Jump to content
The Dark Mod Forums

Dark Mod Pre-Beta Download links and discussion.


New Horizon

Recommended Posts

  • Replies 361
  • Created
  • Last Reply

Top Posters In This Topic

wewt! bugg!

 

*Step one, fire arrow at base of door some moss "attaches" it's self vertically to the door's surface*

*Step two, open door, moss stays floating in air*

*step three, try to move through door and laugh as I have to jump over the moss because it blocks pathing*

I'm in yur forumz,

Makin' them frobbable.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Really? Heh, that's cool. I never got to play Thievery. :(

 

How did they deal with the mentioned exploits? Or did they just ignore them?

My games | Public Service Announcement: TDM is not set in the Thief universe. The city in which it takes place is not the City from Thief. The player character is not called Garrett. Any person who contradicts these facts will be subjected to disapproving stares.
Link to comment
Share on other sites

They dealt with it by not allowing the guard to climb ropes but ladders yes. They could also fight while on the ladder, so you couldn't really get close to them without being wacked.

 

As for arrows - IMO right now it is more an exploit then if the guards were able to climb ladders, as now you can shoot them freely from a safe place (top of ladder) without them being able to do anything about it, while if you were shooting them while they climb, it would mean you could get one or two arrows off at most before fleeing/dying.

 

In an ideal situation, the guards would be covering their head with their armor while climbing (so arm pads etc) unless you were in range of attack in which case they swing their sword etc at you. They would climb with their sword out when alert, but with their sword away when not alert. This means 6 anims:

* Climb up with sword out

* Climb up without sword

* Climb down with sword out

* Climb down without sword

* Attack with sword up

* Attack with sword down

 

That would also mean 2 more anims for mounting and dismounting the ladder top and bottom (you could play them in reverse for the opposite).

 

 

To summarize: Ladders are more an exploit now what with the top being a safe zone then with AI being able to climb and you shoot them while they climb.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Personally I would take the easy way out. Either leave as now with no climbing. That's acceptable imo. Or just give them one simple animation climbing/descending without weapon (presume the same anim reversed?) and accept any oddities that may occur. Maybe a simple test without animation - just enable AI to go up and down ladders - then extensive testplay to see if it is acceptable.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

To summarize: Ladders are more an exploit now what with the top being a safe zone then with AI being able to climb and you shoot them while they climb.

 

Shooting them while they climb is only one of the possible problems with ladders. What about the other two?

 

right now it is more an exploit then if the guards were able to climb ladders, as now you can shoot them freely from a safe place (top of ladder) without them being able to do anything about it,

 

AI currently just run around in circles if you're at the top of a ladder. Obviously they should take cover or run to get missile backup (assuming there is no other way up) just like they should if you were in any other unreachable place shooting arrows.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Shooting them while they climb is only one of the possible problems with ladders. What about the other two?

AI currently just run around in circles if you're at the top of a ladder. Obviously they should take cover or run to get missile backup (assuming there is no other way up) just like they should if you were in any other unreachable place shooting arrows.

 

Should we continue this discussion in the internal coding forum? :unsure:

"The reasonable man adapts himself to the world; the unreasonable one persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore, all progress depends on the unreasonable man." -- George Bernard Shaw (1856 - 1950)

 

"Remember: If the game lets you do it, it's not cheating." -- Xarax

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Shooting them while they climb is only one of the possible problems with ladders. What about the other two?

AI currently just run around in circles if you're at the top of a ladder. Obviously they should take cover or run to get missile backup (assuming there is no other way up) just like they should if you were in any other unreachable place shooting arrows.

 

Just read the 3 reasons against.

 

True, blocking the ladder is an exploit indeed, and ladders like that in the Horn of Quintus are a problem also. I guess in general it is better to wait till all the other features are done before we consider implementing this.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 3 weeks later...

You guys should play Assassin's Creed, the guards can do everything the player can, such as jumping across roof tops, jumping along beams, climbing ladders etc. It's pretty funny to see guards chasing you all over the city, literally up the walls and stuff. Oh, they can also mantle up walls.

I always assumed I'd taste like boot leather.

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Yeah, but how smart are they? How's their path-finding? I suspect that they're not very good at routing based on where they can climb or jump. Routing for wall-climbing should be fairly easy, as it's essentially vertical floor with obstacles, but I'm not seeing how they could handle jumping in the general case--or for that matter, mantling. They could be using special AI flags to mark jumping, rather than relying on good path-finding or preprocessing.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Actually the AI pathfinding in Assassins Creed is extremely impressive to me. I couldn't believe my eyes seeing them chase me all over the city up walls and ledges, across rooftops, jumping gaps and doing everying I can do!

shadowdark50.gif keep50.gif
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Actually I read that although they used alot of algorithms designed for the Prince of Persia games, the pathfinding in Assasin's Crossing... er Creed... Was quite a bit more involved and was a partial cause for gameplay trailers to be released so late in the development cycle since they had nearly finalized most aspects of the game before the pathing and persuit AI was complete, and at one point it was even heading off the player causing severe frustration. (I'll try and find a link later)

I'm in yur forumz,

Makin' them frobbable.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 1 month later...

If anyones interested I have managed to get the thiefs den demo installing and running via GarrettLoader (albeit a slightly modified version which I aim to release soon, version 1.44).

