ALFA 1.23 Switchover (Progress)

[Rotku]

Anyone is more than welcome to try and convert my PC.

I would patch myself, but I really don't have the time the next week or so

[dergon darkhelm]

Patching (on very slow wi-fi) as we speak

You can put a copy of Rathalan up there and we'll see what happens

[AcadiusLost]

You can put a copy of Rathalan up there and we'll see what happens

Already done.

[hollyfant]

Will the announced "hotfix" throw a spanner in the works?

[AcadiusLost]

Depends when it comes out. If it's going to be soon, we'll delay to patch both at once. Typically hotfixes involve very minor changes to the game resources, so hopefully the 2da merges, if any, would be very quick indeed.

[AcadiusLost]

Isolated a pesky and frustrating bug in NWN2 with custom skills the other night, which was breaking things for Spirit Shamans. Unfortunately, the root cause wasn't the class itself, but rather the fact that they receive the "Alertness" feat automatically, which for some reason breaks the class/cross-class skill distinction for custom skills.

The downside of this, is that it seems to hold true for /any/ PC taking Alertness, at character creation or later in progression. I expect this may be addressed by a later patch of NWN2, but it may be quite a long time before then.

Practically speaking, the only way to make this work is to remove the Alertness feat altogether. I can try reimplementation of the feat at a different row to see if that works, but I'm not holding my breath on that one. Since all existing PCs will be rebuilt by the scripts from level 1, those who took the feat at a later level will get to choose something else to take along the way. For those who had it from character creation, I can sub in Skill Focus: Spot (one extra point of spot bonus above Alertness, at the cost of the two Listen ranks). I believe the Harper Agent PrC that requires Alertness is being changed to require Negotiator instead anyway.

A checklist of things that still need to be done (mostly for my own organization):

Language system:

• (done, -AL) Finish integrating the 11 additional regions
• (done, -AL) Account for changes in INT bonus from levelup, in terms of available bonus langs.
• (done, -AL) Account for additional languages by class for multiclass PCs
• Add PC tools button for Teach Language (implementation may have to wait)
• (done, -AL) Add Automatic Language for Current Region to the available bonus langs on levelup

Prestige Classes:

• (done -AL) Merge altered requirements into the edited prereq 2das
• (done -AL) Edit PrC class descriptions to reflect new requirements

Automated PC Rebuilder:

• (done, -AL) Account for Alertness Feat
• Add better handling for 12, 14th level attribute changes (shouldn't be necessary by Live)

ACR changes:

• (done, -AL)Add IPlogging onlogin
• Add Class4/Level4 fields to characters SQL table
• (done, -AL)Add RP increment code to new OnChat module event
• (done, -AL) Add divine feat removal OnLevelUp for PCs with Paladin levels who no longer meet class requirements

TLK/2da edits:

• (Done -AL) Edit class descriptions to include updated class skill listings
• Finish descriptive text for the last 10 or so background regions

Also want to start moving autodownloader files to a new FTP setup at Zic's fast, unlimited-bandwidth amsterdam FTP source.

Finally, will start putting the new files into their proper haks and documenting them accordingly.

[edit: added the TLK/2da edits list]
[edit: a bit of progress from last night]
[edit: a few more items ticked off the list]
[edit: more progress 8.3.2009]

[hollyfant]

Could the trouble with Alertness be due to it having code "0"?

[AcadiusLost]

Could the trouble with Alertness be due to it having code "0"?

That's my theory as well; most integer-returning nwscript functions return "0" as FALSE, so having a "valid" return of 0 sometimes leads to unexpected behavior. The actual symptoms are strange though; it almost seems like one of the NWN2 programmers might have been working on a way for the Able Learner feat to apply for skill points at character creation, but didn't finish and just disabled the option; but in such a way that having FeatID=0 inadvertently applies some of that code.

Able learners get full benefit of the reduced skill cost with their starting skillpoints in ALFA under 1.23, incidentally, by having those ranks cleared and re-allocated at the reduced cost during the adaption convo.

I'm in communication with one of the NWN2 community developers who contributed quite a bit of code to the official 1.23 patch presently with regard to the Alertness Issue, hopefully that will facilitate the useful bug reports getting to the right people at OEI to get a fix in eventually. Certainly won't be in the upcoming hotfix though, as those changes had to have been locked in weeks ago.

[Blindhamsterman]

Harper Agent does indeed require negotiator now as per the Players Guide to Faerun

[AcadiusLost]

Harper Agent does indeed require negotiator now as per the Players Guide to Faerun

Or it will, once we've switched over, at least.

