Custom Framing!

So, I showed off in the earlier screenshot dump some new picture/painting frames I'd been working on; but welched on actually releasing them to mess with normalmaps.

Normally (heh, get it? puns) when I do that sort of thing, you never hear about it again. I'm kind of unreliable, I know.

This time, I really have been working on it; and am nearly done. Only one frame remains in the unsure pile.

Here's what I've got so far:






You can see the black marble frame here. I set it up to look solid, but have just a bit of sheen; as cut and polished marble tends to. Depending on lighting, it's a little too shiny sometimes; so it may need to be dulled it in the future, but for the lighting in the Estate, I like it fine.








This is the rosewood frame, which is the "unsure" culprit.

I like the bit of shine; varnished or oiled wood tends to have it. Very nice. The problem is that second screenshot. When viewed from an angle, you can clearly see raised woodgrain; which you will not find in a finely finished, hand-oiled piece of wood.

The problem is I can't decide whether to leave the wood grain (which looks neat in its own right); or knock the normal down to make it appear smooth and all.




This is the silver portrait frame. Both portrait frames (silver and gold) use the same normal. As you can see, it's got a bit of sheen; but not so much that it looks mirror-polished. Also I successfully got rid of that damned engraving reflection on the name plate.






This one is the white marble, which I think turned out the best. Not only does it match the walls of the Ultralux tileset, but you can see where under the right lighting the normals show up as gaps and indents where the pieces of marble are fitted together. I like the way that looks, I have to say.


As for the release: I'm leaning towards a mediafire upload or something similar; so anyone can grab it and use it.

However. Unfortunately, due to the nature of this sort of thing, this one won't be a complete plug 'n play setup. Creating these paintings and pictures -- even with templates and normals supplied -- is going to require basic-to-moderate knowledge of image-editing software (either GIMP or PS), a .dds exporting plugin or third-party utility for conversion, and basic knowledge of Nifscope to create new copies of the meshes with the proper texture path(s) set. It's really not that hard... but an alarming percentage of the "mod community" these days seems incapable of anything more complex than clicking a single button -- which you ain't gonna get when editing textures.

I'm still open at this point to comments on the frames, and suggestions on what might look better. Also open to other styles if there's one you'd really like to see -- provided you can point me to a tile-friendly sample of the material or pattern that I can import into GIMP as a fill pattern.

NosCo NV Weapons Collection, Upcoming

I mentioned in my last post I got a fair bit of work in lately on the NosCo NV Weapons Collection.

I found myself wanting to get a few of the weapons into my game awhile back, but I don't like those gimme "test containers" for anything other than... well, tests.

So, I set about creating the sales office.

It... kind of got away from me.

I mean to create a simple store; much like most others in the game.

What I ended up with was a three-level complex, kept open 24/7 by a staff of ten NPCs.

Top floor is living quarters; ground floor is the sales office; and the bottom floor is storage and work-rooms.

I'm still refining... and the lighting definitely needs work (I don't think I've ever managed to get a cell lit correctly on the first try); but some of it is decent enough to show off.

Like any good retail outlet, the NosCo Weapons Division sets up displays:








Weapons are displayed not only on the two islands, but along the counter behind which the weapon vendors work; as well as on window displays. Ammunition and miscellanea are displayed on their sales counters.

Ammo and miscellaneous goods are steal-able, but weapons are all simple statics that can not be taken. I did this for two reasons: 1) it makes the havok behavior much less annoying in the cell, and 2) I like screwing with people.

While steal-able, I would not personally recommend trying to swipe anything off the counters, since there is a minimum of one guard stationed in the sales room at all times -- a second patrols the entire complex, and may or may not be in the sales room at any given time.





The four of you who downloaded the alpha release of the mod may recall that it automatically activated all Caliber ammo types that the mod uses -- which is pretty much all of them. In the interests of keeping vendor and loot lists less cluttered with crap you won't use, I've disabled that script and replaced it with a terminal that you see above. The terminal allows you to activate only the ammo types that you intend to use -- or the ones that you want to be able to loot/buy, at least.

You can also see the sniper rifle window display there behind Natasha.

A new feature that the store has that I haven't seen in another mod before (though I'm sure someone has made before) is a working Nuka Cola machine. I don't mean loot-able; I mean working.

When activated, you get a buy interface:



The final version will have a cancel option to get out of the menu without purchasing; I just didn't add one because I remembered menus I had created before getting one automatically. Apparently not.

On selection, the caps are taken from you automatically, and the bottle of your choice added in their place. Prices are full value; you get no barter bonus. It's a vending machine -- be prepared to pay for the convenience. On the up side, it's also an endless supplier if you have need of a ton of them for whatever reason.

Should you attempt purchase without at least twenty caps in your inventory to cover a basic Nuka Cola...




Yes, I'm an asshole. No news there.

Sadly, large portions of the complex aren't fit to show off, owing to the poorly balanced lighting; but here's some of the living area upstairs:







These were taken after 2200; when the lights are scripted to go out upstairs. Unfortunately, the game really, really doesn't like that script; so it's going to have to go. I suppose they'll just have to live with it being lit all the time.

Stupid game, always stifling my genius...

Opposite that dining table is a full kitchen suite, including a booze-bar with a set of beer taps. I may not drink anymore, but I still know how to keep minions loyal.

There are also bathrooms on the top floor, and in the basement; the one upstairs has full bathing facilities.

Items will be sold by six merchants; two each for ammo, reloading components, and weapons -- one of the two on-duty in the sales room at any given time. There are four guards; two who patrol, and two who sit static in the sales room -- again, one of the two on duty at any given time.

