Major Suggestion

[Aeramus]

Well, since Oblivion Online seems like it is really going well, I think that the community should focus on creating a more online orientated Oblivion Game using the most popular mods. It should also work on GUI interfaces for chatting etc, and the chatting with NPCs should be put into this interface (IE: choices show up inside the text area for the chat window)

 

Some of the things the community should first focus on, as I said above, is converting Oblivion to work fully with multi-player capabilities. Just consider it to be more like an MMO now. With Oblivion Online progressing as it is, we can expect it to be an MMO : ), and the community should be ready for when that happens. Not to mention that these modifications can also be used in single player.

 

1. Imply the Unofficial Oblivion Patch

 

2. Update FCOM so that no NPCs are leveled based on the player, etc. Just re-configure it a bit. Arena challenges should be based on the avg level of the player group.

 

3. Update current Oblivion Installations (this includes FCOM, Shivering Isles, etc). Arena should have team combat avaliable, full scheduling, improved stadium for MMO capabilities, multiple arenas in each city

 

Guilds should be changed to be more dynamic (kill NPCs/players based on real contracts, NPCs put them in based on what's been happening to them, steal from regular people or NPCs (once again based on current events, it's possible), fighters guild dueling, protection for regular people/NPCs, etc, and so on.

 

In short, every guild should be expanded. NPCs should be involved as well as players. If a player happens to become master of the guild, they are in charge of managing the guild. If you become the master of a hall, you are in charge of giving out assignment to people in that hall that were given to that hall to do : P. Gold is dispersed at the master's discretion =P.

 

Different NPC Disposition System: NPCs should have memories. If they can remember you, either they have a major low disposition or a major high disposition to you. If they don't, the disposition is set to default. Make new friends etc. Raise disposition by doing things for the NPC, helping the NPC with things, etc. It doesn't make sense that someone become's your best friend just by talking to them for 2 minutes -.-. The current system is just too easy. It should be a lot harder, especially with MMO features. Maybe your best friend NPC asks you to kill a player that got on their nerves? You'll become closer friends with that NPC and you'll distance yourself from the player's friends, or you'll distance yourself from that NPC ; P.

 

Next- Players should be able to do anything. They shouldn't have to fight if they don't want to. so, upgrade all capabilities of oblivion (openning your own shop, raising in the rank of the imperial legion, politics, war, etc). Perhaps you take over a city with a small troop and declare independence. You need to fend off against the empire, you need to attempt to expand, keep the economy going, protect the citizens, etc, etc.

 

I'm talking about a major change to Oblivion to give more freedom to the players. Oblivion Online will be working some time soon, so Oblivion should just have these features.

 

From here: I know about bosses, legendary items, armor, etc. Well... make them harder to get (groups needed unless you are just... ><), put more into the battles (spires that spawn demons to help their person, etc, etc), put new bandit replacements or other horrors into places like Vilverin after they've been cleared out. You can keep Vilverin, or other dungeons like this, completely clear with patrolling. However, if you leave it for a bit, it's bound to continue to get more and more sinister. Let the baddies get more powerful as time goes on (the longer they are around, the more powerful they become depending on what they are). For an example, The Vampire Covent by the lake. Most of those should get a little more stronger as time goes on. Dynamic stories (stories get repeated with different names, but it gives more realism for the respawning etc, different models based on the story being used, different strengths and weaknesses).

 

Allow players to set up traps (setting up a trap should be based on the player's knowledge and the materials, not on the player's abilities)

 

Make the spell-casting system is a bit flawed (need instant spells vrs regular spells. Regular spells can be countered if done in time, interrupted, etc. Instants can't. All Oblivion Spells are pretty much instants at the moment.). The spell system should also require the player to have a more in-depth understanding of the spell and the school of magic. Oblivion has a lot of lore in it, so the player should know this lore to use the spell. Each spell should have certain things a player must do to cast it, whether they be words to type, items to eat, something to sacrifice, just something to make it so players must know their own spells. People have to know how to use the combat system in order to fight, so why not spells : P.

