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Re: Fix The Lady Lover and Steed Birthsigns

Posted: 18 Sep 2018, 06:48
by Naugrim
drakovyrn wrote: 18 Sep 2018, 06:26 Compared to the many other things that have "fixes", why can't there just be a toggle in the config/launcher to allow user to use vanilla behavior if they so wish?
If you allow this and users can change it during a game, this will be exploited. Enable "old" mode and get extra HP while you are < 100 and then switch to "new" model to increase the attribute's cap.

Re: Fix The Lady Lover and Steed Birthsigns

Posted: 18 Sep 2018, 14:09
by Capostrophic
I thought this wasn't up to a debate. The new behavior isn't "fixed", it's just different, and it causes some issues the original behavior of birthsigns either avoided or tried to work around.

Making everything an option is not good. Different options need to be maintained and documented, and they're currently a serious headache anyway.

Re: Fix The Lady Lover and Steed Birthsigns

Posted: 18 Sep 2018, 15:41
by Chris
The important question to ask is, what exactly does vanilla do? AFAIK, OpenMW applies them "correctly", as per the way they're defined in the game data. However, if the vanilla engine behaves differently than what the game data suggests, what is that behavior? How and when does it deviate, to ensure proper vanilla and mod compatibility?

Re: Fix The Lady Lover and Steed Birthsigns

Posted: 18 Sep 2018, 15:53
by Capostrophic
When the player gets a birthsign ability (typically in chargen), the ability modifies the base value of the affected attribute (e.g. you can train dependent skills to that increased value). When the player gets the very same ability not due to having a birthsign with that ability assigned, the ability affects the modified value and acts as a buff.

Re: Fix The Lady Lover and Steed Birthsigns

Posted: 18 Sep 2018, 16:29
by klorax
I think options are fine when what you choose between has to be implemented anyway. Such as a value of a variable in a formula, but not the option to choose a different formula. Another example is ownership of items, the cursor, and color of the cursor, they all have to be implemented: do you want ownership to be shown on the cursor or not?

In this case, IMHO, one should try to avoid options.
Either:
  1. keep it as it is now, or
  2. hard code abilities and powers (i.e., available from character generation rather than in game spell making) to treat spell effects (what magic actually do) differently from in game created spells. That is, +X attribute from ability/power is not the same as +X attribute from spell.
I personally find the latter somewhat flawed, confusing, and complex.

Re: Fix The Lady Lover and Steed Birthsigns

Posted: 21 Sep 2018, 21:30
by xirsoi
Naugrim wrote: 18 Sep 2018, 06:48
drakovyrn wrote: 18 Sep 2018, 06:26 Compared to the many other things that have "fixes", why can't there just be a toggle in the config/launcher to allow user to use vanilla behavior if they so wish?
If you allow this and users can change it during a game, this will be exploited. Enable "old" mode and get extra HP while you are < 100 and then switch to "new" model to increase the attribute's cap.
This is not a valid criticism. There's nothing that can be done to prevent players from cheating, and I'd argue that OpenMW shouldn't go out of it's way to prevent it.
klorax wrote: 18 Sep 2018, 16:29In this case, IMHO, one should try to avoid options.
Either:
  1. keep it as it is now, or
  2. hard code abilities and powers (i.e., available from character generation rather than in game spell making) to treat spell effects (what magic actually do) differently from in game created spells. That is, +X attribute from ability/power is not the same as +X attribute from spell.
I personally find the latter somewhat flawed, confusing, and complex.
I don't understand how it can be confusing to treat some things as inherent abilities of a character (birth signs, racial abilities, favored attributes, etc.) and others as deriving from external forces (magical enhancement/curses). This is not flawed, or complex, or confusing.

The vanilla content was built with those assumptions in mind, as was all the mod content developed over the last 15 years. Breaking that assumption is bad and I really cannot understand the point of view that says otherwise.

Re: Fix The Lady Lover and Steed Birthsigns

Posted: 21 Sep 2018, 22:07
by klorax
xirsoi wrote: 21 Sep 2018, 21:30 I don't understand how it can be confusing to treat some things as inherent abilities of a character (birth signs, racial abilities, favored attributes, etc.) and others as deriving from external forces (magical enhancement/curses). This is not flawed, or complex, or confusing.

The vanilla content was built with those assumptions in mind, as was all the mod content developed over the last 15 years. Breaking that assumption is bad and I really cannot understand the point of view that says otherwise.
The reason I find it confusing is due to the fact that a magic effect (i.e., what magic does) is different from case to case. Say you have two constant effect +25 endurance buffs affecting you, one of which is from the birthsign. IMHO it is not trivial without previous knowledge, that one of those will not count towards level up health and governing skill level ups, and that the other one will. It is not difficult to understand that one from birthsign might count and one from an item does not, but why should it then show up as a buff?

It would be better then if you never got the constant (magic) effect on you at all, and it just showed up as base stats after choosing birthsign, just like the attributes from class does. Maybe that could be a third alternative, but I haven't really thought about how that would be implemented.

Re: Fix The Lady Lover and Steed Birthsigns

Posted: 22 Sep 2018, 02:44
by wareya
It is to be assumed that any permanent changes to the character that happen during chargen as a result of character configuration should act as though they are inherent to the character. That is more basic and fundamental than what the effects look like on the HUD. I was never once confused by birthsign stat boosts as a casual player, and the constant effect on the HUD was basically just a nice way of showing why my character started with more of some stat. If it's really bothersome, the solution is to display inherent-like effects in a different way than non-inherent-like effects, not to change how the game mechanics work.

Re: Fix The Lady Lover and Steed Birthsigns

Posted: 27 Sep 2018, 23:25
by Jemolk
The real problem here is the way it's implemented in vanilla, which is: abilities work one way, everything else works another, full stop, and the rules for abilities DO in fact bork some things rather badly. I agree vanilla functionality should be available, though to be quite frank, I also want the current functionality available as well. HOWEVER, how we implement this should definitely be different from vanilla behind the scenes, I believe, even if we replicate vanilla functionality for birthsigns. The original method is a hacky workaround to a never-fixed bug. You may not realize this at first. Hell, some players may never realize this at all. But once you realize precisely how it actually works, there's only one explanation available, and that's it.

Tl;dr: Replicate original FUNCTIONALITY for birthsigns? YES. Replicate vanilla method entirely? HELL NO.

Re: Fix The Lady Lover and Steed Birthsigns

Posted: 28 Sep 2018, 00:08
by wareya
We have to implement vanilla behavior for the sake of mods, too. Just because it's annoying to certain mods doesn't mean it's a bad behavior.

The vanilla behavior is not a workaround for a bug. It affects way more than just that one thing. They just implemented birthsign bonuses that way so that they showed up on the HUD, no big deal.