Fan Mission: The House of deLisle

[thebigh]

5 hours ago, Marbrien said:

Can all the secrets be found before you take the necklace?

Spoiler

The gemstone in the lava pit is present on all difficulties. One secret disappears for good once the house seals you in, but that one is very hard to find and only worth a small amount of gold so it shouldn't make a difference between making or missing the loot goal. The other three you can get any time.

 

[Cambridge Spy]

Here's my video playthrough of the House of DeLisle:

 

 

[tib]

On 10/2/2023 at 11:37 PM, thebigh said:

  Hide contents

Look for a room full of dry, easily flammable material and it will catch alight on its own.

 

Well, thanks for this, i could never imagine that those books could catch fire from a pot full of mushrooms.

In readables also no content about it. Definitely not yours best one.

P.S. Constructive criticism.

[Zerg Rush]

23 minutes ago, tib said:

Well, thanks for this, i could never imagine that those books could catch fire from a pot full of mushrooms.

In readables also no content about it. Definitely not yours best one.

P.S. Constructive criticism.

In the readible appears that this Mushrooms can burn, with this information and a room full of flamable papers and books, result in a 1+1 clue, i think. At least for me it was clear, only somewhat struggeling to find all Mushrooms and carry the pot upstairs to this room.

Edited October 4, 2023 by Zerg Rush

[tib]

4 minutes ago, Zerg Rush said:

In the readible appears that this Mushrooms can burn, with this information and a room full of flamable papers and books, result in a 1+1 clue, i think. At least for me it was clear, only somewhat struggeling to find all Mushrooms and carry the pot upstairs to this room.

O.K. for me it wasn't clear. But next time i will await in TDM that i can make fire on water.

[Zerg Rush]

5 hours ago, tib said:

O.K. for me it wasn't clear. But next time i will await in TDM that i can make fire on water.

Not so difficult, when you use Mushrooms with a high enough Sodiumlevel. There are also other elements with a strong exothermic reaktion with water.

 

Edited October 4, 2023 by Zerg Rush

[tib]

11 minutes ago, Zerg Rush said:

Not so difficult, when you use Mushrooms with a high enough Sodiumlevel. There are also other elements with a strong exothermic reaktion with water.

 

Alright, just pls don't try put pot of mushrooms on your bookshelves Mr. Zerg Rush

[thebigh]

I've never been one to make levels that hold the player's hand all the way through. The difficulty should gradually increase as you progress and the "Aha!" moment you get from solving a puzzle is worth a few moments of head-scratching.

[Marbrien]

I too was puzzled by what to do with

Spoiler

the pot of mushrooms. The "soup" was glowing but did not seem to be alight, so I assumed I had to light it.  I tried the available flames in fireplaces and torches, but wasn't surprised they did nothing because they were of the "supernatural" variety. 

Eventually I stumbled on the solution, and was told to run, but wasn't sure where.  A new wine cellar appeared after I took the necklace, so I wondered if I needed to find a new exit,

Spoiler

before realisining  the original exit was available again. 

But none of this tipped me over into outright frustration; I thought it was a really good mission.  The only slight gripe I have is about the secret which Cambridge Spy's video shows at the starting place, and which is presumably inaccessible once the house has locked you in.  I think I found all the others.

[thebigh]

Thanks! Glad you enjoyed it.

[Zerg Rush]

On 10/4/2023 at 11:24 PM, thebigh said:

I've never been one to make levels that hold the player's hand all the way through. The difficulty should gradually increase as you progress and the "Aha!" moment you get from solving a puzzle is worth a few moments of head-scratching.

I confess that with some missions I have had quite a few problems, with puzzles that were not very clear in the readables (also due to very small letters or handwritings, with my old eyes i sometimes leave traces of my nose in the screen), as happens for sure to others also whose native language is not English. It will be much harder for those to finish it.
But I don't think this mission falls into this category, where the main challenges are a good level of stealth and not so much the puzzles.

[tib]

On 10/4/2023 at 11:24 PM, thebigh said:

I've never been one to make levels that hold the player's hand all the way through. The difficulty should gradually increase as you progress and the "Aha!" moment you get from solving a puzzle is worth a few moments of head-scratching.

You have made a great leap forward, using interactive introducing in the begining, using medailon like in The H.O.L.S., nice timed effects etc. The puzzle is also very good chalenge just if it is logical. Still miss the logic of putting a pot of mushrooms to papers making fire. If you can describe me this process closely, maybe i change my opinion that this is a huge mistake in this nice adventure. I really thought that i need to put that pot somewhere where the lightning can reach it...
So, take in consideriation to the next version patch this: 1. at least give player a slow match or some true source of fire... 2. make a sound effect when the sealed door is magicaly unsealed (also it will be great to use a random pattern e.g. bricks, if mention this). Good wishes.

