World of Wesnoth (MMORPG add-on project)

[Dugi]

I'm not agree with system, where you can get any item from (almost) any NPC.

Please, it should be 'I don't agree with...' and not 'I'm not agree with...', seeing that error is too disturbing.
Your idea makes sense, things like that are pretty common in games, but it has unpleasant drawbacks. If you want the drops to be balanced, all kinds of enemies will have to be mixed together in most areas of the game (undead to drop axes, humans to drop swords, fencers and elves to drop rapiers, mages to drop wands, heavily armoured units to drop heavy armours, lightly armoured units to drop light armour), that would be quite nonsensical. It would also make all areas mostly identical in terms of enemy types. This just isn't feasible.

Without this, there would necessarily be areas that produce some kinds of items, other areas that produce other kinds of items. That means that all areas with mostly zombies or animals would be absolutely useless for equippable gear, and avoided by most players (unless it would be balanced by good crafting component drops). Areas with undead would be really welcome for axe or bow users, but hated by sword or mace users, meaning that after a larger part of storyline related to fighting undead, Hunters who use bows and don't care about the type of melee weapon they use would rule and Fencers, heavily tied to using swords or rapiers would suffer for having to fight with low level weapons. Rogues who prefer daggers would have difficulties to find them pretty much in all areas of the game.

Or another problem, let's say you're looking for a good wand, your friend is looking for a good heavy armour. You are a good tank+nuker team, but you can't farm together, because heavily armoured wizard enemies are nowhere to be found. Your other friend is trying to craft an item and needs an albino wolf tail, but nobody is going to farm with him because wolves drop no proper equippable items. Only people looking for similar crafting components will hunt there, and you can't ally with them, because they look for the same item. The only other valuable crafting component dropping from wolves is wolverine alpha's tooth, but there isn't a thousand people playing all the time.

Or let's assume that you have a necromancer who totally pawns melee enemies (because of his summons). He's looking for wands and enchanted clothing. However, these items drop from wizards and not from melee enemies, but he is weak against wizards, because his summons can't shield him from their spells, and their area of effect attacks wipe his summons faster than he can summon them. This means that this necromancer can't get good gear for himself, although he kills enemies pretty fast. Or there is a barbarian who kills ranged enemies and mages like nothing, because they can hardly stand his melee attacks, retaliate almost nothing and their damage is not high enough to do serious damage to him anyway. Yet, neither of those drop melee weapons, so he has great difficulties to get proper gear for himself. Both the necromancer player and the barbarian player will need to have other characters that will farm items for them, or will be entirely dependent on trade.

This was suggested to me when I was working on Legend of the Invincibles, and after some consideration I decided that items that drop reflect the types of items your units can use, not those the enemies can use. Something like 'I need to get a lot of Elvish Fighters and Swordsmen, because I am fighting orcs and they drop a lot of swords' didn't seem like a good option. Making axe wielding and mace wielding orcs just for this purpose was no acceptable because of the sheer amount of work this solution would require in a 2D game (it would be easier to create 3D models of units and weapons, animate them and write a program that would generate 2D sprites from them, but that's sheer madness).

What are you going to do, when you introduce crafted items? For example crafted from bones, which is supposed to drop off only from skeletons. Same with wolf/bear fur, drake skin and many other things.

I didn't like much the idea to combine a dragon rib with a shark's kidney, white troll's spleen, demon's horn, black soul spectre's ectoplasm and female dwarf's entrails to produce Black Axe of Doomspire's Fall. It's a bit gory for first, let's let it be. It refers to such cruelties like ivory hunting, but let's let that be too. Like before, you'll need to hunt for these ingredients in areas where nobody else needs to go (forcing you to hunt alone), or just from some special rare mobs (making you ignore all other mobs), or from mobs that the character that needs the item can't hunt effectively (like before, forcing you to create a secondary character just to hunt those).

Drops too specific lead to a separation of players into way too many groups, that would not be nice given that there won't be a thousand players around all the time. I was rather thinking about crafting using some precious gems (dropping randomly anywhere depending only on area level, the more precious ones dropping only in higher level areas) that in some combinations can imbue an item with special properties (recipes will be known), might be added that they need to be in some special geometrical patterns for lore embelishment. For example if you place an obsidian, a lodestone, an amethyst and an opal into a sword, you create Black Sword of Doomspire's Fall (Black Axe of Doomspire's Fall if put into an axe and so on).

