DISCLAIMER: The information contained within this FAQ sheet was compiled and distilled from posts in the various threads and topics on Interplay's Neverwinter Nights forums. This FAQ sheet is merely designed to correlate known information, from posters and more importantly the replies from the developers, on the subject of Dungeon Master powers and limitations using the Neverwinter Nights gaming system, including the Neverwinter Nights Toolset. The examples discussed below are not my ideas, but are included to demonstrate the powers and limitations of the Neverwinter Nights Toolset. We will attempt to include quotes whenever possible. Last updated on 10/18/2000.
You mean that all of my modules that I create will have the same tilesets? So, in other words, after a while my modules will start to look like each other?
At first glance you would think so. However, keep in mind that you will be able to choose from a variety of tilesets to start with. Think of a tileset as a group of tiles that all have a common trait, be it a grassland feel or a dark dungeon look. There will be many different uses for each tileset. For instance, lets take the grasslands tiles and look at them closely. First, you would have a set of tiles that represented your basic grassland look, flat green grassy tiles. Then you might have some tiles with rocks in them. The set might include village tiles that represented, say, a small town situated in a grassland environment. Here is a partial listing of some of the tilesets that will be included in the Aurora Toolset when it is released.
Generic Tilesets
Grassland
Deep Forest
Urban Tilesets (each urban tileset includes curtain walls, defensive walls, buildings, docks, water channels, bridges, etc.):
Neverwinter
Luskan
Castle Tilesets (each castle tileset includes interior and exterior tiles, with numerous variations on a general architectural theme - library, throne room, personal chambers, guard room, etc. Castle tilesets can also double as subterranean tilesets)
Good Castle
Evil Castle
Subterranean Tilesets (each subterranean tileset includes a variety of passable and impassable tiles suitable to its theme.)
Sewers
Caverns / Mines
Dungeons
Crypts
So you see, the possibilities are almost limitless as to the areas that you will be able to design for you module.
Will the NWN systems allow me to create my own cut-scenes or will I have to use some generic canned ones?
Yes, the Aurora Toolset will allow you to script your own cut-scenes by basically setting the camera to record, and then having your NPC’s "act" out a scene or have some effects go off. Then you would stop filming as it were. Now let me show you how this really shines. Let’s say that your players finally make to the center of the evil temple after chasing the head priest. You want the head priest to summon his evil master just as the party enters and you want some form of scripted dialog to occur between the priest and the summoned creature. But you want this scene to occur and the creature summoned before the party is allowed to attack or run. You definitely don’t want the party to interrupt the summoning. What you can do is script the scene, record it centering on the head priest and the summoning, then take that .AVI file and script an encounter that is triggered when the party steps on the inner sanctum’s entryway tile. That way, when a party member steps on the tile the .AVI file is activated, all the party members see this scene and after it is played they are returned to the action.
A Barbarian (with enough HPs to survive re-entry into the earth’s atmosphere)
A Necromancer
A Mage/Thief
And me, a custom character that was sort of a chaotic good paladin who worshipped the Phoenix
and of course the usual clerical NPCs (two)
We needed to bust into a large keep out in the wilderness (not sure why, it was something we did after the Temple of Elemental Evil). We got close enough to see that it was guarded by Hobgoblins on the battlements with bows. Hobgoblins having infravision prevented the night attack. The keep had (from sketchy memory) towers and battlements around an outer gate (open) a huge courtyard and then inner gates. All in all, it seemed pretty impregnable. The barbarian (CN alignment) wandered off on his own and came to a river. He had a brain wave and covered himself with the thick mud and came back. The elven mage thief confirmed for us that it prevented infravision (the DM was relying a little more on the movie Predator here than the actual rulebook). The barbarian’s idea, a frontal night assault. After a little discussion we decided to try a little plan of mine.
