Crucible Pre-Release

[Guest morpheus562]

Majority of the mod is done and pushed onto git for you all to dig your teeth into. There are some anticipated scenic routes to be added in due course near the end of the mod, but that should not interfere with this next phase of testing. I am looking for any and all feedback you all are willing to provide so I can tweak, update, polish, etc. as much as possible before the mod officially goes live.

Thank you all for your help and support!

Edited January 31 by morpheus562

[Lava]

I am checking the pre-release and I have some note and I think I encountered a big bug. Here are my notes for now:

1. The ambient sound of the new location is too loud, louder than character sounds. (should by lowered by 20%)
2. Kirinhale's, Drargumaz's, Osmadiel's voiced lines are a bit too loud (-4 dB)
3. In Kirihale's line "I don't know why, but I suspect..." I would shorten it to "I suspect..." because CHARNAME's presence there is a good enough reason for "why" and that first part reads strange in that context.
4. Spiraling Murder description: STATISTICS should be above Equipped and other abilities
5. Corrupted Orog Shaman feels too powerful? Unless he is truly an optional enemy.
6. I always imagines Viekang's voice TOTALLY differently and I think many people heard a different voice in their head for him. I think I would remove his voice and keep him only with his original soundset, no voiced lines.
7. As a non-optional fight, Malchediel feels too powerful.
8. Mechaldiel does not die, he talked with me, the fight began, then I used godbow on him and he talked again, the fight continued, and... now it does not end.

[Guest morpheus562]

Thank you, I'll start looking into these.

1 hour ago, Lava said:

1. The ambient sound of the new location is too loud, louder than character sounds. (should by lowered by 20%)

@Acifer do you know how to reduce ambient audio?

1 hour ago, Lava said:

3. In Kirihale's line "I don't know why, but I suspect..." I would shorten it to "I suspect..." because CHARNAME's presence there is a good enough reason for "why" and that first part reads strange in that context.

I don't think at any point Kirinhale knows you are a Bhaalspawn as that was not addressed during Durlag's tower, but thematically it wouldn't hurt to shorten the lines as you mention.

1 hour ago, Lava said:

4. Spiraling Murder description: STATISTICS should be above Equipped and other abilities

Fixed and will be pushed tonight.

1 hour ago, Lava said:

5. Corrupted Orog Shaman feels too powerful? Unless he is truly an optional enemy.

Totally optional and can be skipped.

1 hour ago, Lava said:

6. I always imagines Viekang's voice TOTALLY differently and I think many people heard a different voice in their head for him. I think I would remove his voice and keep him only with his original soundset, no voiced lines.

This was one I went back and forth on to include voiced lines or not. He did not have any voice acting I could find within the original series, hence I chose to include some for him, but I'm fine taking it out.

1 hour ago, Lava said:

7. As a non-optional fight, Malchediel feels too powerful.

I was hoping you'd comment on this and gather your thoughts on where it landed. I'll look at reducing the difficulty a little bit further.

1 hour ago, Lava said:

8. Mechaldiel does not die, he talked with me, the fight began, then I used godbow on him and he talked again, the fight continued, and... now it does not end.

Something must have occurred between testing and you getting it as he was 100% killable on all of my playthroughs. I'll dig into it and see what is going on. When he talked again, did you get the dialog: "Forgive me Jergal for I have failed!"? That should award each player exp and start a cutscene to kill Malchadiel.

Edited January 31 by morpheus562

[Acifer]

1 hour ago, morpheus562 said:

do you know how to reduce ambient audio?

Yes, no problem!

[Lava]

43 minutes ago, morpheus562 said:

@Acifer do you know how to reduce ambient audio?

When you open the .are file in DLTCEP there is a bookmark "ambients" and there is most likely a global ambient or something (unless there are more of those, not sure which one is the loud one). Each ambient uses 0-100 volume. Just make them a bit lower, by something like 15-20 I would say

45 minutes ago, morpheus562 said:

I don't think at any point Kirinhale knows you are a Bhaalspawn as that was not addressed during Durlag's tower, but thematically it wouldn't hurt to shorten the lines as you mention.

I kinda assumed that a character with ~25-30 lvl may be already pretty recognized But then again, that is just my suggestion

46 minutes ago, morpheus562 said:

Fixed and will be pushed tonight.

Cool!

47 minutes ago, morpheus562 said:

This was one I went back and forth on to include voiced lines or not. He did not have any voice acting I could find within the original series, hence I chose to include some for him, but I'm fine taking it out.

Yeah, but dialogues has these tones that... just made me picture a really different voice. I think I wouldn't touch this one and keep him quiet

1 hour ago, morpheus562 said:

Totally optional and can be skipped.

Right. Even though, I think I would make it at least a bit easier. I am unsure what happened there, but before I could do anything, my Mazzy lost 70% of her max HP and I was a bit lie... "what was that...?" But since it can be skipped, it's still all up to you. I just thought I would share my thoughts

1 hour ago, morpheus562 said:

I was hoping you'd comment on this and gather your thoughts on where it landed. I'll look at reducing the difficulty a little bit further.

