World Map Travel

[neo6874]

Thing is, with BG, the areas were so expansive that it doesn't really matter that each one was edged with a "world map travel" change.  Other games (NWN) don't really have travel at all (in the campaign anyway), everything was just an area stitched to another area ... so travel from a town to another town (if ever done) was always

 

town 1 -> forest area 1 -> forest area 'n' -> town 2

 

got tedious when the thing you needed was in town 2, and you had to return it to the guy in town 1 ... 

[LTD]

I just hope it won't be made *too* convinient.  Otherwise it stops feeling like travelling; impression of moving in large world stops and  you rather start teleporting around like some Star Trek character.  Skyrim, for example got enjoyable only after I disabled the ridiculous " go anywhere" fast travel.

 

In my books, Baldur's Gate I has travelling perfected well enough. Perfect balance of rules, restrictions and subtle flavor of tedium to ensure credibility, feeling of party actually travelling, not teleporting.

[neo6874]

And enough annoying instances of "your journey took [12+ hours], now your party is whining about being tired"

[rjshae]

Can we please stop throwing titles names around discuss particular features? 

 

I'm guessing that the Baldur's gate/Neverwinter Nights style of travel is much easier to implement than the Fallout/or Storm of Zehir type travel.

I don't know if its easier. The difference between Fallout and BG travel map implementation is mostly about random encounters i.e. when you click on a location instead of jumping to that location, you'll might get a random encounter on the way. A possible drawback is that it allows to open location through world map exploration instead narrative only, in FO it meant you could take a shortcut which allowed you to finish the game in 15min...  

 

IMO It might be nice, but you can get the same encounters without having an exploreable world map.

 

Well it is much easy to implement a point-and-click travel map using the Neverwinter Nights 2 toolset than an overland map. The former just takes a picture, some icons, and control scripts, while the later requires actually building the map in a 3D exterior area plus a whole lot of scripting, trigger areas, transition regions, lists of wandering monsters, placeable models, and so forth.

[Lephys]

And enough annoying instances of "your journey took [12+ hours], now your party is whining about being tired"

 

Haha. "Maybe go ahead and, I dunno... FACTOR IN THE REST BREAKS!"

 

Who plans a road trip nowadays and is like "Okay, if we drive for TWENTY STRAIGHT HOURS, with no food, pottying, or hydration, we'll get there! 8D!"?

 

Answer? The BG characters, if they lived today.

[rjshae]

To do that realistically, the developers would need to factor in the start time to compute the travel time. If you start in the evening, it may take longer than if you start in the morning. Or they could just use days.

[Lephys]

To do that realistically, the developers would need to factor in the start time to compute the travel time. If you start in the evening, it may take longer than if you start in the morning. Or they could just use days.

 

True, but I'm less bothered by the inaccuracy of ill-factored resting times than I am by "your party traveled for 20 hours but didn't rest at all."

 

In fact, if you want to get down to it, you could even have a simple setting for, ehh... travel "urgency," for lack of a better term. You could choose between 4-hour camps, 6-hour camps, or 8-hour camps, for example. Something like that. This way, if you really need to get somewhere, you'll get there faster with a 4-hour camp ("We don't have time to get our beauty sleep!"), but your party will become weary (using the BG system as an example) sooner than if you had chosen longer camp time in your travel speed.

 

You might could even just choose an actual travel speed, so that you'd make it somewhere in 6 hours instead of 8 or 10, but you'd maybe suffer some kind of stamina regen penalty or fatigue penalty.

 

Anywho, traveling somewhere with absolutely no representation of resting while traveling is a bit silly, since you then pop out into that area with all weary characters, and you then must rest anyway. The system might as well have just had them rest during the travel, and added that time to the travel time. If my people show up somewhere weary, it should be because I explicitly told them to do so, and presumably had some kind of reason for this. Not just because that's the only way to travel.

[Pipyui]

I just hope it won't be made *too* convinient.  Otherwise it stops feeling like travelling; impression of moving in large world stops and  you rather start teleporting around like some Star Trek character.  Skyrim, for example got enjoyable only after I disabled the ridiculous " go anywhere" fast travel.