[Heindal]

@xudo Or you just use a normal array which contains monstertypes as well as lists of loot. The problem about the loottables in the way presented is that the loot of monsters can be different in following scenarios. To add a variable to EACH enemy or npc seems very odd and I don't think this is high performant. A table (array) containing monstertypes and a list of randomobjects according to the area is much more flexible. It however could influence the game performance.

Crafting has been done already in different other campaigns such as LoI or SL and could be adapted to World of Wesnoth. Its imho just reducing and increasing variables, so it could be easily done by itself - but needs balancing and game performance which would eat to many ressources by now. However it should NOT have priority by now. The idea with the tools isn't new, but imho absolutely unnecessary, when we are trying to make things work and try to get rid off the bugs.

[Xudo]

Loot tables discussion:

If you want the drops to be balanced, all kinds of enemies will have to be mixed together in most areas of the game (undead to drop axes, humans to drop swords, fencers and elves to drop rapiers, mages to drop wands, heavily armoured units to drop heavy armours, lightly armoured units to drop light armour).

You are a good tank+nuker team, but you can't farm together, because heavily armoured wizard enemies are nowhere to be found.

Your other friend is trying to craft an item and needs an albino wolf tail, but nobody is going to farm with him because wolves drop no proper equippable items.

these items drop from wizards and not from melee enemies, but he is weak against wizards

It is MMO, isn't it? I will help you to get good sword, you will help me to get good mage's clothes. There is no need in mixing ALL enemies together in order to provide drops for EVERYONE.
I think there should not be cases of "only mages" enconters or even "only mages" locations. Some kind of mixing have to be. Look to D&D encounters: 1 mage-like, 2 warrior-like and something else.

Without this, there would necessarily be areas that produce some kinds of items, other areas that produce other kinds of items. That means that all areas with mostly zombies or animals would be absolutely useless for equippable gear, and avoided by most players (unless it would be balanced by good crafting component drops).

You're talking as if players are going to equip every item, which is going to drop in the location. I'm not going to expect (weapon) better than mine from random zombie which wanders in the area.
I think there have to be some kind of "boss" NPCs or heavily guarded unique containers. For example I will implement corpse of paladin (with really good mace) decaying in the swamp, surrounded by swarm of undead.

crafting discussion:

I was rather thinking about crafting using some precious gems (dropping randomly anywhere depending only on area level, the more precious ones dropping only in higher level areas) that in some combinations can imbue an item with special properties (recipes will be known), might be added that they need to be in some special geometrical patterns for lore embelishment. For example if you place an obsidian, a lodestone, an amethyst and an opal into a sword, you create Black Sword of Doomspire's Fall (Black Axe of Doomspire's Fall if put into an axe and so on).

Runewords, aren't they?

I think magic items might consist of multiple common ingredients (metal, wood, cloth) and one special ingredient (shark's kidney, white troll's spleen, ...)
Common ingredients might range with quality of material (metal: iron, steel, mithril, trollium, ...) Player can get them from friendly NPCs or by mining/skinning/looting/...
Special ingredients should drop off boss-monsters or unique containers.

Both suggestions have right to live.

[Xudo]

@Heindal

loottables discussion:

@xudo Or you just use a normal array which contains monstertypes as well as lists of loot.
The problem about the loottables in the way presented is that the loot of monsters can be different in following scenarios.

I see no problem in it. You just create new loottable.

To add a variable to EACH enemy or npc seems very odd and I don't think this is high performant.

You will need to add one integer value(loottable id) to each enemy to make things work.

A table (array) containing monstertypes and a list of randomobjects according to the area is much more flexible. It however could influence the game performance.

Do you have some examples? I don't understand this.

You can't predict, what (custom) enemies is going to implement scenario-designer. Thats why you can't list all possible monstertypes.
In the same time, you can create common loot tables, which will be used by scenario-designer as if he wants.

The idea with the tools isn't new, but imho absolutely unnecessary, when we are trying to make things work and try to get rid off the bugs.

