Neverwinter Nights Forum Update

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(Originally posted by Marnix)

Bob McCabe, Writing & Design:

Making Maps: If you're just painting down an empty map, it's going to take you about 3 seconds - if that. If you want to me an interesting looking map, but still have nothing going on within, it's probably going to take you closer to 5 to 20 minutes, depending on how big the map is and how picky you are about the look of things (and how many times you start over to get it just right).

One thing that would make that a bit more headache-inducing late into the show, however...if you've got creatures or objects placed on a tile, you have to move or remove them before you can edit the tile. It's not really hard to just grab them, shove them over a tile or two, edit and replace.

Immortal NPC's: Characters can be flagged as mortal or immortal. The actual terminology is something like "killable", but like "placeable", that don't fly with me. The same goes for whether or not your NPCs can be attacked. Regardless, it's up to you to decide whether your NPCs are "normal" or not. And for all of the arguments against using it, a single-player game with no DM can end pretty quickly if you accidentally kill the character that gives you all of the quests.

David Gaider, Designer:

Planar Tilesets: Just a comment...I've seen a few people sometimes requesting planar tilesets, and I'd just like to point out something. Keep in mind that we're not only developing the D&D ruleset but that we do have an official setting, as well...the Forgotten Realms. This does not include Planescape, Greyhawk, Kara-Tur, Spelljammer, Ravenloft, or any other campaign setting.

I'm not saying it's impossible that we would ever expand beyond the FR license, but the fact is that the FR setting as it stands is what NWN is being developed for.

If there is an expansion, I've no doubt that it will likely involve some new tilesets. Whether there is an expansion, however, and what it will contain has yet to be determined. All I'm saying, however, is that NWN is specifically based in the Forgotten Realms...not in the D&D universe at large. Planescape may be adjacent to and reachable by people in the FR, sure...as is Greyhawk (technically), Ravenloft and the others...but that NWN is being developed specifically for the FR setting, itself (and, yes...arctic, desert, jungle and other types of tilesets would be part of the FR, I'm not referring to those).

It would be nice to do some planar tilesets and so forth...what's a good D&D game without an occasional jaunt to the planes? We are not restricted from adding in elements from Spelljammer or Planescape, sure, but the priority will be developing the FR setting and not the D&D Universe at large. I'm in no position to rule it out, of course...I just thought I would urge caution to some who may be expecting a bit much in terms of the setting scope.

Penguins: I don't know how they got in there...but, yes, oddly enough there are penguins.

Boats: You can get on the ship. Not sure if there is anything that would qualify as a really good boat interior. You could probably put something together with the interior tiles that would look good. There are both docked ships as well as a ship that is entirely surrounded by water.

There's no moving water animation that I've seen (except on the fountains and waterfalls and such)... we've no plans on including ship travel with this release, so it's hard to justify a reason to include it. There might be some coastal sound effects, but only Dave Chan would know for sure.

I set up an area, myself, and put the ship on it...it definitely looks like you're on a ship at sea that way (fog's nice, too). It does not really look like the ship's in motion, tho... no effects that can think of that would fake it, either, unfortunately.

Swords: Flipping through the list of weapon types, we have:

Bastard Sword
Greatsword
Longsword
Rapier
Scimitar
Short Sword
Two-Bladed Sword

Each have their own unique selections for their appearance, though some have more options than others.

Making Modules: Basically, you spend very little time putting together the actual tiles for the maps. A lot of stuff that you do often (like area transitions) is mostly automated... so you can create large areas that connect to each other fairly swiftly. Background scenery is, more or less, painted in...it takes literally no time at all.

Once you start adding placeable objects to a map, it takes a bit more time. I find this part enjoyable, tho, as it adds a lot of detail and makes things come to life. Even right now, there's a whole pack of 'standard' items and creatures that you could literally just drop in wherever you'd like.

