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[RTC] Return to Skullkeep, beta-tested version

Posted: Mon Apr 13, 2015 4:56 pm
by THEO
I am starting new topic, because I believe I have reached point, when I have finished all necessary testing and optimalization and could upload playable version of my dungeon, which should be good enough for ordinary playing. There can still be some bugs, but hopefuly nothing serious. Any bug reports and recommendation are still welcomed. If there is a one thread per one dungeon rule, please merge my threads, admins. Thanks and have a fun.

https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/ ... zlWX090ZWM

Re: [RTC] Return to Skullkeep, beta-tested version

Posted: Tue Apr 14, 2015 2:48 pm
by Chaos-Shaman
I could not Dload the zip. not familiar with google drive

Re: [RTC] Return to Skullkeep, beta-tested version

Posted: Tue Apr 14, 2015 3:14 pm
by THEO

Re: [RTC] Return to Skullkeep, beta-tested version

Posted: Wed Apr 15, 2015 12:48 am
by Chaos-Shaman
ok, got it... i'll give it a whirl

Re: [RTC] Return to Skullkeep, beta-tested version

Posted: Wed Apr 15, 2015 9:20 pm
by Chaos-Shaman
I did a little whirling, reminds me of the original Skullkeep. I like that you have made some attacks work without needing to cast them such as tracking. fun so far. I did run across a problem with the food shop, I can't buy the objects, i did sell meat. it looks to me i need that food, please have a look at the food shop let me know if i should continue.

Re: [RTC] Return to Skullkeep, beta-tested version

Posted: Wed Apr 15, 2015 10:24 pm
by THEO
That is very odd. I tested the shop and could not find any problem. You have to wait until the merchant comes to the table to operate it. Maybe you did anger the merchant by throwing something at him or by stealing his picture or tapestry. Does he come to the counter when you stand next to it or not? Is his guard hostile or not? Please before doing anything else, try new game, go immediately to the shop and try to buy food and tell me if that works.

Re: [RTC] Return to Skullkeep, beta-tested version

Posted: Thu Apr 16, 2015 5:09 pm
by Chaos-Shaman
what I did was sell the meat to the shop and collected all the coins and turned them into gold coins. when I tried to use the gold coin to buy the food he would not accept the gold coins, or the green gem, he just gave it back. on the selector the food was available.
https://www.sendspace.com/pro/dl/lpbd0g

this is the save game

Re: [RTC] Return to Skullkeep, beta-tested version

Posted: Fri Apr 17, 2015 6:35 pm
by Igor Poulpupov
Weird. I can't see any problem in your save game... The "buy" table is the one on the right, as in the original DMII, and it works for me. I bought a shank with the gold coin that you left on the "sell" table, and an apple with a green gem.

Re: [RTC] Return to Skullkeep, beta-tested version

Posted: Fri Apr 17, 2015 7:23 pm
by Chaos-Shaman
yup, just tried it now, it works. i mixed what side operates what, that's weird. i missed it, thanks

Re: [RTC] Return to Skullkeep, beta-tested version

Posted: Sun Apr 19, 2015 10:12 pm
by THEO
Sorry I did not reply earlier, I was on the vaccation. I am glad to hear everything is sorted out now.

Re: [RTC] Return to Skullkeep, beta-tested version

Posted: Thu Apr 23, 2015 5:56 am
by Chaos-Shaman
I messed up, been messing with the shop so much I forgot how it worked to be honest. vacation, where you at, Happy Vacation THEO :) vacation, this year I get to go on one after 30 years the last one, life has caught up. I don't like planes, it's a wedding I must attend. 30 years grounded, a shaman's perspective.

shop, the way the shop is set up no longer needs to be two sides, I was messed up because I forgot that. the shop can be brought to the party by way of meeting with a NPC that will on one tile offer buy and sell, adds a slightly different touch to DM. I messed up cause I forgot how.

it is sorted out THEO

Re: [RTC] Return to Skullkeep, beta-tested version

Posted: Fri Jul 24, 2015 9:50 am
by Haios
So I went and tested your custom dungeon and in general had a lot of fun. I was looking forward to its release since you announced it a while ago when I last had a DM itch. I'm in the minority here liking DM2 better than DM1, so it definitely had appeal. There were some issues along the way with how RTC handles DM2 among other things, like not showing any general weapon strength when inspecting weapons or not using both hands. I think the extra skills you added per character would have been much better if you didn't need to pull their weapon out.

