37 replies to this topic

[Qwinn]

I disregard game manuals in general because they seldom bear more than a passing resemblance to the finished product.

Compared to what, though? As far as I know, the PS:T manual has only 3 instances where it contradicts what you see in game:

1) The hit point thing, where MCA confirmed that the manual was right and the game was wrong.
2) The "TNO is a single class at any given moment" thing, the topic under discussion, and
3) The thief experience table in the back.

That's it. On the other hand, we've got at least 25 confirmed (and in some cases MAJOR) bugs in the engine so far, never mind the hundreds of bugs outside of the engine. And note that there's only one guy in the known universe able and willing to extensively research and discover those engine bugs, at least so far.

The manual's got at least as good a track record as the rest of the game does when it comes to errors. Your decision that the manual is untrustworthy and must be dismissed out of hand whereas the engine code must be considered infallible evidence of designer intent is completely arbitrary.

My stance isn't that you're wrong, as you seem to have mistakenly assumed, it's that there isn't enough explicit evidence either way.

The -only- evidence that it was supposed to work the way it does, is the fact that it works the way it does. By that standard, no fixpack is possible, because every bug is ironclad evidence of the designer's intent that it be that way. There are tons of other cases that no one argues is a bug, and what kind of evidence do people accept for them? Because it's inconsistent with other game mechanics. Because it's illogical. Because it clearly causes balance issues for which there's no reasonable justification. Because it contradicts the manual. Because it contradicts in game dialogue. I'm not applying a different standard here than I do in other bug fixes. I submit, however, that you are, because I'm willing to bet that I could provide examples of other bugs that you couldn't sincerely object to being called bugs, based on considerably less evidence than we have here.

My whole point is that you made a subjective judgment call, which you've admitted.

I don't believe I did. I said I made a call made on the merits of the evidence that I was able to garner from the game and the manual. That doesn't mean I think the result was subjective. I believe I made the call on objective legitimate evidence that you subjectively choose to dismiss for arbitrary reasons.

As far as the Occam's Razor argument goes, of course #2 looks better when you load it with subjective statements.

I can't identify a single "subjective" statement in #2 that doesn't exist in #1... I used the term "screwed up" in both. I think every portion of #2 is objectively true given the assumptions. If you believe that TNO was supposed to have features of multi-classing, then all other things being equal the manual statement "Furthermore, he cannot access any of the other classes' abilities when he is spacializing in one of the classes." objectively contradicts it. I'm not going to dig up the class trainer statements (as I have posted them elsewhere already), but other than your admittedly pedantic (and thus irrelevant) objection about the difference between swords and edged weapons, the class trainer dialogues contradict the notion of TNO as a multi-class every bit as objectively. There is also objectively no corroborating evidence anywhere else in game that the way it works in the vanilla game was intended. So what part of it was "loaded" with "subjective" statements?

Regardless, I don't see this discussion proceeding further in a constructive manner, so this will be my last post on the subject. Thank you for your time.

Eh, I enjoy these sorts of arguments. If I gave offense, I certainly didn't intend it. But sure, if both sides aren't enjoying it, not a good idea to continue. If anyone else wants to carry that torch (or wants to chime in with agreement on my side), please feel free.

Qwinn

Edited by Qwinn, 28 July 2009 - 03:34 PM.

[KIrving]

While I have no intention of debating the issue, I will chime in with a request for a modular release. I'm not sure why you feel the need to be convinced though. You are either interested in providing this option or you're not. Which is not to say that your efforts are not appreciated because it appears, very much, that they are. As it stands, however I'm not interested in installing the fixpack as it currently exists.
If you are truly serious about the possibility of a modular release then I will be very keen to wait and install such a version. (and be very grateful for the effort expended in providing such an option )

[Qwinn]

I'm not opposed to the idea in principle, but I did want to explain that it is a pain in the ass to actually do.

If you really will not install it as it stands, could you be specific about which components in particular you would want to see made optional? As I said, this is something I'm willing to entertain on a case by case basis, but I'm not going to make -everything- an option.

