Only got to tinker with it a little late last night and some this morning.  So far, its more daunting but I'm impressed with the power of the editing...and I have only scratched the surface it seems.  Just with the little scribble area I made, I can't see a reasonable model for what the final outdoor area size will be like just yet.  Anyone else get some good info on this?

Can you export files with it?

Only tinkered with the terrain editor thus far, I have spent a total of 30 minutes with it.  Managed to figure out textures, heights, water levels and placing placables and monsters.  Thats really where my experience ends.

I hate you... :TONGUE:

I haven't taken the time to go after a back-door solution for getting the toolset. Soon... sooon... soooooooon...

*Disclamer* This is not a message of ill-will of any sort towards those who found resourceful ways to get the toolset. Nor do I intend this thread to become any kind of accusation or depate on the method of aquiring the toolset.

P.S. Is it wierd that my disclamer is longer than the main message? But know this, you have it, I don't; and I envy... :EVIL:

[Edited by EtherDragon at 1:19 PM on 10/2/2006]

If its any consolation, my day of trying to download the toolset was:
3am Sunday Morning: Waiting, going nuts with the rest of the forum in a happy way.
4am: Asleep
8am: Woke up for 5 minutes. Nothing still.
1:30: Race at Kasas starts. People mention the file is on that FTP thing.
1:45: Tried the FTP thing.  Found that I couldn't keep a connection.
3:00: People were setting up BitTorrents for it at this point and organizing the parts.  Joined thier IRC channel, got a crash corse in torrent'ing.
6:00pm: Race and Post Race is done.  BitTorrent is probably slower than the Atari FTP at this point.
9:00pm: After switching from torrents of parts and the full thing, I gave up with torrents.
12am Oct 2nd: I retry the Atari FTP and find speeds are 200kb for 2 files at a time.  Seems they never closed it off and no one was downloading from it anymore.
3:30am: All 9 files were done.  I looked wearily over at my presell code and wonder why it exists.
4am: Sleep, feel cold coming on.

FTP beats Torrent any day of the week.  Hopefully the FTP site will still be open and empty tomorrow night when I get my dsl throttled up to an acceptable level.

Until then if you have the chance could you check if the export command is enabled in the demo.  Would be nice if we can export files from it for later inclusion in the real thing.

Okie dokie. I'll check tonight when I get home.

Export seems to work the same exact way NWN1's toolset did.  Choose which types of blueprints/scripts/coversations/area etc you want to export and it will pack em into an erf (presumed name, didn't actually try it yet - nothing to export)

Good....thanks.

I find that the learning curve for someone like me, a rank amateur to be sure, is VERY high. That's of concern to me since a LOT of people who buy NWN 2 will not have had experience with the NWN 1 toolset or ANY toolset. They'll open it up thinking that they will be building a module and get frustrated and ditch it. :(

One thing I heard from my interview with the Rogue Dao guys is that their feeling after using the toolset practically without stopping for 24 hours is that teams of at least 10 will be required. It's simply too much work for one guy and a dream. ;)

*sighs* Hopefully the community will step in with time-saving plug ins. We have some plans to help out n00bs to the toolset. If you're interested, give me a jingle. :)

[Edited by Kalia at 10:26 PM on 10/2/2006]

I agree Kalia, the first thing i said to myself was that many project will never see the light because of the versatility (and complexity) of the toolset. Like you said, people who never worked with the nwn1 toolset will be way lost! I also have a feeling that the outdoor areas can be awsome, but need a minimum of artistic vision. Someone can spend weeks on a single map because of the details that can be added.

I have spent a few hours in the toolset already, testing stuff, looking at scripts, features and all. I find it harder to play in, but ...so much tools/adjustement right at the fingertip!

So far, so good but I admit that creating a complete world will be a time consumming effort for all the teams out there. I dont expect to see many quality project during the first year.

and oh...btw, an empty 8 x 8 outdoor area is 7mb. ;-/   

Try a 32x32 exterior, then bake a walkmesh on it and report the results please.

32 x 32 (Exterior Empty)

53647kb ....?? only one area took about 3 minutes to bake. with a duo cpu.

a 32 x 32 Interior (empty) is 1161kb.

53MB lol pimped out that's about 150ish MB

Yay for 5-6GB PW modules.

I've said it before and I'm going to stick by the statement: PWs are going to have to accept a paradigm shift in planning, size, travel, etc. The days of 500+ areas are gone and design is going to have to buck up accordingly. Builders and scripters are going to have to make their worlds lean and mean. Additionally, IF (and this is a big if) Atari manages to support the game through 2-5 patches in the next year, I'm sure we'll see some optimization of areas, etc. I refuse to throw in the towel for PWs yet.

As the Rogue Dao guys have said, PWs with less than 10 on staff aren't going to make it any more. The days of "Hi I'm Bob and I have a dream and a PW" are gone. It's going to take a concerted effort on the part of PW owners, builders, scripters, writers bordering on professional design studios to build PWs any more. I sort of see it like WalMart vs. the neighborhood store. Those days are past.

BUT...the days of a more artistic, professional style of PW are on the horizon and I fully expect that the community will step in and amaze us even if OE isn't allowed to.

