If you could add a garuanteed one thing to the foundry only, what would it be?

tantivetyrell · November 2014

If there was one guaranteed addition to the foundry, that a Dev could make happen, what would it be?

I'd want a Death (with) timer. We have Combat, Follow, Fight to Submission, Contact etc.

I want one function there Death, in a form of Contact Death, Combat Death, working in a fashion like this. It's only function is to kill an npc, for no xp. It should still have the option to talk to them, so it could be something you 'kill' as a dialogue option.

Start Dying : [Component Reached, Component Complete etc.]

Time to die in Seconds [0 is immediately] : (This function would be able to used for any and all timer related mission requirements)

Stop Dying : [Component Reached, Component Complete etc.] (In case if it's a save someone mission)

Die Anyway. : [Component Reached, Component Complete etc.] (It's function exists just to kill something dying with a timer. Like a fail condition set besides the timer.)

No more stupid killzone hacks, fears of exploits so mobs can't sit together. This could set an entire new genre for Foundry missions, and fix allot of broken quests.

Whats your one addition?

wollowstone · November 2014

Maybe a way to "rate" unfeasible quests. Example of such quest: ONE encounter, 50 monsters backed-up with 20 summoning portals! It is undoable, at high level, so, these quests never get the negative reviews they deserve, since we cannot finish the quest! It may even be that these quests are doable at level 3, 4 or 6 (the default character when we start, at the foundry) and that the author will never know that the scenario is not doable at hight level... and will "never" know... until how many players will be totally disgusted to fall on yet another one encounter undoable quest? and thus how many players will STOP playing quests from the foundry? That is a bad thing to have those quests, imho, and to be unable to "express" the problem.

maegmaag · November 2014

Simple basic even trivial access to any script binding. That would solve all the issues an auhtor could have/come across.

eldarth · November 2014

Integrated LUA scripting.

zebular · November 2014

Quest Tree Branches, offering different ways to complete objectives and outcomes, instead of our current linear mapping.

maegmaag · November 2014

...well its Lua, but when we are at naming, i vote Perl XD

PS: k nvm, twould be too much to ask for

orangefiree · November 2014

Customizeable encounters, allowing selections of what abilities the enemies have, how many hit points they have, etc.

idiotamongus · November 2014

Most of what I would suggest has already been suggested however, there may be a few things which others have overlooked.

EITHER:
•Timed events
•A cut scene/movie animation system similar to the beginning cut scene on the shipwreck and Plague Tower
•Multimap Transitioning instead of just one for free roaming
•Actual moving objects instead of static
•Full sized Dragons or actual bosses and/or their attack animations to be used in the Foundry such as Valindra's Illusion hand grab strike.
•Similar to the animation system and the custom encounters idea. Maybe the use of customizable weapons and gear not just armor for encounters but also for NPC's with the use of a pivot animation system where you can create your own animation like a looping realistic sword fight.

That's all I have for now

mrgiggles651 · November 2014

A button that would go back in time and make a bunch of beta authors listen.

imaginaerum1 · November 2014

Dunno if this counts as "one", but...

If it's available in the game, it's available in Foundry. Monster in the game? There it is in Foundry. Details and textures in the game? There they are in Foundry. Animations (like SIT) in the game? There they are in Foundry. Clothing patterns being worn by NPCs? There they are in the Slots menu for Foundry.

I can work around "or" functionality and lack of levers and lack of timers and such, but I can't fake all those missing things that are already in the game but not available in Foundry that we've been asking for all this time.

reiwulf · November 2014

Probably being able to have more than 5 people in a foundry quest.

nehemiah217 · December 2014

Simple,

My one sole request would be for the ability tk use the Foundry OFF-LINE!!

There are many times throughout my day when I would love to work on my Foundries, but cant, either because I dont have internet access or, if I do, it is restricted. (My luncb hour at work, the 1.5 hours per day that I ride the bus, etc)

Honorable-mention would be the ability to pass variables between foundry quests, which could be in the form of a token or other aome such object. Maybe add a Foundry Token bag to the inventory, similar to the currency bag?

idiotamongus · December 2014

UGC Foundry currency you mean?

I have been working on UGC currency for one of my campaign stories, however it is rather tedious as it involved exchanging UGC items regularly. If UGC currency were made such as gold or whatever the author decides, this would be much easier for Roleplay style Foundry's.

eldarth · December 2014

I've changed my mind. The ONE thing I would add to the foundry would be something we've never had.

A full time developer.

eldarth · December 2014

idiotamongus wrote: »

I have been working on UGC currency for one of my campaign stories, however it is rather tedious as it involved exchanging UGC items regularly. If UGC currency were made such as gold or whatever the author decides, this would be much easier for Roleplay style Foundry's.