 

[tapewolf]

Nice, I enjoyed that.  The death sequence is impressive, deceptively clever and impressively creepy.

 

EDIT: As for the puzzle which has stumped some people, the readables do tell you exactly why and what you should be doing.  Just not where.  I didn't have an issue with that apart from lugging the thing from floor to floor to try and find the right spot.

 

For people wondering about the secrets, since I haven't seen a list yet, I've now found 5 on easy difficulty - my default when playing a new mission.  I've not tried the higher levels yet.

These are:

Spoiler

1. At the starting location, a pocket can be picked.  This will become impossible once all objectives are met since revisiting the location will end the mission.

2. In the attic is a jewellery box

3. The jewels in the grating basement, as others have mentioned

4. In the dining room, there is a little something near the chimney

5. In the front room, there is a hole in the ceiling.  I've not found any rope arrows so to get there you will have to ferry crates and suchlike from the attic to build a tower of babel.  This will not be easy if the lord has gone into murder mode, though it is possible to jam the doors with crates and trap him in the kitchen, which is what I did.

Hope that's useful!

Edited October 7, 2023 by tapewolf

[JackFarmer]

Looks great, sounds great & creepy atmosphere...plus, all these cool effects, the lighting and the details!

...this image gives a good impression of the overall mood:

Spoiler

 

Question:

Spoiler

I have put two mushrooms in the pot in the kitchen, but nothing happens. I cannot remove them, I cannot take the pot...plus, I have the feeling, that the oven is out. What is my mistake? When I first came to this kitchen (before you could pick the mushrooms), the pot was already frobable, touched it, and something happened, but can't say what.

 

[thebigh]

Spoiler

The first time you frobbed the pot, you poured the contents out onto the floor. There are five white mushrooms hidden around the house. Once you put them all into the pot it becomes carriable.

 

[datiswous]

Spoiler

On 10/1/2023 at 12:19 AM, thebigh said:

The key to the locked room in the basement is by the headless corpse in the attic tower. The dead guy took it with him when he hid up there.

Spoiler

I can't find the attic tower. I can see a headless corpse sitting at a table, but he doesn't have a key. So I still can't open the door.

I tried multiple times by now, I cannot find what you describe.

Edited October 8, 2023 by datiswous

[thebigh]

There's a little hatch in the attic near the spinning wheel that you can pick open to get into the tower. It's directly above the staircase.

[datiswous]

Ok thanks. I'm not sure if I will continue though, it seems the kind of mission for if you like Mother Rose and I hate that mission.

The visuals are stunning though and the story is decent too.

Edited October 8, 2023 by datiswous

[thebigh]

Fair enough. Not everyone has to like every mission.

[datiswous]

10 hours ago, thebigh said:

There's a little hatch in the attic near the spinning wheel that you can pick open to get into the tower. It's directly above the staircase.

Is there actually a clue in the mission how to find the attic? I only found the entrence after nocliping around.

Edited October 9, 2023 by datiswous

[thebigh]

 If you get to the locked door at the end of the cellar there is a crumpled note on the floor that mentions a secret hatch in the bedroom.

[MirceaKitsune]

Was going to try this one out but apparently there's an error that doesn't even let the map load:

FM installed from the official mission download menu, TDM dev16829-10455 on Linux.

[thebigh]

That's weird. I just tried it with the exact same setup (linux, dev16829-10455, fresh install from the in-game downloader) and I am not getting that bug.

Are you using any mods? I don't use any except the stealth stats one, and I haven't tested the map with various mods installed. Maybe one of those is interfering.

[MirceaKitsune]

37 minutes ago, thebigh said:

That's weird. I just tried it with the exact same setup (linux, dev16829-10455, fresh install from the in-game downloader) and I am not getting that bug.

Are you using any mods? I don't use any except the stealth stats one, and I haven't tested the map with various mods installed. Maybe one of those is interfering.

Oh, I see it now! Does this FM...

Spoiler

Attach anything to a spider? I made a patch long ago to disable those as I have arachnophobia, to the point that even seeing them in TDM makes it impossible to play. Seems removing its pk4 fixes it: This is going to be a mentally challenging FM to deal with if those are present... good occasion to engage in some masochism while dealing with my phobia I guess

 

[thebigh]

Spoiler

Yep, that'll be it. I attached some searchlight beams to two of them. I suppose any patch that removes the spiders will need to remove anything bound to them as well.