1 hour ago, morpheus562 said:

Something must have occurred between testing and you getting it as he was 100% killable on all of my playthroughs. I'll dig into it and see what is going on. When he talked again, did you get the dialog: "Forgive me Jergal for I have failed!"? That should award each player exp and start a cutscene to kill Malchadiel.

I played through this sequence again and this time it worked fine. It must have been some engine thing. Still, I had to cheat to get through this fight

* * *

As for new things: I think you wrongly use music. Because I had my own music installed along with my In Love, Undeath, it is my mod's romance track that plays on new location. I think that your mod assumes somewhere that the next new track is your while mine was. It can be easily fixed. To make sure yours is always used make sure the area's music is used, not whatever new track is there on the songlist, use this script:

IF
Global("mobha2setmusic","mobha2",0)
THEN
RESPONSE #100
SetMusic(NIGHT,%MODREAM%)
SetMusic(DAY,%MODREAM%)
SetGlobal("mobha2setmusic","mobha2",0)
Continue()
END

Make it part of mobha2.baf -- HOWEVER, to make it work, make sure that when this area script is compiles, use EVAL. I am unsure why you use COPY for scripts, but to use EVAL you will need:

COMPILE ~crucible/baf/mobha2.baf~  EVAL 

That way, when your area script is compiles, WeiDU will check the value for your new song that is set during the installation of your music, and %MODREAM% will be replaced with the value of your song.

* * *

Final thoughts:

This time it was all way smoother and I like how it is all shaped. Apart from both towers' boss fights and the final boss before you meet Amelyssana, it all feels way better, these three I... I am unsure how would I need to approach them. I think they use some spells like blade barrier, or something like that, right? I may be what kills me the moment he approaches me. Kinda annoying. Apart form that I like how we can walk through the diabolical areas, face these creatures. With the new items, it is also quite interesting and I am glad you added those, I just hope you are happy with them too.

The only thing I what I have mixed feelings about is the encountered "with the one that observed you from the very beginning". I don't want to spoil that. I shared my ideas of how I would approach it in the PM I sent you before I just feel it is a bit much, I think I would write the talk the way nothing was exactly clear so players could be left with their interpretation of what it happened, maybe I would make him wear different faces, of different characters.

Then again, the fact it's not how I would approach it and my kind of twist is more about me and how I like stories to be told.

Anyway, it's cool to see how the mod evolved! Thanks for inviting me here, to this workroom!

[Guest morpheus562]

1 hour ago, Lava said:

I played through this sequence again and this time it worked fine. It must have been some engine thing. Still, I had to cheat to get through this fight

I still think this needs to be looked at, and I have a theory as to why it was caused for you. I'm going to make some tweaks and it should resolve this from occurring in the future as I think it could be timing related. Regarding the fight difficulty, I may tone it down to either a single support Planetar or two Devas. Insane for this section ports in 4 Fallen Planetar, a magical sword with 90% DR (carrying the anti-paladin sword from WK), and will bring in more Fallen Planetar every couple rounds or so. Very much a night and day difference between non-insane and insane difficulty.

1 hour ago, Lava said:

Final thoughts:

This time it was all way smoother and I like how it is all shaped. Apart from both towers' boss fights and the final boss before you meet Amelyssana, it all feels way better, these three I... I am unsure how would I need to approach them. I think they use some spells like blade barrier, or something like that, right? I may be what kills me the moment he approaches me. Kinda annoying.

I'm happy the changes I've made are resonating with you in a positive light, and I was really looking forward to your feedback to ensure the difficulty is set right. Looks like there is still some fine tuning required, but at least I know I'm closer to where I need to be.

1 hour ago, Lava said:

The only thing I what I have mixed feelings about is the encountered "with the one that observed you from the very beginning". I don't want to spoil that. I shared my ideas of how I would approach it in the PM I sent you before I just feel it is a bit much, I think I would write the talk the way nothing was exactly clear so players could be left with their interpretation of what it happened, maybe I would make him wear different faces, of different characters.

Then again, the fact it's not how I would approach it and my kind of twist is more about me and how I like stories to be told.

I would need to think more on this, as I really do like how it came out for the player. The first line the character uses in the mod is verbatim the same first line he greets the player with in BGEE. I was really how happy how it worked so well in the mod.

1 hour ago, Lava said:

Anyway, it's cool to see how the mod evolved! Thanks for inviting me here, to this workroom!

Thank you! This is my first time to be a storyteller, and I respect and value your feedback. Thank you so much for your help and support on this.

[Guest morpheus562]

I also want to say, if I don't adjust Kirinhale's dialog it is because I literally ran out of paid time to voice her last night. I had just enough to get her dialog completed and I would rather not throw more money down unless there is much needed voice work in other areas.

[Guest morpheus562]

6 hours ago, Lava said:

This time it was all way smoother and I like how it is all shaped. Apart from both towers' boss fights and the final boss before you meet Amelyssana, it all feels way better, these three I... I am unsure how would I need to approach them. I think they use some spells like blade barrier, or something like that, right? I may be what kills me the moment he approaches me. Kinda annoying.

I have cleaned up the scripts so Blade Barrier and Globe of Blades will only be used on insane difficulty. This should reduce the difficulty you encountered from the three fights you mentioned.

[Lava]

Cool!