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[Thothie]

...and... Yet another patch fails to come in on time (something about writing a thesis on CRPG systems for MSS, no doubt.)

Not too far from done though - mostly just need to finish populating this last huge map - a combination of Dridje's and Joe!'s work - gotta whip up another boss or two for it yet too. Plus another 35 tier item.

As far as things to look forward to: vastly increased Galat Storage chest capacity, no more slow down for memorized spell prep, no more monsters derping when players duck in shallow water, splicing The_Wall in two, fixed the level cap bug, and a few thousand other minor changes.

Barring any other work thrown my way (knock on wood), maybe I'll look into starting on the long overdue magic system revamp after this next patch.

 

[zeus9860]

Not too far from done though - mostly just need to finish populating this last huge map - a combination of Dridje's and Joe!'s work - gotta whip up another boss or two for it yet too. Plus another 35 tier item.

splicing The_Wall in two

What do you mean with this? You are going to split the_wall in 2 maps now?

maybe I'll look into starting on the long overdue magic system revamp after this next patch.

Woohoo, thats going to be +1 awesome compared to polearms release

 

[CrazyMonkeyDude]

splicing The_Wall in two

What do you mean with this? You are going to split the_wall in 2 maps now?

To minimize crashing.

Although now you'll probably see everyone join in as soon as it hits the_wall2 unless it gets locked first

 

[zeus9860]

Although now you'll probably see everyone join in as soon as it hits the_wall2 unless it gets locked first

Fffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffff. I hate when this happens, lodagond lures way too many newbies to get free lewt...
I still hope rewards system in that map remains the same though

 

[Thothie]

It's gauntlet'ed, so yes, you will need to hit The_Wall1 before you hit The_Wall2 (actually, it's just "The_Wall" and "The_Wall2", to avoid confuzzionz/wasted file space). Same reward set - though I had to tweak the scripts a bit to get it to work this way - it's a bit funky as Velend and his elven pimp-squad are on both maps - the entrance back into the wall collapses on the second map, sparing the overhead of everything from the entry all the way to the halls just past The Cold One (and visa-versa on The_Wall1). Hopefully this will make it all much more stable. Don't need any funky compile params for either half, at least.

Forsuth's reward is damage point dependent, and Velend's rewards require the Telf heads, which are also damage point dependent, so shouldn't be too much of an issue with sharks. Worst case scenario is someone more bad-ass than you manages to join just as The_Wall2 starts, and steals your fire in Forsuth's eyes.

The extra chests are individualized, so newbies might get something out of them, but not much.

 

[zeus9860]

Worst case scenario is someone more bad-ass than you manages to join just as The_Wall2 starts, and steals your fire in Forsuth's eyes.

Hahahaha, would like to see that happen!

Guess it's still all good then, other than possibly wasting a few more potions but it's no big deal i guess. :roll:

 

[Dridmar]

Hey Thoth, is there any chance of the patch being released before Judgement Day?

 

[J-M v2.5.5]

 

[Thothie]

Meh, silly Europeans have no right to complain about religious nuts. You have NO idea. ><

Hey Thoth, is there any chance of the patch being released before Judgement Day?

Gods... I've been in BFE so much of the time lately, both physically and internet-wise, and am likely going to continue to be so for most of the remainder of the month. I should start hauling around the big laptop (instead of the netbook) as it can actually run MSC - however, my experience is that Steam's "offline mode" only works once in a blue moon, and you need to connect to the net between sessions, at least. *sigh* I really need to invest in a 4G phone and hack up it for use as a hotspot. Then again, it's not like I've had the extra time when I have been out there. :\

There's really not much left to do though... Just need to populate some chests... Attach Idelmark and Orcfor proper, and maybe make an NPC trans for Deralia sewers. Some testing would be nice as well. If I get half the chance, maybe I can at least get us an alpha pack up for testing in the next few days, as it's far enough along for it.

 

[Thothie]

Barring anything bizarre cropping up, and I've no bug reports on the alpha, patch tomorrow, maybe.

 

[Stoned]

Barring anything bizarre cropping up, and I've no bug reports on the alpha, patch tomorrow, maybe.

 

[Thothie]

FN going down pending update...

 

[Thothie]

FN is back up...

...and the patch is up IN THE USUAL SPOT...

I bet you want a changelog here or something, don't you? Well F*CK YOU VHLT, F*CK YOU!

Changelog tomorrow...

