Obsidian Contest Update

Here's our latest update from the contest:

Elanee and Friend by JackTaylor ("cheap pencil on cheap typing paper")

Khelgar and Neeshka by Hellcow/Spajk (in Painter with a wacom pad; my personal favorite in this batch)

Bishop by Ernie (in Photoshop)
Shadow Reaver by Patcha

Sicko

Tonight, my wife and I went out and had our first dinner & movie date since before our daughter was born well over a year ago.

We saw Sicko. This is the third Michael Moore film I've seen, and it was the best of the three.

I'm going to be brief about this: I feel disappointed in and embarrassed for my country right now. Yes, like all Moore films that I've seen, it is one-sided, and prone to oversimplification and hyperbole. But also like all of his films that I've seen, there is enough substance to his argument to be both compelling and impossible to ignore.

I can't pretend to know the best solution for health care in this country. I'm going to wager that it will probably not be exactly the same as what works for other countries. But I am certain of two things. One, there is a very real and very serious problem here, and it is completely unacceptable. And two, we as a country have a moral obligation to fix it.

...I won't let my politics become a regular intrusion on my postings here, as I know that's not why you folks come here. But at the same time, part of the reason I have this blog is so that I can have a voice about things I care about. So I'm going to go ahead and be off topic this time. Future posts will be back to focusing on hacking and slashing. Mostly.

Feargus Interview

I spent 15 minutes watching the E3 Mask of the Betrayer Gamespot video just now. There's not a ton of new information, but a few highlights:

• The character customization options with the Genasi look pretty fun. They show one of the water genasi's hair syles, which essentially looks like cephalopod tentacles sticking out of one's head. Not that I get that excited about character appearance, but it should make the multiplayer crowd happy. :)
  
• The new camera settings look promising. They don't seem all that revolutionary, but if they did more to prevent the camera zoom from darting around in top-down mode, I'd be pleased. It also looks to me like you can zoom out farther in top-down mode (or, as it's now called, strategy mode), which should be really nice.
  
• If you fast forward to 11:30 or so, you get a fairly long look at a Wyvern in the distance. Unfortunately, Feargus decides to fight Gnolls instead, so we don't get to see it in action. But the passive animation is neat, with its tail darting back and forth. :)

Update: In the new screenshots at IGN UK, there's a shot of a great looking golem(?). It's great to see some of the new creature models that will be in the game, as they should prove extremely helpful to builders:

Obsidian supporting its contest / Wyverns!

I'm making it a weekly habit to report on Obsidian's blog entries, but they've just been so good this past month.

First, the lead feature had to do with Obsidian's fan art contest. I think it's wonderful that Obsidian is doing this mid-term feature on their contest, as it's something that a lot of community members wished they'd done more of during the module contest. There are still a few weeks left for you artistic-types out there, so be sure to get your entries in.

Second, they released a new screenshot of one of the new monster models that will appear in Mask of the Betrayer--a Wyvern (pictured top right). Pretty amazing looking critter--I'm looking forward to seeing it in game! :) It is a bit different of a design than we saw from DLA in Wyvern Crown of Cormyr (below). More avian than reptilian (though aves is technically a clade within reptilia, of course...).

Update:
I decided to grab some more pictures of Wyverns from around the 'net, just because I think they're neat creatures:

Wyvern Hunting by Donato Giancola:

Ochogames:
Draconika:

Another Wyvern:

Obsidian Fan Art Contest Update

Here is our next batch of fan art for Obsidian's Fan Art contest. This seems like a particularly well-done set!

Sand Portrait by Minttu Hynninen, in Photoshop CS
Meet the Party, also by Minttu Hynninen (make sure to click on this one so you can read the dialog)

Bishop by Pinguicha (my personal favorite of this bunch)
Khelgar and Neeshka by Richard Gulick

Interview with ADK

There is a nice interview with ADK at the Vault. I played both of his Kunoichi modules and enjoyed them. They offer good roleplaying, and offer a great respite from the more typical fantasy adventures we see among NWN modules. I'm excited to see that he is working on both a prequel and the conclusion of his Kunoichi series, though I do tend to wonder if I'll ever get a chance to play them--I still haven't reinstalled NWN1 after my hard drive issues, and sometimes I wonder if I'd be able to go back without getting frustrated by both the graphics and the game engine. I'm pretty committed to NWN2 at this point.

Anyway, here are excerpts from my comments on both of ADK's Kunoichi modules. Both were posted 14 October, 2005.

Kunoichi 1

Kunoichi is one of the most controversial modules yet produced because of its content. Nevertheless, it is a quality module that emphasizes roleplaying and allows the player to make decisions that have meaningful effects on the outcome of the story. You play a female recruit to a group of ninja assassins. There is honor in this sort of occupation, but being an assassin is a brutal business.
...snip...
For its roleplaying virtues alone, this module is hard to beat. If you can stomach the emotional ending, I would recommend this module to anyone interested in a short module that will test your principles and allow you to make meaningful decisions.

Kunoichi 2

The structure of the module is similar to the first – you are given a series of missions in a nearby town and sent on your way. This time you'll be accompanied on your trip over to the town by Miho, your friend who joined up with the clan at nearly the same time as you. This gives some opportunities to further your relationship with her, and is one of several NPC's with whom you have the opportunity to develop a relationship that started in the first chapter. Once again, there are multiple quests, but this time there are only some in which there are multiple ways to complete them successfully. Some require successful skill checks (persuade is very important here), and the final quest requires you to work through some very creative and interesting puzzles. I'm particularly fond of the crime scene investigation puzzle, although I also liked the one that required you to interpret a painting.
...snip...
In general, however, this module is a set up from Kunoichi 1, in that its missions are more interesting and the characters are deeper than before. There is some real plot development that occurs both early and late in the module, and I'm itching to play the next mod in the series.