The time-consuming parts could be considered the following:
- dialogue (it CAN be simple... but can also be as complicated as you like. Fortunately we've got some generic dialogues that the module-maker can use and edit as he wishes, making dialogue a lot easier. This will allow you to create an assortment of simple plots, information-providing NPC's and ambient characters without even having to know how to script or have good dialogue structure.)
- creating creatures (the wizard can make this very simple... and you can spend as much or as little on the details as you like)
- scripting (this CAN be a big one... it all depends on what you're trying to accomplish. There are a lot of scripts included and annotated that you can use or modify right off the bat. If you have really complex things in mind, it can take a while).
- journals (you don't have to use these...but the ability is there, and it's a great way of rewarding XP. If you have a DM overseeing a game, tho, even that's not necessary.)

Hmmm... can't think of other things right off the bat. Naturally, we spend a lot of time on dialogue and scripting and going through and making sure everything just so... and it'll be no different for any end-user who wants to make a very complicated and large campaign. It doesn't have to be so complicated, however, is my point... and fortunately the simple stuff is easy and all your time can be devoted to the stuff that really makes a difference in your module.

Changing Maps: You can alter the map at any time. All you need to do is have the 'map' function on the painter selected and you can edit away.

Trap-setting: There are two ways to set traps:

1) by laying down a poly trigger (same as BG2) that has a script attached.
2) by applying a trap script in the Trap section of containers & placeable objects.

At current glance, there are 4 categories of pre-cooked trap scripts... Average, Minor, Strong, and Deadly... each with about 10 different scripts in them.

Placeable Walls: No walls as placeable objects, no. Not a bad idea... but I'm wondering how it would be possible to make a believable fit between actual tile walls.

Unless the plan is to put down walls on their own so, say, a building was demolishable or something. Not sure how that would work. At any rate, there's nothing like that in the objects currently.

Current testing-char: Still using my female bard, at the moment. I'm loving some of the animations that can play... walked into a tavern that Preston had put together and I was really struck at how cool it looks to have all the people physically look like they're talking/arguing/pleading and such. Scripting the emotes works really well (pounded down a door in the bordello to be greeted by the courtesan and her customer angrily shaking their fists at me and displaying all kinds of angry text... that looked really cool. I actually felt like I had intruded.)

Had a good laugh when a certain naughty erinye in a certain tower didn't recognize that my character was female... although I guess demonesses are allowed to be a bit racy, eh?

Monsters & Equipment: Yes, to close out the thought, the biped set can also wield any-and-all armor and weaponry.

For most of the monster animations, you will be able to give them whatever equipment you like...whether or not you will see it on their animation depends on whether or not it was set up for that creature.

For the most part, you won't see armor that you put on a creature. The majority of them, however, can display all weapon types and (often) shields. Some of the humanoid monsters that have variations to their models have varying levels of armor, though.

As mentioned above, the sheer number of armor skins required for the player races alone prohibits this from being extended to all creatures as well.

You could add the armor onto the giant, but most likely you wouldn't see a corresponding change in the giant's model. He still gets all the proper effects from wearing said armor, though.

If you didn't want the player to be able to take/use that armor, you could mark it as 'non-droppable' so it won't appear on his body. Otherwise the player could take it and wear it as per normal.

Giving the giant weapons, however, would make them appear on the model properly.

Nathan Frederick, Quality Assurance:

Toolset Facelift: The toolset is currently undergoing a gui/interface facelift.
Anything shown to you right now, would look nothing like what you get to use.

Jonathan Epp, Quality Assurance:

Fences: Yes, you can shoot arrows and cast spells on people when there is a fence between you and your target.

Brenon Holmes, Programmer:

Visuals: Perception is relative, it's entirely based on what you see and hear as a player, not on what other people see... each creature has a unique perception of the world. However the visual effect system used in the scripting language is an entirely different beast altogether as it simply applies effects to objects with no thought as to relative perception or anything of the sort... something either exists or it doesn't. However as David mentioned this is something that has been brought up by design so we'll probably be looking at this at some point...