We covered ourselves in mud and filled bags of mud as well. We went to the keep and penetrated the outer towers (which I think had some sort of undead in them). After recovering we took either a door or a table and managed to slip out. We moved around to the walls of the keep, in about the middle. We covered the top of the table with mud and held it up over the necromancers head who then cast polymorph self and transformed into an Umber Hulk. We'd discussed this with the DM already and he decided that the Umber Hulk’s burrowing ability was a natural attribute and didn't involve any magical or special powers (some DMs wouldn't agree, but who cares - ours did). The cleric then cast silence 15’ radius. The Umber Hulk was too big for us to be covered with mud (we didn't have much left) but he was fine standing under the table. The digging through the walls of the castle would have been quite noisy, but not with silence. And that was how we penetrated the core of the keep completely undetected.
If BioWare can even come close to allowing this sort of thinking outside the square I will be truly impressed."
A. Here is the reply from Rob Bartel, Lead Writer of NeverWinter Nights:
"Sounds great! It may require a little suspension of disbelief but here is how I would approach such a scenario as a NWN DM:
The paladin has a brain wave down by the stream and petitions me to see if I'll allow him to be covered in imaginary mud that blocks infravision. I decide that it's a creative enough solution and agree to allow it, as long as he's willing to change his flashy silver paladin colors for something a little more brown. He and the rest of the party complies and it's a deal. I turn off the infravision on all my hobgoblin archers (or just give them clubs and swords instead). When I'm ready, I trigger the coming of night and the game begins again in earnest.
As the players had told me that they were bringing along some of the imaginary mud in some bags they had on them, I can't really argue when they want to spread mud all over their polymorphed mage. Still, I don't like where this is going, so I make the argument that they don't have enough. Defiant, my players suggest the table idea and I decide, what the heck, if they already have imaginary mud, they might as well have an imaginary table (as long as they can find a place that has a real one). When the Umber Hulk starts 'digging' I just teleport the party into the core of the keep. As for the ingenious use of 'silence,' I concede defeat and let the remaining guards sleep in peace (though, if I so chose, I could possess a guard, have him stumble upon the player's nefarious deeds, and then run like heck for reinforcements, shouting bloody murder all the way).
So, yes, it would require a little bit of suspension of disbelief and the players might have to wait around a little bit to allow me to work my magic but, when all has been said and done, the game session would have played out in a way that very closely resembles your pen and paper experience.
Thanks for giving me a concrete example with which to strut NWN's stuff. I'm getting goosebumps just thinking about it."
Ok what about the issue of PKs and alignment?
I have asked this question in order to post a thread that was in BioWare’s Dev board. It touches on some areas that we as DMs will sooner or later encounter and some resolutions to the problems that would ensue.
First post:
"Besides the NPCs, I think that having some PCs be given the mission to track down an evil PC would be awesome also, and would be even better if the 'evil' PC would turn out being not really that 'evil' after, but actually just misunderstood, or it could be a case of mistaken identity, or the 'evil' PC could just be really charismatic. Back on to the NPC bounty hunters, what's to stop the player from just killing the bounty hunter? I mean, assume that Wild Billy Entrail-Eater kills somebody for lookin' at him ornery-like. Then the sheriff sends a lvl.2 bounty hunter after Billy and Billy kills the hunter. So the king sends a lvl. 3 bounty hunter, etc. You can see where this is going. It could keep going forever if you script it that way, right? So, I think that when people start implementing bounty hunters that this is something to be avoided. I think that a good solution would be to make the killing of a bounty hunter a greater offense. Like, if Billy kills the level 2 bounty hunter, then the sheriff realizes that Billy's out of control and sends out an entire detachment of guards (about 5 3rd level warriors) to take Billy down. If he comes quietly, then he'll just get the normal sentence. If not, they try to kill Billy. Obviously, Billy, the PC is going to think of running before these guys catch up with him. Still, I think that this kind of stuff would help to put some kind of real threat to the character's life. Sorry about my thinking out loud here. Here's a question though: What kind of punishments (other than death) will there be possible? For instance: will there be cells that PCs can be placed in, so that if the player tries to play that character for a set period of time, they have to either just sit in a cell, or provided that they figure it out, break out and then be a fugitive. Will there be stockades or any other kinds of imprisonment? Also, on a very dark note, what about torture devices?"