Bronze Dragons & Console Commands

I meant to post about this when it happened, but forgot. Anyway, Rob McGinnis posted yet another really exciting update to his blog this week.

The piece of info that has gotten the most attention is the surprising addition of Bronze Dragons to the toolset as of patch 1.07. There has been a lot of criticism of the fact that only two dragons were included in the original release. I've always found that a bit of a strange criticism--the tinting and scaling capabilities of the toolset allow you to do an awful lot with the two models that are available, and I'd much rather have them flesh out some of the other underrepresented monster categories (golems, shapechangers, etc) than focus on more dragons. But whatever, I'm certainly not complaining about getting free content. This should make a lot of people happy--and it is a gorgeous model.

Perhaps more important, however, was the news of a number of new DM commands that will be available in the next patch. I think this means that these will be available in the in-game console under DebugMode, as well as the DM client. The reason that is so important is because these were among those commands that will be added:

dm_getvarfloat : Returns the value of the specified variable.
dm_getvarint : Returns the value of the specified variable.
dm_getvarobject : Returns the value of the specified variable.
dm_getvarstring : Returns the value of the specified variable.
dm_giveXP : Gives the specified amount of XP to the current target.
dm_givegold : Gives the specified amount of gold to the current target.
dm_god : Turn player character invincible.
dm_jumptopoint : Jump to the specified points. Syntax is: float float.
dm_setfaction : Your current target will have its faction set to the one specified in the command line.
dm_setfactionreputation : Where: faction1 and faction2 are the names of factions. x is an integer value indicating the value to set the reputation value to. Description: This function will set the reputation value for how faction2 feels about faction1 (0 is hostile, 100 is friendly).
dm_setvarfloat : Sets variable specified to the given value.
dm_setvarint : Sets variable specified to the given value.
dm_setvarobject : Sets variable specified to the given value.
dm_setvarstring : Sets variable specified to the given value.

These, particularly the dm_setvar* series, are absolutely essential for players, as they allow us to get around occasional variable-related bugs in modules. They don't happen often, but I still probably used them 10-15 times in modules over the past few years. Without these commands, I'd otherwise have to reload from an earlier part of the module, or even worse, restart from scratch. This is a big improvement--kudos to Obsidian!

June Hall of Fame Inductions

Neverwinter Nights 2

There were no modules inducted into the NWN2 hall of fame this month. That's a shame, but I think we're likely to see that from time to time. NWN2 module production is happening at a much slower rate than it was for NWN1, and the requirement of an 8 or higher is a steeper requirement under the new voting standards. I think we'll see a steady series of releases for a long time to come, I don't see any signs that the rate of release is likely to escalate. Fortunately, there are several modules that will be eligible next month, so we'll certainly see some inductions then.

The only NWN2 inductee I have any experience with is Ar Pharazon's cave roof, which has already been used in several modules, including Once Upon a Time... by Mungo_D. It allows you to use exterior height maps to create much more varied and complicated cave environments than are possible with the caves tileset. There is also some nice looking Asian-style armor by Schazzwozzer, which might help spark some asian-themed NWN2 modules at some point. I always enjoyed those in NWN1.

Neverwinter Nights 1

The only inductee here that I have first-hand experience with is Sethai's NWS - The Black Dragons, a former feature in the Overlooked Module Project, and a module for which I was an early voter. The highlight of the module was its opening battle, in which your character joins a desperate and inexperienced militia on the battle field as they seek to defend against an onslaught of an army of rebels calling themselves The Black Dragons. If you've played NWN2's OC, imagine the opening battle in West Harbour, just with more variation in elevation, and constant waves of foes. It was exhilarating. Here's an excerpt from my comments, posted 21 June 2005:

The story is, on the surface, fairly simple: you answer a call for mercenaries to assist in the defense of a small little village from a veritable army of rebels. Odds are not in your favor: there are 6 purple dragon soldiers, 8 townsmen who’ve been trained to fire a bow, a hardened general, and 2 other mercenaries besides yourself against upwards of 200 troops! Strong defensive position or not, this sounds desperate. The mod does a superb job of getting you into the story, not to mention quickly into the action. And as the story progresses, you learn some of the background surrounding this conflict. There’s more nuance in this short story then there is in a lot of longer modules I’ve downloaded on the vault.

I was shocked to discover that this is Sethai's first time being inducted into the Hall of Fame. Congrats!!

I also want to congratulate Avi Maxwell for her demo module, Dusk of a Samurai, getting inducted. I never got a chance to play it (I was waiting for the official release, which now seems unlikely to happen), but I played and reviewed one of her earlier releases, Ronin: Kensai of Kyoto. It had a few issues, but it also was clear in playing it that Avi had tremendous potential and talent.

Congratulations to everyone who was inducted this month, and thank you for your contributions to our community!

Obsidian Art Contest Update - ATOM

It's been a few weeks since I last posted submissions for the Obsidian Fan Art Contest, and since then, there has been a ton of submissions. Today I'll post four submissions, and I'll try to follow this up with more frequent postings like this as I catch up.

Today, I'll feature the work of ATOM, who has four submissions in the contest. All are digitizations (is that a word?) of acrylic paintings.

Neeska, Khelgar, and Me
Atom the Axe battling undead
Sand, Khelgar, and NeeshkaTroll Attack!
Hope someone's got some mechanism for generatin' some fire in that last shot, or they're going to be in for a world of hurt. :)

The Rampion Champion

Last night I played the module that placed third in Obsidian's first module building contest, The Rampion Champion. Despite its relatively low Vault scores, I found that it was surprisingly enjoyable, even if very brief. In a lot of ways, it reminded me of some of the better submissions in the Bioware writing contest--very short, but enough to it to be interesting and engaging. My vote reflects more on its brevity than on its quality. I probably still would not rank it 3rd in the contest overall, but I can see how it could be that well-received.

