Extreme Newbie here. Yukiko was kind enough answer some of my many, many questions, and point me in the direction of the Development Discussion board. I am in the very early stages of development, namely trying to decide if my plans for a shard are feasible, and, if so, whether POL or RunUO are better suited to my purpose. This is a bit of a hobby and a labor of love, though it would also be interesting if it attracted a few Ultima loving RPers as well.
My notion is for an enforced but not hardcore role-playing shard, probably with a Trammel rules set, and with a lore heavily steeped in the old single player series, namely elements of 2-5, and beginning directly after the events of Ultima 5. I also want to throw in some elements of my own design, and to use only the original map of Britannia. I want it to be open and fairly sandy, but to also impose a few of restrictions.
I am using my (somewhat faded) knowledge and (undiminished) love of the series, my design doc (on a wiki), and the Codex of Editable Wisdom Wiki as my Bible. For the record, I am an old school player (1997-98, little bit in 99) and do not care for the addition of Trammel, but I think consensual, and perhaps faction-based PvP will work better for the sort of RP I am looking for (and require less refereeing). I expect a very small player base (actually, I expect no player base, but am hoping for more). I am looking for an earlier version of UO, somewhere around UO:R. Yukiko has suggest 0.95 as a possible starting point.
I would like to list a few of my ideas and desires for the shard here to see if they are possible, if scripts perhaps exist and have been implemented on another shard, if those scripts are available for use, and if anyone has any general comments or advice. Some of these Yukiko has already touched on, but I thought I would list everything here.
Newbie with a few questions...
Re: Newbie with a few questions...
1. Gypsy Fortune Teller
Implementing a version of the old Gypsy tarot card spread as part of character creation. Ideally this would feature during the character creation process itself as a series of stills with choices, more in keeping with the single player games, though I suspect it more likely that it will have to occur on a part of the map, by accessing an actual NPC. I believe RunUo has a script or two based on this idea. I want this system to give each player a starting virtue (see below), and to determine the character's starting town based on that virtue.
2. Starting Virtue.
I want to give each player a starting virtue, based upon the results of the reading. This will never change, and will always be that character's guiding virtue. In terms of gameplay, I would like each virtue to govern certain skills associated with the eight original professions of the single player games (Fighter, Paladin, Ranger, Bard, Mage, Druid, Shepherd, Tinker), and to give the character a slight percentage to gains in these skills. I likewise want to do something more substantial with the virtues and shrines, but I am not sure what that is exactly at this point. Certain skills would not fall under any particular virtue.
3. Magery
I want to make mages a bit like they were in the Ultimas (and D&D). I want to implement cloth and padded cloth armor (a bit weaker than leather), and to implement a temporary, cumulative percentage decrease in magery for each piece of armor (other than cloth) worn(the heavier the armor, the higher the decrease). I would also like to cause magery to decrease permanently and in direct proportion to gains in weapons skills other than staves and daggers. I am not sure how to separate staves and other sorts of maces, and daggers and other types of fencing weapons, or if such a thing is even possible. I do not want to outright implement a class-based system, but rather to encourage professions more organically. I may do something similar with other skills as they relate to certain professions (bards experiencing negative effects from wearing certain heavy armors, namely plate, for example).
4. Mounts and Travel
I want to limit mounts to only horses, and to disable Recall and Gate spells, but to leave in the original eight moongates. Is it possible to have them only appear at night, and to perhaps function according to the phases of the moons?
5. Map Changes
Yukiko has been kind enough to tell me about map editors. I do not want to greatly alter the existing map, only to add and change a few things to fit the particular lore I wish to implement. I want to edit Magincia and turn it into a humble town based on herding and agriculture, as it became after its fall and subsequent redemption. I want to alter Occlo and Nu'jelm, and maybe a few other islands, turning them into areas featured in the single player games (mixing a bit of 2-5, perhaps even a little of 1), and to also add in the old lighthouses.
Regarding art in general, are there any repositories of free artwork available for POL?
6. Town Governments and the Guild System
Much of my inspiration for this shard stems from a desire to make things more local. I would like to implement player citizenship and governments in the eight major towns (and maybe the others as well, depending), and to disable the creation of player guilds. In their place I want to establish guilds based on some of the organizations within the games (the Rangers of Skara Brae, the Paladins of Trinsic, the Library of Scars from Jhelom, The Thieve's Guild, The Brotherhood of the Rose, etc.), and allow players to join them and to have them function as actual guilds, run by the players.
7. Dynamic NPCs
I would like to make NPCs a bit more dynamic, primarily in the number and length of their expressions, making them a bit more conversational, or at least more interesting. Are there any scripts/programs available for editing individual NPCs (appearance, location, names, expressions, etc.)? I would like to include certain NPCS based on the lore.
8. Druids and Paladins
I know Chivalry exists, as well as Spellweaving, both of which would work for Paladins and Druids, respectively. I assume with an older build that these would not be included. If I were to use a newer version of the software, and edit it to fit my vision, I worry about endlessly tweaking balancing issues. Does anyone know if there are other magic systems available for these two professions? I would like to spice up the Paladin a bit, but not to make it overpowered, and not a more viable option than playing a Fighter, or any other profession.
