OpenMW future plans and MCP features?

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mikeprichard
Posts: 113
Joined: 16 Dec 2018, 19:42

OpenMW future plans and MCP features?

Post by mikeprichard »

Long-time OpenMW forum lurker, first-time poster here. Short version: is the wiki here (https://wiki.openmw.org/index.php?title=MCP) accurate as to the current status of OpenMW re: the incorporation of bugfixes and features from MCP?

Longer version/disclaimers: I've been scanning the forums at least once every couple weeks for 2-3 years now, and have seen many instances of non-contributors like myself posting rude demands for the hard-working OpenMW devs to prioritize a particular bugfix/feature/etc. This is not at all my intention, and I greatly appreciate and respect the incredible amount of work the devs have already put into this project over the years. I also realize many planned features are likely still far in OpenMW's future, i.e. post-1.0. It's simply that I personally enjoy many of the features available in vanilla Morrowind using MCP, and look forward to the day when it will be possible to use those same features in OpenMW (which is without any doubt the future of Morrowind IMHO). For example, with the recent 0.45 change highlighted here (viewtopic.php?f=38&t=5542&p=60306&hilit ... ion#p60306), the MCP feature "Changes the Persuasion window to pop up at your mouse cursor's position" would be even more useful. There are quite a few other MCP features listed in the wiki article posted above which I enjoy that aren't yet in OpenMW, so again, just trying to gauge progress in this respect. Thanks in advance for any input, and to all OpenMW contributors for your work!
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lysol
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Joined: 26 Mar 2013, 01:48
Location: Sweden

Re: OpenMW future plans and MCP features?

Post by lysol »

mikeprichard wrote: 16 Dec 2018, 20:00 For example, with the recent 0.45 change highlighted here (viewtopic.php?f=38&t=5542&p=60306&hilit ... ion#p60306), the MCP feature "Changes the Persuasion window to pop up at your mouse cursor's position" would be even more useful.
The thing here is that OpenMW has keyboard navigation, meaning, you can navigate most of the UI with your keyboard. This lead to this exploit. Akortunov made a change so that you now can't just hold the enter key, but instead have to re-press it everytime.

So you can still spam-persuade, you just have to use your index finger a lot more.
mikeprichard
Posts: 113
Joined: 16 Dec 2018, 19:42

Re: OpenMW future plans and MCP features?

Post by mikeprichard »

Thanks lysol; I realized after posting that I probably misunderstood the change, and will need to test it in-game with 0.45.

Otherwise, is the wiki article accurate as to current status, and are all of the MCP features not already simulated in OpenMW planned for inclusion in OpenMW after 1.0?
terabyte25
Posts: 55
Joined: 26 Jul 2018, 12:58

Re: OpenMW future plans and MCP features?

Post by terabyte25 »

lysol wrote: 16 Dec 2018, 21:01
mikeprichard wrote: 16 Dec 2018, 20:00 For example, with the recent 0.45 change highlighted here (viewtopic.php?f=38&t=5542&p=60306&hilit ... ion#p60306), the MCP feature "Changes the Persuasion window to pop up at your mouse cursor's position" would be even more useful.
The thing here is that OpenMW has keyboard navigation, meaning, you can navigate most of the UI with your keyboard. This lead to this exploit. Akortunov made a change so that you now can't just hold the enter key, but instead have to re-press it everytime.

So you can still spam-persuade, you just have to use your index finger a lot more.
I personally loved this "feature" because, well, it was an easy way to do speech craft, and also there isnt a world of difference between doing it by repressing it and holding down enter IMO.
kuyondo
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Joined: 29 Mar 2016, 17:45

Re: OpenMW future plans and MCP features?

Post by kuyondo »

there isnt any significant difference imo. you would want to discourage people from spamming(by using extra energy and time), but the goal is achievable in the end anyways.
mikeprichard
Posts: 113
Joined: 16 Dec 2018, 19:42

Re: OpenMW future plans and MCP features?

Post by mikeprichard »

The way the change is being described sounds like a reasonable compromise to me as well. It should still be fairly easy to increase speechcraft with repeated key presses for those (like me) who have no shame in doing that, but at least you won't be able to just weigh down the key and auto-level.
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Capostrophic
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Re: OpenMW future plans and MCP features?

Post by Capostrophic »

The wiki page is not up-to-date.

There aren't any coordinated "plans" because the definition of such is very loose when you have random people coming in and leaving doing something on their own. If someone wants to implement a feature from MCP and the implementation is not extremely complicated, so be it, but it's not like anyone's forced to do something they don't want to.

I personally don't like adding options because while the mechanics of that are not very complicated, the surrounding necessary work with writing the documentation and potentially adding the option somewhere where the player can easily change it is painful (so it's often ignored by other which irks me). Also, nifty features while interesting are ultimately not as important to me as grabbing the low-hanging fruits on the tracker in a hope to bring 1.0 closer to release which I do every single day.
mikeprichard
Posts: 113
Joined: 16 Dec 2018, 19:42

Re: OpenMW future plans and MCP features?

Post by mikeprichard »

Capostrophic, I've often scanned the bug tracker/git over the past few years, and (no offense intended to the many other active contributors working on OpenMW in their limited free time), it's clear that both you and Andrei Kortunov have been critical to the rapid progress OpenMW's seen for some time now. That said, and as I already mentioned, I understand 1.0 is of course the priority. I do look forward to more MCP and/or similar features being incorporated after that milestone is reached, so I guess we'll see where the contributors' time and interest take the project then.
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wareya
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Re: OpenMW future plans and MCP features?

Post by wareya »

OpenMW will probably undergo extensive internal structural changes immediately(ish) after 1.0 happens, and I presume that that is the reason for trying to avoid adding anything that is unnecessary for 1.0 and would need to be stripped out and rewritten during that refactoring. OpenMW also has lots and LOTS of vanilla compatibility bugs left to deal with before 1.0 can happen. I made a patch for custom class randomization and it was declined for that very reason.
TamrielCitizen
Posts: 22
Joined: 04 Dec 2018, 06:25

Re: OpenMW future plans and MCP features?

Post by TamrielCitizen »

I'd just like to mention that implementing all of the MCP/MGE XE features (as options) in the future is very important in my opinion, too. I presented a more thorough explanation in my own thread, but basically, for some people not having an option to enable some MCP/MGE XE feature that they consider crucial in OpenMW would be enough reason to just not use OpenMW at all. And at the same time, for other people not having an option to have OpenMW behave in the same way as the Vanilla Engine would also be enough reason to not use OpenMW, as everyone has different preferences.
To avoid the fragmentation of the Morrowind community, virtually everyone would need to eventually switch to OpenMW, and that could only happen if both types of people can have their preferred behaviour. Which is achieved by adding an option in every case where there are both people who want the Vanilla Engine behaviour and those who want a different one (introduced by MCP or OpenMW-exclusive).

I understand that adding more options can sometimes require a lot of effort and/or time, but I believe that it's important enough to be worth it. Of course, adding MCP/MGE XE options shouldn't delay 1.0, so this is mainly a post-1.0 goal. But it is a vital eventual goal.
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