My vote: 6 - Good, Qualified Recommendation
Character: lv. 1 human male rogue/fighter (advanced to lv.2)
Module version played: v.1, released 29 May 2007

With one of the more delightful, tongue-in-cheek titles of any module I've played, The Rampion Champion is an enjoyable, even if very short, little module. Some users have reported being finished in 5-10 minutes, but I was occupied for closer to 25 minutes, not including the time it took to create a character. The module is light-hearted in tone. You play the father- or godparent-to-be of Rapunzel, and are sent by Rapunzel's pregnant mother on a desperate quest to retrieve rampion (basically radishes) from a nearby enchanted garden. Along the way, you'll encounter some light combat and meet some strange creatures before your adventure comes to a dramatic(?) end.

The most remarkable thing about this module are its fabulous cutscenes, which are highlighted by the use of still images that the author somehow created from in-game screenshots. The effect is something that looks like it came straight out of a book of fairy tales, and yet clearly uses NWN2 content. Really awesome stuff. The writing is good, with a nice amount of humor and a couple of interesting characters. There is a fun riddle with a few possible solutions, and the one you will uncover is determined by one's characters' attributes and skills. The combat seemed well-balanced for a soloing lv. 1 rogue (I can imagine the no-rest nature of the garden might make it a bit tough a wizard or sorcerer, however), though it is quite light. Impressively, there are multiple endings for this module, though the end result is not dramatically different.

I did encounter one bug in the dialog scripting. But the main limitation of this module is its length. It ends a bit abruptly--I expected that there would be at least one more interior area in which I'd get to sleuth about. Still, it represents a nice first effort by a new builder, and I hope that she will consider putting together another module in the future.

The Subtlety of Thay

As I mentioned last night, I finally finished Subtlety of Thay. I say finally not because I was relieved to be done, but because I'm so impressed at how long this module is. I didn't keep track of my game time, but I'd estimate it took well over the estimated 8 hours Dirtywick projected. Maybe closer to 12 or 15?

Below are my comments. As seems to be typical, I'm about a point more conservative than most voters, for whatever reason. In this case, I think this probably could have been a genuine must-have module, except for some of the polish problems I encountered (minor bugs, typos, and area design issues). Nevertheless, it is absolutely one I'd recommend to everyone and anyone interested in NWN2 mods.

My Vote: 8 - Excellent, Recommended to Anyone
Character: lv. 4 chaotic good female wood elf ranger, previously used in Witch in the Wood (advanced to lv. 8)
Module Version: SoT v.1.7, dated 4 June '07

Subtlety of Thay is a tremendous module that is easily among the top two or three mods I've played thus far for NWN2. It has a wonderful story. What begins as a simple fetch and retrieve quest becomes a problem of epic consequence, ultimately causing one's character to play a pivotal role in a conflict between two nations. That might sound a bit generic, but the details of what happens are very creative and engaging. There are a variety of interesting and well-developed characters that are deftly interwoven into the story as you progress through the module. Several of them become companions, at least for a time, and there is a great deal of well-done banter between party members, as well as between the PC and these NPC's. The plot is executed very well, with excellent pacing and good justification for almost everything that happens. The story is generally linear, especially once you get past the initial quest. That said, I almost never found that it felt railroaded, because the need for an urgent course of action was always justified by the story.

Stylistically, the writing is excellent, though there were a fairly large number of typos in the version I played (these may have since been fixed--and if not, I'm forwarding a long list of these to the author--check your @aol email). There was also one conversation in which about ten new obscure names of people, places, and organizations were mentioned in rapid sequence, and I got totally lost. For the most part, however, there is plenty of exposition for someone with only marginal Forgotten Realms Lore skill (like me) to understand what was going on. Furthermore, the dialog options were well done, with numerous hidden skill checks (I found this a nice change from the typical declared skill checks we usually see) that dictate both whether you see a particular option, and whether you are successful with a particular line of conversation.

Combat was generally very well balanced, varied, and fun. I was particularly fond of the final series of battles, which required a bit of puzzle-solving in addition to good strategic combat. It became very important to have both cold iron and alchemical silver weapons, even early in the module, and switch between them was a common necessity--it really enhanced the strategic element of combat, which I loved.

Almost all of the combat areas, be they dungeons or external environments, were interesting and creative. There was, however, one dungeon area that was not much fun. It contained a repetitive series of "filler" spawns that included a type of monster that I would argue should never be used as filler, as they're just too interesting for that. It also contained a long but very narrow corridor with a huge number of very easy, but still very annoying little critters. I understand what the author was going for in this sequence (I think), but the result was that I felt I was battling nwn2's pathing as much as I was these animals--and the fact that they kept respawning over and over again made it even more of a chore.

Nevertheless, in the grand scheme of things, these critiques are very minor. I would absolutely recommend that everyone play this module that is interested in NWN2 mods. It's a tremendous debut effort by a first-time modder, and has me very excited to play the sequel when it is eventually released. Thanks for a genuinely great module!

Finished Subtlety of Thay

Tonight, I finished the Subtlety of Thay. It's an excellent module--I'll write up comments tomorrow. I think I'm largely (though not completely) in agreement with BGP Hughes' review of the module, which was just posted to the Vault today.

For now, though, I need to go to sleep. :)

Banned!

So, I got banned from the Bioware Forums today for the first time! Here's proof:
I was responding to this thread. Here, as best as I'm able to recreate it, is the message I was trying to post:

Yeah, I can certainly understand not want to give a low vote. My general rule of thumb is that I only vote on modules that I complete. And if I'm not enjoying a module, I will generally not complete it.

Nevertheless, I wanted to echo Childhood's suggestion to at least try to leave constructive feedback. Most builders are very happy to receive feedback, even when critical, as long as it is written in a constructive tone. One thing I always try to do (in addition to being sure to highlight the good as well as the bad) is to accompany any criticisms I have with suggestions for how the problem might be addressed. This helps me to emphasize how an author might improve his or her work, and to keep the tone positive and encouraging.
-B

Let's see here. No obvious swears. No words that I see that could contain a bad word, like "cumbersome," "shittake mushrooms," or even "craptacular." Heck, I don't even think I was saying anything that could be construed as controversial! Anyone have any ideas? I haven't gotten a response from Bioware yet as to what the heck is going on, though I certainly hope I will. :)

NWN2 Mods Needing Votes

One of the features that the old Vault (pre-2005) had that the current Vault software is lacking was the ability to generate a report of modules needing votes to get on the top rated list (requires 10 votes minimum).

While there haven't been as many NWN2 modules released compared to what we saw with NWN1's release, there actually are a surprising number that have yet to cross the 10-vote threshold. And several look like they'd be worth playing.

Therefore, I thought I'd take a quick jaunt through the NWN2 module list and create a report of those modules that need more votes to reach the "immortals" list so that they may avoid getting lost in the ether. I ignored modules that were declared to be in beta, as well as modules that were geared toward builders (script examples, builder utilities, etc) and not players. Trainer modules, PvP arenas, cutscenes, etc, were fair game, as long as they were geared toward players. Here are the top-15 modules on the list, sorted by votes needed and current score:

Title	Score	Votes	Comments
Treasure Hunters	7.64	9
Alternate NWN2 Ending	7.61	9	cutscene
The Final Journey	7.32	9
The Rampion Champion	6.07	9	contest module - ranked #3 by Obsidian
Heroic Dream	9.75	8	utility
Happily Never After	6.96	8	contest module
The Garden	6.17	8
Curse of the Timberclaw	5.71	8
Road to Glory	2.67	8
Village of the Mutes	1.00	8
dmraist's Trainer Module	8.10	7	utility
Grimm's Patchworld	6.05	7	contest module
The Otherside Chronicles	7.38	4
PvP Mod + Items/XP/Gold	7.33	3
War Grounds X	7.17	3
Rise to Power	5.58	3	utility

If you have tried these modules and have yet to vote, please go do so! And if you are looking for something new to try, why not check one of these modules out?

This was somewhat cumbersome to compile, so I can't promise I'll update it. But you never know...

Rob's NWN2 Blog: Genasi & Purgatorio

Pretty amazing update today on Rob McGinnis' Official NWN2 Blog. I'll highlight two items that caught my fancy.

First, he has more detailed info on the Genasi, the new playable race(s) in the upcoming expansion. All seem to get a penalty to Charisma, which makes them unsuitable for some classes. I'm guessing (I could probably look this up) that they will also feature an ECL penalty. But still, they could be interesting races to play. I'd be particularly excited if someone decided to do a Genasi-specific module at some point. That could be extremely cool.

Second, he posted some screenshots from Rogue Dao Studios' upcoming module, Purgatorio. They apparently have custom monsters in game, including the much-needed Slaads. I think they look awesome, particularly the Green Slaad. Can't wait to see them animated--and I can't wait to start hacking them up. :D This continues to look like it will be the biggest community release of the year.

Fallout 3

Mostly, I just play Neverwinter Nights 2 when I need a roleplaying fix. But every once in a while, I do like to check out the offerings of other games. So I was over at Gamespot tonight, and noticed this:

Kind of exciting. Fall 2008 is still a long way off, but Fallout 2 is one of my all-time favorite games. I understand that this sequel will be far different in terms of the gameplay, but my primary hope for it is that they will be able to keep the incredible atmosphere and feel of the first two games. We'll see. I'll likely be following news on this one a bit more closely from now on.

Upcoming release: The Zelbross Affair

Seryn mentioned in a thread at the FRW forums that he hopes to release his module, the Zelbross Affair, near the end of the week. Here's a very brief description that he posted some weeks ago:

**The Zelbross Affair**

Setting: Zelbross and the surrounding area (The Delimbiyr area of the North)
Levels: 1st, reaching 3rd by module end (a relatively short module)
Classes: All
Races: All
Alignments: All

Description: A starting module based in Zelbross centered on a merchant plot involving humanoids and caravan raiders. Generally hack and slash, with the choice of adding up to 3 of 6 available custom companions.

Looks like fun!

I'm sure that no one is really interested in this, but my short-term playlist, in approximate order, is as follows:

1. Finish Subtlety of Thay -- impressively long module. I keep thinking I'm nearing the end, and a whole new plot segment appears! Using a wood elf ranger, who began her career in Witch in the Wood.
   
2. The Rampion Champion -- new character--probably a rogue, given that he's sneaking into a garden to steal a vegetable.
3. A Walk in the Woods -- new character--no idea what class. Given that it's light H&S, perhaps I'll go ahead and use my gnome bard from Uninvited Guests. It'd be nice to get her out of level 1...
   
4. Daark Twins -- use included character.
5. Night Howls in Nestlehaven -- I think I'm going to use my cleric from Keep on the Borderlands for this one, levelled up to lv. 10 or so. I have a dwarven defender who is closer to the appropriate level, but the cleric should offer more enjoyable roleplaying.
6. The Zelbross Affair -- new character. Since it's low-level H&S, I'll probably go with a melee-type, most likely a tank (as opposed to a high-dex sort). Which class/race I choose may depend on the module description.

