The Almighty Doer of Stuff

Many scenarios are balanced with infinite Bless stacking in mind. Capping acid stacking on PCs would be useful though. No scenarios AFAIK utllize dissolving the party. If they want to do that they just use Kill Party nodes. I think webs do slow NPCs, but not Insect type NPCs. Also, check this out: http://truesite.openboe.com/SWArchive/Geocities/blyceum/DForum/index.html It has a few articles on broken stuff in BoE. EDIT: Also, for OpenBoE and BladesOfExile.Com, Celtic Minstrel and I respectively try to emphasize legacy scenario compatibility. For any changes in OpenBoE that affect how legacy scenarios play, CM includes a legacy switch that turns off the changes in legacy scenarios. For my project, I'm making only changes that do not alter how legacy scenario designers expected their scenarios to play; as in, in BladesOfExile.com, gameplay is not exactly the same, but no existing legacy scenario features hinge on the original behavior (based on either my own experience or what other players and designers have said/conspicuously not said, in my memory. Motardo is taking notes on any changes he makes, so the changes can be very easily reversed if I'm wrong.) EDIT 2: Come to think of it, I'm not sure about the acid. Someone could very well have used it as part of a battle's strategy. Until shown otherwise, I won't touch that in BladesOfExile.Com.

Altering missile range is impossible in legacy BoE but if Celtic Minstrel hasn't implemented it in OpenBoE, I bet he will. Also, some bows are made for close quarters. Small recurve bows were used by some peoples, such as the Mongols, to quickly send an arrow straight through a foe and out the other side. The Mongols in particular would do so on horseback.

Yes. Clearly, an Ermarian stone is equal to the weight of a boulder that an average hill giant can throw 15 feet.

Weight is listed in "stone" in Exile, not pounds. Considering that, a single arrow weighs 14 pounds. On the other hand, you can carry up to 250 stone, or 3500 pounds. I don't think the weights are supposed to be literal. But the reason I said it'd be better to make most missiles weightless is because a stack of 100 arrows weighing 100 stone can make using bows too loot-carrying-prohibitive to make missile weapons worth the investment.

The General Discussion forum is described in the forum list as being for general discussion of Spiderweb Software and their games. So I suppose a general discussion about multiple series, connected via remakes and sequels or otherwise, would go there, right?

Corylea, what you're describing is a literary device known as the "unreliable narrator" and it's one of my favorites. It's differentiated from the "omniscient narrator" who knows everything about the situation and describes it accurately, or at least accurate to what the author wants to instill in the audience. With the unreliable narrator, either the story's narrator, or a character narrating their own perspective within the story, has a flaw in their telling, which should give the audience pause as to whether to rely on them. They may be crazy, they may be a liar, they may be brainwashed, or they may even just be misinformed. I love this story mechanism because it's true to life. Believing everything people tell you - gullibility - will lead a person to disaster.

Servant Minds speak.

I think missiles could be made dramatically more interesting even with legacy BoE. It'd take some dramatic rebalancing of statistics, as well as balancing of distribution within the scenarios. Examples: Make most missiles weightless. Make missiles and missile launchers with Item Abilities and/or non-Exile-standard stats common. Use them creatively. Provide special node-based Archery, Thrown Missiles, and Dexterity training outside regular "training" dialogue nodes. Make missile launchers generally pricy, but missiles cheap. Include "target button" mobs that do things if shot with a missile. They're out of reach of melee, immune to poison, magic, fire, and cold, and in antimagic clouds to prevent use of Wound.

Missile skills could be better as a secondary skill for a warrior than a specialty on its own; a warrior would have high dexterity anyway. I could also see it being given to a special "utility" PC, if you want to play that way. It might not be an ideal party combat-wise, but it might be workable. It's also notable that as a game with a specialty in customizability and role-playing your PCs the way you enjoy, most scenarios can accomodate non-combat-ideal parties if it just makes you happy to have an archer or flinger. And although joining the Anama in BoE isn't a thing, a non-magic party could make use of missile weapons. EDIT: Now I'm considering clever ways to make missile weapons more useful and appealing. Thanks for getting me thinking!

I think one of the biggest improvements one could make to one's own scenario to make missiles better, is to make them weightless, or maybe just lighter in the case of javelins - and make the javelins more powerful at the same time. Missiles are just too heavy to be useful, unless you get a sling or a missile with the Returning ability. I still hope to make an "epic" scenario at some point. It's always been a dream of mine, and I hope I haven't completely missed the boat forever on actually getting players. A scenario that brings a party from beginner level to very high level would be ideal for overall rebalancing of items.

