I am starting this thread for you guys to use to hash out how you want to handle/organize this. Post each of your comments on the blog, not via email. I am about to leave to go to Showlow and ski, will be back on Sunday. I expect to be able to read back thru this thread the entire history on how you guys plan to organize and assign ownership, etc. of this. So, when I get back, I can learn all of it as if I were a new member of the Guild, and get completely up to speed on it. :-)
1/28/2005
Module Building Organization
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24 comments:
I have been working under the assumption that we are building this uild within the traditional game setting of D&D, The Forgotten Realms...is that acceptable to all of you guys?...i can send you adobe files of maps that i have of the Forgotten realms and i also have some old digitized game genre books that provide lots of detail and history of the lands of "Faerun".
Pop followed those comments up with these in separate emails...but did not post them to the blog...shame...shame. I have cut and pasted them all here together. This is really good stuff by the way...something that i think would make for gaming material.
It is possible that this dragon is so extaordinary, that he has no other name than Dragon (Wyrm) or The Dragon (Se Wyrm). All others are mere rumor and legend, imposters.
Another possibility is that all dragons, by both personal witness and rumor, are mere manifestations, or faces, of the same "The Dragaon." People far and wide with limited world-views could assign different names and attibutes to the beast they thought they saw or heard of by way of hearsay; but the reality could be that all sightings and rumors and legends have torturous roots back to the same Wyrm worldwide for all time. There can be only one.
Which leads to another possibility: that there are more dragons, each similarly described as The One Wyrm, all competing at various historical or legendary instances, to become the single surviving dragon. They increase their powers and potential for survival as The Wyrm (the last or The One) through the influence their legends have upon the mortals who believe.
Furthermore, the ultimate truth behind all of these possibilities is blowing in the wind.
Groups of people scattered across the world think they have the answer, the truth. Some call the dragon 'Wyrm,' and say there is only one. Others call it by another name, saying there is only one. Still others say that there are more than one, and perhaps theirs is the good one or the strongest.
These various viewpoints on the reality of Wyrm can provide a background for alignments and struggles between different groups. Those among them who speak to Wyrm, or interpret the records of the ancient sayings and acts of Wyrm, directly influence the present day mindset and actions of their followers.
I know no one personally who has ever seen Wyrm. There are ancient stories and legends of men who have seen it. There are rumors of living men in far away, obscure places, who have seen it, and some nearby whose great uncle or distant cousin encountered it.
Many of these sightings have been investigated and explained away as clouds or volcanic ash plumes highlighted by lightning, moonshine, and sunlight at dawn or dusk, the imaginings of men, conjured up by anxiety, hope, desperation, or guilt. Other investigators have been unable to find logical explanations for the sightings, leaving a cloud of mystery around the causes.
Regardless of the conclusions of the investigators, men both agree and disagree, engaging at times in enlightened debate, but mostly in heated argument. Few have been convinced to change the beliefs they've held since children.
I like the whole grafting of the Highlander plot on to the dragons thing. But I suggest we not intefere to much with the current games rules on the nature of dragons. There are quite of few dragons and about 10 different types. They can live to be gargantuan in size and super ancient in age. Many of them are very powerful magically and can take human form. Since they are magical, if and when they mate with the lower races such as man, elf or orc they can produce hybrid offspring. If a dragon is chromatic (colored) then it is likely that it is evil. If on, the other hand, it appears metallic then it is most likely good in alignment. Black, green, white, red and blue...are the evil ones. Brass, copper, bronze, gold and silver are the good ones. And unless I am mistaken the Silver dragons are considered to be the most powerful. That is the basics of D&D dragons...this game is based largely on D&D. Each of the different types have specific climates and geographic circumstances that they each prefer and each type is said to have generalized personality types...one type may be know as tricksters while another may like to take human form and join up with armies and fight in the great wars of the mortals. Most importantly though is that all dragons are covetous and horde treasure though each type has its treasure preferences. They like to sleep on their hordes and the really old dragons will have gems and coins encrusted on their bellies from laying for months on end on their treasure...just staring at it. They are so very covetous that they are loath to leave their hordes to gather food for fear it will be robbed while they are out.
i prefer to stick to the rules so that down the road we do not encounter any serious inconsistiencies that we won't be able to surmount.