 

Anyway heres what I did to make it GarrettLoader ready (setting it up in the right zip format):

 

1. Download thiefs_den.exe and copy it to a temp folder called DMOD

2. Run thiefs_den.exe. A thiefs_den folder will be created.

3. I moved the DevIL.dll out of the thiefs_den folder and into the DMOD folder.

4. I also moved the thiefs_den.txt file to the root DMOD folder (so that GL can pick up this info to display in GL).

5. I then zipped up the contents of the DMOD folder (so the folder structure remains the same but the 2 files mentioned are moved out of the thiefs_den folder.

 

And there it is, GarrettLoader ready. The zip file created is 258mb in size though.

 

Just for info, the DLL was moved so that the install puts it in the right place in the DOOM 3 folder and so that GL can copy it to windows\system32 easier.

 

GL version 1.41 could nearly handle this properly, however the structuring of the folder used while playing and the launch command were slightly wrong (they worked with most DOOM 3 FMs).

 

I'll post a link to a test patched version of GL sometime next week if you want to test it out.

 

 

I have however also suffered the crashing and PC hang other people have had , I did a driver update via windows update (so its probably not the latest drivers) which has improved it as its not crashing much now, I'll do a proper update of my graphics drivers soon and test again.

Edited by potterr

GL16x16.gifNEW 03/Sept/06 GarrettLoader 1.41 GL is a replacement for Darkloader which plays SS2, Doom 3 & Thief 3 FMs as well. With support for Half Life 1 and 2 and a lot more games as well.

GL's FM Scores System

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Yeah, but how smart are they? How's their path-finding? I suspect that they're not very good at routing based on where they can climb or jump. Routing for wall-climbing should be fairly easy, as it's essentially vertical floor with obstacles, but I'm not seeing how they could handle jumping in the general case--or for that matter, mantling. They could be using special AI flags to mark jumping, rather than relying on good path-finding or preprocessing.

Jumping and mantling can be done reasonably "easily" - you just need to do enough precomputation of reachabilities. (I've put quotations marks around "easily" because it's a bit of a pain to implement, but the theory is straightforward enough.) From pathfinding's point of view it's not much different than being able to walk between two adjacent pathfinding nodes on a flat surface; the AI just does a few slightly more involved things with physics and animations to execute the movement. You do need quite a few more animations to get it looking good (if you can do it procedurally ala Euphoria, even better), but it's doable if you have the manpower.

 

The Doom 3 AAS code actually has stubs for a whole bunch of movement types, like jumping and crouching and so forth, which is left over from Quake 3 (D3's AAS is basically ripped straight from Q3). It doesn't actually work, but the enumeration values are there, and it could in theory be made to work. It's a bit more of pain without the full engine source code than it would be otherwise, but we do have enough access even with the SDK to hack around AAS limitations. That's how AI handling of doors and elevators (as seen here) works, for example.

 

I can unequivocally state, however, that The Dark Mod will not have jumping and crouching AI on release. Or ladder-climbing AI for that matter (ladder climbing is actually a fair bit more complicated, as there are some nasty exploitable edge cases; search the forums if you're interested, there were some previous discussions on this). Unlike Ubisoft, we don't have the manpower. :)

My games | Public Service Announcement: TDM is not set in the Thief universe. The city in which it takes place is not the City from Thief. The player character is not called Garrett. Any person who contradicts these facts will be subjected to disapproving stares.
Link to comment
Share on other sites

If anyones interested I have managed to get the thiefs den demo installing and running via GarrettLoader (albeit a slightly modified version which I aim to release soon, version 1.44).

 

Great to hear you got it all working. :)

 

We do have our own fully functioning FM loader built into our main menu, that swaps missions in an out of place, but it's always nice to have options. :)

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 1 month later...

Perhaps this is not the place of the question(and maybe someone had asked it), but can the FM makers create subtitles (or will be subtitles in your campaign?)? Because in Doom 3, there aren't any subtitles. It would be REALLY important for those who's mother language is not English (for example me). The demo is fantastic, the viktrola music is FAR more better than any in Thief 3.

Edited by Gerratt
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Hi Gerratt. We're not making a campaign, we're making a mapping toolset. There will be a few maps released with the toolset to show what it can do, but not a campaign.

 

I don't think we have any plans to add subtitles to those maps, but some fan mission authors may do this in the future.

 

Perhaps this is not the place of the question(and maybe someone had asked it), but can the FM makers create subtitles (or will be subtitles in your campaign?)? Because in Doom 3, there aren't any subtitles. It would be REALLY important for those who's mother language is not English (for example me). The demo is fantastic, the viktrola music is FAR more better than any in Thief 3.
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.


  • Recent Status Updates

    • Petike the Taffer

      I've finally managed to log in to The Dark Mod Wiki. I'm back in the saddle and before the holidays start in full, I'll be adding a few new FM articles and doing other updates. Written in Stone is already done.
      · 4 replies
    • nbohr1more

      TDM 15th Anniversary Contest is now active! Please declare your participation: https://forums.thedarkmod.com/index.php?/topic/22413-the-dark-mod-15th-anniversary-contest-entry-thread/
       
      · 0 replies
    • JackFarmer

      @TheUnbeholden
      You cannot receive PMs. Could you please be so kind and check your mailbox if it is full (or maybe you switched off the function)?
      · 1 reply
    • OrbWeaver

      I like the new frob highlight but it would nice if it was less "flickery" while moving over objects (especially barred metal doors).
      · 4 replies
    • nbohr1more

      Please vote in the 15th Anniversary Contest Theme Poll
       
      · 0 replies
×
×
  • Create New...