9. Starter Areas, New Player Status.
I want to disable all of these features, or simply not to include them. I hoping to return it to the old system, whereby you started with a very little amount of gold, a couple professions specific items, and it was a hard climb up the skills ladder.
I have other questions, but will start here. Thanks in advance for any comments or advice.
Implementing a version of the old Gypsy tarot card spread as part of character creation. Ideally this would feature during the character creation process itself as a series of stills with choices, more in keeping with the single player games, though I suspect it more likely that it will have to occur on a part of the map, by accessing an actual NPC. I believe RunUo has a script or two based on this idea. I want this system to give each player a starting virtue (see below), and to determine the character's starting town based on that virtue.
2. Starting Virtue.
I want to give each player a starting virtue, based upon the results of the reading. This will never change, and will always be that character's guiding virtue. In terms of gameplay, I would like each virtue to govern certain skills associated with the eight original professions of the single player games (Fighter, Paladin, Ranger, Bard, Mage, Druid, Shepherd, Tinker), and to give the character a slight percentage to gains in these skills. I likewise want to do something more substantial with the virtues and shrines, but I am not sure what that is exactly at this point. Certain skills would not fall under any particular virtue.
3. Magery
I want to make mages a bit like they were in the Ultimas (and D&D). I want to implement cloth and padded cloth armor (a bit weaker than leather), and to implement a temporary, cumulative percentage decrease in magery for each piece of armor (other than cloth) worn(the heavier the armor, the higher the decrease). I would also like to cause magery to decrease permanently and in direct proportion to gains in weapons skills other than staves and daggers. I am not sure how to separate staves and other sorts of maces, and daggers and other types of fencing weapons, or if such a thing is even possible. I do not want to outright implement a class-based system, but rather to encourage professions more organically. I may do something similar with other skills as they relate to certain professions (bards experiencing negative effects from wearing certain heavy armors, namely plate, for example).
4. Mounts and Travel
I want to limit mounts to only horses, and to disable Recall and Gate spells, but to leave in the original eight moongates. Is it possible to have them only appear at night, and to perhaps function according to the phases of the moons?
5. Map Changes
Yukiko has been kind enough to tell me about map editors. I do not want to greatly alter the existing map, only to add and change a few things to fit the particular lore I wish to implement. I want to edit Magincia and turn it into a humble town based on herding and agriculture, as it became after its fall and subsequent redemption. I want to alter Occlo and Nu'jelm, and maybe a few other islands, turning them into areas featured in the single player games (mixing a bit of 2-5, perhaps even a little of 1), and to also add in the old lighthouses.
Regarding art in general, are there any repositories of free artwork available for POL?
6. Town Governments and the Guild System
Much of my inspiration for this shard stems from a desire to make things more local. I would like to implement player citizenship and governments in the eight major towns (and maybe the others as well, depending), and to disable the creation of player guilds. In their place I want to establish guilds based on some of the organizations within the games (the Rangers of Skara Brae, the Paladins of Trinsic, the Library of Scars from Jhelom, The Thieve's Guild, The Brotherhood of the Rose, etc.), and allow players to join them and to have them function as actual guilds, run by the players.
7. Dynamic NPCs
I would like to make NPCs a bit more dynamic, primarily in the number and length of their expressions, making them a bit more conversational, or at least more interesting. Are there any scripts/programs available for editing individual NPCs (appearance, location, names, expressions, etc.)? I would like to include certain NPCS based on the lore.
8. Druids and Paladins
I know Chivalry exists, as well as Spellweaving, both of which would work for Paladins and Druids, respectively. I assume with an older build that these would not be included. If I were to use a newer version of the software, and edit it to fit my vision, I worry about endlessly tweaking balancing issues. Does anyone know if there are other magic systems available for these two professions? I would like to spice up the Paladin a bit, but not to make it overpowered, and not a more viable option than playing a Fighter, or any other profession.
9. Starter Areas, New Player Status.
I want to disable all of these features, or simply not to include them. I hoping to return it to the old system, whereby you started with a very little amount of gold, a couple professions specific items, and it was a hard climb up the skills ladder.
I have other questions, but will start here. Thanks in advance for any comments or advice.
Re: Newbie with a few questions...
I'm going to be lazy and rather than quoting you I will just use the numbers you have for each of your questions.
1. There are some shards where the new character approaches different NPCs and chooses their various skills from a gump that the NPC governing that class opens. You aren't using a class system ofcourse. When you mention "stills" do you mean pictures? If so just remember that any graphic displayed in the game must be entered in the art files. In the case of pictures the gumpart file would be where that would be stored. For example the login screen graphic is actually a gump picture. Any special traits (virtues) that a character is given are easily attached to the character using custom properties (CProps). A CProp is like a variable that can be read or written to and when they are attached to an object they remain with that object until they are deleted by a script. I use the term object rather than character because CProps can also be attached to items. Both characters and items are objects.
2. It is an easy matter to read the CProp holding the players virtue and using that information your skill system can make the necessary tweaks to the gains you desire.
