Temple of The Roguelike Forums
Game Discussion => Early Dev => Topic started by: Zireael on July 05, 2013, 09:22:26 AM
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As the Veins of the Earth is getting better with every passing day, I'd like to ask for feedback.
If you want the bleeding edge instead of the beta releases, use this link (https://github.com/Zireael07/The-Veins-of-the-Earth/archive/master.zip)
If you already have a beta downloaded, replace the VotE folder with the contents of the zip. If you just have T-Engine, drop the contents of the zip in the modules/VotE folder.
To play it, download the Windows standalone from ModDB (http://www.moddb.com/mods/the-veins-of-the-earth) and click on t-engine.exe.
Tested only on Windows. Linux/Mac users might experience more bugs.
If you have Linux or OS X, you'll need to download T-Engine 1.3.1 and the ZIP from Git (https://github.com/Zireael07/The-Veins-of-the-Earth)
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Given the frenetic pace thus far(though you did have this long simmering back in the Oook days), what exactly is the Complete Picture in terms of features period that Underdark will hopefully ultimately contain, or at least in a beta or v1.0 sense to the point where it comes down to heaping on content to fill up the systems and less so beating the systems into shape?
At this point I'd say to just keep on dashing ahead given how well everything has been falling into place with all the hard work put into it thus far.
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We're hoping to have the d20 mechanics complete in the beta release, that is:
- classes*, including abilities gained by leveling
- feats*
- skills [still discussing the form, though]
- saving throws*
- attack rolls and AC*
Other main features include:
- some items (including magic items) *
- some monsters*
- some spells*
Things marked with an asterisk are already in.
Everything else is just window dressing. For example, highscores and encumbrance are in, but do not work properly yet.
Once the basic mechanics are complete, we can freely add more classes/feats/skills/monsters/items/whatever.
EDIT: We're discussing how to code in multiclassing and prestige classes, so they are bound to show up sometime, but I'm not sure they'll make it into 0.1.
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Yeah, it sounds indeed like everything just needs to proceed as you continue to smash the checklist for the time being---so long as the content comes and nothing odd happens on the UI/Presentation(Even setting aside ASCII vs Tiles, there's quite a lot of "stuff"/variety at play with this general setting)/Controls front this is all bodes very well indeed.
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Yeah, it sounds indeed like everything just needs to proceed as you continue to smash the checklist for the time being---so long as the content comes and nothing odd happens on the UI/Presentation(Even setting aside ASCII vs Tiles, there's quite a lot of "stuff"/variety at play with this general setting)/Controls front this is all bodes very well indeed.
T-Engine basically takes care of the presentation/controls :)
The work wouldn't be progressing so far if not for Sebsebeleb - his knowledge of coding is invaluable, especially when it comes to UI.
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Lots of updates and fixes. We're getting close to the first beta release - that is, the basics are 95% done.
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The first beta was released on Monday.
Do not hesitate to report bugs here or on GitHub.
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We're now at 0.0.6, also available from ToME site.
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... aand now we're at 0.0.7.
Can I haz some feedback?
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... aand now we're at 0.0.7.
Can I haz some feedback?
You shall haz, good sir! ;) I'll play a run or two at my earliest convenience and post my feedback here.
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... and we're now at 0.0.7b, very close to 0.0.8.
Changelog in the announcements section.
The mod is also available from ModDB.
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v. 0.0.8 is now available as a standalone from Github, and soon from ModDB.
Feedback welcome!
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Thanks to excellent feedback from Leissi and Gunther, two bugs have been killed with fire and a hotfix is out!
Feedback is still welcome, regardless.
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Considering the recently situated Design Document:
http://zireael07.wordpress.com/2013/08/18/the-veins-of-the-earth-design-document/
Among other bits, the explicit exclusion of the Paladin is rather notable---is the aim to harvest from the many other class templates available scattered throughout the various OGL'ish bits instead or...? I'd also imagine this would have an effect on Prestige classes and such that would otherwise have it as a prerequisite. Tangentially, what implications might this have for any sort of Pantheon to contend/interact with?
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Considering the recently situated Design Document:
http://zireael07.wordpress.com/2013/08/18/the-veins-of-the-earth-design-document/
Among other bits, the explicit exclusion of the Paladin is rather notable---is the aim to harvest from the many other class templates available scattered throughout the various OGL'ish bits instead or...? I'd also imagine this would have an effect on Prestige classes and such that would otherwise have it as a prerequisite. Tangentially, what implications might this have for any sort of Pantheon to contend/interact with?
The paladin strikes me as a poor class because it is practically a mix of fighter and cleric while allowing only one alignment and not providing anything useful in exchange (except the mount). Coming up with 9 useful things for the paladin (to comply with the next assumption, 'every class should grant something useful every 2 levels') would be insanely hard for me.
Any prestige classes that would require the paladin will probably be rebranded to require semi-high BAB (ie. a level or two of fighter) and a decent divine spellcasting ability.
I've been toying with the idea of a pantheon recently, but because of licence restrictions I would have to come up with an original pantheon and I don't have any clue. This is actually another problem the paladin has - in order to exist, it requires a Deity of Righteousness (and I hate those).
Harvesting from other OGL sources is a definite possibility once we get more mechanics out of the way (ECL and poisons, I'm looking at you!)
That is, if someone managed to make the paladin be useful, it would be a welcome addition.
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Sensible enough, and surely there can be all sorts of liberties taken as this gets further crafted. I've always moreso fancied the idea of Avatars of Whatever, allowing for Deities and such to directly contribute to any class in various ways as opposed to a strictly Fighter/Cleric relationship---if even Divine in nature as opposed to Arcane/Infernal/etc.
As to OGL Pantheon wranglings, it seems there have been some that have tried to go down this road before---the most likely, though not necessarily ideal as such---and whose website may actually have even MORE stuff of use otherwise for Veins:
http://grandwiki.wikidot.com/gods-of-the-grand-ogl-wiki
http://grandwiki.wikidot.com/dotf
So...yeah, hope that all helps.
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Thanks, the links are very helpful.
Anyways, we're now at 0.0.9 (beta 2.25).
Feel free to leave me feedback to read when I'm back after the weekend!
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Happy to be of some help---I'd have thought I had all manner of OGL links accounted for back at the start of the lot of this and yet here we are with my digging about bookmarks and such.
Heh, you've certainly got a nice assortment of things to source from at this stage even aside from all the ongoing projects getting Kickstarted and whatnot. :D
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A forthcoming OGL just barely squeaking past the stretch goal to make it so this morning, but while this one isn't D&D OGL---something tells me what will eventually come of it may indeed have some appeal and use in Veins and whatnot:
http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/159628170/the-arcanum-30th-anniversary-edition
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Thanks for the link.
I've just pushed 0.0.9a out and I really need to know whether money and magic properties do spawn, or I'm just getting unlucky, or maybe I should increase the numbers in the generator?
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Aaaand we're at beta 2.5!
The stuff listed for beta 3 is pretty complex, so don't be disappointed if getting there takes some time.
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Cool! Other links that came to mind that may or may not be of any useful sourcing use:
http://www.ruleofcool.com/about-legend/
http://www.gratisgames.webspace.virginmedia.com/darkdungeons.html Dark Dungeons and/or the Darker version in the Extras section
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Thanks getter.
I've killed a bug which was affecting the bard class, so now you can take v.0.0.11 out for a spin.
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404 Link not found when clicking the "released" link from the main Roguebasin listing, though the link over in the Announcements board thread works fine.
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404 Link not found when clicking the "released" link from the main Roguebasin listing, though the link over in the Announcements board thread works fine.
Ooh, right, typo. Fix'd.
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... and now you have 0.0.12.
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Another potential OGL bit, Dungeon Crawl Classics:
http://www.goodman-games.com/5070preview.html
And this ongoing thing, a seemingly comprehensive second look at the whole of spells and spellcasting:
http://www.reddit.com/r/rpg/comments/1mf7ia/brilliant_rewrite_of_35_spells_and_casting_system/
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Thanks for the link to the spell reformation (sounds similar to the streamlining I planned to do).
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... and another one.
The random name generator, in addition to being cool in and out of itself, should fix the weird engine problem some players reported, of not being able to enter the name when prompted.
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I just released a hotfix to fix bugged monster stats.
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... and 0.0.14 is out.
I've had a player report yesterday that T-Engine hangs on WinXP at 13% before loading main menu.
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We're now at beta 3.
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Another version is out.
Bear in mind that updates might be less and far rarer now that the university year has started again...
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Even if so, that's still a good progress trajectory---think of it as not quite dropping the blocks in Tetris as quickly, but things are still deliberately arriving with momentum to boot. 8)
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Getter, got any tips for this problem:
P.S. I think my understanding of semantic versioning is sloppy - if I'm reading the outline correctly, v.0.0.5 should have been 0.1.0, 0.0.7 should have been 0.2.0, 0.0.9 should have been 0.3.0, 0.0.12 - 0.4.0, 0.0.13 - 0.5.0, 0.0.15 - 0.6.0 and this update should be 0.7.0.
The question is, can I change the version tags on Git? And the download names on ModDB?
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Hmm, at this stage having gone moreso public compared to this being an entirely internal project---I would say now is a good time to greatly back away from purely numerical versioning towards a mix of numerical and thematic with the latter being the overall leaning.
"V0.anything" will get just so much attention from an implied sense of "ready for fun", "v0.0.anything" stands to get at least an order of magnitude less to no tangible benefits. The project here is at the Beta level, ramping up as it does, so meeting and ideally exceeding public player expectations is the next good bit ahead.
Taking a page from ToME 4 itself, or Desktop Dungeons, and going with a Beta 4 "Sorcery Unleashed"....or some other indicative adjective as to the content is almost certainly a good way to go---you should be able to transition the ModDb page as you please in terms of filenames and whanot going forward given you are writing and submitting your own updates---and people will be far less inclined to look into earlier releases going forward versus the latest and greatest. This would also have the side benefit of helping to crystallize the "Title Goal(s)" to shoot for breaking each release up into, as opposed to just numerical decimal values increasing into the bleak horizon. 8) For those that somehow want to, a catch-all archive in chronological order with the old naming scheme should suffice just fine.
For Git I got nothing though.
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Screw University, I say ;) Since the beginning, I've been thinking Veins is something I need to check out. Any day now … Is there some sort of stand-alone download, or do I need to go through ToME4 to get it running under Linux? (No problem if the latter is the case, just curious.)
Re: versioning, I think getter hit the nail on the head, as usual. Version numbers are bound to be slightly arbitrary, but in general, v.0.0.x kind of signals an alpha version, and I've got the impression that's not quite where you're at. Also, paraphrasing getter again, evocative subtitles make the game much more inviting, in any case.
As always,
Minotauros
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Is there some sort of stand-alone download, or do I need to go through ToME4 to get it running under Linux?
There IS a standalone download (ModDB) but it's Windows only, I am afraid. You'd probably have to grab ToME 4 itself to get it running under Linux.
I am going to tweak version numbers now and I will think about evocative subtitles, too.
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Beta 3.25 "Christmas Tree" is out.
Most of the bugfixes were made thanks to Castler's feedback.
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Another OGL'ish thing to perhaps pay mind going forward, this time a long-simmering truly indie affair from Spain! 8)
http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/davebrown/adventures-in-the-east-mark-the-red-box
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Thanks getter!
A new release, "Swirling Red Potion" is out!
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I think I want to use gource to make a video of the development, but hey, how do I use it?
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I'm afraid I have no skill with gource to help same as most.
But completely unrelated, another potential OGL thing afoot online:
http://www.pelgranepress.com/?p=13316
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Masses of things
http://greysix.weebly.com/dd-retroclones.html
Wide range of largely OGL stuff running quite a gambit---pretty sure this will allow for much reading/harvesting as it goes even beyond the scattered ones on the grand listing that I'd already ferreted out.
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I already knew about 13th Age having its own SRD, and I looked at the retroclones - really interesting.
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We're at 0.9.0, mostly due to AuraOfTheDawn's invaluable feedback!
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We're at 0.9.0, mostly due to AuraOfTheDawn's invaluable feedback!
I'm going to check it out right now!
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We're at 0.11.0 now.
Gr3yling, any feedback?
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those new tiles look good. Much better than the old t-engine ascii. I did have one problem though - I started a character who began in a room filled with ice floors and I could take on step and that was it. I couldn't move again. I presume that I was failing balance checks due to the ice floor, but it didn't make for much of a game.
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those new tiles look good. Much better than the old t-engine ascii. I did have one problem though - I started a character who began in a room filled with ice floors and I could take on step and that was it. I couldn't move again. I presume that I was failing balance checks due to the ice floor, but it didn't make for much of a game.
Balance checks are a bit of a problem in that you need two in a row to move instead of one - and I have yet to figure out why.
The fact that you were unlucky enough to spawn in an ice room is just proof that this is a roguelike game :)
P.S. Thanks for the kind words!
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We're at 0.11.0 now.
Gr3yling, any feedback?
Oh, sorry, I haven't been watching this thread. I'll play 0.11 and get back to you.
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So, feedback:
The new graphical interface looks very nice, and I noticed you implemented hunger. Cool.
I am having some problems with bugs, though. In most of my games, it seems like after a few minutes of play opening the inventory screen leads to some sort of error message, and then that screen then becomes inaccessible. On my most recent character, just walking over an item led to an error message. I did send error reports like the game asked me to, if that helps any.
I think that what you have done so far is a major accomplishment, though, and I'm definitely going to keep following veins of the earth.
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So, feedback:
The new graphical interface looks very nice, and I noticed you implemented hunger. Cool.
I am having some problems with bugs, though. In most of my games, it seems like after a few minutes of play opening the inventory screen leads to some sort of error message, and then that screen then becomes inaccessible. On my most recent character, just walking over an item led to an error message. I did send error reports like the game asked me to, if that helps any.
