[MOD - Released] "The Missing Heir"

[leewroy]

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Finished the module! Took me around 8:30 to end it. Found 3/3 treasures, 4 skulls and 23/26 secrets
Your module is def. in my top 10, dude. Great plot, very good design! There's a final issue I´d like to report you. At the end, on the cinematic, the last phrase was cut.

I´d like to congratulate you for this great job. Be sure that the community will like it

[Ryeath_Greystalk]

SpoilerShow

Finished the module! Took me around 8:30 to end it. Found 3/3 treasures, 4 skulls and 23/26 secrets
Your module is def. in my top 10, dude. Great plot, very good design! There's a final issue I´d like to report you. At the end, on the cinematic, the last phrase was cut.

I´d like to congratulate you for this great job. Be sure that the community will like it

I will look into that last issue on the cinematic. I appreciate you taking the time to go through this. You did very well on the secrets also. I will post a secret / level breakdown when I release the level. Still have two testers going through it with a fine tooth comb.

[Isaac]

Minor typo in the conversation at the alter of sinful intention.

http://i271.photobucket.com/albums/jj12 ... 8406e3.jpg

[Ryeath_Greystalk]

Thanks Isaac.

[Ryeath_Greystalk]

Just wondering if Mal85 or Isaac are still testing the mod. Haven't heard anything in a bit.

Thanks.

[Isaac]

Just wondering if Mal85 or Isaac are still testing the mod. Haven't heard anything in a bit.

Thanks.

I am.. but didn't have a chance to play yesterday.

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I've competed the master's challenges. I have some suggestions.
The Dragon puzzle was a neat addition, and well done IMO.

Two things I've noticed in this game... First there is not a lot of food where there are no herders; so by level 5 my party is starving; and forced to live on healing potions... but that means no energy to fight or cast spells; there are not a lot of blood-drop plants either, so by level 5, my mage is effectively useless.

The other thing is that I must have missed the bow(s) in the earlier levels, because the first bow I found in the game was on an archer in the [level 5] room with two gold keys on tables.
And it required level 19 in missile weapons; (which none of my party was even close to having ~because none had ever found a bow).

The last this is minor, and might not be a problem at all (I don't have the save game to go check); It's the Dragon puzzle... IIRC most of the dragons are out of sight from the buttons and levers at the same time, so quite a lot of 'back and forth' running around to check which one moved ~and since they don't move if they can't... it's confusing to match up the levers with the dragons. My thought at the time was that the levers should be assigned opposite positions for opposite dragons; [ East / West == Both Up / Both Down]. But I don't remember if you already have a logic in place already ~that I just didn't catch at the time. Is it one lever up for E&W/ down for N&S, and the next lever for E/W or N/S ?

What I mean is, that if it is was originally an arbitrary assignment of the lever positions (to control a given dragon) ~then perhaps it shouldn't be. IMO it's easier ~but more satisfying to be able to guess the control scheme based on what they've seen when they flip the lever and press the buttons... You can't do that if it's random. But like I said... I don't recall (and can't check) if you already did it with a pattern.

[leewroy]

Isaac

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the dragon puzzle took me a day to solve, I had to make it on a shee of paper btw. It's complex, in my solution requires 33 steps between clicling the buttons and turning the levers. There's a pattern that he gave me on a previous post, you can check it. Levers UP/UP moves the north dragon, DOWN/DOWN, the west dragon; UP/DOWN east dragon; DOWN/UP south dragon. The first is the left lever, the second the right lever. By "north dragon" and so on, I mean facing the north diretion of the map. You can use the column with the buttons as a compass

[Isaac]

Isaac

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the dragon puzzle took me a day to solve, I had to make it on a shee of paper btw. It's complex, in my solution requires 33 steps between clicling the buttons and turning the levers. There's a pattern that he gave me on a previous post, you can check it. Levers UP/UP moves the north dragon, DOWN/DOWN, the west dragon; UP/DOWN east dragon; DOWN/UP south dragon. The first is the left lever, the second the right lever. By "north dragon" and so on, I mean facing the north diretion of the map. You can use the column with the buttons as a compass

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I saw how to solve... but the difficulty for me was the lever positioning (which position controlled which Dragon)... I didn't write it down ~but should have; Had I done so, then it would have saved a lot of running around visually checking.

What you mention is what I was pointing out... [To me at least] x2UP = North is fine... but confusing when x2Down = West. Of course that can be the point of it.
But IMO ~unless there is a reason not to, x2Down = South would seem a logical guess to the first time player; and probably satisfying to see that it's the right guess ~when they check.