3. Again, you can have a CProp added to the various armour containing the percent penalty that will be applied to a mage and when they equip that armour you would read that value and then add it to a "MagicPenalty" CProp on the character. Now when that character casts a spell you read the cumulative MagicPenalty value from that CProp and apply it accordingly to the spell power or chance of successful cast. However you want to do it. Naturally you will want to adjust the MagicPenalty back down as the player removes the "offending" armour. You'd just read the armour's penalty CProp at the time of unequipping it. There are special scripts that get called when an item is equipped or unequipped where all this "scripting magic" can be handled.
As for separating staves from all other mace weapons, I did that by changing one of the Samurai Empire skills, I think it was ninjitsu, to "Polearms".
4. Eliminating mounts is easy. You just don't spawn the ones you want to eliminate. I already talked about handling the spells. Do you know the pattern for the moongates as it originally operated? You can make the gates open any way you like at any time you like. It's all scripted so it's flexible.
Basically you should be able to do what you want to do. There might be some restrictions due to limitations in the client or in POL itself but POL is pretty versatile so you can get pretty close to where you want to be once you start scripting.
1. There are some shards where the new character approaches different NPCs and chooses their various skills from a gump that the NPC governing that class opens. You aren't using a class system ofcourse. When you mention "stills" do you mean pictures? If so just remember that any graphic displayed in the game must be entered in the art files. In the case of pictures the gumpart file would be where that would be stored. For example the login screen graphic is actually a gump picture. Any special traits (virtues) that a character is given are easily attached to the character using custom properties (CProps). A CProp is like a variable that can be read or written to and when they are attached to an object they remain with that object until they are deleted by a script. I use the term object rather than character because CProps can also be attached to items. Both characters and items are objects.
2. It is an easy matter to read the CProp holding the players virtue and using that information your skill system can make the necessary tweaks to the gains you desire.
3. Again, you can have a CProp added to the various armour containing the percent penalty that will be applied to a mage and when they equip that armour you would read that value and then add it to a "MagicPenalty" CProp on the character. Now when that character casts a spell you read the cumulative MagicPenalty value from that CProp and apply it accordingly to the spell power or chance of successful cast. However you want to do it. Naturally you will want to adjust the MagicPenalty back down as the player removes the "offending" armour. You'd just read the armour's penalty CProp at the time of unequipping it. There are special scripts that get called when an item is equipped or unequipped where all this "scripting magic" can be handled.
As for separating staves from all other mace weapons, I did that by changing one of the Samurai Empire skills, I think it was ninjitsu, to "Polearms".
4. Eliminating mounts is easy. You just don't spawn the ones you want to eliminate. I already talked about handling the spells. Do you know the pattern for the moongates as it originally operated? You can make the gates open any way you like at any time you like. It's all scripted so it's flexible.
Basically you should be able to do what you want to do. There might be some restrictions due to limitations in the client or in POL itself but POL is pretty versatile so you can get pretty close to where you want to be once you start scripting.
Re: Newbie with a few questions...
It is good to know that the gypsy feature and the virtue feature are doable. These are two of the primary features I wished to implement. Yes, as far as "stills" go, I was referring to including a series of pictures, perhaps after character creation, directly before the town selection gump, the "gypsy" sequence would begin. If you are unfamiliar with the original series, the card reading is basically a series of questions with two possible answers for each, each based on a particular virtue. Each answer is represented by a corresponding card representing one of the eight virtues. The system gradually narrows down the characters main virtue and would indicate the character's starting class.
As I said, ideally, it would be nice to use the above system, and to have the card system function as a sort of mini-game, with the card gumps and the questions perhaps displayed over that of the background gypsy gump (preferably a fairly cool piece of opensource or commissioned artwork).
I have played on shards using a system of class selection similar to what you describe, with NPCs or through clicking certain items, such a book, to customize the character after initial character creation. I suspect that this would be the easiest manner for accomplishing what I want. Implementing the mini-game card routine will likely take some work and research, though I know of someone who has worked it out and may try to contact him. Granted his used RunUo, but he had fully broken down exactly how the system worked in the single player games.
Overall, everything sounds so much simpler to implement than I had expected. Can you recommend a good tutorial or starting place for learning eScript?
Thanks for this information. It sound terribly customizable and with a much gentler learning curve than RunUO. It has definitely generated more thought (specifically with regards to removing/altering things in a newer version, rather than attempting to add them to a older version). How about removing/disabling skills that are incompatible?
As far as the moongates go, I believe in the original UO, the towns were on a cycle, each time you entered the moongate, it brought you to the next town on the cycle. I am not quite certain the exact technical aspects of how it all worked in all its intricacy, to be honest. I have noticed that on a lot of free shards, and maybe on OSI itself now, you are presented with a menu system, which I do not like.
As far as the original games, they operated on a time schedule with all moongatess opening at a certain time in the evening, and all closing early in the morning. The destination was determined by which moon was highest in the sky, and so entering a moongate at any time during this time frame (a couple of in game hours for each) would send you to that destination only.
While I like this system, and the planning that would be required of players, upon further reflection, I think that this system would likely not really be feasible, and would breed more frustration than anything, largely based on play times. Thus, I think a simple system more in line with the original OSI version would be best (without a menu system), though it would still be a nice touch if they only opened at dusk and closed at dawn.