I think that what you have done so far is a major accomplishment, though, and I'm definitely going to keep following veins of the earth.
I've identified the cause of this yesterday evening (an item is generated without a name somehow) and I am going to try to fix it ASAP.
Thanks for the kind words!
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http://gothridgemanor.blogspot.com/
Perhaps handy OSR-centric thinkings and such.
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There is a beta module available from te4.org - http://te4.org/sites/default/files/game-modules/veins/veins-0.11.1.team (http://te4.org/sites/default/files/game-modules/veins/veins-0.11.1.team). Report any missing tiles here. I want to get the best tileset I can before 1st Dec (the ending of the modules contest)
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Zirael, I had a question for you. have you thought about adding some documentation to the game to explain the mechanics in a little more detail? I don't have much of a background in D&D, and finding out the details about how certain mechanics work (like how a dex bonus is applied to armor), was surprisingly difficult.
By the way, Dex bonuses in Veins do follow this formula, right?
1. Subtract 10 from the ability
2. Divide by 2
3. Round down
4. Bonus can't go above the max allowed for the type of armor equipped.
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Zirael, I had a question for you. have you thought about adding some documentation to the game to explain the mechanics in a little more detail? I don't have much of a background in D&D, and finding out the details about how certain mechanics work (like how a dex bonus is applied to armor), was surprisingly difficult.
There is an in-game help (press F1), which shows controls first and then rules under one button and ASCII legend under the other. Point out any things you'd like to see added to the rules screen. I will add more on dex bonus if you want.
By the way, Dex bonuses in Veins do follow this formula, right?
1. Subtract 10 from the ability
2. Divide by 2
3. Round down
4. Bonus can't go above the max allowed for the type of armor equipped.
Yes, they do.
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It seems like you did add a number of explanations since the last time I played. Or maybe I somehow missed them before? I do feel like the explanations help a lot, either way. I like how you can mouse over a lot of values on the character sheet and it breaks down how they are calculated.
And now you can even name the PC. That's cool.
There are a couple of things I noticed. The step in character creation where feats are chosen seems to display them in an odd way. Feat names, even ones that should be two words, are truncated to one word. So, “blood vengeance” just shows up as “blood”.
There’s no message letting you know that you are even choosing feats, as far as I can tell. It seems like there should be some sort of message telling the player “choose a feat from the list” or whatever. It seems like feat descriptions here would be nice so that the player knows what they are choosing, also.
I noticed there are feat and skill descriptions in the level up screen, but not on the character sheet. Shouldn’t it be possible to view them from the character sheet also?
Also, have you thought about displaying some sort of message after the PC eats, like, “you ate ‘x’, it was a great meal”? Right now you just get the message “you have no more x”, which doesn’t really make it clear that the PC actually ate an item that they “used” from the inventory. Maybe it would also be clearer what was going on if eatable items had an “eat” option, rather than just a “use” one? It also seems like an “eat” command that takes you to a menu displaying just the PC’s food might be nice (like in ADOM).
Anyway, great job so far. I’m looking forward to the next update.
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Version 0.12.0 ('There's a lot of monsters out there") is out, just in time for the modules contest!
I expanded some descriptions to clear up some misunderstandings and added the feat description tooltips.
A message after eating is a very good idea, to come whenever there's a next release! This month has been really hectic, with a record-breaking number of commits in order to make it as enjoyable as possible for the players...
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Version 0.12.0 ('There's a lot of monsters out there") is out, just in time for the modules contest!
I expanded some descriptions to clear up some misunderstandings and added the feat description tooltips.
A message after eating is a very good idea, to come whenever there's a next release! This month has been really hectic, with a record-breaking number of commits in order to make it as enjoyable as possible for the players...
It looks really good so far. I'm glad that you added paladins. I know you said before that there isn't enough to distinguish them from other classes like clerics, but I still think they're pretty cool.
It looks like the modules contest something that we could vote in maybe after December the first? I would be happy to support VotE if that's the case.
EDIT: Never mind, I found where to vote. I think maybe that section wasn't up yet when I originally posted this.
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DG put up the link to the voting section quite late, so I don't blame you for failing to find it!
I've just uploaded a hotfix to te4.org as I've fixed some annoying inventory bugs.
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Another hotfix is out, and as an additional feature you now get automatic attempts to ID items in your inventory every X turns.
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An update is out so that it works with 1.1.0!
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Apologies for not having time to work on it. Uni stole my free time. Not likely to get anything done until term ends - have to write a whopping 20 pages for the end of January.
I was notified of a bug or two and will try to squeeze in some time and fix it.
And btw, Veins has 10 votes in ASCII Dreams Roguelike of the Year competition, so I'm floored!
Go forth and vote. Maybe we'll nab the "new game" category somehow.
http://roguelikedeveloper.blogspot.fr/2013/12/request-for-votes-ascii-dreams.html
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Zirael, I voted for VotE in the ToME modules contest, by the way.
The categories you could rate the modules in were innovation, fun, and Polish. I gave you a really high rating in Polish, because you seem really good at it. I mean, you even have posts on your blog that are written completely in Polish. So you must pretty much be a Polish expert.
That particular criteria does seem kind of unfair to people who speak languages other than Polish, though. Oh well.
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Seriously, I just wanted to let you know that I did vote for your module. Hope you do good in the contest.
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The categories you could rate the modules in were innovation, fun, and Polish. I gave you a really high rating in Polish, because you seem really good at it. I mean, you even have posts on your blog that are written completely in Polish. So you must pretty much be a Polish expert.
That particular criteria does seem kind of unfair to people who speak languages other than Polish, though. Oh well.
I guess you could look at it this way :D
And yeah, I'm a Polish native speaker :)
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Also, another potentially potent source for sourcing---Heroes & Witchery, especially if the guy ends up doing the planned supplements. 8)
http://www.dcrouzet.net/heroes-witchery/
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Taking a look now.
I wish I didn't have to write 20 pages for university :(
In related news, ASCII Dreams voting has closed at 16 votes for Veins, so I guess I have to say THANKS 16 times :D
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I heard somebody won third place in the ToME module contest! Congratulations, Zireael!
Just out of curiousity, what's the 20 page paper on?
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I heard somebody won third place in the ToME module contest! Congratulations, Zireael!
Just out of curiousity, what's the 20 page paper on?
Thanks!
It's the literature review for my MA (key words being hearing-impaired and language learning).
So far I have 4,5 pages :(
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I heard somebody won third place in the ToME module contest! Congratulations, Zireael!
Just out of curiousity, what's the 20 page paper on?
Thanks!
It's the literature review for my MA (key words being hearing-impaired and language learning).
So far I have 4,5 pages :(
So. Is the paper finished yet? We're all eagerly anticipating a new version of VoTE.
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We miss you, Zireael. VoTE is really promising. I know that school must be really tough for you, but please don't forget about VoTE. Incursion needs a successor, and this could be it. Don't give up!
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We miss you, Zireael. VoTE is really promising. I know that school must be really tough for you, but please don't forget about VoTE. Incursion needs a successor, and this could be it. Don't give up!
Hoping to have a spot of free time after handing in the 20 pages (I have 15) on Feb 4.
Yeah, RL is a bitch.
And thanks for the warm words!
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Handy maybe?
http://www.gratisgames.webspace.virginmedia.com/3y.html
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Thanks getter.
RL continues to be a bitch. Maybe I'll get something done over the weekend...
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The first thing I did after the loong hiatus was update my ToME to 1.1.5 and update the init.lua to require this version.
In the last two days, I fixed several bugs, bigger and smaller. Also, actor generation now is more sensible - no more golems on dlvl 1.
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Lots of bugfixes and improvements made in the last week. I also managed to cross out a big thing from the checklist:
http://www.moddb.com/mods/the-veins-of-the-earth/images/monster-info-screen (http://www.moddb.com/mods/the-veins-of-the-earth/images/monster-info-screen)
Yeah, it's Sil-style XP for seeing monsters!
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Very cool Zireael. It's good to see that you're back. Keep up the good work!
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Very cool Zireael. It's good to see that you're back. Keep up the good work!
Thanks. It seems I'm getting shit done - I just made stealth work. It's not perfect, but it works!
... once I don't have the MA hanging over my head - that is, it's still not done, but the next deadline is end of April, so I have some free time again!
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The bleeding edge builds can now handle character saving & loading. This is gonna make testing much easier!
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I was forced to take out Luck implementation since it caused some items to stop spawning completely.
On the plus side, bleeding edge builds now can give you a random magic item as a starting perk.
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New release is out! I am aware of a peculiar bug with monsters on very high dungeon levels but haven't had time to look into it (and BIG thanks to the player who loved the game so much as to descend to dlvl 77 and further)
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Some time ago, I actually set up a second git repo on bitbucket to make use of their excellent issue tracker.
You can find it here (https://bitbucket.org/Zireael07/the-veins-of-the-earth) and you can download the newest release from there, too.
The issue tracker on bitbucket, however, is set to private, as I use it as my own TO DO list.
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Looks like a good deal of updating went down on the Heroes/Witchery front:
http://www.dcrouzet.net/heroes-witchery/?page_id=83
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I have tried veins. I didn't like it much unfortunately.
Legend, would you mind telling me what did you dislike?
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Yet more fresh OGL material (to come)
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1706035146/saga-of-the-splintered-realm
http://www.splinteredrealm.blogspot.com/
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All that OGL goodness to take a look at and continue developing in hopes of eventually supporting three things that the revived Incursion does not:
1. tiles and graphic icons
2. infinite dungeon
3. nearly infinite leveling (with a soft cap around 40-50 character levels)
Also, thank you getter for starting a thread on HeroicFantasyGames - link (http://www.heroicfantasygames.com/Forums/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=495).
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No problem as always---seemed like a fitting time to give it a mention over there as the incredibly small tribe that is OGL-folks might as well stick together to reach greater heights. I also invited chooseusername to this topic from the big Bay12 Incursion one to avail as needed or curious to this growing mass of OGL fare. Perhaps at some point I can be more directly useful to both Veins and Incursion as I was/am in the KoTC realm of things...some point.
Another way to go about Infinite Leveling might be something of a Retirement system where a character picks up a new class and gains new special/unique intrinsic perks/feats from the previous based on what the prior class was. Less of a Multi-Classing notion and more of a Reincarnation one I suppose in a sense? Advantage being greater flexibility for exotic builds going forward more and more over time, no sense of "waste" from time spent on each generation, etc.
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No problem as always---seemed like a fitting time to give it a mention over there as the incredibly small tribe that is OGL-folks might as well stick together to reach greater heights. I also invited chooseusername to this topic from the big Bay12 Incursion one to avail as needed or curious to this growing mass of OGL fare. Perhaps at some point I can be more directly useful to both Veins and Incursion as I was/am in the KoTC realm of things...some point.
I looked over all the OGL links, but nothing grabbed me. I'm not really looking for new content for Incursion anyway, more just getting it stable, polished and filling in the gaps. Once that is done, maybe I'll make a module and take a look at some of this stuff.
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Yep, it is all under the auspices of The Long Haul moreso than the here and now since there was definitely lots left to implement from the partials in Incursion proper.
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I've found the Bay12 Incursion thread and had a good laugh over some of the stories shared there.
In the meantime, I'm really busy with Veins. Can't decide when to stop putting new features in...
DarkGod is busy polishing a new version of T-Engine, so that's a major thing to take under consideration, too. At least he's fixed the MD5 not showing up bug.
Once T-Engine 1.2.0 shows up or I decide I'm pleased with the features, I'll release a beta 5 - that's right, it's no longer beta 4.x.
Sneak peeks:
(http://media.moddb.com/cache/images/mods/1/24/23463/thumb_620x2000/veins-0.15.0-1397316311.png)
(http://media.moddb.com/cache/images/mods/1/24/23463/thumb_620x2000/veins-0.15.0-1397412993.png)
(http://media.moddb.com/cache/images/mods/1/24/23463/thumb_620x2000/veins-0.15.0-1397466361.png)
(http://media.moddb.com/cache/images/mods/1/24/23463/thumb_620x2000/veins-0.15.0-1397645413.png)
(http://media.moddb.com/cache/images/mods/1/24/23463/thumb_620x2000/veins-0.15.0-1397415151.png)
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It would probably be a really good idea to try and time the next release to sync up exactly with ToME4's if only for the synergy and attention coupled with being specifically ready to be showcased as far as that forthcoming "automatically promote and download/install addons" feature DG has been getting wrangled these past months alongside all else. Odds are it would take the great many addons some time to get updated, so you could have a relatively uncrowded field for most players to be made aware of the existence of Veins when they load up the game.
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It would probably be a really good idea to try and time the next release to sync up exactly with ToME4's if only for the synergy and attention coupled with being specifically ready to be showcased as far as that forthcoming "automatically promote and download/install addons" feature DG has been getting wrangled these past months alongside all else. Odds are it would take the great many addons some time to get updated, so you could have a relatively uncrowded field for most players to be made aware of the existence of Veins when they load up the game.
That's what I thought, too, but DG tells me there are problems with the showcase/installer so T-Engine 1.2.0 is not coming so soon.
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I've just noticed that softpediagames are watching the Veins on ModDB and that they've made the game available on softpedia.com, in the Mods/Addons category. I've reached out to them in hopes of getting a review.
Speaking of reviews, I think beta 5 is plenty stable, so maybe a chance of getting a review on the Temple too?
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A WIP of a new character creation screen.
(http://media.moddb.com/cache/images/mods/1/24/23463/thumb_620x2000/veins-0.16.0-1398020929.png)
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If you happen to run into a mob which doesn't want to die even long below the death threshold, it seems it's an engine bug.
The bleeding edge build is stuffed silly with safeguards to prevent it, but from time to time it happens again.
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Among other things, a lively ongoing assortment of new races and such detailed out in an OGL fashion:
http://d20despot.blogspot.co.uk/
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Solved the unkillable critters hanging around thanks to Marson's Bosses AWOL addon code.
