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Update on my new projects -- huge ship cobbled together!

A

alan_smithee

Corsair
Storm Modder
Finally making some progress in some projects. Just a moment ago I'd written out a whole explanation of my complete and explorable ship interior mod, but the whole machine got zapped by evil francophone lightning or something. le sigh. In short, I was buzzed on coffee&cigarettes&gramma'schristmasfudge last night (aaalll last night), and I was experimenting with CCC's awesome location cloning and linking instructions. The result is shaping up to be a `9-room` ship you can explore in game, complete with crew and captain's quarters, a galley, a brig, a scullery/armoury, and other assorted decks. It's cobbled together from deckfight and shop interiors, but I got it very roughly linked in a roughly logical and circuituous fashion, giving the impression as you walk through it that the various interconnected rooms really do form a single coherent vessel. (The locations of some of the locators are sketchy -- you'll go through a door from five feet away, or half to pretend to walk through or past boxes, and there aren't always clear indicators of where you should stand or look for the portal -- but I think it's close enough to count.)

I'm'a actually do some research now on how 17th century ships were arranged inside, but I think I managed an approximation that's at least logical: For and aft midship gundecks; captain and crew's quarters aft, galley to the fore, and armoury kind of in the center, with the brig and cargo hold.

I'll release it after reskinning some of the rooms, giving them wooden walls instead of brick. And as of now it's vacant, so I'll need some help populating it with officers and sailors. I'm'a add rats, so I can chase them with a hatchet.

---

Just a bit ago, I zapped up to the FTP my first public release mod, my Captain Hook skin. (Sans hook, sadly. Or happily.)
<img src="http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v251/alan_smithee/hook.jpg" border="0" class="linked-image" />
I'm afraid it's just the relevant files and nothing more, no zipping or archiving of any sort. And one of the little portrait pictures needs some kind of fixing that I don't know how to do, so maybe some kind soul will help with that. But I was sorry to miss the deadline for B12 and I gotta give something.

Linking it didn't work; it's in `upload-download`, called "Alan Smithee - capnhook v.1"

---

Finally, I found out the coolest thing during my binge last night, it was the absolute happy accident.

How to flood rooms!

<img src="http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v251/alan_smithee/flood1.jpg" border="0" class="linked-image" />

And caves! bwa ha ha!

<img src="http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v251/alan_smithee/flood2.jpg" border="0" class="linked-image" />

Drown, skellingtons, drown!

You just take those two lines in every interior initialization entry that ask for weather or not and whether it's the sea, and change them both to true. (I'd explain better but I'm pooped; maybe you understand what I mean.)
--

So anyway, I hope some people get excited about the linked ship dealie and contribute ideas and knowhow and whatnot. I felt like adding a more `life-at`-sea angle, where you walk your ship and talk with your crew... normally we just skip over the `sailing-between`-islands bits and it's off to the next land or sea battle, ignoring all the good groggy fun of a band of filthy pirates living in close quarters. I see some opportunities for promoting officers from your own crew, gambling with them or just trading salty stories. e.g., crew's morale could be affected by how much or how little time you spend with them. Like neglected puppies and children, or those little Japanese beeping digital egg thingies...
 
I just love the ship interior idea. Do you do the reskinning with Maya?
The locator locations could be changed with the tool (menu view/locaotrs), but I suppose it's a lot of work...
 
Ooh, a response already. I'm seriously jazzed about this mod.

I just reskin by changing the txa.tx over an existing model. (Maybe I'm not using the right term; people keep asking me about modelling when I say I'm reskinning.) I tried model editing once but it's alien territory to me. I'm gonna get some successful projects under my belt before I go stabbing around again.

But like I say, I'd like it if people built around this idea, if you feel like trying to make the locators crisper.
 
The ship interiors sound great, Alan... I love the idea of interacting with your men. Perhaps we could figure out a way to say, set the ship to autosail to a certain harbor, and then make the time pass by going into the ship's interior... When we emerge from below, we will be at the overhead map "Land ho!" right outside the town we set sail for.

<img src="http://www.piratesahoy.com/forum/style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/onya.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid=":onya" border="0" alt="onya.gif" /> I like it! <img src="http://www.piratesahoy.com/forum/style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/yes.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid=":yes" border="0" alt="yes.gif" /> <img src="http://www.piratesahoy.com/forum/style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/par-ty.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid=":cheers" border="0" alt="par-ty.gif" />
 
I've got a lot of ideas for how to pass the time inside the ship.

You could randomly meet a sailor anywhere on board, and maybe your officers could be made to appear in certain places, like the officers quarters. They'd all have a dialog where you could just shoot the breeze with them, or offer to train them and give them exp points, things like that.

