LOL j/k with Warcraft 3 Maps, That's So 2003

Whoops! So yeah, sike on the Warcraft 3 map. I'll probably still continue working on it, but the big kids that sit at the big kid table during Thanksgiving use the Neverwinter Nights Toolset, and woo boy that toolset is off the troutscale.

Where in Warcraft I'm happliy plunking down NPCs and creating nifty little If/Then statements in the trigger editor, NWN2 requires that you actually code the location of every shrub in binary. Like ones and zeros: 0001010 0110010010 10010 1001.

That was a joke, but yeah...

It's much more advanced, and by more advanced I mean you just write code. That's cool, I'll figure it out. I kinda had a few cool ideas for my WC3 map, though, so will probably go back to that once in a while when I want to stab myself in the face. Playing with Legos is fun, and relaxing!

In the end, it's a better experience, and a true test of whether or not I can learn a new piece of software (and scripting language) on demand. I was kinda fudging it with WC3, as I already knew my way around the editor, I was just digging deeper. With NWN, I'm Alladin on the magic carpet, converting Integers into Strings, and singing A WHOLE NEW WORRRLLLDDD!!!

I keep going back to my basic principle of having multiple keys to unlock a final showdown, and I keep realizing that I'm horrible at single player RPGs. I kinda click around randomly, and in NWN that means I'm pulling up the inspect menu every time I want to attack something. Plus NWN is totally hax! You can just make your dude level whatever with whatever gear that has plus whatever stats. Oh, sure you honestly earned the Uber Duber Sword of the Tuber Luber. Riiight. You didn't just make a module that was like 'zone in, loot sword, award myself 10 zillion XP woohoo!'. How do I tune for that? Just throw random mobs around and assume the guy is gimping himself to make it a challenge? How does that even work? In WC3 I could assume players started as level 1, and the longer they played, the harder mobs got. Hmm... more to figure out, I guess.

Oh, well. At the end of today, having spent about 6-7 hours poring over tutorials, I've got my basic plotline set up. It's a dungeon crawl, set up in an underground lair. The town above has been wiped out by an undead army set loose by a doctor whose son had died in an accident. He dabbled in a bit of the ol' dark magics to bring him back to life, and was exiled. He fled to a nearby cave and at night would come and dig up the dead from the graveyard, enlisting these dead as his workforce to burrow under the town directly.

Over time he's perfected his craft, and connected his underground network of tunnels to come up through the outhouses above ground (mmm... stinky zombies....).

They made quick work of the town, and you've been called in to put him and his son down for good. Upon entering the outhouse, you travel down into the first level of his lair, and find a scroll on a table facing three doors...

Long have I toiled alone, undergrounds,
while the fools on the surface make their day and night rounds.

With many ways in and many ways out,
I labor in silence; in my mind is no doubt.

That I'll soon have my vengenace, my will will be done,
the dead will rerise, as before did my son.

They mocked me well then, but the day will soon be
when they cower before the new powers that be.

Should you seek me out, hero, here in my lair,
the path is quite simple, just down every stair.

I await your appearance on low level five,
preferably dead, although if you're alive...

My minions await fresh additions like you,
but I'll leave special hints, so your path may be true.

Before you is three doors, a plain simple sight;
going right you'll be left, going left you'll be right.

But then of those two, which will you desire?
The cold stone of death, or the warmth of life's fire?



...more coming later, but this one is gonna take a while...