I love your concept and it's very similar to something I wanted to build but I have one question. Why not use regular skills and haks? I know it's possible to do everything with variables but it would be much cleaner for players to have everything on character sheet. Also I see that only open part is java as there's no nwn side of it. Do you plan to release at least demo presenting that or you treat that as your internal private knowledge how to hook it up?
@Valgav We didn't want to create more of a barrier to entry than we had to. It took a lot for me to even decide to use CEP, to be honest. We might consider using haks if/when the auto-download is implemented.
The specific problems I have with NWN-style skills is that they're really finicky. There are places where the skill ID is hard coded so if you want to replace it, the replacement skill will still function like the original did. Then there's a lot of black box stuff where you have to know under which situations a skill will increase/decrease based on the character's attributes. All of this can be worked around but it's a real pain.
Another problem is you can't display arbitrary data in the character sheet. So players would need to go to a separate menu to view their XP for each individual skill anyway. Then there's the Perk menu which is a separate piece from your character sheet as well.
Basically it comes down to NWN limitations and the convenience of being able to update the skills on the fly as needed.
We have a module we're specifically building for use with the skill system so I won't be open sourcing that piece. However, I have plans to document the set up process and how to adjust things. When we release, balance, and test the thing I'll most likely release a base module for people to use. But it's so premature right now it's not even on my radar
Until then, if you're interested in playing with it feel free to pop on Discord and join our alpha when the time comes! https://discord.gg/q38r3gw
that's all good to know, thank you very much for 'splaining! Tinkering with github is a bit beyond my skill level/comfort zone at this point, so i'll just lurk in the background! I do look forward to a base module coming on your radar, and i am a very patient person!
also, I never answered the question - i have multiple versions of the CEP installed on my machine, so no problemo there!
We've made a lot of progress over the last month or so since this project started. We are officially in alpha testing now and fixing lots of things before we have a full launch.
Today I've got some screenshots to show off from the alpha server. I hope you enjoy them!
First up is the new Meditate perk which allows you to quickly recover mana outside of battle.
Next is an example of my character rummaging around for food with the Forage skill.
Here's a shot of our hero casting Recover, a spell using the Alteration Magic skill.
Let's take a look at our hero's (relatively sparse) home. Watch your step - things are still under construction here!
After a long day of adventuring, our hero just wants to take a break and grow a plant. Let's go make a shovel so he can do that! Let's head to the Metalworking Bench to make one.
Not much to choose from yet. I bet more things will unlock as he gets better at Metalworking. Let's choose the "Tools" category.
Here we go. There's lots more to choose from here. But right now we don't want weapons - we want a shovel! We'll pick the "Stone Shovel" blueprint.
Here's some important information about what it takes to make this item. Looks like we already picked up everything we need to make it. So we'll just select the blueprint.
Now we'll just drop the materials inside and select "Craft Item". Don't forget to put your Metalworking Tools inside, too!
Alright, now comes the hard part. We're actually making it. Don't mess it up, hero!
Success! Our hero is one step closer to becoming a world-renowned farmer. Check out that slick shovel!
Well, what are you waiting for? It's time to use it. Dig a hole, scrub!
Let's go investigate it...
We can either plant a seed or cover up the hole. Well, we certainly don't want to cover it up after coming so far. So let's plant a seed.
Let's start simple and grow some wheat.
Great! Our hero has planted his first crop. Just look at that beauty.
Well, this is going to take some time. Why don't we build a chair and take a load off? Let's use that fancy Structure Tool that's been looking at us funny.
We'll select a chair to build this time. (Note: A few steps were skipped - check out previous posts for the full process of building a construction site and picking a blueprint).
Our hero starts bashing - I mean **building** - the chair!
Looks like he finished! Oh dear, we built it the wrong way. Now we can't watch our plant grow ever-so-slowly. What will we do!? Well, I guess we need to build another chair.
Oh, but wait! We can simply rotate the chair using our Structure Tool again.
Good thing this list is sorted by nearest to farthest structures. Otherwise it might be difficult to find the chair! Now we simply need to select "Rotate" and make changes until we're satisfied.
