MrMunkeepants on 1/8/2025 at 02:19
playing on easy I've completed everything except the Get Out objective, but I'm not sure how to do that. I found a mummy but no lava.
there is an emerald hidden in a planter box in the courtyard.
a pair of earrings fell behind a guard's bed.
at the basement entrance is a note about a valuable sword next to a loot sword; it is a decoy. keep looking.
a ring is hidden above the metal shelves in the betting area, though I didn't get an objective for finding one so it could be any ring.
there is something hidden in the chapel rafters. I thought it might be part of a set, but no.
there is a lot of light leak and sound leak in the mansion; the light leak doesn't really affect gameplay, but footsteps can be heard across rooms and floors.
Hucklebarry on 1/8/2025 at 10:53
Quote Posted by MrMunkeepants
there is a lot of light leak and sound leak in the mansion; the light leak doesn't really affect gameplay, but footsteps can be heard across rooms and floors.
You are right. I forgot to go back and look at that because it seemed it was only one-directional. I could hear them, but they couldn't hear me from across the mansion, but could hear if I was close.
Not sure if my previous post was noticed based on when it was approved, because it looks like it went in place, rather than at the end when it was approved, so I'll just mention there is a loot list linked above in the thread.
Quote Posted by MrMunkeepants
playing on easy I've completed everything except the Get Out objective, but I'm not sure how to do that. I found a mummy but no lava.
For the lava:
While it might be tedious, the fire elemental is there for a reason. I was successful in getting him to trigger the lever in one my test runs. I also found that you can make the jump from the wooden beam to the lever, although that wasn't intended, I left it so it's not too annoyingMrMunkeepants on 1/8/2025 at 18:01
audio leaks: the guard in the library started searching while I investigated the dining room. I had left the guard on stage alone, since the room was bright, but triggered an alert when I was climbing the metal shelves in the gambling back room.
key/exit: thank you, I had gotten the key from the chapelbut couldn't find a place to use it even after checking everywhere... not realizing I'd walked past the door several times without noticing the lock :rolleyes:
Hucklebarry on 1/8/2025 at 18:32
Quote Posted by MrMunkeepants
audio leaks: the guard in the library started searching while I investigated the dining room. I had left the guard on stage alone, since the room was bright, but triggered an alert when I was
climbing the metal shelves in the gambling back room.
key/exit: thank you, I had gotten the key from
the chapelbut couldn't find a place to use it even after checking everywhere... not realizing I'd walked past the door several times without noticing the lock :rolleyes:
Yeah, thanks for the heads up. I know why. Horrible mistake on my part. I think I found the worst possible way to set up the mansion layout, and the top floor is one big mess with some overlap from other areas. I'll keep poking at it to see if it's salvageable.
As for the guard in the bright room:
I normally hate it when guards are facing bright spots, but there is a dark shadow to get to the carpet right in front of him, past the door (the stage lights point over that area and leave some shadow). A decently timed jumping KO is pretty easy with a little practice. I made sure I could consistently reproduce it before I left it inI'm curious if that feels kosher from a gameplay standpoint? Or is it bad form?
bjack on 1/8/2025 at 18:48
Thank you Hucklebarry for the link to a loot list. Some nice touches and features, especially for a 1st FM. Well done. I look forward to your next effort. You did pose a challenge and add creative ideas to your FM. It might not be the best visually, but game play was very good.
Minor Critiques:
The light bleed throughs and sound propagation through walls could be addressed, if you wish. I should not be able to hear a burning torch through a solid rock wall. Nor should a guard 30 meters away hear one tiny foot fall through solid walls. For instance, even when I was crouched and moving extremely slowly, if I made one little foot tap, guards far away for go into full alert.
