Good place to find modders who want a challenge...?

[BlackJax]

Hey guys,

While I have the Xbox version of Morrowind: GOTY, I have decided to get the PC version so that I can edit my own levels and whatnot.

I recently came up with a game improving idea that should be possible for modders who are familiar with tweaking and scripting. Obviously that's well beyond me, so I wanted to know where a good community of modders might be located who are looking for a challenge?

The basic premise of my mod idea is to basically modify the alchemy engine as a separate entity to allow the creation of bows and weapons, which would have additional material makeups, upgrades, and variable levels of enchantment potential. It would also require the addition of a new skill and would allow multiple levels of combination, all of which are showcased to some extent in Morrowind and the GOTY expansions in their unmodified state.

If you can recommend a community that would be most appropriate for this type of specific request, or if you are a modder who wants a challenge, please let me know!

Thanks,

Blackjax

[mr_sir]

There are a couple of members on this site who make mods. Try contacting Magelord648 as I know he has been creating a few mods lately and may be able to help you find a modding community.

[ch85us2001]

I'm resident Scripter.

Worship me.


Some of that's possible, and some of it's not.

It couldn't use the alchemy engine. One could be built to work similar though.

New Skills can't be added, though Math Formulas can be used with Globals.

The stats of equipment aren't editable through script. You would have to have many different copies of each item.


Any questions?


EDIT @ Mr Sir --- Magelord doesn't know scripts. Fable has limited knowledge, but he doesn't know syntax.

[BlackJax]

THanks. I'll give him a try!

-Blackjax

[ch85us2001]

THanks. I'll give him a try!

-Blackjax

See my Edit

Code: Select all

Begin ItemConstruct

Short Construct

Short Number

Shrt DoOnce

If (OnActivate == 1 )
     Set Number To ( Construct + Random, 25 )
Endif

If ( Number == 1 )
If ( GetItemCount "Ingredient" == 1 )
If ( DoOnce == 1 )
     Player->AddItem "Item1"
     Player->RemoveItem "Ingredient", 1
endif
endif

If ( Number == 2 )
If ( GetItemCount "Ingredient" == 1 )
If ( DoOnce == 1 )
     Player->AddItem "Item2"
     Player->RemoveItem "Ingredient", 1
endif
endif

If ( Number == 3 )
If ( GetItemCount "Ingredient" == 1 )
If ( DoOnce == 1 )
     Player->AddItem "Item1"
     Player->RemoveItem "Ingredient", 1
endif
endif

That would need tweaking.

[BlackJax]

ch85us2001,

What I was wanting specifically was a combination of materials that could be used with specialized tools that will make certain weapons. The value of these materials makes them harder to combine, requiring expensive weapons to be made with a high level of training. Specifically, I was wanting to see if it would be possible to have a person's skill and the type of material they are working with multiply by a component of their luck to create variable enchantment point levels on different weapons. However, from what you're saying, enchantment capacity can't be randomized like that? Any idea why they put that sort of limitation in?

Thanks,

Blackjax

[BlackJax]

ch85us2001,

Who does know scripts then?

-Jeremy

[ch85us2001]

Me.


See above.


MWSL has a lot of stupid limits and bugs in it. No reason why.

You could do it, but it would use about a hundred different items, all with differents settings.

[wing]

You could do it, but it would use about a hundred different items, all with differents settings.

I think that's one of the "challenge" parts.

[ch85us2001]

I think that's one of the "challenge" parts.

It's not really a challenge, it's just drone work.

The script is the challenge.

[BlackJax]

ch85us2001 response...

ch85us2001,

Okay. So let's simplify this and see if I have the overall idea down and then you can tell me if you know anyone crazy enough to help me mod the specifics.

Rather than trying to make a mini-game that lets you make any type of weapons, lets restrict it specifically to archery, as there is less variance in bows aside from points and materials.

Because we can't create a new skillset for 'Bowery', we'll have the 'Armorer' skillset govern this craft. Next we need to decide which tools would be appropriate for the player to have to collect. From a realistic perspective, the things a bow maker would need would be: a carving knife, a tillering string, a lathe, and a vise. (Technically, they should need a forge for working on any sort of metal bows, but that's borrowing way too much trouble!)

So, once the player has his building kit assembled, he will need to have materials for each of the types of bows to be made: Chitin, Wood, Iron, Steel, Bonemold, Glass, & Ebony. For each of these to be built, he needs ten pieces of the requisite item and he needs to have a Armorer skill at least high enough to have a chance of making the item. Say, at least a 10 for Chitin, a 20 for Wood, a 30 for Iron, a 40 for Steel, a 50 for bonemold, a 60 for glass, and a 70 for Ebony. Each time he tries to make something, his strength and Armorer's skill determines if he is successful. However, we want there to be able to be a variable enchant poiint system, so there should be three possible bows for each material: one at the normal enchantment points, one a little higher, and one a lot higher. Luck factors dominantly in selecting which bow is made, with you only have a chance at the third type of bow if you're over 65 in your luck.

