Kelandon

Quote: Originally written by Spidweb: The new area is up a certain remote river (visited in early games but not Avernum 4). The obstructions in it were cleared by workers sent by the king to reach new areas for Avernum's growing population. Good! This is what I was hoping for. I'm glad. Quote: Originally written by Dikiyoba: Here's something Dikiyoba is wondering. Dark Waters of A2 and Exodus both follow a river full of waterfalls downstream. How do people ever travel upstream? Exodus also has a bunch of land routes for backtracking, which you do a fair bit in the scenario (going from Nakhtha back to the first Camp by land, for instance). Presumably merchants during the height of the slith empire would have gone overland bypassed the waterfalls both ways, since going down a waterfall is fine and good for adventurers, but it's not as good for someone laden down with goods for sale and money. Still, the difficulty of passing helps to explain how the cities lost touch with each other and became independent as the empire collapsed. It's not so easy to get from Thassaka to Vasskolis that it would be inconceivable that the two cities could lose contact. I assumed in Dark Waters that people didn't travel upstream all that much. It seemed a pretty isolated and difficult passage, and I don't remember if there was any reason to believe that people had ever gone down or up it very frequently.

I'm having trouble even finding which topic this is in reply to. Anyone know?

Wow. I'm actually excited about Spidweb games again. I was mostly sticking around for BoA, but GF4 has gotten such good comments on the boards, and Nethergate 2.0 sounds like enough of a good thing, and A5 sounds so promising, that I'm genuinely looking forward to playing these games. It was getting kinda depressing in there around GF3 and A4, but I like the way things are turning now. One thing: I hope that this "new area of Avernum" will have a reasonable justification for it and will fit within the sense of the Avernum world. Here I'm thinking of ZKR and how difficult it was to make sense of the geography of the scenario in relation to what we knew of Avernum — it was just some new place that we'd never heard of before, without any explanation why we'd never heard of it or really even where it was. A2 did a really good job of opening up a new area of the caves: of course we didn't know about the route to vahnatai lands, because it was opened via a cavequake. I hope that some similarly reasonable explanation will be included in A5.

Now that I think about it more: I really hated the lack of outdoors. It might be a problem that I have with GF, too. Lack of elevation was also a problem.

No, like, Exodus, the BoA scenario. The premise of my most recent scenario is exploring a large, newly-opened area of the caves.

Yeah, and Solberg's homeland sliths idea is kinda treading on my territory, too.

For the record, this is what Jeff had to say about this a while back: Quote: Originally written by Spidweb: The way I currently picture Avernum 5 is: i. In a whole new area of the underworld. ii. On a much smaller scale, plot-wise. You have a major mission, but no monolithic power trying to blow up the world. iii. More like Avernum 2 in details of storyline. iv. Vahnatai are present. v. More talk and diplomacy. vi. More PC icons and graphical improvements, but the same underlying engine. But I won't think about things in real detail for a year, at least. - Jeff Vogel I am in favor of i, iii, and vi, and I'm probably happy about ii. I'm unsure about v, and I'm a little anxious about iv.

I assume you mean scenario creation from the ground up, as opposed to something more specific. In that case, I tend to work from large to small. Here's what I've done, although it may not be the best way for everyone: * Basic plot outline. Who are the major characters? What are their roles? What is the role of the party? What happens to the party, and what does the party do? This happens before I even touch the scenario editor. * Basic engine adjustments. One of the first things I did in Exodus was design the special spells and artifacts, which turned out to be a very good thing to do. Then I was tinkering with them (although perhaps not as much as I should have been) for the rest of the design process. Similarly, I figured out the no-magic alchemy-based system in LP pretty early on. * Outdoors. Not every detail in the outdoors need be accounted for (and most of the special encounters will not be, at this point), but some general map of the land is useful. * Friendly towns, in approximately the order that they're visited. First layout, then encounters and dialogue. * Hostile towns. Layout first. Combat and puzzles last. This has the advantage that one can focus on plot more in the beginning, which is fairly critical. I may do something totally different for my next scenario, though. Who knows.

Of course, that scenario is not by any stretch of the imagination more recent than Tomorrow.

I'm holding off on an opinion until I actually play it, which is more charitable than I usually am.

Exodus Large Scenario

When was that deadline, again? November 30th, 2006.... at what time? 11:59:59 EST? More conveniently for me, 11:59:59 PST? I'd really like to get in a little more work on Thursday night before I submit it to Spiderweb and send in a contest version.

As a side-note, didn't Isaac do only the Mac 3D Editor? I think Notus was responsible for the Windows version. That might factor into the attribution for that utility.

Oh! Oh! Idea! If you're already going to work on the code for BoA, you could do a small set of bug fixes, too. We've had bug topics ongoing for a while, and it wouldn't be too hard for us to cobble together an updated list for you. Even if only a few things here and there could be fixed, it would be much appreciated.

Oh, it just occurred to me: I could enter the HLPM in the Utility part, couldn't I?

Quote: Originally written by Spent Salmon: Either Jeff was unwilling to donate a prize or prizes to the winner(s), or he was never asked. I'm assuming the latter. We might ask him to donate a free game to the winner.

