Neverwinter Nights Forum Update

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(Originally posted by Tiamat)

Derek French, Assistant Producer

Music: You have full control of setting what music plays where.

Only one hak pak can be used at a time: Yes, that's it.
Another way of thinking of it is like Counter-Strike for Half-Life and CTF for Quake 2. Both of these are modifications for their respective games. You cannot run both CS and TFC at the same time. Only one. Period.

New Models: There WILL be more models released, but there is no schedule worked out yet. We WON'T have a new model for you next Wednesday (March 20th).

Hak Paks: The release of the NWNMV seems to have refuted this point. We're assembling models and animations and distributing them not as hack packs, but as .mdl files coupled with .tga files. And Bioware has indicated that these same files (.mdl in text format) are supported by the game.

So therefore, could we not get around the whole "single hack pack" problem by distributing collections of models in plain (.mdl and .tga) format, rather than relying on hack packs to begin with?

Yes you could try to to abuse the override directory and it will work, but we will dislike you very much and curse members of your family. The override directory is out of bounds for the end user. Our update system will sanitize the override directory so we don't have resource conflict with 3rd party files. This was a huge problem in BG2.

If you want the zero hassle version, use the hackpacks.

Several comments...

First, I have had my head slapped for spelling it wrong. Here is the OFFICIAL name... Hak Pak not Hack Pack.

The directory for all Hak Paks is called "\hak\" inside there you can have as many Hak Paks as you like, but only one can be active in a module at one time (thus only one active in the Toolset and the server). No subdirectories. And .hak files only.

Source control. This is what I see as the main issue that some of you are talking about. Welcome to development! Yes, you as the developer will have to handle your source control. This may include doing such things as naming your Hak Pak "derekf_underdark_01.hak" and naming resources inside in a similar fashion. We are saddling you with this issue.

Hak Paks must be created before you start using it in the Toolset. Even if you aren't finished with the content and it needs to change, it still has to be done before you start the Toolset. That sound file is too loud? Use your wave editor, fix it, re-add it to the Hak Pak, save, then open your module in the Toolset. Bang. There it is. Keep in mind that this is a "while developing" example.

Hak Paks and Decompressing: Not true any longer! The current version of the Hak Pak editor adds, extracts, and deletes. No internal directory structure, just flat.
There is going to be an internal description area for each Hak Pak where you can describe the Pak.
Yes, there is the potential for a lot of data duplication with same files in different Hak Paks. There is simply not much we can do about it.
"override" does exist and will exist at ship. We will "delete override\*.*" every time you update. 3rd party files in override=BAD. This has burned us in the past and broke BG2 for many people. That is why we are constraining you to the Hak Pak concept. Sure, you can use override while developing for testing, but you had better get those files in a Hak Pak for release. Or we will start to actively hate your cat.

Hak Pak Descriptions: Basically an internal readme that can be viewed in the Hak Pak editor, but I hope to get some of that information in other areas. Not sure about limits, but I would say don't try to write a novel. Wouldn't it be cool if you connected to a server, didn't have the Hak Pak, and the server told you where to get the Hak Pak from?

David Gaider, Designer

NWN & D&D: We are taking great pains to implement D&D faithfully. There naturally will be some things that we have to change, due to limitations of one kind or another, and some things that we want to change.

The number of things that we want to change and do are, however, few and far between. If you want to promote the idea that this means we approach all our decisions regarding the game with ambivalence or whimsy, so be it. You'd be wrong, but that's never stopped anyone before.

We're not saying that we did the fire giants this way because we think we're the DM. We made the fire giants that way because we think they look better that way, and because the color of their skin isn't intrinsic to them being fire giants (as opposed to the color of a dragon or a slaad, for example). We make decisions like that because we're the ones implementing the game.