If not for the helpful guy himself on te4.org forums, I'd be stumped for a looong time.
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Looking good, Zireael. Looking forward to playing the update.
Just out of curiousity, do you have any goals to ever implement an overworld? I realize you're busy with other parts of the game right now, but I was wondering if it was in your long term plans.
Oh, and I thought you might be proud of me because I've been sticking with learning python/libtcod and have some very rudimentary beginnings of a roguelike in place.
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Just out of curiousity, do you have any goals to ever implement an overworld? I realize you're busy with other parts of the game right now, but I was wondering if it was in your long term plans.
Oh, and I thought you might be proud of me because I've been sticking with learning python/libtcod and have some very rudimentary beginnings of a roguelike in place.
Probably yes, but in veery far future. T-Engine is scarily powerful and allows doing a sh*tton of stuff with little effort.
What is your roguelike going to be about?
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(http://media.moddb.com/cache/images/mods/1/24/23463/thumb_620x2000/veins-0.16.1-1398625491.png)
Green denotes suggested class based on your attributes. Light blue means your race's favored class.
Remaining problems include multiple golden highlight for selection and stats table not refreshing on reroll.
... oh, and the textbox still doesn't work and the load premade is broken for some reason, too.
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Not sure if it's been already discussed but I was wondering that will there ever be any plot or quests? I know the game's based on infinite dungeon but I'm just wondering.
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Not sure if it's been already discussed but I was wondering that will there ever be any plot or quests? I know the game's based on infinite dungeon but I'm just wondering.
Quests planned in the future, might connect into some sort of a plot. For example, if I work out how to make levels thematic without breaking the dlvl display, I could make a city level where you would take quests from drow/duergar/whatever nobility and might even become nobles yourself.
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Not sure if it's been already discussed but I was wondering that will there ever be any plot or quests? I know the game's based on infinite dungeon but I'm just wondering.
Quests planned in the future, might connect into some sort of a plot. For example, if I work out how to make levels thematic without breaking the dlvl display, I could make a city level where you would take quests from drow/duergar/whatever nobility and might even become nobles yourself.
Yeah, city level sounds nice. Some kind of a reason for the main hero to descend into the dungeon would be good.
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I just downloaded this and the point buy feature is not working. Every time I finish making a dude with it the game sends me back to character creation.
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I just downloaded this and the point buy feature is not working. Every time I finish making a dude with it the game sends me back to character creation.
Are you sure you're clicking Birth and not Reset? The buttons are close by and it's easy to misclick, make sure it highlights the correct button.
I'm in the process of overhauling the character creation UI, anyways.
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Yes, I click birth, choose my sex, class, alignment, all that stuff, then it says it's generating a world and I'm right back at the point buy screen.
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Yes, I click birth, choose my sex, class, alignment, all that stuff, then it says it's generating a world and I'm right back at the point buy screen.
That's really weird. As I said, I'm overhauling the character generation screen(s), so hopefully this weirdness gets fixed.
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What is your roguelike going to be about?
Oh, just a weird story I've had in my mind for a decade or so. I'm really terrible at pitching things, but when I finish it I'll show it to you.
And, by the way, working on my own game really makes me appreciate how much work you (and all the other game authors out there) put into your projects. Don't get me wrong, I've always known that making games was really, really, tough, and had a respect for game developers, but my recent experiences just made me want to say thanks.
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Finished wrangling the code for a new character creation screen.
(http://media.moddb.com/cache/images/mods/1/24/23463/thumb_620x2000/veins-0.16.1-1398938852.png)
You can grab it by going to GitHub and pressing download zip, and then unpacking the folder to the /modules folder of your VotE or T-Engine installation.
There's a nit or two left, that's why I'm not releasing a new beta yet.
***
Vanguard, it might be worth checking if the character creation overhaul fixed your issue.
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(http://media.moddb.com/cache/images/mods/1/24/23463/thumb_620x2000/veins-0.16.1-1399123224.png)
Me on #tome IRC: my rogue is drooling over this scale mail
SK: that best be one powerful staff
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(http://media.moddb.com/cache/images/mods/1/24/23463/thumb_620x2000/veins-0.16.1-1399297977.png)
That's right, item creation feats are being done. This is Craft Arms and Armor, the wizard is selecting the bonus he wants to apply to an existing item. Creating items from scratch will take some more time, alas.
***
Don't know when the next release will be, as I have come down with a cold. Argh.
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Get well soon Zireael! :)
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Don't know when the next release will be, as I have come down with a cold. Argh.
Time to implement diseases then! *whip crack*
Get well soon.
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Diseases are not yet in, I was too busy polishing other stuff. Beta 5.2 is out with significant changes in dungeon generation...
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Based on player feedback, I've added explicit instructions to the character creation screen.
I also killed a bug where a confused player tried to increase the rolled stats - which should not be possible anyway - and got a lua error because the stat was less than 8.
(http://media.moddb.com/cache/images/mods/1/24/23463/thumb_620x2000/veins-0.17.0-1400432692.png)
Also, adding a tutorial level has been suggested. Any ideas?
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Two different players sent me error logs regarding spellbook and higher-level spells.
I've reproduced the problem (spellbook displaying spells a level early, so you can't learn yet), fix coming tomorrow or in 2 days.
***
That's in between adding a crapload of other stuff, most notably a randomized lore system, as I have to pass a course and one of the ways of doing so is making a text generator :D
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You might have noticed I've revised the README to make it more readable.
Also, a big thing has been crossed off my list, namely polymorphing. That means mounts should be done tomorrow and the next beta should be up on Monday, as usual.
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Did I promise you mounts and riding? Yeah, I did.
(http://media.moddb.com/cache/images/mods/1/24/23463/thumb_620x2000/veins-0.18.0-1400857893.png)
This fighter has a heavy warhorse for a mount. If the player clicks the mount button, the fighter will perform accordingly - his speed will be increased and the horse will disappear from screen. Another click will then dismount, making the horse show up again.
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I fixed a problem two players reported with being unable to memorize 2nd level spells (and getting an error instead) as Wiz3. Added a check which might seem spurious but prevents similar errors in the future. I also improved the right-hand part of the screen to be more readable.
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Another beta is out!
Big THANKS to the players who sent me error reports, which allowed me to nail quite a few bugs in this release!
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I tried this over this past weekend, but I was unable to type anything in the character naming field.
Also, I was able to left-click to increment character stats, but right-clicking to decrement them wasn't working. And there was also some overlap of buttons over the list of available races, making selection difficult.
Unfortunately, without a named character I couldn't proceed to look at anything else.
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Right click is not implemented, you reset stats using the reset button. The naming box doesn't work either.
I am working presently on a fix for the overlap buttons in 1366x768. I will release the fix as a single file, as in the meantime, I am partway through a big spell rework...
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A hotfix for those with 1366x768 or similar resolutions:
https://bitbucket.org/Zireael07/the-veins-of-the-earth/downloads/Birther.lua (https://bitbucket.org/Zireael07/the-veins-of-the-earth/downloads/Birther.lua)
Save to /modules/VotE/dialogs and overwrite the existing file.
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A sprawling assortment with some already tracked down otherwise, some not. One close to the top, for instance, aims for an OGL adaptation of sorts for various things from D&D 4e...
http://fossilbank.wikidot.com/category:tabletop-game-libre
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Thanks, that is an excellent repository of all things OGL.
In other news, there's a new beta, mostly focused on UI and bugfixing, and I have to thank Supermini from te4.org forums yet again for his invaluable feedback!
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I have put out several test versions on te4.org in preparation for the next beta.
I got some feedback yesterday from a player on OS X and it seems I need to go through the code and pick any errant case which is making problems on this case-sensitive system.
Not to mention there's a few things which stubbornly refuse to work and a new WIP feature.
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Beta 5.6. is out and FruitandGarbage from forums.te4.org gets a prize for being a most persistent tester - in addition to providing invaluable feedback about the game working on OS X.
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A great OGL'ing and such is happening for the Bedroom Wall Press folks:
http://www.bedroomwallpress.com/
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We're getting yet another thing to differentiate Veins from Incursion!
Back from hols for a few days, started working on a randomized worldmap.
(http://media.moddb.com/cache/images/mods/1/24/23463/thumb_620x2000/veins-0.20.0-1405534472.png)
It doesn't do anything yet, but it generates pretty for different characters.
Tell me, how many of you wished for a worldmap in Inc?
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Gonna go ahead and reckon everybody was hoping for that given it was to be one of the major draws for the Beyond Tech Demo Incursion alongside that massive rewrite---nice to see that is starting to enter the mix alongside all the rest.
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And speaking of OGL, by complete accident I discovered the existence of Eclipse (http://www.rpgnow.com/product/51255/Eclipse-The-Codex-Persona-Shareware), which is free.
I've also found a wealth of conversion guides for d20/Pathfinder on the net, so I will have something to work off when I think about overhauling char gen to use some form of point buy, which has been on my list for very long (basically to let players unlock more points by leveling up, so in some way 'unlocking' more powerful classes/races).
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Nice stuff on both fronts.
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In related news, I've fixed the ASCII/tiles switch to work at last (to be frank, I gave up on the previous version and simply copied ToME's code and shaved off unused stuff).
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Regarding Brigand's problems with Solstice and Chrome, I would like to know if anyone here uses Chrome and had problems with the browser flagging the download as suspicious/malware.
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Regarding Brigand's problems with Solstice and Chrome, I would like to know if anyone here uses Chrome and had problems with the browser flagging the download as suspicious/malware.
Problem with which download? Brigand's? I gave it a try a few minutes ago without a problem; no warnings. (Chrome is up to date, and the phishing/malware toggle is enabled...).
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No, mine :)
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ok ok :) I didn't get any warnings when downloading from your links either.
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ok ok :) I didn't get any warnings when downloading from your links either.
That's cool, great to know!
I've added a few new egos and monsters and made humanoids use A* for pathing. I'm not likely to get much done before the weekend as there's only so much I can do with GitHub's online API and a pretty crappy computer.
I plan to work on the worldmap and moddable tiles once I get back to my own computer.
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I'd had a feeling that the year mark passed when I was away and I was right.
The first commit is dated 21 Jun 2013 and the first beta was dated 15 Jun 2013.
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(http://media.moddb.com/cache/images/mods/1/24/23463/thumb_620x2000/veins-0.20.0-1407158348.png)
(http://media.moddb.com/cache/images/mods/1/24/23463/thumb_620x2000/veins-0.20.0-1407165314.png)
That's two of Retropunch's (from Bay 12) requests now realized, and another one which doesn't lend itself to pictures well (lowering the CR cap).
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A new beta is out - with a random worldmap. I need the feedback on it!
Also, what dungeons would you like to see next? Classic, themed (fire/ice/jungle/orc barracks/whatever), town, persistent, non-persistent?
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For the sake of momentum, start with the easiest, relatively, to implement and take it from there.
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A town level is now in. I plan to add some variations to it, however. All town levels are persistent. I also added an arena level purely for the sake of testing combat.
***
(http://media.moddb.com/cache/images/mods/1/24/23463/thumb_620x2000/veins-0.21.0-1408729784.png)
(http://media.moddb.com/cache/images/mods/1/24/23463/thumb_620x2000/veins-0.21.0-1408820560.png)
That's right, hirelings are now in! Getting them to a working state was surprisingly easier than I thought, just yesterday and today in between some UI improvements. (Shopkeepers have been made notably less chatty, too!)
Next: trying to figure out how to give casters spells at game start.
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(http://media.moddb.com/cache/images/mods/1/24/23463/thumb_620x2000/veins-0.22.0-1409675070.png)
Character creation, now 100% better! Tabs, deity selection, asterisks and more!
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In trying to deliver a bug-free upcoming beta 6, I ran into an engine bug, the same that's plaguing players of ToME itself, where the game will sometimes lose track of the player completely, leading to no player on map or turns running by insanely fast.
That's the only bug left, however, so the question is: do you want beta 6 now or do you prefer to wait for an engine fix?
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Better to wait I'd think---ideally each update will be all it can be and all that. You might come up with yet more good content or fixes in the meantime. 8)
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(http://media.moddb.com/cache/images/mods/1/24/23463/thumb_620x2000/veins-0.22.0-1409937193.png)
Deity and favor are now shown in character screen. That's right, you can gain favor with certain deities by killing enemies.
It's a start to a complex deity system just like Incursion's. More to come soon!
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Incursion's deity system has been 80% ported (the only thing missing is the insight framework and the ability to bless items on the altar).
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Beta 6 is out due to changelog getting unwieldy.
Right now I am not feeling overly well, so no progress towards next release, just brainstorming and reading up on the following things:
- fixing ASCII oversights and missing tiles - compiled a master Excel table to help me keep track of all the monsters
- monster AI in roguelikes
- item costs in AD&D vs 3.5 - gonna make a comparison table because I am thinking of switching over to basing all prices on silver pieces (sp) as opposed to gold pieces (gp)
Also I've returned to playing Forgotten Kingdoms - a d20-based MUD I've played for a few years and then nearly forgot last year due to MA and Veins. So more ideas may be forthcoming due to FK - such as using AD&D prices in a d20 setting.
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Beta 6 was released only three days ago, and I've already fixed some oversights. Castler has contributed a fix for the pseudo-ID and auto-ID not affecting worn items, and also reworked some talent dialogs.
All this means there will probably be a beta 6.1 before Oct 1.
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I have migrated all the stuff from the GitHub wiki to the new wikidot site.
http://veins-of-the-earth.wikidot.com (http://veins-of-the-earth.wikidot.com)
Tell me what else do you want to see on the wiki? Sample character builds? Worldmap description?