NPCs off duty will live; eat, sleep, use idle markers, use furniture, work in the work room, even sweep the floor.

Crimes are set to be tracked and reacted to by the guards; and all sales staff are armed, to boot. No bullshit level 100 guards; but they're nonetheless well armed and wearing solid armor. They will also be receiving variants of my special combat styles. It's possible to knock the place over, and loot it... but I don't think it would be worth the bloodbath -- seeing as most of the "ammo cans" are static and not activate-able.

Reloading benches, and work benches down in the basement are usable by the player. The complex can be wandered freely; just don't get caught taking anything.

I've also rebalanced some optic powers. The closer range variants of the Marksman Carbine (458 SOCOM, most pistol calibers) have gotten a reduction in magnification. I'm shooting for about 1.5x - 2x; to make for fast shooting accuracy on close-in targets that may be moving.

Also: as of this time, none of the NosCo weapons are moddable; and the Gunfighter series does not have their swappable cylinder scripts in place, yet. I wanted to get the store up and running before delving into finer details like that.

The NosCo Weapons Division sales office is located near New Vegas; due south of the eastern entrance to the Crimson Caravan compound. There will be a map marker.

With the normal map issue worked out for the NosCo Super Blackhawk, I'm toying with the idea of adding it to the mod and using it as the basis for the Gunfighter series; rather than that shoddy looking base-game 357 revolver. It also appears that Ranger Sequoia does not use a scope judging by the statics I was looking at earlier. If that is the case, I'd like to retexture it, and use it as the basis for the bigger hunting revolvers in the mod; since I personally don't like scoped handguns.

Independent Companions

...Or, "What would you want to see?"

As everyone's favorite neko so astutely guessed regarding the last post, this 'hardcore code' brings the tally of kickass companion features that won't fit into NCCS for whatever reason high enough that it's got me considering releasing one (or even a series of) stand-alone companion -- that is, companions not tied to any specific system, who can be run without master mods of any kind.

I know that because I slack off and actually, y'know, play games these days instead of just beating my head against the GECK all day every day, I've lost most of my readership here; and will likely only get three or four people responding... but I'm going to ask, anyway.

Say you have been offered a NosCo companion of your very own. I'm not talking a cookie-cutter, same-as-anyone-else-can-make-if-they-can-read NCCS companion. I'm talking about the kind of evil bitch that lives in my personal companions plugin. The kind of companion who can break the difficulty scale of the entire game if you aren't careful.

The kind of companion who has custom everything. Armor, weapon, dialogue, combat style, hair, eyes. Assuming Dimon99 was still amenable to the idea, a custom body, too -- hell, you guys might even finally get to see that black-nailed custom body texture I made up for Maeva a few years ago (again, assuming Dimon99 was okay with my reuploading a derivative a one of his body textures).

So, I ask: what would you want to see? Gender, class, combat style, personality, whatever.

A few things to bear in mind:

1) At present time the only custom armor/clothing I have available to actually upload would be my collection of recolors -- black versions of Cass' outfit and Legion Centurion armor (I did fix the brown gloves on the Centurion armor, by the way); a darker Cass that comes in gray and blue, and a midnight blue Centurion outfit. I should also still have in my archives the black Enclave officer's uniform (and ye Gods are those 2009 screenshots horrid quality...) I made for FO3; it would be a pretty simple matter to remove the 'V1' logo and port it into FNV. I think I also still have copies of my old ACU, MARPAT, and Multicam power armors. I'm willing to talk to other mod authors about potentially reusing their custom outfits if anyone knows of any that are really nice; but I don't have any personal favorites in the pipeline already.

2) Questlines really aren't my bag. I can do story quests, but it likely won't be epic.

3) Voice-acting is completely out of the question; so all dialogue will be text-only.

4) Custom weapons are restricted similarly to armor; I worked the normal map issues out with the NosCo Super Blackhawk the other day, so it's in shape to be uploaded... but aside from that I don't keep much on hand. As long as it's based on a normal game weapon, it wouldn't be too big a deal to run one up, though.

So, there it is. Still in the conceptual stages at the moment; but with hitting wall after wall with NCCS, the idea of running up non-plug 'n play companions that can actually showcase the best features I can add has piqued my interest.

Hm. Re-reading #4 reminds me, I still need to crack open Honest Hearts and make up a 1911 in 10mm...

Hardcore: Harder Than I Thought?

Hm. No, I should delete that post; it'll just seem like I'm bragging about things I won't release...

Short version, this time:

(Don't bother checking your reader; I've learned not to hit post until I'm sure I want something read)

HC mode for companions works, mostly. It's been an uphill battle, but I've got it 98% reliable, and I think I know how to get the other 2%; it just isn't tested yet.

Trouble is, it doesn't work for NCCS.

Modifying script variables of an NPC isn't like moving them, or adding and removing factions. It turns out the engine has to be able to read the variables, or it won't edit them right.

This means that NPCs to be used in HC mode must be explicitly referenced. Which obviously I cannot do for NCCS.

I haven't abandoned the project by any means; and I am at least learning how to make the system work... it's just getting there from here that's the bitch.

I'd ask if anyone had any insight, but I'd be surprised if anyone did. No slight on anyone's intelligence; this is just another of those things that as far as I can tell, no one's done before.

This may be something I have to learn NVSE for; distasteful though it is to me.

I even went and looked through the highly vaunted Willow Companion -- who, judging by endorsements, is approximately fifteen times the companion that mine are -- and found that she doesn't have hunger or thirst, apparently. That or I need to go get my optical prescription updated.