Reply from Trent Oster:
"If Billy goes on a killing spree and murders a few innocents, Billy's fame goes through the roof and his epithet is set to murderer. This causes the guards to go hostile to Billy and the local bounty hunter to emerge in pursuit. If Billy changes his ways and lays low for a while, his fame will decrease and the guards and bounty hunter may forget about him. If Billy kills the guards and the bounty hunter, his fame (Billy's) goes even higher. So high in fact a certain do-gooder organization in the Forgotten Realms may hear about Billy and dispatch a high level party to dispose of such a threat to the order of the realms. When Billy dies, his fame is set lower and his epithet is reduced, allowing him to benefit from the schooling he just received."
Second Post:
"In a 'PK' server, where anyone is allowed to kill anyone else, is it possible to have guards in certain areas (their jurisdiction basically) who will attack a violent PC as soon as they become violent? (I'm guessing that this one is a definite ’Yes.’) But after that, if a PC is continually killing other PCs, is it possible for bounty hunters to suddenly appear and start hunting down said players? I reckon that the thought of a level 30 ranger hunting you if you go on a killing spree would make a pretty good deterrent to Player-Killers not to go overboard, whilst still allowing a role-playing aspect impossible in UO where guards magically appear out of the air to squish you, or a PK doesn't get caught for any kind of mass-murder.
Also, depending on how many people the player has killed, could the bounty hunters vary in toughness? i.e.: If I were playing a mad-psychopath and killed someone in a tavern because they gave me a funny look, I would have a lvl 2 bounty hunter looking for me. If I followed this murder up by razing an entire village to the ground and killing 50 innocent people, then a level 20 bounty hunter is looking for me, as well as the level 2.
The main thing is, will the bounty hunters be able to cross areas, and will they remember who they're hunting etc. even if the player logs off and then back on? This way, you could have one bounty hunter hunting several people at once."
Reply from Cord, Dev board moderator:
"We are supporting evil alignments as a viable mode of gameplay. The system will work as follows: You have an alignment, this determines your outlook and influences what those who have heard of you think. You also have fame, which decreases with time and increases with certain actions. An evil character is best served by having a low fame, allowing him/her to deal with good merchants and not be troubled by guards. An evil character with a high fame may not be served by good-aligned shopkeeps, but the local thieves guild will give him/her great prices. Mass murdering is what breaks any reputation system. If you go around randomly killing townsfolk, the game quickly falls apart, all the people who could tell you about quests are quickly gone and the town is effectively broken for all players. To get around this we are going to add a tag to players who murder innocents, setting them up for pursuit by guards and bounty hunters."
The "tag file" will save to the server right along with the rest of the PCs info, so logging out wont save them. Also, they, and indeed all NPCs and monsters can chase you across areas (zones). I would assume that setting the degree of "toughness" for the guards/bounty hunters spawned would be as simple as setting it for any other spawn. I'd be surprised if we wont be able to have the "posse" appear at the local jail to begin their pursuit as opposed to the "suddenly over your shoulder insta-guards" of UO fame....
"Tour guides and text pop-ups are already in the plans. We intend to implement a flag system whereby the module designer can drop down DM-visible flags anywhere on the map. DMs can use them as hotspots to jump to and they can be referred to in scripting as well. They're there, so use them however you wish (waypoints for patrolling guards, tour guide triggers, party location warnings for the DM, whatever)."
I am wondering if the spell Teleport will be included in the Neverwinter Nights gaming system?
Sadly no. However, do not fret because it can be added (sort of). Let's say that your DM tells you that you can have the spell Teleport. What you will have to do is to add it to your character sheet (maybe in a notes section or something). In order to use the spell you would then query or pass a electronic note to your DM saying I want to use the Teleport spell in a such and so way. Your DM would then mentally calculate the operation assign appropriate dice roll and just teleport your character to the decided spot using his DM tools. Voila! a way to implement the Teleport spell.