I'm touching the basics now. Thats why I think, that current bugs are not that important, than decision about my suggestion.

I don't want you to get hard time implementing second adventure for WesMMO.

[Dugi]

@Xudo
Excuse me for using philosophical terms, but don't throw the burden of proof on me. You're to 'prove' that your suggestion is better than the currently implemented system, not to prove that your suggestion can work, that's just fallacy. I found the item system in D&D games far worse than in Diablo, exactly because of this.

It is MMO, isn't it? I will help you to get good sword, you will help me to get good mage's clothes.

Yes, but it still requires deals between people. I can't handle the area where the item I need drops, none of my friends has time for me (or they're just all offline), so I ask a stranger to help me, but after that, I just refuse to look for the item he needs, and he has no means to force me to do so. Yes, it can work between friends, but not if you're alone or without people you can trust. With the current system, none of the problems I described above can happen, because I can find the item I need in the area I can farm (unless the level limitation is the problem), and I can create a farming team with whoever I want if he has a character that can cooperate with mine, without being limited by item needs. I am not telling that your option is totally awkward and unsuitable, just that it is worse.

You're talking as if players are going to equip every item, which is going to drop in the location.

Let's assume that you're passing through undead infested caves several areas, with item levels from 8 to 11. You're entering this passage with items on levels 6 and 7 from previous areas. Many level 10 and level 11 items are better than level 6 or level 7, and you need them. If they didn't drop, you'd enter level 12 area with level 6 and 7 items, and you'd have to struggle really hard to kill something. Or you get unlucky with a rogue who needs daggers, first enter an area with loyalists, awesome, no daggers, then enter an area with mages/cultists/necromancers, great, no daggers, then an area with dwarves, brilliant, no daggers, then an area with animals, everyone is hacking them with axes from dwarves, zapping them with wands from mages, and your poor rogue has just a dumb level 4 dagger than does very little damage.

For example I will implement corpse of paladin (with really good mace) decaying in the swamp, surrounded by swarm of undead.

In D&D, it was absolutely useless to have weapon specialisation in scimitars, because no good scimitars dropped through the entire game. Same was for falchions or katanas. In Neverwinter Nights: Hordes of the Underdark, there was one bloody good longsword by the beginning of the campaign, and any character specialised in longswords was in a huge advantage until you found more good weapons. Predefined drops like this are bad. If this mace is found with character level 4 and items of comparable quality are dropped about level 10, all mace-wielding characters will rock from level 4 to level 10. It motivates you to gimp your character choosing maces as favourite weapons even if it might be better with a brilliant unique sword fitting it much better, but available only as random drop after level 25.

Runewords, aren't they?

Pretty much yes.

Special ingredients should drop off boss-monsters or unique containers.

Here we go again. You have a special build that needs to get an Archübermeganecromancer's earring to craft an item that it absolutely needs, but nobody else has any reason to attack that Archübermeganecromancer, and Necrodeath Skeletons that guard him are too hard to defeat without a good party. What shall you do? Beg anyone to help you? Wouldn't it be better if this item could be found anywhere (maybe an increased chance to get it from Archübermeganecromancer, but that one would drop also pretty decent uniques to make it worth farming for any part strong enough)? Things like this might be good for single player games, where you're supposed to and capable of getting everything by yourself, but not for multiplayer like this.

Both suggestions have right to live.

But I am not getting why should your option be better.

Regarding the implementation, I don't think it is important now. I have implemented crafting in Legend of the Invincibles, I have implemented much more complex things here, there is no reason why I should be unable to implement crafting here. But there are more pressing matters now, this add-on can exist without any crafting at all. I think that scenarios are the thing that needs the most to be expanded by now. Freeroam mode appears to be quite necessary, but is absolutely non-existent, for example.

[Xudo]

Some time ago you said.

the problem is that high level base items require high attributes, which some characters might be unable to use. Low level base items have lower attribute requirements, and if they have good magical prefixes and suffixes, they might be even better than high level base items with weak prefixes and suffixes.

And now you said

Let's assume that you're passing through undead infested caves several areas, with item levels from 8 to 11. You're entering this passage with items on levels 6 and 7 from previous areas. Many level 10 and level 11 items are better than level 6 or level 7, and you need them.

