Spidweb

That trapdoor is hidden until Neray has been chased to the Jhereth Deeps.

- Jeff Vogel

pulverizer, try deleting your copy and downloading a fresh one. That will verify that you don't have a corrupted game file somewhere causing the problem.

- Jeff Vogel

pulverizer, I just checked this on an iMac and a MacBook and it's launching in full screen just fine. Are you SURE you are not telling it to run in windowed mode?

Perhaps go into your preferences folder and delete the file "Avadon Settings", run the game again, and, when the resolution screen comes up, just run the game without changing anything.

Has anyone else who tried it had trouble playing in full screen mode?

- Jeff Vogel

The blinking pants were meant to be a very useful item.

Until they aren't. :-)

- Jeff Vogel

This discussion is, frankly, making it sound like the system gives a lot of choice. You can take a valued skill to level 8, giving it a big bonus, or you can use those points to go deeper into the tree and get more abilities.

I've seen a lot of saved games and a lot of builds over the last few months, and there is a HUGE variety in the parties people build. I think that giving meaningful choices that result is character that play very differently from each other is the opposite of dumbing down.

Now, if there is a set of skills for a specific character class that is completely non-viable even on Normal difficulty, I would love to hear about it and I can work on that. I think all of the skills are useful, though I may be wrong.

And if playing on Torment really restricts the number of viable builds, that is unavoidable. But I am not seeing evidence that this is a problem for the vast majority of players.

- Jeff Vogel

I have wrapped up the first set of bug fixes and improvements into Avadon. The public beta of v1.0.1 is here ...

[Removed. Update released. Just get it from the main game page.]

Any comments or feedback is welcome at support@spiderwebsoftware.com. Even if you try it and it seems to work fine, a message to that effect would be valuable. If everything seems to be fine, I will release it for real on Wednesday.

* Avadon has been upgraded to a newer game engine. It should now be slightly faster for most users and do a better job of cooperating with the operating system.

* Avadon will now run on case-sensitive hard drives.

* Moving the PC Roster header bar to the bottom of the screen no longer freezes it there.

* When you clear the flooded corridor in the Jhereth Deeps, it will still be cleared when you return to the area.

* The demon Incarnus can now only be defeated once.

* A map of Lynaeus is ow in the Avadon folder.

* Other minor tweaks and typo fixes.

EDIT: 3/8/2011, 2:25 PM

I have removed b1.0.1 and replaced it with b1.0.1b. This revised candidate fixes several problems with the first 1.0.1, most notably ...

* A very rare crash on launch should be fixed.

* On first launch (when you get the Are You Sure You Want To Run This? warning), the game wasn't being moved to the front. This should be fixed.

* The F13-16 keys should work now (if the OS hasn't mapped them to something else).

If you tried the first v1.0.1, please migrate to this one. Thanks to everyone who replied and e-mailed me. If this version works better, a note to support@spiderwebsoftware.com is much appreciated!

- Jeff Vogel

The shield appears in your inventory, not on the ground.

- Jeff Vogel

Thank you for the saved game ... I tracked down the issue. It only affects alchemical equipment, as far as I can tell. It will be better in v1.0.1. In the meantime, as a workaround, move alchemical equipment to your junk bag before you pick up more.

- Jeff Vogel

All of our games are very easy early on, but they also all get more difficult. I designed Hard difficulty to be Hard, and Torment difficulty is much worse.

If you run into problems on Hard, I would suggest playing on Normal for much of this run-through.

I hope the people who always accuse me of making my games too easy remember threads like this one.

- Jeff Vogel

I'll look at the Incarnus thing.

As for the summoning issue, I can look at a saved game. Please save the game with the character that's having problems summoning in it.

Send the saved game to support@spiderwebsoftware.com and I can take a look. Save the game to the upper left slot, go to the saved game folder (in Documents/Spiderweb Software), compress the folder Save0, and send that to us.

- Jeff Vogel

Mouse over the weapon and look for red text. Perhaps your strength isn't high enough.

- Jeff Vogel

I can look at a saved game. Please save the game with you standing next to that alchemical equipment and send it to me.

Send the saved game to support@spiderwebsoftware.com and I can take a look. Save the game to the upper left slot, go to the saved game folder (in Documents/Spiderweb Software), compress the folder Save0, and send that to us.

- Jeff Vogel

"This is what I suspected given what was happening. Is the size limit imposed in the game software, or is there another configuration file? If it is the former, doesn't this violate the entire principle of data-driven design?"

It's imposed in the game software. It might violate the entire principle of data-driven design, but it is entirely in line with the principle of Release the Game Some Time In This Century.

