Kia Ora


If I fast travel to either Ventara or Tebella I end up in the sea and when I swim to land it runs away.
I ran to -64 -64 and then ran each way to -37 -64 and to -64 -32 and then across to -105 -32 to anothe corner where I could have run along -105 -32, -33, -34, -35 etc
Given the size of this whole I'm guessing the whole landscape has not be done yet?

I know this is a work in progress and I'm not trying to be a smart A but it begs the question,.. Is it safe to mod and make esp's if the landmass is yet to be finished and may chamge under somebodys mod?
I only ask this because I have fallen into this trap myself where (as I mentioned in earlier posts) I changed mods saving esp's without the master esp esmify'd and ended up with mod parts floating and no land or
land with floating doors. I was thinking the esm was the master with the landscape highmaps in it but maybe I'm wrong. When I used TESAnnwyn with the commadline:
TESAnnwyn.exe -b 32 -p 2 -s 0.50 -w Hiboria Oblivion.esm,hiboriamain.esm,Hiboriamap.esp to make a map of the landmass it would not work. The -w switch is the worldspace it looks for to render the rest is the esm/esp's it
looks in for that worldspace data. one should get something like the blue and yellow one here

http://picasaweb.google.com/Kiwi.Hawk.NZ/Map# The otheres are from trying to join up the textures and normapmaps in the textures\landscapeLOD\generated folder then you layer the texture over the normal map using filters
to give a map with the mountains etc

I have just loaded the game and tried to replicate your errors, both on my laptop and desktop. No errors.

I fast travelled to Tebella: http://i992.photobucket.com/albums/af43/valisarius/ScreenShot105.jpg
Fast travel to Ventara: http://i992.photobucket.com/albums/af43/valisarius/ScreenShot104.jpg
-105,-32 http://i992.photobucket.com/albums/af43/valisarius/ScreenShot101.jpg
--33,-34 and then onto the land by swimming to it. http://i992.photobucket.com/albums/af43/valisarius/ScreenShot102.jpg and http://i992.photobucket.com/albums/af43/valisarius/ScreenShot103.jpg

I am not sure what you have done wrong, but your load order may be messed up, or you might be trying to run the mod through some third party program that isnt up to it.

You need to ensure:
1. Oblivion and SI are both in use and patched to the latest version.
2. You run the mod direct through the game or via OBMM and dont use any other third party prog that interferes.
3. hiboriamain,esm is directly loaded second to oblivion.esm and no other master files are used, just those two.
4. hiboriamap.esp is loaded last in the load order.

It sounds to me as if you are running Oblivion.esm as usual, then either hiboriamain.esm further along the load list with something inbetween these two master file or have a third master file running thats interfering with the land.

I would also commend people to go and look at Mesogea.org and view the latest photos by the Grimblade that provide excellent action shots of some of the common beasts of Mesogea. As we add in more exotic ones these pics will be even more fantastic to see.

Heya!

Just in case you need some: http://tinyurl.com/29lxmks has some historical weapons that may be of use to you.

StarX,.. theyer beautful mate real realy choice,.. I'm tink'n ya beastie mod would do well here too if that was ok with you and your team

Kia Ora

BTW guys I downloaded all the bits again and things seem to have settled down now,.. had heap fun running round,.. bit like playing Russian Rullet jumping on roofs
you don't know which your gonna land on or which you go through lol looking real choice tho a

Thekarithian do you know of TESAnnywn at all? only asked cause you might find it handy latter for map making

http://www.projectmanager.f2s.com/morrowind/index.php?menu=TESAnnwyn.html

Hey, did you see the new ones I posted the other day?

Wow, thanks man - those are nice weapons! I'm sure thekarithian would love to use them for the mod.

Glad you got this settled a bit. I knew there had to be something wrong in there. I could fast travel to those locations without falling into the sea.

Sounds like we might have to check collision on a few roofs (or is that rooves?) for the roof jumpers around here.

Oh, and good suggestion, I wonder if TESAnnwyn can handle the manly girth of Mesogea's environs. If so, it could be a great map making tool. I know the current map kinda gets off kilter when you travel to certain locations.

Umm... one small problem with TESAnnwyn - It doesn't have any install instructions. Will it run properly if extracted to its own folder and esps dropped into there for export, etc? or does it need to be run from the Oblivion Folder or Oblivion Data folder, etc? There is really no info about this in either the readme or the website. I was going to see if I could get it to work with Mesogea.

I'm guessing it has to be in the Data directory? Anyone know for sure?

This is probably why I never played around with it, b/c I had actually DLed this program a while back.

Ill have to think over a lot of this, tonnes of stuff to digest, but really, as in keeping with the theme of the mod, if anyone wants to have a go at doing things, please feel free.