I played it through solo with Uggo, so I probably missed most of the dialogue. Mainly melee focused and once I learned them, 255 on all stats from potions.

Here's the list of bugs/comments I came up with in the playthrough:
Spoiler
A hand full of grammar mistakes in the early sections (I didn't write them down). I know you have to deal with wordwrap and limited space, but it might be better to shorten some of the dialogue.

Odo spams that hes carrying too much right out of the freezer at less than 5kg load.

You can't remove gold keys from the top level of the castle with the first clan key. Same with the cauldron room of the last clan key.

Game crashes if you let a bomb blow up in your hands

You can easily get trapped in the worm cave. Pull on rocks requires a lot of strength and you can trap yourself in some sections

The Section with Cordian's freezer has boulders up top, but when you fill the holes from above, nothing shows up below.

Graen's mine seam ability turns seams into fountains, but otherwise seems to work

Jarod says something when you enter the worm section of the cave, but he is not in my party.

Second village grammar stuff... "Our smith Graen also joined Equus on his expedition to the east of Safri. What foolishness! Now our best fighter and smith rot in the bowels of the devourer while we are short of both men and good arms." Shouldn't their expedition be West of Oaktstown?

The other talking npc in the second city mentions an ambush but it sounds more like an assault.

"I just hope he did not meet a gruesome demise inside of that monstrous worm!"

More grammar errors from the second city (Oaktstown?) "Without the clan key, nobody will be able to enter Skullkeep and reclaim it back from Dragoth before he uses the crystal of power to open a portal to the world of chaos. Then we would truly be lost forever."

It is somewhat confusing what the town names are. You should put up a sign somewhere.

Village elder:
"It is rumored the library of the maelurn monastery holds many secrets and amidst them, the most potent arcane spells. The monks are also famous enchanters known for their skill at creating magical equipment."

Techmace felt really weak, slower, and more expensive compared to the Vorax or Excsymyr.

Weapon Store in the second village won't buy my katana and it is not sharpenable. None of the later weapons are sharpenable either.

In the note from the monk about the key in the drain. It says swipe a floor instead of sweep the floor. Killing him doesn't make the rest of the monks attack either.

Couldn't get the secondary room in the monastery library to open up. No clue how to do it.

The monastery music can get really really loud if it stacks from loading saved games.

The main village elder did not update his text after getting the 4th key.

You can pretty easily get all of your stuff into the Keep since you can just throw it in. If there was a retracting ladder like the gladiator pit, it would really only be what you can carry.

There is almost no music in the keep, and when there is music, it is very soft.

The fire keys in the caves level don't do anything for the most part.

Couldn't get the last secret chamber in the Vault area open. It probably had a gargoyle and Tech Pants, but I couldn't find a button.

I did not figure out how to open the Arch Mage door, but managed to get in from falling into a connected room.

There were a few doors that I never got opened and were probably broken. One at the end of the poison hallway on floor 1 near lightning maze and the stairs up to floor 2. You fall into it after using a gold key, but the door doesn't open when you use the gear. The next one was a dragon door near the "an eye for an eye" placard on floor 1. Another one floor 2 by the "one trick and one treat only" placard. If you don't use the gold coin and go around instead, the door won't open with the gear.

The Stunt, Scare, Confuse, Freeze scroll in the room with barrels after the 4 elements room has spells that don't work or are uncastable (spells with 2 form symbols).

You can lock yourself into the 3x3 square room with barrels on floor 2 above the imp maze by throwing something onto the pressure plate at the only exit.

The Cistern could use a few more types of monsters to make the glomp's root more effective. Maybe a fast slime with less damage and no root spell?

The dwarf that recharges items is an asshole that broke my new fury weapon. I killed him then loaded my game.

When in the power crystal room and looking to the left side, there is an eye, a pressure plate, and the hallway that the roof lightning comes from. The floor pit the eye creates does not reset, so it might make it impossible to proceed if you close the zo gate then trigger the eye (blocking out the roof lightning).