After that, who knows? We'll see what else has been released. Sgt. Why's Red Hand of Doom is also in beta, so perhaps it'll be ready by then. And there are several other mods I've been thinking about playing for some time now.

Akkei working on NWN2 module

One of the things that has been a bit disappointing to me as a player is how few of the "old guard" of NWN1 builders have made the transition to NWN2. The majority of those that have seem to be working for larger, professional studios like Ossian, with just a few (Adam Miller, Enoa4, and Markus Schlegel head the list) independent artists out there who were significant players during the main part of NWN1's modding life. It's not that I blame them--hardware requirements are steep, the time investment required is greater, and they've already put a significant part of their lives into modding and thus may be ready to move on. But I still hold out hope that more will continue to make the transition. And perhaps they will:

Yesterday, Akkei announced that he is working on a NWN2 module. A long-time community member and well-regarded builder, Akkei published three important and highly original modules for NWN1. You can read his announcement to find out about his upcoming module, but I thought I'd reflect back a bit on his past contributions. Below, I link to each of his three English NWN1 modules, and post an excerpt of my comments:

Orcs 1 - The Awakening of the Arak-Hur (my comments posted 3/30/05)

"Orcs" had been on my playlist for a long time, and I finally have had the opportunity to give it a go. It was everything I’d heard it to be. You begin as the adopted child of an orc, having just come of age to serve your orc clan, the Arak-Hur. Your clan was driven into the caves in the mountains 30 years prior by human invaders into your lands. They have bought their time, grown their forces, and now are prepared to strike back at the humans. Since you are not an orc, they ask you to go do some reconnaissance on the human populations to help them identify weaknesses in their defenses.

So begins a very open ended game. Once you leave the Orc confines, you have your choices of a large variety of quests which all can be accomplished in any order you choose. Quests are varied and interesting, and many of them are mutually exclusive—if you agree to cooperate with one faction, quests from other factions will become impossible. There are numerous opportunities to roleplay characters that range from lawful neutral to chaotic evil. The best accomplishment of this module is that it allows you to very easily slip into the role of an orc. Throughout most of the module (exception—see below in spoilers), I felt absolutely no regrets about spying on the humans, discovering their weaknesses, and reporting them to my superiors. After all, these are the corrupt bastards that conquered your clan’s homelands for nothing more than financial gain.

Orcs 2 - Return to Al-Dha (my comments posted 4/5/05)

Orcs 2 is a worthy sequel to the original Orcs module by Akkei, and is the 2nd in this unfinished series. You begin shortly after the events in Orcs 1, having been promoted to Arms Master, a very prestigious title in your clan. Having defeated the humans responsible for your clans' exile, your chief has decided it is time to return by sea to the homeland of the orcs. You are assigned the helm of one of three galleons used in that transport. But things don’t go quite as planned…

So begins this very open-ended module. There are few modules that give you as much choice in the way the story goes than Orcs 2. There are three different plot lines here. I only sampled one of them, but the nice thing is that even though the stories are the same, you get to see most of the module playing through each one of them. This was a good, important design decision—it allowed there to be a decent amount of detail in the world and a lot of side quests, even though the world can be experienced through the three storylines.

There was a lot of thought that went into the gameworld. The module creates three very distinct orc cultures, each of which is different from the other (largely along the lawful-neutral-chaotic axis), and also distinct from the player's home clan. They are locked in what seems to be a long political struggle that has a very uneasy peace. Further, they have a long history that is only alluded to, but includes an interesting tale involving elves. I really enjoyed the setting of this module.

The Breach

As it turns out, I never posted comments on this one, though I did play it for an evening or two. I found the setting and concept to be absolutely fantastic. Amazingly creative, fun, and exciting. The opportunity to play undead characters is something that has never been done as well, before or after this module was released. The cutscenes that start this module are to die for (heh), and the experience of navigating a dark undead keep while rooting out pesky good-doers was delightful.

Nevertheless, I found the combat to be far too over-the-top for my enjoyment. I tried to play the sorcerer, as well as the fighter, and in both cases the repeated and constant spawning in some of the town areas just became tedious. Nevertheless, this module is worth a look, if for no other reason than to experience the first hour or so of gameplay. I'd love to see someone try to do something like this for NWN2, just with less over-the-top combat. :)

Contest Art - Khelgar, Balor, Succubus, Phaerimm, and Sand

Here are a few pieces of contest art that I haven't been able to work into another post.

Hand-drawn Category
Khelgar by Vaei (not an official entry, but darn nice):

...a quick watercolor sketch of Khelgar (hands down favourite character in the official campaign!) I'll probably opt for a tighter digital render for the final submission.

Balor and Succubus by SuiSa:

This is my second image for the NWN2 fan-art contest (Ed: her first can be found here).

Render category:
Phaerimm by Chris McSpurren:

Here's a pic of a Phaerimm that I modelled in Maya awhile back. I'll convert it for use in the game if anyone wants it.

Sand by Sorcha Ravenlock (another non-official entry from the thread, done in Daz Studio/Photoshop, but I like it, so...):
Thanks to these artists for their submissions. I'm really enjoying seeing what folks are coming up with.

Dark Waters

So, as it turns out, another member of the review guild was particularly interested in writing the review for Dark Waters when/if Adam Miller decides to submit it. Furthermore, I don't know if it's ever going to be submitted for review (Miller asked to delay the review until he had more time to patch it...and it's been a while), and besides, I've moved on to other modules...so I've decided to just post my comments.