They should just allow us to use actual gold/silver/copper - those currencies are virtually worthless already. Even if we were limited to a max of 1g for a transaction would be great. But then they would also have to implement drop/receive item stacks as well. I implemented a "vendor" system in the beginning, outside my "Arena of Calimport" that uses a "Calimport Gold Piece," a "Half Gold Piece," and Calimport Silver Pieces. Unfortunately it requires forcing the player to "pickup" 4 silver pieces of "change" which is kind of annoying.

Is your quest using currency online yet?

iandarksword · December 2014

The ability to customize/change (transmute?) NPC and Enemies' type of weapon(s)/shield and enhance with any existing enchantment as per weapon/armor enchantment slot. Perhaps using the existing "C" menu as players' do for their characters? Is it that hard to update the existing gear/costume list to include HR and SW gear or add Dragonborn NPC's? I mean, "Yay, the Dragonborn showed up in Neverwinter! Now what do they do to help adventurers out in the story-line? Nothing. They're just here, rooming with Neverember..."

nehemiah217 · December 2014

idiotamongus wrote: »

UGC Foundry currency you mean?

I have been working on UGC currency for one of my campaign stories, however it is rather tedious as it involved exchanging UGC items regularly. If UGC currency were made such as gold or whatever the author decides, this would be much easier for Roleplay style Foundry's.

I'm mot thinking about it being limited to currency. The currencies in game are superflous and pointless, as it stands. I universal "Foundry Currency" has been brought up before as an incentive to run foundries (given that the currency is actually useful; something that 99% of the currencies lack).

Moreso, I am thinking about a way to transfer variables between Foundry's, so you could set a BOOL in Quest A, and then look up the value of that variable in another quest. In an OOP sense, you could use the quest as the object, with variables as data members. That way, there would be no way to "forge" variables.

This could be used to link Foundry quests sequentially or insequentially, depending on your design. Side quests from one quest with rewards in another? Oh yeah, that'd be a breeze (nevermind the fact that rewards are nil).

The only reason that I brought up "tokens" was that, this was the easiest way that we accomplished this in Neverwinter Nights. Create a specific object and that designated a particular variable. Check for the item, if it exists, flag is true. Stacks repeesented integers, and so on.

eldarth · December 2014

iandarksword wrote: »

The ability to customize/change (transmute?) NPC and Enemies' type of weapon(s)/shield and enhance with any existing enchantment as per weapon/armor enchantment slot. Perhaps using the existing "C" menu as players' do for their characters? Is it that hard to update the existing gear/costume list to include HR and SW gear or add Dragonborn NPC's?

Yes it is that hard.

The problem is you must have attack/defense animations for that enemy with that weapon.

Imagine giving an Ogre a greatsword -- he's gonna raise it over his head and smash it into you/ground.
Imagine adding a shield to the mix - he's gonna raise both hands greatsword and shield over his head...with the sword and shield all clipping through each other.

idiotamongus · December 2014

eldarth wrote: »

They should just allow us to use actual gold/silver/copper - those currencies are virtually worthless already. Even if we were limited to a max of 1g for a transaction would be great. But then they would also have to implement drop/receive item stacks as well. I implemented a "vendor" system in the beginning, outside my "Arena of Calimport" that uses a "Calimport Gold Piece," a "Half Gold Piece," and Calimport Silver Pieces. Unfortunately it requires forcing the player to "pickup" 4 silver pieces of "change" which is kind of annoying.

Is your quest using currency online yet?

The gold may be cheap, but it' still something you could have used to spend on something you could actually use, though would be a good idea if you could create UGC items you could use with stats or whatever. Even a temporary mount just for that Foundry. Remember players of all levels will play UGC Foundry's. If they are saving up for another companion or a permanent mount, they would have to find extra gold elsewhere and low levels don't get much gold as it is.

Secondly. I'm still developing the quest with the UGC currency mechanics. I've basically used a system of bags of Gold that are worth different amounts but have an "Inventory Exchange" system that can reconvert quantities to save bag room. E.g. 2 bags of 5 UGC gold can be converted to 1 bag of 10 gold. However, the vendor system I'm using needs specific quantity types, forcing the player to keep exchanging different quantities of gold bags each time. E.g, if I had some UGC item worth 20 gold and I had 2 bags of 10 gold, I'd need to reconvert to 1 bag of 20 gold as you can't use more than one required item per usage. I don't even know how this will play out, but I'm hoping the first run through of it should be decent enough.

Re-edit: I may just put the objects in view and use the'Required Item' of Bag of gold and get the items without the need for the dialog GUI which is what I was initially using. May be much simpler.

eldarth · December 2014

idiotamongus wrote: »

The gold may be cheap, but it' still something you could have used to spend on something you could actually use, though would be a good idea if you could create UGC items you could use with stats or whatever. Even a temporary mount just for that Foundry. Remember players of all levels will play UGC Foundry's. If they are saving up for another companion or a permanent mount, they would have to find extra gold elsewhere and low levels don't get much gold as it is.