 

After all of Oblivion's features are pretty much upgraded to be compatible with a sort of MMO game, all textures, models, and so forth should be upgraded (packs). The low-res pack, the med-res pack, and the high-res pack. This should just be a compilation of things like Qarl's Texture Pack, Parallex Mapping Updates, Exnem's Pack, and so forth. The models don't have to match (one player can see one thing and another can see another thing). As long as they are the same thing (not in quality, but you know : P), it should be just fine ^_^.

 

So after all of Oblivion is upgraded, including models and so on, then we should work on adding popular custom content for players to use. All players connected to a server must match the server's customization, so um, a global patch is suggested. The server's can create patches to enable and disable esps and even add their own esps, but the community should add what's already been made like Blood and Mud, The Spires, etc. From here, new systems should be made. In my opinion, the current leveling system is flawed because of the fact that you can only go up to a maximum of 5 when leveling. Levels should be taken out completely and everything should be based on stats. As you train in skills, the stats raise. As the stats raise, things like hp, mana, mana regeneration, encumbrance maximums, etc raise. There is no need for levels. Levels take away from the realism and they limit everything. Sure, there should be stat maximums, but these maximums are set by the abilities. Each race should have its own base stats that are then modified by the things the player is best at and the skills they are best at (majors). Your stat maximums are dependant on these. You can only be amazing at a few things. If you try to be an Orc Mage or something to that nature, you probably wono't be that great because you won't be able to attain the stats that other races could attain.

 

From here, my second thing is that all stat maximums should be taken out. Ability maxes should be raised to 500 to add more dynamics (stat levels will raise more slowly, ability levels will raise more quickly, it just adds more power to what can be done. 100 Isn't enough to really get into it. Maybe increasing it to even 1000 could be beneficial.)

 

There should be no actual set stat maximum. Your stat maximum, as I keep saying, should be based on what you are best at.

 

So all this being said, what do you guys think? = )

 

Personally, I think that if all of this were done, Oblivion Online would just be... incredible : O

 

It would offer things no other MMORPG offers right now

 

I also think that there should be a community server with what was discussed in this thread. To access it, there should be a montly fee (if you want to be part of the community, you need to support the community : P) much like TESNexus here. Just things to pay for the server and future developments, completely non-profit.

 

So, what do you think?

[bigdog112]

Theres oblivion online?

 

Is it a mod or a different game all together?

 

LINK PLEASE!!!! Thanks :D

[Aeramus]

It's still being worked on, but you can host servers, connect to other servers, and chat through the command console using a new chat " " command

 

like chat "howdy" : P

 

http://ooservers.gotdns.com/

 

Oh, and I'm going to begin working on the mod.. the first thing I will do is rework all the dungeons along with leveled NPC instancing. I'm going to figure out way to randomize which camp spawns. It's currently based on player level, but since it'll be multiplayer, it needs to change to just random.

 

Since Oblivion would do away with all leveling in this method, I could just change the level to a random number and spawn that camp, but then again, a single variable is terrible. It needs to be an array, one for each camp, that way multiple instances won't screw it up ; ).

 

So, I'll figure out a way : P.

 

And I just found it ^_^

 

AddToLeveledList

RemoveFromLeveledList

GetRandomPercent

 

kudos to me : P

[Abramul]

You don't have any idea what the limitations of the Oblivion engine are, it would appear.

[Aeramus]

What does that mean? Are you talking about the online capabilities are the regular upgrading of oblivion?

 

I've looked through it all... took me about 10 minutes to learn the entirety of the scripting language, how it runs the world, cells, memory, etc. It really isn't that hard.

 

So just asking, are you referring to Oblivion Online or the upgrading?

 

Oblivion online is completely possible because it's already been done. If you're referring to that, then you're the one who doesn't understand the limitations : P

 

if you're referring to upgrading, I say goals, but I have no idea how to achieve them yet ; ). However, as I tackle them, I always find a solution, even to something that seems impossible. I did it for a 10 year old game (applied object orientation, loading data into units, 3D gridding, etc for a language that didn't support any of this and also created a memory system for multi-threading for a scripting language that only supported multi-threading through database triggering).