I made good progress, but I'm not done yet and I'm tired. Tomorrow I'll probably finish it. I hope. EDIT: Ha ha ha, just kidding. I got hungry and went to the Blades of Exile Delay-catessen. I don't know why I ever give time estimates, I don't even percieve the passage of time at all. It'll be done soonish. Yesterday instead of hex-editing, I spent hours improving the documentation of my text changes, thinking it would take a few minutes. Nope.

It's Ess's opinion. I can just dismiss what I don't think is valid, no big deal. At least they were friendly about it.

Part of the goal of this project is to make BoE as simple to use as possible. I don't want to put the version number in the filename. I think a change to the Main Menu along with a note in _Read_Me.TXT that says "Unless this package was altered irresponsibly, this copy is version BladesOfExile.Com.yyyymmdd.x. See the ZIP filename and Main Menus of each application." should be overkill. I also have a policy for readmes that they must be brief and just the essential information, so it will be seen there too. EDIT: I think even better, just below _Read_Me.TXT in the file list could be _Version_BladesOfExile.Com.yyyymmdd.x.TXT, containing that note. That way it'll be super visible. I can't control when other people screw with the files. For all I know they could insert a Trojan Horse and credit it to me or even Jeff Vogel. Buyer Beware at some point, especially when you Buy it for nothing.

No, Ess is right, Salmon. GNU GPL and CC-BY-SA both require clear attribution, both so work is acknowledged and to ensure people aren't credited with changes they don't approve of. I don't need to rename the resource files like HELPPICS.BMP. The filenames BladesOfExile.Com.Game.EXE, BladesOfExile.Com.CharacterEditor.EXE, and BladesOfExile.Com.ScenarioEditor.EXE don't affect function, and I otherwise think putting the project name and version number in the name of the ZIP, in the changelog, and on the Main Menu should be sufficient. EDIT: Although regarding Ess's Thrown Missiles example, nobody knew why Thrown Missiles sucked until we looked at the code. The worst that would happen is the player would disregard Thrown Missiles. Nothing ever relied on the stat mixup because nobody knew about it. Also, the former copyright note on the Main Menu does say it's modded, but it could be clearer, certainly. This morning I finally finished rewriting the Outdoor Commands dialog, which was keeping me stuck for a while. This is going to progress a bit better now.

There's a copyright/version note on the Main Menu, which I've been editing. I don't think it's 100% clear enough at present but it will be. Also I made an attempt already but the ZIP file will be named more clearly. If it's not obvious though, the version number is yyyymmdd. I'll make the next ZIP file called BladesOfExile.Com.v(whatever the date is).ZIP Do I need to label the EXE itself with the version number, or is labeling the ZIP and altering the in-program Main Menu note and changelog sufficient? I don't want people to have to rename their menu shortcuts every time they update the program.

It's not boring and tedious, and I'm keeping a detailed changelog, including every piece of text I'm changing. Thank you for the clear instructions regardless, Ess-Eschas. Tomorrow is Saturday and I have no other plans or obligations, so I plan to finish updating the help texts and such today and get all the required documentation going by the end of the day, I hope. I don't want to label it "ADoS". Do you think BladesOfExile.Com.ZIP is sufficient, like I suggested in the first post? If not I'll try to come up with something else, but I don't want to call it "BladesOfExileADoS" because as I said, most of the hard work is being done by Motardo and I would welcome other people's help if it's useful too. Not that I would accept any and all input, I'm kinda "managing" it in addition to rewriting the text, but I don't want to put my own name on it. Does that make sense? None of the changes would affect legacy scenarios in a detrimental way. I'll show you the list of things I requested from Motardo, which will be documented if and when they are implemented: 1. Fix Thrown Missiles/Defense stats mixup in E1, E2, E3, and BoE. (Done) 2. Re-implement Bash/Pick keyboard shortcuts, 'b' and 'p', in BoE. (Done) 3. Disable password check in scenario editor. (Done) 4. Change keybind for cancelling any action to "Esc", not "m" to cancel Mage, "u" to cancel Use, etc. (Not done) 5. Fix Look using up all action points. (This happens in Exile 3, at least.) (Not done) 6. Fix shop glitch where custom item graphics display the graphics 5 rows up in the sheet. (Not done) 7. Fix last missile's item ability glitch, where the last missile in a stack uses the item ability of the next item in the inventory list. (Not done) 8. Increase maximum stats as far as they can go in the scenario editor, for items and monsters. (As in, Jeff imposed hard limits where a stat could otherwise potentially reach, say, 255.) (Not done) 9. Fix broken Add/Lose Sanctuary item ability. (Not done) 10. Change default window size to fit Main Menu GUI. (In-game GUI is smaller than Main Menu GUI so that'd be fine.) (Not done) 11. Make Acid Weapon item ability not also Lifesaver. (This is the only one I'm not sure of, but I don't think anyone was aware of this bug prior to 2007, to design a scenario around it.) (Not done) 12. Make Petrification Touch work. (Not done) 13. Correct the "feature" that opaquely adds days to timers on one OS but not the other (if that OS is Windows, I forget). (Not done) 14. Fix untextured vertical stripes in BoE game and editor backgrounds. (Not done) 15. Alter Bash/Pick dialog to show a lock instead of an adobe wall door, and alter its text to avoid using specifically the word "door". (Not done; I am working on the text part myself) *. Do not fix Resurrection Balm. It may break existing scenarios which do not provide it, with designers knowing it originally wasn't needed. * Motardo created a patch to disable Instant Help by default, but this is not implemented in BladesOfExile.Com (or whatever I end up calling it). I've just renamed the applications BladesOfExile.Com.EXE, BladesOfExile.Com.CharacterEditor.EXE, and BladesOfExile.Com.ScenarioEditor.EXE . I was concerned they wouldn't run properly, but they seem to. I don't think I can rename other game files without breaking the game.

