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Post by DEV Jlf2n on Apr 29, 2008 12:06:42 GMT -5
To say I am a big fan of player housing is an understatement. To me it is a staple of any online world and I very much look forward to us adding it to our PW.
With that being said, what are some of your thoughts on player housing and what can be done to make it even better?
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Post by DM Sin on Apr 29, 2008 14:16:18 GMT -5
Player housing is possible, but we will have to prepare well in advance i.e. make quite a few empty houses and when players want to purchase/conquer/whatever one then it can be made available I like my idea of having auction events run by DM's (not biased or anything ) which will allow players to buy a house and will also be a nice interaction event between players and DMs that isn't ur regular quest/ dunegon crawl event that DM's usually hold
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Post by DEV Jlf2n on Apr 29, 2008 14:36:41 GMT -5
Yeah, it won't really be needed at first, seeing as all the PCs will be low level. As far as preparing, it won't be that big of a deal, I can make 4 or 5 house interiors in an afternoon.
PC's buying them is always a norm, but I wouldn't mind just giving them away to people who contribute to the world in some form. Considering an interior takes up a small amount of room on the server, it should be a win win.
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Post by Lanessar on Apr 29, 2008 17:02:48 GMT -5
Biggest problem with player housing is the amount of space needed to keep this up for a playerbase of, say, 30 players on peak. This easily becomes about 40 areas (as exists in Myth Drannor at this time). Another problem is that builders can get too overwhelmed with player housing, and not be building the mod up. That's a big one, especially for NWN2. A suggested handling is to put in "stock houses" or areas. They all exist in say, a 32x32 interior (very small footprint comparitively), but are built as "seperate areas". Towers can then be made, mines, etc. all within the confines of that area (or perhaps two). You'd use stock prefabs for the placeables, and upon request, add in something the player requests (like a small library or laboratory for a wizard). I'd do this as far as costs: Standard "hous" (no changes, couple of sittable seats) with two rooms costs nothing. It's stock prefab, and can be basically copy-pasted into the module pretty easily. When someone wants a tower or a castle, then they start paying PHB rates. You can mitigate this for people who are contributive, for example, you have a guy who makes a 15-area interior dungeon for the module which requires little fixing to get in, perhaps just spawn and treasure placement. If it was well designed, then I'd say "design your tower and it's free". I only say this because of the ratio of builders to players in NWN2 seems inordinate - and you'd need to give some sort of good incentive to a person to start to learn. It's how I managed to get some of the better builders involved in the NWN1 server I started, and seems to work well.
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Post by Erulaan D'Anhoor on Apr 29, 2008 21:47:54 GMT -5
Does this include a persistent personal treasure chest?
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Post by DM Sin on Apr 30, 2008 5:02:45 GMT -5
I meant by preparing as in not needing to update the PWC constantly everytime a player gets a house Imagine having to do those uploads about 30 times, maybe even more. As far as space is concerned I wholeheartedly agree with lanessar, it would be better to put as many as possible in the same interior. It will reduce loading times and reduce lag as multiple players wont be loading onto multiple areas just to get to their houses. Erulaan D'Anhoor there are some good scripts out there that allow for persistent chests and banking systems for both gold and items. It is something we are hoping to implement. If we can achieve it we should be able to have persistent chests within a persons house where they can store their items and gold.
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Post by DEV Jlf2n on Apr 30, 2008 6:55:27 GMT -5
Good points, and yes I was thinking the same thing with having as many houses as possible on one big interior area. As long as they aren't right up against each other. But come to think of it, unless you have been in someone elses house, you wouldn't be able to see in it anyways right?
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Post by Iceshard on May 21, 2008 22:19:01 GMT -5
*looks around*. . . .
Does this mean I can design my own place Jlf? lol Well if you put the rooms right next to each other, youd see the outline, but not the room it self.. and think of it like an apartment...
Persistant Banking/Chests wooooo Love those things.
I guess for the housing, I dont really care if I had my own place, depending on the character I play, I may not even need it.
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kiu
New Member
Posts: 10
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Post by kiu on May 22, 2008 11:16:40 GMT -5
Just a suggestion: As much as it might be fun to see a dwarf living next door to a drow, perhaps there can be districts. Maybe big ol' stone buildings for dwarves, exotic colorful domiciles or whatnot for elves, treetop dwellings for the druids, some kind of underground tunnel to get to Drow-Ville, and standard-type houses for most of the humans...