 

So far, from what I've looked at, I've already figured out how to do most of it.

 

For quests: quest stages are currently based on the player. Quests will need to be re-configured for multi-player compatibility as I said above. I've been trying to devise a way to do dynamic quests, like continuing the story in a world. Most games that have done this and have histories do it by using no NPCs. It's all player based. Oblivion doesn't have the community to do that... the world would be virtually empty.... ><

 

Other games did away with history and just had random quests. Stories are repeated. If you see an NPC die, they'll probably be respawned the next day. Highly unrealistic, but practical. Oblivion can take this approach.

 

However, I'd rather keep the nice setup Oblivion has right now and as I said, try to work in dynamic questing. Now, I already know what to do for the dungeons. A few set stories for each dungeon. When one story is completed, the other one starts out after a few days and slowly develops according to the story. It can start up any instance. Some instances can lead into others. The dungeons are the easy part. Can use completely unique names by creating a fantasy name database and assigning a random name to each NPC involved (names will have themes connected for more realism). It'll be some work, but completely possible. Easiest through arrays, but can also be done in Object Orientation, especially with the interesting looping method that the team working on OBSE came up with. Really don't need to use any of those commands or methods... completely possible by making a function call itself until some global variable is equal : ). Well, I guess this is wht OBSE did since you would have to add a new function to Oblivion to do this... the scripting language capabilities are pretty limited, oi oi... So, random names by converting integers to strings and back to integers =) to find the randomized data etc. Can treat the objects as global arrays in this way (one array for each theme).

 

Now, to tell you the truth, I haven't figured out questing yet... and for things like NPCs assassinating other NPCs and what not, NPCs getting killed, well, I don't believe in respawning NPCs ever... it just takes away the realism, unless some sort of cleric revived them which is highly unlikely (another system I want to get into)... But, if I can figure out a way to do dynamic questing, something somewhat similar to the ideas stated for dungeons etc, then I know it'll be completely possible. Just need a system for the world to run on... something that'll add in new content, take out content, and make history based on the player's actions.... I've already figured on making areas constantly spawn every once and awhile, meaning the longer nobody goes there, the more dangerous it is. Also as it spawns, some of the creatures spawning will become more powerful. Take Vilverin for example. Maybe, if nobody goes down there for the first instance, a Lich Lord is finally down there? Now that would be an interesting adventure. Maybe at one point the Lich Lord takes out the bandits and goes for the Imperial City? You can see where this can go.

 

Currently, my idea for dynamic questing is um.. the same sort of idea as the dungeon. A pool of quest types for each area with random NPCs and so on.... a lot of quest types would be needed to keep the realism up. This is an alpha stage idea atm... I'll come up with another one that'll be better : P. To store values, just use object system giving the object a unique name based on the unique character values of the player. Maybe the name? The stats? a combination? As the character values change, so does the object name, this way it stays completely unique to that character. The journal tab would well... be interesting.. I'll leave that up to the devs at Oblivion Online... I know how the data will be stored, but not how the GUI will process out.. this community would be in charge of data, upgrading, etc. The Oblivion Online community would be in charge of updating the GUI. Someone already created an incredible chatroom GUI for Oblivion Online. They've also talked about storing the character data on the servers.. I haven't seen any talk about creating a Login Server yet though... that'll be needed to get the character IDs. From there, they need to have a character selection screen, along with a quick way to create a new character etc.

 

We'll be in charge with making Oblivion compatible

 

They'll be in charge with making the Oblivion menus and so forth compatible ^_^, along with getting the server stuff up and running.

 

Now, let's see... obviously, the game would have to be completely static for leveling. If there are any leveled items, they should only level with the player wielding them. All NPCs, creatures, etc are completely static.

 

Also, considering all legendary items like Umbra and what not need to stay unique, need to come up with a lot and need to make them hell to get... meaning it's unlikely anyone will even get something like Umbra, but if they do, it'll be quite a feat.