Some things I'd be willing to go through the trouble to do, others I wouldn't. As I already said, the Dak'kon sword changes are one that I'd be willing to. The THACO fix really isn't, because in addition to the reasons given above, non-fixed THACO combined with the confirmed HP bug fix just results in a -ridiculously- unbalanced and broken game, even worse in that respect than the game as shipped, and I'm simply not interested in going out of my way to make that possible.

That doesn't mean I wouldn't consider other things, though. One thing I'm surprised no one has ever asked to be made optional is the Lock fixes... gripes about that would IMO be a lot more reasonable than complaints about the THACO thing, because those fixes really are my totally subjective call on what is a reasonable lockpicking difficulty at various points in the game. That doesn't mean I don't think they qualify as fixes, there's simply no other way to make the Open Locks thief skill (and the Knock spell) anything other than trivial and uselessly broken. I consider the trivial values they were left at as oversights/unfinished. But I can still see a purist argument against them much easier than I do some others I hear regularly.

So anyways, feel free to ask me for specific fixes to be made optional, if it hasn't been discussed already. I'll be happy to address 'em on a case by case. Some I will likely agree to, others I won't. Hopefully, those I am willing to option out will be sufficient to make you interested in installing the fixpack as is.

Qwinn

Edited by Qwinn, 28 July 2009 - 05:05 PM.

[Jaesun]

Just chiming in on this subject (and I DO want to thank you so much for all this work you have been doing).

I personally have no problems with any of the "fixes" you have or will be introducing into the game at all. Having played PST more times than I care to admit, ANY new change is honestly welcome to me.

But I can see the point where possibly "purist" people only want 100% verifiable bug-fixes in a so called "fix pack". As an example, the incredible work Killap has done for the Fallout 2 game. Like you, he does ask for feedback on changes, and if it then becomes at any point questionalble, it it removed from the fix and moved elsewhere, and made optional, leaving the user to decide on what to "fix".

You have provided fairly good feedback and info on why you have approached each change, and I think sometimes you really get to a point where YOU personally feel that this is the way the game should have been, and is a 100% bug.

I think your fixpack *should* be possibly made into 2 sections when you install it. Un-Controversial stuff added to the basic fix pack, and then the controversial changes/fixes added optionally. I COMPLETELY understand how much of a bitch it is to provide such options, but options are always a very good thing. Some just like the broken/exploitable way PST worked, and some of us would love that you fix it.

Anyways, thats my take on this, and again, I look greatly to more of your fixes to this game. It is truly appreciated.

[Daulmakan]

While I have no intention of debating the issue, I will chime in with a request for a modular release. I'm not sure why you feel the need to be convinced though. You are either interested in providing this option or you're not.

As I said, this is something I'm willing to entertain on a case by case basis, but I'm not going to make -everything- an option.
Some things I'd be willing to go through the trouble to do, others I wouldn't. As I already said, the Dak'kon sword changes are one that I'd be willing to. That doesn't mean I wouldn't consider other things, though. One thing I'm surprised no one has ever asked to be made optional is the Lock fixes... gripes about that would IMO be a lot more reasonable than complaints about the THACO thing, because those fixes really are my totally subjective call on what is a reasonable lockpicking difficulty at various points in the game. So anyways, feel free to ask me for specific fixes to be made optional, if it hasn't been discussed already. I'll be happy to address 'em on a case by case. Some I will likely agree to, others I won't.

With KIrving post in mind, could I suggest you just state the components you are indeed willing to make optional? Once we know which ones, we can vote or whatever to see which ones gather enough interest to actually justify making it optional (eg. I'm guessing the locks thing won't be protested, it was the first thing I put skill points on and was useless until the FP...; on the other hand, Dak'kon's sword seems like it could be the opposite case, and so on).

Just wanted to add that I already have the fixpack installed and I plan to install the next version too, so the optional inclusion (or not) of a certain component won't change this for me (though it might for others).

[gothemasticator]

My two cents:

What is a bug? No piece of software as complex as Torment is ever released bug-free. Developers that continue to support a piece of software--think of Firefox or OpenOffice--not only continue (for years!) to fix bugs, but they also offer updated versions, which are a mix of new features, redesigns of old features, and always more bug-fixes (many, of course, to fix bugs introduced by updates). Developers that cease to offer support (as in the case of Torment) simply stop this process at a point in time.