Keep in mind that my comments were from Dark Waters version 1.03, and there is currently a 1.04 version on the Vault. Nevertheless, I think my comments are still applicable--Miller has primarily been fixing bugs, and while I did encounter a couple of those, it's not my primary critique of the module. As you'll see, I did think it was a fun game. I just think the story needed a bit more fleshing out.

My comments:

My Vote: 7 - Very Good, Deserves a Look
Version Played: Dark Waters 1.03, using NWN2 1.05
Character: Human male rogue/fighter (hey, we're going to be a pirate, no?)

There's an awful lot to like about Dark Waters--its potential is amazing--but in the end, I thought it fell a bit short of being a satisfying experience. Surprisingly, though, I think it fell short for reasons other than those that are typically mentioned in votes by other players.

First, what I liked: it's a wonderful setting. I guess you could call it Final Fantasy meets Waterworld--a very cool blend of traditional swords 'n magic fantasy with late 1800's-style technology, all set in an interesting post-cataclysm world that is just starting to come back to life. It's very deep and well-conceived, with a unique history, class structure, and feel. The setting alone makes it worth checking this module out.

On top of that, of course, is the custom content. The voice acting is the flashiest and most obvious innovation, and it ranges from very good to not real good. Fortunately, most of the main characters are very well done (particularly Heather and Daniel), and those are the characters that you converse with most often in the game. There is also a custom score (excellent), and a ton of custom placeable models included in the game. It's quite a resource for the community.

But what really impressed me--and in this way, it reminded me a lot of Dreamcatcher 2--were the variety and creativity of the various puzzles you encounter along the way. None were particularly difficult, but they were interesting and original, and often dazzling.

The story itself borders on outstanding--it's a bit complicated, but it's fascinating, splendid science fiction/fantasy. But I found that the main shortcoming of this module is the execution of this story. While it is true that the opening series of cutscenes has a bit of a clumsy feel to it (a common complaint), I didn't find this to be a big issue. The problem I ran into were the final few nodes in the story, which seemed pretty rushed.

The issue, I think, has to do with the rather large size of the cast. There are effectively eight main characters for most of the module, two of which are treated as villains much of the time. I found that the development of this core cast of characters was well done--you learn about them at a nice pace, develop their personalities slowly, and ultimately have a good feel for who they are. But then, near the end, a 9th character is introduced who plays a pivotal role in the plot.

I found this individual's introduction to be really jarring. It was very difficult understand who he was, and he was never really given a genuine introduction. It'd be one thing if he was a stranger, but instead he apparently has a long history with some of the characters in the party. The result was that the final few cutscenes had a very rushed, and somewhat contrived feel as the author tried to tie up all the loose ends. I think that a bit more time spent generating backstory for this character--perhaps with another major flashback, for example--could have made a world of difference.

My other critiques have already been offered by other players. The combat is fun enough for a light/moderate combat module, though the final battle was much too easy. There are a lot (maybe too many) of speak triggers throughout the module, and sometimes it's possible to trigger one that assumes you've already experienced a previous one, which can be confusing. Also, there are still a few remaining bugs, though fortunately it looks like most of the show-stoppers have been resolved.

Overall, it's an interesting module and is definitely worth checking out. It's something of a landmark given the amount of custom content, but the issues with the story in the latter half of the module left me feeling a bit unsatisfied. Nevertheless, for the most part, I had a terrific time playing it, and I'm really looking forward to playing the next chapter.

It's kind of a shame for these comments to be coming out so late, but oh well. Live and learn.

More on the Red Wizard

One of the highest-profile additions that will be coming with the expansion class is the new Red Wizard of Thay prestige class. In the NWN2 blog yesterday, Rob McGinnis gave the lowdown on how they will be implementing it:

Requirements: The Red Wizard prestige class requires that you be human and have any non-good alignment. You must have 8 ranks in the Spellcraft skill and at least one metamagic feat or item creation feat (other than scribe scroll). Other feats you must have are Spell Penetration and Greater Spell Penetration, too. On top of all that you must be a specialist wizard with the ability to cast at least 3rd level arcane spells.

Class Features: The Red Wizard uses the d4 Hit Die, just like a normal wizard and has a low base attack bonus (BAB). Her high save is Will. Red Wizards gain no armor or weapon proficiencies and gain 2 skill points, plus intelligence modifier, per level in skill points.

The special features a Red Wizard gains are as follows (not listed in any particular order):

1. Red Wizards continue to gain spells per level as though gaining a level in Wizard.
2. Enhanced Specialization: Upon becoming a Red Wizard, the character becomes even more skilled at casting spells from his chosen school of specialization.
3. Specialist Defense: A Red Wizard gains a bonus to defending against schools from his specialist school.
4. Spell Power: The Red Wizard's effective caster level for determining level-dependent variable checks is increased by +1.
5. Wizard Bonus Feat: Red Wizards gain a bonus metamagic or item creation feat.

Overall, it looks like a nice option for neutral and evil specialist wizards looking for something a bit different. Unlike the Pale Master, I don't think there's any sort of delay in caster level, so this seems like a nice alternative. The enhanced specialization might be really powerful for an illusionist or an enchanter, and the spell power boost is handy. That said, I don't think it's going to result in the feeling that you're significantly different from a normal wizard--but at least you get to be a Red Wizard!

The graphic, by the way, is an excellent collage/paint job by relsh (note, this is not a contest submission).

...

Life's been pretty busy, and my university was in the College World Series recently, which means I haven't played NWN2 in about 5 days. I'm nearing the end of Subtlety of Thay, and hope to finish it up tonight. Fun mod. Comments on that to follow.