Made a bit of progress last night, mostly with tlk edits and language code. Looking less likely to have the whole deal ready by this weekend, but we'll see how it goes. Still need to give the "Alertness Issue" some more testing; contacts of mine in some other PWs with slightly smaller skills.2da files are not seeing the same symptoms, it seems.

[AcadiusLost]

Plenty more hours spent on this over the weekend. Lots of little bugs squashed, a few new issues cropped up.

Currently on my "still to-do" list:

• (Done, -AL) Remove Alertness from Yuan-ti racial feats, replace with SF: Spot
• (Done, -AL) Initialize DMFI after skillpoint adaption at 1st level for rebuilding PCs, rather than at the final level.
• Implement DM-style PC DMFI custom skill roller (or block the current, broken one)
• (Done) Finish integrating PrC req/class skills/2da/tlk edits
• Finish region descriptions/info (~95% done, Lou/AL)
• (mostly done) Clean up some leftover debugging spam

The rebuilder is working reliably with PCs of all sorts, including newly rolled PCs, existing PCs who had Alertness from character creation, PCs who changed alignment or Deity over the course of their development, etc. I've also implemented a VFX, immobilizer, and Ethereal protection for any PC undergoing rebuild/reassortment. Since this happens as soon as you log in to a 1.23 server, this will insure that no one's 8th level PC is de-leveled to 1st and then dropped in the middle of a kobold spawn while locked into an inescapable convo (!). Also did a lot more with Languages, adding appropriate languages by class (Ranger favored enemy bonus languages, bonus languages by Faith, etc). Even fallen paladins with a change of faith now emerge from the scripted rebuild/adaption process with alignment, diety, and feats correct.

I'm pretty happy with the state these scripts are in; so I'd like to get a bit more testing in this week, then move to integrate these systems into the ALFA 003 Silver Marches module. This may happen later this week or this weekend, so long as no more major issues crop up. If the switchover happens while BG is down, that will simplify things slightly as well, as it saves me trying to do things in two places at once. We'll see, though. I'm hopeful that we won't run into many bugs that need to be hurriedly patched after we're Live on 1.23.

[edit: more progress from mon night]

[AcadiusLost]

OK, most all the bugs squashed now. I've got a growing list of small cosmetic fixes to make, but seems pretty solid now. I've hosted the 1.23 testmod again today, looking for anyone who is able and willing to try patching up to 1.23 to give testing feedback.

Look for the ACR 1.23 Test Server in PW Story, or direct connect to it at 71.206.168.254:5129 (normal ALFA player password). New TLK, PWC, and testing haks will automatically download. Create and level up as many PCs as you like, and report any bugs observed.

In particular:

• Test PrC requirements and class skills, make sure they match those listed in the Standards thread forum, and the in-game class descriptions.
• Look for places where the in-game descriptions or names of feats, skills, regions, classes, races, etc should be amended to reflect ALFA-specific information. (A few regions remain unfinished for their descriptions).
• Test various combinations of class/race and with/without Able Learner, with and without use of the Recommended or Package buttons in character creation, with or without the "Clear All ranks and start over" option in the adaption convo. We want to make sure the total skillpoints always add up OK.
• Try "saving skillpoints" for next level-up and make sure they're available in the right numbers.
• Try investing in Speak Language, canceling out without selecting one or more available languages, see if they are re-offered on a subsequent levelup.
• Try selecting the same language twice when being offered 2 or more languages at once, see if it decrements available languages. If so, see if the total become available again on next levelup (with or without more Speak Language investment).
• Try boosting INT on 4th, 8th, 12th etc in order to change INT bonus. Confirm that this does not change the number of languages offer on subsequent levelups, nor prompt the language selection GUI.
• Try rebuilding existing Live PCs who have had class-affecting changes of alignment, or changes of diety, to confirm that the final version is comparable to the original.

Anyone who wants a copy of their Live PC to test with should let me know on IRC, and I will move it over within an hour or so, schedule allowing.

Thanks for your help! Aiming for this weekend for the switchover now.

[dergon darkhelm]

Just took Rathalan through the rebuilder and it worked smoothly.

Will try some of the complexities above on a new pc

[dergon darkhelm]

edit --NM ---discovered the PrC validation lever

[AcadiusLost]

Testmod up again today. Contact me on IRC to get a copy of your PC to rebuild.