Maestro's Augmentation mod for MM7 - continues! v0.2a is here

[the beavers1]

Just finished the game on the dark path (I DO NOT RECOMMEND) Ive always felt that the game was skewed toward the light path, and canonically the light path was chosen. But as for the mod, I loved the visuals, the monsters and people all look great, the trees a pretty and overall the world looks more vibrant. The change in loot I have with mixed feelings, I love the penny pinching mentality needed at the beginning and mid game, but i felt that the end game loot was actually worse than the mid game loot, one of the most profitable dungeons for me was actually the barrows in barrows down, I got a ton of money and loot there, but when I went to the end game areas the loot was negligable, with barely any decent enchanted gear at all. Not sure what happened there but it felt like middle level areas got a buff but the end game areas got a huge nerf or stayed the same. I was really irked to realize that my Warlock couldnt GM elemental, but could GM the body/mind/spririt. I figured dark path (as the one of destruction) should get GM elemental instead. The only other issue I had was that EVERYBODY targeted my Cleric almost exclusively making it an absolute chore keeping her alive, especially once i got to the Lincoln, at that point i just left her with regeneration and didnt bother any more. Overall though Id say I enjoyed the mod, and look forward to future editions.

[vladimir-maestro]

Just finished the game on the dark path (I DO NOT RECOMMEND) Ive always felt that the game was skewed toward the light path, and canonically the light path was chosen. But as for the mod, I loved the visuals, the monsters and people all look great, the trees a pretty and overall the world looks more vibrant. The change in loot I have with mixed feelings, I love the penny pinching mentality needed at the beginning and mid game, but i felt that the end game loot was actually worse than the mid game loot, one of the most profitable dungeons for me was actually the barrows in barrows down, I got a ton of money and loot there, but when I went to the end game areas the loot was negligable, with barely any decent enchanted gear at all. Not sure what happened there but it felt like middle level areas got a buff but the end game areas got a huge nerf or stayed the same. I was really irked to realize that my Warlock couldnt GM elemental, but could GM the body/mind/spririt. I figured dark path (as the one of destruction) should get GM elemental instead. The only other issue I had was that EVERYBODY targeted my Cleric almost exclusively making it an absolute chore keeping her alive, especially once i got to the Lincoln, at that point i just left her with regeneration and didnt bother any more. Overall though Id say I enjoyed the mod, and look forward to future editions.

thanks for your feedback! appreciate it! thanks for the dark druid report. actually it should be opposite. dark - gm elements, light - ego.
btw about loot: it stayed the same but without gold.=)

[vladimir-maestro]

Not sure if bug or intentional but all the dragons in the mega dragon cave gave 0 loot and the place and chest loot of both the dragon caves was low level stuff. was a bit dissappointed as ive had trouble getting any good loot pretty much all game, lots of money, but the only relic ive found was in clankers and the rare and powerful rings and weapons have been very scarce ( could just be my luck) even the griffin bow ive only found 2 and im still using the assassin daggers as i havent found any better daggers (again could just be my luck) but i know they you did some modifications to the loot and was curious to if this is intentional or not.

thanks. you are the first to report this! we'll look into it. as i mentioned above - i didn't low the loot quatily...i want to belive that...should recheak. plus chest loot is tired to local map and i cannot edit maps due to comp problems so i guess you just got bad luck in your quest.

[vladimir-maestro]

I have played through emerald island, and must say you've done amazing job!!! Game feels much more "living" now, and new monster sprites are also very welcome. I looked at the screenshots and I probably won't like behemoths but that hasn't happened yet and all sprites so far were really nice.

Class changes are superb and have actually caused me to create much different party than I usually make (knight/ranger/pala/druid). Especially like that ranger gets now m/gm disarm . If I can suggest something, mind making M armsmaster available to both ranger paths? That would help in comparison to paladin, because the latter gets gm shield/mace/plate (50% phys reduction), M/GM self spells, M armsmaster on one path and even master light/dark! Unless I'm not seeing something, ranger is very weak compared to pala, and he is using the axe, slowest weapon; perhaps that armsmaster and GM chain could compensate? Also Tomsod in his elemental mod made expert axe double effect (each point reduces recovery by two). That is also something to consider. Master elemental or self, depending on path, would also make him more enticing power-wise.

Also, I don't know if it's a good thing that dark paths are generally restricted to GM self spells only and light to GM elemental respectively. That forces you to take cleric/sorcerer if you want corresponding spells on other path. Perhaps mixing it up would be beneficial?

My only problem is that there are no content changes I have played through vanilla countless times and want something new desperately. Are you planning to include some of them in future updates? I can contribute some small/simple dungeons if needed (I know a bit of modeling, but not too much).

interesting ideas about axe skill. and yes - it's not quite good weapon now and we planning to do something about it. like full armor ignore at GM = always hits! about magic not sure cause i was wondering between archer and warrior balance = higher shooting skills or combat powers.

[the beavers1]

interesting ideas about axe skill. and yes - it's not quite good weapon now and we planning to do something about it. like full armor ignore at GM = always hits! about magic not sure cause i was wondering between archer and warrior balance = higher shooting skills or combat powers.

I feel like changing the axe skill to ignore armor would actually be a decent idea, by the time you get gm axe, melee becomes mostly hitting anyways and you are only one step away from just getting blasters, making obsolete all other weapons anyways. Also, glad to know Master elemental for dark side druids was NOT the intention. That just felt wrong, also rangers lost the ability to get GM Identify Monster, Which I was very disappointed with since I really wanted to experiment using in game knowledge of resistances instead of looking them up, found out too late it was locked to light path.

[Eksekk]

I feel like changing the axe skill to ignore armor would actually be a decent idea, by the time you get gm axe, melee becomes mostly hitting anyways and you are only one step away from just getting blasters, making obsolete all other weapons anyways.

