So, what's going to be changed in the patch? Will the balance tweaks Ichor and I suggested be considered?

I got a chance to copy the mod to my brother and play it a bit there, and unfortunately I found a good deal of bugs. I didn't write them down but one of the most bizarre was that if I bashed at a specific type of tree I got experience points for just hitting it... and this is a tree which is indestructible. But on the bright side, all the bugs I encountered were minor.

And one other thing. For the first time I managed to enter the secret level in the first hub (kind of silly, it seems that everytime I have played I've actually done the right things to enable the passage to the secret level, but the idea to jump into the water just never hit me). Anyway, in that secret level there's that mini puzzle with the heart of d'Sparil (sp?) and when I picked it up I gained 4 levels... and the experience points didn't even change! Is this meant to happen? If so, no offense, but this *totally* ruins the game balance in the mod.

-Remi

I noticed that Bright Crucible (secret map) bug too, but I didn't know if it was a bug or something one of you threw in as some kind of experience reward. It was like that in the first mod as well. It seemed like a good idea to give some experience to the player whenever he solved a certain puzzle or discovered a hard to find key, like maybe a linedef or thing special that can be used in an ACS script to give some experience to the player whenever the script is activated.

And as for the experience from trees, it was also in the first mod. Destroying trees, pots, and that suit of armor gave a tiny amount of experience (around 10 or so). It was so low that I didn't even bother worrying about it.

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I agree to giving the player a reward if he does something tough or not, but this is just insane. 4 levels are a *lot*. But that's not the worst thing, the experience points stay the same!!! For instance, if you pick the artifact while being 6 you get to become level 10. And then you can become 11 at the same experience points price as level 7. That's the outrageous part. Doing that secret level or not makes a gigantic impact on the rest of the game. Personally, I would have remade that part, so the player gets a set amount of experience points instead of levels, that way the higher levels still need high xp to gain.

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That is not what I mean. I found a tree on the first level which was invincible. Hit it as much as you like, it would still stand there forever. But for each hit, you gained some xp (very little though). I've been aware all the time you gain xp for destroying non-living objects.

-Remi

You must mean that tree they call in the code the Xmas tree. I noticed that it works for the bell too. I think it will also work for the shrubs or anything that can be shot. It shouldn't be hard to fix this bug.

Yo:

The 4-level increase is not a bug, it was requested by Ramborc. It also depends on the skill you're playing how much levels you get. The "bug" with the trees was also known, but ignored because it only gave very little extra xp. The multi death objects have been forgotten in this case. The probably simplest solution would be to make an enum with the monsters allowed and do a cross-check by their deaths to lookup if they should give you the xp.

Or just have anything with the MF_COUNTKILL flag to give experience, and nothing else, regardless of whether it's shootable or not.

TThe Boss is away for a day and there's a rebellion behind his back... ROFL j/k

The tree type you mean isn't indestructible, you just nead some kind of fire to burn it. BTW the same goes to bushes. I noticed this EXP thingie already in the original KMOD, but I actually found it a cool little secret... if any of you've ever played Stonekeep, there's the Glorystone in the Dwarven Clanhall... the first 3 times you hit it with a weapon, your rating for that one goes up by one star (if you take the fact that the max is 5 stars for a weapon skill, it's pretty good), and by hitting the stone again and again and again and again you can increase all your melee weapons skills to max, it's just a question of choosing a meleee weapon from a class, equipping your character with it, aiming the pointer at the Glorystone, taping down your mouse, and going away for 20 minutes or so, then coming back, checking the stats, if it's not yet 5 stars then taking another long break, if it's already at max then changing weapon and repeating the steps until you're the best with all weapons... I got this tip from the OFficial Stonekeep Strategy Guide, so why shouldn't KMOD have something similar? [img]images/smiles/icon_smile.gif[/img]

As for the secret level of 7 Portals, what "jumping in the water" do you mean?

Also, the D'Sparil's heart thingie was entirely my idea back in Spring this year, it's just a little bonus for people who're very good at finding secrets or intelligent enough to check with the RavenGames walkthrough [img]images/smiles/icon_smile.gif[/img] (w/o a strategy guide or that walkthrough there's nearly zero chance you'll ever figure out how to get to the Bright Crucible, this secret level is the most hidden in Hexen).