You may define a bug narrowly--as, perhaps, a mistake in the code which leads to some portion(s) of the program not functioning. But then what about spelling errors in text the end-user will see? And, if spelling errors are to be fixed, what about a set of drop-down menus which function perfectly code-wise but are confusing to the end-user because they don't use intuitive enough categories? What about an oft-used function that just clearly should have a button on the main controls bar but was left off for no logical reason--it just didn't get done?

Any to-do list of fixes for still-supported software will be broken down into categories, some of which will be labeled bugs and some of which will have other labels. But the point at which a proposed fix is designated "essential" is ultimately a decision made by the people in the room. There are no absolute rules dictated by the laws of the universe.

Also, when a development team tackles the question of why is that like it is and shouldn't we change it?, the people in the room answer the questions. "Oh, that was me. I did that on purpose, because [reason]." But just because there was a reason, doesn't mean it doesn't get changed. Because there are people in the room, that question is now open for discussion. And just because there was a good reason to do it in the first place doesn't mean there isn't a good reason to do it differently now.

What Quinn is doing is quite an uncommon thing in software development: taking a no-longer-supported piece of software and committing to "fixing it" while not moving forward to new versions. (I put fixing it in quotation marks because, as I hope I explained above, there really isn't such a thing as "fixed" software. It's not static. There's really just software no one works on any more.) There really aren't any rules for what he is doing that we can hold him to. There are analagous situations in film and literature. Check out the restored version of Orson Welles' A Touch of Evil, and watch all the documentary extras if you want a glimpse into the complexity of restoring a clearly broken product that exists in an eminently editable medium. That Quinn struggles even now with every decision is a testament to the fact that he cares enough about the material he is working on to not let himself rely on static rules. That he, in addition, takes pains to make his own decision transparent to us, the end-users, is remarkable. That he actually invites discussion, which he enters into gustily, is bold and generous.

What am I saying? That everything Quinn does is the best possible thing there might be to do? No: I don't believe there is a "best possible." That I agree 100% with every decision he has made? No. I am saying that I think the stance That's how the game shipped; it must have been intended. is untenable in every case. To elaborate a little more: The game as shipped is a piece of software. Every software developer understands that "shipped" doesn't mean "perfect" or "finished" or even, "we're done working on that one." It just means "shipped," which is a very important stage in software development but not the last one.

Why am I posting this essay in this thread about modular releases for the fixpack? Because, to tell the truth, I think it is a bit petty to complain that because you might not agree with certain changes, it is somehow worth someone else's time to accomodate you. Clearer: I want the bugs fixed, but I don't think everything you fixed is a bug; please do more work to accomodate me. is a petty and ungenerous attitude to take.

If you have opinions you want considered, hang around the forums, argue your points, listen to others argue theirs, be open to changing your mind or at least open to living with not always getting your way. Or, make your own damn fixpack.

In my case, apparantly two cents gets you a wall of text.

gothemasticator

Just so's it's clear: It was Caffiend's posts that set my ire. gtm

[Kung Fu Man]

To sum up the previous post in a way, you guys do get it's not so much "should it be modular or not" but "is this going to make a slew of additional work for translators and whatnot", right?

If you want to undo something, it's like he said above: you can undo it. Making an argument over and over about how it should all be optional comes across as a) ungrateful and b) kinda rude after he's already said "I really don't want to do this." So quick beating the dead horse already.

Edited by Kung Fu Man, 29 July 2009 - 03:39 AM.

[KIrving]

To sum up the previous post in a way, you guys do get it's not so much "should it be modular or not" but "is this going to make a slew of additional work for translators and whatnot", right?

If you want to undo something, it's like he said above: you can undo it. Making an argument over and over about how it should all be optional comes across as a) ungrateful and b) kinda rude after he's already said "I really don't want to do this." So quick beating the dead horse already.

