idea for an annoying obstacle ...

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AuthorTopic: idea for an annoying obstacle ...
Agent
Member # 1993
Profile #0
Since you invented night an day on surface, you could introduce office-hours. It is not normal, that you can trade and get missions the whole night, every tradeunion would cry out.
Of course, you could still travel, fight enemies or go for a sleep. Resting will change the game to daylight.
is this an annoying idea? ;)

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Slartucker: * facepalm facepalm facepalm *
Dikiyoba: Are you unconscious yet?
Posts: 1420 | Registered: Wednesday, October 2 2002 07:00
The Establishment
Member # 6
Profile #1
Good luck implementing it.

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Your flower power is no match for my glower power!
Posts: 3726 | Registered: Tuesday, September 18 2001 07:00
Warrior
Member # 1460
Profile #2
I kind of like the idea of your people needing rest. It would make the game much more realistic. Suddenly there would acually be a practical use for rooms to rest in. I'd like to see the factor of having food come back into play. Like how it was in the Exiles. Probably almost near impossible to implement the whole rest thing, but food maybe.

Also at night maybe most people should go to sleep, and leave the streets and go to their homes.

[ Monday, December 29, 2003 03:10: Message edited by: Cho Dan ]

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If you don't drink milk from your mother, why drink it from a cow?
Posts: 72 | Registered: Monday, July 8 2002 07:00
Triad Mage
Member # 7
Profile Homepage #3
Well, it would be possible with the VTE equivalent.

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"At times discretion should be thrown aside, and with the foolish we should play the fool." - Menander
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Posts: 9436 | Registered: Wednesday, September 19 2001 07:00
Guardian
Member # 2238
Profile Homepage #4
I don't see how this could be so hard. Whenever it reaches "night", you send a script or something moving all the people into houses, and open up the black-market. It's a great idea, I do believe, and deserves some testing to see if it will actually work.

On a side note, this feature is what many claim to be a major point-dropper in RPGs these days. Games that have such interactive worlds (ES3:Morrowind) but lack any idea of what time of day it is, really lose points in a reviewer's head.

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DEMON PLAY,
DEMON OUT!
Posts: 1582 | Registered: Wednesday, November 13 2002 08:00
Shaper
Member # 73
Profile #5
Having the party need to rest was done in Revenge, a BoE scenario by the Creator. I don't see why it would be any harder to do in BoA.

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Posts: 2957 | Registered: Thursday, October 4 2001 07:00
The Establishment
Member # 6
Profile #6
Because there is no 'night' checking script. In BoE, we simulated night. In BoA, night is just a natural cycle.

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Your flower power is no match for my glower power!
Posts: 3726 | Registered: Tuesday, September 18 2001 07:00
Triad Mage
Member # 7
Profile Homepage #7
But there is a turn checker. And even though Jeff acknowledges that it's incredibly screwed up, it could be utilized.

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"At times discretion should be thrown aside, and with the foolish we should play the fool." - Menander
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Posts: 9436 | Registered: Wednesday, September 19 2001 07:00
...b10010b...
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Profile Homepage #8
If it's anything like the timers in BoE, it'll run at different speeds in towns compared to outdoors, which is no good at all if we want the day to keep coinciding with, well, daytime.

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The Empire Always Loses: This Time For Sure!
Posts: 9973 | Registered: Saturday, March 30 2002 08:00
The Establishment
Member # 6
Profile #9
Yes, we have the turn checker, but for some reason I have my doubts as to the stability of it over the course of an entire scenario.

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Your flower power is no match for my glower power!
Posts: 3726 | Registered: Tuesday, September 18 2001 07:00
Agent
Member # 1993
Profile #10
You think, it is not possible to synchronize the timers of in- and outdoors? I am just a stupid user and don't know the secrets of writing games ...

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Slartucker: * facepalm facepalm facepalm *
Dikiyoba: Are you unconscious yet?
Posts: 1420 | Registered: Wednesday, October 2 2002 07:00
Guardian
Member # 2238
Profile Homepage #11
All with good reason. That's why we need some, ahem, beta testers to be checking into this.

It's not that big a deal anyway, we can still simulate the effect thru graphic changes.

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DEMON PLAY,
DEMON OUT!
Posts: 1582 | Registered: Wednesday, November 13 2002 08:00
BoE Posse
Member # 112
Profile #12
Heh. Rest-checking ala Revenge is possible, but far from easy. There'd only be about five designers who could do it.

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Posts: 1423 | Registered: Sunday, October 7 2001 07:00
...b10010b...
Member # 869
Profile Homepage #13
The best way I can think of is to put a timer in every town and outdoor section that increments an SDF, and a scenario timer that checks that SDF, provides warning messages about the party needing to sleep when the SDF reaches certain values, and eventually kills them if they don't get some rest before it hits, say, 100.

But how you'd prevent people from standing in place like you did in Revenge is beyond me, short of using yet another scenario timer that increments yet another SDF and kills the party if it gets too high, and giving every single type of floor terrain a "calls scenario special when stepped on" property that resets the SDF to which the timer is attached.