A quick video update: Corrus Duborium (Port Deboran, WIP)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WYsjpfhbqnM

Dump it in thr data dir and theres that help file in the archive it's html (Readme-TESAnnwyn.html it's called) with the switchs etc, try TESAnnwyn.exe -b 32 -p 2 -s 0.05 -w Tamirel Oblivion.esm
Just double click the CommandConsole and enter the comandline you desire, see you in six months lol after you finished playing with all it options I can see you having fun

TESAnnwyn.exe -b 32 -p 2 -s 0.05 -w Hiboria Oblivion.esm,hiboriamain.esm give me an error I don't get tho, say we got a wild one,.. could it be that parts of the highmap are not finished?

Back in a few days, off camping. Keep up the good work. I will be finishing Port Deboran next week.

Looks great, man! You really pulled that "Pharos" look for the lighthouse off well. When you get back, if I still haven't heard back from that guy about the Pharos model, and you feel like making that ruined mesh set for me, that would be great! Maybe by then I'll have made a little progress.

Have a great trip!

That said, I've got alot on my plate this week so it's probably not gonna be very productive for me modding-wise, but when things have calmed down a bit on the work and home front, I'll be back strong on Astaroth. Plus whenever I get a free minute during the week I'll work on it.

While looking around in settings I noticed there is a http://mesogea.spruz.com/gfile/!-!75r4!-!GLDLFJ!-!zrzor45!-!QEGGOJOF-RHHK-HJGR-ONPS-DGHQFRNPIJSK/big_201082500530883.jpg where you can set custom Climate and weather for your worldspace. You can set a Mesogea climate, and probably custom climates for special zones, like for less precipitation in Desert areas. Also, note the check box where you can disable one or both moons and set moon phases, sunrise, sunset, etc. I guess you could just disable Masser and use the sky mod to replace Secunda.

If someone ever gets a viable heightmap (preferably textured...) exported with TESAnnwyn, I could probably throw together a pretty cool looking map. What I mean by viable, is one with the right scale and aspect ratio so that it matches up well in game. The current map gets a little off in places.

I won't waste much time on it tonight, as I'm just waiting for the CS to load up mesogea and my Astaroth.esp, but here is an example of the style I could use to make a sort of "painted look" on either papyrus or old parchment (I did this one while working on some Mesogea Load Screens):
http://mesogea.spruz.com/gfile/!-!75r4!-!GLDLFJ!-!zrzor45!-!QEGGOJOF-RHHK-HJGR-ONPS-DGHQFRNPIJSK/big_201082500480763.jpg
And here's the original to show how much I mucked around with the picture:
http://mesogea.spruz.com/gfile/!-!75r4!-!GLDLFJ!-!zrzor45!-!QEGGOJOF-RHHK-HJGR-ONPS-DGHQFRNPIJSK/big_201082500510668.jpg

Mind you, I can make it look better than that first pic, probably by trimming some of the outer 'traced' portion and just having more of the oil painting style for the map itself.

Well CS is done so, cheers!

This has a very Hyborian age (Conan) feel to it. I approve.

This is probably way outside the bounds of this project, but it's something I've tossed around in my head for my own total conversion that will never get made. It's an updater app and it would be perfect for a project like this.

In a nutshell, there is one "production build" of Mesogea that is constantly updated, just like it is know. Except the files for this build are hosted and checked by the updater application every time it's launched. The app hits the latest build, squares up with any changes or new content and downloads it then installs it. The updater then displays a change log and you can then launch the game with the latest content. This also lets you pre-configure any load orders, files, etc so that the end use doesn't have to touch it. You could have seasonal content, content that changes the game world, etc. It becomes a "live" game in the sense that it's constantly changing/updating even while people play though it.

Of course, I can't build the app myself. There *have* been apps like this written for games like NWN2, etc for persistant worlds, you just need someone with the will to do it. And server space..

As it should, and I feel the same way about it - that's definitely a direction I'd want this to take, as an influence.

I know theKarithian cites Robert E Howard, JRR Tolkien, among others as his influences. I myself am a big fan of the writings of Howard (Conan), Tolkien, Fritz Leiber (Fafrd and the Gray Mouser), and most obviously Michael Moorcock (Elric of Melnibone - the Stormbringer Saga).

So I feel like we are going for that dark, gritty Sword and Sorcery tone rather than the overdone, oversaturated medieval-based high fantasy style where every goblin or rogue you meet up with is carrying a magical weapon and every average Joe can cast spells.

If it were up to me, I'd make magic very rare, especially magic weapons, and a very well made weapon would be hard to come by and almost like having a magic weapon ("Conan - what is the riddle of steel?")

As it is, I think we are aiming at least limiting access to spells and magic, but making it decently potent, where instead of spamming minor heals and flare spells, etc. you'd have maybe a few more useful spells. I'd say, more along the lines of Midas Magic or something like that where you have to actually work for the spells, but they would be worth it.