 

I actually think Skyrim addressed this very well with the horse carts.  They could be found outside of every major city and would take you to another city for a small fee.  The trip was instantaneous, so the carts served absolutely no purpose to those inclined to fast-travel.  For weirdos like me on the other hand, I used the carts exclusively if I wished to fast-travel.  If I couldn't be bothered to adventure to the nearest city, or from any city to a cavern, I wasn't much of an adventurer at all.

[rjshae]

Perhaps they could present a choice between:

• Forced march -- higher wilderness encounter risk and no camp recovery benefits but very fast
• Cross country -- higher wilderness encounter risk but faster and with camp recovery benefits
• Road travel -- lower wilderness encounter risk with camp recovery benefits

[Lephys]

I didn't even think of encounter probability. Good call,

 

That's also a perfect example in answer to the "If kill XP is out, then when WOULDN'T avoiding combat be the best solution?" question.

 

Answer: When time is of the essence. Better built for combat? Then you have an easier time of getting places in a rush. Built for diplomacy? Well, have fun trying to negotiate truces with all the things/people that detect you rustling through the woods as fast as humanly possible with no regard for stealth or caution at all.

 

Not that that's the only time, but that's getting into a different discussion.

Edited November 20, 2013 by Lephys

[neo6874]

To do that realistically, the developers would need to factor in the start time to compute the travel time. If you start in the evening, it may take longer than if you start in the morning. Or they could just use days.

 

I kind of agree with Lephys though -- if a trip takes 12 hours, it takes 12 hours if I leave at 6AM or 6PM ... BUT I should be resting at least 4 hours (or whatever the minimum "you're no longer fatigued" time is) somewhere along the way.  

 

This, in turn means one of two things:

1. The trip actually only takes 8 hours, but we rested for lunch/dinner/etc somewhere along the way.

2. The trip actually takes 16 hours (12h of travel, plus 4h resting somewhere).  

 

 

The resting doesn't ever need to be a full 8h, UNLESS the base travel time is over 24 hours (excluding any rest breaks).  "Standard" FRCS travel times (at least as I recall them) for a "forced march" are 10h of actual travel plus 2h rest "per day", provided that you're resting full 8h overnight (the 2h rest is really "lunch and care for the mounts at midday") ... but then again, I still have my DMG, et. al. packed away somewhere (stupid moving).

[Pipyui]

I like the sentiment, but putting time-sensitive content into something like map travel seems like an especially bad idea to me.  There are too many factors involved in enforcing time limits that aren't event-driven to make it necessary to include faster-but-riskier travel (event-driven as in time is measured by a sequence of events, where you may do A and B, but not C, as opposed to a less discrete measure like a typical timer).  As much as I like the idea of road/crossroad travel, I can't see it as being particularly practical without time-trial events, and event-driven timers wouldn't (shouldn't) be affected by it either.

[neo6874]

TBH, I like the "time based" travel of BG and IWD, especially in the savegames.

 

I mean, instead of "NWN Save - 0:42" (i.e. just time played), you see "BG Save - 12h".

 

Also, it makes for some "fun" challenges along the way.  For example in BG, you can take an ankheg hide to the smith in Beregost, but if you don't have 4k GP to get him to make the armor, you have a tenday before it goes bad (although it's unfortunately a global timer, rather than for that particular hide).

[Mor]

I'm not really sure, but my understanding was that there would be large areas that would serve as hubs from which additional / smaller areas would be accessible.  From the smaller areas, travel would be possible back to the hub area,  possibly the world map, or another specialized quest area.  But it wouldn't be map to map roaming like BG.  

 

I can't recall where I saw this however, so take it with a grain of salt.

Maybe they have a road network of sorts? once a way into a new area is clear, you can travel where the road leads or stop anywhere in between. It might be interesting if reputation will open/close certain paths.

 

Perhaps they could present a choice between:

• Forced march -- higher wilderness encounter risk and no camp recovery benefits but very fast
• Cross country -- higher wilderness encounter risk but faster and with camp recovery benefits
• Road travel -- lower wilderness encounter risk with camp recovery benefits

I suspect that everything of that sort will be tied with road traveling skills.

