Opal-Eyed Fan on 13/1/2010 at 23:51

---

I had some spare time to play the mod a little today and take some pics. The mod isn't finished but I sometime play through the current build to see if I can spot any bugs.

Though this is a mod focusing on stealth and fighting back means certain death, I thought I should post some action pics just to show the consequences of being spotted or noticed at the wrong place by the wrong people:cheeky:.

If people play this mod the way it is supposed to be played though, there shouldn't be much fighting taking place:angel:

http://img707.imageshack.us/img707/9015/deadhammers1.jpg

http://img707.imageshack.us/img707/2659/deadhammers2.jpg

http://img707.imageshack.us/img707/1292/deadhammers3.jpg

http://img15.imageshack.us/img15/169/deadhammers4.jpg

Cheers

Opal-Eyed Fan on 28/1/2010 at 00:35

---

Thanks Tiranasta:D I enjoy the feedback:thumb:

About bethsoft and their forums, I have made a wip thread over there, but it went unnoticed, and to this day it only had 34 views and no replies :cheeky:




First time I've ever uploaded anything to youtube, and then youtube degrades the quality of the video making it barely viewable:confused:
Youtube hates me :rolleyes:

anyways, this vid if you can bare to watch it, illustrates hopefully how the mod was influenced and inspired by thief, yet is no direct replica (as that would be too difficult using the Oblivion engine anyway):)


Possible Spoiler Alert! Though there shouldn't be any as far as I can tell.
(http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rJPYW1OjZcA) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rJPYW1OjZcA

Opal

Opal-Eyed Fan on 28/1/2010 at 20:23

---

:D glad you like the vid!

Might be a good time for me to get into some detail about the sneaking part of the mod.


sneaking in vanilla oblivion was pretty much that way yes, the AI would notice you approaching at a certain distance no matter how sneaky you were, from behind or lurking in shadows, hardly made any difference..



But here, the determining factor is light only, so whether you're an inch away or fifty feet, the AI will only notice you if you step into the light.




So to make the guards detect you easier, I would have to put up more lightsources or adjust the ones already in place.

Oblivion lights also fade, so if at the source, the light hitting the player is 250 250 250 strong, then on the outskirt of the affected area, the light hitting the player will be much weaker,, let's say 15 15 15 strong. So if the player wants to stay hidden from the view of the AI, he/she must avoid getting too close to the center of the lightsource. Of course an AI facing the opposite direction will not see the player even if the player is bathed in light.

To make things more complicated there is also the possible interference of other nearby light sources.

For instance the player can get close enough to a lightsource to receive 54 54 54 without AI spotting the player.
But if the player is at the same time hit by faded light from a remote lightsource, let's say 20 20 20 then the total amount of light hitting the player ( 54 54 54 + 20 20 20 ) will make the player visible to the AI.


So staying in shadows or at the outskirt of a lighted area make you invisible, exposing yourself to too much light makes you easy to detect. Distance to AI is not playing a big part in this.

Changing the amount of which the light is fading, is also a effective way of changing the difficulty and risk of AI detection, well nothings carved in stone yet so I'll keep all options open for now.

Btw here is a video showing how hidden you are sneaking in the shadows and how easily detected you are if you wander into the light.
(http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vvSSwDIMMCs) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vvSSwDIMMCs

Cheers!
Opal

Opal-Eyed Fan on 30/1/2010 at 08:53

---

I like your suggestion, but I'm not sure if I can pull it off,:D Having guards have different alert levels like in Thief would be cool indeed, and I'll try to tinker with a few settings and see if I come up with anything useful.

Problem is there are so many settings affecting the sneaking/guard detection in Oblivion, that fine tuning each one individually would take months. I will see if I find the time to work on that someday, but it will mean a lot of extra work.

The Oblivion game settings which seem relevant to sneaking and detection are as far as I can work out :

Fdetectionsneaklightmod -5.0000

fdetectionactiontimer 1.2000

fdetectioncommenttimer 30.0000

fdetectiontimersetting 0.3000

fAIawareofplayertimer 10.0000

fAIpursuedistancelineofsight 2500.0000

fAIradiustorundetectionexterior 2000.0000

fsneakbasevalue -25.0000

fsneakexteriordistancemult 2.0000

fsneaklightmult 1.4000

fsneaklostmin -20.0000

fsneakmaxdistance 1500.0000

fsneaknoticedmin -20.0000

fsneakrunningmult 1.3000

fsneakseenmin 0.0000

fsneakskillmult 0.5000

fsneaksleepbonus -10.0000

fsneaksoundlosmult 1.0000

fsneaksoundsmult 1.6000

fsneakswimminglightmult 0.5000

fsneaktargetattackbonus 100.0000

fsneaktargetincombatbonus 25.0000

fsneakunseenmin 0.0000

isneakskillusedistance 1000

These numbers are the default Oblivion values of course.


I think maybe the mod you were thinking of, may have been Reneer's Guard Overhaul?
(http://www.tesnexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=5977) http://www.tesnexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=5977
RGO uses scripts mostly to achieve desired behavior, and scripts unfortunately is not my strong side:cheeky:

Opal-Eyed Fan on 6/2/2010 at 00:14

---

Hi Tiranasta. thank you for the generous offer:D.

Scripting npc responses I guess is pretty advanced stuff and mimicing the behaver from Thief using Oblivion scripting might be out of reach to even the most skillful of scripters.

However adjusting the fdetectioncommenttimer to a lower value reveals that the AI notices the presence of the player approaching early through the shadows and will comment verbally on the "detection" even though the AI will not go after and attack the player before "visually detecting" the player.

Is it possible to use the early detection revealed by the fdetectioncommenttimer, to set the Ai into a Thief-guard like "search mode" through scripts?
I honestly have no idea?!



Scripting tutorials are gathered here though I'm sure you already know that:
(http://cs.elderscrolls.com/constwiki/index.php/Category:Scripting_Tutorials)


About help, well any script that is Thief-like might be useful I suppose, if you could come up with
something similar to the stuff that came with Thieves Arsenal, that would be neat since my attempt to obtain permission to implement anything from TA was unsuccessful.:D

If you decide to learn scripting though, water arrows might be an easy thing to do to get started.
Basically that would meen a script that swaps a lit-torch with a non-lit-torch upon impact with an arrow ("water arrow"). Very basic stuff.



What other scripts would be useful to a Thief like mod like this? Hm..
You know in a typical Thief scenario you could pick up a fire arrow, shoot it at a dead torch on the wall and set it on fire and a secret door would open.

Maybe this mod could use something similar?

So I guess that would require a script that swaps a dead torch with a live one and activates a door, when hit with an arrow ("fire arrow").


If you think any of this seems interesting, you could have a go at it, no pressure or anything, all up to you, no deadline monster breathing down your neck:D


Btw!
here's a small vid showing some acrobatics.
The interesting part is actually the last few seconds as they reveal the mantling function I invented for the mod.
You walk into a wall (specially prepared for mantling purposes) and you instantly get "mantled" up to a ledge or mantle or surface otherwise out of your reach in vanilla Oblivion... happens so fast that I show it twice at the end there, to give you an impression of how effective it is.:cheeky:



(http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=__Sutg7-Zwo) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=__Sutg7-Zwo