Thanks again for the thorough answers. You are making this a lot less nebulous than it was at first, esp. after looking into RunUo, and I am starting to think that this might be doable, even with my limited knowledge of...well...everything.
As I said, ideally, it would be nice to use the above system, and to have the card system function as a sort of mini-game, with the card gumps and the questions perhaps displayed over that of the background gypsy gump (preferably a fairly cool piece of opensource or commissioned artwork).
I have played on shards using a system of class selection similar to what you describe, with NPCs or through clicking certain items, such a book, to customize the character after initial character creation. I suspect that this would be the easiest manner for accomplishing what I want. Implementing the mini-game card routine will likely take some work and research, though I know of someone who has worked it out and may try to contact him. Granted his used RunUo, but he had fully broken down exactly how the system worked in the single player games.
Overall, everything sounds so much simpler to implement than I had expected. Can you recommend a good tutorial or starting place for learning eScript?
This is good news indeed. The same could as easily be done for fencing and daggers, I suppose. I had read that it is difficult, perhaps impossible, to add new skills to the client, and was wondering about the possibility of renaming other skills and completely overhauling them. This sounds perfect, and fairly easy. From what I have learned from your posts, tweaking Chivalry and Spellweaving (and renaming it to Druidry or Nature Magic or something) to balance them would likewise not be terribly difficult. A renamed Bushido might likewise work for a more medieval monk.As for separating staves from all other mace weapons, I did that by changing one of the Samurai Empire skills, I think it was ninjitsu, to "Polearms".
Thanks for this information. It sound terribly customizable and with a much gentler learning curve than RunUO. It has definitely generated more thought (specifically with regards to removing/altering things in a newer version, rather than attempting to add them to a older version). How about removing/disabling skills that are incompatible?
So removing certain creatures and items is as simple as not spawning them? Does this hold true for any creature or item? Could I fairly easily eliminate neon items, artifacts, champions, etc.?Eliminating mounts is easy. You just don't spawn the ones you want to eliminate. I already talked about handling the spells. Do you know the pattern for the moongates as it originally operated? You can make the gates open any way you like at any time you like. It's all scripted so it's flexible.
As far as the moongates go, I believe in the original UO, the towns were on a cycle, each time you entered the moongate, it brought you to the next town on the cycle. I am not quite certain the exact technical aspects of how it all worked in all its intricacy, to be honest. I have noticed that on a lot of free shards, and maybe on OSI itself now, you are presented with a menu system, which I do not like.
As far as the original games, they operated on a time schedule with all moongatess opening at a certain time in the evening, and all closing early in the morning. The destination was determined by which moon was highest in the sky, and so entering a moongate at any time during this time frame (a couple of in game hours for each) would send you to that destination only.
While I like this system, and the planning that would be required of players, upon further reflection, I think that this system would likely not really be feasible, and would breed more frustration than anything, largely based on play times. Thus, I think a simple system more in line with the original OSI version would be best (without a menu system), though it would still be a nice touch if they only opened at dusk and closed at dawn.
Thanks again for the thorough answers. You are making this a lot less nebulous than it was at first, esp. after looking into RunUo, and I am starting to think that this might be doable, even with my limited knowledge of...well...everything.
Re: Newbie with a few questions...
Here is the link to the POL documentation page. In each version of docs you will find Racalac's eScript guide. That documents just about every statement in eScript and shows usage examples. What I recommend for new people coming to eScript is to read through Racalac's guide then take a look at some of the text command scripts to begin with. Most of those are small so there's not a lot to take in. Than experiment by modifying some of them to do different things. There's a dozen ways you can approach learning a new programming language but for me I find it easier to start with a working program and then modify it.
You might want to look through the gumpart once you install UOFiddler because there might be artwork for the tarot card system or perhaps something you can use. I took a brief look and found eight different symbols that look like they are carved from stone. There was a heart, an ankh, a sword, a scale (as in weight scale), a shepherd's crook, etc. I assume since there are eight of them they relate somehow to the virtue system or perhaps to skills. Since you are far more familiar with the storyline and history of Ultima you would know better than I what you are looking for.
On the mount issue, you can also just remove the definitions for them from the MPCDesc.cfg file. POL uses configuration (cfg) files for many things, two of which are for defining items and NPCs. If I were going to limit mounts I would leave the cfg files alone and just not create the unwanted mounts in the world. That way if you ever decide you want new mounts all you have to do is create a spawn for them but it's your shard. I am unfamiliar with "neon", or "champion" items nor do I understand what makes an item an "artifact". I assume those are categories of special items in the official UO game. You will find that POL differs from RunUO in many ways. One of which is that POL, or rather the POL Distro (the scripts that define how the world and players interact with it.), does not nor has not attempted to follow, or copy if you prefer, the official UO servers since probably version 0.94 or earlier. Even then I don't know how closely it mimicked OSI. So you probably won't have "neons", champions" or "artifacts" to deal with.
I am still of the opinion that you would be better using an updated version of the POL 0.95 scripts considering that you want to hold true, or as close as you can, to the traditional Ultima. I will see if I can find the version I converted to run with POL 0.98.