Maybe I should teach the NCCS companions how to cook...

Ah, well; issue for another day.

The other issue is that the HC code and all its accompanying checks and such pushed the scripts that run my girls up over five hundred lines -- and they were originally simpler versions of the NCCS scripts. This would push NCCS up near 550; and I'm not sure the engine will handle it. I remember them running out of space around 500 once before.

So, I suppose at the moment HC-for-companions can be considered to be in neutral; until I figure out a new workaround.

Other planned new features for v1.0 are still on track, though; and I've recently run up a set of "living" AI packages similar to what CM used to make companions appear to live a normal life when not adventuring with you.

BURN COMMA CRASH AND

Got a couple hours testing in on a new FNV game this morning.

Was initially pleased -- as we were finishing up the "tutorial" with Sunny (which I always play through to get the extra ammo) the girls stopped me, each in turn notifying me that she was thirsty, but had a drink on hand.

The code fired.

Once.

Never happened again. Nor did the hunger state ever appear at all.

I know the code is valid... but I have no idea why it's failed this time.

Slack-ass pieces of shit actually drew a salary for coding this engine...

Anyway. Now I get the fun of running up diagnostic scripts, to figure out whether the counter isn't running, or the variable checks are stuck, or what.

From as long as it took to get the one successful appearance, I can tell you that their object scripts are not running every frame like they're supposed to -- the girls' timer started running before mine did, and it was still five solid minutes after I got the first dehydration notice before they did.

Once, just once, I would like this game to obey it's own goddamned rules.

So, bets are off for the inclusion of a working HC mode for NCCS in the near future, until I figure out what in the unholy fucking shit is going on this time.

Too Much?

Finished off the HC dialogue this morning.

Contained in its own quest for the sake of my sanity, it was easy to check the counter and see how many lines of dialogue were involved in this rather basic endeavor.

The answer? 201. For three personalities.

I had figured on six for NCCS general; plus seven new personalities; plus four or five extras here and there. Assuming the number of lines needed track into NCCS, that will make for 1206 lines of dialogue.

...I may not have thought this project through well enough.

On the up side, I further modified the code so that when you give a companion a Sunset Sarsaparilla, there's a 10% chance of them getting a Star cap instead of a standard bottlecap. Either way, they also keep the empty bottle, as well.

Edit: remembered to add Nuka Cola, as well (and have them keep cap and empty bottle).

After updating the companion scripts to make use of the new hunger and thirst code, the plugin now weighs in at 485kb; up from 352kb. Assuming the same ~38% increase in size, this alone will put NCCS up over the megabyte milestone.

So. Much. Work.

Bored enough this morning that I'm working on the preliminary version of NCCS' Hardcore Mode again.

Three lines of dialogue per companion (one response for each 'tier' of survival skill); times nineteen possible options, equals a metric fucktonne of dialogue (the metric, or "long" fucktonne, of course being more than the Imperial, or "short" fuckton).

I have to say, this right here is what keeps me from doing more with the companion system. Dialogue.

I hate it. The editor is clumsy and slow, has a shitty excuse for a spell-checker that can't be turned off; and all-round takes forever. It isn't even hard -- it's just the sheer, mindless, monotony of the endless copying and editing.

It's comparably simple, no less -- my personal companions plugin has three companions in it. Each one gets her own dedicated set of responses.

NCCS will be... more complicated. I figure an odd half dozen randomized responses based on gender, alignment, and so on; plus extra responses for each of the seven new personality types -- and a few extras for alignments and genders within said personalities -- all times three for the tiers of survival skill and scripting aside, this is going to end up a not insubstantial amount of work.

It's times like this I wish I really was head of a multinational evil corporation. I'd type up a couple of templates, and have a couple of slaves whittle away their life on the remainder. I'd make a joke here about the market rate for a pair of third world children, but someone would probably think I was being serious and take great offense.



...Like I could afford to buy human beings these days anyway...

NCCS v0.9?

May be a bit early to really announce that as imminent, but it's the next version, so yeah...

Anyhow, doing some scripting this afternoon; as the petulant whining accusing me of having that house mod pulled has already lost its amusement.

I keep forgetting how horrifically boring scripting is.

Still, I had a couple good ideas today that I felt bore inclusion into the test package.

1) I came up with a way to get the companions' hardcore mode to maintain compatibility with any overhaul mods you might be running. That is, if you run a mod that changes for example the dehydration rate; your companions will use the same rate you do, rather than the one from the vanilla game. This should at least help keep everything straight and even between your and your companions' needs.

2) I couldn't find any way to in-line increase the consumables' effects for NPCs in a way similar to how it works for the player. So, I copped out a bit and expanded to three sets of food/drink dialogue. One for Survival below 50; one for 50 to 75; one for 75+. That's the companion's Survival skill, not the player's. Item effectiveness will be determined on a per-companion basis; so companions with Survival tagged will get more benefit than ones without.

I also added almost-complete effects to the consumables -- I say almost complete, because there's little point in adding rads to an NPC since it isn't tracked for NPCs, and can't affect them anyway -- for example, Barrel Cactus fruit will reduce both hunger and thirst; but on the flip side, Pork 'n Beans will reduce hunger but increase thirst. The effects are again, the same for the player; so they won't be massive, but it will be something to keep in mind -- you won't want to be loading up on Pork 'n Beans and Potato Crisps if you and your companions are low of water and far from home.