I know....we don't know anything...its the mystery....but now i know. The dragon is amoung us! He is in mortal form! yeah yeah that is why he likes us...he is a strategy and war buff...he just wants to command armies and lead head long charges into the enemy lines...this is the reason...I knew I would figure it out! He must have spent ages putting this together...the patience.
Well...this is just the thing though...we don't have to build a brand new world...the laqnds of Faerun have been thoroughly documented and mapped...I have mapped in pdf format of the forgotten realms...the City of never Winter nights is on them
The beauty of the way the area transitons work is it lets us place screens up to hide things that maybe should be there and isnt. If our road passes into a forest and is parrallel to a stream then that stream should be there in the next area over...on the other hand if a stream passed through the same zone wall that a road does, but they hit the zone wall considerable distances from each other then...lets not worry about it...we cannot account for every square inch of land...we have to do things in a functional and playable manner. Playbility is our first and foremost concern. I propose that we use the maps of Fearun as an outline...and then fill in the blanks in as functional and playable manner as is possible.
something we should seriously consider is only emailing the areas we have been working onto each other. How you do it is as follows:
Export the area and give it a nice little appropriate name.
Next, Explore the NWN folders and look inside the "erf" folder...That is where the exported area files are placed. Now just attach that to your email and...viola!
ok...me and Chip put the Blood moon Castle mod up for inspection again. i want you guys to critique it ok...don't just tell me it looks good.
this is the effect im going for here:
It has one central structure. An ancient massive castle, half crumbling off the edge of a cliff, built upon the ruins of one of Netheril's fallen cities. Beneath the castle lies a vast complex of tunnels and fissures some of which contain the ruins of the ancient Netherilian structures...crumbled and smashed from the Great Fall. The Hall's of the Wyrm are ancient and filled with Ghosts both friendly and violent. Some rooms are inhospitable due to their supernatural inhabitants while in others the vaporous occupants go about their odd daily ethereal routines.
Its got to be deserted and dead feeling...A place where only those who have no choice or those who are contented by the company of dust, ruin and decay would like to live.
I'm gonna darken the fog...more purple...going for a magenta...reduce the screams and lower the voluman on all ofhte ghosts voices...see if i can change the rain to mist and reduce the gusts of wind and thunder. Writting this partially so i won't forget everything.
Ok...i go to sleep now.
Oh... :-( That sucks.
I thought I read in that post I sent in the old blog about Hordes was included in either one of the expansion packs. Let me read back thru that:
http://pettitt-cattle-coffee.blogspot.com/2005/01/nwn-platinum-edition-readme-file.html
Ok, there at the bottom. It says you should be able to play it if you have one of the expansions. But I think you are right, if he chooses some items from the other expansion that you guys don't have, you won't be able to edit the module, I bet.
So Chris, you have the Platinum edition? If so, then we should probably have Chris or me designated as the "Module Integrator". Since I haven't even looked at the editor yet, Chris, why don't you play this role? Eveyone can send you their parts and you can integrate them together and then send the final module to me and I can post it on the server.
I'm considering figuring out how to DeMilitarizeZone my other machine in my router, and set it up as an FTP server for you guys to use for sending your stuff. Wondering if that would be easier than forcing you to rely on me by emailing to me. If I use an FTP server, I could set it up so that you could FTP your files with an account name and password, and then they would automatically be loaded onto the server, I THINK I could get it going.