You might want to look through the gumpart once you install UOFiddler because there might be artwork for the tarot card system or perhaps something you can use. I took a brief look and found eight different symbols that look like they are carved from stone. There was a heart, an ankh, a sword, a scale (as in weight scale), a shepherd's crook, etc. I assume since there are eight of them they relate somehow to the virtue system or perhaps to skills. Since you are far more familiar with the storyline and history of Ultima you would know better than I what you are looking for.
On the mount issue, you can also just remove the definitions for them from the MPCDesc.cfg file. POL uses configuration (cfg) files for many things, two of which are for defining items and NPCs. If I were going to limit mounts I would leave the cfg files alone and just not create the unwanted mounts in the world. That way if you ever decide you want new mounts all you have to do is create a spawn for them but it's your shard. I am unfamiliar with "neon", or "champion" items nor do I understand what makes an item an "artifact". I assume those are categories of special items in the official UO game. You will find that POL differs from RunUO in many ways. One of which is that POL, or rather the POL Distro (the scripts that define how the world and players interact with it.), does not nor has not attempted to follow, or copy if you prefer, the official UO servers since probably version 0.94 or earlier. Even then I don't know how closely it mimicked OSI. So you probably won't have "neons", champions" or "artifacts" to deal with.
I am still of the opinion that you would be better using an updated version of the POL 0.95 scripts considering that you want to hold true, or as close as you can, to the traditional Ultima. I will see if I can find the version I converted to run with POL 0.98.
Re: Newbie with a few questions...
Thanks for the link, this will help immensely. You have convinced me to use POL instead of RunUo, and I am definitely even more excited about the project. I agree that jumping in is the best way to learn. Do you think I can develop the shard (though not actually host it) on a netbook (1.6 CPU, 1 G RAM)? I travel a lot, and find the netbook to be extremely portable. Plus I do not have to worry so much about losing or damaging a more expensive latptop. If not, I can grab a cheap laptop when I am back in the States for the holidays.
I will definitely download UOFiddler and have a look at the art and other features. It seems very handy for what I have in mind. I am looking for some rather specific in-game artwork as well, that perhaps I can find on this or other programs/sites.
Regarding neon colors, they were implemented in the Age of Shadows extension for certain items, and I find them rather gaudy and unnatural. I much prefer the original more realistic, medieval look, with more muted earth tones.
I am not overly familiar with the champion and paragon system, only that they are more powerful versions of mobs, and do not really fit with my vision. Artifacts are powerful named magic items dropped by certain champions, and perhaps gained in other ways. I am not intimately familiar with all of the details, as I have never played on a private server long enough to fully explore them. I want magical items to be something of a rarity, and not terribly powerful. I think, as you say, some of this may not even exist in the POL incarnation, and, if it does, most can likely simply be eliminated by negating access to certain areas where the spawns occur. Again, as you say, I think the thing for me to do is to download it and see what the situation is.
One quick question about skills…You say you modified Ninjitsu from Samurai Empires to Polearms, something I would be interested in doing myself, actually. In fact, I would like to split a number of weapons into separate skills, something like the following separate weapons skills/classes: Swordsmanship, Axes, Polearms/Spears, Fencing (maybe combine with swords, or do away with altogether), Knives/Daggers, Mace Fighting, and Staves.
If I use 0.95, is it still possible to import/use/etc. skills from later expansions, and to modify them in a similar manner. There are a few skills available from later expansions that I would either like to use (and nerf/modify a bit), or turn into entirely different skills altogether. It would be nice to have a few place holder skills as well, to experiment with later as inspiration strikes. For that matter, I have seen a few POL shards that offer “lots of new skills.” Is it possible to create entirely new skills without resorting to modifying/sacrificing other skills?
I will definitely download UOFiddler and have a look at the art and other features. It seems very handy for what I have in mind. I am looking for some rather specific in-game artwork as well, that perhaps I can find on this or other programs/sites.
Regarding neon colors, they were implemented in the Age of Shadows extension for certain items, and I find them rather gaudy and unnatural. I much prefer the original more realistic, medieval look, with more muted earth tones.
I am not overly familiar with the champion and paragon system, only that they are more powerful versions of mobs, and do not really fit with my vision. Artifacts are powerful named magic items dropped by certain champions, and perhaps gained in other ways. I am not intimately familiar with all of the details, as I have never played on a private server long enough to fully explore them. I want magical items to be something of a rarity, and not terribly powerful. I think, as you say, some of this may not even exist in the POL incarnation, and, if it does, most can likely simply be eliminated by negating access to certain areas where the spawns occur. Again, as you say, I think the thing for me to do is to download it and see what the situation is.
One quick question about skills…You say you modified Ninjitsu from Samurai Empires to Polearms, something I would be interested in doing myself, actually. In fact, I would like to split a number of weapons into separate skills, something like the following separate weapons skills/classes: Swordsmanship, Axes, Polearms/Spears, Fencing (maybe combine with swords, or do away with altogether), Knives/Daggers, Mace Fighting, and Staves.