I'm still defending this idea entirely... IMO if by gaining the 3-5 levels (depending on skill) your EXP would increase accordingly, that would ruin gaming experience as afterwards getting new levels would be suddenly very sluggish (in Shadow Wood you wouldn't gain any new levels as monster there haven't got that much health, thus EXP). Also, it doesn't tip game balance, at least in KMOD it didn't... I played KMOD with the Fighter on skill 3 and along with these 4 extra levels I was able to defeat Korax by a hair's width (w/o these levels, maybe I'd have never made it).

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Wrong, Camper... I know that it was a bug but afterwards I didn't want it to be "corrected", as I found it rather hilarious. You see, in Hexen II you can demolish a lot of things in the environment, which is fun in the beginning and an itching constraint later on... after playing the game for the 3rd or 4th time, I nearly hated it, as I just felt the need to hit them but I never got a single EXP for it ==> one of the reasons (however little) that I got so frustrated with Hexen2 I stopped playing it. That's why I found it simply great that in KMOD you could smash that fuckin' pot and get some EXP for the deed done... [img]images/smiles/icon_biggrin.gif[/img]

To answer the 1st question last, I don't think anyone wants to spend more time than necessary on KMOD2 any more when we could use that time to work on the full-blown RPG Korax Alpha which will be way more popular anyway (new mods w/o new maps have a rough time, that's why KMOD managed only some 500 downloads in nearly half a year, whereas a cool new Hexen map might get more downloads in a month). If any new feature should be implemented into KMOD 2.1 it's the planned multiplayer things like the Cleric healing other player or the Mage extending his invulnerability spell on the whole team... indeed, making Cooperative as good as possible would make a lot of sense since KMOD2 is the last Korax project ever with classic Cooperative mode (Korax Alpha will have team multiplayer, but never a player characters vs monsters kind). For the balance tipping, it'd make a lot more sense for Korax Alpha, where it can even be enhanced further (i.e. more spells, a more detailed stats system, etc.).

p.s. download number for KMOD2 currently stays at 136. I find it very low but Camper means we got less DLs in the first 2 days for KMOD. I'm not sure any more, but we'll see in half a year how much KMOD2 will get. [img]images/smiles/icon_smile.gif[/img]

He meant that to get to the secret level of the first hub, you have to jump in the water where the stone pillars originally blocked. There's a single flechette there too.

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Well, I still believe it's too much. If the xp was changed it would acceptable... ~14 free skill points is a lot. Every time I've played has been without getting those free 4 levels and even *then* I thought it was too easy... grrrrr... thou leaves me no choice, heathen! *shoots RambOrc*

Hear hear all! With RambOrc killed I'm the new team leader and I have some changes around here! First of all, Korax Gamma and Serpent Flower or whatever they're called are now cancelled. We're now making a TC called "Remi's TC" for Hexen which is all about what a cool person I am and that everyone should become my slave... it's going to be really neat. The TC will play very simple, the gamer will stare at a picture of me... and sometimes a text will appear with the text "Remi is cool!". It's going to be so cool. And I think we should demand money for it, 100$ per copy should be enough. And we should release a collector's edition costing 1000$ where the only difference is that the user gets a free picture of me free of charge with the purchase. [img]images/smiles/icon_biggrin.gif[/img]

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Which means that if you don't get those 4 free levels you *can't* beat Korax at all? [img]images/smiles/icon_razz.gif[/img]
Personally I call that imbalance.

The reward could be done a completely different way. We could simply give the player some skill points. That way he wouldn't get those uber powerful spells so early and we could give him a more balanced quantity of skill points... don't you agree a tiny little bit that 14 skill points may be a little tiny bit too much?

Also, there's one bug with this thing. The spells (or other stuff) the player gains while gaining levels through the heart will not be announced... it would be pretty easy to fix though.