 

As much as I like the idea of road/crossroad travel, I can't see it as being particularly practical without time-trial events, and event-driven timers wouldn't (shouldn't) be affected by it either.

I think we already have time-trial(?) events, such as the stronghold attack of which you'll be notified in advance and would be able to travel back and intervene.

[Hassat Hunter]

Personally, I would prefer the BG-method.

 

The 'action' is happening on the maps, the travel inbetween is just on re-used maps (unless you want them to map each location uniquely too, an unreasonable requirement), over and over. And just combat. Which isn't P:E's main focus. Yes, there will be combat, but there's no point to add more combat to your combat due to... Combat!

So instead of having 10 potential random combat rolls, just 1 would be just fine. And not just combat, could also have other stuff happening.

Yes, you could do that too with overhead, but having to explore an overhead map for the extra missions isn't my idea of fun, just added tedium, much rather have those added then as random encounter inbetween, BG-style, or actually on a map (outside or city).

I do think BG1's method of finding more maps upon exiting maps in a certain direction would add exploration and fun and makes you use your maps to the fullest, more-so than an overhead map instead.

 

Just my 2 cents...

[Lephys]

Basically, I'm not against the game doing the math for any and all resting for any and all trips. However, unless we're going to be taking 108-hour trips, I really am not going to be worried about it abstracting some rest-time. Especially when you factor in that, in the context of the escapades of adventurers, you have a lot of wonky scheduling. "We need to wait until sundown to try to see what Baron EvilMan is up to... better go get your rest now, while we have nothing better to do." Etc.

 

That being said... what if it kept up with how long you'd been awake, and didn't prompt any travel-sleep extra-time additions unless it had been so long since you last rested? You could just have an ultra-intuitive gauge on the travel map, showing your current "weariness" level, as compared to the "I'm literally not the least bit tired" minimum and the "OMG, IS THIS REAL LIFE?" delusionally-sleep-deprived maximum. Then, whenever you go to travel, you see two projections: travel time, and weariness... ehh "cost" we'll call it. So, un-check "sleep during travel," and your trip time goes down 6 or 8 hours (or whatever... this is just an example), but your "here's how weary you'll be by the end of the trip" gauge shows a higher segment.

 

You could even still have the "how long should we spend resting" options on the travel menu, and some kind of "automatically rest if weariness level would go beyond X during this trip" settings, etc. And just have a staged Weariness penalty set on the gauge, kind of like Hydration or Radiation poisoning in Fallout: NV. That way, you know exactly what the effects of your current travel decisions will be at a glance. "Ohhh, that's going to take me into Major Fatigue. Better rest for... 3 hours? No, that's still too close to Major Fatigue for me. Okay, 5 hours. Yup, that'll do it. I should be able to get through this next scenario without entering into Major Fatigue."

 

I think BG and the like already kept track of how long you'd been awake. They just didn't have any allowances for any resting but manual, non-travel resting. And nothing was intuitively conveyed to you.

[neo6874]

 

I think BG and the like already kept track of how long you'd been awake. They just didn't have any allowances for any resting but manual, non-travel resting. And nothing was intuitively conveyed to you.

 

Correct, and they were a bit nice about it... (you got 25 or 26 hours between resting -- so that 24h trip between the Nashkel mines and High Hedge wouldn't leave everyone dead fatigued upon getting there) though resting anywhere outside of town was generally a recipe for "holy crap, ambush"

[Lephys]

True that. But, at the same time, I often found myself going to one place, exploring around a bit, then traveling somewhere else (several hours of in-area exploration, since the last rest) for maybe 10-16 hours of travel time, only to arrive with several characters immediately fatigued and complaining about sleep.

 

I realize that what they were doing with the game was pushing the extent of the technology at the time, so they had a pretty full plate, but it just would've been nice to at least have the option of resting during your travel, or not. I mean, you're either going to travel to a safe place to rest (non-wilderness, so no ambushes) manually, or you're going to "stay out past your bed-time" in the wilderness and travel straight to another un-safe place. No point in giving you the option of doing so, but requiring you to become fatigued just because of the travel time, THEN manually fix that fatigue.