The only exception is going to be Sunset Sarsaparilla and Nuka Cola -- they'll be coded to reduce companions' thirst similarly (but not as effectively) to water. It's pretty silly that neither drink in the base game quenches thirst; but I'm not out to overhaul the base HC system here, so we'll have to settle for companions acting right.

I also remembered to have the companion save the cap when you give them either soft drink.

I have to say, while certainly not my most advanced or impressive work, I am fairly pleased with how this is coming together.

Now, if I can just fight down the urge to add stripper-dancing to the sandbox packages for all female companions...

Hardcore Companions

Okay, so it's serious question time, Kiddies.

I'm in the process of writing in the prototype hunger/thirst code for companions.

What I want to know is what everyone thinks. I know I don't have enough of a readership to build much of a consensus; but I'm also not taking this question onto the Nexii forums.

So, here's what I want to know:

How "hardcore" should it be? Same numbers/rate of increase as the player? More? Less?

Rate of decrease when they do eat/drink; should it be a simple one item resets the counter, or go by points just like the player? If #2, should it tie to their (the individual companion's) survival skill? This could open a new avenue of companion creation -- one that has survival as a tag skill to survive in the wastes longer on less supplies at the expense of a combat skill; but it could also be a colossal pain in the butt to track numbers.

Items valid for bringing down their levels: all foods/drinks? Most commonly encountered? Only a select few?

How many times should you be able to refuse to give a companion supplies before they lose faith in your leadership and walk for greener pastures?

Just how pissed should a companion be when they walk? Just returning to town and be re-hireable after a speech check? Or maybe disabled; and thus gone completely from the game world without cleaning and re-enabling their plugin (thereby taking whatever equipment they had with them into the aether)?

Before anyone asks: sleep will not be making an appearance as a requirement. I'm sorry, it's just too hard to get an NPC to sleep in a specific bed on command; not to mention getting them to sleep a set period of time.

Coming Soon!

So, I played through Old World Blues yesterday; and the main thing I wished I had done differently was get the NosCo NV Weapons Collection up and running before heading into the DLC.

Why? Everything short of the brush gun was like spitballs on those damned robo-scorpions; and the brush gun didn't have the rate of fire to keep up with attacking heavily armored bots five and ten at a time.

I'd have killed for a NosCo brand Shapeshifter in 458 SOCOM.

That in mind, this morning I returned to the Mojave, and finished the setup for a (very early) alpha of the mod -- something to at least get the weapons into the game for testing.

Made some pretty decent headway, all in all. I figured out how to script the mod to add the weapons to the appropriate form lists to make the weapons work for the various perks and challenges that the vanilla weapons do; but without having to modify the lists in the plugin header -- thereby avoiding the dreaded conflicts with over-reaching, overbearing overhaul mods that are invariably regarded as my fault despite the fact that I'm not the monkey who felt one mod should fuck with every facet of the game at once.

Anyway.

Got the test plugin made and the weapons master loaded into the game, and immediately noticed an issue.

I used the unique 44 revolver model to make the 454 revolver -- wanting to set it apart from the 44 -- but quickly learned that the unique was apparently commissioned by a displaced pimp from a lew-see-anna whorehouse. It's like... chrome; with fake pearl stocks, and every time you draw it guitar music plays.

I cannot tell you how badly I wish I were exaggerating that for comedic effect.

Needless to say, that shit had to go. What is it with magpies and chrome, anyway? I see it on Taurii all the time. I mean, if you're going to be a gaudy attention whore, at least have some style and pick up something in carbona blue or color-case-hardened...

...Rambling again. Sorry.

A quick trip through the GECK had it back to looking decent. I ended up using the standard 44 model; but the sub-model with the "heavy frame" installed. I figure it looks different, and hey; it's a 454 -- heavier frame is always good. Also reverted it to the correct equip/unequip sounds.

Also caught a couple of minor details that needed repairing -- an errant weapon mod setting; a sniper rifle in an incorrect chambering; just those annoying little things that make up the bulk of releasing mods that have any semblance of quality.

One of the neat things about this mod is that because I'm (at least somewhat) creatively reusing base-game resources, at this point in time there are no resources to have to upload beyond the master file -- which weighs in at a whopping 77kb.

I should be able to swing an early alpha if you guys want, but it's pretty much just free guns and ammo at the moment -- the merchant NPCs aren't done, I haven't even started on the sales office cell yet; though I do have three of the merchant containers (weapons, ammo, reloading supplies) set up and ready to go.


Edit: and here, have some screenshots.



This is the message that pops up to confirm the new weapons have been added to all the lists they're a'sposed to -- since it's really hard to tell for sure otherwise.




Location of the 'test container' in the game world: right next to the front door of Victor's shack in Goodsprings.
















Some shots of most of the new weapons. Much like in real life, the plethora of calibers doesn't serve much practical purpose -- one won't necessarily do much another similar one won't; but there's a variety to work with one's fancy, to let you use whatever chambering you like best and practicality be damned.






Here's the 458 autoloader in my inventory, and another one showing that it does indeed spawn casings on use.

In case you missed it before, the "NosCo Super Blackhawk" is not part of this mod. It's something personal. In the weapon collection here, I've taken care to not use any registered trademarks for the weapon names.

I don't think I ever went into detail before, so here's the basic rundown of the model families:

ALSR, or Autoloading Sniper Rifle: based on the sniper rifle model; chambered in full size cartridges and smaller. High precision, low capacity.

BBH, or Big Bore Hunter: based on the hunting revolver; chambered in large, straight-wall, black powder cartridges -- 40-70, 45-70, 50-70. Like the hunting revolver of the base game, these come scoped only.