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I've fleshed out the User Guide part of the wiki: http://veins-of-the-earth.wikidot.com/help:_home (http://veins-of-the-earth.wikidot.com/help:_home)
How do you like the character builds? Players have oft requested a 'default' button for character creation, so there's five builds to pick from. Which one do you want as default? Probably not the drow :P, but which one of the four appeals to you the most?
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Fighter seems to be the usual default character everywhere.
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Fighter seems to be the usual default character everywhere.
Fighter tends to be the simplest/easiest to play in RPGs, and I guess the default class would be the one that you would normally start with as a new player to the game.
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Fighter seems to be the usual default character everywhere.
Fighter tends to be the simplest/easiest to play in RPGs, and I guess the default class would be the one that you would normally start with as a new player to the game.
The problem is, simplest/easiest does not necessarily equal most survivable. Currently, the most survivable characters are the ones who can cast healing spells - hence cleric or ranger on the list.
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Thanks for the kind words, Retropunch! I'll admit I stole a look or two at Incursion's online manual and at DCSS wiki.
As for the variant rules discussed upthread (money weight among them), I've decided to make them game settings - that is, you'll be able to set them once when starting a game and they wouldn't be changeable later to avoid abuse. One of said settings will probably be difficulty level, implemented in a way similar to BG/NWN (a percentile change to player's hp/damage dished out).
By default all of those variant settings would be off. The first one to go in will probably be defensive roll (roll d20 instead of having a set base AC of 10) and piecemeal armor (http://paizo.com/pathfinderRPG/prd/ultimateCombat/variants/piecemealArmor.html).
Piecemeal armor would later go hand-in-hand with body parts option. More options would include training (spawn trainers you have to find and pay to learn skills & feats) and spellbooks (learn spells from spellbooks like in Incursion instead of automagically).
***
Incursion-style parry bonus would go into the base game, as I think it's not controversial.
After a week of research, I've finally decided on using Runequest prices (Google "Runequest SRD" and "Open Quest") instead of d20 ones. That means we're moving to using a sp instead of a gp as a basic currency.
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Defensive roll variant is now in! Piecemeal armor and body parts will take a bit more time...
Also, due to player demand, bleeding out now allows you to attack. Note you still can't move, though.
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Bad news for those players who wished for barter functionality - implementing it proved much trickier than I expected. Mostly due to strange engine behavior making it supremely difficult to access item prices in ShowStore dialog.
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Bad news for those players who wished for barter functionality - implementing it proved much trickier than I expected. Mostly due to strange engine behavior making it supremely difficult to access item prices in ShowStore dialog.
I think it's not more than 3 days since you praised the engine as "incredibly easy to pick up" :).
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What if you interpret it under a framework of Quest (items) and Quest Prerequisites instead? Something roughly akin to how the Alchemist quests are handled in ToME 4 proper for instance.
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Bad news for those players who wished for barter functionality - implementing it proved much trickier than I expected. Mostly due to strange engine behavior making it supremely difficult to access item prices in ShowStore dialog.
I think it's not more than 3 days since you praised the engine as "incredibly easy to pick up" :).
It's easy to pick up, but some stuff isn't as easy as the rest - turns out I was going about accessing those prices in a wrong way :)
Actually, the store functionality is one of the trickiest parts of the engine, while adding new monsters/levels/spells/dungeons/worldmap is straightforward.
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So do the item prices give away ID information?
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So do the item prices give away ID information?
Anything that's in the shop is ID'ed by default. I might change this behavior now that the friendly ToME folks showed me how to tweak the store code without ending up in a loop...
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Well, yeah, it's normal for a shop that's asking you to pay for something to explain what the heck you'd be spending your money for. I was asking about deals in the other direction, which only operates if people can also sell things to the shopkeeper.
One of the games people play with ID is to walk into a shop and say, "I went for a walk and I found this stick." And if the shopkeeper offers you 342 zorkmids for it you know it's a pretty good stick. Like a wand of bunny-flinging or something. On the other hand, if the shopkeeper looks at you funny and says, "Dude, that's just a stick. Are you mental?" You figure, okay, so, it's nothing special. But if the shopkeeper offers you 7455 zorkmids for it, you know it's a really awesome stick, lke a wand of elephant-flinging or something.
Anyway, in a lot of games it develops that the shopkeeper offers you money for it without telling you what it is, but you can cross-index the amount of money with a spoiler to figure out what it is.
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Well I'll be damned---WoTC actually managed something quite sensible! :o Could it be they have finally learned after all these years, shots fired at Pathfinder to boot?
https://sites.google.com/site/dndphilmont/free-d-d-community-use-license
Of special note among many finer details is the entirety of all that is Birthright not just going "free", but full on Public Domain! 8)
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Woot woot!
*starts drooling*
In other news, price overhaul finished today!
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Actually, I apparently don't lurk enough D&D forums, just some extreme jackassery. :'( I guess I was bound to hit some utterly dud links when it came to this sort of thing at some point given how many I've posted in the thread over these past many months...
http://www.enworld.org/forum/showthread.php?365124-Parody-Thread-Two-new-licenses-for-2015-D-amp-D-COMPATIBLE-and-FREE-D-amp-D!-COMMUNITY-USE
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*sobs**
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Beta 6.2 is out.
As I've started new university year, I will have less time to devote to working on the game. But I can and will work on the Wikidot site.
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Found a bit of free time on my birthday, so bleeding edge builds now have item flavor lua errors fixed and death messages have been added in!
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Have a great b-day! 8)
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Found a bit of free time on my birthday, so bleeding edge builds now have item flavor lua errors fixed and death messages have been added in!
Oh, cool. :) I was just trying it out and I think I was hitting those item flavor errors. :D Apologies if this is answered somewhere else in this thread (it's kinda big!), but is there a place to get bleeding edge builds (or do you mean compiling it from the Open HUB page?) I want my wands and potions! :D (Especially if I'm going to be fighting cockatrices on the first level. Mean old cockatrices...)
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Ferret - OpenHub is just a statistics page, but it should have a download link.
In any case, the bleeding edge files are on GitHub https://github.com/Zireael07/The-Veins-of-the-Earth/archive/master.zip (https://github.com/Zireael07/The-Veins-of-the-Earth/archive/master.zip)
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Cool. :) I'll try it out either tonight or Wednesday, depends on when I finish up a small upgrade to Demon. :D
I got a Fighter to 6th level or so. :D I got into a D&D group a month or so ago, but I found myself wanting just a litttttle bit more D&D than the few hours a week that provides, so I found this at a good time. :D
Some feedbacky stuff / questions:
* It's pretty fun. :D I'm looking forward to playing more, especially with item flavors working. :)
* Are scrolls supposed to be infinite re-use?
* I had a lot of trouble staying fed (though it didn't seem to matter that I ended up Starved!), is there some way to use the corpses to get food ala Stone Soup? I tried just 'using' them, but that just got rid of them.
* My Shaman started with Cure Light Wounds, but couldn't cast it for some reason? Other spells seemed to work as expected for a non-prepared spells class.
* Veins' interpretation of Mobility (+4 AC permanent instead of +4 AC vs. opportunity attacks) is reaaallly powerful. Not sure I can think of a character it wouldn't be my first pick on.
* Speaking of feats though, the only time I could see what feats did was in the Bonus Fighter Feats UI. Is there a way to see that normally?
Going to try mages out once I get the bleeding edge thingie, those are where my heart is anyway class-wise. :D
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1) Scrolls and wands have 50 charges but I didn't get around to displaying the charges anywhere :P
2) Using corpses is a bug, unless you used drop :) Devouring corpses and cutting them into chunks is planned
3) Gonna take a look at this.
...
If you want to play a mage, you'll have quite a hard time - best to multiclass.
I'm slowly working on adding more spells and on making skills useful, but it takes time...
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I'm slowly working on adding more spells and on making skills useful, but it takes time...
I understand, believe me. :D I've been appalled sometimes by how long it takes me to do a decent-sized content push. No worries, I'll have fun times with what's there. :)
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Listen and Appraise have been coded in. Detect evil/good/law/chaos spells are in, too.
Next beta slated to arrive in December - my studies are a mess in the literal sense.
In the meantime, take a peek at the changelog (https://github.com/Zireael07/The-Veins-of-the-Earth/blob/master/CHANGELOG.md).
Most important changes:
* T-Engine 1.2.4 compatibility
* AI improvements
* monk abilities & Stunning Fist
* increased XP rewards for low CR monsters
* ported over all Incursion templates except class templates (since we're doing NPC classes in a much more flexible way) and undead templates
* a whole heap of bugfixes
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Cool, end of October is as good a time as any to get some good news for December to make things interesting. 8)
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Spent most of last week researching various homebrew class fixes and the tier system.
Decided to work on documentation. Split off the changes and classes to separate pages; added tables to class descriptions. Color-coded said tables.
http://veins-of-the-earth.wikidot.com/base-classes (http://veins-of-the-earth.wikidot.com/base-classes)
Now the tables are complete for most classes that are in game. Time to sit down and actually code the missing class abilities and spells.
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Not coded missing stuff yet but the new version is here 8) because no classes on 11th!
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I've added level titles today.
That means the only things left on GitHub issues page are thrown weapons (darts, javelins) and assorted optional stuff. Optional stuff being optional, I might just close them just to have all the issues listed cleanly on Bitbucket.
Thrown weapons aren't thrown yet because I can't figure out if I should plonk them via the existing shoot icon or make a separate throw icon and talent.
In other news, got Mount & Blade yesterday for free from GOG.
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I've updated the wikidot page with the equipment list and some info on the silver standard.
Equipment (http://"http://veins-of-the-earth.wikidot.com/equipment")
In the meantime, I'm working on a drow city - with buildings, factions and new NPCs, all procedurally generated.
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Mod of the Year awards @ ModDB are upon us!
Can you VotE?
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Beta 6.5 is out, feedback wanted!
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I've spent the last two days poking incessantly around room generation code.
The result is that room name is finally printed to screen - something which has been envisioned for over a year and what I'd attempted to make work for the last month or so.
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I've spent the last two days poking incessantly around room generation code.
The result is that room name is finally printed to screen - something which has been envisioned for over a year and what I'd attempted to make work for the last month or so.
Why was it so hard?
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I've spent the last two days poking incessantly around room generation code.
The result is that room name is finally printed to screen - something which has been envisioned for over a year and what I'd attempted to make work for the last month or so.
Why was it so hard?
Because I had self.map.attrs(i-1+x, j-1+y, room_name, true) instead of self.level.map.attrs(i-1+x, j-1+y, room_name, true).
My own fault for not looking carefully enough at how T-Engine sets grid attributes.
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Because I had self.map.attrs(i-1+x, j-1+y, room_name, true) instead of self.level.map.attrs(i-1+x, j-1+y, room_name, true).
Such errors should be detected during the compilation (or interpretation) phase. May I ask what language is it?
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Because I had self.map.attrs(i-1+x, j-1+y, room_name, true) instead of self.level.map.attrs(i-1+x, j-1+y, room_name, true).
Such errors should be detected during the compilation (or interpretation) phase. May I ask what language is it?
Lua. T-Engine has pretty good error detection, but this one somehow slipped through the cracks...
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Lua. T-Engine has pretty good error detection, but this one somehow slipped through the cracks...
I'm not a LUA expert, in fact I've never used it, so I can't even tell whether it is LUA's fault or the engine's. Nevertheless, one year, or even one month, because of such a tiny mistake is a terrible waste of time (said the guy who has been developing one game for almost 15 years :D).
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Because I had self.map.attrs(i-1+x, j-1+y, room_name, true) instead of self.level.map.attrs(i-1+x, j-1+y, room_name, true).
My own fault for not looking carefully enough at how T-Engine sets grid attributes.
It's always these small errors that waste your time. I remember when I did game development professionally, and some fellow developers were clearing out a STL mapping in C++ instead of deleting the entry. So instead of detecting no entry, and then handling that, it would get a null and proceed to pollute other things with this value.. and crashes ensued. I blame intellisense in visual studio from getting in the way of people reading the documentation.
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I blame intellisense in visual studio from getting in the way of people reading the documentation.
Intellisense is a great thing (that is, when it works). If it wasn't there, people wouldn't read documentation either. I mean, documentation is important when you are doing something for the first time, but for repetitive (and trivial) tasks such as clearing a container it is good to have something more tightly integrated with your editor. So I'd rather blame STL for its confusing API.
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That month was terribly busy at uni - I did not have time to code. Next beta should come sometime in February, before next semester starts.
Some things I managed to do:
* fix some spelling mistakes in log
* AI no longer walks into chasms/lava/water
* low Int characters get separate answers in dialogues
* the drow noble house is now named after the actual House that lives in it
* consumables now stack
* in inventory, un-wearable items are highlighted in red; unusable ones in blue
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With the announcement of T-Engine 1.3 beta tests, the next Veins beta is obviously postponed until 1.3 comes out.
That doesn't mean development has stopped, quite the opposite!
* Far Shot and Precise Shot are now implemented.
And the big change:
The sorcerer class and its divine equivalent, the shaman, have undergone significant revision. They both use spell points now instead of spell slots.
The game is now a cross between SRD and Incursion - with some classes working the SRD way and some working the Incursion way. Interestingly, this is what Julian Mensch envisioned for the "full" release of Incursion: Return of the Forsaken.
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Probably the most sensible plan, as v1.3 looks to be a pretty significant update, and to stay flexible on it especially as far as how classes fare.
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This appears to be back in action/better than prior and could well be useful! 8)
http://wizardawn.and-mag.com/
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Thanks for the link, perusing fantasy equipment list atm.
(http://media.moddb.com/cache/images/mods/1/24/23463/thumb_620x2000/veins-0.26.0-1424353511.png)
That's right, metamagic feats are finally implemented, except for Enlarge Spell.
I still need to implement Enlarge and Quicken Spell, and apply the heightened spell point cost/use up higher level spell slots properly.
