Zugg Software :: View topic

Newbie Joined: 23 Dec 2003 Posts: 6 Location: USA

In Horizons, one of the big commodities is going to be to find where certain resources are currently. I've been sending these in as Point of Interst places, but it sure would be nice to have a new category!

Can you add these?

Beginner Joined: 19 Jul 2001 Posts: 15 Location: Germany

Yes, that is a good idea. Otherwise we will have tons of PoI markers on the map.
Also there are already several plots marked as PoI on the map. But in this case, i don't think we need yet another marker but the Building marker should be used instead.

Zugg, I wish you you and your family a merry christmas and a happy new year.

Peter

Newbie Joined: 23 Dec 2003 Posts: 8

Updated all my plots from PoI to building

Newbie Joined: 23 Dec 2003 Posts: 6 Location: USA

I changed my plots to buildings too, that was a good idea.

I'm still using PoI's for resources currently.

Big areas of blight, I'm using the Withered Aegis Settlement.

Small Areas I'm using Evil Village.

Newbie Joined: 23 Dec 2003 Posts: 8

I been mostly busy on player towns, I have no real way to add lantarns and destroyed bridges, I added them as POI since I already put plots, gazebos and the Ivy archways as buildings.

Posted: Wed Dec 24, 2003 8:04 pm

For resources I'll have to really give this some thought. My understanding is that resources can move around a lot and I hate to add stuff to the map that isn't going to be there. We might want to limit resources to the "rare" ones if they don't move as much. For stuff like Copper/Tin it's easier to just look near any Smelter machine.

Newbie Joined: 23 Dec 2003 Posts: 8

There are large places with resources far as i've seen. And from what I seen specially the rare stuff moves around a lot (as in you will see like 1 vein of gold and 1 of platinum but nothing else), so not much use mapping that.

If you are adding stuff could you add an icon for agressive monsters? They roam specific area's from what I noticed, and it would be nice to have like a RED npc icon mean agressive non player mobs or something like that.

Newbie Joined: 23 Dec 2003 Posts: 6 Location: USA

I think Tivalus has it right...the rare resources might tend to move around more.

Common resources though (like Copper and Tin near Dalimond, for example) are probably fairly fixed locations. Most resources seem to be assigned by general area, and then a certain number and random location within that area.

I'm guessing that rare resources are done like this as well, but probably with larger areas. There are places I know where I can generally always find Cotton, Gold, and citrine--though the amounts and exact locations of these items will change. Also, some rarer second tier ones seem to have fairly fixed locales---like blighted flax just SW of Dalimond at the gates of the Aegis outpost.

So again--I'll request a genearal resource marker. It is very useful to know where, for example, copper and tin is near Aughendell, and to be able to see quickly where that is in comparison to the location for a smelter. But, even if resource locations change over time, having them as a separate marker makes them easy to filter out of the view.

For now, I'm still going to be listing most of them that seem to be semi-permanent as POIs.

Newbie Joined: 23 Dec 2003 Posts: 6 Location: USA

Oh, and Zugg...thanks again, this is an AWESOME tool.

If you remember, I was the felow two years back who hacked your ACExplorer putting in the Istaria map and the cities, asking for a generic explorer tool for multiple games. I'm very excited to see you eventually got this done!

Newbie Joined: 24 Dec 2003 Posts: 6 Location: USA

Awsome work Tivalas entering in all that city data. For the player cities I entered, I tried to follow the standards set here:
plots = building
destroyed buildings = building
destroyed embellishments (gazeeboo, arch)= poi
resource = poi

I think we do need a resource type, and possible a destroyed building/constructable object type.

-Talya Thornwynd

Posted: Wed Dec 31, 2003 9:41 am

I'll add a resource icon, along with some sort of Mob icon. However, people should be very careful with adding stuff that moves. If you add a location that ends up moving, then your User Rating can drop in the future when your locations ends up being wrong unless you are really active in updating it. In Asheron's Call stuff like Random Portals got *really* out of hand. I'd rather that you keep track of locations that move privately and not publish them. But if it's a resource that is static, then go ahead. Just keep an eye on it to make sure it remains up to date.

I like the look of using "buildings" as plots, so keep doing that. I've been marking a destroyed "building" as a building, but a destroyed object, such as an arch, as just a POI. Horizons is really the first game that is going to have truely dynamic differences between servers (AC2 promised this but never delivered). The next version of zExplorer will have the Horizons server list so that you can start putting server-specific locations in (if anyone has yet gotten a player building constructed).

The tricky part that I'm not sure how to handle yet is how to remove the "generic" destroyed-building icon once a server-specific player-built icon is added. Suggestions on how to handle this are welcome.

I'll have a new version with the new icons soon (maybe before the end of the holidays if I get some time).

Newbie Joined: 23 Dec 2003 Posts: 6 Location: USA

Zugg, you rock! Thank you.

The building change icon is going to also be something we need to consider for blighted areas. As we've already talked about, they are apparantely already different between servers, and should continue that divergence.

I'll give some thought to this as to the best way to go about it.

