SDN oblivion mod

[Chardok]

Well, I kind of got the idea of making our own oblivion mod when seeing that it would take 20 hours of tedious work. I figure if a bunch of us get to gether on this, we can make something really neat happen and address all of our own concerns at the same time(without all the tedium being laid on one person). I've never modded before, and I don't know coding. Most of my computer stuff I do by trial and error, but I'm pretty good at picking things up quickly, and there is some kind of toolkit that you can get to screw up the game if you want. I don't know about skinning and stuff, and I don't even know if we want to get that deep...(Who knows where this will lead?) But I know we've got the talent here at SDN, all we need now is some willing participants, some drive, and a leader.

In this thread, I would like to get this ball rolling.

First, we will need volunteers to even do it. If we don't have enough, then the project stops here. Once we have enough volunteers interested, then we pick a leader. The leader should be, of course, someone good at this sort of thing (Or at least familiar with it). The leader will do...leader stuff... as well as work. (ie. assigning people to complete certain portions of the project, reviewing the assignees work.)

I'm interested, but I absolutely will not lead this project. I'm too dumb.

We, I suppose, will also need testers outside the modders...or maybe we can just use the modders. Anyway, I have hope for this project, but I do have a nasty habit of not following through on my bright ideas.

I think this will be different. I love fixing things.

[Stark]

I'm up for it. I doubt many people would agree with my desire to slash and burn almost the entire item system, so I better not be in charge.

[Ace Pace]

I'm up for it, I got the hours to do wholesale item changes, I got the time to do anything except scripting(as of now, I have no idea how that works) and redesigning cells(the building blocks of the game).

One of the things you CANNOT rely on me to do is balence, I'll admit it, I don't do Balence.

However, if you want to change the weight of every single item in the game, give me weights and I'll go in.

[Stark]

I figure we can nick the scripting we like from other mods: there are plenty of levelling-reduction mods, and all we'd have to do is tweak their code a bit. I've even got largely-figured out values for armour ... although it's the Stark-likes-variety-not-boring-tiers version.

[Ace Pace]

I figure we can nick the scripting we like from other mods: there are plenty of levelling-reduction mods, and all we'd have to do is tweak their code a bit. I've even got largely-figured out values for armour ... although it's the Stark-likes-variety-not-boring-tiers version.

I'm with that kind of version, post it here, get some comments, and I'll spend tomarow doing it.

[Chardok]

I figure we can nick the scripting we like from other mods: there are plenty of levelling-reduction mods, and all we'd have to do is tweak their code a bit. I've even got largely-figured out values for armour ... although it's the Stark-likes-variety-not-boring-tiers version.

I was thinking that, too. we could swipe other mods, bend them to our will by tweaking them some, (removing features we don't want and adding to those that need adding to) and compile them into one All-encompassing, game-fixing supermod, that makes oblivion what it should be. (ie. getting rid of level scaling so that masters of their chosen weapon art can go around killing and senselessly murdering people as they should be able to!)

Let's us three compile a list of bitches and gripes that we here at SDN have, then, go and get the mods that fix the bitches and gripes, then, we can begin the compilation process, and those bitches and gripes that remain unaddressed by the mods we pick up, we can start digging around and figuring out how to deal with it.

Also, lets make 1000% sure we give credit to the authors of the mods we take/compile/tweak, their hard work should not go unacknowledged.

[Ace Pace]

I'll start off with the basics:

Clutter should have worth, gems should be priced, ingridients should weight less. Thats all mods that have been done.

Torchs should have value and should burn longer and brighter, again, done.

Bounty reduction: Done.

[Stark]

For armour, I'd like to see 'interesting' differences between armour types other than 'better=heavier'. For example, Iron should be heavier *and* weaker than steel, Orc should be heavier and stronger, Dwemer should be slightly heavier but significantly better, etc. If armour weight gave speed penalties, that'd be kickass - there'd actually be tradeoffs and decisions about what armour you used, instead of the current 'lolz daedric' situation.

If possible, I'd like to see lockpicking changed. It being basically a twich game where someone with a torch and timing doesn't need any skill is stupid, as is picks always breaking when you fail. Repair hammers break based on skill, and that should be the way picks work too.

[Ace Pace]

I'll add that HEavy armour should bring actual benefits.

