The Evolving Society Mod

[QQuix]

The concept you suggest is (kind of) implemented, but not as different islands, thou.

 

The mod world (a large island, about 1/5 of Cyrodiil) has different regions, one suitable for farming, one for mining/quarrying and one for lumbering. If the player positions his extracting facilities on the right region, the production will be better than elsewhere.

 

But, of course, initially the land will be wild and unsafe far from the initial settling location and you need 'tame' the land and make it safe before the settlers can explore the natural resources of such regions.

[masternetra]

Well if your looking for a landscape to use I think Moo Cow (aka Gerald)'s Europe-like landscape would be good. Its not on the nexus but it is on planetelderscrolls: http://planetelderscrolls.gamespy.com/View.php?view=OblivionMods.Detail&id=2404

 

It will need plant and animal-life of course.

Edited August 22, 2013 by masternetra

[QQuix]

Thanks for the tip, but I am fine landscape-wise.

 

(time for a status report, anyway, so I will take the bait)

 

I [sort of] inherited the Aledra Island from the NPC WITH JOBS Team. By ‘inherited’ I mean, the NWJ project died and I have authorization to use their island.

 

It is a great island with 4 cities already built.

For this mod I needed only the island, so, at first, I removed the cities and left just what was natural to the island.

But I always felt bad about removing the cities, as it is very obvious that A LOT of work (and love) has been put in.

So, last month, when I finally started to test the mod in the island, I decided to adjust this project to use their cities (at least 3 of them).

 

Originally, the player of VOX would be able to build the initial village, which will become the capital city of the realm. As this one grew, the player would build other villages as supporting communities (farmers village, miners, etc).

 

To pay homage to the efforts and time the NWJ team members put in, the new VOX approach (so far) is that the player will still be able to build the capital as he-she wishes, but will not be able to choose the location of the surrounding villages, These will pop up in predetermined locations, building by building, as there are resources available and the player decides to build then (e.g., the farmers claim for a Granary in their village, the player checks if there are resources available, authorizes the building of the granary, the granary shows up in the village).

 

So this is what I am working on right now: grouping together the parts of each building (the building itself, the door, the fence, the decorations, etc) so I can enable each group of building parts as the mod progresses. One village done: Turil (the lumber’s village), two to go: Lutur (farmer’s) and Queel (quarriers’ and miner’s).

 

 

QUESTION to any NWJ team member that happens to pass by: Do you have any info on Jurad? Where was it planned to be? Has anyone done any work on it? All I have is a road sign with its name and a note somewhere that says that it was supposed to be a fisherman’s village.

* And, of course, thank you again for letting me use your work.

 

 

[AnimalRiot]

Glad you're still putting effort on this mod QQuix. I'm really looking forward to playing it!

[QQuix]

Thanks for the interest (and for mentioning it)

 

I spent most of my vacation mapping and grouping literally everything there is in the island, except trees and rocks: about 5,000 objects grouped in 100+ 'buildings', so i can disable every trace of recent human inhabitants and enable them, one by one, as the mod progresses.

 

The only thing that i can't do much about is land texture. I still have to decide whether I leave as it is (and the player will encounter streets and roads 'painted' on an empty land) or i repaint everything as grass and such (and the final cities will have grass streets, and the roads will not be obvious as they should). Comments are welcome.

 

Anyway, vacation is over . . . back to work tomorrow and the mod progress will slow down again.

[AnimalRiot]

Are you planning to pave the roads or will dirt roads do? I think the look of a well-worn path and having bits of grass at the side would be workable for a frontier type town and it would be a better transition from the empty state of the rural land.

[QQuix]

Ideally, the area should be all grass, with no paths. When a village is first created (when the player finds a good area for, e.g. farming and hires/orders/convinces a farmer to move there), a dirt path would appear between the main city and the new village.

 

But, unfortunately, the ground texture is one of few things that cannot be changed on the flight.

 

So what I am thinking is a message that will popup when the player arrives on the island saying something along the lines of “You have found a new island. It seems to have been inhabited in the past, but they are long gone.”

This would explain the existing paths between the locations and the obvious stone/gravel textures on the will-be city/village streets.

 

Toward the end of the mod, when the cities and villages are well developed and the player does not have to worry about basic needs anymore and the population starts to long for beautifications and amenities, I am planning an option to pave the streets, which will make the population happier, and an option to pave the roads, which would get the village products faster to the city.

[AnimalRiot]

Is it possible to hide the roads and paths with just the addition of grass meshes?

 

I think I may have another idea. How about doing a static mesh (like a rock) shaped the same way as the landscape, elevate it slightly above the actual landscape and texture it with grass, then disable it by script as the quest progresses. Then it will reveal the true landscape mesh underneath which has the final paved texture. I'm not sure if the LOD might have quirks though, but do you think that might work? You could do it in stages. I think you can get away without adding collision to the fake grass mesh, too.

[QQuix]

That would be a possibility, but, considering the size of the island and the length of the paths, would be a lot of work (besides, I have no knowledge about creating meshes).

 

That is, sort of, what I am planning to do with the paved streets and roads I mentioned before. Anvil sidewalks fit very well for this task. I already have the scripts that will allow the player to lay down the pavement, piece by piece, although, I am not sure I will use them. Maybe the pavement will just popup when the player decides to build them.

 

In the past, I have considered the possibility that you suggest, but discarded it due to the amount of work and the fact that the paths don’t look that bad in the empty island.

What really bothers me is the ground texture in the area where the cities will be and, now that you mentioned it, I think this may well solve the problem on two of them, which are flat. The game has many flat surfaces (e.g. the IDFloor… set). I suppose it would not be difficult to retexture them as grass to hide the ground on those two cities.

Edited September 8, 2013 by QQuix

[Stefanice]

I've just found this mod and I want to say that sounds really good :) .I havn't read all this topic but I want to ask that if you'll recruit soldiers, would you have the option to follow you and change their equipment?