*sigh* I'll make this, relatively, short and sweet then. (I'm post migraine and not terribly capable of stringing lots of words together let alone typing them and making much sense)
I'm not trying to debate the issue or 'flog a dead horse'. Since the thread came up I thought I would express my personal preference. I've always had a preference for component install in any fixes or mods I use. For BG2, I didn't even install the entire baldurdash back in the day but only installed the components that I particularly wanted.
I don't see how expressing an opinion becomes ungrateful or rude. I can't possibly imagine how much work it will take. I'm not a modder. I'm just someone who loves these old games and likes using mods to make playing them an even more enjoyable experience for my playing style.
I'm cool with whatever Qwinn decides to do, it's his baby after all.

[Qwinn]

KIrving, like I said, if there's particular fixes in the Fixpack that prevent you from wanting to install my mods, tell me what they are (and why they bother you so, hopefully), and I will see what I can do.

Also, had some further musings for the general debate over modding styles. I was thinking about this and came up with a new way to explain my position:

I think there's two kinds of "purist" when it comes to modding, if you will. Believe it or not, I do actually consider myself a purist. I know some self-described purists will balk at that. But there's a secondary impetus that they have that I don't. I think you can be a "purist", and you can also be a "minimalist". Some who are minimalists may think that you have to be minimalist to be purist, but I strongly disagree.

By my definition, a purist is someone who considers the intent of the designers to be paramount in terms of what is allowed as far as modding.

A minimalist goes further than that, though they may not realize it. A minimalist holds that the mechanics of the game -as it shipped- has a special status, and all attempts to fix the game must strive to deviate from how it was as it shipped as little as possible. Something could be a clear, unequivocal bug, but if it makes a significant change to gameplay, then, no, to the minimalist there's simply something wrong with that on its face. It really doesn't matter how well supported the reasons behind the fix are. The simple fact that it's effect is a significant deviation from how the game shipped is enough to mean it's a bad fix, or worse, not a fix at all.

I consider myself a purist, but I'm not a minimalist. Having been a programmer for years, both on small projects and large, I frankly don't think the way a game ships has necessarily -any- correlation to how it was intended to be. I know a lot of non-programmers think "But if they intended it to be that way, and it's so different from what actually came about, surely they would have -caught- it". Even in a normal programming cycle, this isn't the case. A normal tester is only going to catch bugs in whatever he's specifically looking at. A good tester may catch -some- details not related to what he was looking at. Great testers are rare in that they notice most problems as they go about their testing. But no one catches everything. Not even an ARMY of testers will catch everything. If they did, then bug-free software would be a frequent thing, rather than pretty much non-existent. 20, 30, 50 testers will never catch everything that 40,000 players will. That's just the way it is. And something as big as, say, the THACO change, can -easily- get by 20, 30 or 50 testers. I think a lot of people just don't accept that, which leads to the minimalist attitude.

Then add to that that PS:T itself was literally rushed out the door a good year (I believe) ahead of schedule. They themselves felt it would take a lot longer to finish, but due to economic realities, they had to rush it. A lot of things simply didn't get finished. Really -basic- things, like, for example, lock difficulties. Or assigning alignment hits for killing the Clerk's Ward and SW Hive guys. Stuff like that.

The minimalist doesn't care about that. The shipped state has some special status in their eyes, and if economic realities dictated that the game must ship with trivial lock difficulties and half the innocents in the game giving no alignment hits and other oversights (or, in fact, "there's no time/money left to finish it"), well, then that's just the way it is, and to complete the work they couldn't isn't a fix, it's a -mod-.

I don't agree with that. I'm a purist, not a minimalist. I'm working off what I can glean from the evidence was the designer's intent. I don't think there's a distinguishable difference between a piece of code that doesn't work right because of programmer stupidity (which everyone calls "a bug"), and a piece of code that doesn't work right because the guys on the top floor at Black Isle weren't willing or able to get enough funding to finish the job properly. As I said before, to me, they're both exactly the same thing: "clearly unfinished code".

