172 replies to this topic

[Waywocket]

So when do I bust your bubble about the fact that Elminster doesn't use a sword?  He did when he was a thief, though I doubt it was a large broadsword like that one.  The books all mention his staff (and his pipe usually floats around his head, he never has to carry it).  Read Ed Greenwood's Elminster series for some ideas.

Otherwise, all the pics look great to me.  A really nice change from the standard images of the game.

That's the picture of Elminster from the Forgotten Realms campaign setting source book, so in 3rd edition at least he does use a sword . In fact, it's a +5 thundering longsword .

Thanks for the feedback though .

Edited by Waywocket, 22 March 2005 - 09:31 AM.

[Yacomo]

So when do I bust your bubble about the fact that Elminster doesn't use a sword?  He did when he was a thief, though I doubt it was a large broadsword like that one.  The books all mention his staff (and his pipe usually floats around his head, he never has to carry it).  Read Ed Greenwood's Elminster series for some ideas.

Otherwise, all the pics look great to me.  A really nice change from the standard images of the game.

Oh no, this is true? That's mean, you know where this picture comes from? It's actually from page 7 of my FR campaign setting book They even list a thundering longsword +5 among his possessions

Well, off we go and search for a different image...

* EDIT * That's the best alternate I found, but it does not even come close to the other one. I would stick with the one from the FR campaign setting if nobody gives us a better image.

Edited by Yacomo, 22 March 2005 - 09:46 AM.

[Cantrip]

Here are some more Elminsters...

Attached Images

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[Waywocket]

I still like the first one. The two with staves aren't really quite the right style IMO, plus it would be extremely difficult to extract them acceptably from the background. Plus the other one's still got a sword

[Yacomo]

Here are some more Elminsters...

Hmm, the second one is nice, but it would require a completely different composition, back to the cliff maybe? Way, what do you think?

For the rest of the day I'll be silently away and assemble a list of which files we need to change, so that we can actually get some 'real' work done - see you all tomorrow B)

[Cantrip]

Here's another useable pic (not Elminster, though), slightly edited by me:

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[Waywocket]

I don't like the idea of trying to take that elminster from the background, though anybody else is of coures welcome to try . I do really like that elf picture though.

[Yacomo]

Here's another useable pic (not Elminster, though), slightly edited by me:

Hmm, this is a nice picture indeed, but could he be turned into Elminster? Maybe, if you give him a beard and some red clothes, but like Way commented on the other pictures before, it would surely require some major editing. Somebody wanna do it?

Oh and before we forget: There is much more to be done, than to compose a single picture We need at least one additional picture for the ToB start screen, maybe Cantrip wants to use his nice elf to design something for that one? And of course we need all the separate files for buttons etc. As mentioned before, I'll really be going now and assemble a list...

[Cantrip]

I would help more with the work itself, problem is I have to work with Paint...
I don't own any other graphic program .

[Yacomo]

I would help more with the work itself, problem is I have to work with Paint...
I don't own any other graphic program .

Try Gimp - its free B)

I really like that elf, now if we could find a way to put him to good use...

[Waywocket]

I would help more with the work itself, problem is I have to work with Paint...
I don't own any other graphic program .

Well there's always www.gimp.org. The UI's fairly painful if you're unused to it though .

[Yacomo]

As promised, some details about the required changes to the game files.

After this enthusiastic afternoon, I did some research in order to figure out, what actually needs to be changed in the game files. Good thing is that .chu-editing is really simple. Bad thing is, that there are some serious hard-wired limitations that will affect us.

Graphics files to be changed:
- start25.mod ? main start screen, will feature Sarevok for previous SoA option
- startold.mos ? SoA start screen, will feature Elminster
- start.mos ? ToB start screen, design yet to be determined, maybe something darker to please KD
- start.bam ? contains animation sequences for the buttons used in the start screens, it is possible to add and use new sequences (tested it), but we cannot use as many sequences as we would like to due to reasons detailed below; for compatibilities sake I suggest that we add new sequences anyway instead of replacing existing ones, we would need six of them

.chu file to be changed: start.chu
- contains several ?windows?, we need to change ?window0?
- every window contains a fixed set of controls and these are wired into the engine by id; there does not seem to be a way to add additional controls to a window, we only could reorder them or remove some
- limitation: ?window0? in start.chu is used for both SoA and ToB, thus the start screens for both of them must be designed in the same way; the buttons will have to be at the same place and they will look the same for both; this is a serious restriction that makes me very sorry 
side note: there seems to be some ?magic? within the engine that knows that it has to use ?startold.mos? for SoA, at least there is no reference to this file anywhere in the game files
- further limitation: the same control is used for different purposes under different circumstances, see table below
- what needs to be done is: adjust position, width and height for the following controls and fix the animation sequence reference number

Table of controls:
Control      | main menu usage | single player  | multi player          | options
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
control id 0 | single player  | Baldur?s Gate  | connect                | sound
control id 1 | multi player    | Load Game      | none                  | graphics
control id 2 | movies          | Baldur?s Gate 2 | pre generate character | none
control id 3 | none            | back            | back                  | game play
control id 4 | options        | none            | none                  | return
control id 5 | none            | none            | none                  | none

[Eon Blue Apocalypse]

I like the screens that are canvassed best, because the ones that are not look too photographic, they don't fit in with the rest of the game art that is more 'drawn' style. But the whole project is very promising!

Baldur's Gate Trilogy:

Part 1: Tales of the Sword Coast [the whole of BG1]
Part 2: Shadows of Amn
Part 3: Throne of Bhaal

Edited by Eon Blue Apocalypse, 22 March 2005 - 02:57 PM.

[Waywocket]

Yeah, I've looked at this and seen more or less the same problems (not looked into this with much detail though, so I was hoping for a better resolution); I'll try to make some sane kind of suggestion in the morning, after I've had some sleep and time to look at it all. I probably won't come up with anything new, as I'm sure Yacomo's looked properly, but I hope I should be able to say something worthwhile (not entirely sober at the moment). Of course, we might end up having to use generic buttons rather than buttons taht ore an effect on the background image, just because we need to use the same for SoA and ToB...

[Sir BillyBob]

That's the picture of Elminster from the Forgotten Realms campaign setting source book, so in 3rd edition at least he does use a sword. In fact, it's a +5 thundering longsword.

What? Ed Greenwood created Elminster as part of a series of books the company asked him to write about the new game campaign called Forgotten Realms. Elminster started out as a thief, then became a cleric of Mystra and finally a wizard. I guess someone at Wizards of the Coast forgot about this when they drew the picture.

[Sir-Kill]

I thought Ele. should look a bit older. still needs work but....

Edited by Sir-Kill, 22 March 2005 - 09:39 PM.

[Yacomo]

SirKill, JRichard,

Those mages add a new dimension to this project, very good material :thumb:

Since it would be a shame to dump the last scetch, even if it contained the 'wrong' Elminster, why not package two variants of the screen and let the player decide which one he likes best? I am all for creating a second screen using a cliff and SirKills older Elminster variant. Do you have a version of that without the black border, SirKill?

Unfortunately I will have to deal with some serious RL issues today and then I'll be heading into easter holidays until monday. So most of the work will most likely have to wait till tuesday next week. But then maybe not, since Way is so enthusiastic at the moment

Oh, and if anybody has a good suggestion for the ToB start screen - go ahead and tell us!

[Chevalier]

Can you do a random start screen? with the buttons in the same place and differnt pic each load??