It's OK if you think that's not a good idea and believe we should stick closer to the rules. This doesn't mean we're playing fast and loose with the rules however... like I said, being faithful in our implementation is important. If you feel that this one detail is some harbringer of sloppiness to come, then by all means gripe. Like I said earlier, some people are going to feel that we have no room for interpretation. If we disagree, I don't think that makes us condescending... we can still talk about it. There is no need for wild gesticulation here.

I understand what Karzak, newc and some others are saying, here. We disagree on the point of the fire giant's appearance, and that's that. They are concerned about just where we draw the line between faithful interpretation and license to change... that's a fair question. I don't think the point need be stretched any further than that, and the sullen bitterness that's being expressed on these threads by each sides is a bit much.

So please... calm down. To suggest that someone who thinks the fire giant's appearance is not a big deal is insulting... everyone values different things, and since information on the rest of the game is limited at the moment, it shouldn't be too hard to understand how someone might interpret that as possibly leading to bigger and more unpleasant changes.
To the ones who are that fearful or distrusting, just keep in mind the same thing... you don't have all the information, yet. I can't stop you from distrusting our ability to make a good 3rd edition D&D translation or the fact that we love this game... so be it. But making pre-judgements and stretching this point to ludicrousness doesn't exactly make us keen to listen to you... and only serves to stir up the pot and create an arguement. If that's what you want, however, then this discussion will be thrown out of here just like the last time.

"Ideal" Player Number: Like any module put out for PnP, we will probably arrive at an 'ideal' number of players for the official campaign... from 1 up to however many. That will be just a suggestion on our part, however.

Can we lock chests? If a chest has been marked as lockable, yes.

Sitting: As for sitting, we've enabled NPC's to be given a script which makes them sit... haven't seen it for PC's, yet, so we'll have to see if that makes it in. Right now they sit on the ground.
There is a generic script right now that tells an NPC to find the nearest chair and sit it in until told to do otherwise.

Decaying Objects: I don't think the global decay timer can be changed.
Setting all items to 'Plot' would be required. It's just a checkbox in the item editor and available whenever you create an item, so the only work would be in checking all the standard items (if that's what you wanted).

Removing Old Items: That's a function right in the DM client.
You could choose to destroy it (zip, gone) or send it to Limbo if you wanted the option to call it back into existence at some point.

Animations: There is drinking animation (for potions) and reading animation, but no eating animation. Hmm... I don't think the drinking animation actually puts anything in your hand (but it looks alright). You'd need to 'equip' a model with a beer mug or whatever for that to look even better... and we don't have equippable beer mugs yet. (fairly minor mod, tho, don't you think?)
There's a lot of 'talking', 'yelling', 'listening' and such types of looping animations, tho... one of the bars in Chapter 2 in the official campaign looked really really good once these were implemented. You got people talking to each other, arguments going on, people at tables drinking and laughing, the barmaid going around taking orders and telling people to shut up... it's great stuff.