So why is there even a UB mod? If I consider everything unfinished to be a fix, why don't I meld the Fixpack and UB? Because if it's reasonable to believe something (like the Candlestick quest) was -intentionally- cut, then I put it in UB. I reserve what looks to me like unfinished due to bugs or lack of time in the fixpack. If it's reasonably arguable that they cut some content on purpose, then its UB. But I don't think the stuff that is most argued about falls into this category anyway. I just wanted to make the point that, again, intent is what's at question here, and I do need some evidence of intent, not just the existence of unfinished code, to decide to put it in the Fixpack. That's part of the whole "purist, not minimalist" thing.

If anything, I think I err on the side of caution. Restored Able Ponderthought Research should seriously be in the Fixpack - its very clearly the result of stupid-durrrr bugs, there's no indication it was yanked on purpose that I can see. Ditto some of the "More Morte Mortuary Moments" component, and even the Restored Alley of Dangerous Angles thugs was I think a case of unfinished code due to time constraints. But, whatever, if I'm erring on the side of caution, good, and I hope that will mean even some with minimalist leanings will be willing to install my Fixpack anyway.

My UB is unlike the BG1 and BG2 UB mods. 95-99% of my UB mod, Expanded Deionarra aside, is original black isle content, not just "I know they intended this cause I talked to a dev" but 95% the physical files that shipped with the shipped game, and I'm just tweaking it to make it work. Most other modders for most other games would call something that was 95% part of the shipped game "a fix". Don'tcha think? The point is: basically, UB -is- my "Optional but Cool" components.

Anyways, I know some minimalists will never agree. They accord some holy status to the game as shipped, and "patches" are (for some strange reason) only allowed to have really minimal effects on gameplay. *shrug* I simply don't agree with the logic behind that. I want to -finish- the game and achieve what I believe to have been the intent of its authors, not just apply little tiny bandaids that cover very little while leaving the big gaping chest wounds because, hey, if we heal that big gaping chest wound, then the patient's condition will have been -substantially- altered by his visit to the hospital, and we can't have that...

Qwinn

Edited by Qwinn, 30 July 2009 - 05:57 AM.

[Qwinn]

All that said, I think 97% of the Fixpack qualifies as just fixing stupid-durr programmer errors, the sort that would be acceptable to the purist -and- minimalist. Maybe 3% qualifies as arguable in terms of "bug" versus "unfinished".

I think that the difficulty in getting those complaining to actually bring up -specific- complaints is evidence of that. If I were really torturing the game that badly, I'd think getting specific complaints wouldn't resemble pulling teeth so much.

Just wanted to point that out, in case this thread is scaring anyone from trying the fixpack.

Qwinn

[Jaesun]

Well said Qwinn. It is nice to see specifically the angle at which you approach your mods.

That said, hurry up and finish the next fixpack. After my BGT play through I'm going to give your latest mods a run through.

[Kulyok]

No go. "This change won't work" - I posted it with arguments once or twice, then, after finding out it was just like talking to the wall, I just marked changes I didn't like in polls - when I noticed those polls in active threads, that is. Again, it won't work with you. You've proved you don't want discussion. You want control. And, speaking as a professional programmer, tester and writer, no, your arguments don't make sense to me. Storywise, balance-wise - especially storywise. You can disagree with original intent all the way you want - but these gaping wounds will become even deeper when a bad writer tries to do the stitching.

One could take Quinn's work the way he/she took Platter's and make it modular, but I don't think it's the right way to do things. For the time being, the best way is likely "edit .tp2 where Quinn screwed up".

Sigh. I have a bad feeling that if there's going to be a reply, it'll be 1) asking for specific links with my posts instead of searching for them(oh, yeah, more attention, longer thread, defenders running to the rescue); 2) pulling phrases out of context and answering. I don't need answers. What I need is a one-hour work: putting a BEGIN @XXX line in front of every change, and leaving an "Install all components or ask about each one?" option in the beginning. Don't want to do it? Fine. But don't say your way is better.

[Qwinn]

Well, it's still tentatively set for the release date I gave it 8 months ago... v4.0 will probably come out somewhere around December/January. There's certainly enough new content to warrant a new release at this point, but there's a few things I'm waiting on:

1) scient. He's disappeared himself for like 3 weeks now. No idea if it's due to internet troubles (which he had a while back) or if he's burnt out or what. I know there's a few more things he seemed to really want to get done for the next release, but till he comes back it's hard to estimate how long that'll take.