If players are in need of low level items, they just can go to low level adventures. So I think, that level of dropped item should be in range between X-3 and X, not between 1 and X

I found the item system in D&D games far worse than in Diablo, exactly because of this.

This system works fine for about of 9 years of World of Warcraft. Though, you have made your decision.

Which leveling rate do you expect from players? 2-3 levels per scenario? 1 level per 2 scenario? Exponental function with quick start and slow end?

New adventures should be located in root/Scenarios folder? In the very beginning, I have proposed you to make WesMMO an era. This is how BOB_RPGs are designed: One era and multiple scenarios. Everything is a separate add-ons. This is very convenient.

[Dugi]

If players are in need of low level items, they just can go to low level adventures.

I don't know where you see a contradiction. They might need items with level base items because of the attribute requirement, but they still need higher prefixes and suffixes. This isn't always the case anyway.

This system works fine for about of 9 years of World of Warcraft.

I don't know enough of World of Warcraft to comment (really, I know it is a bit weird). I can't tell whether it is so popular because of its item system or something else, like the class/feat/attribute system in D&D that is awesome in my opinion. And there is a load of popular MMORPGs that totally suck and I have no idea what are their players doing with their lives. You never seemed to care about explaining any advantages of that system anyway, just shown that the disadvantages I saw weren't as serious as I saw them.

Which leveling rate do you expect from players? 2-3 levels per scenario? 1 level per 2 scenario? Exponental function with quick start and slow end?

It should be a bit slower than the advancing speed, to avoid players having problems with not being able to equip items that drop. I have set it to 1 level per scenario, but it can be adjusted, depending on the campaign's final length (just as the level-up speed will be adjusted).

New adventures should be located in root/Scenarios folder? In the very beginning, I have proposed you to make WesMMO an era. This is how BOB_RPGs are designed: One era and multiple scenarios. Everything is a separate add-ons. This is very convenient.

To be honest, I remember nothing of it, but it looks to me like a good idea now. It doesn't even need to be an era, but the scenarios have to obey some rules to work with it.
I was thinking of some other option, that might be too crazy, that the whole would be a large campaign with free roam allowed between areas/scenarios after completing the related quests there.

[Xudo]

It should be a bit slower than the advancing speed, to avoid players having problems with not being able to equip items that drop. I have set it to 1 level per scenario, but it can be adjusted, depending on the campaign's final length (just as the level-up speed will be adjusted).

Have you considered the option of leveling players up as a reward for completion of scenario?
Something like that was implemented in Dark Messiah. You get several skill points at specific stages of game.
This way you will be able to create infinite sources of enemy NPC's without problem of over-levelling. In addition it will unlock additional game mode - "hero defence" "team survival".

I was thinking of some other option, that might be too crazy, that the whole would be a large campaign with free roam allowed between areas/scenarios after completing the related quests there.

This will disallow the option of independed creation of addons by other authors.

What is the fundamental difference of crafted items from the unique ones? Why do you need to separate the in special table?

[Dugi]

Have you considered the option of leveling players up as a reward for completion of scenario?

I have seen this, but I didn't like it. It does not allow you to get a higher level if a vital skill awaits you there and you need it to beat a boss or something. Experience for quest completion or some other progression is fine, but no exp at all from enemies isn't, IMO. It reminds me rather games that aren't RPGs, but the character improves somehow after completing parts of the quest line to avoid monotony (a.k.a. Assassin's Creed, Brütal Legend).

This will disallow the option of independed creation of addons by other authors.

No, I meant it so that they edit the existing add-on and submit their edits so that we could add it. It would allow us to create an open world, with a lot of quests. But as I said, it might be just too crazy.

What is the fundamental difference of crafted items from the unique ones? Why do you need to separate the in special table?

Crafted items can be made into all kinds of item - you have one recipe, but you can create a hammer, an axe, a rapier, a bow etc. Armour/helm/gauntlets/boots/shield recipes would be different than weapon ones to prevent players from making supermegaoffensive characters.

[Xudo]

No, I meant it so that they edit the existing add-on and submit their edits so that we could add it. It would allow us to create an open world, with a lot of quests. But as I said, it might be just too crazy.

