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ricon

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What I enjoyed the most in the Thief games was the hiding/sneaking idea with a great story behind.

Having a line of continuity in a game, brings more realism. In The Dark Mod it seems that there is not that. I played some missions some years ago. Then I left, now I am back and I would like to know if there is any kind of story mod, or lits of missions with continuity that brings the sense of realism and immersion in the TDM world, as Thief did.

So, what do you think?

 

Thank you!

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Most mission authors create a connected series of missions with a continuous story. Checkout the William Steele Series by Grayman, the Shadows of Northdale Series by Goldwell or the Thomas Porter Series by Sotha. There is also the No Honor Among Thieves Campaign by GoldChocobo.

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In addition to the previously mentioned there is also the Chronicles of Skulduggery series by Bienie, and Kingsal has the Volta series.

 

Plus you've got Requiem and it's sequel A House of Locked Secrets by Moonbo.

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16 hours ago, ricon said:

What I enjoyed the most in the Thief games was the hiding/sneaking idea with a great story behind.

Having a line of continuity in a game, brings more realism. In The Dark Mod it seems that there is not that. 

That's definitely something I miss as well. As mentioned though, there are at least some mission series, which have a bit of that. Even though I'd still prefer 20 missions with one story behind it, of course, and a consistent gameplay. But, that's probably not very realistic.

Edited by chakkman
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One thing that was very cool in the Thief campaign besides the story was, that you could take your stolen goods and buy equipment from it in the next mission. 

"Einen giftigen Trank aus Kräutern und Wurzeln für die närrischen Städter wollen wir brauen." - Text aus einem verlassenen Heidenlager

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7 hours ago, chakkman said:

That's definitely something I miss as well. As mentioned though, there are at least some mission series, which have a bit of that. Even though I'd still prefer 20 missions with one story behind it, of course, and a consistent gameplay. But, that's probably not very realistic.

I agree.

Its also very good to have this community creating great missions, but it would be hard to create a consistent set of conected missions. I would love that too! But in a fan game we cannot have that. At least we have the most similar game to Thief so far. If I search on internet, I only see crap 😞

There is a very distint game, that I love so much as Thief, and thats Deus Ex, but they are different in the mood they create. I really love DeusEx too. Thief, Deus Ex, Ufo-Xcom and a few more games are in the Top5 of my list I think.

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  • 2 months later...
On 5/10/2020 at 10:45 PM, ricon said:

What I enjoyed the most in the Thief games was the hiding/sneaking idea with a great story behind.

Having a line of continuity in a game, brings more realism. In The Dark Mod it seems that there is not that. I played some missions some years ago. Then I left, now I am back and I would like to know if there is any kind of story mod, or lits of missions with continuity that brings the sense of realism and immersion in the TDM world, as Thief did.

So, what do you think?

 

Thank you!

You have plenty of missions that weave together a continuing or otherwise interconnected story: https://wiki.thedarkmod.com/index.php?title=Fan_Mission_Series

I think the lack of a campaign is, strangely, a bit of a benefit. Yes, we could make a whole official campaign or keep extending the existing one with Corbin (he's the closest we have to a Garrett figure), but I actually prefer the more "shared universe", anthology approach of mission authors. Mission series have been a thing since the earliest days of this project and have only been getting more common, not less common, precisely because mission authors see the benefit of a continuing storyline with some main and recurring characters.

Also, people crying that "lacking a campaign means TDM is not a real game" is really getting on my nerves at this point. This game is in development and available online for free. We don't, can't and wouldn't want to make any money off of it. Financial donations are also pointless. Talent donations, tangible contributions, is how this game can keep on moving forward.

 

Speaking entirely for myself, and anyone can disagree with my opinion, extending the campaign we already have - the mission at the inn, then at St. Lucia's church, then some further missions after that - would be the best way to create an official campaign for TDM. I think that past efforts, with the idea that we need to have this stupendously impressive campaign, where every single mission is going to be a blow-your-socks-off affair, is part of why we haven't created such a campaign until now. The man hours needed and the sheer ambition are just overblown. The perfect is the enemy of the good. I feel that, contrary to what some Thief veterans might think, having a game that has an official campaign welcoming to both complete newbies and old pros is a far better route than a monumentally ambitious and impressive campaign that satisfies only a few die-hards, and frustrates others due to its length, scope, and sheer over-indulgence. If we strive for overly lofty heights, we'll end up with a game equivalent of Cimino's Heaven's Gate. Bloated, self-indulgent, potentially incomprehensible and irritating.

I'm a "less is more" kind of guy. No hand-holding beyond the training mission, but start the players off easily enough, with the inn mission we have, then it gets a little harder at St. Lucia's, then we create a similarly small-in-scope and once again slightly more difficult, but entertaining and pretty-looking mission. And then another, and another. Gradually expand the campaign to some 10 or 12 missions, and you have an official campaign that'll entertain newcomers and veterans alike. And then they can play all the other mission series or one-off episodic mission, whatever they like. By that, I don't mean finishing the official campaign would be compulsory. No. It's just that it will serve as a natural introductory point for most new players of The Dark Mod. The more incentive we give players to have fun and finish the official campaign, the better. Make the missions bite-sized, not technically overdone, and make them fun, and we might have a real Keeper (Thief pun intended).