Obsidian Fan Art Contest

With the conclusion of the first Obsidian competition, we have another to follow:

Due to the fun we had with the mod-building contest, we are announcing a Fan Art contest for the non-builders.

There will be two categories that a person may enter:

First Category: Your favorite NWN2 Companion (Khelgar, Neeshka, etc.) or NPC (Lord Nasher, King of Shadows, etc.)

Second Category: Your favorite NWN2 creature or monster.

Submissions are due July 31st, so folks have plenty of time to work on their entries. There could be a potentially really cool prize associated with winning. From Rob:

...I am toying with the idea of the winner(s) artwork being added as a placeable piece of art in game. We would get the artist's permission for that, of course... and no guarantees that will happen.

I'm sure almost any community artist would be thrilled to have this happen. Kudos to Rob for thinking of it, as it immediately makes this contest seem far more interesting. Even if it doesn't happen officially, I think that converting these submissions to placeables could be a really cool project for some enterprising custom contest creator out there. :D

It should be a fun contest, and I'm looking forward to decorating my blog with the submissions. :)

Speaking of which, here's the first (unofficial) entry thus far, an entertaining little comic by SuiSa2006 from the official forums:

Obsidian Contest Wrap-Up - Updated

Today, following the announcement of the winner on Monday, Rob McGinnis his list of the top three Contest Modules, as ranked by Obsidian's internal voting. They are:

1. Grimm Brigade by Jason S. Roy (jclef)
2. The Birthday by Maerduin
3. The Rampion Champion by Death Quaker

The latter has to be considered a surprise winner, as it currently has the lowest popular vote score among contest modules with at least 5 votes. Comments on it generally indicate that it was well done, but extremely short. All of these contest modules were quite short, but in this case, it seems shorter than most. I'm going to put it at the top of my to-play list so I can see for myself, right after I finish Subtlety of Thay (currently about 3 hours into that mod). As always, I'll post my feedback in this space.

I posted this in my previous update, but for posterity, here are the rankings, by popular vote, of all contest modules (scores as of Tuesday):

1. The Birthday - 8.92
   
2. Grimm Brigade - 8.50
   
3. Cry Wolf - 8.33
   
4. Daark Twins - 7.69
   
5. Being Good - 7.68
   
6. Witch in the Wood - 7.25
   
7. A Walk in the Woods 7.21
8. Ebha - 7.00
9. Happily Never After - 6.90s
   
10. Once Upon a Time - 6.67
    
11. Grimm's Patchworld - 6.56
12. Queen of Lies - 6.50
    
13. Prince of Light, or Shadow - 6.48
14. The Rampion Champion - 6.10

Final Thoughts On the Contest - UPDATED

I have decided to remove/revise this part of my post. Originally it highlighted some of what I felt were problems with how the contest was run, and questioned whether any prizes at all were awarded (this was not clear at all initially--and from my perspective even doubtful--but Rob has since verified that Jason Roy is receiving prizes as the winning author).

This afternoon I contacted Rob McGinnis via PM, once again mentioning Lorft's thoughtful post on the contest, and addressing the issue of the prizes. It was a very polite and civil e-mail, and it had a constructive tone (to my eye, anyway), but I did state my case. Shortly afterward, I received a response from Rob indicating that prizes are indeed being awarded to the winner. Then, perhaps in response to my PM, or to others he has received, he made this post in the forums a few minutes later, which addressed some of my (and others) additional concerns:

As with everything we do, we received some criticism as to how the contest was run.

Let me first say that the winner is going to receive some prizes. It won't be anything along the lines of a new computer or a job or anything, but the winner will receive prizes, the least of which is an Obsidian T-Shirt.

Second, some people feel there should have been more publicity. I am not sure if the feeling was that we should have publicized the contest, the entries, or both. I do not know what more to do in these forums except bump the thread.

Third, there was criticism that the contest was unclear. I tried to clarify it as much as possible and, as was stated, if there were any questions, I was available through PM or forum post. If something was unclear, I could have cleared it up, if asked. I don't see every post on these forums, so a PM would have been useful.

I have said many times before, the NWN2 community is only possible if we work together. If you hold your questions and concerns and wait to only criticize at the end (this goes for anything), we may find that the contests are more trouble than they are worth.

The latter rebuff is perfectly fair. The problem, in my case at least, is that the pieces didn't come together about what was troubling me about how this contest was run until the short winner announcement post was made in the forums. As I continued to reflect on it, and read the posts of others, I realized that there were some issues that really troubled me about how the contestants in this contest were dealt with. Some of my concerns were admittedly based on misconceptions (primarily the issue of prizes), but most are still valid. And so, I've made a few comments about it both here and elsewhere. If this had all crystallized earlier, I would have written earlier.

Lorft also sent a PM to Rob that expanded upon his earlier comments. Rob's response to him was extremely positive and receptive--which is very good. I'm encouraged by this and hope we'll see improvements in future contests--and that we will see future contests. Lorft is right when he says that this contest has been a great thing for the community.

Apparently there have been a large number of attack e-mails sent to Rob over this issue. Our correspondance was friendly, which I appreciate. But I hope that my postings here and elsewhere didn't result in rude messages being sent to Obsidian. That was never my intent, and it is never productive. I know I don't get all that many readers, but I have been pulling ~150-200 readers a day over the last few days because of this contest stuff.

Anyway, I'll just close by reiterating that this contest has been an excellent thing for our community and for Obsidian. It is true that more could have been done to recognize those that invested so much into their entries, and Obsidian caught some flak for that.

But in the end, more went right than wrong. There were 16 entries, many of which have been very well received by the community. And these modules helped showcase many new authors in our community, which is always a good thing. And, ultimately, the winning module is a fine example of a fun and polished module, even if it's not my personal favorite.

