Fan Mission: The Threepenny Revue

[Thiefette]

Congrats on the release of your first mission. It was short but sweet. Although I did find it a challenge to get 

Spoiler

in around the guards at the doors. Had a heck of a time finding the rope arrow but everything went well after that. 

Look forward to your next mission, thanks for all your hard work.

[esme]

On 10/8/2023 at 10:58 AM, Marbrien said:

Whereabouts, in Yorkshire perhaps?  I have lived in England all my life, mainly the east midlands, the north west and the south east, and everyone I know pronounces threepenny as threppenny, the double e being pronounced as a short e rather than a long e.  The UK has many accents for a relatively small place, so the pronounciation you suggest may exist, but is not the most common one.

I'm a 65 yo Mancunian, everyone I know pronounced it as "Thrupenny"

[chakkman]

I just finished this mission. Not bad, but, there are some things which would have made the mission better.

Spoiler

I enjoyed the atmosphere and the setting. There could have been a bit more detailled environment, rooms and streets felt a bit empty.

The difficulty was about right. Although I really dislike "no knockout" objectives, especially when they don't make much sense (and, I really don't see a reason why you wouldn't knock someone out on such a mission). I had to play on the medium difficulty for that reason.

I think what the mission suffered the most from was its shortness. Especially with a rope arrow in the mission, I wished there would have been more places to break in. There are quite a few other buildings, so, it surely would have been possible to make some appartments to break in. Also, the tavern could have made with some back room, or a basement (wine cellar?). The theatre also was a bit undetailed. Could have been better with more furniture and ornament, an attic maybe, a basement maybe.

I also got all loot, which is usually never happening, so, that might be an indicator that it was too easy to spot. Although I'm happy, of course, when one time in my life I find all the loot...  

Edited August 7 by chakkman

[Jnon]

Thank you for playing, I'm glad you had fun with it at the very least. This was a first outing with DarkRadiant, and I kept the focus very narrowly on the theater building because I wanted to keep it short and get it out the door in a reasonable time frame. You're not the first person to want to poke around in other buildings, and I can understand the feeling... my favorite Dark Project/Dark Mod maps are things like "Endless Rain", "The Sound of a Burrick in a Room", and "The Painter's Wife"... huge, free-roaming city maps that fold in on themselves and have hidden nooks and crannies everywhere.

The experience making Threepenny gave me enough confidence to keep working, and I'm in the process of making a much more ambitious map right now, one that emulates the exploration heavy free-roam city environments I always love playing. If I can ever get it done, hopefully it'll give players more to scratch the exploration itch.
 

19 hours ago, chakkman said:

There could have been a bit more detailled environment, rooms and streets felt a bit empty

Detailing environments is a weak point, I'll admit... the desire to say "eh, good enough" is always there when there's another area to work on, and I also worry about overdoing things and cluttering up the map too much. If there's any areas in Threepenny in particular that you think are better or worse than others, let me know. It'd help me calibrate my own sense of how much is enough.

 

19 hours ago, chakkman said:

Although I really dislike "no knockout" objectives, especially when they don't make much sense

This might be how I personally see it, but I always viewed the highest difficulty level as "the master thief who challenges himself above and beyond what's needed". In that sense, no knock-outs is like a self-imposed challenge to ghost through the level without anyone even knowing he was there.

 

19 hours ago, chakkman said:

I also got all loot, which is usually never happening, so, that might be an indicator that it was too easy to spot.

I did want to keep this map as quick and simple as possible, but I also fall into the trap of being too logical with loot placement. "Of course all the valuables go in the safe, with an expensive bottle of wine or two in the wine cellar... where else would the valuable things be?" I like Immersive Sim best when it builds an environment that reflects the reality of the characters and the environment they live in... but with that said, tucking a few surprises away in unexpected corners should be part of the fun too. I'm trying to keep this in mind with the new map I'm working on, and throw a few more curveballs with loot placement.

Anyway, thanks for the feedback.

[chakkman]

25 minutes ago, Jnon said:

This might be how I personally see it, but I always viewed the highest difficulty level as "the master thief who challenges himself above and beyond what's needed". In that sense, no knock-outs is like a self-imposed challenge to ghost through the level without anyone even knowing he was there.

Can always do that without a mandatory objective though.

A good example for where and when such an objective makes sense is the "Casing the joint" mission in Thief 2. Or, the mission where you visit the police station, to frame Lieutenant Hagen. But, I really can't see how it would make sense in this mission. 

It's your mission and your decision, just saying that such objectives should in my eyes be treated carefully, as they limit the way the player can approach the mission and the game, and, I always find it very beneficial when there's more than one way to play a mission or a game. That's why you allowed 3 ways of entries to the theatre, and not just a single one.

There's also a singificant difference between no knockout and no kill objectives. No kill objectives are absolutely understandable in the context of a break-in which shouldn't bring too much "heat" on the thief and his employer or fences, but, no one will care if the thief who robbed someone of all he has knocked some guards out in the process. 

Edited August 8 by chakkman

[Jnon]

47 minutes ago, chakkman said:

Can always do that without a mandatory objective though

That's a fair point

[thebigh]

Yeah, Threepenny Revue is one of the shorter and easier missions. But I think it's nice that TDM has a range of different mission sizes and difficulties. Not everything has to be a gigantic sprawling masterpiece.