Regarding the 'configure' thing reported a few times, the hotbar's code is taken from ToME. I assume the 'configure' hint refers to auto-using talents. Which will probably come along in the future, but I'm not sure how quickly. For now, I will try to fish out the tooltip and remove the reference.
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Also potentially useful as far as tools and various other things:
http://dungeonchannel.com/
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I like that site a lot, looots of random generators I could get inspired by!
Josh (aka Castler) has made a PR with some UI fixes, I've merged it and used the chance to update the changelog.
Here's the list of stuff done since beta 6.5:
* bug fix - FBO lua error on save load
* bug fix - Lua error & nil exp for creatures with CR in-between table values
* bug fix - character creation screen now does check if a character save already exists
* bug fix - flavored amulets spelling
* bug fix - incorporate the engine fixes for ActorSeenDisplay, making the switch work
* bug fix - shooting not using the weapon's designated crit damage
* bug fix - flyers showing for critters outside lite range
* bug fix - assassin name typo
* bug fix - charges being displayed off or not displayed at all for multiple lines of spells in a spellbook
* bug fix - training stat tracker values are now properly zeroed when increasing stat
* bug fix - no more Lua errors on right clicking talents
* new spells - divine favor, entropic shield, doom, shield of faith
* new NPC: human/dwarf/drow healer
* sorcerers and shamans now use a spell points system instead of Vancian spellcasting
* implement room descriptions
* hirelings now use party member code from ToME
* implement metamagic feats - Extend, Empower and Maximize Spell
* implement Precise Shot and Far Shot feats
* implement spell points & psionic power
* consumables now stack
* unwearable items are highlighted in red; unusable ones in blue
* drow noble house is now named after the House that inhabits it
* can now throw thrown weapons
* low Int characters get separate answers now
* log message is shown when player gains EXP
* UI improvements and bugfixes for feat select screen
* AI no longer walks into chasms/lava/water
* game options screen displayed before the first level is generated
* implement talent configuration from ToME
* backport room generator improvements from ToME git
* backport ego improvements from ToME git
(The last two will go after ToME 1.3 arrives and I update to it)
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When I tried VotE some time ago I was put off a bit by "dull" dungeon generation - it was sort of reminiscent of a block-like US city map layout with lots and lots of dead ends. Now when I played it again a few days ago, it seemed much more varied and interesting. Was there any changes made to the generator in newer versions or am I just imagining things or was unlucky the first few times?
Anyway, I like it a lot - I`m an old fan of AD&D, game is complex, and the dungeon seems quite alive with neutral characters and infighting among monsters. A welcome change from the usual "everybody rush the @" behaviour.
I had a good run going and was enjoying myself, but then it turned out that after quitting I can`t restore my old game. That`s happened twice now - the bar goes up to 100% and nothing happens.
Any clue why this might be happening? I had some scripting errors (sent reports off) during the gameplay, but the game managed to continue. Also TOME itself seems to work fine. Could provide more details, just not sure what kind of apart from the fact I`m on Windows 8.1.
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Dungeon generation has been changed a few times, and one of the versions included the block-like layout, which is still in as one of the side dungeons.
I had a good run going and was enjoying myself, but then it turned out that after quitting I can`t restore my old game. That`s happened twice now - the bar goes up to 100% and nothing happens.
Any clue why this might be happening?
If you were using beta 6.5, that was the FBO crapping out on save load. If you were using a newer version, then you should have a te4log.txt file in your T-Engine folder, look for the error somewhere at the end after force-closing the game (but before re-opening the application)
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Bit confused...I think all three downloads out there are called beta 6.5? Which one would be the newest?
Tried the module from te4.org itself but my Maj`Eyal launcher finds it "incompatible" (not sure, might be doing something wrong - tried to load through Addons?). Then the github version acts the same like ModDB one - hangs after loading.
And yes, the error at the end of the log relates to "FBOs".
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They are all the same - I realized I forgot to include the instructions on getting the bleeding edge in this OP.
If you want the bleeding edge instead of the beta releases, use this link (https://github.com/Zireael07/The-Veins-of-the-Earth/archive/master.zip)
If you already have a beta downloaded, replace the VotE folder with the contents of the zip. If you just have T-Engine, drop the contents of the zip in the modules/VotE folder.
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Thanks...that sorted the saves problem. On the other hand though, both times I played the game ended in irreparable crashes. Not sure how your bug reporting works so didn`t save the logs. Hopefully it will all stabilise after 1.3...
Requests:
-possibility to switch weapon sets - melee/ranged
-staying in the inventory or character upgrade screens after making a change
Weird behaviour:
-game seems to report on stuff happening outside main character`s field of vision
-drow casting outline/blinding every single turn
-I once got minus four points to distribute after leveling
Well, it seemed weird to me but maybe there are rules behind this kind of stuff?
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Requests go into my growing pile of notes.
As for weird things:
-game seems to report on stuff happening outside main character`s field of vision
- bug I can't fix, for now I pretend the character can hear slightly farther than he/she can see; also, keeps the game from being punishingly hard if you have no light source for some reason
-drow casting outline/blinding every single turn
-I once got minus four points to distribute after leveling
Bugs. The drow one is an easy fix, I tried a low Int character but never got minus points so far, will keep testing :)
***
I've implemented vitality and wounds system, a version of which was on Julian's to-do list for new!Incursion.
The plan isn't that injuries will be hard/impossible to heal, just that they'll take some notable resources and time to do so. So drinking a healing potion will be a notable event rather than a "quaff 3-5 after every fight" routine.
The current plan is for a more realistic combat system that still allows cinematic toughness [...] and then making serious injury and healing a more serious and difficult matter, with healing harder [...]
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The drow darkness/faerie fire spam is fixed.
Josh and I have churned out a few more bugfixes, including the map going under the UI thing which has been plaguing me for at least two betas. (Turns out I was poking at the wrong function lol)
DarkGod is on RC1 for T-Engine 1.3., so that means beta 7 should be out as soon as ToME 1.3. lands. (I've tested with b9 and RC1 and found no new problems).
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ToME 1.3. is supposed to land on the 18th of March, so I suppose beta 7 will come around the 20th.
Gives me some time to poke around some improvements and maybe more dungeons :)
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Beta 7 is out, waiting for any wishes/comments/bug reports (maybe not the latter :P)
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I'm deeply deeply appalled by this announcement. Soon, Incursion will be a dated dinosaur that has been left in the dust. Keep up the good work!
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I'm deeply deeply appalled by this announcement. Soon, Incursion will be a dated dinosaur that has been left in the dust. Keep up the good work!
Thanks for the kind words :)
There's quite a lot of things that Incursion does better or Veins doesn't have yet.
Let's see, off the top of my head:
- monster AI - monsters able to hide/turn invisible/follow the leader/shapechange
- traps being placed in narrow corridors and not randomly
- no dud 1-room dungeons with stairs up and down in a single room
- tunneling which actually works without lots of dead-ends
- swarms, dragons, drakes
- bull rush, grapple
- mid-level feats and spells
- flat-footedness and uncanny dodge
- Luck actually affecting loot generation
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T-Engine 1.3.1. is out, including a small developing feature I've repeatedly asked DG about :)
On the Veins end of things, I've been working on AI (it can now pick up stuff as well as swap weapons).
I also tried to stop the kiting the player could do without penalties. Attacks of opportunity are nearly working now, except that they tend to trigger for monsters around player and not for player around monsters :P
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Requests:
-possibility to switch weapon sets - melee/ranged
Done :)
If you grab the bleeding edge, pressing q will switch between your mainhand and the new shoulder slot.
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Managed to fix the amulet ASCII symbol not showing up :) which used to annoy me to no end.
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Churning out bugfixes rather than new content. Some things have escaped notice until now, others were annoying but relatively simple to fix once I spotted how (difficulty selection).
Pile of notes in CintaNotes is growing. I think I'll tackle the player's offspring next - that's right, you'll be able to take over as your kid once you die, if the kid's old enough (I guesstimate ~12 for starting as a young/teen templated character or ~16 as roughly adult)
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http://www.moddb.com/mods/the-veins-of-the-earth/images/your-kids-listing (http://www.moddb.com/mods/the-veins-of-the-earth/images/your-kids-listing)
Stage one of the player's offspring is done. Time to make it possible for your kid to take over after you die without starting a whole new game.
The kid's age and the pregnancy time (~9 months) are not yet taken into account, and the kid is named just that, "kid", as a placeholder until I figure out how to make it access the random names list.
Oh, and the character sheet now lists all the effects on you in a nifty tab.
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You can now take over as your kid when your first character dies. Then said new hero can breed more kids... you get the idea? ;)
The functionality is not complete, for some reason I can't get the kid to get the player body instead of the NPC one - meaning he/she won't be able to use many slots, including the player-specific shoulder slot. Also, the kids are all named "kid" as a placeholder - fixing those is on my priority list.
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I was thinking that the word "Kid" as the header is quite immersion-breaking, how about "Offspring" as you talked about or "Descendant"?
How about also seeing ancestors listed?
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Changed header, thanks for the suggestion!
As for ancestors, filing the idea away for the future - I need to polish my MA draft due Tuesday first, and only then I can play URR or poke around the code...
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Yet more OGL happenings:
http://ironfalcon.basicfantasy.org/
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Next beta will arrive after 6th May at the earliest (MA draft due 5 May).
I have been fixing assorted spelling mistakes, such as decimals in elemental damage log or superfluous "a" before item names.
I have also added lots of weapon egos - you can now enjoy bane weapons, aligned weapons, elemental weapons and elemental burst weapons, I think that's around 20 egos total.
As for the kids, the only thing left is to make them get randomly generated names.
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My MA supervisor agreed to me handing in the draft a week later, so...
Beta 8 "Mayfly-December Romance" has just been uploaded to GitHub.
How do you like the new way to keep playing after death? How many successive characters have you had?
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While you're enjoying beta 8, I'm working on adding the missing monsters (SRD comes first, Pathfinder SRD second). And some of those monsters need tiles...
I uploaded said tiles to my DeviantArt account (http://zireael07.deviantart.com/), which was pretty much unused for several months.
Do you like them? I'm getting better at this, but they're still not made from scratch :P
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Seems like it is off to a solid enough start considering, tough as it is to cram evocative details into the super low res and all.
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An ongoing OSR mag apparently chock full of various things all the while:
http://www.and-mag.com/
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I've finally made the elemental planes. Not perfect, admittedly - they don't choke you (Earth), drown you (Water) or burn you to crisp (Fire) and I think none of them should have any loot around, especially not Fire or Air, but...
(http://media.moddb.com/cache/images/mods/1/24/23463/thumb_620x2000/veins-0.27.0-1432056103.png)
(http://media.moddb.com/cache/images/mods/1/24/23463/thumb_620x2000/veins-0.27.0-1432056354.png)
More screenshots in the gallery, of course. I'm proud of how pretty it all is - while I took the floor tiles from UT 32 tileset, the walls are my edits.
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Polishing my MA (complete text due for review June 9), but found some time to poke around the chat code.
(http://media.moddb.com/cache/images/mods/1/24/23463/thumb_620x2000/veins-0.27.0-1432662829.png)
Yes, that's the beginning of NPC portraits I've been planning to implement for the longest time.
Next step: make the overlays (eyes, brows, nose, mouth) work, then randomize them, then make them depend on race.
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I should really try The Veins of the Earth.
As always,
Minotauros
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Thank you, Minotaur!
The randomization bit is done and I've printed and bound my MA today, so I should have some more time to work on Veins and get beta 9 out there :)
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Did you consider back to ascii-display option?
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Did you consider back to ascii-display option?
ASCII display is as simple as pressing Esc, clicking Graphics Mode and 'ASCII with backgrounds'.
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This option never was removed?... I sought this option from a few versions... What's shame :D
Thank you, Zireael :)
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Beta 9 is out! Ideas, wishes...?
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I just tried to download beta 9 from gamefront via moddb and the file's not available there. I'm not a member on moddb so I don't know if their direct link is working or not.
Edit: Never mind, it just popped up!
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No, this is not dead. :)
I've implemented Pick Pockets and Decipher Script. I've also bitten the bullet and implemented the background skills (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/skills/background-skills) variant from Pathfinder as a default rule. This should make Craft (and other non-immediately useful skills) much more viable.
I've drafted a new class over the last week.
Magus draft (http://veins-of-the-earth.wikidot.com/new-classes-drafts)
As you can guess, it draws on the Pathfinder magus (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/classes/base-classes/magus), but also on the vanguard (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/classes/3rd-party-classes/super-genius-games/vanguard) class.
Once again, the goal is to have every level be significant (i.e. no "dead levels").
**
On the game end of things, shuffled around some effects and hard at work adding more spells.
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Link formatting seems broken somehow on those---but still, cool stuff and congrats on the deepening progress! 8)
Link that seems to work on the first one:
http://veins-of-the-earth.wikidot.com/new-classes-drafts Initial thoughts: Nifty and a good mix that should definitely add to the variety of viable approaches
I would also suggest you check out the latest 2 design docs that have went public/came out period for Knights of the Chalice II in the last little while:
http://www.heroicfantasygames.com/Forums/viewtopic.php?f=5&t=213&start=180#p4649
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I'm checking new version finally. For now I encountered one mistake (because word 'bug' isn't best choice this time). When player is checking Chaotic Good description he read that he's Neutral Good.
Next what bother me is problems with leveling character. When 'level up' window appears, i see that I have 0 skill point, 1 class points, 0 feat points and 0 stat points.
I spent class point and back to the game. Next I noticed that 'level up' message is still displayed. I check character sheet - ouch, I have 2 skill points! It's a bit weird. I replicate bug in next character, and this occurs in every 'level up' event.
Next weird thing is descriptions of items. For example:
battleaxe {mundane}
A normal battleaxe
Damage 1d6.This is martial weapon.