Let me quote the parts I agree with in a very good review of the skill system here

Blunt: The use of blunt oriented-like weapons including Maces, Hammers, Staves, and Axes. Beyond what we already all know about Staves and Axes not really qualifying, my critique again centers around the rank advancement. While the addition of various kinds of power attacks at subsequent levels makes logical sense (smash more = smash harder) one thing that really urks me is the utter lack of imagination at higher levels. All of the weapon skills end up in the same place, that is, a cool power attack with the chance to knockdown and disarm. While I recognize the need to release the game at some point, this is the part where modders need to take out their paper and pens (or Notepad or Word) and take some notes. The mastery level doesn't make sense, well kind of, but they could have added a distinct array of mastery level abilities so that playing one kind of weapon is a different experience than another kind of weapon. For Blunt weapons, instead of disarming them, I would take the more Blunt route and give the master the chance to crack a foe's armor into pieces. The weight of a master wielded warhammer should not only knock you to the ground, it should punish you for even thinking that wearing armor was a good idea in the first place. After all, I would like to run screaming across the wilderness to the nearest Legionaire when a Nord starts chasing my with a monsterous weapon.

Blade: For all of those Thieves, Assassins, Knights, Spellswords, and sharp edged wielding adventure goers, congradulations, you are all now apart of the elite group of players lumped into the same category because it didn't make enough sense for there to be a short and long blade skill. Morrowind wins on this one, somehow it's a really far stretch of the imagination to suppose a 2 pound dagger is coupled with the Strength attribute rather than Agility. It's a simple realism plug that was amazingly overlooked. Sneers to Beth on this one. Also, as Peregrine and I have discussed at great length, having all of the blades under one category actaully inhibits character options...yes, you read that correctly. The idea behind this argument is that players who choose blade are limited in the effectiveness of their weapon, especially for Thief classes. Consider that as a Thief, you have the option of either using that crappy silver dagger, or doing a considerable amount more damage with a silver claymore. In terms of roleplaying, those dedicated enough to a build should be able to stick to their roots, but I shouldn't have to stretch my imagination to believe I live in a world where daggers and claymores fall under the same skill and pretend like there isn't a difference in how much damage they do. I would hope someone at Bethesda is reading this, because you all seriously missed an important aspect to such an open ended game: IT'S ALOMST IMPOSSIBLE TO HAVE BALANCE. When most players create characters they make decisions as to what skills to use based upon an idea about how their character will function within the environment. Without a clear distinction as to the benefits of using one type of weapon instead of another, I might as well play a thief with an enchant Dai-Katana on my back since it's quite obvious how impossible it is to dish enough melee damage with smaller weapons at higher levels. Funny how Blade falls under the "Rant about how you can't balance open ended games" category. But of course, Axe falls under Blunt, so this connection isn't unwarranted if you really think about the association I'm making. In terms of the Rank levels, again, getting access to more skills makes sense, and I'll probably make the same point when I get to Hand to Hand. The Expert and Mastery levels also fall into the category of 'needs more work'. Knockdown with a bladed weapon, yea, like that's realistic. Paralyze, well, maybe if the sword is poisoned. My ideas about what to replace these isn't completely developed, but it would be extremely interesting to have a % chance for chopping off a limb at mastery level. I suspect that this isn't at all possible without a patch update, but I would really like to see something more in tune with the actual skill implemented than another neat benefit for gaining master when every other weapon skill seems to enjoy the same thing. Again, this plays into the decisions made by the player to design their character with a specific idea about how they want to function. Beth would do well to diversify their combat Power Attacks to make each skill truly unique.

Sum it up: Move axes to blades, make blunt skill mastery more damage, keep powerattacks in Blade, create a new skill for light blade weapons such as daggers to make thieves use daggers and not claymores.

Athletics:[snip] So instead of regen stamina, try these on for size. Apprentice: hold breath twice as long; Journeymen: reduce stamina spent jumping by 1/2; Expert (this is where it gets fun): How fast you travel is not effected by how much weight you carry (of course, if you are over-encumbered, you can't move); Master: Using normal or power attacks does not expend stamina. Now I recognize this might have some balance issues, but as we know, games like Oblivion are naturally suseptible to being unbalanced.