Exam Questions: 1) What are the few Skills and Feats you are sure of? There's only a couple left that might change at this point. We may reveal them soon, but I won't provide a list for you. Nice try, tho.
2) What is the number of familiars and animal companions? Haven't seen the familiars, yet, but there were six animal companions at last check.
3) Are henchmen predetermined, or can anyone be hired through dialogue? A henchmen must be determined as such, as we have to make a version of them for each level. That would be difficult to do for a lot of NPC's. That said, you do have a fair selection.
4) True or false, animals such as horses and cows will be able to move around. True, if they exist, they will have animation to move.
5) True or false, your PC can kick the butt of everyone else on the BioWare server. I have never PvP'd in NWN, personally.
What is the highest level you have ever reached playing with any of your NWN PCs? 8th. I had a 6th level bard/2nd level fighter at one point.
6) At that level, were all of your stats implemented properly? Why not? What stats? You mean skills and feats? All the ones that were going in the game were done, yes. There was some class abilities that didn't work at the time, tho.
7) And how did that make you feel? Pretty good. I'd thought I'd miss some of the stuff that wasn't in more, but I didn't. The pace of combat was actually much less frenetic than I had expected. The quick-bars work very well for spells as a result... I never feel harried.
8) Now, have you created your first module yet? It's not done, but it is started.
9) Was it designed for one or multiple PCs? Multiple.
10) Did you DM it? I intend to. If it's good, maybe other people can.
11) How easy was that on a scale of 1 to 10, 10 being easiest? 6, so far. A lot of it has been very easy. There were a few things that I wanted to do which were perniciously difficult since I didn't know how to script it and some people were too busy to ask. I either worked around it or have left it until later. Naturally I don't have scripting help or documentation available, as people using NWN will eventually have. I also swear a lot and give up easily and go back to work.
12) Did the PCs complete the adventure? Were they able to attempt all actions that they wanted to perform? In what percent of these did the DM have to intervene because of module shortcomings? Obviously, none of these apply to my module.
13) How many bugs in the game did you notice today alone? Errr... in the 20's or 30's, I believe. I was balance testing today, though, and not writing.
14) How many of those bugs were rules-oriented rather than display-oriented? None. They were all game-balance, dialogue or scripting bugs.
15) How many of these questions have you actually answered? All the ones I could. I'm waiting for my ride to the bar to arrive, so why not?
16) What do you do when you are finished with your daily NWN chores but are still around work? I go home. It is usually very dark at that point. On a Friday, like today, I go out so my friends know I yet live.
17) What is your least favorite part of NeverWinter Wednesdays? Why should I have a least favorite part? Neverwinter Wednesdays are for you guys, not for me.

Hair Length: There is shoulder-length hair. It cannot go past the neck, however.

Scripting Horses: Meaning what? Can you script horseriding?
Someone could create a model for horses, if they wished, yes. If you wanted riders for them, you'd have to create the "rider & horse" models individually (short of us solving the z-axis problem... which is something only we can do).
To make PC's ride horses, you need basically one model for each race and their horse... and be able to apply the proper heads, clothing and such to them.
As far as scripting goes, it would be easy enough to make someone respawn as the combined horse model... 'getting on their horse', in other words.
Beside all of that, you'd need to take into account speed and battle (can you trample? Hmmm... I guess we need extra animations for creatures that are going to attack someone on horse-back rather than their animations right now which would only attack the horse. Can you knock someone off their horse? Does the horse attack?).
So we're talking something way beyond scripting.
If someone wants to make a horse model that someone can click on... and it teleports them to wherever they want to go ("you ride to so-and-so town...", fade to black), basically spawning them in front of the new area in front of their horse... that'd be different. That's fairly do-able.
If we add horses in, though, it's got to be the whole thing. It CAN be done... what we have to decide is if the amount of time to do it is worth giving up stuff that could be done in an equal amount of time. Not to mention that we need to put aside the time to do it.
It may get done, at any rate, in the future. All we've said is that we don't have the time to add it in right now. Period.
Stacking seperate models without overlap, and yet having them animate smoothly together, could be a bit problematic. I suspect not one that can't be overcome, however, with a bit of effort.

What about war chariots? Anything is possible, although I don't know how much call there would be for chariots in D&D.

No need to leave out horse models just because PCs can't mount them: Oh, I know. No horses, however, period.
Not everybody is so understanding. For many, if they see horses, it would 'make sense' to them that they should be able to ride them. I, myself, would have liked to have a horse model at least to tie up in front of the inn or whatever...
...but, no, no horses at this time.

Adding Horses To NWN: Hmmm...if we had examples to work from, maybe less than you think. It was the mod community that showed us the way to do bags of holding for BG2, after all, as I remember (ie. the portable store).
In this case, though, it may not be so much a problem with trying to figure out functionality so much as it is raw effort required. Leaving stuff out like that is really painful to us, believe me. The idea that the community may leap on it and make horses is both a big relief and a little sting to the pride (we really wish we could have spared you all the effort... hopefully, if and when we do put horses in, it will be done all the way and done well and worth the damn wait).