If I use 0.95, is it still possible to import/use/etc. skills from later expansions, and to modify them in a similar manner. There are a few skills available from later expansions that I would either like to use (and nerf/modify a bit), or turn into entirely different skills altogether. It would be nice to have a few place holder skills as well, to experiment with later as inspiration strikes. For that matter, I have seen a few POL shards that offer “lots of new skills.” Is it possible to create entirely new skills without resorting to modifying/sacrificing other skills?
Re: Newbie with a few questions...
First, you should have no trouble editing and compiling POL on a netbook. Developing a shard requires being able to run the server which you should be able to do on a netbook but since you'd also be running the client on the same machine you might experience some slow down in performance. Probably not much but expect some lag from time to time.
UOFiddler should work on your netbook but it might take a few seconds when it loads in the data files. It has to load in a lot of info and even on my desktop doesn't come up instantly.
Item colours can be controlled by scripts for the most part. There are exceptions such as the gold colour in the gilded (Fancy) dress. You can change the colour of the "cloth" but not the gold. The way that works, I've been told, is if the colour in the artwork is grey scale then it can be dyed or changed but if it is not then it is fixed. I haven't seen any items that are a gaudy colour in the art tiles except maybe the crystals. Some of those are a glowing green or blue.
I found out from my son what champions and artifacts are. All that stuff has to be scripted. So you won't have to worry about them. That's not to say that there are no very powerful hostile NPCs in the basic scripts but again you can control their presence in the world by simply not spawning them. You could, theoretically, have a world without any NPCs at all if you wanted to by simply not creating the spawns. The spawn types, placement, frequency and number of creatures to be spawned are at your disposal.
I don't know if you can add more skills than those already present in the client. The last time I looked into it you couldn't easily do it. I believe some people may have "hacked" the client to make it possible but that is beyond my ability. Perhaps the newer client versions have made this easier or possible. At any rate you can take existing skills and change their names as I did with ninjitsu and bushido. You can also change a weapon's attribute (skill) to whatever skill you want. For example, if you wanted to do something totally weird you could change a viking sword's attribute to blacksmithing. So that every time you fought with a viking sword you would gain in blacksmithing and as you increased your blacksmithing skill, whether by use of the "weird" viking sword or by actually blacksmithing items at a forge, your damage effect with a viking sword would increase. I don't mean to confuse you here by taking this strange foray into weirdness. I only gave that example to point out how truly flexible POL is. Naturally you wouldn't create a sword that builds blacksmithy in a normal game but I think it proves my point.
One thing I did on my shard was to change the attribute (skill) associated with axes from swordsmanship to macing. My logic in this is that axes having a large heavy iron "thing" at the end of a stick or pole are more similar to a mace than they are to a sword. Granted the "thing" at the end of the stick has a sharp edge but the skill needed to swing an axe is not dissimilar to that needed to swing a mace. Plus, who could argue that sword play is a far more elegant skill than swinging an axe. I don't mean to imply that there is no skill needed to fight properly with an axe; only that swords and axes are very different weapons.
When talking about which version of POL you should use remember that POL is a two part system. You have the core and you have the scripts. Think of the core as the computer and the scripts as the programs that run in that computer. When I speak of the POL 0.95 Distro I am talking about the scripts. The "computer" part of POL, the core, has been upgraded over the years. For a while the scripts would run just fine from core version to core version but when POL 0.96 was released the core was changed in such a way that the old scripts wouldn't compile and run on the new core. What had to be done was either rewrite the Distro entirely or go through the older Distro and make the changes necessary to get the old Distro to run on the newer core.
Think of it this way. You may know that some older programs will no longer run under Windows because Microsoft has made some changes to Windows that no longer support older 16 bit code. Those older programs could be updated to run in a 32 or 64 bit Windows environment and in fact some of them have but unless they are updated they can no longer be used. In a way that is the situation with POL.
What I chose to do was upgrade the POL 0.95 Distro to work with the POL 0.98 core. I did this because the newer core allowed access to more than one map, a more flexible magic system, fixed problems with characters getting stuck in certain locations on the map and many other things. Also I was familiar with the organization of the older Distro and how the different scripts interacted with each other. I had been working with it for something like 6 years when POL 0.96 was finally released. One reason I suggested you use the 0.95 Distro was because it is a bare bones working shard. There are no frills, no class system or anything you might not want, from what I can tell anyway. All the skills work. The basic magic system works. There are no religions, necromancy, druid magic or faction system. I know you were thinking about druids being in your world but you could script them to work the way you want them to and not have to worry about figuring out how to change someone's system to suit your needs.
I think I have a copy of the upgraded 0.95 Distro scripts before I added my modifications. If not I will see about creating a set that are as basic as I can make them. They might have some changes from the original but should be minor ones.
UOFiddler should work on your netbook but it might take a few seconds when it loads in the data files. It has to load in a lot of info and even on my desktop doesn't come up instantly.
Item colours can be controlled by scripts for the most part. There are exceptions such as the gold colour in the gilded (Fancy) dress. You can change the colour of the "cloth" but not the gold. The way that works, I've been told, is if the colour in the artwork is grey scale then it can be dyed or changed but if it is not then it is fixed. I haven't seen any items that are a gaudy colour in the art tiles except maybe the crystals. Some of those are a glowing green or blue.