Now magic

Destruction:[snip] Here are some possible rank implentations (Modder pens at the ready). Novice: well you're novice, suseptible to having your spells fail and cast on yourself. It would make the game much more interesting if a % of failure resulted in some mishap that cause permanent scarring. Welcome to the world of below average, the only place you can go from here is up. Apprentice: you're starting to get the hang of things, so naturally you won't kill yourself when you cast a spell, but you still have a hard time grasping how to finesse your spells, therefore, your character's on target spells have a chance to go wildly off course. I hope you have that staff ready to block with. Journeymen: now that you have some actual skill with your spells, not only do those penalties go away, the damage bonus you receive is a % relative to the amount of magika you have left (like weapon damage and stamina). Expert: So close to being oh-so-sweet, Radius effects are doubled, yum. Master: your are supreme in your ability to cut through the defenses of your foes, their natural resistances to your elemental (fire, lightning, ice) destruction spells are null (magical shields still reduce damage). Overpowered perhaps? Who cares, I'm a master of destruction, don't even try and stop me.

I agree with most of what he says bar the the progression, after novice you should not have defects but all bonuses.

I'm ignoring his alteration notes because they suck. As the rest of his magic notes. They make Stark look accepting.

[Rye]

What about killing people and then being able to use their house as storage space? That's what I want to do.

[Chardok]

I want to see an unarmored skill added. I will need to look around in the...coding...I suppose somehow, and see how each individual skill is hooked onto actions in the game as it relates to increasing that skill. Perhaps adding a base AC to a person's skin, which increases through getting hit (fighting)

If I can figure that out, and get something going with it, we could potentially add light armor to the game.

I am guessing that each part of the body is assigned their own "Hit percentages" meaning that if I'm wearing heavy leg armor and light chest armor, that if I'm hit in the chest, my light armor skill goes up, and if I'm hit in the legs, my heavy armor skill goes up, potentially.

The previous statement will allow for wearing, say, a leather helmet and monk-type robes, which will allow for quicker increases in unarmored, and slower in light armored.

If we can figure out how the armor skills are implemented in the game, and determine how the skill-ups are figured out, we could modify the setting for any skill we chose, potentially by looking for similarities between all of the skills.

I suppose I will take on the skill balance issue...though I will probably be slower than christmas in figuring everything out.

I will also take on the issue of NPC level balancing. This will be extremely slow in coming, because I think I will have to modify all the values for level by NPC type, zone, and to a very small extent, character level. (Maybe set the base difficulty lower, and the base creature/npc level higher/lowe, and reduce the pool of items the game chooses from to equip the (humanoid) NPCs with

[Ace Pace]

Actully chardok, level balencing for NPCs is dead easy. take 3 populer leveling mods. merge. Tweak. Hand to stark for balence. Get back. Tweak. Publish.



However, I'm rapidly running into a problem. Finding skill variables and scripts.

[Chardok]

Actully chardok, level balencing for NPCs is dead easy. take 3 populer leveling mods. merge. Tweak. Hand to stark for balence. Get back. Tweak. Publish.



However, I'm rapidly running into a problem. Finding skill variables and scripts.

what about the equipment pools? Bah. I'll have to look when I get home.

[Ace Pace]

Actully chardok, level balencing for NPCs is dead easy. take 3 populer leveling mods. merge. Tweak. Hand to stark for balence. Get back. Tweak. Publish.



However, I'm rapidly running into a problem. Finding skill variables and scripts.

what about the equipment pools? Bah. I'll have to look when I get home.

Equiptment pool? You mean NPC(bandit for example) equiptment? Theres a great mod for that which makes the items % based to show up.

Equiptment changes? dead easy, open up item category and change.

AGAIN, FUCKING USELESS DOCUMENTATION IN THIS GAME, UNLIKE MORROWIND WHICH HAD PERFECT DOCUMENTATION. BETHSADA, PLEASE, FOR THE LOVE OF GAMERS EVERYWHERE, GIVE ME REAL DOCUMENTATION ON CHANGING STUFF. DO NOT GIVE ME A FUCKING WIKI.

Now that I finshed that...

[Old Peculier]

For armour, I'd like to see 'interesting' differences between armour types other than 'better=heavier'. For example, Iron should be heavier *and* weaker than steel, Orc should be heavier and stronger, Dwemer should be slightly heavier but significantly better, etc. If armour weight gave speed penalties, that'd be kickass - there'd actually be tradeoffs and decisions about what armour you used, instead of the current 'lolz daedric' situation.

I suggest seeing if armour/weapon 'health' (aka durability) can be changed, so that, for instance, Dwemer stuff is more durable, but Elven less so.

