The Wilderness and darkness

[Brar]

I had a vision, what if:

When in the wilderness and without light, the rooms that are lit still shows up on the mini map, but only the rooms that are lit, so you don't know where you go and what is in between, but you see that light from afar and can try to reach it.

Just an idea out of tireness

Brar

[Raona]

I like this! I think it would be hard to code to work for non-permanent light (like a PC with light passing through) but it makes sense for a lit town or wagon, perhaps out to a short distance, at least.

[Patchems]

This is my issue with maps at night in the wilderness or anywhere dark: A map should never read darkness, it is a map, after all and should list areas in darkness as if it is daytime. Perhaps the maps can be coded in a manner that the map itself is viewed as if it is always daytime, furthermore if I am holding both map and light, when I look or exit, I should be able to see more than just the generic "darkness" again I do have a map. This would greatly improve travel at night and avoid unnecessary character death. Also the whole drakness thing bothers me, even at night, there is some light, visibility is limited perhaps but not dibilitating as the game would suggest. PCs should not be "blind" in every dark area without a light, except of course areas like dungeons or thick forests. In 3.5 it accounts for different types of visibility with rules and stats for low visibility.

[Nylo]

They're talking about the VT map showing surrounding terrain, rather than a physical map. And the 3.5 rules for vision are what we're using. The physical maps do have shortcomings, but they were put in more as an in character reference to the real maps on the website.

I like this suggestion as well, even if I don't go wandering in the dark a whole lot.

[Jeanne]

"Howard Johnson is right!"

(Mel Brooks for "I think it's a good suggestion also")

[Tamryn]

This is my issue with maps at night in the wilderness or anywhere dark: A map should never read darkness, it is a map, after all

The mini-map isn't really a map, though. It's just a representation of what you can see. And at night, you can't see as far as during the daytime.

[Patchems]

I understand what you guys are saying however, this is a suggestion that should really be considered, the game becomes 1000 times more attractive when travel at night isn't overly difficult. I'm really not asking for something that would break the game mechanics.

[Aldren]

I can see where you're coming from, Patchems, however if you take two precautions (A.) purchasing a light, which every adventurer should have, and B.)purchasing a map, which you've seemingly already done), you can effectively go off your map (which is just a link to the world map in your browser window) and follow any road, in almost the ENTIRE game, and the worst you'll need to worry about is a bandit or three (or accidentally wandering off the road). I personally enjoy the limited sight at night while traveling in the wilderness, but I know how much it can hinder lowbie characters.

I'm torn here either way. I like the suggestion, but I enjoy the code as it is now.

[Beskytter]

My issue with the blinding darkness is that there is moonlight. It should be enough to see by in the room you're in. So doing something like dropping a bit of charcoal or an arrow to make a small fire should be possible.

Personally only one of the three characters I play has a night issue. Besky and my Ranger both have continual light cast on something they always wear. This said, there was a time when my Ranger lent his amulet to a friend so that friend could do something while I went offline. When I came back, I was stranded in complete darkness until daytime. I should have been able to at least create a campfire, so I could do something useful like work on a paper, or write a journal, or do pushups.

I like the idea of seeing lights in the distance, and yeah I think it would be damn near impossible to work in PC lights, but static lighting as a beacon would be cool to see. If I'm out in the High Moors and my torch dies, then the lights I would see if I head in a generally west direction would be Daggerford at first, and as I get closer, I might also see the Deep. Makes night travel really cool to think about, given the distances we're supposed to be travelling in the world map vs. city maps.

[Rhangalas]

Yeah, it would be nice if there was a room flag for light percentage that works off of the weather for wilderness rooms.

Normal vision - 25% light source required to function. 100% light and you are treated as blinded. For darkness dwellers without daylight adaptation, anything beyond 10% blinds them when they switch to the normal spectrum.

Low-light - 10% light source required to function. No penalty beyond 10% as low-light functions with normal light. 100% light still blinds you.

Infravison - Room must be from 1% to 10% for it to function, otherwise you are treated as being blinded. 0% is magical darkness.

Percentages are in no way balanced, and are just examples.

It would be a huge project no doubt. But you could have blinding light/darkness spells that change the percentage. So the Drow could finally have their innate globe of darkness ability.

[Solaghar]

As far as I know, with the way the VT terminal map works, this would require a major change to work. What the game does is it looks at the exits and THEIR exits and THEIR exits and it uses them to populate a map. The size of the map is based on your ability to see in the dark. However, there is no specific code that notes that a room is 'lit', rather there is a piece of code that notes a room is dark, but that's not one that exists in the wilderness. Whether a room is lit or not during the night is up to there usually being some object with a light in the room. This would require a major recoding of the way that the map populates the rooms around it, forcing it to keep track of everything with or without a light currently in every room and to keep that updated, such that if someone moves from one room to another, you'd see a moving light on the map. Sounds cool but I imagine it would take a lot of work.

[Mask]

Implemented a version of this...

[Tortus]

I just noticed something. I didn't check whether this applies to all races. At least for the half-elf I am playing, when I wear a light the darkness works fine, with the ?'s showing up. Really cool effect btw! When I remove the light, however, the map is revealed as if it were daytime, yet the room echo still says it's completely dark.

I don't know whether this is a bug or not, but it seems worth looking into!

[Raona]

Oooh, I like this twist, Mask! Alas, as with many a new feature, there's some tweaking required out of the gate.

Tortus' observation is confirmed, and seems to apply for all PCs not possessing darkvision when not in the presence of a third-party light (i.e. not in the same room as another PC holding a light), when they have no light source equipped at all.

Expected: HUD map will show lesser range than nighttime with light, or none at all
Observed: Full HUD map coverage in detail out to normal daytime limit

[Mask]

Hopefully fixed, thanks for the good bug report!

[Grenwyn]

It still seems to be broken on the game port, though it may just be pending a copyover - I'm not sure.

[Harroghty]

One thing that I notice is that one's location appears to be marked now by a black square instead of a symbol. Was that intentional? The symbol (I believe it was @) is a little bit easier to find amid a landscape that includes other black squares.

[Kinni]

One thing that I notice is that one's location appears to be marked now by a black square instead of a symbol. Was that intentional? The symbol (I believe it was @) is a little bit easier to find amid a landscape that includes other black squares.

I've notice the @ symbol is still there (if you highlight the wilderness map with your cursor), it's just black in color so it blends in with the normal black client background.

[Blarc]

Oddly enough I still have the @ mark being white, don't know if that has something to do with the fact of me playing on phone and thus having just some totally random client tough.

[Melusine]

If the @ symbol could be turned back to what it was, that would be wonderful. It's a bit hard for my eyes to figure out where I am at a glance, compared to before. Pretty please?