2) The Vhailor/Trias thing (see related thread). Last time I talked to Colin McComb (original game dev, responsible for Trias), he did in fact seem sincerely interested in writing up the dialogue for the missing option, but also said he had some other commitments. If he hasn't contacted me again in a few weeks, we'll see.

3) Chris Avellone (lead designer): he said a ways back that he'd be swamped until Alpha Protocol shipped, which should be sometime around October, but at that point he'd be willing to get into depth on some of my questions. At that point hopefully I can get some better ideas on what the original intent of certain issues was. How much additional work that might open up that I'd want to get into v4.0 is, of course, impossible to estimate.

4) Translations, as always. When I'm done, then will come the waiting period as our honorable volunteer translators finish up their work.

Anyways, that's the status of v4.0 atm.

Qwinn

[Qwinn]

No go. "This change won't work" - I posted it with arguments once or twice, then, after finding out it was just like talking to the wall, I just marked changes I didn't like in polls - when I noticed those polls in active threads, that is. Again, it won't work with you. You've proved you don't want discussion. You want control.

Oh, BS, Kulyok. You actually posted two days after I released my mods, shocked and appalled, that I corrected "Great, great trials of war... much too much to be born by any mortal thing" to "Great, great trials of war.... much too much to be borne by any mortal thing." Which is ridiculously minimalist, as many other posters pointed out. Oh, and based on that SINGLE example, you declared that I had already established a "pattern" of horrific editing comparable to translating "muslim scholars" as "a girl's name". Yes, of course I got insulted at such ridiculous hyperbole and shut you down on that - that was freaking ridiculous.

This absurd accusation, based solely on my changing the word "born" to "borne" (which accurately corrects a very common error) is here:

http://www.shsforums...&...st&p=398639


Now, your having decided two days after the release of v1.0, where there weren't yet ANY even remotely questionable fixes (even by the most anal retentive minimalist on the planet, or you'd think anyway) that I was a horrible writer and modder, it's not exactly stunning that you've maintained that opinion going forward.


Every drive-by complaining you did after that, you gave hardly any argument at all, just complained and left, even when I politely asked you to give more details.

There was this complaint about the HP and Tweak fixes:

http://www.shsforums...&...st&p=429913


I responded 3 posts down, addressing what I believe was a polite and legitimate question regarding both issues that was not addressed by your point. No answer. And let's note, MCA acknowledged that the HP thing was in fact a bug, meaning you were wrong. It wasn't because I refused to listen to you that it went in. The THACO thing has already been beaten to death in this thread.


Then this:

http://www.shsforums...&...st&p=451234


Rejecting any change at all to Vhailor's dialogue. For which I again responded to your point, with no reply. Note that, based SOLELY on poster input, I decided to move anything but the most minimal fix to UB. Turned out that what I wanted to fix in the Fixpack was in fact an error, confirmed by the guy who actually wrote Trias. But don't let the fact that somehow the posters managed to get through my "wall" and brought me to the correct decision interfere with your declaration that I'm all about "control".

And that's it. That's all your posts a search turns up in my forum. Besides that and your snark in this and the Apologies thread, that's all the input you've ever given. Three posts of substance, one that was absurd and hyperbolic on its face, and two that were contradicted by the original designers of the game. Never once responded to -any- rebuttal in any of these threads - apparently, "talking to a wall" means leaving a two line comment and ignoring any response except "Yes, master". From that, you decide that I just can't be talked to. Pretty amusing.

I'd be willing to bet money that you were the one and single nay vote against the alignment fixes. Care to confirm?

You commented in the Apologies thread that I'd "earned my reputation". I'd let your comments bother me more if several people hadn't already warned me about yours, and that your response to my work was pretty much set in stone from the start, since the point is that only you get to decide who is a "good modder". The fact that you decided my "pattern" of horrific modding was established and based solely on a single character obvious misspelling of a single word two days after my mods released pretty much makes that painfully obvious.