That is precisely the reason why I almost never use blaster - it's just one skill which basically wastes entire game of item and skill progression. The fact that it makes game too easy is secondary, but also important

Also, glad to know Master elemental for dark side druids was NOT the intention. That just felt wrong

This situation is similar to one I can never get good answer for: in Merge, should priest have dark or light magic (similar problem is for sorcs)? I usually lean towards giving him dark, because without it he is literally only for healing and some moderate melee contribution, and with dark he is both good at defense and offense. However, I can see the appeal of matching magic to class styles - that is, priest gets light and body for excellent support, and sorc gets dark and elemental for full damage arsenal. That is actually what I choose most of the time, idk why really, but nonetheless would like to see some variety.

[vladimir-maestro]

Hooraaay!!!!
Grayface FIXED mine editor!!!! Now i can make changes =)



(p.s. if you are interested in what it was: somehow Alt+F1 didn't work for me. so Grayface added Shift+F1 to open an Editor for me)

[vladimir-maestro]

Here are the heroes ready to save the world in the Augmentation MOD (future update). 64 heroes + 8 undead variations.

Racial diversity supported by Methflix! Methflix - we have been delivering agenda-correct content directly into your brain since 1986! =) joke =)

Humans are just humans, boring, not interesting, ordinary, like everywhere else.

Half-bloods are a race to replace goblins, because the author (me!) believes that MM7 goblins are somehow very different from the standard goblin from Heroes 3. Therefore, he came up with the idea that they would be half-bloods born from the union of the barbarians of Kryulod and other races that they raided. Therefore, there are half-orcs and half-goblins here, some had ogres and trolls as ancestors, but also barbarian leaders. Yes, yes - Conan the Barbarian =)

Elves are standard Antagarich elves.

Dark Elves - dark relatives of elves originally from Jadam (mm8)

Dwarves are widespread on all continents of Enroth.

Red dwarves are the more hot-tempered and belligerent relatives of dwarves. At the moment, their largest population is concentrated on Jadame, but also presents on Antagarich

Zombies and Liches - just added analogues for dwarven race.

[Kaltenberg]

This is amazing! How many working hours are involved?

[vladimir-maestro]

This is amazing! How many working hours are involved?

alot. about 3 months of irregular work for all chars.

[DaveHer]

Where does one get the new extension? I went to the website and it still has the old one. 2.2

[Tomsod]

Hooraaay!!!!
Grayface FIXED mine editor!!!! Now i can make changes =)

(p.s. if you are interested in what it was: somehow Alt+F1 didn't work for me. so Grayface added Shift+F1 to open an Editor for me)

Ha ha, I feel ya. Just the other day I had to switch it to Alt+F3 myself, as I spilled some tea on my keyboard.

Where does one get the new extension? I went to the website and it still has the old one. 2.2

It's not quite released yet, but the up-to-date WIP version can always be downloaded from GitHub -- click the green button "<> Code", then "Download ZIP".

[vladimir-maestro]

adding horses:

[DaveHer]

Adding Horses is a very nice touch.
David

[Kaltenberg]

Very atmospheric!
I guess the horses are added as sprites. Do you happen to have any help for editing/adding new sprites in the game? A few sentences of help for example.

[vladimir-maestro]

Very atmospheric!
I guess the horses are added as sprites. Do you happen to have any help for editing/adding new sprites in the game? A few sentences of help for example.

yes. horses are added as a decor.
and what do you mean with editing sprites help?

[Kaltenberg]

yes. horses are added as a decor.
and what do you mean with editing sprites help?

i mean, if i wanted to put in the game as a 'sprite' a... i don't know what, say a 2 L bottle of beer, how would i go about it? Do I draw it myself, or find a picture of it somewhere? (I certainly couldn't draw a horse, nobody would want to see the result in the stables.) And where would I get a colour palette (which I think needed, and put in BITMAPs.) So things like that.

[Tomsod]

Nobody stops you from using an existing picture, except possibly the copyright law, but modding is already in violation of it, so whatever. You need to convert it to a 8-bit BMP with the palette you want -- while you CAN add a new one, if you don't need precise colors, just pick a palette already in bitmaps.lod (I generally use #9). Then add it to sprites.lod (or preferably create your_archive.sprites.lod), create a single-sprite group in Data/Tables/SFT.txt (this whole directory is created by MMExtension, otherwise you'd have to edit binary files), and create a decoration sprite from this group in Data/Tables/DecList.txt. Then it can be added through the editor.

[vladimir-maestro]

yes. horses are added as a decor.
and what do you mean with editing sprites help?

i mean, if i wanted to put in the game as a 'sprite' a... i don't know what, say a 2 L bottle of beer, how would i go about it? Do I draw it myself, or find a picture of it somewhere? (I certainly couldn't draw a horse, nobody would want to see the result in the stables.) And where would I get a colour palette (which I think needed, and put in BITMAPs.) So things like that.

well. i've already done a tutorial for that:
https://www.celestialheavens.com/forum/10/17526
works for mobs. if you wish to add decor you just need to do some extra movements like:

deselect a cheakmark in monadder and leave only SFT add.
also add extra row with your new sprite in Data/Tables/DecList.txt that should work.

[Kaltenberg]

Okay, thanks, I've got it now. I needed some more snowy wood and stones.

well. i've already done a tutorial for that:
https://www.celestialheavens.com/forum/10/17526
works for mobs.

Oh, by the way, I just remembered that I've read this before. Just haven't looked into it much, I'm not there yet.
But I was wondering, what is step 0? I mean, what prog you use to create/draw the monsters? It seems like it's not in there, but maybe I just skipped over it.