I found out from my son what champions and artifacts are. All that stuff has to be scripted. So you won't have to worry about them. That's not to say that there are no very powerful hostile NPCs in the basic scripts but again you can control their presence in the world by simply not spawning them. You could, theoretically, have a world without any NPCs at all if you wanted to by simply not creating the spawns. The spawn types, placement, frequency and number of creatures to be spawned are at your disposal.
I don't know if you can add more skills than those already present in the client. The last time I looked into it you couldn't easily do it. I believe some people may have "hacked" the client to make it possible but that is beyond my ability. Perhaps the newer client versions have made this easier or possible. At any rate you can take existing skills and change their names as I did with ninjitsu and bushido. You can also change a weapon's attribute (skill) to whatever skill you want. For example, if you wanted to do something totally weird you could change a viking sword's attribute to blacksmithing. So that every time you fought with a viking sword you would gain in blacksmithing and as you increased your blacksmithing skill, whether by use of the "weird" viking sword or by actually blacksmithing items at a forge, your damage effect with a viking sword would increase. I don't mean to confuse you here by taking this strange foray into weirdness. I only gave that example to point out how truly flexible POL is. Naturally you wouldn't create a sword that builds blacksmithy in a normal game but I think it proves my point.
One thing I did on my shard was to change the attribute (skill) associated with axes from swordsmanship to macing. My logic in this is that axes having a large heavy iron "thing" at the end of a stick or pole are more similar to a mace than they are to a sword. Granted the "thing" at the end of the stick has a sharp edge but the skill needed to swing an axe is not dissimilar to that needed to swing a mace. Plus, who could argue that sword play is a far more elegant skill than swinging an axe. I don't mean to imply that there is no skill needed to fight properly with an axe; only that swords and axes are very different weapons.
When talking about which version of POL you should use remember that POL is a two part system. You have the core and you have the scripts. Think of the core as the computer and the scripts as the programs that run in that computer. When I speak of the POL 0.95 Distro I am talking about the scripts. The "computer" part of POL, the core, has been upgraded over the years. For a while the scripts would run just fine from core version to core version but when POL 0.96 was released the core was changed in such a way that the old scripts wouldn't compile and run on the new core. What had to be done was either rewrite the Distro entirely or go through the older Distro and make the changes necessary to get the old Distro to run on the newer core.
Think of it this way. You may know that some older programs will no longer run under Windows because Microsoft has made some changes to Windows that no longer support older 16 bit code. Those older programs could be updated to run in a 32 or 64 bit Windows environment and in fact some of them have but unless they are updated they can no longer be used. In a way that is the situation with POL.
What I chose to do was upgrade the POL 0.95 Distro to work with the POL 0.98 core. I did this because the newer core allowed access to more than one map, a more flexible magic system, fixed problems with characters getting stuck in certain locations on the map and many other things. Also I was familiar with the organization of the older Distro and how the different scripts interacted with each other. I had been working with it for something like 6 years when POL 0.96 was finally released. One reason I suggested you use the 0.95 Distro was because it is a bare bones working shard. There are no frills, no class system or anything you might not want, from what I can tell anyway. All the skills work. The basic magic system works. There are no religions, necromancy, druid magic or faction system. I know you were thinking about druids being in your world but you could script them to work the way you want them to and not have to worry about figuring out how to change someone's system to suit your needs.
I think I have a copy of the upgraded 0.95 Distro scripts before I added my modifications. If not I will see about creating a set that are as basic as I can make them. They might have some changes from the original but should be minor ones.
Re: Newbie with a few questions...
Thank you for clarifying all of that. Far from being weird or confusing the sword explanation has given me some considerable food for thought. POL truly is a flexible system. You are quite correct in that I want a pared down foundation from which to start, but definitely want access to all of the tools.
So just to clarify, if I use 0.95 Core and 0.95 Distro (or modified 0.98 core and 0.95 Distro as you have done), will I have access to all of the skills, including those introduced with the latest expansions? I understand that they will not all be scripted under 0.95, but just wondering if they will be accessible. You say all skills, so I assume so. Does which Core is used have anything to do with which features are accessible from which expansions, or is everything available for all cores, but dependent upon scripting on the Distro side (and how does the Client come into play)?
For example, were Ninjitsu and Bushido accessible before you upgraded to 0.98? And will such new skills as Chivalry and Spellweaving also be available if I choose a 0.95 Core and Distro (again, not necessarily pre-scripted, but accessible for scripting)? I am not necessarily interested in implementing all of the specific skills, mostly in the open slots and potential for use as other skills, or modified versions. Sorry to beat the subject to death, but I am not terribly technically savvy. The number of empty skill slots I have available (either from “useless” skills, or from skill that I do not find compatible) plays a major factor in how I approach my design. I suppose I will essentially have a sort of class system, one that is not forced upon the players, but rather is controlled by the choices they make by way of skills, with increase in some skills causing others to decrease, or by making certain items interfere with, or perhaps even enhance certain skills.
I have toyed with the notion of adding extra maps a bit at some point, perhaps an expansive underworld area “beneath“ the Britannian continent, so it might be worth it to look into doing what you have done with 0.98. The other features of 0.98 sound equally attractive. How is the magic system more flexible? One of my thoughts regarding the druid magic system was to take another skill, perhaps Necromancy, rename it, and change the names, characteristics, reagents, etc. of the various spells. Or perhaps to take a different skill and duplicate Magery, changing the name, spells, etc. I had also thought to perhaps do something similar with a bard "song" system.
