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[Toady One]

So, it has been almost a year since the last Armok release.  The very last post seems to have been on July 22nd.  I Really don't think I'll be able to make a July 22nd deadline, but I'm going to push for it and enjoy all of the things that go wrong along the way.  The dwarf game is still in progress, and it has helped quite a bit with issues that will come up during the Quaint Thorpe version, but I figured I'd give this a try to celebrate the One Year Anniversary of me becoming a lazy-looking dumbass.

[SkeleTony]

I was born a lazy-looking dumbass(except I am really good looking and more of a smartass...still dumb though)!

Anyways...I know you cannot finish the whole game in the next release but here's a few things I think you should shoot for:

1)Full cities and civilisations!

2)NPCS, quests, and such.

3)Magic, psionics, energy weapons and multiplayer.

4)Bump mapped character models and a software mode for those of us who will not be able to run modern 3D games on our PCs.

5)Full scenario and campaign editors!

6)Nekkid elf women!

7)Cash prizes for anyone who manages to slay Armok!

8)The ability to slay Armok.

9)A CD soundtrack by The Misfits(reforming with Danzig just for this project), Ministry, and/or Gwar!

10) Optional CD purchase for those of us without broadband.

11)Cutscenes and decent voice actors!

12)Naked Angelina Jolie running around for no apparent reason!

If you could just get that stuff out with the next release I think you will find finishing the game to be less daunting a task.

[X]

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[Toady One]

Perhaps not so old and bald -- Skeletony's modest plan has been partially realized:

Armok 4.50 ALPHA

[Toady One]

Oh, and that picture...  my last quarter of undergrad I had this giant beard thing.  It just grows if I don't shave it for some reason.  But that was 4 years ago.  Now I am old.

I fixed corpse processing.  Now I'll have the player make things out of rabbit hide, at last.  There aren't any tools or skills for it yet.  I'll think I'll let some of that wait, and just do a basic interface.  Then what...  lots of bugs, armor effects...  I have magic items, combat styles and a universe editor written here.  That was a while ago.  I'm tempted to do that stuff later.  Frankly, this release has been kind of boring to program.  Maybe if I finish it off and start in on the Quaint Thorpe things will go more smoothly.  Let me pare down my documents...  [wanders off]

[The_Ancient_Sleeping_Dude]

How about removing any bugs there might be with the current progress of the dwarves thingie, release it, and call it a demo  

btw, lcs roxxors

[Toady One]

Nah...  I've got too many lingering projects as it is.  Maybe I should start releasing more things that are done (still fixing bugs, of course).  Then I can get on to the others -- there are many more game ideas that still want to see the light of day.

[The_Ancient_Sleeping_Dude]

How about coding Civilazations, fantasy style!

Of course, you would get sued by Sid meiyer or whoever owns the trademark civilazations

[Eagleon]

Test of Time had a fantasy game. Other Civilization games have had it, but I'm biased towards ToT since it felt the most like the original to me, while still adding a lot to it's features.

Oh, and Toady, shamhath! Got me all excited.  

[Toady One]

Master of Magic was a civ rip off that was also a fantasy game.  The AI was crap though.  And I'm not sure if it'll run on XP.

Dude, it had lots of features!  There was only one salaminizer tab on the web, and I had to use the sample from amazon to remind myself of the rhythm since I lost my brother's tape -- yet still, I provided!

[Zonk]

Another(little)rant :-) It's possible that some of these things have been already said, butstill...

STRENGTH: It's strange that we forgot this, but...Would it be possible to give
strength modifiers to specific sets of muscles? So it would be possible to create
creatures that have average strength in their bodies, but incredible strength in

their
jaws/legs/tongue, so they can bite/jump/do strange things very well.
Also, this would probably be much harder to code, but what about "limit strength"
(the maximum of weight that can be moved in a single direction) vs "explosive

strength"?
The latter would be more useful in combat, while the former would help in carrying
big weights.
Also, at the moment, it seems that strength isn't very useful in the game. For

example
a Titan, a 22 meters creature with a Strength of 1100, can't destroy a tree.