The machine situation was really frustrating. The first time, I had freed the golem behind the blood key and he used all the pyro. He later died somehow but the pyro only came back one at a time which means I only had 30 seconds to try to get the lightning working on both machines. The lightning rod on the top is only good for 1 bolt of lightning per fuse.

I loaded my save before I entered Skullkeep to do this all over. Saved all of the pyro for the end, and made a teleport mark at the gate switch. Put a fuse in the roof and the spam clicked the switch to open the final portal.

Final boss was really easy... He only hit me once and I didn't even try to dodge him or move around. Just straight up melee fight. I think he needs those attack minion portals like the original DM2 had, and also move and act faster.

The second time I went through it, floor 2 did not have any stone golems.

There is no Eli's staff in the keep, so if you did not bring one, every floor is filled with annoying creatures. This is mostly okay and makes the coverplates useful, but might make the last floor impossible. Maybe have it on sale from the dwarves?

Many of the spells are confusing. I have no idea what Fuse does or Des Kath Ra. The auras were not very clear either, like tracking. Same thing for most of the persistent spells.

The dungeons were pretty easy in general. All of the enemies moved slowly and were easily danced around since there were not many of them.

I had to unfreeze the druid to break down trees in some places. It would have been nice if I could bomb the trees instead.

Only the spoiled bats disappeared, but the other spoiled food did not. Poison does almost no damage, so there was no problem letting food spoil.
I also read some of the comments from the original thread and thankfully did not have to deal with the save pads or spell backfires. While both are interesting concepts and the dungeons are clearly built for limited saves, I think the rewards for progress should be better than not having to redo your work if you mess up, so thanks for removing that. I really like the addition of stores to any dungeon since I never like throwing away starter daggers or clubs. Bartering to buy things for less than the listed price has always been one of the charms to the original.

Overall, I think it was a pretty good take on DM2. Thanks.

Re: [RTC] Return to Skullkeep, beta-tested version

Posted: Tue Jul 28, 2015 5:38 pm
by THEO
Hi Haios, thank you for your findings.
Spoiler
- A hand full of grammar mistakes in the early sections (I didn't write them down). I know you have to deal with wordwrap and limited space, but it might be better to shorten some of the dialogue.
- Second village grammar stuff... "Our smith Graen also joined Equus on his expedition to the east of Safri. What foolishness! Now our best fighter and smith rot in the bowels of the devourer while we are short of both men and good arms." Shouldn't their expedition be West of Oaktstown?
- The other talking npc in the second city mentions an ambush but it sounds more like an assault.
- "I just hope he did not meet a gruesome demise inside of that monstrous worm!"
- More grammar errors from the second city (Oaktstown?) "Without the clan key, nobody will be able to enter Skullkeep and reclaim it back from Dragoth before he uses the crystal of power to open a portal to the world of chaos. Then we would truly be lost forever."
- It is somewhat confusing what the town names are. You should put up a sign somewhere.
- Village elder: "It is rumored the library of the maelurn monastery holds many secrets and amidst them, the most potent arcane spells. The monks are also famous enchanters known for their skill at creating magical equipment."
- In the note from the monk about the key in the drain. It says swipe a floor instead of sweep the floor. Killing him doesn't make the rest of the monks attack either.
- The main village elder did not update his text after getting the 4th key.
I will revisit the grammar and lore at one point, but currently I did not get a chance to look at that.

- Odo spams that hes carrying too much right out of the freezer at less than 5kg load.
- Jarod says something when you enter the worm section of the cave, but he is not in my party.
I Same as above. Character dialogues are not completed yet. I really lack an inspiration and writing capabilities to complete them, so I will disable them for now in the next version. Maybe you could come up with some dialogue and characterization?

- Graen's mine seam ability turns seams into fountains, but otherwise seems to work
- You can't remove gold keys from the top level of the castle with the first clan key. Same with the cauldron room of the last clan key.
- None of the later weapons are sharpenable either.
That is actually intentional.

- You can pretty easily get all of your stuff into the Keep since you can just throw it in. If there was a retracting ladder like the gladiator pit, it would really only be what you can carry.
That is OK, no equipment restriction was intended. You can always overburden your characters anyway.

- Only the spoiled bats disappeared, but the other spoiled food did not. Poison does almost no damage, so there was no problem letting food spoil.
That is intentional, but I may decide to change it.