This topic gets a serious wtf. As far as I can tell, the questions at the beginning have been answered. Any further discussion of how to make fyoras (fyorae, a demented little part of my brain says) more effective can be directed to the myriad topics already existing on the subject, or to a new topic. -X-, don't call people names. Point out serious errors if necessary. Otherwise let it be. Dermonster, speaking in the third person is fairly normal on these boards, although Kelandon honestly doesn't do it except to annoy Alorael, who does in fact use the third person pronoun "he" to refer to himself in his signature, suggesting that he really does speak in the third person about himself. —Kelandon, who enjoys annoying Alorael. A lot. Especially on boards that Alo doesn't moderate, where his posts are safe from Alo-based tampering.

Salmon: I said that based on what people are actually doing , which I found surprising.

I am opposed.

If the voting is done in secret — which I think it has to be — then why even bother opening a forum? The person running the contest can just post basic results as necessary, i.e., "Echoes: Renegade and Magus of Cattalon are the two scenarios from Large Scenario moving on to the finals," or whatever. And a scenario gets entered in exactly one category? That is, a Newcomer scenario is only a Newcomer, and not a Small or Large?

Which town?

BoG may happen when Jeff is done with the GF series, but that won't be for a while yet. 'Til then, it's pretty easy to insert GF graphics into BoA; someone has basically already done all the conversions. Of course, you'd have to go pretty all-out on special spells in order to simulate GF spells, and you'd have to go pretty nuts with flags in order to simulate Leadership, but it wouldn't be all that hard.

Quote: Originally written by Nija_Halycron: kill a rouge infestation AAAHHH INFESTATION OF BAD COSMETICS Sorry. This is just one mis-spelling that comes up all-too-often on these boards, and I can't stand it.

You know, when something has no reason to be a poll, click on "New Topic" and not "New Poll."

1) Which is your favorite Avernum game? Hmm. BoA, I suppose, although honorable mention to A2 and A3 (for almost opposite reasons). 2) What is your favorite melee weapon class? Sword, which is kind of blasphemous, given my scenario designing. 3) What is your favorite missile weapon class? Slings! 4) What is your favorite spell in Avernum? Bolt of Fire! Ol' reliable. 5) What spell did you like in an earlier Avernum game, but was removed in a later sequel? Duh, Divine Warrior. 6) What is your favorite dagger/sword? God Longsword. Other than BoA, Demonslayer. 7) What is your favorite spear/pike/halberd? The Divine Slith Spear in BoA or the Black Halberd outside of it. 8) What is your favorite bow/crossbow? The Crystal Wand, which is technically a sling. Outside BoA, the Fury Crossbow. 9) What is your favorite thrown missile? Razordisks. 10) Which enemy type do you hate the most? Alien Beasts. Lame. 11) If you could stand-in for any character in the game aside from the party, which character would you choose? The guy in the university in Lorelei. 12) If you could stop or change one event in Avernum, what would it be? Starrus's birth, for sure. Such a cop-out. 13) Who is your favorite character, aside from the party? Erika, I suppose. 14) Which Black Shade did you like the most? (A4) Not sure that I had a favorite, but they were definitely the brightest part of A4. 15) If you could destroy one being in Avernum, who/what would it be? Starrus. That guy is going down. 16) Who is your favorite dragon? Sulfras. 17) What type of armor do you prefer? (Leather, chain mail, etc.) The relevant artifact from A3, which I've forgotten. A3 had the best items, really. 18) Aside from adventuring, which profession would you take in Avernum? Study at Patrick's Tower. It seems a lot safer than the Tower of Magi. 19) Do you prefer to fight enemies, or would you rather flee? Fight! 20) What reasons do you have for becoming adventurers? I didn't choose the life. The life chose me. 21) Who is your favorite mage/priest outside of your party? Patrick. Almost X, but he's too much a single gimick. 22) Who is your favorite villain? Grah-Hoth or Limoncelli. 23) If you had the chance to have a cameo of yourself inserted in any of the Avernum series, would you take it? Sure, why not. 24) Who was the most annoying non-party character in the Avernum series? Gah, Rentar. 25) What is your favorite city in Avernum or the Empire? Lorelei. 26) If you had just one character in your party, what skills would he/she be trained in? Magic and a little with weapons. 27) What's your favorite Xian Item? The skull, of course. 28) If you could travel to any of the continents on the surface, which one would you choose? Pralgad. 29) Which skill do you think is the MOST valuable in the entire Avernum series? After the obvious Mage Spells and Priest Spells, it was Gymnastics in A1 and A2. Probably Assassination in A3/BoA. Not sure I care in A4. 30) Which skill do you think is the LEAST valuable in the entire Avernum series? Pathfinder. 31) What is your favorite Avernum cuisine? Mushrooms! 32) If there was one thing you could add to the Avernum series, what would it be? Riding lizards and legitimate jobs are two good ones. I'd really like a game that combined a fun sort of plot like A2 and the great locations and characterizations of A3. I still don't think that Jeff has put together a really complete Avernum game yet. 33) What's your favorite special item? Phoenix Egg. 34) Do you have your characters wear pants? Yes. If only for the armor and, in A3, the enchanting. 35) If Avernum had lost the Avernum/Empire War, what do you think would've happened? Some deus ex machina from Jeff to make A3 essentially the same. What should've happened is another story: probably wholesale massacre of Avernites, leading to large numbers of refugee camps in scattered obscure areas of Avernum, all hiding from patrolling Empire guards. Woah. That's an amazing idea for a scenario.