Wow, yeah, that would be a great. If we're lucky and enough interest is eventually generated, then who knows? There are some very talented programmers out there; just look at the OBMM, Wrye Bash, the BAIN format, etc. Right now, it would be great to have a "cleaning" program that could handle Mesogea without crashing due to memory, etc. As it is now, I think there is some info that is saved to new esps based on the Mesogea master file that doesn't need to be in there, and could be cleaned out to reduce potential conflicts. Most of our work will be merged to master, but it becomes a problem when people start making their own "non-canon" or optional quest mods, etc. based in Mesogea. Mods that stay in esp form may be vunerable to conflicts with other things based on a different version of the master file, etc.

The LOD generation is another beast entirely, but we've at least got a work around for that, though it could always be improved (having it generated on the end user's computer would be more efficient for mod distribution.)

I don't know half of the complexities involved in all this, but I hope theKarithian/our team collectively will get it sorted out. This mod has great potential, and I'd like to see it succeed.

As a friend I asked about this points out, you could probably use a source control client do a sync of the game directories that're checked into source control (only the ones relevant to mods ideally) and then launch the game. It'd be like a 2 line batch file. In other words. So user logs in to source control client, client updates new files and game launches. Most of the heavy lifting for this might already be done. I need to look into it.

If we did what you have said, Vis, we might as well make Mesogea it's own game, which wouldn't actually be a bad thing... The main problem would be copyright problems, though some games out there were originally just mods that became their own games. Ex: Quake Wars: Enemy Territory, Gary's Mod, etc. Though they required you to have the original games, they did not have to load all of the game, so for example, If we could make a working version of Mesogea that ran without Oblivion.esm... that would be awesome. It would be crazy hard, but then again, so would a program that runs updates for you... The only kinds of games I see that do that are those being updated constantly (Mesogea meets that) and MMOs.

There is definetly enough content in Mesogea to be it's own game...

True, True. If I had more time on my hands, I definitely wouldn't mind being involved in the development of a game like this. Heck, I'd still be interested in working on it, but probably not as a programmer, at least not as an engine programmer. I'd write scripts like the CS ones all day long, but it's been too long since I did any *real* programming. Plus my band has been eating up alot of my "free" time lately. I'd probably be most gainfully employed working on world design, scripting and maybe even some music.

Anyway, just wanted to bump this since I believe theKarithian/Valisarius may be back from his camping trip. Now maybe he can find his thread.

Good start on the modelling stuff btw, Grimblade. It will be nice to have another 3d modeller on board!

I like the idea I'm looking forward to playing in due time. Keep it running I think its brilliant! Thumbs up!
Good luck with it I will look into this soon

Yep, back from camping. Slightly cut short due to weather in the Lake District, but a good time all the same.

Some great ideas coming through here and quite a lot of interest being shown, which is definitely good. Noted the 3d modelling thread etc too. Lots to do, back to finishing Port Deboran, and checking the world for faults.

Ooh, the Lake District's nice... I haven't spent real time there since I was a kid though...

Anyway, onto "business". I've got good news and (possibly) bad news for you.
The good news is that I've pretty much finished my redesign of the ALS loading screen format. That means that after I check it all over one more time carefully I'll go back to making screens.
The bad news, that's actually good news for some people is that the new format is widescreen-only. The screens your provided to me were all in regular (non-widescreen) format, so I have a strong suspicion that this is bad news for you as the widescreen format isn't what you were hoping for.
The good news is that if you don't want the widescreen format screens I'll still be willing to make the loading screens I offered using the older ALS format. I've no particular desire to do more work than I have to, so it's kind of an either/or offer. New widescreen or old regular format?

All the best,

Vac

I'd vote Widescreen, but that's just me! Haha. Will the edges of the pictures be cut off if they're in widescreen and someone has a regular format screen? Or is there a only a border region that will be clipped? Not sure if you were doing screens with a border format or if they have a bigger actual picture area than standard...

Wide screen sounds perfectly fine to me.

Are you familiar with the ALS design as it has been? Or load screen formats? You're working with a 1024*512 texture with a picture placed centre. The game automatically resizes the 512 vertical dimension to match your resolution and crops anything on the sides of the texture. You don't really notice it on the vanilla load screens because they're so... uhh... uninteresting at the edges. (Or all over IMO). If you start doing "interesting things" further out towards the edge of your 1024 horizontal space then you're going to lose that on a non-widescreen resolution. The new loading screen design does exactly that: increase the quantity of screen dedicated to the picture and reduce the amount of screen devoted to boring background, however on non-widescreen resolutions you're clipping off the sides of the central picture and also the sides of the text that accompanies the loading screen.Fabulous, then. That's the least amount of work for me all around.

Vac