And then special things you can do special places... like when you capture another captain, he'll appear in the brig (which I've now got flooded AND crawling with rats), and maybe you can talk with him. Taunt him or negotiate something, or challenge him to an honorable duel. And then other options in the galley or armoury, where you do silly things like decide what's for dinner, or important things like check the gunpowder.

Or... Heck -- you know those Excellent sabers Mings is collecting and modding your recieval of? What determines how your boading party is armed? because maybe you could leave all your best weapons somewhere in the armoury, and they'll be what your party is armed with.

And then, with your crew in general, you could hold drills for cannon firing or sail raising and lowering, which would increase your ability in these areas. A much more gradual, intentional and interactive way of doing it. And by holding drills you'd be increasing discipline, which raises morale... but if you hold too many in a short amount of time, your crew gets antsy and morale falls.

So, ideas, ideas. But my coding `know-how` is primitive...
 
Neat ideas! Very neat indeed.
If you need any code help, give a shout. <img src="http://www.piratesahoy.com/forum/style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/smile.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid=":)" border="0" alt="smile.gif" />
 
Heh, you have Fred Bob as your Boatswain, and find him in the galley cooking up some shrimp! <img src="http://www.piratesahoy.com/forum/style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/w00t.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid=":woot" border="0" alt="w00t.gif" /> <img src="http://www.piratesahoy.com/forum/style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/laugh.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid="xD:" border="0" alt="laugh.gif" />
 
<!--`QuoteBegin-alan_smithee`+--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(alan_smithee)</div><div class='quotemain'><!--QuoteEBegin-->... but the whole machine got zapped by evil francophone lightning or something. ...[/quote]Mein Puti is auch putt!!! <img src="http://www.piratesahoy.com/forum/style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/mad.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid=":c" border="0" alt="mad.gif" /> <img src="http://www.piratesahoy.com/forum/style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/urgh.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid=":urgh" border="0" alt="urgh.gif" /> <img src="http://www.piratesahoy.com/forum/style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/ko.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid=":ko" border="0" alt="ko.gif" />
 
I pictured that too, FB in the galley...

OK, big snag I got now: You can only go from your cabin to the main deck at the very beginning of the game, during the tutorial. After that, the lock shows up, even as open, but won't activate. I spent hours trying to find out just where the "enter cabin" button points to, and I guess it's that tutorial deck entry in quest locations. I put all the ship interior files in the same place, just under that entry. Could this be fixed, you think, if the enter cabin button pointed to a cloned cabin entry somewhere?

I'm also trying to mod the islands, either by sea or by land. I realized FdF is actually two islands, and you only ever hang out on one... BUT I found a rope bridge connecting the two; you sail right under it from port when you go toward the end where the islands almost touch. So I'm attacking that from the land; got a trail from the one jungle location in all of FdF running over the bridge (I copped IM's bridge, and used a different locator, the size of which I increased, so it's impossible to get to the beach part of that area), and eventually to a small settlement on the other island (it shall be the remains of the original Spanish settlement, the inhabitants of which mysteriously vanished years ago, as has been known to happen in history). I'm making an underground passage too, like a big long flooded tunnel under the water between the islands.

BUT I want to get a new beach location working. I'm close, I can feel it... CCC's location cloning and reload/locator jimmeying works with "sailto" too, since the places your boat goes around an island are defined as proper reload locations (and even then, you can fake something else). So I can approach an island and sailto a new beach icon... but the location doesn't really work. All the proper landside reloads are used up; there are just "ship_x" and "quest_ship_x" locators scattered around. And I thought I knew how to get one of those to work anyway, to zap you to a beach location, but no matter how hard I tell the thing to go to a certain beach, it wants to go to the main port. Screwy.

Also found how to sort of create locations in the worldview mode, like the settlement icons and text labels around each island. But those don't seem to affect anything.

So I'm limited to working landside. So ok, I'm trying to fake little reefs and atolls, that you "swim" to from an island's beach. Almost done building a `Rum-runner`'s Reef just off QC, with a hidden cave. I'm using just a portion of the Animists' cave for it, with an automatic reload made out of a goto location so you can only visit one room (also used this to use a proper little prison cell for my ship's flooded `rat-infested` brig; the house models weren't doing it for me). But it has no item locators or anything, for like the tons of rum I want to find and store there. Could a goto locator be forced into an item one, the way items can be made into goto's? Or does someone feel like helping out and writing a crewman's dialog interface that would do something about storing rum for the winter?

