Toolset or Toolcrap?

[Yossarian22]

Hi

 

Since at some places the amazing possibities of dragon age toolset were mentioned, I decided to take a look...

But so far, this toolset may have some possibities, but its incredible user-unfriendly it seems to me. I mean, just

the Level-Editor... you need to build a level and then export it to continue build on it? What if I wanna change things

later in level-design? Or, for every single static I wanna place, I need to open a file-browser? oh my godness...

 

Seriously, maybe I missed something, but does somebody imagine it is possible to create real quest and location mods

with that tool?

[Bridgepiece]

hmm, well, yes it is a bit 'user-unfriendly' but remember that it is also more complex in the amount of things it can do compared to other editors. It will take a bit to learn, patience is required! lol

 

I mean, just

the Level-Editor... you need to build a level and then export it to continue build on it? What if I wanna change things

later in level-design

 

One editor is to build the static features, such as terrain, vege, water, etc. You then take that level, turn it into an 'area' then add all the non-static goodies such as partical effects, area transitions, doorways, etc etc.

 

And yes, there is a mod that adds nearly 4 hours of gameplay, can be found on official forums I believe (forgot the name :P)

[theuseless]

Everything I've heard about the DA editor makes me steer clear of the game. I'm currently modding Oblivion and Fallout3. If it is any more difficult to mod Dragon Age, I'm simply not buying it. I will get it when I see it used for $20, then beat it vanilla. If anybody has a tutorial that makes the modding process less painfull, please post it as the game looks fantastic! I've also heard that a lot of the features are hard coded into the game's exe, unmoddable. If so it is a major turn off for me.

 

If there are unique things you can do with it, please let me know as I would be willing to buy if I can do something phenomenal with the game. I'm just only buying games that I can mod right now.

 

Thanks for letting me rant,

theuseless

[Yossarian22]

One editor is to build the static features, such as terrain, vege, water, etc. You then take that level, turn it into an 'area' then add all the non-static goodies such as partical effects, area transitions, doorways, etc etc.

 

And yes, there is a mod that adds nearly 4 hours of gameplay, can be found on official forums I believe (forgot the name :P)

 

Well, but it often happens, that you place some statics and during process, you notice, you need it displaced or whatever. So, in Bethesda-Games this cost me a simple click, here I would have to re-export the entire map, delete the old one and so on. Remember back to Oblivion days, there were amazing mods like unique landscapes and better cities. Something like that isnt possible with dragon age.

[1Monk]

Bioware's tool-set is much more elaborate than bethesda's geck. it even has with it's own face morph, animation editor and a better scripting language (and a proper script editor).

 

however, it is unfriendly, there are lots of properties that are hard coded and DA's world is anything but open space, it's a collection of stages to act upon, even the cities.

 

that said, the game itself is awesome!!

[w00teh]

Everything I've heard about the DA editor makes me steer clear of the game. I'm currently modding Oblivion and Fallout3. If it is any more difficult to mod Dragon Age, I'm simply not buying it. I will get it when I see it used for $20, then beat it vanilla. If anybody has a tutorial that makes the modding process less painfull, please post it as the game looks fantastic! I've also heard that a lot of the features are hard coded into the game's exe, unmoddable. If so it is a major turn off for me.

 

If there are unique things you can do with it, please let me know as I would be willing to buy if I can do something phenomenal with the game. I'm just only buying games that I can mod right now.

 

Thanks for letting me rant,

theuseless

 

You know Oblivion had that issue as well...For example Deadly Reflex never really seemed like a possiblity when Oblivion first came out, but you're right DAO's toolset is far more unfriendly than the TES Construction set. It's still usable however, but to me the biggest issue is that getting skinned meshes working isn't half as easy as it was in Oblivion

[DarkeWolf]

I've messed around with the toolset on a few occassions, and I gotta say that so far, I have YET to even be able to figure the damned thing out.

I mean, I can't even get a scene to load, just the tree view.

 

TESC was great! It did have a few limitations, but I really liked playing around with it. This datoolset.... Argh! So much that I would like to be able to do, but with a program that you cant figure out, combined with a really wierd set of filename extensions, and not knowing which kind of files do what..... I have yet to even figure out what extension the scripts use!

I know that .cut is what the cutscenes use, and beyond that, I'm clueless.

 

Yeah, IMO, they made this game a royal shedog to mod out.

[rebalious]

The unfriendliness of the toolset is the main reason I stay away from the official forums. Heavens forbid you point out a legitimate flaw in the all perfect, all powerful toolset. Afterall only truly loyal Bioware fans know how to use it and everyone else is either trolling or computer illiterate to some degree--(continues off on rant for another hour).

 

In all seriousness though I dont use it unless backed up by tutorials unless its just cheating since thats pretty easy to get a hang of.

[Diggerdan]

The only toolset I have used was for Neverwinter Nights, was really looking forward to using Dragon Ages toolset then I opened it and was immediatley overwhelmed. Am I complaining? Not at all. Would just like to give a tip of the hat to all of you that understand and can use it. That being said I would love it if those of you that can mod with it, please quit your jobs, drop out of school and get to work on hundreds and hundreds of mods for me to download lol.