Damage: 1d6
Threatens a critical on roll of: 20
Unindentified
I wanna to blow the whistle on dobuled 'damage' info. Other issues are less annoying.
Another problem with leveling. 'Missing' or 'escaping' feats' desriptions. So, when I highlight specific feat, desription field is empty. If I want to read description, I must:
1) have 'expanded menu of feat' (I don't know how to say it in English - for example, I must click 'active combat' to get 'Power Attack' feat
2) highlight LEARNED FEAT (so, I see description)
3) highlight specific feat ('Power Attack')
when I hightlight outspread feat menu ('Active combat') and then highlight feat, everything is ok. But when I am highlighting not-outspreaded feat menu and later highlight feat, description disappears.
Hm, interesting. Sometimes feat menu works perfectly.
Inventory menu is auto-closing after every action, this is tedious.
I think that dungeon generation algorithm could be better. Actually very long corridors - without crossroads, with dead end - are generated (too) often.
Zireael, I don't want to leave only criticism in this post. I like VoTE and I wish you luck with this project. I hope that my feedback (...criticism, ok) could help you to improve Veins of The Earth.
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I have fixed the 'Neutral Good' thing and the doubled Damage entry.
The level up screen will be overhauled soon - possibly even this week, and hopefully this should fix the refresh issues it has.
As for the feat screen, it will become a tab of the new level up screen and I will look at descriptions display.
I am aware that the inventory auto-closing is annoying - I am in fact annoyed by it too - but haven't yet found a way to fix it. For now, you can equip items without closing by dragging them - and picking any option from the use menu seems to auto-close the inventory.
Dungeon generation has long been on my to improve list - alas, I'm not sure I could code a better generation although I have looked at some dungeon generation tutorials, mostly on RogueBasin.
***
I'm afk for the next two days, keep those reports coming as I'm updating all sorts of descriptions and screens at the moment. Also, any wishes for classes/feats/spells?
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Good to know! :) And thanks for inventory screen tip, I didn't try it...
For the feat screen, I noticed one weird think. If only 1 feat 'tab' is open, the problem occurs. When I open another tab (with big list of feats), everything is ok, descriptions are shown as it should.
Two issues with display.
First - if wall is thin, I can see fragments of tiles behind the wall. http://i.imgur.com/ICv5ogI.png
Second - floor tiles replaces part of left section of UI. http://i.imgur.com/tMhHsFN.png
and next - description of monster. Seems to flags of monsters are displayed in description 'as is', for example:
giant eagle
magical_beast
Current place info refreshes only from time to time. When I leave dungeon and enter world map, for some time 'Tunnels, level 1' was displayed. Only later info changed to 'world map'.
Wishes for classes... Only D&D, I think?
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If general crazy wishes are fine: Since I'm not aware of any classes proper that focus on it---I've always reckoned it would be interesting in a different sort of way to have a class strongly focused on Sonic damage and related effects/perks as you'd think there'd be some kind of Bard variant explicitly along these lines all things considered, but instead it always seems to get left out versus the usual Elemental assortment save for maybe Acid usually not getting much more love.
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Huh, nice idea, getter77. Creative. I though about more typical classes, for example - I've always liked scout from D&D 3.5. It's ranger without spellcasting but with more physical advantages, based on dexterity and speed.
Sadly, I have to report very annoying bug. I played half-orc barbarian and I gained new character level. As barbarian, on 2nd clvl, probably I should have 4 skill points and 1 class point. So, I had -4 skill points. When I spent my class point, I noticed I have -3 skill points. A bit weird, I think.
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Minus points are something I haven't been able to track down - the code is math.max (1, <the normal equation>), so the minus thing should never happen.
As for the other reports: the tile sneaking under the UI is a known problem but trying to fix it distorts the map completely :(
And I have no idea about the FOV thing since the walls should block it completely.
I am pleased to report the type formatting has been improved, so you will now see
arrowhawk
magical beast
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Number of skill points is affected by WIS modifier. Characters with higher WIS stat have more skill point than others. Obvious. stats <= 8 have negative modifiers. Maybe SP's value isn't prevent to has a negative value? So, barbarians with WIS==5 can have -x SP.
More strange is adding 1 SP (from -4 to -3) after spending class point.
The FOV problem is caused by T4-Engine, I think. It looks similar in ToME 4 and probably is intentional - to provide 'smoothness' of display, without sharp edges.
I am pleased to report the type formatting has been improved
I am pleased to know it :)
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I think I stopped the negative skill points.
While adding spells, I noticed the hotbar was getting more and more clustered while many of the skills and spells are only situationally useful. I then thought of Baldur's Gate UI where you could pull up the list of spells with a single icon.
Here's what I arrived at.
(http://media.moddb.com/cache/images/mods/1/24/23463/thumb_620x2000/veins-0.29.0-1439287267.png)
The HLW icon is there because it's an innate ability. The spellbook icon stays, as well.
The sword brings up a menu of attack options. The expand icon brings up a menu of skills and the one which looks vaguely like a crescent shows the list of spells.
Pleasantly surprised that this only took 3h to do in all.
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Good news :)
What else are you planning for next version? And when can we expect the BETA 10?
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Good news :)
What else are you planning for next version? And when can we expect the BETA 10?
Plan for beta 10:
* as many spells from NWN 1/NWN 2 spell lists as possible (yes, including spells above spell level 4)
* possibly the magus class mentioned a few posts back
* no game-breaking bugs
When:
before the Athletics World Championships 2015 starts (so before 22nd August) because I'll be watching it on TV :)
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After a few months hiatus I played VotE for a bit over the weekend. The positive impression is that it`s now quite playable - the endless error reports are mostly gone now. And the new "change weapon set" feature is great - thanks for following the suggestion :) On the downside though, the game still feels sort of incomplete...perhaps a wrong word for a beta...but I`m just constantly unsure if I`m in control - or better yet, if the game is in control of itself.
Okay, I didn`t encounter anything seriously game-breaking...but there`s lots of little niggles and curios that sort of wear me down and prevent any more serious approach to gameplay (also break immersion). So, my vote (sorry! :) for the next VotE beta would be to limit new feature implementation and instead hunker down and try to squash as many insectoids as possible.
Hope you won`t take the above as an empty criticism - Veins is right down my alley and I really hope to see it next to my other top-shelf RLs one day. Hopefully sooner than later ;)
Here are some things that bugged me (truly sorry, it must be a Bad Pun day here @@)
I second the points Avagart brought up, some of which I also mentioned before. Other stuff:
-trying Animal Empathy on a critter always ends up in an error
-sometimes: weird and constant "trying to wield" message popping up even when I`m not doing anything with inventory (think it happened when I walked over an item)
-still getting messages about actions outside my fov ("kobold got off the ground"...grand...but what kobold?)
-another map/border problem - I can get two tiles deep below the bottom border - can`t see my character but can move about
-"stolen vitality heals your injuries"...nice, but where did that came from?
-it seems I can make melee attacks from more than 1 tile away. How come? Also it seems I attack sometime just by pressing "wait"
-there`s no "X dies" messages when killing monsters - and sometimes it`s confusing (combined with the comment below)
-monsters seem to appear kind of randomly, even ones that already spawned - now maybe that`s down to the fact that the visibility range is not clearly defined (suggest more contrasting colour for tiles outside fov)
-could really do with a proper map
-spawned wearing armour that requires proficiency which my character didn`t have. Took it off and couldn`t put it back on - naked in a hostile dungeon :)
-I don`t quite get the staircase system - I was going up or down one several times and ended up with weird results - non consecutive or random-looking floor numbers
-hunger clock: once I totally forgot it exists and only realised quite late in. Don`t remember the message state (red), but then I ate 5 rations and lots of corpses in quick succession and still only got up to famished. Weird.
-can I throw stuff? Got a spear equipped but cant do nothing with it...nevermind other stuff...
Phew! But I`m sure some of the above are not errors but me just not knowing or doing something wrong, so sorry about that. If you haven`t heard of any of the above yet (ones that look like genuine bugs at least) let me know and I will try to replicate them.
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-trying Animal Empathy on a critter always ends up in an error
-sometimes: weird and constant "trying to wield" message popping up even when I`m not doing anything with inventory (think it happened when I walked over an item)
-still getting messages about actions outside my fov ("kobold got off the ground"...grand...but what kobold?)
-another map/border problem - I can get two tiles deep below the bottom border - can`t see my character but can move about
-"stolen vitality heals your injuries"...nice, but where did that came from?
-it seems I can make melee attacks from more than 1 tile away. How come? Also it seems I attack sometime just by pressing "wait"
-there`s no "X dies" messages when killing monsters - and sometimes it`s confusing (combined with the comment below)
-monsters seem to appear kind of randomly, even ones that already spawned - now maybe that`s down to the fact that the visibility range is not clearly defined (suggest more contrasting colour for tiles outside fov)
-could really do with a proper map
-spawned wearing armour that requires proficiency which my character didn`t have. Took it off and couldn`t put it back on - naked in a hostile dungeon :)
-I don`t quite get the staircase system - I was going up or down one several times and ended up with weird results - non consecutive or random-looking floor numbers
-hunger clock: once I totally forgot it exists and only realised quite late in. Don`t remember the message state (red), but then I ate 5 rations and lots of corpses in quick succession and still only got up to famished. Weird.
-can I throw stuff? Got a spear equipped but cant do nothing with it...nevermind other stuff...
2 & 3 - should be fixed.
4 - trying to fix it distorted the map and whacked the mouse controls. Leaving it as is for now.
5- your god is nice to you
6 - that's the attack of opportunity mechanic - if the enemies try to move away, you get a free attack. alas, the corpse drops where they end the "move", not start
7 - on it now. works for player getting killed but not monsters
8&9 (dark non-FOV and map) - good points
the last thing: nope, no throwing spears in this ruleset. Although I might implement a rule which lets you throw anything but at a hefty -6 penalty to attack.
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(http://media.moddb.com/cache/images/mods/1/24/23463/thumb_620x2000/veins-0.29.0-1439661570-darker.png)
Akeley, this dark enough for you? It's not pushed yet because I need that FOV change to play nicely with the time passage code...
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A bit too dark for me, I think. It can tire the eyes.
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Yeah, anything more contrast-y than previous version would be good I suppose, as it was already "nearly there"...
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I think beta 10 has "more contrast-y" when it comes to seen vs not-seen. Now that I can happily break things without worrying about an impending release, I will try to make it look even better (hint: the torchlight is yellow!)
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Grats! I'm very glad to see that almost every reported bug is fixed. :)
Hm, I have question. Built-in bug reporting system is your thing, ie sends raports to you, Zireael? Or there is standard ToME4 feature and reports are send to DarkGod?
So, while I don't know it, I will be post reports in this thread...
Leveled from 3clvl to 4clvl. I had 1 available stat point and I tried to increase my WIS stat from 7 to 8.
Lua Error: /mod/dialogs/LevelupDialog.lua:812: attempt to index a nil value
At [C]:-1 __newindex
At /mod/dialogs/LevelupDialog.lua:812 incStat
At /mod/dialogs/LevelupDialog.lua:137 fct
At /engine/ui/ListColumns.lua:462 onUse
At /engine/ui/ListColumns.lua:134 fct
At /engine/Mouse.lua:56 receiveMouse
At /engine/Mouse.lua:94 delegate
At /engine/ui/Dialog.lua:602 mouseEvent
At /engine/ui/Dialog.lua:343 fct
At /engine/Mouse.lua:56
After that my WIS skill increases.
I was walking... No more...
Lua Error: /mod/class/Object.lua:102: attempt to index a nil value
At[C]-1 __index
At /mod/class/Object.lua:102 lightTurns
At /mod/class/Object.lua:89 act
At /engine/GameEnergyBased.lua:82 tick
At /engine/GameTurnBased.lua:46 tick
At /mod/class/Game.lua:736
Hyenas and Duragear are displayed as 'h' letter in tile mode. Sea cat as a 'c'.
Some strange thing in refreshing infos.
'place' (fore example 'tunnels, dungeon level 2') and 'level up!' refreshes after player move
amount of skill points refreshes after spending one of them; before this, skill points looks like set to 0.
I was fighting with two enemies; recently I summoned mounts and my horses attacked enemies
Lua Error: /mod/class/Actor.lua:786 attempt to perform arithmetic on field 'max_wounds' (a nil value)
At [C]:-1 __div
At /mod/class/Actor.lua:786 deathStuff
At mod/class/Actor.lua:904 onTakeHit
At /mod/class/NPC.lua:204 onTakeHit
At /mod/class/interface/ActorLife.lua:42 takeHit
At /data/damage_types.lua:48 defaultProjector
At /data/damage_types.lua:81 projector
At /mod/class/interface/Combat.lua:397 dealDamage
At /mod/class/interface/Combat.lua:245 attackRoll
At /mod/class/interface/Combat.lua:124 bumpInto
At /mod/class/Actor.lua:1170 attack
At /mod/class/interface/Combat.lua:710 provokeAoO
At /mod/class/Actor.lua:358 runAi
At /engine/ai//talented.lua:64 doAI
At /mod/class/NPC.lua:44 act
At /engine/GameEnergyBased.lua:126 tickLevel
At /engine/GameEnergyBased.lua:62 tick
At /engine/GameTurnBased.lua:46 tick
at /mod/class/Game.lua:736
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Beta 10.5 is out. The light problem and stat increase is fixed definitely. I'm not sure about the summons, need to test.
As for missing tiles, I am aware of them, but I can't add tiles and content at the same time :D
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Some more random observations:
- when I select Random at character creation it randomizes my name as well, though I chose it earlier...it`d be nice to be able to keep it
- saying "No" to Tutorial every time you start anew is annoying
- it`d be helpful if item description pointed out that you can`t use it for lack of proficiency - say, change the colour to red and/or disallow equipping it
- "paper doll" - I know it`s the engine`s fault (same in TOME proper) but very annoying anyway: item description stays on even when your pointer moves off the item icon, covering most of other slots
-also, can`t move an item in between slots - has to go back to right panel and then I can put it elsewhere
Less clutter on toolbar to start with is a great move. But...