- There is no Eli's staff in the keep, so if you did not bring one, every floor is filled with annoying creatures. This is mostly okay and makes the coverplates useful, but might make the last floor impossible. Maybe have it on sale from the dwarves?
You can now use markers to close those gates too.

- I had to unfreeze the druid to break down trees in some places. It would have been nice if I could bomb the trees instead.
Sorry, only druids allowed :)

- Game crashes if you let a bomb blow up in your hands.
- Weapon Store in the second village won't buy my katana and it is not sharpenable.
That is certainly an issue, I will try to fix it.

- The Section with Cordian's freezer has boulders up top, but when you fill the holes from above, nothing shows up below.
You mean that the pits are still visible? There is no graphic from filled hole from below.

- You can easily get trapped in the worm cave. Pull on rocks requires a lot of strength and you can trap yourself in some sections.
You shold be able to brew those potions, but perhaps I will remove the strength requirement.

- The monastery music can get really really loud if it stacks from loading saved games.
- There is almost no music in the keep, and when there is music, it is very soft.
Unfortunately there is no way to implement music in a better way in RTC. Whenever you can teleport, it is really difficult to have area-based as opposed to event-based music.

- Techmace felt really weak, slower, and more expensive compared to the Vorax or Excsymyr.
- Final boss was really easy... He only hit me once and I didn't even try to dodge him or move around. Just straight up melee fight. I think he needs those attack minion portals like the original DM2 had, and also move and act faster.
- The dungeons were pretty easy in general. All of the enemies moved slowly and were easily danced around since there were not many of them.
Will try to balance that.

- Couldn't get the secondary room in the monastery library to open up. No clue how to do it.
- The fire keys in the caves level don't do anything for the most part.
- Couldn't get the last secret chamber in the Vault area open. It probably had a gargoyle and Tech Pants, but I couldn't find a button.
- I did not figure out how to open the Arch Mage door, but managed to get in from falling into a connected room.
- There were a few doors that I never got opened and were probably broken. One at the end of the poison hallway on floor 1 near lightning maze and the stairs up to floor 2. You fall into it after using a gold key, but the door doesn't open when you use the gear. The next one was a dragon door near the "an eye for an eye" placard on floor 1. Another one floor 2 by the "one trick and one treat only" placard. If you don't use the gold coin and go around instead, the door won't open with the gear.
I Will double check that, but I believe this is alright.

- You can lock yourself into the 3x3 square room with barrels on floor 2 above the imp maze by throwing something onto the pressure plate at the only exit.
- The dwarf that recharges items is an asshole that broke my new fury weapon. I killed him then loaded my game.
- When in the power crystal room and looking to the left side, there is an eye, a pressure plate, and the hallway that the roof lightning comes from. The floor pit the eye creates does not reset, so it might make it impossible to proceed if you close the zo gate then trigger the eye (blocking out the roof lightning).
- The second time I went through it, floor 2 did not have any stone golems.
That needs a fix. Thanks.

- The Stunt, Scare, Confuse, Freeze scroll in the room with barrels after the 4 elements room has spells that don't work or are uncastable (spells with 2 form symbols).
- Many of the spells are confusing. I have no idea what Fuse does or Des Kath Ra. The auras were not very clear either, like tracking. Same thing for most of the persistent spells.
I will try to explain the effects of the spells better on the scrolls.

- The Cistern could use a few more types of monsters to make the glomp's root more effective. Maybe a fast slime with less damage and no root spell?
I will think of that.

- The machine situation was really frustrating. The first time, I had freed the golem behind the blood key and he used all the pyro. He later died somehow but the pyro only came back one at a time which means I only had 30 seconds to try to get the lightning working on both machines. The lightning rod on the top is only good for 1 bolt of lightning per fuse.

I loaded my save before I entered Skullkeep to do this all over. Saved all of the pyro for the end, and made a teleport mark at the gate switch. Put a fuse in the roof and the spam clicked the switch to open the final portal.
I will probably make the golems not to pickup the pyro in the room and rather extract it from an endless seem. I was thinking of having more charges from the thunderbolt, but this way it is more about timing.