Secondly. I'm still developing the quest with the UGC currency mechanics. I've basically used a system of bags of Gold that are worth different amounts but have an "Inventory Exchange" system that can reconvert quantities to save bag room. E.g. 2 bags of 5 UGC gold can be converted to 1 bag of 10 gold. However, the vendor system I'm using needs specific quantity types, forcing the player to keep exchanging different quantities of gold bags each time. E.g, if I had some UGC item worth 20 gold and I had 2 bags of 10 gold, I'd need to reconvert to 1 bag of 20 gold as you can't use more than one required item per usage. I don't even know how this will play out, but I'm hoping the first run through of it should be decent enough.

Re-edit: I may just put the objects in view and use the'Required Item' of Bag of gold and get the items without the need for the dialog GUI which is what I was initially using. May be much simpler.

If you get a chance, take a look at how I did it in Arena of Calimport. Might give you some ideas and I wouldn't mind any feedback on the vendors

iandarksword · December 2014

eldarth wrote: »

Yes it is that hard.

The problem is you must have attack/defense animations for that enemy with that weapon.

Imagine giving an Ogre a greatsword -- he's gonna raise it over his head and smash it into you/ground.
Imagine adding a shield to the mix - he's gonna raise both hands greatsword and shield over his head...with the sword and shield all clipping through each other.

I meant more like turning the greatswords into greataxes, using the existing animation, the same way transmute works. It'd be like creating a Purple Dragon Knight, using the existing friendly Guard encounter, and transmuting the wooden guard shield into the Ancient Mulhorand shield. While it would be interesting to completely re-equip, certain enemies just aren't feasible.

hustin1 · December 2014

There are so many things I'd like to choose from, but if it was guaranteed, I'd choose individual critter visibility (instead of encounter visibility). That way I could mix different dialogue in an encounter without using buggy hacks to dispose of extra critters. Of course, this is itself a workaround for not being able to select per-critter chat text (as opposed to per-encounter chat text), but critter visibility also lets me mix critter capabilities as well as critter chat text.

maegmaag · December 2014

eldarth wrote: »

I've changed my mind. The ONE thing I would add to the foundry would be something we've never had.

A full time developer.

Great point. I would add active and capable, not just someone whos paid for PR.

andrew12s · December 2014

I would like to be able to set up multiple state options when setting up dialog and objects. Example: A merchant has several objects for sale. The current system only allows the npc to drop one item. If the merchant was offering five items, a multiple state system would allow him to drop one item for each possible selection depending on which the player chose.

eldarth · December 2014

andrew12s wrote: »

I would like to be able to set up multiple state options when setting up dialog and objects. Example: A merchant has several objects for sale. The current system only allows the npc to drop one item. If the merchant was offering five items, a multiple state system would allow him to drop one item for each possible selection depending on which the player chose.

Don't have them "drop" the item -- have them place it on a table, or "drop" a "bag" at the players feet or something -- then you can provide any item you like.

guessswho9 · December 2014

I want the NPCs I place to stay where I place them, not end up inside a wall.

Oh, and dragon NPCs would be cool, too. I want to get quests from a dragon.

eldarth · December 2014

guessswho9 wrote: »

I want the NPCs I place to stay where I place them, not end up inside a wall.

You mean encounters?? I've never had an NPC not be exactly where placed.

charononus · December 2014

wollowstone wrote: »

Maybe a way to "rate" unfeasible quests. Example of such quest: ONE encounter, 50 monsters backed-up with 20 summoning portals! It is undoable, at high level, so, these quests never get the negative reviews they deserve, since we cannot finish the quest! It may even be that these quests are doable at level 3, 4 or 6 (the default character when we start, at the foundry) and that the author will never know that the scenario is not doable at hight level... and will "never" know... until how many players will be totally disgusted to fall on yet another one encounter undoable quest? and thus how many players will STOP playing quests from the foundry? That is a bad thing to have those quests, imho, and to be unable to "express" the problem.

That sounds like fun. Is your description based on a real quest?

guitarzan698 · December 2014

How 'bout a company that cares about their product.. like we care about our foundry creations?

idiotamongus · December 2014

You have to give indie developers like Cryptic some breathing room since they can only go so far. Though with 'Perfect World' sticking their noses in, there is a conflicted pressure from both sides. Consumers and Perfect World telling the devs what they want. Naturally, Perfect World gets the winning decision telling Cryptic what to do with their own game.

eldarth · December 2014

idiotamongus wrote: »

You have to give indie developers like Cryptic some breathing room since they can only go so far. Though with 'Perfect World' sticking their noses in, there is a conflicted pressure from both sides. Consumers and Perfect World telling the devs what they want. Naturally, Perfect World gets the winning decision telling Cryptic what to do with their own game.

That would be because PWE owns Cryptic -- prior to that Atari owned Cryptic. Not quite "indie."
And PWE is pretty seriously competing for worst online game company amid NCSoft and Sony.

If you could add a garuanteed one thing to the foundry only, what would it be?

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