You have been taken by the Mists

Author Topic: Development Status Update  (Read 4005 times)

Soren / Zarathustra217

  • Lead director, main scripter, nutty geek, Community Council
  • Administrator
  • Dark Power
  • *
  • Posts: 12979
Development Status Update
« on: October 04, 2013, 04:29:18 AM »
We've always aspired to update the server gradually rather than in large chunks, both to quickly allow our players to benefit from new content, address concerns and issues, but also to include the community more in the development process.

Inevitably though, as we developers are all volunteers and have our jobs and studies (and not to mention mental health) to attend to alongside working on this project, there'll be periods of inactivity. At other times, we are just working on larger things that delays updates because their nature does not allow for gradual implementation.

Thus, I (and other developers) will try to update you on our work in this topic. We won't report everything or all the time (there should be some left to imagination too), but we'll try to leave you less in the dark as to progress so you don't get the sense that we've abandoned you.

Sincerely,

Søren / Zarathustra217

(on behalf of the team)

Soren / Zarathustra217

  • Lead director, main scripter, nutty geek, Community Council
  • Administrator
  • Dark Power
  • *
  • Posts: 12979
Re: Development Status Update
« Reply #1 on: October 04, 2013, 04:59:09 AM »
I'll begin by letting you know what we are currently working on (among other things):

Mist travelling

As has also been discussed here: http://www.nwnravenloft.com/forum/index.php?topic=34511.0

We've already implemented an early, brute version of mist travelling, accessible through the vistani camp set within the mists.  I'm currently working on expanding, both by featuring more areas, but also making it more true to canon in terms of what you would experience when traversing the mists. The current setup features landscape, but as it's expanded, you will also be crossing through areas of thick swirling mist.

The challenge has been to make the dynamic overland mapping (what pieces the individual areas together) both satisfyingly exciting to travel through while still being unpredictable and challenging to navigate. That part is actually more or less done by now though, but what remains is mainly designing the specific areas and setting them up. This part is more forward, but also time consuming and tedious, so doing it in small bits. Depending on how busy I am with other things in the coming time (like studies) it could take from a week or two up to some months before the next large expansion of the system is ready.

Tailoring craft

Perhaps long overdo, we've started concepting the tailoring craft. To speed up the implementation, we plan to reuse some of the ingredients from armour crafting (the secondary ingredients from both leather and metal armours), then combine it with some basic fabric rather than leather or metal. The mundane fabric could be things like silk, flax or cotton.

I won't promise any ETA on this, but it should be fairly overseeable to just get the basic system ready, so likely we'll prioritize that, then expand it more when we have more time at our hands.

Soren / Zarathustra217

  • Lead director, main scripter, nutty geek, Community Council
  • Administrator
  • Dark Power
  • *
  • Posts: 12979
Re: Development Status Update
« Reply #2 on: October 06, 2013, 04:36:35 PM »
An image of some of the new kind of areas you'll soon come upon when travelling the mists:


Soren / Zarathustra217

  • Lead director, main scripter, nutty geek, Community Council
  • Administrator
  • Dark Power
  • *
  • Posts: 12979
Re: Development Status Update
« Reply #3 on: October 18, 2013, 07:45:01 AM »
The mist travelling update is coming along nicely and should be done within a week or two. The reasons you haven't seen any server updates in a long while is because I had to restructure the way the mistway areas are set up while working with revamping the system, meaning they wouldn't work with the old system anymore.

Soren / Zarathustra217

  • Lead director, main scripter, nutty geek, Community Council
  • Administrator
  • Dark Power
  • *
  • Posts: 12979
Re: Development Status Update
« Reply #4 on: October 31, 2013, 01:37:24 PM »
The large update with the new mistway setup is now ready and should be accessible in game in a few minutes.

Soren / Zarathustra217

  • Lead director, main scripter, nutty geek, Community Council
  • Administrator
  • Dark Power
  • *
  • Posts: 12979
Re: Development Status Update
« Reply #5 on: November 30, 2013, 02:58:09 AM »
A little status update...

As you may have noticed, the tailoring craft is now in game. It's still very basic but it's a start and provide bards, monks and mages with the long-waited opportunity to wear player-character crafted clothings. We are hoping to add more exceptional fabrics fairly soon.

BadBud has been working on updating a lot of spells. The overall idea is to make some of the more less used spells more interesting and useful, but he has also been doing various other minor fixes and improvements. There's many more of these underway.

Beyond that, there's many projects focused on adding new areas in the making, but it takes time to make it perfect. You can see teasers of many of the projects in the works in the topic here: http://www.nwnravenloft.com/forum/index.php?topic=10911.msg375846#msg375846

The Prophet of Misinformation

  • Kept you waiting, huh?
  • Developers
  • Dark Power
  • *
  • Posts: 1672
  • The Forever #Trigger
Re: Development Status Update
« Reply #6 on: December 16, 2013, 06:40:54 PM »
That dark and often frustration-inspiring place known as Sithcus

So it's been over two years and the server's seen nothing. I've not stopped working on it (though I did take a break). Here are the facts:

1. It's over 100 areas large. Most such areas have at least 200 placeables in them. I spend about eight hours on each area. Thusly, 8 * 100 = a lot of hours.

2. About halfway through the project, I had to scrap about half of everything because it wasn't good enough. I had to redesign about 50 areas.

3. Sithicus has eight dungeons. They're all as heavily scripted (though in different ways) as Elketh's tower.

    i. Barrow of Sleeping Kings
    ii. Veidrava
    iii. The Fumewood
    iv. The Fugue (featuring the return of your bestest friend ever).
    v. The Great Chasm
    vi. The Labyrinth
    vii. The Priory of Dusk
    viii. The Ruin of Nedragaard

4. About a month ago, I decided to add a fully fledged town: Har-Thelen. It's prettier than the rest of Sithicus.

5. I'm obsessed with every piece of the domain telling some sort of story. So my (hopeful) aspiration is that you won't ever be bored.

6. Sithicus (the first half. It's being split into two or.. three deployments) will be finished JANUARY 31ST 2014.

Until then, allow the brilliance of Andrew WK hypnotise you into forgetting I'm slow as hell.

[youtube=425,350]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4A1SiQkPqYM[/youtube]
"The brave man inattentive to his duty, is worth little more to his country than the coward who deserts in the hour of danger."
~Andrew Jackson