 

That could be another factor on there: ambush/encounter danger (while resting). Maybe some kind of Survival skill factors into this (and travel times, etc.) You can actually have a pretty complex (taking a lot of things into account) world-map travel system, while still resulting in a quick and simple, intuitive interface that just makes travel a bit of an interesting thing rather than just something you keep doing out of necessity but don't really have any significant control over (beyond your destination).

 

That's kind of the beauty of PnP gaming. Sure, you're rolling a bunch of dice, but you get to make choices that affect things like which dice you get to roll, how many dice you get to roll, what modifier you get to your roll, what the goal number is you're rolling for, etc. It's like chance is a stallion, and you get to tame it.

[Hassat Hunter]

The system you mentioned Lephys seems to take it a *little* too far.

A simple "rest?" checkbox should probably suffice, without having to give all that kind of detail.

 

I rather kinda liked in the BG they never explicitely told you how much % weariness your characters had till they got really sleepy and the penalty. It would make the game more gamey I think if it would outright tell you "80% weariness" and you go on that for example...

[Mor]

A little off topic-ish question.

 

So far we were give only those two concepts: World map and

 

 

 

Shall I assume the later is one playable location(looks like defiance bay) on the world map or is the only playable location during Pillar of Eternity?

[Hassat Hunter]

It's a mockup (also seen by the same map filled with many more locations later in the .pdf) so really, it's probably not remotely representative of the P:E world map.

I would expect something a lot better looking than that at least...

[Cubiq]

I don't really mind if the map looks like that, but we did reach the stretch goal of having 2 major cities, and i hope one of them isn't the upper left that looks more like a village.

[Mr. Magniloquent]

 

BALDUR'S GATE

STEP 1 - Leave the area.

STEP 1.5 - Gather your party before venturing forth.

STEP 2 - Pick your travel interest.

STEP 3 - Random encounter, YES or NO

STEP 4 - Arrive to your travel interest.

 

FALLOUT

STEP 1 - Leave the area.

STEP 2 - Pick your travel interest.

STEP 3 - Possible random encouter number 1

STEP 4 - Possible random encouter number 2

STEP 5 - Possible random encouter number 3

STEP 6 - Possible random encouter number ...

STEP n - Arrive to your travel interest.

I swear I've hit multiple encounters before on my way somewhere in Baldur's Gate. Because, after a random encounter, it stops you whereever you "ran into an encounter," on the map, so that you then re-choose your destination: either the same one, or a different one.

 

Maybe I'm delusional today, *shrug*. I hate my brain.

 

It can and does happen. About the only time it ever will is when you leave the mines or some similar location deep within Cloakwood for a far-off location. I've been ambushed by Ettercaps, Spiders, and Wyverns attempting to exit Cloakwood as much as three times before finally making it out, only to be ambushed by Bandits, lol. That is probably the only place/time it regularly happens.

[Mr. Magniloquent]

My ideal travel system is from Storm of Zehir. It possessed excellent sense of adventure and exploration while making each class's non-combat traits and skills relevant and significant. Traveling was productive and interesting with evading monsters or capitalizing on random encounters, rather than tedious or irrelevant. The lack of "fast" travel also helped compose a world, rather than merely a series of jump-points. I liked having reasons to go to small towns either out of expediency or necessity due to proximity and travel constraints. I also liked having to traverse the dangers of the wood to get to far-off markets with rare resources.

 

I could extoll the virtues of Storm fo Zehir's map/travel system for many many pages. I read how Mr. Sawyer reads most of the posts here, and I hope he reads this one. This was probably the best overland travel system I have ever used. If flattery will encourage you to reproduce a similar system, let me know.

[rjshae]

What's completely discordant about the SoZ world travel system is the lack of any sense of days passing. It should be taking weeks to travel between some of the destinations, but that isn't reflected in the lighting. There's no camping and no changing environmental effects.