How much of the core game will the toolset allow us to change? Hmm. Not an easy question to answer.

Let me possibly err on the side of safety and say that most things regarding the core rules will not be alterable... or, at least, not easily alterable.

You cannot control character creation or the levelling process, nor can you control the physics of the world. There are going to be some situations where you can script work-arounds, but these are going to be specific to the module they're scripted for and will not affect the character directly. You could, for example, create a Prestige Class and script the benefits to be applied to the character as he or she levels up... the abilities would not show up on the character sheet, however, and would not travel with the character should they leave the game.

As I've said before, NWN is not a build-your-own-RPG... it's a build-your-own-D&D-module (or campaign or setting, if you'd prefer a larger scale). The core rules are not designed to be adjustable, though some stuff will be for those who operate outside of the box (and perhaps some will go even farther than that... but that's beyond the scope of my ability to predict and nothing Bioware would be responsible for, naturally).

The idea, however, is that within the realm of the D&D ruleset to give the player as much flexibility as possible.

Now, indeed, one might say "But Prestige Classes are a part of D&D... and so are spells that don't exist in the PHB. That's all I want to add." I'm not arguing that... but in this case, we can't have it both ways. Restricting the access to change some things has allowed us to add a lot more freedom to other areas... and I think this will improve NWN in the long run.

NWN has been built from the beginning so we can easily expand on it... which means stuff like Prestige Classes and so forth is always a possibility in the future. I don't think it will ever be our intent to allow the core rules to be changed, however... although I won't swear up and down that this will never be so. If something is a popular demand to be added and isn't directly in contravention to the D&D or FR license, you can bet that we will at least consider it.

Hope that all makes sense.

NWN Making Money: I don't think you need to be overly worried on how much money Bioware is going to make... if NWN does well, so will we, I suspect.

As far as expansions go, I don't think you ever make as much money off them as you do from the original game. It is a way to keep making money off of a popular game as well as please the people who are playing it by giving them more of what they want... a win/win situation. That, and you have a talent pool who are already familiar with the material and you don't have to create an engine from scratch.

Naturally I could never guarantee an expansion or sequel... that remains to be seen... but I think everyone can see the benefits to all sides of Bioware getting involved in such a venture if NWN does well. Yes, there will be some great stuff to come out of the mod community... and yes, some of their stories and modules and scripts will be better than whatever we can make. You can't deny the fact that we've got the manpower, utilities and experience to do what you're average user can't, however... plus we can change the code.

I think that's the key to NWN's future. So long as there is an audience that loves and uses the game, money is only something that gives us the ability to continue doing what we love (speaking from a developer's point of view, anyhow.

Visual & Spell Effects: Quote: After running through the NWN Script Reference a couple times, I keep going back to the section on spells and see the entries that state:
TRUE
VFX_COM_
and then a bunch of colors with other variables. Also the
VFX_INP_ and VFX_FNF_
Are these the different visual and physical properties of spells?

Hmm. Possibly. I haven't seen these references, myself... it may be stuff that has since changed in the scripting language. FNF refers to 'Fire and Forget', I believe (do the effect once only)...not sure about the others.

Maybe one of the programmers will see this and can illuminate you better.

Quote: If so, (I have not seen any official word on this yet so I thought I would ask) is it possible to if not create spells, at least create triggers that will start a visual effect and do x amount of x type of damage?
i.e. the pc opens a door, there is a swirl of lights (the pc thinking d@mn im done) and then there is 12 points of fire damage in a 10 foot radius..

Yes, that's exactly how you can do it. You have access to a whole bunch of effect resources... with which there are several commands on where and when to fire them. By effects, I mean visual effects (such as swirl of lights or what-not) as well as spell-like effects (damage, polymorph, paralyze, etc).

I am not certain on the details of the effects, however, so that's about all I can say on them. Chew on this, though... there are a lot of effects that occur in the official campaign on a regular basis, combined with spell-like effects (with as much a frequency as BG2, anyway). The scripters who put those together are using the same resources that you will be.