Main things, for now:
- Level Cap 45 is working
- Galat Bank Storage Chest extended (extremely)
- The Wall chopped into The_Wall and The_Wall2
- Deraliasewers (semi-self adjusting, medium to hard)

- Idemarks_Tower connected via orc_for and Keledrosprelude2
- Orc_For connected via Thornlands (Bloodrose via Orc_For - although not the otherway around, atm)
- Deraliasewers can be reached by NPC in Deralia.

RKS servers in process of updating... We've kept RKS up just for this, so everyone give him a hug! :|

 

[zeus9860]

YAY IM FIRST.

Are there any new items this patch?

 

[Thothie]

Yes, two... Go find them... (Changelog tomorrow.)

BTW - I put the Thothie server up, but I'm under a new ISP. I have more up bandwidth, but the turnaround is not as good as it used to be apparently... Also my HLDS isn't keep its affinity anymore... Hopefully the lag is better now than initially reported though. :/

[Reiterate for page bump:]

...and the patch is up IN THE USUAL SPOT...

Changelog tomorrow...

Main things, for now:
- Level Cap 45 is working
- Galat Bank Storage Chest extended (extremely)
- The Wall chopped into The_Wall and The_Wall2
- Deraliasewers (semi-self adjusting, medium to hard)

- Idemarks_Tower connected via orc_for and Keledrosprelude2
- Orc_For connected via Thornlands (Bloodrose via Orc_For - although not the otherway around, atm)
- Deraliasewers can be reached by NPC in Deralia.
- Dragooncaves stabilized.

RKS servers in process of updating... We've kept RKS up just for this, so everyone give him a hug! :|

PS. I noticed someone managed to smash my server on Deraliaservers - near the forest start, as best as I can tell. Find key, open door, go 2 forest - if server dies there, give me a heads up - there's a few possibilities. G2G now... :\

 

[J-M v2.5.5]

RKS #8, #9, #10 and #11 are running VAC

 

[PY004]

RKS #8, #9, #10 and #11 are running VAC

RKS #8, #9, #10 and #11 no longer running VAC [/

 

[Stoned]

PS. I noticed someone managed to smash my server on Deraliaservers - near the forest start, as best as I can tell. Find key, open door, go 2 forest - if server dies there, give me a heads up - there's a few possibilities. G2G now... :\

Guilty....

 

[Thothie]

Hey... Looksie...


JUN2011a PUBLIC CHANGELOG:


Some assembly required...

New Maps

• Deralia Sewers (deraliasewers, NPC trans) [semi-self adjusting, Medium-Hard] - An extensive set of tunnels running beneath the human capital and to parts beyond.
- Deralia lost yet another construction crew down here recently. You can find your way here by asking around town.
- Features a "VHLT" lighting compile. (Although, as VHLT maybe affecting stability, we may undo this.)

Map Updates

• The Wall (the_wall, disconnected) [v.hard] - Has been broken up into The_Wall (disconnected) and The_Wall2 (gauntlet) for the sake of stability. It has also be re-lighted via VHLT.

• keledrosprelude2 [medium] - now has a transition to Idemarks_Tower, and visa versa.

• orc_for [self adjusting, easy-v.hard] - now connects via Thornlands, sitting between the classic map and Bloodrose. It now also connects properly to Idemarks_Tower. There are, however, no return transitions to orc_for from either Bloodrose or Idemarks, at the moment (they still return to Thornlands and Keledrosprelude2, accordingly.)

• dragooncaves [medium] - has been stripped and recompiled for stability... Unfortunately just after the release for this patch, it turns that it also now fails to load on DS servers. Will remedy...

• catacombs [self adjusting, medium to hard, disconnected] - Some re-balancing, and entity stripping for stability.

Other Changes
• The Galat Wondrous Chest has had its storage capacity increased more than three fold. (Anywhere from 60 to 100+ items.)
- Beware that a very stuffed chest may take some time to load when withdrawing items.
• Memorized tome spells will no longer cause slow down during preparation. (Thank Orochi!)
• Weakened the Goblin Pouncer, as folks seem to be having trouble rescuing other players from him.

Nerflog
• The Portuguese bucket has had a bit of a boost.
• Orc_For chests rendered a bit kinder to smaller parties, in some ways.
• Heavy Crossbow reload time increased 50%

Bug Fixes
• Galat Wondrous Chest should no longer lock out other players when full. It will also not allow you to attempt to withdraw items when your inventory is full.
• Scrolls will not cast when inventory is full (to prevent their loss).
• Land based monsters can now attack players hiding in water.
• Added crash prevention for item/monster display names and descriptions being too long.
- You may see some names or descriptions being cropped off though.
• Dragonaxe flames should come out at roughly the right height (seems we changed the bone order on the player models at some point.)
• And the usual 10,000 bug fixes and minor changes I'm not bothering to list.

