the map starts, the AI targets a node that randoms one route for the AI.

 

The second is the more interesting one. You build this dendritic network thingy into your map. Dendritic meaning tree-like, network as in a fishing net structure.

 

Basically you build a network of patrol nodes. The AI walks from the starting node forward until it encounters a spot where it can go into several different directions. Then it chooses randomly the next node. Go left? Go right? Go upstairs? Then it walks to the next crossroads and chooses again. At some point, regardless of the path the AI chose, they end up in the starting node and they start the random walk again. Some loops will be very short. Some will be very long. It all depends on the path the AI happens to use.

 

The cool thing in my experiments was that you can drop several AI's into a single well built network. And it works surprisingly well! I got a bunch of AI walk around in a relatively large city map, as if they were minding their own business. I had no way to predict how or where the AI would be.

 

It all depends in how you build your network. Analyze your map and plan well the deviation points. Which areas form loops, etc.

 

You can simulate life-like behavior by putting low-probability nodes everywhere to spice things up. "Stop warm your hands here 10% of the time", "rarely (5%) inspect this room just to be sure", "occasionally (30%) sit and relax on this chair", "Every now and then (50%) go peek inside the female servants quarters." Since the AI could pop its nose *everywhere* the player will never feel safe again in a room that seemingly is ignored in the patrols.

 

If you have several AIs walking in the same dendritic network and are worrying that they might sit in the same chair, put several chairs in the sitting room and the dendron logic like this:

AI enters the room and walks to the first room node. There are two options there:

80% just patrol past this room, no sitting

20% sit somewhere

 

The first option just sends the AI to the next node outside the room.

The second option targets 5 different sit nodes on 5 different chairs. It is very improbable (but still possible) that two AI's would decide to sit on the same chair simultaneously. It is all about how many AI's you have walking in the network. Once the AI has sat for a while, then it proceeds to the next node outside the room.

 

I would expect the denrditic network type of variation to work best if you have a bunch of dendritic network walking AI's which compliment the static patrol route ones. Static patrols guard the critical locations that must be manned at all times. Network guards wander around and add delightful unpredictability.

 

I was also imaginating how easy it would be to adjust difficulty: easy 2 unpredictable network walking guards, medum 3 and hard 5. All you have to do is spawn more AI that target a single node in the dendritic network. No extra path route definition required. It just works once you have the network in place.

 

As you can probably see, I'm rather excited about this and will definately try to implement this once/if I start working on a mission later. I would also be delighted if someone else would try it. I am confident it will work. I hope you find this interesting. I tried to put everything here in exhaustive detail. Let me know if you had some questions.

[demagogue]

It's an interesting arrangement. If you were going to do that, it goes without saying the map should be conducive to it, with lots of multiple routes, openness, labyrinthine, etc. Also maybe even have the different routes play-off the patrolling variations, e.g., one route could be narrower with more light and fewer hiding places but patrolled by AI a bit less, another route has more hiding places but more likely AI pass through.

[grayman]

Thank you for the details. This is as I remember it, and I asked about it now to see if you had extended the idea in any way.

 

I have a half-dozen AI already patrolling slightly variable routes, but I have a "green room" full of AI waiting in the wings, and I was beginning to get hard pressed to think about where I wanted them to stand or patrol. A dendritic network might just be the answer.

 

Thanks again.

[Springheel]

You can simulate life-like behavior by putting low-probability nodes everywhere to spice things up. "Stop warm your hands here 10% of the time", "rarely (5%) inspect this room just to be sure", "occasionally (30%) sit and relax on this chair", "Every now and then (50%) go peek inside the female servants quarters."

 

It's worth combining this with path_anim nodes as well. I did this in several spots in A Score to Settle, so AI would occasionally stare out windows, scan down side streets, bang on doors, or eat carrots in the kitchen. There are lots of good colour animations that can be used in this way.

[Flanders]

Not to unveil anything but I can say as much as every difficulty will be an unique experience

Let me guess, you can play three different persons? Mage, thief or soldier?

[DeTeEff]

@Flanders: Naaaa, err...hmm, kinda a bit in the right direction, perhaps

 

@Sotha: That is some interresting patrol structure! That will definitely be helpful. Thanks. I used a randomized patrolroute for the people in my garden maze in Reap but it wasn't as sophisticated. In that case the pathways were quite narrow and a collision would cause strange behaviour...

 

On a sidenote, I believe I've found a way to make Reap less frustrating, but it's just a script in my head and those scripts rarely reveal any bugs before they are printed in the script file

[Sotha]

It's worth combining this with path_anim nodes as well. I did this in several spots in A Score to Settle, so AI would occasionally stare out windows, scan down side streets, bang on doors, or eat carrots in the kitchen. There are lots of good colour animations that can be used in this way.

 

Exactly! Without path_anims the AI look a bit robotish. Putting low-probability those everywhere should really bring the scene alive. Dendritic guards hitting trigger multiples could even start up conversations: when the dendritic maid passes by the two static door guards (ie. hits a trigger_multiple reserved for her), the guards start a rough conversation about the maid. If the nodes with peeking, sitting and hand warmings are set as idle only, alarmed AI stop the relaxed activities. You can easily have more guards arrive and put them to walk the network and everyone are searching the premises. There are many things one could accomplish with this.

 

BTW: Do the AI already have the urinating anims? Those would give nice blackjacking oppoturnities.

[raymeld]

A very interesting thread. I've never much liked missions like ' Down in the Bonehorde ' with lots of zombies in them. A Thief 2 The Metal Age original mission I really had a soft spot for though was ' Ambush '. I liked it so much I even played it ' back to front ' the second time i.e running into the ambush instead of away from it and finding my lodgings ( one of the objectives ) from the opposite direction. I just love those big city feel missions with large city maps.But I do like mansion / castle type missions too and sneaking around them. A fan mission I loved was Saturnine's ' The Seventh Crystal ' , Thief 2 I think. I first cottoned on to Thief in my lat (ish ) fifties and I was hooked from the Bafford days. I wonder if I'm the oldest Thief player on here at nearly 69!! I know there was someone in their seventies on the Thief 2 fan mission site at one stage. At one stage I had visions of building my own mission but problems with the hands stopped me and I'm restricted to enjoying yours . So keep them coming folk because I love all the stuff you produce and thank you all for it.

[raymeld]

p.s I have to say too that this is probably one of the friendliest sites I'm privileged to be a member of on the net and I'm involved with a fair few.

[DeTeEff]

When one has produced a FM it's very difficult for me to understand how one cannot be humble to others that are producing missions. It's so much work that goes into creating these things

[Springheel]

BTW: Do the AI already have the urinating anims?

 

I had planned on adding one for aStS, but I never actually got around to finishing it. I still plan on doing it eventually.