His Computer & Blockable Objects:
Quote: What kind of computers are you fellas using while you test the game?

It varies. I, myself, have a Pentium 600... I think. But I'm on the lower end of Bioware staff insofar as power goes. Animators and programmers have the Big Stuff. There are also some computers which are purposefully lower, for testing.

I haven't a clue what kind of video card I have. GeForce 2, I'd suspect.

Quote: Another thing, this time about house modells:
How many will there be in the acctual game? (that is how many different houses it will be..)

Err... that's models, not modules, right? And do you mean creature models? Placeable objects models? Tile models? There's a LOT... nobody here could give you a number, I'm afraid.

Quote: If I create a nice area where a entrance to a cave is will I be able to make that cave impossible to enter and looking like it is brokend (you know like rocks have fallen down so that you can't use it anymore).

Hmmm. I don't think we have any placeable objects that would qualify as 'passage-blocking pile of rocks' (not that that would be difficult to make, I suppose)... but any other big placeable objects would do the trick, if you wanted.

Conversation Editor: From experience, I don't know if it would be worth it to use the conversation editor in real-time. I type pretty fast... but even so even a marginally simple plotgiver is about 1,000 words and takes a couple of hours to put together. Keep in mind that, if you're DM'ing, half your attention is elsewhere, too.
As far as conversations go, I think many things apply to RL just as they do in NWN. If your players are informed before-hand that most characters don't have canned dialogue, and they want to talk to multiple characters, then they have to wait their turn to talk to someone just as they would in a RL PnP session.
Fortunately it's very easy to send messages and navigate around in the DM client.
Alternatively, you could have another DM online with you to handle extra conversations and be a full-time 'possessor' to add a bit of realism to local characters while you spend most of your time guiding the party and dealing with encounters and such.
That's IF you don't want to use canned dialogue. I think having characters with base dialogues is a good idea, and worth the effort you put into them... but writing them on the fly probably wouldn't be worth introducing.

Bob McCabe, Writing & Design

Point Buy: I guess the idea that 30 points is pushing you toward an uber character comes from the point of view of how easy it is to not only clear all the negatives, but make it so that every stat is giving you a positive. In other words, it's easy to make a character who is good at everything.
I personally prefer the lower point buys (and lower starting stats) because I like to see the negatives and positives balance out more. But I won't take that crusade up again. You've all probably gotten sick of hearing me whine about it by now.
I think it has less to do with realism in a fantasy game than creating an interesting character who overcomes flaws to work through a story.
If only there could be some sort of compromise between the extremes (low stats and high stats) of Volourn's rollin', and the consistency between characters of point buy.

Clerics: To cast 9th-level spells as a cleric you need a 19 wisdom, but you also need to be level 17. So if you're trying to multiclass a cleric and a fighter, you're like not to have enough levels in cleric to cast 9th-level spells - in which case you don't really need to have a 19 in wisdom.
As well, you don't need to have the biggest muscles to be the hero.

Darren Wong, Tools Programmer

Viewer Grid Size: Each viewer grid square is 1m x 1m. A tile is 10m x 10m. Hope this helps.

Stanley Woo, Quality Assurance Ninja

Multiclassing: Let me try to address this succinctly:
- all classes must be within one level of each other, or you get a penalty to all future XP awards while your classes are uneven
- each race has a "favoured class", which does NOT count for multiclassing purposes. (eg. a Halfling, whose favoured class is Rogue, does not count his Rogue classes when calculating multiclass XP penalties. He could be Rogue 19/BasketWeaver 1 if he wanted)
- Humans have "Any" as a favoured class, so they can discount any ONE class from their calculation of XP penalties
According to the PHB, Humans discount their HIGHEST class when calculating multiclass XP penalties.
Half-elves operate the same way humans do insofar as multiclassing goes.