Qwinn

Edited by Qwinn, 30 July 2009 - 03:02 PM.

[KIrving]

Okay, I've spent the last three and a half hours trawling through the readme and this part of the forum and I've pretty much come to the conclusion that the fixpack just isn't going to be my particular flavour of ice cream.

Most of the 'fixes' that have already been brought up are some of the ones that I feel uncomfortable with.
Particularly, gameplay (balancing) issues like THACO, resistances, changes to Dakkon's blade etc. and areas where developer intent is being interpreted.
I would prefer such things as optional or within a tweak and/or unfinished business mod.
There's also a fair amount of restored content listed in the readme, not just your's specifically Quinn, but much of the additions taken from the restoration pack. I'm uncomfortable with restored content being in a fixpack that is about fixing bugs. If restored content was optional, then fine.

I also have reservations about some of the proposed future content, such as the alignment mod being in the fixpack, the extra lives in the fortress situation (which may or may not be a bug but certainly seems open to interpretation.) and the Vhailor additional dialogue choices. (hey it may very well have been accidentally left out but why can't it then be in a restoration pack?)

I'm not going to go into any more detail as I really am not looking to be proven right or wrong or to have my opinions validated within a debate. I think that one of the OP's statements sums up how I feel,

Again, I'm not standing on a soapbox telling you what you've done is wrong. My whole purpose with this topic was to ask for options. Not everyone is going to be interested in the game play changes, you've acknowledged that, but as it stands there aren't really any other viable alternatives to your fix pack. That means people either have to live with the bugs, accept fixes they don't like/want, or spent tedious hours commenting out the changes they don't agree with.

Anyway I'll leave this discussion on that note and I hope there are no hard feelings.

[Qwinn]

Kirving,

No problem and certainly no hard feelings, you've been completely polite. And from some of the things you've said, yeah, I don't think I'd ever go as far as you seem to require in terms of making things optional (I'll explain which and why in a moment). But some of the things you said I don't think are quite accurate, and I'd like to correct them for the sake of others who may read your post and believe my rules on what goes where are looser than you seem to believe.

1. There's nothing remaining that can be considered a restoration from the Restoration Pack in my fixpack, at least as of the upcoming version 4.0. The expanded bestiary entries are the only thing that would really count, and they were already slated to be moved to UB for the next version (but, they ARE all original black isle content out of the dialogue file anyway). The "Gained an Ability" sound restoration was also already slated to get moved to UB RS&B component. The "restored" neck cracking and alarm bell sounds were -definitely- just bugged (it was just a typoed filename). All the remaining "minor dialogue restorations" are pretty much a misnomer, they are bugfixes, with one possible exception where KungFuMan slightly increased the difficulty of one creature's stat checks because they were really really -easy- stat checks and it was virtually impossible to fail them at that point in the game (and I think one stat check was for INT 8 or something, impossible to ever fail). But I'll see about moving that out or just getting rid of it, since I can see how that would be troublesome. There's really nothing else I can see that should be bothersome to anyone.

The point is that even though KungFuMan's mod was titled "Restoration Pack", it also contained fixes not addressed by Platter. The portion that is fixes went into the Fixpack, and what was actual restorations is in UB, or at least will be next version. (And incidentally, the ones I'm moving for next version, I'm doing so cause that's where I think they belong, not cause anyone asked me to, at least not before now).

2. Resistances rolling over 100 not causing creatures to heal isn't in the fixpack, and isn't necessarily going to be either. That's something I already said I was going to look at. If the BG2 fixpack isn't doing it, then I certainly won't be, and even if they are I may decide to make that optional or leave it out anyway.

3. Changes to Dak'kon's blade, I already said I planned to make optional. It's something I do plan on asking MCA about anyway. Either way, I'm already rolling part of the change (to Kinstealer) back per poster requests. For the record, the only reason I make those changes is because you really -couldn't- get the alternate blades in the vanilla game, and by fixing it so that it became possible to get them, it makes going through the Circle with Dak'kon a fairly serious penalty to Dak'kon's effectiveness, which contradicts the game's lore and dialogue all over the place and it's really hard to believe it was intended. But if someone really feels that the game lore dictates that helping Dak'kon *know* himself should make his blade actively worse, hey, who am I to argue.