Of course, you always seem to find more elegant solutions to scenario design problems than I do, so you probably did it some better way.

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The Empire Always Loses: This Time For Sure!
Posts: 9973 | Registered: Saturday, March 30 2002 08:00
The Establishment
Member # 6
Profile #14
quote:
Originally written by [E.E.P.:
Karzoth]
All with good reason. That's why we need some, ahem, beta testers to be checking into this.

There is only so much we as beta-testers can do...

Either way, there will be limitations on what can and cannot be done. I'm not saying that it cannot be done, but that it would be difficult to do and you would need to be careful if you ever have things that move time forward, etc.

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Your flower power is no match for my glower power!
Posts: 3726 | Registered: Tuesday, September 18 2001 07:00
Warrior
Member # 3340
Profile #15
A slight addition to the day/night idea running around.

During the day time hours, there would be far less monsters roaming around outdoors...(they're afraid of light)

**but**

during night time hours --- all hell breaks out!

Can this be created somehow??

James

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Posts: 99 | Registered: Wednesday, August 13 2003 07:00
...b10010b...
Member # 869
Profile Homepage #16
It can if we can script a reliable way to distinguish day from night.

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The Empire Always Loses: This Time For Sure!
Posts: 9973 | Registered: Saturday, March 30 2002 08:00
Triad Mage
Member # 7
Profile Homepage #17
quote:
Originally written by The Real Dragon King:

A slight addition to the day/night idea running around.

During the day time hours, there would be far less monsters roaming around outdoors...(they're afraid of light)

**but**

during night time hours --- all hell breaks out!

Can this be created somehow??

James

That's something I'm working on.

I think I can do something with the START_STATE, which is called every turn the party is in the area.

I think that rest-checking like in Revenge would be a lot easier to do in BoA, but harder to make it coincide with day/night cycles.

The tick counter goes to 30000 and then goes back to 0 for some reason. It does account for outdoors and indoors - 10 ticks pass for each one indoors, or 5 when on a horse.

EDIT: If you set the scenario underground, there are no day/night changes, so forcing rest would be much easier and look nicer.

[ Tuesday, December 30, 2003 04:12: Message edited by: Drakefyre ]

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"At times discretion should be thrown aside, and with the foolish we should play the fool." - Menander
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Posts: 9436 | Registered: Wednesday, September 19 2001 07:00
BoE Posse
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Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha! :P

15 years after its release, Spiderweb might finally catch up to Ultima V.

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The Lyceum
Posts: 131 | Registered: Wednesday, October 3 2001 07:00
Agent
Member # 1993
Profile #19
During the day time hours, there would be far less monsters roaming around outdoors...(they're afraid of light)
**but**
during night time hours --- all hell breaks out!


Dragon King that's great! More monsters and ambushs in the night ... and the mages could have an outdoor light-spell that costs incredibly spellpoints ... or there would be heavy and expensive outdoor-torchs, that make impossible to wield weapons when using them ... maybe the party should anyway have a barrow or a packhorse, one time .... :)

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Slartucker: * facepalm facepalm facepalm *
Dikiyoba: Are you unconscious yet?
Posts: 1420 | Registered: Wednesday, October 2 2002 07:00
Warrior
Member # 3252
Profile #20
Along those lines, it might also be possible to have diffrent creatures active at diffrent times of day. But this might also be very difficult to implement - if you're outdoors when the transition occurs, do the monsters you were just running from dissappear, or is it more subtle than that?

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Learn About The Man Behind the Messiah.
Posts: 137 | Registered: Tuesday, July 22 2003 07:00
Lifecrafter
Member # 1768
Profile #21
A better idea would be different nocturnal and daytime creatures.

(And it sounds like want to disable the party too much at night.)

Brt Bixler has a nice touch with his water/essence counters. They add a decent form of 'party-need'.

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Posts: 830 | Registered: Tuesday, August 20 2002 07:00
BoE Posse
Member # 112
Profile #22
Thuryl: That's EXACTLY how I did it. None of my coding is very elegant, it just works. Sometimes. If I come up with an elegant solution, I've usually already implemented the clunky one.

As a result of this technique, if you wander around in the swamps in Revenge for a long time, you'll die from 'resting'. I decided I could get away with this, since only a complete idiot would wander around in Uganta's swamps longer than he had to.

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Revenge
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Posts: 1423 | Registered: Sunday, October 7 2001 07:00
Triad Mage
Member # 7
Profile Homepage #23
I've come up with a way for different monsters during night and day.

Night is from 0-625 ticks and 4375-5000 ticks in each 5000 tick day.

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"At times discretion should be thrown aside, and with the foolish we should play the fool." - Menander
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Posts: 9436 | Registered: Wednesday, September 19 2001 07:00
Warrior
Member # 3252
Profile #24
But I thought the diffrences between indoor and outdoor movement would throw off the counter.

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Posts: 137 | Registered: Tuesday, July 22 2003 07:00

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