Or, to put it another way, I can't justify spending some of my desperately limiting time to enable unknown third parties to hack the app. I'm sure this makes at least a little bit of sense.

By the way, you won't be able to hack the Mac App Store version for sure. This is an Apple issue ... All App Store (and iOS) apps have checksums baked in to prevent any alteration. Not my fault.

- Jeff Vogel

The Avadon dialogue script is at the size limit the game allows. You can't add to it. You should be able to tweak the scripts in the other zones.

In future titles, the scripts will be in the application bundle. They can be edited, though I'm not sure how editing files in the bundle affects the app's ability to run.

- Jeff Vogel

"I would describe it as confusing. Is that a good thing?"

All changes, every single one, confuse some people when first encountered. This is neither avoidable nor a reason to avoid changing the system. I strongly suspect most people new to my games will not be confused by it and people who are familiar with past titles will get used to the new system very quickly.

For what its worth, the zone system in Avadon is very, very close to that of Dragon Age. That was a hugely popular game, and I know of no epidemics of perplexity when people traveled from area to area.

- Jeff Vogel

The old engine Avadon uses can't handle case-sensitive file systems. However, I've made a beta version of the game with a new engine that might work better. The link is here ...

http://www.spiderwebforums.com/forum/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=223880#Post223880

If you try it, could you please let me know if it works?

- Jeff Vogel

"who isn't quite sure why the only place to retrain isn't early in the game. It's early that you'll find yourself making build mistakes."

Because you make the mistakes early, but you don't realize you made them until the game starts to get tricky, which is, coincidentally, at about exactly the point where you meet the respec person.

- Jeff Vogel

Olle, thanks. I fixed this.

- Jeff Vogel

"Like I said before, why does Jeff give us the option of exiting zones from all four sides when most of them go nowhere? Wouldn't it be better to just block those exits with trees, etc?"

They don't go "nowhere". They go out of the zone. I provide multiple exits to minimize the amount you have to travel when you are done in an area and want to go elsewhere. This is a good thing.

- Jeff Vogel

This is, indeed, my mistake. I will put this workaround in the support area tomorrow ...

Miranda Disappears At Beginning Of the Game

If you go upstairs and speak with Redbeard before you get the order from Heart Miranda, it is possible for her to disappear forever. This will be fixed in v1.0.1. If you have this problem, ascend to Redbeard's Chambers. Press shift-D. Enter the exact line below ...

sdf 100 0 5

and press Return. Then go downstairs. Miranda should be there.

Don't get me wrong. It is programmable. It's just trickier and weirder. For example, suppose you approach a door in Avernum. The way its grid works, you can only approach a door head on so it's easier for the game to figure out when you're about to bonk into a door. But in Avadon you can approach a door so that you're half touching it and half not, which is a trickier thing to program.

It's a bigger time investment, and, for the vast majority of movement, the mouse is better (anything not really close). And, remember, one of the platforms I'm porting the game to doesn't have a keyboard at all. So I made the call and spent my development time on other things.

- Jeff Vogel

There is indeed a bug here. Thanks for calling it to my attention. This is what I am going to put on the support page tomorrow:

Jhereth Deeps Corridor Stays Blocked With Water

There is a corridor in the Jhereth Deeps blocked with water. You can turn a wheel to unblock it. However, if you leave the region and return, the passage will be blocked again.

This problem will be fixed in v1.0.1. In the meantime, there is a workaround. Download this file:

ftp://www.spiderwebsoftware.com/mac/z7jhareth.txt.zip

Uncompress it and copy it into Avadon Files/Scripts in the Avadon folder. Then leave the Jhereth Deeps and return. The passage should be unblocked.

- Jeff Vogel

June, is there any chance you could send me a saved game?

You can also send a saved game to support@spiderwebsoftware.com and I can take a look. Save the game to the upper left slot, go to the saved game folder (in Documents/Spiderweb Software), compress the folder Save0, and send that to us.

- Jeff Vogel

I looked at your saved game. You killed all the wretches, but you need to report back to Watcher Harissa. She's standing next to Ilhan.

- Jeff Vogel

OK, I looked at the code, and it seems to be correct. When you try to turn that wheel, tell me exactly what happens or what message the game gives you.

You can also send a saved game where you are standing at the blockage to support@spiderwebsoftware.com and I can take a look. Save the game to the upper left slot, go to the saved game folder (in Documents/Spiderweb Software), compress the folder Save0, and send that to us.

- Jeff Vogel

PS One final thing to check. Maybe a script is broken. Press 't' to bring up the text console. Leave the area, return, and walk to the water. Watch the text area for anything that looks like an error message, and, if one appears, tell me exactly what it is.