From there, I would like to give the player two other options to further improve his bow. The first is to split the bow and put sinew between the two halves, so that, when glued back together, the bow is now a composite bow and has twice the power. (Of course, there would be a fifty/fifty chance that you would destroy your bow doing this.) And the final upgrade, would be to attach a grand soul gem to your bow, which would further upgrade your enchantment point potential. If we make each upgrade sequential (you can't add a grand soul gem UNLESS you've first made a composite bow), then we only have to have 9 bows per material. That would yield only 63 bows that we would need to set up. (Of course, we would need to actually have pieces of chitin, bonemold, wood, and iron scattered around for players to collect.) Additionally, if we only allowed compositing to be an option on the organics of chitin, wood, and ebony, then that would further reduce the number of bows required.

The last thing I would want to do would involve making arrows with 20 pieces of a given material, which would yield a hundred arrows and which would have a set enchantment level (rather than a variable one) based on its material. We would then want to mod the enchanting ability so that a lump of 100 arrows could be enchanted like a normal weapon, but at a pretty hefty price.

Does that sound doable? If so, do you know someone who would be willing to set it up?

Thanks,

Blackjax

[ch85us2001]

That's perfectly DoAble. But you can have another Skill Govern it, it just won't show up on the Stats menu. It will be a global variable.


I would really love to try it, maybe have Magey work on all the bow building while I do the scripts. Unfortunately, I have some personal things to take care of until at least the middle of next week. Plus Drag Racing on top of that, plus Drivers Ed on top of that, so it would be iffy.

So, I could do it, but it would probably be 3-4 weeks (Which isnt all that long a dev cycle, but I could do it quicker without all these distractions.)

Have a nice day,
Chu

[Magelord648]

I will accept your challange if Chu accepts with me. I'll even have a go at some meshes for you as I have recently aquired some free but complicated software. This mod could be a good way for me to know the software.

[Raven_Song]

Dosen't the Ultimate Ranger mod already allow you to craft bows, arrows and such?

[Magelord648]

Yes but in a different way.

[Magelord648]

ch85us2001,

Okay. So let's simplify this and see if I have the overall idea down and then you can tell me if you know anyone crazy enough to help me mod the specifics.

Rather than trying to make a mini-game that lets you make any type of weapons, lets restrict it specifically to archery, as there is less variance in bows aside from points and materials.

Because we can't create a new skillset for 'Bowery', we'll have the 'Armorer' skillset govern this craft. Next we need to decide which tools would be appropriate for the player to have to collect. From a realistic perspective, the things a bow maker would need would be: a carving knife, a tillering string, a lathe, and a vise. (Technically, they should need a forge for working on any sort of metal bows, but that's borrowing way too much trouble!)

So, once the player has his building kit assembled, he will need to have materials for each of the types of bows to be made: Chitin, Wood, Iron, Steel, Bonemold, Glass, & Ebony. For each of these to be built, he needs ten pieces of the requisite item and he needs to have a Armorer skill at least high enough to have a chance of making the item. Say, at least a 10 for Chitin, a 20 for Wood, a 30 for Iron, a 40 for Steel, a 50 for bonemold, a 60 for glass, and a 70 for Ebony. Each time he tries to make something, his strength and Armorer's skill determines if he is successful. However, we want there to be able to be a variable enchant poiint system, so there should be three possible bows for each material: one at the normal enchantment points, one a little higher, and one a lot higher. Luck factors dominantly in selecting which bow is made, with you only have a chance at the third type of bow if you're over 65 in your luck.

From there, I would like to give the player two other options to further improve his bow. The first is to split the bow and put sinew between the two halves, so that, when glued back together, the bow is now a composite bow and has twice the power. (Of course, there would be a fifty/fifty chance that you would destroy your bow doing this.) And the final upgrade, would be to attach a grand soul gem to your bow, which would further upgrade your enchantment point potential. If we make each upgrade sequential (you can't add a grand soul gem UNLESS you've first made a composite bow), then we only have to have 9 bows per material. That would yield only 63 bows that we would need to set up. (Of course, we would need to actually have pieces of chitin, bonemold, wood, and iron scattered around for players to collect.) Additionally, if we only allowed compositing to be an option on the organics of chitin, wood, and ebony, then that would further reduce the number of bows required.

The last thing I would want to do would involve making arrows with 20 pieces of a given material, which would yield a hundred arrows and which would have a set enchantment level (rather than a variable one) based on its material. We would then want to mod the enchanting ability so that a lump of 100 arrows could be enchanted like a normal weapon, but at a pretty hefty price.

Does that sound doable? If so, do you know someone who would be willing to set it up?