Hello! I have been modifying the legacy Windows version of Blades of Exile, with much help from forum member Motardo. The application, and simple instructions to make it run natively on Windows 10, are found here: http://www.BladesOfExile.com/ That website and the applications hosted there need a good amount of work, including properly crediting contributors; this will be done when I am finished with the next release. But they run on Windows 10 without the need for virtual machines or hardware emulation. The only common issue is that your computer may become sluggish while the apps are loading, running, and quitting. Motardo has been developing and applying patches to fix bugs and make small improvements - the difficult part of the work - while I have mostly been altering text to improve usability, and a few other things. I don't want Blades of Exile to vanish into obscurity. There are open-source projects, such as http://www.OpenBoE.com/ , but development is often sluggish with those projects. 14 years of Free Open Source Software-ness without a fully-functional release available from any project. With the BladesOfExile.com project, BoE adventures can be played and designed now, in full glory. (Full disclosure: The original, legacy BoE and Exile Trilogy software run just as well with the method described on BladesOfExile.com although this project fixes bugs and provides simple use instructions while the original software does not, as I said.) (Consider "BladesOfExile.com" with the ".com" to be the name of the project, like the old office software OpenOffice.org used to do. I bought the domain name to prevent it from becoming a God Of War fansite. Mods, I would appreciate if this thread could be pinned to this subforum. Thanks.) Have fun! -ADoS

Nope, not modified. I'm still tinkering and stubbornly refusing to apply your suggested fixes on the grounds that I want to finish the changes I'm making first and ostensibly will do so quickly enough that nobody will be the wiser but in truth am taking my time and ignoring the reality of the situation. And yes, I'm just lumping a bunch of changes into one post without differentiating them, because they're connected. To clarify: 1. There is an easter egg about Valorim in Exile 3 and BoE. Press &*() and you will get a series of four small-text messages. "If Valorim..." "You want to save..." "Back up your save files..." "Burma Shave." This is unfortunate because there is an * on the NumPad, which people use to move their party. If you mispress and hit the * key above the 9 key, it just ominously says, "You want to save..." without the context. Now I half-hid a row of signs with those messages in Skylark Vale, conveniently located in Valorim, and blanked out those four lines. It still gives a blank line but it's better than an ominous message. 2. I said that because I'm also moving other silly things, in particular, the jokes in Tip Of The Day. I'm moving all the jokey messages to a new small library I plan to add to New Market City, where the player can peruse it, along with a few other books of advanced gameplay tips. Those jokes ("Do not taunt happy fun ball." etc.) will be replaced in their original locations with actual gameplay tips. 3. You can buy Resurrection Balm in New Market City. When I'm done, you won't be able to. Something else will be there instead, because due to a bug, the spells do not actually require it to revive your dead PCs. It's useless, and fixing the bug might cause problems in scenarios that don't provide Resurrection Balm, assuming it was unnecessary and that nobody would be hex editing BoE. 4. I'm making a bunch of other changes to text and images in legacy BoE, mostly to make the game easier to understand. 5. Regarding hex-editing BoE, Motardo, who came up with lovely fixes to correct the Thrown Missiles/Defense stat bug (applied currently), re-enable the Bash/Pick keyboard shortcuts (applied in the alleged next release), and turn off Instant Help by default (not going to be applied but it's there if anyone wants it for their own copy), is trying to fix a few other problems I told him about. He's already removed the password check in the Scenario Editor. He says he enjoys these things, which is both kind and convenient. 6. Milu and Motardo will be credited appropriately. As for you, Slarty, for your advice on crediting, clarity, and transparency, you may find... ...your name and mine, inside a heart on a Credits.TXT.