I'm attacking KR too, trying to expand it a bit... add a second beach, from which you "swim" to Shipwreck Reef, a tiny sad leper colony. But I can't find where the new KR expanded locations are; they aren't in the island's init file, and searching my files turned up nothing. Anyone know?

I think that catches me up. Whew.
 
<!--quoteo--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE</div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->Originally posted by Alan Smithee
I'm attacking KR too, trying to expand it a bit... add a second beach, from which you "swim" to Shipwreck Reef, a tiny sad leper colony. But I can't find where the new KR expanded locations are; they aren't in the island's init file, and searching my files turned up nothing. Anyone know?  <!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->

Ahoy Alan, <img src="http://www.piratesahoy.com/forum/style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/par-ty.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid=":cheers" border="0" alt="par-ty.gif" />

Great ideas you've been having, I'm waiting for the day that you develop and release your own game, I'll probably never stop playing it. <img src="http://www.piratesahoy.com/forum/style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/type_1.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid=":nk" border="0" alt="type_1.gif" />

The KR locations are in PROGRAM/KR_Reinit.C, hope this helps. <img src="http://www.piratesahoy.com/forum/style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/pirate2.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid=":p:" border="0" alt="pirate2.gif" /> (At first I thought I read, a tiny sad leprechaun... <img src="http://www.piratesahoy.com/forum/style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/unsure.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid=":?" border="0" alt="unsure.gif" />)
 
Thanks Sir Mings. And this file different from the regular KR file, it don't make any difference to things? I mean, changing one won't affect the other (is the regular one even used?)?

I'd add leprechauns if I could shrink the character models.

You know, come to think of it, Inez once made giant versions of all the animals. What could we do with those?

The rat could be those evil swamp rats from Princess Bride (and I have that Dread Pirate Westly skin around here somewhere...)

I'll post the code for these expansions when they're solid.
 
<!--quoteo--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE</div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->Originally posted by Alan Smithee,
And this file different from the regular KR file, it don't make any difference to things? I mean, changing one won't affect the other (is the regular one even used?)?  <!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->

The file is different from the regular KR Init file and I think it is basically sandwiched in between the original game locations in the init file. (Screwface and CCC were working independently of each other, but it appears to me that they both came up with the same methods.) When I have made changes to Screwface's KR_Init file, I have not made any changes to the original KR Init file, but the changes still take affect after pressing "i".

I don't know if the Devil's Island thread will shed any light on what Screwface did, but it might be worth a look: <a href="http://forum.piratesahoy.net/ftopic2381.php" target="_blank">http://forum.piratesahoy.net/ftopic2381.php</a>

(Interestingly enough, the code that I contributed to enable you to get out of the temple is in Screwface's KR_Reinit and not in the KR Init, but it still works... <img src="http://www.piratesahoy.com/forum/style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/dunno.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid=":shrug" border="0" alt="dunno.gif" /> )

I don't think you need to add the sad tiny leprechauns, I start drinking while I'm playing POTC and sure enough they start showing up on their own. <img src="http://www.piratesahoy.com/forum/style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/whistling.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid=":wp" border="0" alt="whistling.gif" />
 
So are you going to have swimming rats in the flooded, `rat-infested` brig, Alan? <img src="http://www.piratesahoy.com/forum/style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/icon_mrgreen1.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid=":cheeky" border="0" alt="icon_mrgreen1.gif" />

Sounds like a fun mod... I really have to get going on my Sneaky Trader. Been working on those new skins to put in the tailor shops, and a tutorial on how to do it for the Wiki... Once I have everything testing well and the tut makes sense, you'll have it. VERY SOON! <img src="http://www.piratesahoy.com/forum/style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/onya.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid=":onya" border="0" alt="onya.gif" />
 
Hey, that sounds like excellent stuff ! Quite a good example how you can create really new features by combing existing elements with imagination <img src="http://www.piratesahoy.com/forum/style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/onya.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid=":onya" border="0" alt="onya.gif" />

FdF could certainly do with more locations. I found it always a waste that there are no jungles and dungeons, and that you can't walk over that bridge into the other part.

I am (in between other things) working on additional townquarters, houses and forts for Oxbay island. If we continue that way we will have doubled the size of the gameworld sometime next year <img src="http://www.piratesahoy.com/forum/style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/smile.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid=":)" border="0" alt="smile.gif" />

I'll have a look at those shiplocations. What locator do you use to get from the cabin to the other decks?

A hint of the fly: you can increase the size of a locator by setting its radius bigger (often being done for autoreload locators) If you have a box in the shiphold that stands beside a ladder you can increase its radius until the ladder is included. That way the player will activate that locator if he appraoches the ladder.
 