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Well, I believe that we should at least contribute some effort into the patch. There's some bugs which would take so little time to fix. And the multiplayer bit... I'd really really really love to fix it up, but since I don't have access to playing it it would be very hard. I could perhaps fix some of the bugs (berserker, spells affect all and those minor bugs) but those major ones would be near impossible without playtesting. Grrrrr, if only JHexen supported software rendering I could test it multiplayer.

And another thing I'd like to do in the patch is to balance the other difficulty levels. Right now only the normal (3rd) difficulty level seems to be really playable.

-Remi

[ December 15, 2001: Message edited by: Tzar Sectus ]

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So much about ppl not using automap, I figured out at the beginning that there's a level teleport in there as you see the red line on the automap; OTOH it took me years to figure out how to get in there... [img]images/smiles/icon_smile.gif[/img]

BTW to confirm the automap thingie I just fired up DOS Hexen... throughout these last 2 years, I started it a couple of times for testing something, but always just to the point where a new game starts in Winnowing Hall, and it always looked dark and blurry and pixely and old and awful... now I warped to the Seven Portals and after setting gamma to the right level it didn't look as bad any more, indeed it had a different feeling than jHexen/Vavoom. While it looks realy pixely on my 21", if I'd play it on my 17" it'd look much less so... so so I guess that once KMOD2 is closed with all patches (and thus all testing) and I'll ever again play the original Hexen levels, than in the original DOS version (as I do with Heretic up to this day). Source ports are cool for eye candy screenshots and for developing new mods/TCs but the original is much more fun to play. Maybe it's just that I grew old, dunno... [img]images/smiles/icon_wink.gif[/img]

I see there are some misunderstandings here... in my empire, rebellions aren't tolerated and rebels are hung... unless they have some useful talents like this Remmy guy does. [img]images/smiles/icon_rolleyes.gif[/img]

In this special case, there is imperial mercy for you, but you should learn to behave in the future. In any future dealings, you'll call me "Your Majesty" and you'll lick my feet twice a day for 20 minutes each, keeping them at a temperature of 39 degrees Celsius. Failing to do so will result in immediate dismembering. [img]images/smiles/icon_biggrin.gif[/img]

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To be honest, this D'Sparil's Heart thingie has been added because this was the only thing Camper was willing (or able) to code at all. It's also meant as a special reward for the die-hard Hexen fans who know the game inside out. Of course I can't say for sure, but I think I might've beaten Korax even if I had 5-6 levels less, not only 4. It'd have taken a lot more time, but it might've been manageable. Difficult to say...

The original idea was that the player gets EXP for puzzles solved, secrets found etc., but ask Camper what happened to these and tons of other ideas I had about Korax Mod... [img]images/smiles/icon_sad.gif[/img]

...that's BTW why I like you this much Remi, whenever I have an idea, you get down trying to code it and most of the time you get it running... it's a lot more motivating than when I have an idea and the programmer's answer is (w/o even trying to code it) "it can't be done/it's too much work".

Anyway, if this discussion about EXP for puzzles & co. would've been brought up between July and October, it could've been implemented in KMOD2 from the beginning, but now for a bugfix patch it's IMO not worth the work. Especially that the system works a lot better if you have clearly defined sidequests, like in Korax Alpha. Another thing for our first TC... [img]images/smiles/icon_wink.gif[/img]

As for bugfixes, I never said they shouldn't be implemented, of course do them. For multiplayer, we could test it with Camper some over weekends, so if you want to try to fix the bugs, we could give it a reasonably good try.

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Another advantage of the Vavoom engine we'll start using once Korax Alpha is out, it's got not only software rendering but also DOS and Linux ports (==> even more players).

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I'm not sure what you exactly mean? Between the different skills, all original differences of Hexen exist, plus one thing from KMOD, i.e. that once you get a new level, you get 5 points on skill 1-2, 4 points on skill 3, 3 points on skill 4-5. With 12 levels or so reached by the end of the game, it makes quite a difference. I'm pretty convinced that once the game is playable on skill 3 it's also playable on skill 1-2. As for skill 4-5, good Q, I know that KMOD wasn't playable on skill 5 with the Fighter, I tried it and failed at the first Wendigo (you'll never beat them in fastmonster w/o invulnerability, healing or a fast-shooting range weapon).