Don't do open world. This is not the case for it.
I can't tell you a lot of advantages of era+scenarios design. It just be MUCH easier to add content for WesMMO with it.

Crafted items can be made into all kinds of item - you have one recipe, but you can create a hammer, an axe, a rapier, a bow etc. Armour/helm/gauntlets/boots/shield recipes would be different than weapon ones to prevent players from making supermegaoffensive characters.

If I understood you correctly, player will combine gems with base_item and get crafted_item. In this case, you dont ever need to reserve space for crafted items.

[Dugi]

Don't do open world. This is not the case for it.
I can't tell you a lot of advantages of era+scenarios design. It just be MUCH easier to add content for WesMMO with it.

I am not very fond of that idea neither, but it might be a good idea to assemble its advantages and disadvantages if we want to make a decision.

Advantages of open world:
We can prevent creation of campaigns for it that would create characters with high levels quickly (or includes some other unwanted content), if a third party creates one and uploads it, we can do nothing about it.
It gives the real RPG feel, where you can access any quest at any time.
It makes looking for campaigns working with it easier, will result in an add-on with a lot of downloads that is more likely to become popular.
It is much better for such MMORPG practices as item and experience farming.

Advantages of separating it into an era:
People don't have to download everything, saving the server capacity.
It is easier to code and requires less teamwork (I don't have good experience with teamwork so far).
It is more wesnoth style.
It allows add-ons with different numbers of player sides (some sides can always be vacant, but sometimes you need more AI sides). This isn't supported by the code actually, the number of players is assumed to be from 1 to 5.

If I understood you correctly, player will combine gems with base_item and get crafted_item. In this case, you dont ever need to reserve space for crafted items.

Yes, the player will combine gems with base_item and get_crafted item. But I don't understand how would it be doable without an extra slot, it will not just add desired magical prefixes and suffixes, and creating a unique item for each of the seventy possible types of base items is extremely ineffective (could be done easily with macros, but the resource cost would be unpleasant, MP add-ons should be rather minimalistic, and this add-on currently is and should continue to be).

[Xudo]

Advantages of open world:
We can prevent creation of campaigns for it that would create characters with high levels quickly (or includes some other unwanted content), if a third party creates one and uploads it, we can do nothing about it.
It gives the real RPG feel, where you can access any quest at any time.
It makes looking for campaigns working with it easier, will result in an add-on with a lot of downloads that is more likely to become popular.
It is much better for such MMORPG practices as item and experience farming.

• If someone sets itself a goal to create campaign with unwanted content, then open world will not prevent them from doing it. Third party can copy+paste your open_world and modify it in the way he wants.
• Open world is good for games with several hudreds simultaneous players. When there is only 5 players, then whole world will be empty space, which have to be travelled to start scenario. This travelling and waiting for stragglers will be boring procedure.
  In any case it is possible to access any quest at any time. In case of open world, you will need to make several in-game turns. In case of era, you need to select item in list of scenarios.
• As long as your era needed for every scenario add-on, it will get same amount of downloads in any case.
• Isn't it supposed to get everything including loot and xp in the scenario, where players have to overcome some challenges?

Yes, the player will combine gems with base_item and get_crafted item. But I don't understand how would it be doable without an extra slot, it will not just add desired magical prefixes and suffixes, and creating a unique item for each of the seventy possible types of base items is extremely ineffective (could be done easily with macros, but the resource cost would be unpleasant, MP add-ons should be rather minimalistic, and this add-on currently is and should continue to be).

You will need to create table of recipes. Each recipe is a list of gems and expected effect. It will be applied to any item you want.

[Dugi]

If someone sets itself a goal to create campaign with unwanted content, then open world will not prevent them from doing it. Third party can copy+paste your open_world and modify it in the way he wants.

Yes, and it might be distributed to his friends, and friends of his friends, 50 people in total. If it is uploaded on the server, 2000 people will play it. He may, of course, create his fork of the project, and that modified world of wesnoth will necessarily lag behind in development and stability, and will harm the cause. This is a bigger problem, I believe.