The cabin you enter from the deck is in fact "tutorial_deck". Seems that only the "goto2" locator is close enough to the cabindoor to serve as exitlocator

BTW that flooded dungeon is really a great effect. How did you do it? May I borrow that idea for some locations of my own?
 
<!--quoteo--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE</div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->I pictured that too, FB in the galley...  <!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->Arrr! Only under one condition! <img src="http://www.piratesahoy.com/forum/style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/pirate_plain.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid=":p3" border="0" alt="pirate_plain.gif" /> Fred Bob's galley fires ne'er be doused, even when cleared fer action! <img src="http://www.piratesahoy.com/forum/style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/rolleyes.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid=":rolleyes:" border="0" alt="rolleyes.gif" /> Cain't imagine ye wantin' tew fight widout belly full o' me shrimp etoufee, me jambalaya, me blackened redfish, or me..! <img src="http://www.piratesahoy.com/forum/style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/icon_mrgreen1.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid=":cheeky" border="0" alt="icon_mrgreen1.gif" />
 
<!--`QuoteBegin-CouchcaptainCharles`+--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(CouchcaptainCharles)</div><div class='quotemain'><!--QuoteEBegin-->FdF could certainly do with more locations. I found it always a waste that there are no jungles and dungeons, and that you can't walk over that bridge into the other part.[/quote]AYE!!! I agree! <img src="http://www.piratesahoy.com/forum/style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/onya.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid=":onya" border="0" alt="onya.gif" />

Redmond is another big island with not a lot on it. <img src="http://www.piratesahoy.com/forum/style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/yes.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid=":yes" border="0" alt="yes.gif" />

I have been hoping that an appropriate location (with a hidden cove or something) (maybe KR?) can be worked out so that my Armand and Estrella characters can be `re-introduced` as part of a continuing storyline - They have to hide from the Spanish AND the French, thus the hidden cove... <img src="http://www.piratesahoy.com/forum/style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/type_1.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid=":nk" border="0" alt="type_1.gif" />

<!--`QuoteBegin-CouchcaptainCharles`+--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(CouchcaptainCharles)</div><div class='quotemain'><!--QuoteEBegin-->I am (in between other things) working on additional townquarters, houses and forts for Oxbay island. If we continue that way we will have doubled the size of the gameworld sometime next year  :) [/quote]This sounds GREAT!!! <img src="http://www.piratesahoy.com/forum/style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/bow.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid=":bow" border="0" alt="bow.gif" />

<!--`QuoteBegin-Fred_Bob`+--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(Fred_Bob)</div><div class='quotemain'><!--QuoteEBegin-->Cain't imagine ye wantin' tew fight widout belly full o' me shrimp etoufee, me jambalaya, me blackened redfish, or me..! [/quote]<img src="http://www.piratesahoy.com/forum/style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/w00t.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid=":woot" border="0" alt="w00t.gif" /> SIGN ME UP FOR THAT CRUISE!!! <img src="http://www.piratesahoy.com/forum/style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/par-ty.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid=":cheers" border="0" alt="par-ty.gif" />

Okay, now I'm hungry, see you pirates later! Fred Bob, prepare for a guest at your bayou hideout! Afterwards, we can go sack Panama. <img src="http://www.piratesahoy.com/forum/style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/icon_wink.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid=";)" border="0" alt="icon_wink.gif" /> <img src="http://www.piratesahoy.com/forum/style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/laugh.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid="xD:" border="0" alt="laugh.gif" />
 
I'll post more later, but for now everyone should go download the three new guns I just put on the ftp (AlanSmitheeNewGuns in upload/download); they're the "brace of" pistol sets, in three small, three medium and two large. I finally figured out what I was doing wrong.

Been expanding the heck out of IM's governor complex, QC, KR and FdF. Update later.

*moments later*

Crap on a crutch. Belay that download, me hearties; I must have put the files on a bad disk or something. They're just 1 meg in all, but the disk is acting all farty and not wanting to send its goodies onto the C drive so's I can upload. I'll get it soon, along with posting screenshots of the three guns' models.
 
That's great! I'll be looking forward to hearing more of this, Alan! <img src="http://www.piratesahoy.com/forum/style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/onya.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid=":onya" border="0" alt="onya.gif" />

BTW, can we make your wife (or a wench... <img src="http://www.piratesahoy.com/forum/style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/rolleyes.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid=":rolleyes:" border="0" alt="rolleyes.gif" />) appear in your cabin? Well, I know the bed isn't `king-sized`, but, well... <img src="http://www.piratesahoy.com/forum/style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/diomed.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid=":dio" border="0" alt="diomed.gif" />
 
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