Also an enchanting mod would be good. I'd like a return to the old 'enchant' skill to get more charge points, plus re-charging armour/weapons
Maybe have it so that people with high enchant skills can make more use of the altars in the Arcane University.

EDIT By the way, modding isn't my thing, so I don't expect to help, and I have no idea how feasible this woudl be.

[Ace Pace]

I suggest seeing if armour/weapon 'health' (aka durability) can be changed, so that, for instance, Dwemer stuff is more durable, but Elven less so.

Also an enchanting mod would be good. I'd like a return to the old 'enchant' skill to get more charge points, plus re-charging armour/weapons
Maybe have it so that people with high enchant skills can make more use of the altars in the Arcane University.

EDIT By the way, modding isn't my thing, so I don't expect to help, and I have no idea how feasible this woudl be.

Durability is already differant per weapon type, but I can easily change it so the difference is more profound.

[Arthur_Tuxedo]

Hmm, well I have a few ideas for things I'd like to do, but I think we're planning on going about this all wrong (no offense to Chardok). Rather than putting together a big all-encompassing mod that no one can really agree on, we should put together smaller mods. We need to decide what really needs changing and do those mods first.

For instance, one mod that I'd like to see is one that reduces health. I don't like battles where I have to hit someone 50 times or get hit 50 times before it's decided. However, and correct me if I'm wrong on this, if you simply change the health formula it will only affect the player. To make it work for monsters you have to go through and apply the formula by hand to every single monster and NPC in the game. Gah! It's too much for one person to do, but a team could do it. Still, I recognize that this is probably a back-burner type of thing, and not what we should be focused on first.

Making an SDN leveling mod is, IMO, unnecessary. There are plenty of levelling mods to choose from, many of them quite good, and levelling mods don't involve a lot of grunt work data entry, so it's not really conducive to teamwork. Mods that make major changes, like adding new skills, will not be feasible unless we have a talented and experienced modder among us, and the rest of us will not be helpful to him / her.

I think one of the big gripes we all have is the monster level scaling, which is not solved by player levelling mods. There are a few monster / item level scaling mods, but they only scratch the surface. This is how the game should have been set up:

No level scaling for monsters and NPCs. Instead, each area has an encounter list (those of you who've already poked around the CS will know what I'm talking about) that spawns different static-level mobs depending on the PC's level. You already see some of this in the game, but it doesn't go far enough, and there are still too many monsters that scale. We want to design things so that the main quest has a set level progression. It gets harder with each mission, but if it's too hard, you can level up and come back and it won't scale with you. Side quests and dungeons can't be designed this way, obviously, since you don't know the order in which a player will visit them.

Random wilderness encounters, especially bandits, should only be tough at lower levels. There should only be a few different levels of bandits. At ~level 10, you can easily defeat individual bandits, but the game spawns larger groups of them, so it's still a challenge. By level 15 or so, however, bandits are no longer a challenge.

Side quest encounter lists should be designed to provide a challenge at any level up to, say 30 (once you're past level 30 you should be able to breeze through the side quests like the badass you are), but not through level scaling. Instead, you populate the list with creatures whose levels are spaced out by about 5. So at level 10 you'll be fighting the same stuff as level 6, but once you hit 11 you graduate to the new list. Which level this happens at should not be the same for every quest to prevent frustration.

Dungeons should be designed in a similar fashion, but there should be a tough "level boss" at the end, who guards a treasure that is significantly (but not ridiculously) better than the stuff the player can normally find at that level. Ditto for Oblivion romps. There should always be a tough fight at the end in order for the player to close the gate. Every "mook" along the way should not provide a life or death fight, only the level bosses should be really tough.

If we could do this mod, we would add something truly great to the Oblivion community, and it's definitely doable with the CS. It would just be a lot of work.

[Ace Pace]

Hmm, well I have a few ideas for things I'd like to do, but I think we're planning on going about this all wrong (no offense to Chardok). Rather than putting together a big all-encompassing mod that no one can really agree on, we should put together smaller mods. We need to decide what really needs changing and do those mods first.

I thought that was obvious, just make sure they don't hurt each other.