The Backcountry Defender is based on the 44 revolver; and available in 44 magnum and 454 Casull.

BGS, or Big Game Series: these are based on the hunting rifle, and use sporting and big game hunting rifle rounds. This is where you'll find your 30-06, 300WM, 22-250, and similar.

The Dirk series are based on the 9mm pistol (Google it if you don't get the reference). 9mm and 7.62x25 only. Will probably be convertible between the two, since they're only a barrel and magazine swap apart.

The Gunfighter series are all based on the 357 magnum revolver. Single action, six shot, straight-up old school. Runs the gamut of practical chamberings for such pieces -- from your basic 357, through 44 mag, 45 Colt; and even more common auto chamberings like 9mm, 10mm, and 45acp. These will eventually be convertible between chamberings that share a common bore diameter: 45ACP/45Colt, 9mm/357, 40S&W/10mm. Your character will only need to carry a conversion cylinder to go from one to the other.

The Overkill series are based on the AMR, and available in cartridges that are generally considered unsporting to use for shooting people.

The Room Broom is a riot shotgun; except available in either 12ga or 20ga, to match your personal preference and/or current ammunition stocks.

The Shapeshifter is based on the marksman carbine, and will be convertible through a wide range of pistol and rifle rounds. After buying one complete rifle, you'll be able to go from one chambering to another by buying conversion uppers; allowing you to carry the equivalent of multiple rifles to cover many situations, but at a reduced cost and weight penalty. Different variants may get different magnification on the scopes; I haven't decided yet.

The Suppressor is the light machinegun; just available in a wider range of ammunition.

The Vermin Eraser is your basic varmint rifle; save that it's available in pretty much any CaliberX rifle round that fits in a 5.56mm length action. Yes, that includes the 458 SOCOM, despite the fact that it is most certainly not a varmint class cartridge.

The Woods Hunter is based on the brush gun, and available in accordingly longer and more powerful cartridges than the trail carbine. Available options include lightweights like the 30-30, up to the shoulder-bruising 500S&W "Oh yeah? Well mine's bigger!" magnum. Also available in the old black powder cartridges for people who like to play cowboys 'n injuns.

Lastly, the Workhorse (of course, of course) is the old standby pump shotgun. Available in 12 and 20.

Some weapon mods will be available, some won't. Expanded magazines will likely be available; silencers may or may not.

Damage ratings, and strength and skill requirements are balanced against the weapons in the base game.

Finishing Touches

So, the yearly Day of No Nos Modding starts in a bit over four hours. I'm throwing the final touches onto NCCS v0.8 to go ahead and get it uploaded (since the whole "release an early alpha and get testing data" thing seems to have been a massive bust) before I go dark.

No new code, I'm just throwing in some new dialogue. Greetings at the moment. Specialist "packaged" companions will get special greetings (they won't appear every time, but will be chosen randomly from the list that the companion meets the requirements for from a list of things like gender, alignment, and skill package). Right now I'm writing in some alignment-specific dialogue, and wondering if people will consider the evil/very evil dialogue a bit much. Don't get me wrong, I'm going to do it anyway... I just wonder.

The offending dialogue? Things like:

"I'm not selling Ultrajet to orphans! Who said I was? I'll sue the hell out of them..."

"Hey, uh... no reason to go into more detail about this, but if someone should happen to come along and mention I had something to do with beating a sack of dead puppies; I was with you the entire time, okay? "

"Is violence impending? No? Then why are you bothering me...?"

"You know, I could be at home watching my Soaps right now."

Of course, there are others. Medic-greetings based on player health and rad levels; repairer and reloading greetings; some for recruited companions only, some only for non-recruited; a couple for female companions only that may get me attacked by feminists.

Also:

"Ugh. That gecko isn't sitting well. We may want to sleep outside tonight... s'all I'm saying..."

BECAUSE FART JOKES ARE ALWAYS FUNNY, DAMN IT!


Edit, and from the "Behavior" menu:

"Oh Gods yes; I love it when you micromanage me! Do it more!"

Must resist urge to have the companion refer to the player as Mein Fuhrer...

NCCS v0.8, The Slow March Forward

NCCS has taken a major step forward this morning; further eclipsing its would-be "competition".

Firstly, the Nellis artillery issue has been fixed -- and without touching a single base game reference or script. How I did it would be boring technical minutiae, so I'll spare you all; except to say that in-party companions now exist in a perpetual state of being considered the player's teammate -- save when you talk to them, or during combat if you have XP sharing off. This teammate change will also allow some compatibility with follower-centric perks; but this is mostly untested so I don't know offhand which work without further scripting. The new "teammate" condition has been tested and verified to not affect companions' ability to enter the Lucky 38, or keep their weapons on entering other casinos.

Second, during the companionscript overhaul, I re-wrote the case-spawning code. It is now driven by form lists rather than specific item names. This will allow for plugin-patching of the weapon lists, to allow it to work with mod-added weapons without changing individual scripts or forcing your custom companion to require a weapon mod. It will also allow similar patches to include the DLC weapons in the case-spawning code -- though obviously new ammunition types will require modifying the scripts.

Third... companions will now repair their own weapons. Yeah, you read that right. Companions' weapons will no longer reach 0% condition, break, and be dropped only for you to have to go look for where they dropped the damned thing. NVSE is not required for this feature. Companions' repair ability is linked to their repair skill; and companions who are not using the new repairer class will only be able to maintain their weapons at about 60%. Once a Repairer companion's repair skill tops out, they'll be able to maintain nearer 100%, with their weapons never dropping below 70%. I think this strikes a good balance; since it'll keep their weapons from breaking, but not negate the need for the player to perform periodic repairs if they want companions to do maximum damage.