I think it's telling that, over the years, far more people new to TDM have asked "What missions would be good for a newbie ? Which do you recommend ?", rather than "Where's the big blockbuster official campaign that will bring me into pure gaming ecstasy ?". Tellingly, already a while back, I compiled a whole wiki article just about these recommendations, because people were asking them so frequently: https://wiki.thedarkmod.com/index.php?title=Mission_recommendation_discussions

Including a recommended list of simple enough, shorter missions, to start them off with something smaller, simple, but entertaining. The fans, especially new ones, want more accessible things before they can move on to the more demanding missions. More accessible isn't about dumbing down, it's about respecting the natural need for a learning curve. :)

Edited by Petike the Taffer
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On 5/11/2020 at 10:50 PM, SeriousToni said:

you could take your stolen goods and buy equipment from it in the next mission.

I agree and disagree. It makes little sense to steal a bunch of money that you never get to spend, and it would give the hypothetical campaign some sense of continuity to have carryover loot. The problem is that DM missions are geared towards minimal use of tools. DM isn't like the original Thief duology where buying and using dozen water arrows makes sense. The engine, and the skills of most mappers, better fit the sparing and minimalist style.

21 minutes ago, Petike the Taffer said:

Speaking entirely for myself, and anyone can disagree with my opinion, extending the campaign we already have - the mission at the inn, then at St. Lucia's church, then some further missions after that - would be the best way to create an official campaign for TDM.

I think a long campaign would only be good with some advance planning. Although divided into missions, the campaign would need to be a coherent whole. It wouldn't be enough to just take some random missions, slap them together, and call it a campaign. LGS may have gotten away with that in Thief 2, but they're just that good. No disrespect to the DM community, but we are not LGS.

Did you ever play the fan campaign Shadows of the Metal Age? That was planned out from the beginning, and each level fit properly into that plan. A big glorious DM campaign would need that level of forethought and commitment.

21 minutes ago, Petike the Taffer said:

we might have a real Keeper

That's something missing from the DM universe right now. We've got the City Watch, the nobility,  the Pagans, and the Builders which are obviously inspired by organisations from the original Thief games. Even the mysterious Moors are reminiscent of the Hand Brotherhood in a way. But I haven't seen an analogue to the Keepers yet.

Edited by thebigh
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My missions:           Stand-alone                                                      Duncan Lynch series                              

                                      Down and Out on Newford Road              the Factory Heist

                                                                                                  A House Call

                                                                                                  The House of deLisle                                                                                                  

                              

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On 7/26/2020 at 12:42 PM, thebigh said:

I agree and disagree. It makes little sense to steal a bunch of money that you never get to spend, and it would give the hypothetical campaign some sense of continuity to have carryover loot. The problem is that DM missions are geared towards minimal use of tools. DM isn't like the original Thief duology where buying and using dozen water arrows makes sense. The engine, and the skills of most mappers, better fit the sparing and minimalist style.

Yes, I think this makes a good deal of sense. Buying equipment in between missions isn't a must. Maybe a potential official campaign could use it a few times as a concept (some TDM mission series do it, if the package includes more than a single mission), but I don't think we should copy the Thief approach wholesale. Even Thief didn't have the shop menu before every single mission, if it made sense to omit it for the sake of the story.

On 7/26/2020 at 12:42 PM, thebigh said:

I agree and disagree. It makes little sense to steal a bunch of money that you never get to spend, and it would give the hypothetical campaign some sense of continuity to have carryover loot. The problem is that DM missions are geared towards minimal use of tools. DM isn't like the original Thief duology where buying and using dozen water arrows makes sense. The engine, and the skills of most mappers, better fit the sparing and minimalist style.

I think a long campaign would only be good with some advance planning. Although divided into missions, the campaign would need to be a coherent whole. It wouldn't be enough to just take some random missions, slap them together, and call it a campaign. LGS may have gotten away with that in Thief 2, but they're just that good. No disrespect to the DM community, but we are not LGS.

Did you ever play the fan campaign Shadows of the Metal Age? That was planned out from the beginning, and each level fit properly into that plan. A big glorious DM campaign would need that level of forethought and commitment.

That's something missing from the DM universe right now. We've got the City Watch, the nobility,  the Pagans, and the Builders which are obviously inspired by organisations from the original Thief games. Even the mysterious Moors are reminiscent of the Hand Brotherhood in a way. But I haven't seen an analogue to the Keepers yet.

Never got to playing T2X, because every install .exe I've downloaded, ever, has never worked on my computer. Not on XP, not on 7, nothing. I never could get the install .exe itself to work, despite it being straight off the mod site. I still don't understand where people got T2X from. As for the total conversion itself, I liked what they did with it, it was a fine fanfic expansion to TMA. So much so that, if there were to be a Thief series or film, I'd have Zaya made a canon recurring character that shows up occassionally during the events of TMA. We might get some lady thief characters sooner or later, I'm part of a minor audio project to enable the creation of a potential female player character in TDM.

Concerning the Keepers or the Hand Brotherhood, we already have the Mages and the Hermetic Order in Bridgeport, potentially other cities in the Empire and setting as well. The setting also has necromancers, but they're described as scattered, individual dabblers in arcane or forbidden magic, rather than some highly organized order of magic practitioners.

To tell you the truth, I never fully got the appeal of "Ahhh, Thief needs to have loads of magic and mysticism...". They're good distractions, good extra material, but something seen as key to the setting ? Not so much, at least to me. And I say that as someone who regards the Keeper faction as his absolute favourite from the trilogy, so it's not me being a Negative Nelly about the Keepers. I just think that, like the Mechanists, the Keepers don't need a direct analogue in TDM. We're a Thief homage, not a wholesale plagiarising of Thief. LGS did the hard work over twenty years ago, we're doing our own thing and showing appreciation, but we shouldn't retread their ground. Certainly not in too similar a way, and not just for copyright reasons, but also creative reasons.

Edited by Petike the Taffer
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