 

The wilderness will obviously be more dangerous with stacked spawning... but need to keep it working like our world so it isn't overflooded. Wolves might kill deer, bears might kill wolves, NPC hunters kill bears, etc, etc. All cities must be radically expanded... new market places, dynamic shops, meaning can be owned by a player or an NPC and any item within the shop that is owned by the NPC/player can be sold.

 

Well, you can see why I labeled this as a major suggestion. I hope that the solutions I've given are more than enough to supply you with the evidence that this is possible. I don't know about the menus, but I do know about the gameplay, and I'm saying it's possible. If Oblivion Online can't work the menus, we can change the diary into a set of scrolls. The maps will need to be re-worked so your marker isn't shown. Maps should not be made in any way unless you buy a map or make a map out yourself. A mapper's guild might even be created for people who go through areas making their own maps. NPCs can also go, this way the world is mapped out and discovered. The players can buy these maps, make these maps, etc, and the map will be automatically brough up when they enter an area if they have a map of that area. There might be multiple maps in the world of the same area. Some might be more accurate than others. When a map is made, there's only one copy of that map. If the mapper wants a second, they need to remake the map. This way it's a real viable mapper's business. Depending on the difficulty of the area etc, and the detail of the map, the map can be ranged from a cheap map to a very rary and expensive map. Mappers should always keep an original map of an area that they made so they can make out new copies of it. If you want a map of an area, you should seek out a mapper who knows that area or just look through shops and so on for a map : P.

 

Well, there's some more evidence to you that this is completely possible. It's even possible with the scripting language for referencing the player. Remember that unique object ID we give to each player? Well, instead of referencing to the global player variable, just reference to that object ID. To get the object ID, retrieve the values and merge them to create it. I suggest just creating a new function to do this : P.

 

Well, I'll cya all

 

Don't under estimate me. I've never lost an online debate, and I won't start losing one today even if I've only looked at what I'm debating on for about 10 minutes : P. In my vocabulary, the word impossible doesn't exist. Everything is possible, you just need to find a solution. Once, I dealt with an engine that worked on database triggers. You couldn't remove specific trigger events from a trigger, you could only remove them all. I created a way to remove specific triggers from a trigger... it wasn't very efficient, but it did it. So mm, my job with this stuff is to make things that are considered by others to be impossible into real life possibilities. I've even written systems for programming languages to change non object orientated programming languages into object orientated programming languages. It's like in this script. Before, doing loops would have be considered impossible by people who dont' think outside the box, that is until OBSE released a function that would do it. It was originally possible, OBSE just showed the way for everyone else.

 

So don't talk about engine limitations this, or impossibilities that. If there's a will, there's a way. The best way may not be that great, but atleast it works : P. I created object orientation through multiple arrays and looping. I linked the arrays with a base array that would contain the string ID of the array. That string ID was associated with the array ID, the index. All data was connected to that string ID via the index. The array type was mentioned in the array. I did it this way because the game could only hold 8k memory, so the array's were very limited. I could have done it using a multi-dimensional array formula, but eh ; P, no point when you got limits. Might as well just create a bunch of new arrays. You called the object through the array string ID. It would then retrieve the index ID, and from there, whatever piece of data you were looking for : P. Not real object orientation, but it worked just the same, especially with my command formats. With ingenious looping and use of arrays, I could create interfaces, structs, and whatever..

 

And now that I look back at this post, I see it's extremely long and says everything in an extremely round about way. It's also quite chaotic, but everything stated here is quite viable to the argument.

 

And to end this, if you were in fact talking about the Oblivion Online capabilities vrs the engine, then go to the Oblivion Online community and debate with them. If you were talking about configuring wc3 to work with this setup, then I'm the right guy to talk to because that's what I'm proposing here since Oblivion Online already has servers working : P, already has some new GUI layouts, already has some new menus, and already has people playing with each other over the servers... so bleh = )

[Vagrant0]

You don't have any idea what the limitations of the Oblivion engine are, it would appear.

I would agree.