Thanks,



Blackjax

Ok. Lets get picky. Enchanting ability on the arrows should just be the same as the arrows that come with the game. That would mean no more IDs so the scripts can be written while I work on the bows etc. This would mean that all arrows have the same enchantment value but no one really enchants arrows any way.

Next, resources. Glass and ebony already exist in the game so no more work would need to be done unless you want then to be refined.
Iron would have to be mined and refined but iron would be useless to make bows as it has no spring. I think that should be crossed out.
Chitin as you should know is made from insect shells. The only one that jumps to mind is the shalk.We could put shells into the shalks inventory. The player would then have to be took to an NPC who will proccess the shell. (for a price.)

Just some ideas.

[BlackJax]

Awesome...!

Mage & ch85us2001,

Very cool. Thanks a lot!

Comment to ch85us2001,

Three-four weeks isn't a problem, as that's going to be about the time that I'm going to have had a chance to mess around with the PC version myself.

Will the script be understandable enough to someone with very basic programming experience (I dabbled in basic and do refine and tweak JavaaScript) to add additional bows down the road? I figure that if we want to give folks an even greater feeling of variability, I could create some additional bows for each material as an upgrade down the road, if it's not too complicated to modify the coding.

In answer to your questions, Mage:

1) Good point about iron. What if we put in a new material: Ivory. It's an organic and it's technically doable. (We could also do adamantium, but the fewer metal bows, the less unrealistic this becomes without a forge! *smile* I even thought of ice, but felt that would be more unrealistic still! *grin*) While in the real world, it comes from elephants, we could have it come from tusked Gwars in the game. (I think those are the correct ones.) This would be more powerful than bonemold, but not as powerful as glass.

2) Chitin makes sense to come form shalks. I like the fact that the player has to get it processed by an NPC.

3) Maybe have Bonemold as a derivative of bones that could be found on skeletons. This can then be processed by an NPC to create workable bonemold.

4) Glass and steel should have to be processed by an NPC, as well, as players can only scrounge up scrap metal and raw glass.

5) We would need to get sinew for combining with the bow to create a composite, which comes off the tendons of most animals in the real world. In the real world, you have to take those tendons and shred them. As such, we could have the tendons show up on nix-hounds and scamps. These pieces are then taken to an NPC who will shred them into sinew for the player. Sinew can also be woven into a bow string, so we could have two parts of bowcrafting where the player needs sinew.

6) Final question: This is about arrows. I was thinking about it after my post and it would be cool if each version of arrows could have two types: the basic and ultra-enchantable. The ultra-enchantable arrows would be made like normal arrows (combining 20 pieces of material, 10 clif-racer plumes, and 3 pieces of scrap metal) but, instead of the scrap metal, they would have one different ingredient: 20 Greater Soul Gems. The implication is that the points of these sharp soul gems are broken down and used as arrowheads, which substantially increases the enchantment potential. This makes for a costly arrow and one that is more difficult to create successfully, but would be very rewarding to players who go all the way with these. (Imagine a napalm-style arrow or 100 Unlock arrow or whatever.) This would be a total of 14 arrows (two for each type of material.)

7) One clarification on arrows as they currently exist (to the best of my understanding). You had mentioned something about arrows being enchanted the way they normally are in the game. Actually, without mods, none of the enchanters will enchant arrows in the normal game or GOTY versions. Even with the current mods, I've heard they only enchant arrows one at a time, which is why the ability to create and then, later, enchant a sheaf of 100 arrows at a time would be such a great improvement.

Thanks and let me know if any of the ideas in this post aren't doable. Right now, I'm just giving out ideas that I think would be rocking cool!

Thanks,

BlackJax

[BlackJax]

Additional idea...

Hey ch85us2001 & Magelord648,

I appreciate you both being willing to craft this entire mod from scratch. However, I ran across a mod out there that seems like it would be a good one to work off and expand upon, as it already allows you to craft a lot of items and provides a lot of materials for such crafting. (It's called "Morrowind Crafting" at: Morrowind Crafting - Planet Elder Scrolls)

Our ideas wouldn't replace most of their ideas, but, like I said, could easily be a nice expansion to it. (The mod already allows you to create your own arrows and poison them with potions, so we wouldn't need to recreate the ability to make basic arrows if we work off this mod, though the enchantable arrows with the shards of Greater Soul Gem arrowheads would be a big difference.) The specific differences I see are:

1) Changeable enchant point values on the bows you make
2) The ability to make more powerful or more echantable bows with additional upgrades
3) The ability to create enchantable arrows with the Greater Soul Gems
4) The ability to enchant arrows in clumps of 100 at a time

Let me know if this is helpful!

Thanks,

Jeremy

[Magelord648]

I know about Morrowind crafting. There is also Corv's ultimate ranger mod. I don't really like the idea of expanding on a mod. I'd prefer to make one from scratch. Chu and I will be able to work everything out.

[Magelord648]

Sorry but chu has left so I do not wish to continue. If you really desperatley want this mod made PM me.