**I'm not suggesting my pattern be used... just that the pattern used should probably be a partially guessable one. (Though it's fine as it is.)
___________________________________________________________________________________________________________
***It's a really neat puzzle, but prior experience as a Klotski addict makes the solution quickly apparent.

[Ryeath_Greystalk]

Just wondering if Mal85 or Isaac are still testing the mod. Haven't heard anything in a bit.

Thanks.

I am.. but didn't have a chance to play yesterday.

SpoilerShow

I've competed the master's challenges. I have some suggestions.
The Dragon puzzle was a neat addition, and well done IMO.

Two things I've noticed in this game... First there is not a lot of food where there are no herders; so by level 5 my party is starving; and forced to live on healing potions... but that means no energy to fight or cast spells; there are not a lot of blood-drop plants either, so by level 5, my mage is effectively useless.

The other thing is that I must have missed the bow(s) in the earlier levels, because the first bow I found in the game was on an archer in the [level 5] room with two gold keys on tables.
And it required level 19 in missile weapons; (which none of my party was even close to having ~because none had ever found a bow).

The last this is minor, and might not be a problem at all (I don't have the save game to go check); It's the Dragon puzzle... IIRC most of the dragons are out of sight from the buttons and levers at the same time, so quite a lot of 'back and forth' running around to check which one moved ~and since they don't move if they can't... it's confusing to match up the levers with the dragons. My thought at the time was that the levers should be assigned opposite positions for opposite dragons; [ East / West == Both Up / Both Down]. But I don't remember if you already have a logic in place already ~that I just didn't catch at the time. Is it one lever up for E&W/ down for N&S, and the next lever for E/W or N/S ?

What I mean is, that if it is was originally an arbitrary assignment of the lever positions (to control a given dragon) ~then perhaps it shouldn't be. IMO it's easier ~but more satisfying to be able to guess the control scheme based on what they've seen when they flip the lever and press the buttons... You can't do that if it's random. But like I said... I don't recall (and can't check) if you already did it with a pattern.

Isaac,

thanks for the quick response and the valuable input.

As for the bows

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There are two before level 5 as well as two crossbows. The first bow is in the secret room on level one, the second laying on the floor near the end of level two where you fight the mini boss skeleton. The first crossbow is in a secret room in the labrinthe with the moving walls on level two and the second laying on the floor in the walk about room on level 4.

One issue with missle weapons is they don't return until the monster is dead and since the main boss is a multi stage fight I found I ran out of missle weapons early on and had to use a spear for much of the fight. I have since added more arrows & quarrels and throwing weapons, but they won't be reflected in the version your playing.

Food,

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Drakken also noted a lack of food later on. I added some more in the later version.

Every playthrough I've done I've been overloaded with food, but I know where everything is and don't have to worry about time spent looking for stuff. That obviously factors in. I know from play phitt's "Mines of Malen Vael" mod I was always on the edge of no food, but he says there is plenty enough to do with a bunch left over. I guess the designer will always use less resources than the player.

Blooddrop,

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I actually thought I had too many and swapped a few for tarbeads. I will go back through and recount them.

And last of all the dragon puzzle,

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I used a version of this room as my submission for the one room dungeon 2. Diarmuid also mentioned it was easy to lose track of which dragon was selected and suggested I slightly illuminate the selected dragon to make it easier. I went through and did it for the group dungeon and it looks pretty neat and wasn't as hard to do as I thought it might be. I may go through and do it to this version also.

As for controls the lever would represent binary numbers 0 -3. The number then represents the same as the facing direction numbers in the editor so,
both up == binary 0 == north facing dragon
left up right down == binary 1 = east facing dragon
left down right up == binary 2 == south facing dragon
both down == binary 3 == west facing dragon

(note: normally on a binary switch up would be 1 and down 0, but since in game its up = deactivated I used up as 0 and down 1. Irrelevant to the conversation I know)

As for the dragons being out of sight and requiring a lot of running back and forth, that is on purpose. I wanted the whole puzzle to take place in the cage. View it as good mental exercise to see how many moves you can hold in your head at once.

Thanks for you work Isaac and know from here on out it goes pretty quick.

[leewroy]

After write down my solution I was just following the steps, never turned back to look at the dragons, cause I knew it was right

But I´ve got your point Isaac. And I have to say I agree, it's a thing that CAN be changed on the final release, if ryeath want