The AI in the mansion seem to be set to a very high awareness level and are extremely sensitive to proximity. The guards became aware of me if I got close, even in silence and complete blackness according to the gem. I could not get within KO distance (even lean forward distance) without them turning around and attacking me. It just seems the AI had some ESP to my presence. Many KOs had to be done in a fast rush, hoping that they would not become too alerted and immune to hits. Not a big deal though. It did make me slow down a lot. Maybe this was intentional. :D
I didn't see your last post, so here's an update. I was able to deal with the "stage lit" guard by sneaking to the right and doing what you suggested. I did not like it, but was able to do it. It may be annoying, but it is a realistic situation. I think it is OK to make some AI very hard to sneak around. However, I don't see a way to collect the loot in the room without a KO. I would be surprised if anyone can play this FM ghosting. Some things require KOs or slashes to work. The water banner is one example. It's cool with me, but people that wish to ghost might not like it.
downwinder on 1/8/2025 at 20:47
a simple trick for dealing with enemy a.i. that cant be ghosted, find a area with darkness, then go only close enough to enemy to trigger a simple search and run back to the shaded area and lean forward in darkness when enemy gets close knock him out with the leaning forward knock out
bjack on 2/8/2025 at 01:41
Yes, I know this and have been using that darkness hiding tactic for 20 years or so. The problem is when an FM creator sets the AI up to be super hyper overly sensitive (a bit hyperbolic of a comment), I'm almost always able to hide in black shadow and KO AI frontally, even when they are in 100% alert mode. Not so in this FM. Especially in the mansion. The guards would see me at least 3 or 4 full paces away in the complete dark, and then they would attack. Even if I caught them off guard, they would not drop on a sneaky black jack, being immune to hits. It seems the alert level is far too high. At least in my opinion. I still enjoyed the FM. I also have enjoyed other FMs that are super AI critical. I just don't prefer that tactic. I'm not suggesting an FM creator not use it, I'm just voting no. :D
Hucklebarry on 2/8/2025 at 03:22
Quote Posted by bjack
Thank you Hucklebarry for the link to a loot list. Some nice touches and features, especially for a 1st FM. Well done. I look forward to your next effort. You did pose a challenge and add creative ideas to your FM. It might not be the best visually, but game play was very good.
Minor Critiques:
The light bleed throughs and sound propagation through walls could be addressed, if you wish. I should not be able to hear a burning torch through a solid rock wall. Nor should a guard 30 meters away hear one tiny foot fall through solid walls. For instance, even when I was crouched and moving extremely slowly, if I made one little foot tap, guards far away for go into full alert.
The AI in the mansion seem to be set to a very high awareness level and are extremely sensitive to proximity. The guards became aware of me if I got close, even in silence and complete blackness according to the gem. I could not get within KO distance (even lean forward distance) without them turning around and attacking me. It just seems the AI had some ESP to my presence. Many KOs had to be done in a fast rush, hoping that they would not become too alerted and immune to hits. Not a big deal though. It did make me slow down a lot. Maybe this was intentional. :D
I didn't see your last post, so here's an update. I was able to deal with the "stage lit" guard by sneaking to the right and doing what you suggested. I did not like it, but was able to do it. It may be annoying, but it is a realistic situation. I think it is OK to make some AI very hard to sneak around. However, I don't see a way to collect the loot in the room without a KO. I would be surprised if anyone can play this FM ghosting. Some things require KOs or slashes to work. The water banner is one example. It's cool with me, but people that wish to ghost might not like it.
Thank you so much for the critiques, it's how we get better. I learned a lot making this one, but I'm learning more seeing how people interpret what I attempted.
I did not tweak the AI, I believe that to be all an issue of sound propagation. I have redone all the room brushes for the top and middle floors of the mansion. It definitely made a difference, although now they appear a little too deaf, but that is probably a better side to err on for now. I also added a piece of loot in a mini-secret to hopefully make expert a little less tedious. It should be live now on the existing link to hopefully help anyone that hasn't played it yet.
As for light leaks, that is a new term to me. I'll be looking into it. I realized midway through I made a mistake choosing T1 over T2. I was remembering them being more similar and all I got in my research was dead links, wrong answers, and reasons why T2 is so much better of an engine than T1.
bjack on 2/8/2025 at 03:33
Thank you for your efforts and desire to improve future FMs. Frankly, I'm surprised that more people have not tried playing yet, TTLG seems to have some trouble lately with bandwidth and connectabilty. This thread should have over 100 posts by now.
zappenduster on 2/8/2025 at 09:49
Quote Posted by bjack
TTLG seems to have some trouble lately with bandwidth and connectabilty.
Definitely.
Quote Posted by bjack
This thread should have over 100 posts by now.
That would have been the case for a much more complex FM, not for this one. For me the only challenge was the jump over the lava which took me a speed potion and ~10 tries. :rolleyes:
