Blades of Avernum

freelunch · Post by **freelunch** » Tue Nov 16, 2004 8:14 am

I've fooled a little with Spiderweb's Avernum games but never played them seriously, now I'm considering picking up Blades of Avenum largely for the editor.

the only RPG creating I've ever done has been for pen and paper systems and I have absolutley no coding experience or aptitude - if anyone here has used the Blades of Avernum editor I'd appreciate your thoughts on how idiot-friendly it is. ideally I'd like to be able to create a town and a basic dungeon in a couple of hours - if that's not going to be possible I'll never have enough time to make something bigger.

Peacedog · Post by **Peacedog** » Tue Nov 16, 2004 9:06 am

the only RPG creating I've ever done has been for pen and paper systems and I have absolutley no coding experience or aptitude - if anyone here has used the Blades of Avernum editor I'd appreciate your thoughts on how idiot-friendly it is. ideally I'd like to be able to create a town and a basic dungeon in a couple of hours - if that's not going to be possible I'll never have enough time to make something bigger.

Doing the layouts is fairly easy. You could create a decent sized town and dungeon in that time.

However, to give things "life" will take longer. Monster & treasure placement is a snap. giving your towns people, or putting in special encounters, takes effort and does require using AvernumScript, the custom scripting language Vogel created. AvernumScript isn't difficult to comprehend, but I'm not sure you'll be able to do what you want with BoA.

freelunch · Post by **freelunch** » Tue Nov 16, 2004 6:03 pm

I'm scared of "scripting" - maybe it isn't for me.

DireAussie · Post by **DireAussie** » Wed Nov 17, 2004 3:19 am

From my very brief look at scripting, it looks as though if you know how to program in C then it will be very straightforward. So it probably isnt for you

Peacedog · Post by **Peacedog** » Wed Nov 17, 2004 8:03 am

Yeah, it's very much C based, syntactically speaking. There isn't any thing like NN's "conversation editor" (though I don't mind saying I wasn't crazy about the interface there) - everything must be done in script, and hand coded.

Andy, you could still populate a dungeon with treasure, monsters, etc. I believe there is a generic town you can load up, but AFAIK you can't even do any shoping without some basic scripting. So you'd have nothing to do with all of your hard earned loot.

Meghan · Post by **Meghan** » Wed Nov 17, 2004 8:40 am

Try Morrowind's construction set. You don't need scripting for that (although it's there if you want it.)

Here's a site with whole collection of MW tutorials. Scroll down until you get to the "Editor" section and start with Dragonsong's "My First Room" guide. It's got a brief section on skinning and scripting at the end but you can just skim that part.

Regarding NPC's and quests and dialog, try Scott Fisher's tuts in the "NPC" section.

For a better guide to skinning, you'll want Srikandi's guideand also Dave Humphrey's NIF texture tool. (There's a link in the guide.) Also at Sri's there's an Index to every item in the construction set. It will save you mucho time.

It will probably take a few days to get comfortable with all that but once you are it's very simple.

freelunch · Post by **freelunch** » Wed Nov 17, 2004 8:54 am

I spent several hours of slack-jawed stupor in front of the Morrowind editor when it was first released and couldn't make any sense of it. then my PC died so I grabbed the GOTY X-BOX version and gave away my PC Tribunal. I could probably get it running now though...

Peacedog · Post by **Peacedog** » Wed Nov 17, 2004 9:03 am

It will probably take a few days to get comfortable with all that but once you are it's very simple.

Yes, but it has that one unfortunate issue, namely that it makes things for morrowind.

freelunch · Post by **freelunch** » Wed Nov 17, 2004 9:10 am

I like Morrowind, though I'd prefer to build for a game with turn-based combat and a party of PCs.

Gizah · Post by **Gizah** » Wed Nov 17, 2004 10:51 am

How cool would a Temple of Elemental Evil game editor have been?

Damn.

Dirt · Post by **Dirt** » Wed Nov 17, 2004 1:16 pm

Will they be making another game with the TOEE engine?

Gizah · Post by **Gizah** » Wed Nov 17, 2004 3:20 pm

I hope so, but I haven't heard any buzz on that.

Meghan · Post by **Meghan** » Wed Nov 17, 2004 7:14 pm

Didn't Arcanum have an editor? I seem to recall it was rather painful ...

It will probably take a few days to get comfortable with all that but once you are it's very simple.
Yes, but it has that one unfortunate issue, namely that it makes things for morrowind.

Oh hush your mouth - it's a whole other game these days, you know. You haven't lived until a naked, anatomically correct, orc comes tearing at you.

Peacedog · Post by **Peacedog** » Wed Nov 17, 2004 7:17 pm

Didn't Arcanum have an editor? I seem to recall it was rather painful ...

I don't recall, though the game did get modded. Maybe they released certain tools.

Oh hush your mouth - it's a whole other game these days, you know. You haven't lived until a naked, anatomically correct, orc comes tearing at you.

Who I can then slice and dice with that crappy combat system.

And honestly, what makes an orc anatomically correct? Who makes that decision? I reject any such mod on the grounds that it implies orcs that are not like its own orcs are inferior. Those orcs are just as good as the mod's Uber-Orcs.

Meghan · Post by **Meghan** » Wed Nov 17, 2004 8:04 pm

I was being facetious but ... *cough* anatomically correct orcs and their friends. NSFW, mostly because you wouldn't want to have to try and explain it.

The Better Bodies team decided that when they were going to redo things, they were going to do it right and do it like adults.

You didn't ask, but Orcs in TES are actually elves. They were followers of Trinimac, a mythic champion of the first race of elves who slew Lorkhan, the trickster spirit who convinced the immortal priaml spirits to create the mortal world, thus severing themselves from their divine and immortal connection. Trinimac ripped out Lorkhan's heart and the last games have revolved around finding the heart, an artifact of world shattering power. (The elves want to end the world although they don't discuss this much and hopefully return to their divine path. Theoretically, they'd say.) Anyway, the original elves were arguing over how they should live in the new mortal world and a movment had started to follow the Prophet Veloth who thought the elves were becoming weepy and mopey. Trinimac and the other elves (the Aldmeri) opposed Veloth's teachings. (Veloth was prompted by the daedra lords.) The Daedra Prince Boethiah ate Trinimac, and while he was being digested, his followers were changed into the shape they have now. Boethiah eventually ..., er, relieved himself, of Trinimac and the, er, remains became the Daedra god Malacath (god of the scorned and oppressed.) Trinimac's followers who had been twisted by his suffering became known as the Orsimer and still rever Malacath. All of this understandably took the heart out of the Aldmeri opposition and Veloth and his followers hoofed it. They became the Chimer until they were cursed by Azura and changed into the Dunmer, were the events in MW pick up the tale.

Look for the Heart of Lorkhan to feature in Oblivion, set in part int he Daedra realms. I love this series.

So that's what an anatomically correct TES Orc is all about. Didn't Tolkien make up the word?

Mr. Fed · Post by **Mr. Fed** » Wed Nov 17, 2004 8:47 pm

Peacedog wrote:And honestly, what makes an orc anatomically correct? Who makes that decision?

Internet "subject matter experts."