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Light level

Posted: Wed Jun 30, 2004 4:09 pm
by George Gilbert
<musing about one of the not-a-bug postings...>

When you cast lots of light spells the effect lasts ages and you don't have to worry about light ever again when wondering through the dungeon. Although this would be different to DM, would people be interested in removing the maximum brightness, so that if you cast too many light spells it gets too bright to see (i.e. just as the dugneon view gets darker than normal when there's not enough light, it could also get lighter if there's too much).

I would suggest building in a tolerance band. For example:

0 = complete darkness
100 = "normal"
....
200 = "normal"
400 = complete white

Currently 0-100 is smoothly alpha-blended, and anyhting over 100 is treated as 100. There's no reason to stop at that though....

Note that this also opens up interesting design possibilities, for example a level with an intrinsic light level of 400 and you have to cast darkness spells in order to see you way around...

Posted: Wed Jun 30, 2004 4:35 pm
by linflas
i want it !!!! :D

Posted: Wed Jun 30, 2004 4:41 pm
by Gambit37
Yes, this sounds like a great idea! I assume your value of 200 should have said "> normal"? ;)

While your at it, could other effects be achieved? E.G.:

1) Coloured lighting
2) Implementing the 'fog shading' colour specified in another thread

Also, can RTC only handle standard alpha blending? What about including procedural blends, such as addition, subtraction, multiplaction, etc. It would make the effects much richer. Paul Stevens posted this link which gives information on how some of these modes are calculated:

http://gimp-savvy.com/BOOK/index.html?node55.html

Posted: Wed Jun 30, 2004 5:09 pm
by George Gilbert
Thanks for the link - I'll have a look.

I did actually mean "normal" for 200 (i.e. any light level between 100 and 200 would come out as normal). This would make it easier to play as you wouldn't have to get the light *exactly* right, it just penalizes excessive light levels (i.e. those over 200).

Posted: Wed Jun 30, 2004 5:36 pm
by andyboy_uk
Just as a quick note, could you add a couple of trigger options as well to say,

Raise the light level by x amount
Lower the light level by x amount
and
Change the light level to x

This way you could have a corridor that got darker as you walked down it (or so bright you couldnt see and fall down a pit at the end) like a walk of faith sort of thing.

No idea if that's easy to do.

Posted: Wed Jun 30, 2004 6:32 pm
by beowuuf
i second the original idea of the whiteout...very cool!
actually, i go with andy's ones aswell if they are easy : )

Posted: Wed Jun 30, 2004 6:55 pm
by linflas
maybe we could use some light effect to get blind during a few seconds after being shooted by a fireball! a violent white flash depending on the fireball power, then the light goes back to its last value very slowly...

Posted: Fri Jul 02, 2004 9:57 am
by George Gilbert
Implemented for v0.29!

Posted: Mon Jan 03, 2005 11:49 pm
by Gambit37
We definitely need a changelog!!!! This was missed and reported as a bug....