Fourth: this is mostly a back-end issue and not something you players will ever see, but I managed to shave 65 lines off the companionscripts in the course of the rewrite. This is important because the scripts were getting up near the character limit; and by cutting so many lines off I've preserved the ability to continue expanding the scripts for a moderate part of the future.

Lastly, not a new mod development so much as a testing result: I know a couple players and myself have run into an issue where the companions hesitate before engaging an enemy; reloading their weapon one or more times before entering combat. I got some more testing in, and this seems to be directly related to non-standard ammunition types. When I removed the special ammo from the companions, and added default ammo, the issue went away. It doesn't seem to be a sure-fire issue or fix; but that does seem to be the most common way to fix it. I can't even begin to surmise what's causing it (but I have the nagging suspicion it's an engine issue) so I doubt there'll be an NCCS-specific fix in the foreseeable future.

And of course, here's the new alpha; for those three of you who give half a fuck.

NCCS v0.8, Issue Solved

Sooo... I've been holding off on releasing v0.8 because of the aforementioned issue with a script that refused to run.

Fixed that this morning, finally.

Bigger?

I'm sure someone has wondered, with all the new stuff I've been adding, just how much bigger is v0.8 of NCCS?

Well, I had to restore a backup of v0.7 today to open it in the GECK and disprove a claim that my scripting was faulty, so I took the opportunity to screenshot the overwrite:



About double the size. That, for those of you who have never done it, is a lot of scripting.

NCCS v0.8, Upcoming, Part V

So, few more updates that popped into my head today.

Firstly, I've reworked the combat radii on some of the NCCS combat styles. The thought occurred to me after commenting back and forth with Darksong that I had switched the radii in my personal companions plugin to get rid of an issue similar to one he described; but had forgotten to switch all of the NCCS styles to match.

It's a new issue that's only manifested since the last patch (Obsidian can't patch anything without breaking something else, can they? Incompetent fucks...) and seems to have to do with the combat radius -- that is, how wide an area they're allowed to notice enemies and engage in combat at. Default is 10,000. Prior to patch v1.4, I had been running them with good effects at 40,000. Since the last patch, however, anything over 30,000 seems to get them buggy. I know the limit is somewhere between 30 and 35k; but truth be told I'm too lazy to go ten units at a time trying to find the exact limit.

I realized this after seeing the issue again playing this morning -- a new companion I created for v0.8 is running the new "operator" style I copied direct from my personal companions, with the other two using existing NCCS styles. Two bugged, the new one didn't. Went back through, and sure enough I had left the "high" level Sniper combat style's radius set to 40,000. Checked and changed all the styles where necessary, and am hoping that will clear it up. Haven't had a chance to test yet, though.

Also, I've added compatibility to NCCS companions for players who take the "Ferocious Loyalty" perk -- the perk adds something like 50% damage resistance to companions when you fall below 50% health. Seemed kind of a waste to not have my companions able to use it while the vastly inferior vanillas can... so now NCCS can, too.

I'm also considering adding something I've mentioned before: a "hardcore" mode for lack of a better term. In HC, companions will have their essential flags stripped, and you will be limited to one NCCS companion per two points of Charisma (similar to the FO1 method). HC would also forcibly disable and preclude XP sharing. Vanilla companions and those from other systems will not be affected by this to minimize conflicts. May also add a need for companions to eat and drink in HC much as the player does in game-wide hardcore... but I haven't quite worked out how to keep a reliable running tally of food and drink needs. It should be straightforward enough to code... but we all know how far "should" goes in this game.

Also also: with all the bitching I've received about the equipment randomizers, I'm considering coding the companion scripts so that the companions spawn random gear once, and then the leveled lists are removed; not spawning any more items until/unless their plugin is clean saved and reactivated. This could be made a system option (I think), so I may plow ahead with it regardless of what the three people who actually comment on this blog think of the idea.


Edit: oh, and before I forget again, I've also edited my premade companions again. Their pip-boy plugins dialogue option will now appear on the top level of dialogue rather than in the equipment menu, and will disappear once they've given you the plugin -- rather than the option staying there and eating space uselessly in the already over-cluttered menu.


Edit, the second:

Just got through with some playtesting, and have reached a few conclusions.

1) the scripts failing are indeed the quest scripts. In NCCS, the 'sort all' (the command that doesn't work at the moment) is not in its own quest, but rather lodged into the main quest script. I can tell the entire script is locked, as the new campfire isn't being moved when I leave the cell it's in, and companions are not teleporting except at the end of combat (which is controlled by their individual object scripts).

I still have no idea why this is happening, and have found no method of fixing it except to clean save.

2) The issue with companions' weapons equipping/unequipping/reloading/et cetera seems to be a double-whammy. Even with the combat styles' radii reduced to a max of 25k, the issue was still persisting. I had it down to one cycle before initiating combat, but even that was annoying. I swapped out their ammunition for default types, and the issue went completely away through a couple hours of play (at which point the game locked on me while fast traveling, which is why I'm here typing this). So, the solution seems to be default ammo only and no combat radius over 30k.

Again, I have no idea why this is happening; but demonstrable, repeatable fixes trump "should be" every time.

3) this iteration of the game engine is still a piece of shit, even after four patches.

NCCS v0.8, Upcoming, Part IV

Otherwise titled: delays.

For those who don't follow the sometimes meandering comments in other posts, an issue has developed with the sorters.