So...back to gaming!

Patch 1.06 Released

Just over two months since the previous patch, Obsidian has released patch 1.06 (hat tip to Maximus). Their target cycle seems to be a patch every other month, and in general, they've hit their mark each time since 1.03. Here's the past history:

• Nov 1 - NWN2 in stores, patch 1.01 released.
• Nov 9 - 1.02 patch (more of a hotfix than a real patch)
  
• Dec 4 - 1.03 patch (very significant performance improvements)
  
• Jan 30 - 1.04 patch (mostly user interface issues)
  
• Feb 8 - 1.04 hotfix
  
• April 11 - 1.05 patch (AI, scripting, mouse-over health status)
  
• June 12th - 1.06 patch
  

Kudos, as always, to Obsidian for continued support of and improvements to the game.

Looking over the patch notes, here are a few highlights that look useful to me:

Custom Content

• Several new UI customizability features. Among them, users can now set textures on UI objects via script, and users can set the state of progress bars via script.

This could result in some amazing UI modifications in modules. We've yet to see any published modules that really take advantage of the ability to have re-skinned UI's, but Rogue Dao's Purgatorio, which is currently in internal beta, apparently is doing this.

• Placeables now have an OnClick event. This event will fire whenever a user clicks a placeable, regardless of whether the user can currently path to it.

I can see this resolving a number of minor but occasional issues builders have in which they want users to try to use an object, but need to place that object in a place that is not accessible.

Toolset

• Undo and Redo now work for Terrain, Grass, and Water painting.

If this works as advertised, it could be a godsend. There also appear to be several improvements to the tools used to shape height maps. I haven't messed with that enough to know how important these changes might turn out to be. Jclef, winner of the Obsidian mod contest, indicates that the new flattening tool is very useful.

General

• Specular Lighting has been improved. Shiny objects should now look better than before.

I'll see if I notice any difference once I update. I never thought that shiny objects, like armor, were too dull, so hopefully they didn't over-correct a problem here.

• Trees and Objects that fade no longer lose their directional light shadow when faded out.

This is a nice improvement, and should fix something that I occasionally find distracting and disorienting when I'm exploring environments.

Effects/Spells/Domains

• Bestow Curse now reduces all of the target’s ability scores by 3 rather than 2.
• Energy Drain no longer allows a saving throw.

These changes might make me tempted to actually use these spells. I've previously never found them very useful.

• The Turn Undead ability will now function properly.

I noticed a lot of inconsistency in the effectiveness of turn undead when playing Keep on the Borderlands, so perhaps this bug is what was happening.

As with most patches, I'll probably wait to patch until I'm forced to do so in case there are any problems that arise. Although, if I decide to play a cleric or paladin character, I might go ahead and update just to get whatever benefits are associated with the bug fix for turn undead.

Grimm Brigade wins 1st Obsidian Contest

Umm, wow:

And the winner is....

jclef, with his module Grimm Brigade!

The module had some great writing, area designs and a very original concept. If you haven't played it already, I highly suggest it and all of the other mod contest modules.

Thanks to all those that participated. We had a great time judging this contest and playing all the modules.

Stay tuned for a new contest kicking off in the very near future!

A few comments:

• You can read my comments about Grimm's Brigade here. As you'll see, I thought it was a fun and enjoyable module that offered some great action in a tight, polished package. Many congrats to jclef for the excellent submission and for winning.
  
• That said, I'm rather surprised--I felt that The Birthday by Maerduin was on another level in terms of quality. A much deeper, interesting, and, for me anyway, more enjoyable module. And action wise, I think it holds up with Grimm's Brigade quite well.
  
• I would probably also rate Cry Wolf by Lorft above (barely) Grimm's Brigade. All are solid modules--I guess my rankings might just reflect my preference for interesting stories and good writing over action.
• I was surprised that they only announced one winner--I think the community would be much better served if they granted gold, silver, and bronze awards, for example.
  

Nevertheless, congrats again to jclef for his win. It is a deserving module and is well worth a look. Furthermore, thanks and congratulations to all the authors of this first module contest!

Update:

I thought it might be nice to recap the Obsidian Mod Contest, based on the rankings by popular vote. We might consider this a "People's Choice" ranking that makes for an interesting comparison to Obsidian's rankings (I'm hoping they'll release a top-3 or top-5 list).

Here are the rankings with a 5-vote minimum. The number in parentheses indicates my vote, if applicable:

1. The Birthday - 8.92 (8)
   
2. Grimm Brigade - 8.50 (7)
   
3. Cry Wolf - 8.33 (7)
   
4. Daark Twins - 7.69
   
5. Being Good - 7.68 (7)
   
6. Witch in the Wood - 7.25 (6)
   
7. A Walk in the Woods 7.21
8. Ebha - 7.00
9. Happily Never After - 6.90
   
10. Once Upon a Time - 6.67 (6)
    
11. Grimm's Patchworld - 6.56
12. Queen of Lies - 6.50
    
13. Prince of Light, or Shadow - 6.48
14. The Rampion Champion - 6.10

Apparently I'm somewhat more conservative than average. And I'm embarrassed at how few of these mods I got a chance to play. :(

One thing that is important to note about this list is that none of these modules scored below 6, which means that all of these modules were given an average verbal rating of at least "Good, Qualified Recommendation." Furthermore, three scored above 8, which indicates they were "Excellent, Recommended to Anyone." Given the tight deadline of this contest (less than a month), I think that's pretty remarkable. Again, congrats to all these authors, and especially congrats to jclef for winning the competition.

Update2: Lorft had some comments about ways in which the organization and marketing of this contest could have been better. I agree with him. Hopefully Obsidian will take note.