Something else. Can you guys start investigating placing portals in your modules? This is a transition that should allow you to transition from one module to another, so that ONCE I figure out how to run 2 or more servers on the same (or different) machine(s), you can transition from one module on one server to a module on a different server. This would be ideal for cases like Chris' forest could be running on one module on one server, Daniels Blood Moon castle can be running in another module on another server. That way, if we need to take one down to edit/modify/etc., you don't have to take the entire world down.
There is a lot of info on this in the forums on bioware's site:
http://nwn.bioware.com
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From: Daniel Teague [mailto:danielbteague@satx.rr.com]
Sent: Monday, January 31, 2005 10:51 AM
To: Wyrm-Raiders-of-the-Blood-Moon@googlegroups.com
Subject: Re: [Wyrm Raiders of the Blood Moon] 1/30/2005 06:08:19 PM
hordes are not in Gold Ed.
----- Original Message -----
From: Daniel Teague
To: Wyrm-Raiders-of-the-Blood-Moon@googlegroups.com
Sent: Monday, January 31, 2005 11:48 AM
Subject: Re: [Wyrm Raiders of the Blood Moon] 1/30/2005 06:08:19 PM
we will not be able to view it...but you may be able to attach our areas to it and then we might be able to play it on chips server
----- Original Message -----
From: TeagueCJ@mfr.usmc.mil
To: Wyrm-Raiders-of-the-Blood-Moon@googlegroups.com
Sent: Monday, January 31, 2005 11:13 AM
Subject: RE: [Wyrm Raiders of the Blood Moon] 1/30/2005 06:08:19 PM
Thanketh you very much; I will get back to building a Barbarian/Weapon Master some day; but for now I plan to focus on the enchanted forest mod; do you think there will be a problem using this mod for Daniel, and Dod because it is being built using the Platinum Edition? When I started building it mentions that those without the Hordes Expansion will not be able to use it? What do you suggest?
-----Original Message-----
From: Charles Teague III (Chip) [mailto:cteague3@cox.net]
Sent: Monday, January 31, 2005 10:30 AM
To: Wyrm-Raiders-of-the-Blood-Moon@googlegroups.com
Subject: RE: [Wyrm Raiders of the Blood Moon] 1/30/2005 06:08:19 PM
He's gone. His soul has left the Binary Sectors and entered into the Recycled Bin Realm.
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From: TeagueCJ@mfr.usmc.mil [mailto:TeagueCJ@mfr.usmc.mil]
Sent: Monday, January 31, 2005 06:24 AM
To: Wyrm-Raiders-of-the-Blood-Moon@googlegroups.com
Subject: RE: [Wyrm Raiders of the Blood Moon] 1/30/2005 06:08:19 PM
Chip,
Do me a favor please, will you delete my Orc off of your server please; I am not pleased with the direction he has gone and want to start him over attempting to choose some better options along the way that will allow him to mulit/prestige class sooner.....thanks a lot!
I saw your email when I took him out searching for adamantine - yes I admit he did begin to get a little out of hand killing some innocents to see if they would cough up some adamantine or at least tell me where it is.......heh, heh
Glad to have you back to the real world of NWN; unlike that fantasy land of skiing you were in.....
See you 'round,
Chris
-----Original Message-----
From: Charles Teague III (Chip) [mailto:cteague3@cox.net]
Sent: Sunday, January 30, 2005 8:48 PM
To: Wyrm-Raiders-of-the-Blood-Moon@googlegroups.com
Subject: RE: [Wyrm Raiders of the Blood Moon] 1/30/2005 06:08:19 PM
Hey guys. I'm back home now. We had a great time skiing, and I got some pictures. I will post them on the internet shortly and send out the link.
I am going to spend a little time with Carissa, then later tonight catch up on the postings you guys have been discussing, and will get involved.