An unresolvable one, as far as I can tell.

I set up some diagnostics and resetter functions. The quest runs, the dialogue command to the quest script works... and then nothing. The script hangs before any actual sorting takes place. The problem is it's not a code issue.

The script worked 100% until just a few hours of play time ago. I'd guess somewhere around the fifty-two hour mark. Since then, it dies every third or fourth use; and the only way to get it back up is to clean save. Annoying at best.

Tried stopping and starting the quest, tried forcibly resetting the sorting variables. No luck. It's in the script itself, and it seems to be corrupting in the savegame. Clean save flushes all this data, so the script is entered anew when you re-add the plugin.

Trouble is, there isn't a whole shit ton I can do about the issue. I'm already not re-using saves -- I create a fresh one each time, and periodically clean out all the old ones for space's sake -- and there's no real way to reset a script from within the game. Quests? Sure. But a script is a script until and unless it's removed and added again.

The other two sorters still work fine. For some reason, the game just hates the reloading sorter. Ironically enough, it's the smallest of the three -- but not surprisingly the one I use most. Just goes to show the universe still hates me.

About all I can do is switch to NCCS; see if that reloading sorter craps out regularly too.

This is another case when more information would be very nice. I know the script is the link of failure in the chain, but beyond that? I may as well be throwing darts at a board and attempting to contact dead relatives for tips. Some debug functions in this game would be nice. Except that they'd... y'know, not work. The debug mode would insta-corrupt saves, or refuse to print logs, or something else to make it totally useless.

NCCS v0.8, Upcoming, Part III

So, Herculine's probably going to be annoyed with me; 'cause she's going to be getting another alpha to test later today/tonight.

I hadn't intended to, but I nonetheless ended up working some more on v0.8 this afternoon.

I finally got around to adding working details to the repairer class and faction -- that some people have noticed, but reported not changing anything as a bug (protip: that's because it didn't do anything -- it was a placeholder for future features). That should now be a drop-in option for companions.

As well, there's a 'reloader' faction that allows the player to access portable reloading equipment.

And, I'm about 25% of the way into the medic class/faction. I've got the healing dialogue done, but still have to do addiction, crippled limbs, and radiation.

As noted before, the Operator class and combat style have also been added; using the combat style I designed and refined for Maeva in my personal companions plugin.

Still no plans to make use of the NCR and Legion placeholders; mainly because I just know someone will try to make one (or more) of each and have them fight, then complain it doesn't work right. I'm thinking at this point I'm just going to pull those placeholders altogether; until and unless I can figure out some way to keep them workable as companions, but still prone to leaving/turning on you/whatever if you alienate their faction sufficiently.

Also made some more changes to the back-end; cleaning up code that was now redundant with the backpacks removed and so forth.

Once that's all done, I'll probably rework a few of the companions in my premade pack to get them using the new features.

Lastly: I hate cleaning carpets. Yeah, I know it has nothing to do with modding; but it's what I spent the morning doing, and I just wanted to drop that in there.

NCCS v0.8, Upcoming, Part II

I've said it before, I'll say it again: there are entirely too many items in FNV. Got the last of the updates made to the v0.8 alpha this morning -- I did all the scripting the other day, but hadn't copied the new companion scripts to entries #2 - #20.

Got it fired up, my game didn't implode, and Carrie still drew/holstered/followed.

Exited out to make a few revisions to the sorting scripts, since in testing the sorters (which worked) I noticed a few more items that didn't sort -- various Gecko, Nightstalker, and Radscorpion eggs. That has been rectified.

I based where the eggs sort to on what they're good for -- if anything. Gecko, Fire gecko, Golden Gecko, and Radscorpion eggs go into the general container. Nightstalker eggs go into the survival container, as they're used in crafting... 'Mushroom Cloud'. They others weren't listed as being used in any recipes, so they sorted into general swag for later selling purposes.

That aside, v0.8 looks promising. As I said, the centerpiece of this update -- the sorters -- all work. That's the big one. The case spawning script still needs testing, as does the campfire -- I verified that the campfire wouldn't be set up indoors and Carrie made the correct snarky comeback, but I didn't try it outside to see if the thing will successfully appear and vanish as it's supposed to.

I'm also trying to decide whether an ammo sorter would be worth writing. Now, this one gets a little tricky: even with NVSE, there's no way to determine what ammo types you want to keep, except by checking what weapons are in your inventory -- you'd have to store any weapons you weren't going to use first, and then the script would leave behind only the ammo calibers for the weapons you're carrying. It's straightforward enough to actually implement; the issue is whether it's worth the trouble. There's no way I know to make this one mod-added weapon friendly, and likewise it won't sort mod-added ammo.

Since ammo only has weight in hardcore, I'm not sure it's worth adding to NCCS. Most people don't seem to play in hardcore, and no matter how you slice it, an ammo sorter will not work ideally for everyone -- or probably anyone.

May add a limited version for myself to my personal plugin; because there are some ammo types -- flamer fuel, missiles and such -- that I simply never use. Making them sort as part of the reloading sorter would save me some time in stowing stuff, since I virtually always have more ammo and swag than the lightweight merchants in NV can handle.

Anyway.

Assuming the universe doesn't decide to fuck me on this update, v0.8 should be ready to send to my partner for an internal alpha later today. Once she's played with it a bit and seconded my "doesn't destroy the game" results, I'll get a changelog typed up and the update made to the Nexus.


Edit: nothing ever goes simply in a conversion.

Carrie has been through three combats, to the tune of ninety odd seconds; and has spawned 371 casings.