16x16 Exterior area, with a moderate amount of non-baked placeables thus far comes out to 12mb.  I created basically a dock area, with lots of buildings, some textured roads and a wall around the city section.  Strangely enough, after baking the file size went up to 23 MB.

This took about 3 hours to make.  But puts some insight on how long it will take and how large they will be:

Screenie

Even on my 1000 area+ mods of the past 4 years I never used areas larger then 16x16 and maybe 75% of them under 8x8.  The inherent lag of 32x32 was never worth the effort.  It'll be enough dealing with the edging at 16x16 or less.

Multiple servers will definitely have an advantage.  Both with future expansion potential and with building process and walkmesh downloading.  Establishing the first server will be the most taxing on players and walkmesh.  Then build each additional server one at a time offline, say six months apiece and introduce a one-time walkmesh dl then move on to the next one/6 months, rinse and repeat.

If TTL opts for NWN2 it's 6 servers should supply the builders with 3 years of relaxed building and after the first one maybe only a few major walkmesh re-ups(post-patch adjustments) for each of the additional ones over the following 2 to 3 years.

That's if TTL goes NWN2 and the bossman utilizes the potential it has.

I'll be the first to admit I am not anywhere's near a professional level game designer.  I enjoy the work I've done under NWN mainly because it was fun and the material I had to work with was almost inexhuastable after 4 years of community supported content.

I already see some limitations on creature models that I enjoy using.  Didn't know my favorite, the Minotuar, didn't make the cut until yesterday :-( .  Will have to seek out a workaround for it depending on how much humanoid models can be dressed out(horns to head, tails etc).

The dynamic visuals look great but could be some major lag producers in a PW.  There's incredible potential with the toolset but in the end lag will determine the course of a PW the same as it was in NWN.  My advantage is my PC is mid to low-end on the posted req's.  So anything I build and can test on my system should be playable on other low-end machines as well.  Developing something on a high-end PC may limit low-end rigs from effectively playing it without lag issues.

I'll start my self-tutorial this weekend with my planned TTL2 project Barrelton.  First up will be porting over and testing scripts and conversations with the inport and export functions.

[Edited by ExileHF at 12:08 PM on 10/3/2006]

< One man with a dream

I tihnk there are going to be some basic dynamic changes that you will see for development of NWN2 worlds.   A few very large exterior areas and a large number of interior areas.   I would not be surprised if Pre-Fab areas become very popular.   Let some creative person spend 3-4 weeks building that 32x32 forest exterior, you pop it in and make the changes you need to fit the world.

Like in NWN1 where we had to do certain things to make an efficient module, the same will happen in NWN2.

• Conservative use of Textures, maybe no more than 3 or 4 per area.
• Creative ways to eliminate the "Horizon" area
• Converting most placeables to environmental objects.
• Conservative use of Tree types
• Tedious elimination of walkmeshes under placeables and other areas the players should not go.
• Limitations of placeable counts
• Some type of instancing system for shops so that you only have a half dozen shops built that you reuse through scripting instead of 100 different shops.

While Module size is a huge concern for me, my real challenges come with maintain all the stuff related to server adminstration.  How do you get the walkmesh to the player, what the update schedule, how do you communicate that to the players, etc...

While the toolset is more complex and just about everything does take more time, it wont remain that way.  Once we get used to it and the nifty plug-ins start coming down the pipe, it will become more efficient.   In the end, the things that took the most time in NWN1 will take the most time in NWN2; conversations and scripts.   Since we spent the last 9 months writing 130,000 words of dialogue and coding 200+ quests; I feel we are in pretty good shape.

From using the toolset last night, I found that creating a moderaly decent looking area wasn't that much of big deal.  However, my experiences may differ than another persons.  Building time + Quality isn't much of an issue.  Seems pretty easy so far, but then again I'm a nerd with too much time on my hands.  I'm even starting to develop early habits and have figured out that building will need to be done in distinct layers to be effective.

The quickest method to produce good results was (for exteriors):
1) Layout map and do heights, keep pressure below 30% for starting smooth hills, increase later for cliffs.
2) Place down your larger placeables (buildings, trees, large debris) - do not fill in forests entirely instead just make a few tree seeds copy them around the edge of your more forested sections.
3) Now that you know where the larger sections and placeables are, adjust terrain and placeables once more to fit.  Start painting down the textures you want.
4) Fine tune your textures.  If you want finer detail, be sure to use an edging texture between one main texture and another.  Dirt usually works well, ie:  Dirt edges between the road and grass.  This will create a much more real feel to the area.  To conserve textures, try to use only 1 grass type, 1 cobble type, 1 rock face type, and 1 dirt texture. 
5) Paint down detail placables (rocks, debris).  Fill in your woods with duplicated trees.  You can make clusters of trees and save them as blue prints.
6) Paint down grass and shrubs where you want them.

At this point you can further fine tune your area and check your area for oddities.  You should have a pretty good looking area too.

Maybe I'll create some 'realism' type tutorials.  Not like I'll be releasing a PW any time soon.  Going SP for a bit before I make that choice.