All of the above, I can see your concerns, I don't think your concerns were "over-minimalist", so to speak. I'm correcting where you're incorrect about the content, but I wouldn't argue with you for not wanting to install 'em -if- the things you thought weren't optional or part of the fixpack really were. Those are fair concerns.

But I do have to say, the following paragraph, no, I'm never going to get as minimalist as you seem to require.

I also have reservations about some of the proposed future content, such as the alignment mod being in the fixpack, the extra lives in the fortress situation (which may or may not be a bug but certainly seems open to interpretation.) and the Vhailor additional dialogue choices. (hey it may very well have been accidentally left out but why can't it then be in a restoration pack?)

1. The "alignment mod" that I originally proposed isn't going in the Fixpack. That proposed alignment mod was looking to make changes to dialogue alignment hits that seem skewed to me, but I'm not doing that at all. All I'm doing is adding alignment hits for killing innocents that were very inconsistent and clearly oversights. I wasn't even -aware- of them when I first proposed the alignment mod, so they're not related at all. I'll confirm with MCA to make the minimalists feel better, but I can't imagine him arguing that the missing hits were intended to be left out, and I really simply can't see how anyone can honestly feel that those tremendous inconsistencies were intentional. How could it possibly be chaotic evil to kill chaotic evil Roberta the Husband Killer, the slave merchant, and the Carceri executioner judge but perfectly okay to kill lawful good godsmen, sensates, hive touts and Candrian? What possible logic or intent would explain the fact that the only two creatures it is evil to kill in the entire Clerk's Ward and Festhall are the two outdoor bartenders? What intent could explain that it's chaotic evil to kill the brothel patrons but not the prostitutes? Come on. That's kinda as obvious a bug as it gets, isn't it? The poll respondents certainly seemed to overwhelmingly agree, so I don't think I'm being crazy there.

2. Extra lives in the fortress: I don't really see how its open to interpretation... given the lore in the game, how is it possible to get -two- lives per companion you bring to the fortress, and why would their dying give you -more-? That contradicts all the lore we have available, in fact it's exactly backwards. But I think I will be able to get confirmation from MCA before this goes in. If he actually says that was intentional, fine, I'll let you all know, but I'm gonna -really- want to know what possible logic can explain it that's consistent with the lore.

3. "and the Vhailor additional dialogue choices. (hey it may very well have been accidentally left out but why can't it then be in a restoration pack?)" This is the clearest indication that we're never going to see eye to eye, I'm afraid. You read what Colin McComb said, obviously, so you know for a fact that a designer has stepped up and said "that was an error, sorry", and you don't think a fix for that belongs in a Fixpack? If correcting a dialogue that the designer responsible for it said was a clear, unequivocal error doesn't qualify as a fix, then what possibly could? Why would that be a restoration instead of a fix? Especially when (hopefully) it will be the designer himself who provides the missing dialogue, but even if he doesn't, it would at least be with his approval? Sorry, but I'm never ever ever ever ever going to agree that something like that doesn't qualify as a fix. That's not even close to the dividing line. I don't even get the logic that would object to that fix, not when we have such clear confirmation. It may in fact be the single most justified fix in the fixpack because of it. *shrug* You're asking me to -disregard- confirmed designer intent here. That's not gonna happen.

Anyways, not trying to convince you, you've clearly made up your mind (though hopefully some of the cases where you seem to have misunderstood what's in the fixpack, such as the restoration pack misconception, would make you feel better about it). I just wanted to write this for those who come later, read your post, and get more worried than I believe is warranted or might misunderstand the nature of the things you're objecting to.

Good luck, and have fun playing PS:T whether you do with my mods or not.

Qwinn

Edited by Qwinn, 01 August 2009 - 01:47 AM.

[Kung Fu Man]

To liven up this topic a little and to avoid posting a new one just to ask, what's the current status of 4.0 anyway Qwinn? Or more accurately, what's left to work in for that version?

[Qwinn]

See post #33 on this page

Qwinn