Clearly, something did not get copied correctly...

Edit, again:

Well, I can tell I've been up since one in the morning.

Could not figure out why the casings were spawning in such huge numbers. Finally, in frustration I compared the blocks of code side-by-side between my personal companions (who "recover casings" correctly) and NCCS.

Since it was such a small block of code and in the middle of the script, I just rewrote the timer code instead of copying it from the other plugin.

In the version that works, every frame it sets Timer to ( Timer + GetSecondsPassed ) -- that is to say, it advances by one per second of real time that the timer is running.

In the malfunctioning block, I wrote it to advance based on ( Timer + 1 ) -- so in effect it was going up by one every frame, instead of every second; times twenty odd frames a second... and we have our inexplicable massive number of casings.

Gods, I feel stupid days like today. We'll just fix that code up...

NCCS v0.8, Upcoming

Have I mentioned lately how much I truly, truly hate working on mods for public sharing?

Putting together the sorting scripts this morning, and I forgot one crucial detail. That being in the companion reloading sorting script -- my personal plugin has three companion slots in its management system; NCCS has ten. The extra seven blocks of code put the script over the character limit.

So, I had to create another quest and script.

On the up side, most of the new stuff is already in. Five containers, four sorting scripts, three turtle doves... No, wait scratch that last one -- I was reading off the wrong paper...

Got the camp fire in, too; though I still haven't managed to get a working bedroll. Then again, with the Home on the Range perk added by Honest Hearts, it's less of an issue.

Still have to write in the actual dialogue to interface between the scripts and you; but the scripting itself was the heavy lifting bit anyway -- all fifteen hundred plus lines of it...

The two new containers I added are for armor and weapons, and will not have sorters attached to them -- since that opens up nightmarish scripting requirements to not take the weapons, armor, and ammo you're using and all. The other three: general, reloading, and survival will operate identically to the ones I created for my own use that I've been rambling about the last few weeks. Containers will be accessible from any companion in the party, and will be identical regardless of which companion you speak to. There are no plans at the moment for a physically accessible form of the containers.

I may take another shot at adding NVSE, to get the case-spawning code to work with mod-added weapons (note to self: remove the NosCo SBH 44 from the code or it won't parse in NCCS), but I didn't have very good luck with that last time, so it may be a "vanilla weapons only" bit.

NosCo Sitrep, 9-20

Haven't been posting lately. This isn't because I haven't been modding. Have been working on mods in FONV; as well as investigating ways to copy faces from the Fallouts to Oblivion.

However, I saw awhile back which way the wind blows. Several companion-stuff posts have drawn zero comments over the last couple months, but that post on Ling's pulled five in less than twelve hours.

I just assumed I had no readership left. Had I known no one gave a shit about my companion rambling, I just wouldn't have posted it; saved us all time.

So, rather than bore anyone with AI details or combat styles or what I learned in Facegen school; I popped in today to instead announce where I stand with some mods.

The new features are stable, and ready to begin being added to the NCCS v0.8 Alpha when I have time. As it stands, new features will be: categorized, dialogue driven sorting system; dialogue accessible campfire that can be set up in any outdoor cell for survival crafting purposes; additions to the companion scripts will have companions spawn casings and/or spent power cells during combat; expanded dialogue responses for the options that have been proven to work; the addition of one of my personal combat styles for companions that the player wants to be killing machines more-so than learning and growing with the player and yadda yadda.

I've also written a minor overhaul for CaliberX. It fixes some typos that were driving me up the wall, repairs a couple of reloading options that didn't work correctly (namely the 45-70 Hollowpoint breakdown option not working), renames .50MG Match ammo that CaliberX adds so that you can tell it apart from the base game's handloaded match ammo (they were previously named identically), and adds some new ammunition types. Three new loads for the 6.5 Grendel, one for the 44 Magnum, and one for the 45-70. This will be released here, when I've added a couple more ammunition types, and finished overhauling the abysmally unrealistic quantities of powder and lead recovered when you "breakdown" ammunition.

I've also decided to go ahead with the NosCo weapons plugin. Currently slated for inclusion are: the NosCo 44 (which will be reverted to the default mesh and texture until I learn to work with normalmaps); another single-action revolver, that is convertible between 357 and 9mm; a 454 Casull double-action revolver (based on the existing base game 44mag revolver mesh); a new version of the Trail Carbine in 454 to go with the revolver; a 338 Lapua mag "light" version of the AMR; and a "Multi caliber" version of the Marksman Carbine with switchable uppers that will allow you to carry rifles in .22lr, 5.56mm, 6.5G, 9mm, and 458 SOCOM at considerably reduced weight from packing around a full rifle in each. The collection will use CaliberX, of course. At the moment, sales will probably be handled in a widespread method -- one or two roaming caravans to sell in places like Goodsprings, Primm, and Novac; but also a central office nearer Vegas. I've spied a couple of buildings between Gun Runners and the Sharecropper farms that I like the look of; we'll see if either of them work out. The central office merchant will use the 'caps management script' I wrote for Chloe in RR (to allow high levels of caps to be traded without the engine bugging); and will probably include secondary sales personnel for other items as well. Weapon mods yet to be determined.

Okay, that's all for today. I still have stupid, unrealistic PMs to respond to and insane questions to answer, after all.


Edit, Addendum: after several complaints received recently from people who don't understand how leveled lists work, I think I'm going to add a dialogue option to NCCS that will strip the lists from companion inventory to preclude random items spawning and screwing up your carefully tailored postage stamp and dental floss outfits.