As for powerful NPCs and creatures, I very much want to include them, since it will predominantly (and maybe wholly) be a PvM server, but do not want to resort to a sort of “boss” system. I had rather simply work with the original creatures, and perhaps add a greater range to their randomly generated stats, with some individuals being weaker (or normal strength) and some stronger. I want a world where an individual player (and perhaps even a group) will be reluctant to face a dragon (or similarly powerful creature), regardless of what and how high her skills may be. I want certain challenges, and to encourage team play for certain mobs. Rather than create a system that requires more and more difficult opponents, I had rather nerf the character skills a bit, and cause players to diversify by limiting the skill point spread to 700 and separating certain skills (thus encouraging teamwork and the formation of parties). I want to try to make the shard organically less gamist, and more appealing to the explorer/social/RP-minded players.
So just to clarify, if I use 0.95 Core and 0.95 Distro (or modified 0.98 core and 0.95 Distro as you have done), will I have access to all of the skills, including those introduced with the latest expansions? I understand that they will not all be scripted under 0.95, but just wondering if they will be accessible. You say all skills, so I assume so. Does which Core is used have anything to do with which features are accessible from which expansions, or is everything available for all cores, but dependent upon scripting on the Distro side (and how does the Client come into play)?
For example, were Ninjitsu and Bushido accessible before you upgraded to 0.98? And will such new skills as Chivalry and Spellweaving also be available if I choose a 0.95 Core and Distro (again, not necessarily pre-scripted, but accessible for scripting)? I am not necessarily interested in implementing all of the specific skills, mostly in the open slots and potential for use as other skills, or modified versions. Sorry to beat the subject to death, but I am not terribly technically savvy. The number of empty skill slots I have available (either from “useless” skills, or from skill that I do not find compatible) plays a major factor in how I approach my design. I suppose I will essentially have a sort of class system, one that is not forced upon the players, but rather is controlled by the choices they make by way of skills, with increase in some skills causing others to decrease, or by making certain items interfere with, or perhaps even enhance certain skills.
I have toyed with the notion of adding extra maps a bit at some point, perhaps an expansive underworld area “beneath“ the Britannian continent, so it might be worth it to look into doing what you have done with 0.98. The other features of 0.98 sound equally attractive. How is the magic system more flexible? One of my thoughts regarding the druid magic system was to take another skill, perhaps Necromancy, rename it, and change the names, characteristics, reagents, etc. of the various spells. Or perhaps to take a different skill and duplicate Magery, changing the name, spells, etc. I had also thought to perhaps do something similar with a bard "song" system.
As for powerful NPCs and creatures, I very much want to include them, since it will predominantly (and maybe wholly) be a PvM server, but do not want to resort to a sort of “boss” system. I had rather simply work with the original creatures, and perhaps add a greater range to their randomly generated stats, with some individuals being weaker (or normal strength) and some stronger. I want a world where an individual player (and perhaps even a group) will be reluctant to face a dragon (or similarly powerful creature), regardless of what and how high her skills may be. I want certain challenges, and to encourage team play for certain mobs. Rather than create a system that requires more and more difficult opponents, I had rather nerf the character skills a bit, and cause players to diversify by limiting the skill point spread to 700 and separating certain skills (thus encouraging teamwork and the formation of parties). I want to try to make the shard organically less gamist, and more appealing to the explorer/social/RP-minded players.
Re: Newbie with a few questions...
You only have access to the newer skills, ie. Chivalry, Focus, Bushido etc., if you are running POL core 0.96 or later. However, I am pretty sure not all skills (now called "Attributes") are scripted even in the current Distro but you have access to the Attributes to use those which are scripted, script those that are not, change the names of attributes you want to re-purpose for something else as I did with Bushido for Polearms or to leave unused for later if you wish. If you run POL 0.95 core you won't have access to the newer skills. I recommend that you try to use the latest stable release of POL core (0.98) if for no other reason than it resolves a lot of problems the old core had with the map. There used to be "holes" where players would get stuck and there were issues with ladders not working properly.So just to clarify, if I use 0.95 Core and 0.95 Distro (or modified 0.98 core and 0.95 Distro as you have done), will I have access to all of the skills, including those introduced with the latest expansions? I understand that they will not all be scripted under 0.95, but just wondering if they will be accessible.
You saw the example I posted of the Recall spell entry in spells.cfg? The newer system uses the spells.cfg file to determine much of what it needs to cast a spell. In the old system a lot of this was coded in the scripts which made it harder to make changes easily. Now, for example, if you want to change the strength of one or more spells you simply access the one file.How is the magic system more flexible?
Hostile NPCs can be tweaked in many ways to make them tougher or even easier if you have a need to. You can change their AI to modify their behaviour. For example you might want to give a NPC the tendency to "cluster" or group together when one is attacked. It could call out to others of it's kind that are nearby to rally to its aid. There are a lot of ways to nudge players to cooperate in combat.