Dungeon Master Forum

Hi, I know most of them won't even be intended, but I'd like to know how far you want to push your RTC, George. I'm wouldn't want to put lots of effort o a dead end project; that is, if you don't think you will continue on RTC once you achieved the DM and CSB cloning and perhaps an Editor too.
I'd like to make whole campaigns, not just single, one shot dungeons, so here are the suggestions:


1) Non player character interactions:
a) Buy/sell
b) Talk.
c) It needs, obviously, the possibility of "Neutral" monsters.

2) Events management:
a)displaying a text
b)a picture
c)a sound
d) possibility to answer a word
e)to answer YES/NO,
f) possibility to lead to others events (according to the answer)
g) Giving/Taking Experience
h) Giving/Taking Objects
i) activating a pressure pad (or anything else)

3) Use of some global variables and a very simple syntaxe like
a) IF/ELSE/ENDIF/AND/OR/NOT
b) SET variable=number
c)CALL EVENTS
This way, more complicated events could be achieved.
For example: (my comments are in brackets.)
IF _quest1=2 (completed) AND _quest3=0 (not assigned) AND _quest4=-1 (failed) THEN
&nbsp &nbsp &nbsp &nbsp _quest2=1 (assigned)
&nbsp &nbsp &nbsp &nbsp CALL EVENTS(55)
ENDIF

4) For a dungeon, the possibility for a foreign team to keep the inventory when entering it
(in order to allow saga dungeons, or even campaigns -e.g. "End of Chapter I - Now go to Chapter II - the password for it is "KEY"-)

5) A new item, "Book", which is a scroll with several pages, the possibility to go back and forth through them.
This would allow very easily a great background dimension!

6) Some invisible boni and mali to characters like:
a) Bonus/Malus with some kind of weapon.
b) Swift/bad learner
c) Good/Bad sleeper
d) Special resistance/vulnerability to hunger/poison/thirst
e) Bonus/Malus on prices when negociating
f) Gender (could affect NPC interactions)
g) Size (could
1. affect health gained when levelling and could
2. allow to avoid damage done by vertical closing doors if there's someone taller in the group, and could
3. affect dodging missiles too - in particular, if height of the missile is taken into account)
h) Bonus/Malus with a given wallset (Outdoors/indoors/cities/woods...)
i) Non-Authorized clothes or weapons (a dragonlike couldn't wear torso plates for example)

As you say many of these things go well beyond the remit of a DM-like game. Noteably most of them are covered by something like Bloodwych; an entirely seperate game!

I'm also not really convinced that RTC will become a dead thing once I've finished DM/CSB/Editor; the same argument could be applied to such games as Quake/Half-life etc which are "done" but you'd have trouble calling them dead.

In answer to your specifc points however....

1 c) Maybe - to the degree that there are monsters that won't attack unless you attack them first.
1 rest) No - too un-DM.

2 a) Already implemented
2 b) Already implemented (but only if the picture is on a wall)
2 c) Already implemented (you can have random sounds too)
2 i) Already implemented
2 rest) No - too un-DM

3 all) No - far too complex to allow arbitary code. You can however already achieve this sort of thing with the RTC engine, *IF* your "_quest" variables represent objects. For example it's possible to produce a pressure pad which only is triggered if the party has:

OBJECT_HOLY_HAND_GRENADE AND OBJECT_BANANA AND NOT OBJECT_T_SHIRT THEN OPEN DOOR


4) Tricky to make the engine safe from crashes - what, for example, if dungeon A has an object that dungeon B doesn't define - how do you transfer the graphics and properties. It's far simpler just to have a blanket, no-transfer. Also from a users design point of view it's tricky. How do you design a dungeon well which has to cope with new parties and still provide a challenge for a party loaded to the hilt with kit.

5) No. Use several scrolls instead.

6) Some of these are actually already implemented, but I'm not telling which ones as that would give the game away

Thank you for your reply!

I'm hoping to do a limited 1a) and 1b) in my 'dungeon', but as long as you can make creatures neutral as mentioned, then I don't see any problems in getting background mechanics to create the interaction. It might seem clunky if you are wanting active talk, but I think passive interaction where what you touch or walk influences what comments are made to you would still feel like DM...alot can be done with speaking pads, teleporters and multiple copies of the same room : )

2g) I'd like monsters to be able to drain experience...so if this attack is implemented, then it might be easy for a shooter to fire a bolt with a similar effect? If so, then you could once again use background mechanics to simulate this...like for success, you are teleported without realising to a new area and told 'strike the nbll for your reward' and this area actually has the experience gain raised very very high so any action gives you alot of experience, and conversely you could be fired at by the draining shooter for not succeeding

2 h) Maybe related, i would like teleprters that could be very specific with objects..such as teleporting an object to/from your hand/body/inventory, or teleport a specific object from a tile...

5. That's a shame, but i kinda gathered that would be the case. Hmm, how about a scrolling scroll? If you click on the top the text scrolls up (maybe evn with a graphic like it's tristing up) and clickign the bottom scrolls it down. It would allow for more text on a scroll....

5a) I know there wasn't one, but this is kinda related to 5...could you allow a 'bookshelf' object? That is like an alcove, but has two or three heights for objects to go (top, middle or bottom...and even left and right of that too, allowing up to 6 places for objects to go). It was just a thought, as you have a flat version of this on floors, where objects have many subtle places they can go when sitting them down...

6. Oooooh, hidden characteristics *rubs hands*

The one thing I would like are full screen (or dungeon view) interupting events. An event where the dungeon view area or the whole sceen is replaced with either specified text or a picture. A picture would be better but....

I know this is a bit un-DM like, but I think it would really help to make a story out of the dungeon. Good dungeons I don't think will use very many of these screens, but a few at key points could really enhance a dungeon.

Buying and selling is in DM2... but is it possible to do this:
Have one button on a wall above a picture frame.
Pressing the button cycles through pictures in the picture frame.
An alcove that accepts a specific amount of money (dependant on which state the button is in)
Transport an item into an alcove (or onto the floor) when the right amount of money is entered.

Since there is so much room in RTC for dungeons, it seems you could build two or more next to each other. If RTC allowed multiple start points based on the party holding a specific item (the reward from before), then the "saga dungeons" might be possible with much less risk. Then again this is already possible from what I understand, make the entrance to your dungeon a long hall. Down that hall have pads triggered by the party holding a special item. Those pads can triger teleporters to take them to the new dungeon entrance. True this does make the dungeon file larger but....

A quick update on all of these as of V0.38:

1a) Yes
1b) Yes
1c) Yes

2a) Yes
2b) Yes
2c) Yes
2d) Yes
2e) Yes
2f) Yes
2g) Yes
2h) Yes
2i) Yes

3a) Yes
3b) Yes
3c) Yes

4) No. Although this can be got around with the method used in Conflux (i.e. giving passwords for on-line access to maps, or entering them into areas in the new dungeon to allow access to items for imported characters).

5) No. As above, this can be got around using multiple scrolls (and scrolls can now have pictures on them too if wanted).

6a) Yes
6b) Yes
6c) Yes
6d) Yes
6e) Yes
6f) Yes
6g) No.
6h) Not directly, but this can be simulated by placing triggers at the entrance / exit to each area that change the dungeon mechanics appropriately.
6i) No.

RTC has come a fair way since the original post 5 years ago - nearly there!

4) could be largely done without becoming to difficult to implement or instable as far as I understand by simply allowing the dungeon designer to make the engine import inventory directly, but the engine will only import items that defined also in the target dungeon and erase all others. That would make the creation of campaigns a lot easier.

6i) Can now be done too