SoS-BoB
yeah...we need to get the mod. up with all of the areas all connected with transitions (even if the transitions dont make since yet) and then do a walk through....We should take several hours and really hash out the geography and make suggeations on how to handle certain "lay of the land" issues. All three of us mod builders should be in the walk through and we need to be open and critical (constructively) and really come to an agreement on what we are trying to accomplish with the the different areas and how we are trying to fit them onto the map of the Frozen North. We need to determine where wee may need "inter-area areas to create more realistic transitions and i think that we should each have a couple of experimental areas transitioned in on strange doors so that we can kind of present an idea that may help us all develop some solutions to geography issues...I have a Mountain Road area that i have been plying with that I want you guys to look at...I think it may make a good transition between the Homeland and the Castle areas.
I like the Mountain Road idea, but I also want to see the Mountain Tunnel I spoke about. Or should it be an Abandoned Mine? I'd like to give it a shot. It will give me a chance to get to know the Editor. Also, Collin has been wanting me to sit down with him and help him understand what is going on in the Editor. He's always just thrown a few items in a desert scene :-)
I want to look into placing a cave entrance behind a waterfall in Dad's Homeplace, which leads to a Mountain tunnel that climbs up and is frought with Spiders, Trolls, Goblins, etc. Would be cool if I could put a couple of surface caves in it along the way that all open up to the Mountain Road somewhere, and then a couple of secret openings that open up in and around Castle Blood Moon, at least in the lowest, deepest, darkest dungeon of the Castle.
Daniel, I'll do the tunnel, as a learning experience. Then, you and I could get together and kind of plan out the introduction of the 2 or 3 cave entrances along the Mountain Road. I'd like to find a way to make them real secrect and hidden as much as possible.
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From: Teague Capt Christopher J [mailto:TeagueCJ@mfr.usmc.mil]
Sent: Tuesday, February 01, 2005 8:26 AM
To: Wyrm-Raiders-of-the-Blood-Moon@googlegroups.com
Subject: RE: [Wyrm Raiders of the Blood Moon] 2/1/2005 05:16:03 AM
Let me get the forest in a halfway decent process and then you and daniel can send me your most updated versions of your areas; I'll include and link them and then send to chip to post. Then you and Daniel can do a run through and if we have compatibility issues that should flesh them out? Chip, what do you think?
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Chip said:
I don't believe they will have any trouble playing the modules, as long as they have the Gold version or later. Something I was thinking about earlier on in this process was that it might make sense to log on to a couple of the other Guilds' Worlds out there and get a feel for some of the things they are doing. Do you guys not think it would make a little sense to do that first before we jump headlong into this?
I'd like to get Collin and/or Keaton started on another area. Maybe we could use a desert out on the outskirts to the south of the Homeland. I bet the two of them would enjoy doing this.
Chris said:
I think I understand exactly what Daniel is saying, I sure don't want some retard running amuck killing women, children, and attempting to kill some of us even when there is a story going on that should be paid attention to.
I just commented on the Alignment/Guild Alignment thing because I know the topic has come up a few times and that thought jumped into my head on how to fit more alignment into our story line for the guild. Our guild is driven by the Dragon's need to maintain balance in all things........it just sounded cool - a little hint of Excaliber in there.....
I really like the way we continue to develop our Guild, the story, and the ideas for possibilities down the road; it is excellent to see the collaboration come together.
One thing we must consider when building is the need to maintain appropriate Cardinal Directions for the exits of an area taking us to another area. If you go to the Cardinal West to go out of an exit that takes you to an area that is found to the south of your actual game location then there should be a transition area that moves you into the correct cardinal direction. Dad and I discussed this earlier and I think we agree that it is something that really should be considered early on so that as we add on and produce more areas they will fit together properly.
Chris said:
One thing we must consider when building is the need to maintain appropriate Cardinal Directions for the exits of an area taking us to another area. If you go to the Cardinal West to go out of an exit that takes you to an area that is found to the south of your actual game location then there should be a transition area that moves you into the correct cardinal direction. Dad and I discussed this earlier and I think we agree that it is something that really should be considered early on so that as we add on and produce more areas they will fit together properly.