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Post by Sojourn on May 22, 2008 16:14:00 GMT -5
If housing is implemented, then make houses actually have uses for them, instead of just being there to represent who is the richest in town. Inside a house there could be chests for persistent storage (Blackstone Keep 2 had this - though it was kinda buggy), unlimited resting, armor/weapon racks, closets with items in them, and locks and traps to prevent/ward theivery (which is possible with an exceptional thief to add realism). Perhaps if its a wizard's tower then the wayward thief should be careful of magical traps, guards (hired), or even golems. This makes it real and fun and exciting - bringing the server to life if you will, with dangers and rewards. If that wizard is known to have found a highly enchanted shortsword, and he keeps it locked in his basement guarded by a golem, then perhaps an extremely intelligent, skillfull, and luck theif could one day sneak in and steal it...this adds all sorts of rp potential between said parties...perhaps the theif was hired by an enemy of the wizard, or perhaps the theif wanted the blade for himself, or perhaps he wanted the coin by knowing an underground sect that desired the blade. In either case the wizard will be keeping an eye out for him, and he will have to lay low from then on. I think it would spark some extremely amazing rp if things like this could be implemented. No other server I have played on to date has yet implemented this that I know of.
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Post by crabbypatty on May 24, 2008 13:06:52 GMT -5
I authored "Sins Housing System" for NWN1, and I have to agree on some issues:
1. Most important: Owning a house is no fun, there must be functionality within the home. I made the interiors completely void of pre-existing objects and used purchasable furniture items (including beds, chests, bookcases, anything you name, all persistent) that could be placed/moved/turned/etc anywhere inside one's own home. This allows for endless customization because you can script objects to do anything, and gives the player control over what exactly his home consists of. It also allowed for placeable creatures such as guards, pets, etc. Which actually provides support for player run businesses such as banks and shops, but that's a whole other issue.
2. Interiors should be packed into as few areas as possible to minimize module size/stress.
3. The fore-mentioned functionality that may/should be included could lead to plot or player-oriented questing to, say, require a thief in his guild to break in to someone's particular home, or require a character trying to advance in a particular city to be a resident of said city. I don't know what the plans for the module are as far as politics and world-manipulation for the players are *shrugs* Just a suggestion or idea I suppose.
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Gekko
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Post by Gekko on May 25, 2008 2:18:16 GMT -5
Where dynamic objects are concerned, I'm against it. Every script run lags the server somewhat, so less scripts equals smoother gameplay. I think if you want certain items in your house, design the house in the toolset, send it in, have it reviewed, and put in it deemed acceptable. The saving treasure chest is a must though
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Post by rogerwilco on May 25, 2008 13:12:42 GMT -5
Have you guys gave thought to running Player Housing as its own seperate module? That way, you can update the PWCs just for the housing module and link it to various doors in the main module.
For example: Player A gets a deed granted to a house in Baldur's Gate via quest. When Player A clicks on the door, the scripting takes his player token (any persistent string that identifies a certain player) and loads the new module. The new module loads and looks at the player's string and if what type of deed is in his pocket and loads the proper house interior.
I'm not sure it is possible to do it this way with NWN2, but it may just cut down on the server load and constantly updating PWCs whenever you add a new house of a player.
Just an idea...
RogerWilco
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Post by Iceshard on May 25, 2008 21:59:26 GMT -5
As far as I know linking servers together is not yet possible as it was with NWN1. So for something like that you will need to wait a while. That is one reason why servers are now putting several floors/areas into one area to save on room and what not.
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Post by crabbypatty on May 26, 2008 1:43:43 GMT -5
True, but perhaps if dynamic actions for all usable house objects are run through a single On_Used script that differentiates between the objects being used, then you are left with a single, though larger script. I'm not sure what the comparison between the impact of script size vs script quantity is on server load, but I believe it is a considerable solution. I know it will definitely free up many resources if the module is running too many.
And it doesn't matter who designs the home if ultimately it's going to be a part of the module and contribute to module size. However, allowing players to purchase there own items to place wherever they desire means all the module builder has to do is make empty prefab areas, and provide the objects/furniture that can be purchased and placed.
I just really feel like there is no fun to be had by owning a home that has no functionality.
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