Re: [RTC] Return to Skullkeep, beta-tested version

Posted: Sat Aug 01, 2015 6:26 am
by Haios
Spoiler
- There is no Eli's staff in the keep, so if you did not bring one, every floor is filled with annoying creatures. This is mostly okay and makes the coverplates useful, but might make the last floor impossible. Maybe have it on sale from the dwarves?
You can now use markers to close those gates too.
Looks like I did not understand that note. I thought it was referring to a different spell.
Spoiler
- I had to unfreeze the druid to break down trees in some places. It would have been nice if I could bomb the trees instead.
Sorry, only druids allowed :)
Not even something like a special axe/staff drop from the corrupt druid? The hidden items weren't that important I guess
Spoiler
- The Section with Cordian's freezer has boulders up top, but when you fill the holes from above, nothing shows up below.
You mean that the pits are still visible? There is no graphic from filled hole from below.
In the original DM2, I thought for sure that the boulder moved to the floor below when pushed into a hole. I was expecting to see the boulders on the level below in the tile beneath the holes. It has been a while since I've played a real version of DM2 though, so maybe I'm mistaken.
Spoiler
- You can easily get trapped in the worm cave. Pull on rocks requires a lot of strength and you can trap yourself in some sections.
You shold be able to brew those potions, but perhaps I will remove the strength requirement.
Pull and Push have different strength requirements, so you could get stuck. If they were the same strength requirement it would be okay.
Spoiler
- The machine situation was really frustrating. The first time, I had freed the golem behind the blood key and he used all the pyro. He later died somehow but the pyro only came back one at a time which means I only had 30 seconds to try to get the lightning working on both machines. The lightning rod on the top is only good for 1 bolt of lightning per fuse.

I loaded my save before I entered Skullkeep to do this all over. Saved all of the pyro for the end, and made a teleport mark at the gate switch. Put a fuse in the roof and the spam clicked the switch to open the final portal.
I will probably make the golems not to pickup the pyro in the room and rather extract it from an endless seem. I was thinking of having more charges from the thunderbolt, but this way it is more about timing.
If its about timing, it would be nice if you could see the crystal and switch at the same time. Since the magic map doesn't work the same way as DM2 in RTC, you can't watch the bolts fly by in the action window either

Re: [RTC] Return to Skullkeep, beta-tested version

Posted: Fri Oct 02, 2015 9:13 am
by THEO
Version 5.0 posted. I have mainly fixed bugs reported by Haios and added made some areas into bonus areas for certain characters. The furnace mechanic has been reworked. Now the golems stoke the fireplace without consuming any pyro and all pyro burned by the player reappears in a mine in different room on the level (unless conveyor is running - then you can pick it up directly in the furnace room).

Re: [RTC] Return to Skullkeep, beta-tested version

Posted: Tue Oct 13, 2015 3:43 am
by takahashi
Hi , I downloaded version 6.0 and enjoy it now.
I defeated 3 enemy champions and got 3 cran-keys.
But I have problem , that is ,
Spoiler
I can't return to the first town.
In the worm's cave , the rock slides , I can't remove the rock-slides and find the another path for now.
( My party is in the second town and not able to move out from the second town. )
I searched the west-woods in full detail , but I can't find any items to open the path to the first town.
I have the RA-key and 3 cran-keys.
Do I miss the important objects ,events ?

Re: [RTC] Return to Skullkeep, beta-tested version

Posted: Tue Oct 13, 2015 8:46 pm
by THEO
Look for an onyx key in the swamps ;)

Re: [RTC] Return to Skullkeep, beta-tested version

Posted: Thu Oct 15, 2015 6:00 am
by takahashi
THEO wrote:Look for an onyx key in the swamps ;)
Thank you for your advise.
Finally , I could find the onyx key .
It was tough task to search the onyx key in the swaps , their colors are very similar , difficult to discern the key from the swamps.
But I enjoyed the tough task. :)

Re: [RTC] Return to Skullkeep, beta-tested version

Posted: Thu Oct 15, 2015 10:02 am
by THEO
Spoiler
Plus you only need to do that if you did not keep the Onyx key, which you used to unlock the Mummy's tomb.

Re: [RTC] Return to Skullkeep, beta-tested version

Posted: Sat Oct 31, 2015 6:00 pm
by takahashi
Hi,THEO.
Now , I'm playing in the SkullKeep castle.
In the 2nd floor , I got stuck.
In the room of
Spoiler
gargoyle stones
, I put
Spoiler
the pyro , boulder , empty flask,flask of water to the alcov
.
But nothing happened.
How can I defeat
Spoiler
gargoyle stones
?
Do I miss something important?