Very glad I finally registered this. *grins*

Newbie Joined: 24 Dec 2003 Posts: 6 Location: USA

I ran past a few placed where I had entered plot data and many of them now have scaffolding on them. It seems the construction crews are in force on Dawn. So when do you think we should change a plot to a player building; when construction has started or when construction is complete?

Talya Thronwynd, Dawn

Newbie Joined: 23 Dec 2003 Posts: 8

I think once a plot it sold its ok to put a player building on the map..just dont forget to select the server and not (all) for player buildings.

I been busy correcting stuff, changing descriptions and icons, removing wrong info.

I do have a question, adding a "mob" marker to point to a place where certain mobs roam. Think we should keep doing that, and should we include the level range like "brown wolfs (lvl 12-18)"?

For example, Adding a place where you can find werewolfs far away out side of town is a good idea imo, however adding fire beetles 3m outside of town is a bit overkill imo.

what do you guys think

Newbie Joined: 24 Dec 2003 Posts: 6 Location: USA

I like the idea of switching out the the plot to a player building as soon as it is purchased. *sigh* Since many of the dawn plots I entered have been bought, I will spend some time next time I am on and start the editing process.

As for the mobs, I like your plan it provided the key info players will need, but we should be careful. While I think most of the close to town mobs will stay the same or similar, I suspect AE will be changing the many of the mob types and locations out in the wilds. And for all we know locations of Mobs may vary from server to server.

I do have a question/request: Is there a way for me to view only the points I have entered? This would make my editing much easier, since over the past two weeks so many points have been added that I am not sure exactly where all of mine are.

Newbie Joined: 04 Jan 2004 Posts: 1 Location: USA

COuple of things:

1) With resources: the marker should be placed according to the approximate "center" of the field. Being able to "draw" the field would be better, but more time/effort then most would want to do.

2) With machines: Please list buildings which have multiple like machines under one header: "Ore Refinery", "Quarry", "Jeweler's Hut", etc. Don't really need seperate markers for the anvils and smelters in the same structure outside cities.

2a) For machines in cities I"d suggest naming them such, i.e. Dalimond Table Saw for the table saw IN Dalimond.

2b) Need another classification for machines. Tinkerer Bench, Kiln, Oven, Pottery Wheel are a few which don't quite fit any classification given. Perhaps if a blue "X" on a white field in a box for plain Machine classification would allow for misc. machines.

3) Most MOBs have "fields" like resources do. Some good examples are wolves outside Mahara and spiders outside Kion. ONce again if we could try placing the MOB markers in/near the "center" of teh spawn points it would help.

4) Where the heck are Sheep, Blighted Iron/Silver, and can we add water under resources?

Newbie Joined: 05 Jan 2004 Posts: 2 Location: Australia

Greetings all,

I see someone has entered resources/machines on Spirit Island as
CITIES (yellow squares.)

Can someone fix this please?

Philo

Posted: Mon Jan 05, 2004 8:23 am

On resources, yes, we should be careful since we don't know what AE plans to change. But I agree that the higher level quest mobs would be useful. I know that *I* needed to know where to find a bronze golem at one point and had no idea where to look and took quite a while to find a place (finally did).

On (2) Please do NOT change the name. If you are going to combine machines into a single location, put something like "Anvil/Smelter". DO NOT just put "Ore Refinery". The reason for this is that we need consistency for using the Search function. If I want to find the closest Smelter to my location, I want to enter "Smelter" into the search field. So lets try to use the same names.

Naming the items with the city name is fine for the ones closest to the city, but gets more complicated when you get further into the wilderness. But adding the city name certainly doesn't hurt. To keep things simple I've just been using whatever name the idea displays when selected in the game.

(2b) There is already still a generic "machine" icon that looks like a square with an X in it. This should be used for misc machines. If anyone has ideas for other "must have" category icons, let me know and I might be able to draw something. It was getting harder and harder to come up with decent icons for some stuff (essence was hard). And I'd like to keep a small number of categories and not have a separate icon for *each* machine type.

(4) I'd put "Sheep" under the Tanning resource (same as Cows, Deer, anything you get a hide from). For Blighted Iron/Silver, I'd just use the Metal resource icon. There isn't any way to indicate blight and I have a feeling that will be changing. Also, blighted and non-blighted items tend to occur in the same area from what I have seen so far. So a separate icon just would add more clutter I think.

Finally, in response to Philo's last post, I'll check tomorrow to see if they are still there. Tivalus also now has the access permission needed to edit other people's items. And people who add stuff with the wrong icon like this need to be REALLY CAREFUL. As I said, once I start enforcing the Rating system, your rating will drop when you submit mistakes like this. PLEASE TRY TO BE CAREFUL. It takes a lot of work to correct mistakes and I don't want this map to get as useless as some other past games where the data wasn't moderated.

On the other hand, if you post lots of good and useful data like Tivulus has, you too can get your access level increased and have more editing power.

Newbie Joined: 05 Jan 2004 Posts: 2 Location: Australia

Greetings again,

Thanks Zugg,
I see you are a helpful and organised person,
as well as writing great software Smile

Keep up the good work...

Philo