1. If you are playing with a local character (one that has been created on your local hard drive and stored there as well) you will lose the experience points and items you gained since you joined the server and you will be free to journey elsewhere. Or you could wait until the server came back up and resume your adventure at the time index of the last game server backup.
2. You are playing with a server only character (a character that has been created and resides only on the server itself), the server comes back up and you rejoin or if the server is part of a shared vault world you can resume play on another server which shares the character database.
Let's say that I am running two or more servers and the party finishes the module on server #1, would I be able to send any information to the other servers to load the party into the next module?
The ideas BioWare has behind passing parameters between servers is to make it possible for one module to pass a parameter when the current module ends, telling the server which module to load and detailing any special starting conditions in effect. They have stated that this system could be extended to work with multiple servers. One server is running a town while the other servers are in an idle state. In this situation party A enters building B, which is a portal (transitional link) to another server. When the PC's enter the portal, the other server can be parsed the information of which module to load/run and any starting criteria if you wish. One possible problem comes if you want to portal to a server pool where one server accepts players until full and then supplants another server in its place. A way around this would be to have some scripting associated with the portals where a portal is displayed while it is active and when the server is full it will close the active portal and open up another portal to a server that has room for PC's.
When I am designing my server and setting up some parameters, will I be able to tell the server which port to listen to?
When designing your server setup, the port that the server listens to will be a setting that you can choose. It doesn't choose a random port. Initially it will be setup with a default port, but will be easy to change. All network traffic for that protocol will go through that port. If you want to have multiple servers running, you should be able to run them by specifying different ports for different servers in your LAN setup.
PRELIMINARY INFO
Module Title
Recommended Levels
Treasure per Player Target
XP per Player Target
Playtime Target
Approximate Time of Day
Special Notes
STORY
Plot Outline
Plot Breakdown
-Plot Point
--Creatures
--Encounter Creatures
--Items
--Traps
--Text Pop-Ups
--Journal Entries
--Fame, Reputation, and XP
TEXT
Important Keywords
Promotional Blurb (displayed on matching service)
Introductory Text
Concluding Text
Remember that this is just they way we're organizing our implementation plans (and is subject to change, of course). You may find that different types of plans work better for your modules or for your personal approach to design.
Just for clarity, Creatures, Encounter Creatures, Items, Traps, Text Pop-Ups, Journal Entries, and Fame/Reputation/XP are all subsets of the 'Plot Point' category which, in turn, is a subset of 'Plot Breakdown.' Further down, 'Maps' is a subset of 'Overland & Subterranean.'
What are the plans for PvPing for Neverwinter? What is BioWare's view on pking? Response from Rob_Bartel: "Our view is that PvP and PKing are issues that individual DMs and Server Ops should decide for themselves. We'll be providing a variety of server setting you can choose from and custom scripting is also an option."
Response from Don_BioWare: "Howard is keeping the code up to date on a weekly basis. No plans yet for beta."
Response from Rob_Bartel: "The Mac port is coming along nicely, as are the BeOs and Linux versions. We're aiming for a simultaneous, single-box release. Can't promise a beta of any sort at this point, though."
Response from Rob_Bartel: "Yes and we intend to do just that. There will be no hard cap on numbers of NPCs or amount of scripts. Whatever your server can handle."
Area: A collection of tiles from a tileset creating a single environment. The largest size of an area will be approximately 32 x 32 tiles; this size may be smaller.
Module: A collection of one or more areas that are connected together and are currently active on a server. At this time there is no limit to the number of areas in a module. This actual physical limit will probably be determined during play and by experimentation at first.
Campaign: A series of related modules. Think of this in the terms of the Pencil and Paper modules for the tabletop games. When the group has satisfied all of the victory conditions of one module they will then be able to begin on the next module.
With these terms in mind you will be able to create everything from the single session adventure located in a mad wizards tower of a few levels to the world encompassing campaign that spans literally years of adventuring and design.
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