Yeah, I'm going to include detailed changelogs, credits, etc. in the next ZIP. I'm just kinda sluggish about improvements right now, yet stubborn enough to believe I'll get it done quickly. The biggest changes I'm planning to make to New Market City are some modifications to the party-leveling feature to make it a little simpler and more intuitive, and adding a small library with advanced tips as well as some of Jeff's jokes. I'm going to move the Tip Of The Day jokes there to make room for actual tips in the Tip Of The Day feature. I'm trying to make the game easier to understand for new players, because it has a steep learning curve otherwise. I'm altering help dialogs, Tip Of The Day, Instant Help, and the scrolling text on the Main Menu. I'm also removing the Burma Shave joke and putting it on actual signs in VoDT somewhere, because I don't like that accidentally hitting * on the NumPad while trying to move your party displays the somewhat menacing and confusing, "You want to save..." out of context. It also works because Skylark Vale is in Valorim. I exchanged some DMs with Motardo, also. He's going to try to fix a few more bugs. If he can't figure out how to take Life Saving capability off Acidic Weapons, I'll also remove Milu's Corrosive Sword. And I'll find something to do with the spot the Resurrection Balm is in, because it isn't needed for Raise Dead and Resurrect despite advertisements, and fixing that bug could potentially break legacy scenarios.

Thanks! ❤️

I'm confused. It seems there is a clash between points 1 & 2, and point 3? Could you clarify, please? Oh, you mean I can't claim a license unless it's publicly proclaimed, but if I in good faith believe I'm free to use it, I can state that in a note with the content without mentioning a particular license, with the understanding that the author may request I stop modifying/distributing it?

Should I request for Milu to state it in a post here? I'm emailing her because having looked closely at the email, it's clear the graphics are CC-BY-SA but it's not so clear about the scenario. She said we can "use" it. I'd like to go by the books as much as possible but I also don't want to be a pest. Tim Farland, Luz Piazuelo, and Andrew Hunter likewise gave us permission to use their graphics, via private communication. For Luz, it's via PM on this forum, but for Tim and Andrew, it's only through email... For Andrew Hunter, neither he nor Jeff Vogel could remember who owned the rights to the graphics but both said if it was OK with the other we could use the graphics with GNU GPL 3.0. Via email. Celtic Minstrel told me it was good enough. We've been using their content in OBoE. Blame him?

My mistake, it's CC-BY-SA. I just checked the email. Good thing I haven't tried sharing a modified version yet. But the fact remains that... ...the scenario copyright is not the same. You're not to blame. Seems simple enough. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/ I hope including the emails in a document distributed with the modified scenario is sufficient.

There are two versions of New Market City, both in that archive. I don't know what the difference is. Those are Milu's unmodified versions. Milu has released all their BoE work under GNU GPL 3.0, including scenarios and graphics, as communicated to me via email, upon my request. When I modify and include that scenario, I will include the appropriate notes. Given that it was communicated via email, is there some special protocol I should use to make it known?

The sluggishness is the only problem I notice under OTVDM. I don't know how to stop it, but hopefully it's not too bad. It's a little bit annoying but it doesn't disrupt my life much. Valley of Dying Things, A Small Rebellion, and The Za-Khazi Run, in that order, as they are listed in the Start Scenario menu. The stories are independent, but in terms of party level progression, that order should get you in the right place. There are high-level party builders out there if you want just the right level parties for any given scenario. Some are built to be paired with scenarios, although some, like GNU GPL 3.0 scenario "New Market City" by Milu, are independent. I'll be packaging a modified New Market City with an upcoming modified legacy BoE ZIP, but for now you can find it here: http://bladesofexile.com/ScenarioArchive/NewMarketCity2_0.zip EDIT: Also, when I'm done uploading my scenario archive to BladesOfExile.com, there will be notes in the archive when a given designer writes sequels or series of scenarios, so you'll know the correct order to play them in.