Re: [RTC] Return to Skullkeep, beta-tested version

Posted: Sun Nov 01, 2015 10:09 am
by THEO
Oops.
Spoiler
There might be a bug in your version, according to your version there might be 3 items regular boulder (falls from rockman), magical boulder (looks the same, but it's name is YA EW, falls from gargoyles) and small rock (can be slinged, falls from rockman). One of these should definitely work, but it might not be the one on the hint scroll.
Please let me know if it fixed your problem.

Re: [RTC] Return to Skullkeep, beta-tested version

Posted: Tue Nov 03, 2015 6:11 am
by takahashi
Hi,THEO.
I tried to
Spoiler
search and put boulders around the skullkeep floors
,but
Spoiler
I couldn't find the boulder that solve riddle
.
So , I tried to
Spoiler
use the magic glove
.
I found that
Spoiler
'Power push' and 'Power pull' magic can move the gargoyle stones
.
As a result ,
Spoiler
I could solve the riddle , and get to the 3rd floor
.

Re: [RTC] Return to Skullkeep, beta-tested version

Posted: Tue Nov 03, 2015 8:23 am
by THEO
That is a solution I have not foreseen, fortunately. I must make sure the riddle works properly in the next release. Thanks for reproting.

Re: [RTC] Return to Skullkeep, beta-tested version

Posted: Sun Feb 28, 2016 2:12 pm
by sleam
hello,
Great GAME! but...
playing version 10 downloaded from here: http://www.moddb.com/mods/return-to-sku ... ersion-100
1] got Torham high on mushrooms, but even with strength around 300 he wasnt able to move the boulders in worm mines.
2] there is no 3rd boss / evil druid to get part of stonekeep clan key from.
I can see stone table with mage book & RA key. Tried two different parties so far, but both times nobody at home.
I assume I am doing something wrong?
thanks

Re: [RTC] Return to Skullkeep, beta-tested version

Posted: Wed Apr 06, 2016 12:59 pm
by THEO
Hi Sleam,
I am sorry I did not get to read your message earlier. The issue you describe is a bug, unfortunately a very serious one. It should be fixed in the most current version. I have now completed a very thorough testing and uploaded a final version to modDB, currently waiting for the approval. I believe this will be a final bug-free version of the game. There are also new features including hardcode mode, party members chit-chat and some new challenges. Enjoy!
http://www.moddb.com/mods/return-to-skullkeep

Re: [RTC] Return to Skullkeep, beta-tested version

Posted: Wed Apr 06, 2016 5:31 pm
by terkio
Is this a RTC game ?
Is the Beta testing done ? Is a release, likely bug free, available or should I wait for it ?

Re: [RTC] Return to Skullkeep, beta-tested version

Posted: Wed Apr 06, 2016 7:48 pm
by THEO
Yes. Yes (I already released a beta-tested version, but than I added new features and unfortunately introduced new bugs), no dead ends should be there. The most current (and probably final, with the exception of occasional tweaks) version is now available on the ModDB.

Re: [RTC] Return to Skullkeep, beta-tested version

Posted: Wed Apr 06, 2016 8:17 pm
by sleam
Theo,
I dont mind waiting for this great game mod at all !
Though I got to admit I was checking for reply impatiently every day :-)
Thanks again for fixing the bugs. New version already downloaded and ready to be played.
See you when I'll crawl though the Stonekeep....

Re: [RTC] Return to Skullkeep, beta-tested version

Posted: Wed Apr 06, 2016 8:19 pm
by sleam
Skullkeep obviously...

Re: [RTC] Return to Skullkeep, beta-tested version

Posted: Thu Apr 07, 2016 11:01 am
by THEO
I am sorry Sleam, I have a new email adress now and forgot to update my DM forum account so I did not get a notification for your reply. I kinda expected all discussion to move to ModDB and stopped checking these forums. The good news is that there are many new features in the new release so your gaming experience will be slightly different on another walkthrough. If you want to explore the tunnels for example, I suggest that you take Bane into your party this time. He is the only character that can push boulders.