That looks good. Now we can painstakingly watch our plant grow. That seems like a fantastic use of our time.
Now we wait....
zzzz.....
Huh? What? Still here? Oh, hey! It looks like the crop finished growing. Great success!
Let's forage through it.
Looks like our hero is done farming for today. But wait, what do we do with the chair we built? Doesn't make much sense to leave it here. Let's use our Structure Tool again to move it.
We selected the "Move" option. Now it's time to use our Structure Tool one last time and move it to a more sensible location.
Well, that about does it. It's time for our hero to get some rest. Until next time...
You might want to consider checking out Legends of Aria. It allows you to build custom worlds and it already has a built in skill based system. It's also much more customizable as just about everything except the graphics engine itself is open to change. Just FYI. I believe it's still in alpha but can be played.
You might want to consider checking out Legends of Aria. It allows you to build custom worlds and it already has a built in skill based system. It's also much more customizable as just about everything except the graphics engine itself is open to change. Just FYI. I believe it's still in alpha but can be played.
Sounds like a cool game. We're pretty close to leaving Alpha soon, so we probably won't switch games (plus our team only has experience with NWN - we'd be starting from scratch if we went to LoA).
Do they have similar client/server/toolset offerings?
Do they have similar client/server/toolset offerings?
The ease of use of NWN1 is unparalleled but yeah, they have similar offerings. The toolset is basically Unity. The entire game is written in LUA and is open to modding. It's still in Alpha so some things are kind of rough. There are already some Player built PWs that you can play on (in addition to the official server)
Hi all. Sorry for the long absence. I've had some RL stuff come up in the past few months which I had to deal with.
I've spent the past few days doing a conversion of the code over to C# as well as cleaning up some things, fixing bugs, etc. It's in a really good place right now and ready to be used.
Unfortunately, I don't think the skill system will be used for the Freescape project. In my absence, the creator of that project decided to go on a different route.
I'm now looking for a home for it because I really want to see it used.
This will be my last post for the Freescape skill system as I've moved on to working on a Star Wars server called Star Wars: Legends of the Old Republic. You can find out more about the project here: http://starwarsnwn.com
I will be using a modified version of this skill system there and invite you all to come check it out!
Thanks for continuing to follow the project and I hope to see some of you there. You can find our Discord here: https://discord.gg/MyQAM6m
Comments
The specific problems I have with NWN-style skills is that they're really finicky. There are places where the skill ID is hard coded so if you want to replace it, the replacement skill will still function like the original did. Then there's a lot of black box stuff where you have to know under which situations a skill will increase/decrease based on the character's attributes. All of this can be worked around but it's a real pain.
Another problem is you can't display arbitrary data in the character sheet. So players would need to go to a separate menu to view their XP for each individual skill anyway. Then there's the Perk menu which is a separate piece from your character sheet as well.
Basically it comes down to NWN limitations and the convenience of being able to update the skills on the fly as needed.
We have a module we're specifically building for use with the skill system so I won't be open sourcing that piece. However, I have plans to document the set up process and how to adjust things. When we release, balance, and test the thing I'll most likely release a base module for people to use. But it's so premature right now it's not even on my radar
Until then, if you're interested in playing with it feel free to pop on Discord and join our alpha when the time comes! https://discord.gg/q38r3gw
that's all good to know, thank you very much for 'splaining! Tinkering with github is a bit beyond my skill level/comfort zone at this point, so i'll just lurk in the background! I do look forward to a base module coming on your radar, and i am a very patient person!
also, I never answered the question - i have multiple versions of the CEP installed on my machine, so no problemo there!
We've made a lot of progress over the last month or so since this project started. We are officially in alpha testing now and fixing lots of things before we have a full launch.
Today I've got some screenshots to show off from the alpha server. I hope you enjoy them!
First up is the new Meditate perk which allows you to quickly recover mana outside of battle.
Next is an example of my character rummaging around for food with the Forage skill.