- both Skill and Spell menus are called Talents...confusing
- it`d be great if only available talents were displayed...as it is I always have Mount or Polearm ability for example (same on the "m" screen")
- Spellbook needs to show descriptions when hovering over icons
- the numbers on said icons are often hard to see...choosing spells is a chore
- when scrolling mouse wheel up/down over the spell list in Spellbook spells are added in addition to scrolling
and...Some Things That Are Probably In The Manual...
- how to use a wand?
- I can craft items out of nothing?
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I know it`s the engine`s fault (same in TOME proper) but very annoying anyway: item description stays on even when your pointer moves off the item icon, covering most of other slots
Can you provide screenshot? If I understand correctly, you encountered problem which doesn't occur for me.
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Can`t post scr$ at the moment...nowhere to upload...what`s a good host that is not imgur or dropbox?
maybe my description was rubbish, try again
- go to inventory
- hover over the paper doll`s slot that has an item in it - a description should appear
- now move the mouse cursor off the item slot - in my case the description will stay on the screen until you hover over another item.
And another , old thing mentioned before - going up/down staircases produces weird floor numbers. As in: current level 1 - go down, current level still 1 - go down again, level is now 3, go up: level 1, go up: level 2 and so on. What`s up with that? maybe it`s a portal, not a staircase?
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Ouh, yes, you're right. This doesn't bother me in most cases, so I thought you have in the mind something else.
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Some more random observations:
- when I select Random at character creation it randomizes my name as well, though I chose it earlier...it`d be nice to be able to keep it
- saying "No" to Tutorial every time you start anew is annoying
- it`d be helpful if item description pointed out that you can`t use it for lack of proficiency - say, change the colour to red and/or disallow equipping it
- "paper doll" - I know it`s the engine`s fault (same in TOME proper) but very annoying anyway: item description stays on even when your pointer moves off the item icon, covering most of other slots
-also, can`t move an item in between slots - has to go back to right panel and then I can put it elsewhere
Less clutter on toolbar to start with is a great move. But...
- both Skill and Spell menus are called Talents...confusing
- it`d be great if only available talents were displayed...as it is I always have Mount or Polearm ability for example (same on the "m" screen")
- Spellbook needs to show descriptions when hovering over icons
- the numbers on said icons are often hard to see...choosing spells is a chore
- when scrolling mouse wheel up/down over the spell list in Spellbook spells are added in addition to scrolling
and...Some Things That Are Probably In The Manual...
- how to use a wand?
- I can craft items out of nothing?
1) point taken
2) I have no way of tracking if you as a player have refused tutorial earlier... alas.
3) the tooltips should tell you already and the entry is highlighted red in the inventory
4) that is indeed an engine problem - I will ask DG if there's a way to change it, as ToME 4 uses IDENTICAL code
5) talent menu ideas are noted down
6) I will look at the scrolling thing but no guarantees (I don't have a mousewheel here) - as for the numbers, what colors would you prefer? the spell icons vary wildly in coloring, too.
As for the rest:
1) you use the wand the same way you drink a potion or a vial
2) yes, for now it's out of nothing, just like in Incursion. I am researching various crafting systems, for now I'm thinking of something similar to old Star Wars Galaxies (you can find/monsters can drop ingredients which youu then use, and said ingredients come in different rarities and varieties)
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Akeley: "weird" numbers shouldn't happen anymore and the name is no longer randomized if you already chose one.
Right now looking to make NPCs more chatty, not only in terms of dialogue but also "emotes" (that overhead text ToME 4 does) for attacking, fleeing etc.
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I think I mentioned torches changing the map tint as an idea some time ago, it's now done:
(http://media.moddb.com/cache/images/mods/1/24/23463/thumb_620x2000/veins-0.32.0-1445087280.png)
I've been tinkering around the chat screen, here's the latest addition:
(http://media.moddb.com/cache/images/mods/1/24/23463/thumb_620x2000/veins-0.32.0-1445092067.png)
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Akeley: "weird" numbers shouldn't happen anymore and the name is no longer randomized if you already chose one.
Nice one, should I download again or wait for the next release?
I can see how the thing with numbers over icons can be tricky to adjust, what with all the different colours... one way would be to put them under the icons but then it would all get messy and time consuming I suppose. Well, it`s not such a big deal anyway. However that hover tooltip over spell icons could be really helpful - atm unless you know what particular icon means it`s impossible to use this to choose spells. And when you use the right side with names, the scroll thingy messes it up often.
Also I wonder how to add spells or other things to toolbar. Is it possible? Another thing the shortcuts don`t seem to work (eg: I press 1 for "attack" menu and then have to scroll to the particular action like "shoot")
When I choose the "look" option I can only move the main cursor with shift+direction. Any chance I could use this with numpad as well?
Is there a really real permadeath mode where I can only save & quit and if not can we have one?
Big request - some sort of high score table (least I missed it, as often happens :) As it is, it`s an infinite dungeon so no win conditions...but it would be nice to have something to die for...
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I have no idea when the release will happen - I'm looking for a job atm so I can't make any plans. So it's your call whether you want to wait for the next beta or not.
1) I will look at the spell names list getting messed up by scrolling. The tooltip is on my wishlist, it's even mentioned in the code comments, but it's a PITA to implement (and will probably be buggy, requiring magic numbers to make it match)
2) I will check how it works and get back to you.
3) No idea about the numpad, it's all governed by the engine
4) You have the option to quit and save when quitting the game.
5) The engine takes care of the high score table - look for "View High Scores" on the main menu or in the Esc menu while playing. Currently the score is a placeholder, based on your total kills.
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The answer to 2 is you can now drag talents to hotbar out of the generic talent menu (m key) or the button menus.
The button menus also now ignore all the unusable talents per your wishes.
EDIT: All that requires you to re-download the bleeding edge data, though.
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Okay...got that master and the changes are great.
I was trying to test the staircase thingy though and got into a right mess straight away. This happen twice in a row so maybe you could reproduce:
-tried to go > straight away on the first staircase (one you spawn on) and got "down" I think two levels (number still said "1" thou) and then the game sort of went into a time trap - clocks started accelerating, screen flashed, status Starved appeared and I couldn`t do nothing, presumably dead (it felt like being in the original "Time Machine" film and I half expected some Morlocks to appear)
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You tried to go down on an up staircase? Well, in that case the game should have told you 'there is no way to exit the level here'. I will look at the code again, thanks for the report.
In other news, I've managed to port (a version of) Angband's dungeon generation, so the dungeon areas should now be more interesting.
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What I`ve done is copy the github files into the moddb versions VotE directory (deleting what was in there first). Maybe that could cause problems?
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No, it shouldn't, it's the default way to update until a new beta is out.
Anyway, bug fixed. T-Engine has a habit of placing the player in hammerspace if the player is not assigned x and y beforehand. And x and y tend to not get assigned for a slew of reasons. DG himself is battling this bug intermittently. Let's hope the fixes stop the bug.
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Beta 11 is now out!
Bad news: next beta is likely to come out no earlier than March (I'm starting a job Dec 1).
This doesn't mean development is stopping completely, but will be slower as I figure out what to do to avoid code bloat while adding more content.
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Congrats on the new job! 8) Surely things will sort themselves out in terms of a release pace that works for you.
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Congrats for new release! :) I'm sorry but I have to start with bug reports...
I was on first floor. I killed shopkeeper and some monster, get loot, and use downstairs. It's impossible to go down.
Lua Error: /mod/class/Game.lua:568: attempt to compare number with nil
At [C]:-1 __lt
At /mod/class/Game.lua:568 leaveLevel
At /engine/Zone.lua:792 leaveLevel
At /mod/class/Zone.lua:65 getLevel
At /mod/class/Game.lua:594 changeLevel
At /mod/class/Game.lua:1207
At /engine/KeyBind.lua:241
Weird things about skill points still existing. When leveling up, on main stat screen, I see that I have 2 available skill points. In skill menu I see that I have 0 skill points and 4 background skill points. When I added one skill point to background skill, number of skill points changed to 2.
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Thanks for the report, Avagart. Stairs bug fixed. As for stat points, I'll try to look at it but no promises - only two days of free time left...
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Thanks :)
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No idea what the deal with the stat points is, but I've fixed a lot of other old bugs. For instance, players now trigger AoOs and situational stuff such as protection from alignment now works properly (it was being overwritten instead of appended).
Someone upthread complained about poor visibility of items/NPCs. I've found a bit of code in T-Engine 1.3.3. which allowed me to highlight items and actors on mouseover - this should alleviate the problem.
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In the realms of reality this time, in an apparent grand change of face.
Hmm...
http://dnd.wizards.com/articles/features/systems-reference-document-srd
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I saw the info yesterday, checked it out, looks sweet!
I'm unlikely to incorporate any of the D&DN ideas though, I don't want to step on any toes and I want to put my own spin on things.
This reminds me, I had a item damage system drafted up similar to the one used by many MUDs (as I don't understand the d20 item damage at all).
Further Veins work will commence once T-Engine 1.4.0 is out - it's being beta-tested as we speak.
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I've done some updating for 1.4.0 - quite a few things broke. Among the good news, I no longer have to maintain the tweaked_ui, which was taking up quite a lot of c&p code.
The item generation is now much more robust, allowing for instance to generate items with specified egos.
My net's flakiness is the main thing preventing beta 12 from being out.
In other news, I've done a ton of bugfixes and UI improvements, and content additions.
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That's great!
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I have added some logging to skill points to verify it works as intended. It does.
To prevent player confusion, I made two important changes.
(http://media.moddb.com/cache/images/mods/1/24/23463/thumb_620x2000/veins-0.34.0-1456673699.png)
Level up screen reminds you to use the class points first
(http://media.moddb.com/cache/images/mods/1/24/23463/thumb_620x2000/veins-0.34.0-1456942713.png)
Backgrounds no longer affect your skill points - all they do is give you a free +2/+2 skill bonus feat
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(http://media.moddb.com/cache/images/mods/1/24/23463/thumb_620x2000/veins-0.34.0-1457006974.png)
(http://media.moddb.com/cache/images/mods/1/24/23463/thumb_620x2000/veins-0.34.0-1457032244.png)
(http://media.moddb.com/cache/images/mods/1/24/23463/thumb_620x2000/veins-0.34.0-1457097457.png)
The trainer option, which has been in the game for quite some time, is finally playable! (Not completely as I envisioned it, a few rough spots to polish, but still!)
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As you probably noticed, VotE was put on hiatus as I found a job and needed something less intensive to occupy my free time.
Right now the job let up a bit and I'm trying to bring VotE up to speed with all the updates to ToME that happened in the meantime :D
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Awesome on all fronts. 8)
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Thanks getter, for being the voice of support I can always count on.
Updated to whatever the newest ToME version it is now.
Anyway, the game now counts how many times it attempted to generate a level and bails out after too many. Currently the limit is 50. More testing is required to determine a more appropriate number.
Also, the events (random effects on dungeon levels) seem to be working AT LAST - to think I started working on them in 2013 and never noticed that the function was being called too early :D
I am still leery of putting a new beta out, I think it needs more testing... On the other hand, players might have forgotten there was even such a game :P
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You are very welcome! :-[
Just take all the time you need to tinker with the bits and pieces---nothing like a shiny new substantial release to kick off a new period of fresh activity and remind existing folks and entice the newcomers alike. 8)
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You are very welcome! :-[
Just take all the time you need to tinker with the bits and pieces---nothing like a shiny new substantial release to kick off a new period of fresh activity and remind existing folks and entice the newcomers alike. 8)
Hello Getter, been awhile, but im back , hopefully for a long while.
This game is looking good!
Never used T-engine myself.
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Untrusted, thanks for the kind words!
In other news, I finally sat down and made a zone exclusively for testing traps. Turns out there was a TON of stupid goofs there - no wonder since those files date back to the very beginning of Veins development, when I was a complete noob in terms of programming.
(http://media.moddb.com/cache/images/mods/1/24/23463/thumb_620x2000/veins-0.35.0-1471965501.png)
The lower level of thieves guild is a maze full of easy traps. This one is under the beer
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You made the beer a trap???
Oh that's so unfair, turning beer against us. :)
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You made the beer a trap???
Oh that's so unfair, turning beer against us. :)
The beer and the trap just happened to share (a space) :D
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Another beta is out! Any feedback is welcome!
However, the upload/download size has made me think of some other display library that'd be smaller. I don't want to deal with the hassle of changing the language. I'm torn between BearLibTerminal and libtcod. Which would be easier to set up and get rolling?
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Given the latter has been dead for years, I can't imagine going with something else would ultimately be a better idea if a change was absolutely necessary.
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I don't think a change is "absolutely necessary", but I see it as both a chance to decrease upload/download size as well as learn something new.
Since dependencies hell struck again (I say again because I've had it when setting up a Lua linter) with BearLib (I got it to work, but making any sort of releases would be very difficult), I kept looking and found LOVE 2D (http://love2d.org/). It's a 2D Lua engine which is not tailored for any game genre, just takes care of input and output. There's a ton of LOVE-specific libraries for a lot of stuff (A*, FOV, there's even a roguelike-specific one called ROTLove).
I picked it up on Thursday and it's now Sunday.
Day 1 (Thu): lots of grabbing of libraries as well as other love games. Made a start screen in under 30 minutes as well as the game closing on ALT+F4 and reacting to ENTER key by changing the message on screen
Day 2 (Fri): got a basic display working and a barebones 20x20 floor map for testing, as well as player input. The player tile however overwrote the terrain tile. Accidentally find out the engine can recolor anything
Day 3 (Sat): figure out how to draw in layers, so that the player doesn't overwrite terrain. Write a basic "spawn monster at x,y" function. Laugh a bit when the player winds up looking like the orc because of wonky inheritance, and laugh even more as the player can move to the square the orc is in, causing it to disappear forever. Fix said inheritance. Write a function to stop movement if there's an actor in the square. Prototype a player HUD showing the player's hitpoints and wounds as numbers.