We're going to need to add a Braveheart battlefield, too. I'm thinking either the high plains desert we talked about would work good, or we could use a grassy glen or clearing in or around the Enchanted Forest.
I haven't had the chance to log on to the latest BloodMoon mod and take a look yet. Maybe tonight. Carissa has lot's of work lined up, since the carpet guys are going to be here on Tuesday, we've got to finish painting the bedroom and moving the bulk of the furniture out of all the bedrooms, preferably by Sunday, since I've got late meetings on Monday.
Oh, I was thinking about "terms" or "titles" of our "World". What if we refer to it as the Region of Wyrm, or something along that lines? Or Region of the Blood Moon. I was thinking that the Wyrm reference made more sense, instead of using the name of the cults as the overall reference to the peoples and the lands.
Wyrmmark...Bloodlan...Raidermark...Wyrmlan...
The Blood Moors
Or, there is Wyrmville or Bloodberg.
I wish we could make it (something)MARK...like the
Riddermark from the LotRs.
Dracamark
what other words mean serpent or dragon...latin, Greek...what do we have?
I think that this discussion concerning the naming of our traditional lands should be placed in the story line thread...
I found the greek for:
dragon = drakontas
serpent = erpeto
sacred = ieros
sky = ouranos
tried three different latin-englich dictionarys...they all came back with nothing on serpent and dragon...weird huh?
After the 26th I'm gonna start trying to participate again a little in the building of the mod. I have a bit a problem with my toolset freezing up on me though.
I hope to pursue these goals in my areas:
To make the transitions within the castle areas more believeble.
To create areas of regenerative bady territory...i.e. Crushbone Orc camp and the haunted floor of Blood Moon Castle.
I think you guys will find this NWN Forum interesting, about multiple admins:
NWN: 1 Server, multiple admins...help?
Module building strategy
I believe that our module building practices stand as our greatest obstacle to the regular play and interaction of the Wyrm Raiders. We have very commendable goals but, due to our work and familial obligations and responsibilities...these goals are far too lofty. Thus far I beleive our focus has been on creating a world that requires DM managment and that provides a specific story line for the characters to follow. We need a madule that is light on story and mostly action. Why? What do we do most when online anyway?...we just shoot the bull and look for loot. Instead of focusing on dynamic story lines and NPCs we should focus on creating a "dungeon hang-out" that has dynamic combat encounters taht respawn and maybe are random in their creature composition. So, with this as my objective I have come to the following conclusions:
We should do as Chip suggested long ago and split up the responsibility for creating each level or area of the Dungeon Hang-out(DHO). The advantages of this are two-fold...first it allows for everyone to be surprised by what is encountered in the dungeon and secondly it makes the DHO creation move much faster. I propose that we choose a theme, such as Lizardmen and Dragons or Spiders and Drow or Hobgoblins, Trolls and Giants and set some rules about the size of the areas. Each area can only be, with no exceptions, 8x8 and each level or story can only have 4 areas. We can call the four areas NE, NW, SE, and SW. We can require that one door always be placed on the east wall of NE and that a "up-stair" or up-ramp" always be placed in NE. WE can then further set reg.s about doors in the other three areas and state that these reg.s apply to every level. Thus, outside of size and doors and entrances or exits the builder can do as he pleases with the area while trying to stick to the theme. We would only have to have one level of surface or above ground areas and then after that the areas would begin decsending into the earth.
I cannot run the toolset longer then 30 minutes before it locks up...its so very frustrating. I just can't contribute much to the mod. building. I think that this Pool of Radience will work well for a little get together sometime this weekend. Brad says he is up for Sunday afternoon... I plan to try to play multiple times if others need to get on at different times than on Sunday afternoon.
I finally found that link that I posted to that NWN Guild. I actually posted it over on the PC&C blog, before we had created this blog.
The Lands of Acheron post in PC&C
I tried to follow the link from Bioware's site to The Land of Acheron guild web site, which used to work, but looks like it no longer does. This was a really cool sounding world. :-(
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