Open world is good for games with several hudreds simultaneous players. When there is only 5 players, then whole world will be empty space, which have to be travelled to start scenario. This travelling and waiting for stragglers will be boring procedure.

I mean open world like Diablo II, with only a few people in every game, but freedom to go wherever they want and fight any monsters they want, not an open world like these lame MMORPGs like RuneScape where you have to steal kills from other players or be really careful to avoid being stolen a kill if you want even some experience.

In any case it is possible to access any quest at any time. In case of open world, you will need to make several in-game turns. In case of era, you need to select item in list of scenarios.

You mean like replaying a single scenario of a campaign over and over?

As long as your era needed for every scenario add-on, it will get same amount of downloads in any case.

Yes, but the era is useless as it is. Maybe it might have a representative campaign as a dependency or be packed with it. It really sucks if a newbie downloads something high on the list, but realises that it isn't a campaign and he can do pretty much nothing with it.

Isn't it supposed to get everything including loot and xp in the scenario, where players have to overcome some challenges?

Monsters must drop loot and give experience, otherwise it won't be much like the usual RPG games... I've already said that, and I don't know how is it related to the cause of using era instead of a large package.
________

You will need to create table of recipes. Each recipe is a list of gems and expected effect. It will be applied to any item you want.

Yes, with that limitation that weapon recipes won't be usable on armour (and maybe vice versa). The identification number will be composed of the number 1, followed by two number identifying the base item and then three numbers identifying the recipe used (therefore, 109022 means crafted item, 9th base item, 22nd recipe). I am not getting what are you trying to tell with that statement.

[Xudo]

Yes, and it might be distributed to his friends, and friends of his friends, 50 people in total. If it is uploaded on the server, 2000 people will play it. He may, of course, create his fork of the project, and that modified world of wesnoth will necessarily lag behind in development and stability, and will harm the cause. This is a bigger problem, I believe.

I believe nobody will care enough to make such things at all. The result is not worth the effort.

I mean open world like Diablo II, with only a few people in every game, but freedom to go wherever they want and fight any monsters they want, not an open world like these lame MMORPGs like RuneScape where you have to steal kills from other players or be really careful to avoid being stolen a kill if you want even some experience.

But there is only one storyline in Diablo II. Who knows how much independed storylines will be implemented in this project?

Yes, but the era is useless as it is. Maybe it might have a representative campaign as a dependency or be packed with it. It really sucks if a newbie downloads something high on the list, but realises that it isn't a campaign and he can do pretty much nothing with it.

I think you are right. We can create something like tutorial, which will be distributed by default with era.

________

Yes, with that limitation that weapon recipes won't be usable on armour (and maybe vice versa). The identification number will be composed of the number 1, followed by two number identifying the base item and then three numbers identifying the recipe used (therefore, 109022 means crafted item, 9th base item, 22nd recipe). I am not getting what are you trying to tell with that statement.

I see... Everything is clear for me now.

________
One more question. How tanks will tank, exactly?
Many of poplar games now use threat list. In Wesnoth, this is impossible. How characters with high hp, resistances and defences will prevent allies from taking damage?

[Dugi]

But there is only one storyline in Diablo II. Who knows how much independed storylines will be implemented in this project?

Diablo II had its side quests. Side quests can be so elaborate that the become side storylines, like in Skyrim.

I think you are right. We can create something like tutorial, which will be distributed by default with era.

How about making a tutorial campaign from the current one? Initially tutorial, then just the rest of the story to give it a taste. I think that it would be just tagged as an era, but having a campaign packed with it. Still, we need Heindal's input about this, I am quite indifferent about this, you want era separation, I wonder what Heindal wants.

So far, we are just chatting and doing nothing... what kind of thing would you like to do in this project?
Things that might need to be done:
- continuation of scenarios, because Heindal is busy in his new job (however, the storyline is written in a PM I haven't access to because I've written too many PMs from that time, but I believe Heindal has it)
- animations
- spell and skill icons (I haven't added support for skill icons yet, but it won't be hard)
- modification of scenarios and development of macros to allow returning to old areas (in the case we choose the open world option)

Things I am thinking about doing (just for information):
- improve interface
- animations
- item crafting
- scenarios (if everything else fails, my scenarios don't have that RPG style and I shouldn't do it)