[Edited by Ithalyan at 1:26 PM on 10/3/2006]

"....As the Rogue Dao guys have said, PWs with less than 10 on staff aren't going to make it any more. The days of "Hi I'm Bob and I have a dream and a PW" are gone. It's going to take a concerted effort on the part of PW owners, builders, scripters, writers bordering on professional design studios to build PWs any more. I sort of see it like WalMart vs. the neighborhood store. Those days are past...."

With all due repsect I disagree. It can be done with 4-5 dedicated people for at least a year or so, of that I am absolutely certain and just like in NwN communities will come together and the talented (and those that desire to work on the hobby) will step foward to help out. But...I do agree with the heart of what is being stated there.

The problem I have with it is this: NwN/NwN2 is a hobbiest tool, one where people can NOT make money and in fact are forbidden to make money by the powers that be. All well and good...until you start slamming us with very high end server requirements due to large modules, lots of bandwidth being used (walkmesh transfer to the clients has to happen in some way), and a huge manpower time sink. Granted it is absolutely gorgeous. :)  And yes...I know... change the way you do things PW's--heard it a few dozen times already *smiles*. Everybody can say that and everybody will have their own thoughts on it...but why should we be forced to change the way we want our world/pw/module when it is a hobby and we can't make money and we still have NwN? Now...allow us to make money and that is a whole different situation--but right now (and as far as I know it will be this way forever) we can not make money and instead need to pour more manpower/time in to a hobby and spend more money on an already expensive hobby. But that is okay, quite a few people will do that and quite a few will not and NwN2 will be quite successful.

One thing we need to remember is that Atari/OE do not make their money from PW's and online stuff--they get it from SP sales and because of the eye candy and I assume what will be a good gameplay in the client they will continue to make their money from the initial sale and the expansions. I was hoping OE would do more for the PW's out there but I also understand why it didn't happen, time/manpower/money...the same problems that will plague all of us.

I do want to say that the toolset is very powerful and a great product.

[Edited by Leanthar at 10:33 PM on 10/3/2006]

I'm a 1-man persistent world and I fully intend to be able to create a functional PW of decent size (roughly 100 areas?) The days of plopping down a simple set of tiles for my exterior is over, so I can't speed create an exterior area... or can I?

The trick is most of us can't just free-hand an area (yet). So, for me an area has to have function first followed closely by style. Shitty area artists (myself included) should draw an outline. Who lives in the area, what is their function? Draw a shitty map of where they live and where they work (if different than where they live) and put down other houses, general vegitation, pathways, etc... Then draw a shitty picture of what it might look like to get a sense of how height will play into your map. Go back to the map and draw some poorly made contour lines. After that little bit is done... placing the area in the toolset should be much easier.

No matter how sucky your drawing skills and your map-making skills, doing this little bit of pre-concept will make the actual toolset area work a whole lot easier and you'll be surprised at how capable we are of baking gorgeous areas from our shitty as hell drawings. =p

Also I think it's worth noting that the prefab 'market' for this game is going to skyrocket. By being able to use prerendered areas and then customize them to fit one's module, it will make the building and creation of PWs a bit easier.

I think the prefabs might have more impact on the single player developers than on PWs.   My plan is to use approximately 10 32x32 exterior areas and everything else be interior.  With such limited number of exterior areas, you dont have an exhausting need for many of them.   

There's also the issue of how big the SP's modules end up being.  I have DL'd many haks over the years but no file sizes in the range of 2 gigs until now.  I don't see myself DLing SP's over 500 megs in size via a direct DL more then once a week, if that, and tieing up my connection time.  Anything over a gig in size would have to sell me on the idea before hand.

I do see myself queuing such dl's up as torrents though and spreading the download over days and weeks while my day to day activities continue as is.

I think SP's as well are going to have to be rethought to a point with size in mind.  Especially if they also include large haks to go along with them once the community content creators get busy...if they get busy.  Instead of a three part series we could be seeing 6 to 9 part series with one hak to rule them all.

We are entering an era of conservation right across the board.  Games and their capabilities are expanding but our internet connections aren't and at some point progress between the two is going to hit a bottleneck.

I agree to a point, the SP modules might be forced down the same path that many PWs were.  A single community accepted standard (CEP) that the player could download once and play on numerous worlds.  Personally, I like that idea quite a bit since it strengths the need for such a product across the board.   Many PW developers showed amazing creativity to take a very limited set of resources and use in an almost endless number of ways.   Truthfully, I have a lot of respect for that, maybe even more so than for the artist who spends 100s of hours creating custom content to fulfill his vision of how the world should look.

In a similar vein, much of todays games are programmed in sloppy and wasteful ways.  Yes, they are straining the capacity of our internet connections.  But you know what?  Those limitations existed before they even began programming the game.   Maybe its time that the software designers start doing a better job of producing their products and less expectancy on the technology will catch up to them.   Frankly, I remember many great and captivating games that existed on a single floppy disk, when program sizes were measured in Kilobytes and not Gigabytes.   

I couldnt resist.  

:ROFL:

http://ars.userfriendly.org/cartoons/?id=20061011