Spoiler Section Begin



New Items:
• Earth Breaker [35, bluntarms] - Massive Dark Damage hammer, can generate a damaging stun wave when striking the ground fully charged that also repels opponents.

• Helm of Venom - Provides 25% acid and poison resistance. The helm itself looks kinda neat, but sadly clashes with the rest of our equipment no end. Also, I'm kinda open for ideas as to something else to do with it. >_>

New Critters:

• monsters/abomination_venom - Venomous Bone Abomination [hard]
- This beastie is similar to the first incarnation of the Bone Abomination, but better for open spaces, featuring a charge attack, a poison burst, venom and fire breath, while lacking the lightning shield of his predecessor.

• monsters/shambler1 - Shambler [medium]
- Not new, per-say, but previously unused. This god-awful model has been reskinned, but there's really no hope for it. ^_^ Straight forward swamp monster, walks up and hits you, sometimes with considerable knock back. The last of the scripts created by our dear departed Shurik3n.

• monsters/shambler2 - Greater Shambler [hard]
- Bigger version of the same beastie, same author.

• monsters/swampeye - Swamp Eye [medium]
- This is a stationary, worm-like monster, best placed in shallow water, that raises up and blasts anything it sees with an eye beam. It can also swipe with its claws. Yes, the model is totally ripped - but sven stole it first so...

• monsters/demonwing_venom - Demonwing [medium]
- This is the venomous variant of the Demonwing, based on the Firebat Half-life model (fair game IMO, it being base engine material). When I say "variant", put it in finger-quotes, as there is no other version, at the moment. It flies about with a semi-aggressive pattern similar to the grav-fly horrors. It can spit projectiles, in addition to having a pretty mean bite and evasive tactics.
- Additional Parameters: set_no_ceiling_idle
- By default, the Demonwing starts stuck to the ceiling and will only come down when it hears or spots nearby prey. It will also return to the ceiling after slaying its victim, if it perceives no further threats. This prevents that behavior, which maybe useful if you have your Demonwing under a sky brush or such. (As he'd look odd sticking to the sky.)

• monsters/slime_green_large - Large Green Slime [medium]
- This big green slime can toss projectiles at multiple targets, and generates a poison cloud periodically, as well as when destroyed. Unlike its smaller cousins, this one beast is purely aggressive (Not really new, but the previous version failed to function.)

• monsters/slime_green_huge - Huge Green Slime [medium]
- Bigger, meaner variant of same thing with more rapid attacks.

• deraliasewers/mummy_warrior2b - Mummified Flame Guard [hard]
- This is a nerfed version of the standard Flame Guard for use as a final boss under the medium variant of Deraliasewers.

• other/keyhole_sewer - Sewer Maintenance Keyhole
- Not a monster, obviously, but here for reference. Needless to say, takes Sewer Maintenance Keys (item_key_sewer). Triggers "ustart" upon receipt.


Spoiler Section End

Ye Download (75.6MB):
MSC Official Downloads Page

 

[Thothie]

Here's a quick fix for Dragooncaves:
DragoonCaves
Either version will work on FN, however, clients with different maps will get the usual Map Doesn't Match Server's error.

Do not ask me why I am posting this in two places.

 

[PY004]

Do I have to update the servers with this?

 

[Thothie]

I knew I forgot to do something... Yeah, meant to send that to you. Sever's will need that to run Dragooncaves. Clients will need it for the map to match up.

 

[Jonzay]

Why wasn't the severe reload speed /movement penalty during reload applied to the heavy crossbow mentioned in the nerflog?

 

[Thothie]

Didn't change the movement (couldn't if I wanted to). The reload time still doesn't seem to be getting enough time to finish its animation though, may need to drag that out a bit more, not sure.

 

[Thothie]

MAPPERS:

If your map is going *poof* when you run it, and you can't figure out why because of the "clean exit" function, check the log_msdll.log (and maybe the log_cldll.log). It will usually contain the reason for the abrupt exit at the end.

I'll probably make some ms_clean_exit cvar and default it to 1 next patch. I just hope the game can read the cvar while in error state. Not sure how I'm going to test that though. >_>

Also, while I fiddle with the spells, I'll keep a backup of the items folder (where the spells are), so that if you have a map that needs scripts ready before I'm done (as hopefully someone will), we'll be able to release it in an interim patch, without having to wait until the spell system is ready.