Here's a shot of our hero casting Recover, a spell using the Alteration Magic skill.
Let's take a look at our hero's (relatively sparse) home. Watch your step - things are still under construction here!
After a long day of adventuring, our hero just wants to take a break and grow a plant. Let's go make a shovel so he can do that! Let's head to the Metalworking Bench to make one.
Not much to choose from yet. I bet more things will unlock as he gets better at Metalworking. Let's choose the "Tools" category.
Here we go. There's lots more to choose from here. But right now we don't want weapons - we want a shovel! We'll pick the "Stone Shovel" blueprint.
Here's some important information about what it takes to make this item. Looks like we already picked up everything we need to make it. So we'll just select the blueprint.
Now we'll just drop the materials inside and select "Craft Item". Don't forget to put your Metalworking Tools inside, too!
Alright, now comes the hard part. We're actually making it. Don't mess it up, hero!
Success! Our hero is one step closer to becoming a world-renowned farmer. Check out that slick shovel!
Well, what are you waiting for? It's time to use it. Dig a hole, scrub!
Let's go investigate it...
We can either plant a seed or cover up the hole. Well, we certainly don't want to cover it up after coming so far. So let's plant a seed.
Let's start simple and grow some wheat.
Great! Our hero has planted his first crop. Just look at that beauty.
Well, this is going to take some time. Why don't we build a chair and take a load off? Let's use that fancy Structure Tool that's been looking at us funny.
We'll select a chair to build this time. (Note: A few steps were skipped - check out previous posts for the full process of building a construction site and picking a blueprint).
Our hero starts bashing - I mean **building** - the chair!
Looks like he finished! Oh dear, we built it the wrong way. Now we can't watch our plant grow ever-so-slowly. What will we do!? Well, I guess we need to build another chair.
Oh, but wait! We can simply rotate the chair using our Structure Tool again.
Good thing this list is sorted by nearest to farthest structures. Otherwise it might be difficult to find the chair! Now we simply need to select "Rotate" and make changes until we're satisfied.
That looks good. Now we can painstakingly watch our plant grow. That seems like a fantastic use of our time.
Now we wait....
zzzz.....
Huh? What? Still here? Oh, hey! It looks like the crop finished growing. Great success!
Let's forage through it.
Looks like our hero is done farming for today. But wait, what do we do with the chair we built? Doesn't make much sense to leave it here. Let's use our Structure Tool again to move it.
We selected the "Move" option. Now it's time to use our Structure Tool one last time and move it to a more sensible location.
Well, that about does it. It's time for our hero to get some rest. Until next time...
Stay tuned for future updates and be sure to join us on our Discord: https://discord.gg/q38r3gw
Do they have similar client/server/toolset offerings?
http://freescape.pw/
I wanted to drop a link to our new website. It's still going under revisions (especially on the storyline/lore page).
But I wanted to give those of you who have been tracking the project a sneak peak. Please have a look around!
I've spent the past few days doing a conversion of the code over to C# as well as cleaning up some things, fixing bugs, etc. It's in a really good place right now and ready to be used.
Unfortunately, I don't think the skill system will be used for the Freescape project. In my absence, the creator of that project decided to go on a different route.
I'm now looking for a home for it because I really want to see it used.
With the coming release of NWSync I was interested to see if anyone would be interested in playing a sci-fi server that used this as its core? I've written up some storyline / background information for the world. You can check it out here: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1n-uObA5AJ5Ly9g3TPab-8tc6sD-10HOMCzHZB2XyPYg/edit
In a nutshell, the world I have in mind is a mix of Phantasy Star, Star Ocean, and Firefly. There aren't any lightsabers or blasters in this universe.
Looking for constructive feedback. Thanks!
This will be my last post for the Freescape skill system as I've moved on to working on a Star Wars server called Star Wars: Legends of the Old Republic. You can find out more about the project here: http://starwarsnwn.com
I will be using a modified version of this skill system there and invite you all to come check it out!
Thanks for continuing to follow the project and I hope to see some of you there. You can find our Discord here: https://discord.gg/MyQAM6m