Day 4 (Sun): Move the map so that the player HUD is on black background and not the map. Integrate the action scheduler (http://ondras.github.io/rot.js/manual/#timing/scheduler)from ROTLove as well as a debug display for it. Keep poking at the game until it becomes turn-based instead of realtime (with a hilarious bug in between where you could move multiple times in a round because I forgot to make the movePlayer() function call EndTurn())
Note: The action scheduler is a big thing. It allows me to make the game closer to Incursion - which had something called segments and I think 6 segments equalled a turn? most actions took 10 segments but some took less and some took more - looking at you, taking stuff in/out of backpack, 200 segments! Also it means I don't have to futz around with speed leading to sudden double moves, Angband-style. Win-win! And the debug display (it's my turn now) was very easy, so I'm hoping to expand it soon to something like
> Player
Orc #1
Orc #2
which would let you tell which of the monsters moves first, which second etc. and I would probably highlight the player and the last monster (at which point it wraps back to the player) in a different color as soon as I figure out how to do it.
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Learning and the latter-most part on the action scheduler to hew closer to Incursion to solve deep (potential) problems are definitely worthy pursuits to keep in your back pocket---but I wouldn't be especially concerned with upload/download size outside of actual difficulties on your end due to internet connection as the filesize is pretty much right in line with other projects across the modern spectrum given this isn't a terminal project of old. :P
LOVE 2D is pretty much the big name for Lua, such as that is given the momentum/spotlight is sporadic at best, so it stands to reason there may at least be some nuggets to glean and beat out of it----heh, want to say it was one of those things way back in the dustier times on the ToME 4 forums that got mentioned to DarkGod as a thing to at least keep tabs on.
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outside of actual difficulties on your end due to internet connection
That's the crux of the problem, I'm afraid. It loves to go down at most inopportune times :(
Day 5 (Mon): Integrated a nice LOVE-specific pathfinding library called Jumper. Pathing (A*) was fairly easy (apart from the readme on the library being a bit outdated), getting the actors to move along was not. I had to do some passing around of stuff to get it working. Then discovered I forgot to check canMove(), so the orcs were cheerfully lumbering into the player's space :D Fixed now and I can watch the two orcs follow the player around.
The library also has Dijkstra, so I can't wait to play with it. Given that LOVE allows easily writing stuff to screen, I could have a tiny number in a tile's corner being it's cost :)
I guess the next hurdle to overcome is having actual GUI (panels, dialogs, whatever). After that, the only thing left is porting actual content :)
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(http://i.imgur.com/xFb0yeq.png)
The LOVE port now has a basic working FOV. I've been eyeing Adam Milazzo's algorithm (http://www.adammil.net/blog/v125_roguelike_vision_algorithms.html), to add to the list of things I can do now I'm not limited by what T-Engine offers. I have also picked a GUI library from several that can work with LOVE.
Also the basic inventory code has been ported from T-Engine so the player can pick up items, but the inventory screen hasn't been made yet :(
Brainstorming various stuff (dungeon map scale, FOV, geometry (Chebyshev vs. Manhattan vs. something else?)... eats up quite a lot of time. I initially estimated two months for porting, but I think it'll take longer as I keep tinkering with the basic assumptions the game has.
Also Paralympics and real life are stealing some of my time. Not complaining - seeing a friend's brother get a team bronze and team silver medal was AWESOME!
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Awesome on all fronts---the time to port pales in comparison to the value of the port from the sound of things in the long haul...just attack each task in turn as you can to build that momentum~ 8)
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(http://i.imgur.com/qPyOlF7.jpg)
WIP inventory screen - you can drag items into slots to equip but you can unequip or drop yet
I believe this is a massive improvement over this:
(http://media.moddb.com/cache/images/mods/1/24/23463/thumb_620x2000/veins-0.35.0-1457962941.png)
See the teeny-tiny tiles on the right hand side? No way to increase their size, as far as I could tell
Also I legitimately went "eep!" when I saw what came out. I guess the first and biggest RPG I ever played is getting imprinted on my subconscious somehow - see this (http://baldursgate.umwblogs.org/files/2012/04/264024-inventory1.jpg) :D
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If not already, you might stand to gain quite a boon from following Zomia as of this latest ARRP season---project is heavily leveraging both Lua and LOVE in all sorts of ways.
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I am following Zomia from the very moment it sprang up in LOVE forums :) In fact, seeing their implementation helped me bring about the log messages and the dialogs on top of map.
More things that I couldn't do in T-Engine (at least not easily)
(http://i.imgur.com/O8FD91K.png)
By dev demand in /r/roguelikes Discord channel, a visible grid AND toggleable labels (inspired by Cogmind (http://www.gridsagegames.com/blog/2014/11/ui-feedback-map-dynamics-2-0/))
Next: I seriously need to work on making the map scrollable (probably some sort of a LOVE camera module - I know at least two).
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Nice!
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The port will definitely take longer than I originally thought because I've decided to leave the d20 roots behind me.
The d20 ruleset is notoriously difficult to get right in a computer adaptation, and there are already four roguelike d20-based games out there (Incursion, Javelin, Knights of the Chalice, Temple of Torment). Every one is basically the "roll d20 for most stuff" core with house rules tacked on.
As the game grew, there was less d20 and more house rules in Veins, though.
I've decided to make it more similar to the old https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Darklands_(video_game) - this was based on Runequest 2nd edition. Runequest has had several editions since and TWO under OGL. Best thing about it is that it's very simple to adapt - everything, skills, combat, whatever is "roll under d%" and changing the rules is as easy as adding or removing a skill. I could even use some other dice, not d%, and still keep the core rules. Skills are advanced by usage and there is no concept of multiclass as in d20. Runequest has fairly weak magic, but it's really easy to plug in d20-style magic instead.
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I ported the dialogue system from the T-Engine version so you can now chat to non-hostile NPCs.
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I got a ton of stuff done in the last couple of days even though I am a slow coder and an even slower spriter.
The character dialogue now handles the situation where you don't speak the NPC's language better. Your answers don't get scrambled in any case. You just don't get any of the normal answers, just a [Leave] option which closes the dialog screen. If you do speak the language, the answers now feature a small note telling you which skill they test for (i.e. [Bluff], [Diplomacy]).
(http://i.imgur.com/0duDFB6.jpg)
Beginnings of a character creation screen
I was inspired by ToEE's character creation I saw in a gameplay vid on YT. I think this is the only cRPG game with randomly rolled stats where you first roll and then assign every one of the results to one of the stats. All the other games I can recall (BG1-2, IWDII, PS:T, NWN1-2, Angband, Incursion) didn't allow you to reassign the rolls. If you got a high roll but it got assigned to a less-than-useful stat, time to reroll. Oh, the number of times I rolled to get a 18/100 STR in BG1... :D
The HUD now features a body picture - I used a screenshot of Deus Ex 1 as a reference. The picture is grayscale and colored by LOVE's color functions, so I'll be able to recolor it on the fly once I hook up some more code to it. The new ruleset features HP per body part (head, torso, 2 arms, 2 legs) so the color of your torso in the pic will tell you how damaged your torso is.
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You should definitely try The The Temple of Elemental Evil too. It's fairly interesting as it's really turn-based (combatants are queued) compared to BG's and such.
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You should definitely try The The Temple of Elemental Evil too. It's fairly interesting as it's really turn-based (combatants are queued) compared to BG's and such.
I wanted to, but it's very hard to get hold of here and now (I somehow missed it when it was released :(), plus it's buggy. The only way to fix some of the bugs is to hunt down a mod... which changes some of the gameplay in a way many people don't like.
So I just stick to watching YT gameplay videos :)
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You should definitely try The The Temple of Elemental Evil too. It's fairly interesting as it's really turn-based (combatants are queued) compared to BG's and such.
I wanted to, but it's very hard to get hold of here and now (I somehow missed it when it was released :(), plus it's buggy. The only way to fix some of the bugs is to hunt down a mod... which changes some of the gameplay in a way many people don't like.
So I just stick to watching YT gameplay videos :)
You can get it from GOG for 5 euros and there's circle of 8 mod that's the only thing necessary. You can toggle stuff you don't want off.
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There is also this which undertakes some fundamental overhauls from the lowest possible levels previously impossible and aims to carry the game forward in a big way:
http://www.moddb.com/mods/temple1/
Somehow missed about the big change to step back from d20 and into dVarious---makes sense with how you are going about it/ease of momentum though and easily a prime choice given how little is out there. 8)
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Since I last posted, I have nearly finished the game's UI. The lower bar (menu bar/hotbar) currently allows you to make a ranged attack, with the usual caveats (need a bow and arrows). I renamed hp/wounds to Endurance and Health, to be clearer for players. There is now a working viewport, which means our dungeons can be bigger than one screen, and the map GUI elements draw properly on it without weird offsets.
Monster turns are more performant and synced with the debug text in upper right, and there is a player-oriented turn order display in upper left of the map.
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The big news is: I heard back from Shockbolt regarding his 64x64 Angband tileset. His reply was positive, so I sat down and implemented something that's been tickling the back of my brain ever since I saw the capabilities of LOVE2D.
http://i.imgur.com/I0kvAWy.gifv (http://i.imgur.com/I0kvAWy.gifv)
Zooming in (64x64) or out (32x32) at will - an animated GIF
You press Shift + to zoom in and Shift - to zoom out. For those who don't know, + and - are the keys right next to numbers, above the letter keys. The map UI scales to fit (the grid, the border around moused-over tile, the ellipses indicating the actor's attitude, the damage splashes).
You can see the tiles for the actors change, but not for items, which are offset a bit compared to 32x32, and terrain is simply scaled up for now (however I plan to find some good-looking walls in the bigger size). So it's not simply "scale up stuff" or "change the whole tileset" (as in T-Engine).
I am thinking on what to name the two modes - "zoomed in" and "zoomed out" sounds silly. I plan to implement some indicators that would be visible only in the "zoomed in" mode (because of the larger amount of space per tile, simply), such as a number telling you how many items are there in a tile or a small icon indicator (8x8?) for monsters which have special abilities/templates/whatever of some kind. (Said special abilities/templates aren't implemented yet)
Link to a post to which a .love file is attached for those who want to goof around: https://love2d.org/forums/viewtopic.php?p=204900#p204900 (https://love2d.org/forums/viewtopic.php?p=204900#p204900). You'll need LOVE2D installed to run it. Sorry, I can make a standalone build only for Windows, and as usual, I plan for the game to be available for all platforms. Besides it's WIP, so going to the trouble of making a standalone right now is... well.
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There's always good old Tactical Zoom or Focus for a name.
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Even if you shift away from OGL as it does, the sheer amazement and shock value of this latest OGL happening out of nowhere is sure to amuse~ 8)
http://store.steampowered.com/app/576770/
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Thanks getter! It looks amazing but all the screens/vids on the page are in Chinese and I can barely read around 50 characters :P
Haven't been here in ages since there isn't much to report, I was experimenting with Unreal Engine 4 and c++. To be frank, I am still much better in Lua and I have taken a look at Veins code yesterday as I was making a little one-day experiment in Lua again. The experiment succeeded :)
As for Veins, I seriously need to sit down and work out a good level generator since the libraries I included are giving me the 'narrow 1 tile wide corridor' kind of a dungeon, often ending in a dead-end. Also there is a bug that I need to figure out, the map doesn't redraw properly when changing dungeon level, so the first turn on a new level is made completely blindly.
But well, if I could make a road generator, first in blueprints then in c++ in ue4, I should be able to generate a good dungeon, eh? Tile-based stuff is SO much easier than vectors.....
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Good news, I fixed the 'blind on turn 1 of new level' bug. Turns out the FOV wasn't getting regenerated properly...
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Is Veins of the Earth still alive? I've been playing it the last couple of days and it has a lot going for it, but it crashes constantly. I mean sometimes every keypress causes a flurry of errors. If it was more stable I could see myself sinking a lot of time into it. :-[
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Is Veins of the Earth still alive? I've been playing it the last couple of days and it has a lot going for it, but it crashes constantly. I mean sometimes every keypress causes a flurry of errors. If it was more stable I could see myself sinking a lot of time into it. :-[
T-Engine has been updated a couple of times since I last worked on the ToME version of Veins (in August 2016). This is a likely cause of the errors.
Since then, I've set to making Veins from scratch without the reliance on T-Engine.
Currently I'm going with Python + libtcod + bearlibterminal. I'm sorry but the T-Engine version won't be continued (but the code is still available for anyone who wishes to do so)
PS. Your post made my day - it's awesome to see that people still play my little hobby game.
PPS. The Python version is fairly barebones now and I have a day job so I have less time to devote to it.
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Is Veins of the Earth still alive? I've been playing it the last couple of days and it has a lot going for it, but it crashes constantly. I mean sometimes every keypress causes a flurry of errors. If it was more stable I could see myself sinking a lot of time into it. :-[
T-Engine has been updated a couple of times since I last worked on the ToME version of Veins (in August 2016). This is a likely cause of the errors.
Since then, I've set to making Veins from scratch without the reliance on T-Engine.
Currently I'm going with Python + libtcod + bearlibterminal. I'm sorry but the T-Engine version won't be continued (but the code is still available for anyone who wishes to do so)
PS. Your post made my day - it's awesome to see that people still play my little hobby game.
PPS. The Python version is fairly barebones now and I have a day job so I have less time to devote to it.
Thanks for the reply. I can completely understand not continuing work on the T-Engine version if you're rebuilding the whole thing in Python. I'll look forward to playing the Python version when it gets to that point. :)