 

Honestly I havn't looked at much of what is posted here, it seems like too much of "I'll do this, you do that" without really understanding how any of this works. I'm not saying that they may not be good ideas, just that their implementation isn't practical. You may be skilled with programming, but so much of the game has been locked away that all these examples of what you've done to accomplish stuff with other systems isn't really valid. The concepts might be useful, but there is only so much that you can accomplish with Oblivion. Even if you get some of this stuff working, it may not work as intended, and may cause a significant drop in performance. You're familiar with the term "Rube Goldberg"? Oblivion Online is essentially using things as they were not designed to accomplish a result in an extremely complicated way. It may work, but it isn't something that you'd want to use in every day practice. 10 minutes is not sufficient to understand a project like that, especially when you aren't familiar with the hard coded, etched in stone, commanded by Bethsoft, limitations of the engine. Don't even get me started on OBSE. While OBSE can allow some nice things, most of what it's used for are mods which are heavilly flawed and not anything people would really want to use for any reason other than "It looks cool." And it's been the "answer" any time someone suggests that a mod can't be done, because if mounted spellcasting can be done, then anything can be done...

 

The problem is this. Oblivion Online, as it currently exists is rather script heavy and very limited. Adding more script heavy, complicated mods, into the mix to try and recreate a MMO type environment would only lead to things not working due to performance loss. Additionally, the actions performed by "other people" aren't 1 to 1 with what you are seeing. You may see them move around the world, maybe interacting with objects, but in combat, the AI takes over for the most part. That other person may have its movements determined by another player, but as far as the game is concerned, it's just another NPC, and they can only behave like another NPC. This isn't WoW, this isn't L2, this is Oblivion, the interactions between are limited to only what can be scripted, and how quickly those scripts can talk to eachother. Before you go off on another "I'm never wrong" rant, I suggest you do a bit more research on the matter. Screenshots and a few general info posts aren't enough.

[Aeramus]

Well, like I said, I know about the programming side, but not the Oblivion Online side : P. I can update Oblivion to work as a multi-player game, but I can't do the connections, the interactions. You sort of focused on this idea =). But um, I said that since that is working, we should work to improve Oblivion for that. If you're saying that's not going to work well, don't talk to me, talk to the people at Oblivion Online : P. If they manage to get it working well, then eh, what I said is possible. If they don't, then eh, it isn't : ). Simple as that. From what I've seen, it was working well. People were talking to each other, fighting against monsters together, etc, all with full control. One server even had a chatroom in Oblivion : ).

 

I haven't looked anything that they've done. I haven't look at screenshots of Oblivion or tutorials either, I only read about lists and how Oblivion works, so I looked at the programming side, from there, I fiddled with the editor and got how that all worked. I learn programming etc extremely fast and I speed read, so it doesn't take me long ^_^. Just went to the main page wiki site.

 

But yea, I've just been thinking up solutions to current problems with an MMO setting in Oblivion. Just from what I saw at Oblivion Online, it all seems possible, so mm. Most of what I talked about were fixes. And I wasn't saying I was never wrong either, I was saying I've never lost an online debate about what was possible : P. I can configure Oblivion to act in an MMO setting, but the actually MMO stuff is up to the Oblivion Online team, not me or any of us. I've already figured out lots of solutions for lots of problems that would arise, so mm.

 

Well, go talk to them and see what they can achieve, kk. Then come back here and tell me if my dream is really a failure. ^_^

 

Fair enough?

[Vagrant0]

What I fail to understand is why you're talking about this here, rather than over there. Most of the people around here have no connection with that community, let alone even know they exist. Additionally any mods which might make Oblivion more MMO friendly would probably require a dependancy on that mod, or require special scripting in order to work with that mod. These are things which people who are already affiliated wth the project would have a better understanding of, and would be more likely to show an interest in doing. I'm not going to ask them anything. This is your idea, you ask them. You are, afterall, better suited to explaining exactly what you want than I am.

[Aeramus]

was just trying to get the regular Oblivion community involved with the Oblivion Online community and try to get some of the single player devs to go towards multi player compatibility ^_^.

 

Are you against this? =P

[ninja_lord666]

Turning a singleplayer game into a multiplayer game is like turning a pillow into a deadly weapon: it can't be done, at least not very well, but if it does happen, it's still messed up.