MATERIALS: Something that got into my mind...Do matierials curerntly use
their "Oiliness"or "Slipperiness"rating? I think they should: that would be useful
to create creatures
with slick slippery skin that makes blunt weapons and punches slide on, while
making wrestling/grappling VERY difficult.  It might also be possible to have an
"Adhesive"rating, for a glue-covered monster that is hard to kill because
most weapons just get stuck on him.

ANIMATION: Also, are you going to fix the animation for punches? Currently, the
animation for attacking with your hands is pretty silly...

OTHER VARIOUS THINGS:
In the Reactions editor, Pressure and Wind don't work and cause crashes.
Also, I think Enamel Dentine should have an higher Maximum Edge: otherwise,
how can teeths be pointed?

The mottled option doesn't work for materials.

BTW, Toadyone, I think I found something that might be of interest to you:
"GURPS Gulliver". Basically, it's a free GURPS expansion(divided in 8 books)
that details about advanced and VERY realistic rules for creatures and physics
in GURPS...It would not take a lot of work to adapt them to Armok. Some of the
things there you probably already know(like how strength scales with size)

Also...This is more of a question, but...At the moment, are the humanoid bodies
complete? I mean...does everyione have ribs/skulls?

Also, since it's the summer and I suppose everyione has more free time...
Why not use the chat(the one on the site OR on the one on #bay12games I registered)

Also...You don't look old or bald.
And the Armok alpha zip file almost fooled me into thinking it was a release :-(

[Toady One]

We didn't forget about strength -- that's how it was in the beginning, but it was unwieldy to have so many attributes.  It might do to have a species based modifier for the parts though.  There should be something like this.  Naked mole rats have little heads but they can chew through concrete, for example, because a lot of their muscle mass is concentrated there.

Re: the titan, it's more that combat is completely broken.  That's what the combat release (after thorpe) is for.  That release is also scheduled to include animation improvements for everything.

Whoops, there's no way to judge stickiness is there.  I'll add a variable into the cosmetic textures.  Is there anything else missing?  Very few of the material ratings are used now -- most of them are just there for when they'll be needed.  Slipperiness (and now adhesiveness) will probably make their intro, as you suggest, with wrestling, if I have time.

I'll check the pressure and wind bug and try to figure it out, although they haven't been implemented so it won't mean much.

A lot of the texture options (mottling for example) were turned off while I messed with the individual creature models, and I guess I never put them back in.

The E-D edgemax should probably be fairly high, although I'm not sure what the differences are between species in real life.  Some have little needle teeth and others have moderately pointy teeth that can pierce things just because there's a lot of force behind them (us, for example).  Hmmm....  I'm not sure how much you could sharpen a human tooth.  The game should probably look at the dimension and shape of the teeth -- maximum edge refers (I guess) more to how sharp you could make an edge on a tooth if you shaped it, rather than how sharp it can grow in.  The game doesn't analyze the actual shape of the tooth now as it should.

As a general note, just because something is in the editors doesn't mean it does anything.  I tried to add as many variables as I could think of, because it is a real pain to try to add them later when there are a ton of save files that use the older format lying around.  As we all know, the game is very unfinished, so nobody should feel deceived this.

Strength already scales with cross-sectional muscle area in the game...  I found those gurps books on the web and I'll read through them when I can.

Humanoid bodies are very incomplete.  No ribs, not sure about skulls, no stomachs or other alimentary tract organs.

My computer died, so I'll have to get the chat software again.  Whenever I've been on the bay 12 one, it has been empty of course.  If you want, we could organize something for #bay12games say, although I'm not sure what you'd want to talk about.  Mostly, I guess everybody's just waiting on me to put something up, and I'm mostly just squashing bugs and trying to make little rabbit boots.

[Toady One]

I got mIRC working again, and I managed to get back to the bay12 chat area.

[Toady One]

He he he.  Somebody showed up in the bay 12 chatroom while I was doing laundry.  But at least it works.  Unless it times you out or something, I'll be on the WorldIRC channel all day (my day, which lasts for another 11 hours or so).

Now that I have a cable modem, I can just sit online.

[X]

Aha! That was me. I never knew there was a chat feature, how exciting! Was wondering if there is a proper server/#channel I can point my irc to rather than using the mini client on the web site.

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