For instance, one mod that I'd like to see is one that reduces health. I don't like battles where I have to hit someone 50 times or get hit 50 times before it's decided. However, and correct me if I'm wrong on this, if you simply change the health formula it will only affect the player. To make it work for monsters you have to go through and apply the formula by hand to every single monster and NPC in the game. Gah! It's too much for one person to do, but a team could do it. Still, I recognize that this is probably a back-burner type of thing, and not what we should be focused on first.

Give me the formula and I can try applying it to each monster, as I said, I'm ready for grunt work.

Making an SDN leveling mod is, IMO, unnecessary. There are plenty of levelling mods to choose from, many of them quite good, and levelling mods don't involve a lot of grunt work data entry, so it's not really conducive to teamwork.

The problem is finding the best one, there is no single perfect one, so I suggest take them and merge.

Mods that make major changes, like adding new skills, will not be feasible unless we have a talented and experienced modder among us, and the rest of us will not be helpful to him / her.

I'm fine with trying it out, the problem is(as I discovered with trying to edit skills), is finding the right thing to change.

I think one of the big gripes we all have is the monster level scaling, which is not solved by player levelling mods. There are a few monster / item level scaling mods, but they only scratch the surface. This is how the game should have been set up:

No level scaling for monsters and NPCs. Instead, each area has an encounter list (those of you who've already poked around the CS will know what I'm talking about) that spawns different static-level mobs depending on the PC's level. You already see some of this in the game, but it doesn't go far enough, and there are still too many monsters that scale. We want to design things so that the main quest has a set level progression. It gets harder with each mission, but if it's too hard, you can level up and come back and it won't scale with you. Side quests and dungeons can't be designed this way, obviously, since you don't know the order in which a player will visit them.

Random wilderness encounters, especially bandits, should only be tough at lower levels. There should only be a few different levels of bandits. At ~level 10, you can easily defeat individual bandits, but the game spawns larger groups of them, so it's still a challenge. By level 15 or so, however, bandits are no longer a challenge.

Side quest encounter lists should be designed to provide a challenge at any level up to, say 30 (once you're past level 30 you should be able to breeze through the side quests like the badass you are), but not through level scaling. Instead, you populate the list with creatures whose levels are spaced out by about 5. So at level 10 you'll be fighting the same stuff as level 6, but once you hit 11 you graduate to the new list. Which level this happens at should not be the same for every quest to prevent frustration.

Dungeons should be designed in a similar fashion, but there should be a tough "level boss" at the end, who guards a treasure that is significantly (but not ridiculously) better than the stuff the player can normally find at that level. Ditto for Oblivion romps. There should always be a tough fight at the end in order for the player to close the gate. Every "mook" along the way should not provide a life or death fight, only the level bosses should be really tough.

If we could do this mod, we would add something truly great to the Oblivion community, and it's definitely doable with the CS. It would just be a lot of work.

If someone finds out How to implement that, I'm game for applying it.

[Faram]

I would sticky this, but that will screw up the poll so...

But I do not have the time or the skill for a mod but I would load it

[InnocentBystander]

My interest is peaked; I've never modded morrowind; but it seems fairly easy, only problem is time. I've got loads of ideas, mostly spell related. Things like scaling has already been done, but who knows; there's always room for improvement.

[Ace Pace]

My interest is peaked; I've never modded morrowind; but it seems fairly easy, only problem is time. I've got loads of ideas, mostly spell related. Things like scaling has already been done, but who knows; there's always room for improvement.

Spells are intresting, in morrowind it was easy(using the Constructur set) to create very intresting and powerful spells.

[InnocentBystander]

my quarrels with spells include multiple summons at once and AI improvements, plus the return of old spells like levitate. Also I think spells need scalar effects based on ability, rather than say 100 damage, damage is 100%, and the amount would be based on level and skill.

[DPDarkPrimus]

...Oh, a mod. I thought this would be about making some additional missions.

(A level-cap system for the NPC monsters! I'm tired of Bandits wearing Deadric armor.)

[Flagg]

Get rid of the underwear on "naked" PC and NPC models. Maybe even model a wang that jiggles as you run for all the ladies (and guys who are into that... fucking sinners).

[Mr Bean]

Get rid of the underwear on "naked" PC and NPC models. Maybe even model a wang that jiggles as you run for all the ladies (and guys who are into that... fucking sinners).

There will be naked skin mods, there are already four hundred and twenty thousand in devolpment and already some low res versions out there.

I'd like to help if we go out into the physical side of designing spaces since I've still not gotten a handle on the scripting part of Oblivion.