View source for Arianne Project Meeting 2010/Development Discussions

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{{Arianne Project Meeting 2010 Navigation}}



There were a huge amount of development discussions, ideas and brainstorming at our meeting. It was really inspiring! Here is a list so far, split into categories but not particularly ordered. As you can see some ideas are small and easily implemented, some discussions related to existing feature requests and others are much huger ideas which we have always hoped for, but will take longer to integrate to the code.

Completed ideas have a version number next to them.

= Stendhal =
== Quests ==
* Should add Pied Piper quest to next release as it's currently self contained - ''0.82''
* NPCs could have icons to show quest status
* NPC who gives player hints on uncompleted quests appropriate for that level
* Pizza Delivery quest extended to reward player with number of consecutive deliveries
* Improve MeetHayunn quest with cleanup of help already in tutorial and make first creature a mouse inside house/uncowardly rat
* Dungeons need more quests to help direct players there
* We should remember to add Easter Bunny before Easter - ''0.82''

=== XP ===
* More XP for producing items (10 per item) to rebalance 
* More XP for lower level quests?

===Dice Gambling===
* Adjust Dice Gambling in Semos Tavern so top and bottom prize is again a rare valued item like golden legs used to be - ''0.82''
* Change some of the lower prizes like beer to be the exciting treat items like chocolate - ''0.82''
* Don't change the price or the lower items like chain legs etc as these do still seem to be balanced - ''0.82''
* Either: generalise main Dice Gambling class so that Name of NPC, prizes, cost, text is all configurable via subclasses
* Or: create actions and conditions for DiceGambling to use in each quest file

==Vow of Peace==
* this feature request should not be too hard to implement
**If player has not attacked another for 2 weeks, allow vow of peace to be taken
**When player wants to remove the vow, they have 1 hour or so cool down time
**Should the pease status be represented visually with icon, on Look or simply deduced when soemone tried to attack?

== Magic ==
* Spells can only be cast with a magic wand
* The magic wand is a quest reward and player bound
* Mana is used up when casting a spell
* When not in battle (or only when in specific places?), mana restores slowly
* Mana can also be restored faster with mana potions
* Spells must be learnt 
* Spells are added to a spell book 
* Spells are reuseable
* The spell book will be a narrow bar horizontally above the client chat line
* Spells are not items and so they cannot be moved around or dropped like items
* Each player's spells count how often they have been used
* The client shows a visual effect when a spell is cast
* The client plays a sound when a spell is cast
* Use a targetted spell by click on spell then click on target
* Spells are taught at magic towers 
* Magic towers already exist but replace them to use Laguz's very nice wizard tower image
* Magic is split into disciplines: Fire / Water, Earth / Air, Dark / Light
* Each tower specialises in one discipline
* Fire spells are ineffectual against fire creatures, for example 
* Weapons made magical with their damage type (fire, ice, dark, light) having different effect on creatures that are fire, ice, etc. - ''0.83''

=== Balancing with RP ===
* Require magic wand in hand for spells to work (which is a minimal attack and slowish 'weapon')
* Require magic robes worn instead of armor for spells to work (lower def)
* Do not allow switching magic wand to other weapon types or vice versa, while in battle
* The magician could be more vulnerable to attack for a short time after casting a spell (creatures have more luck in obtaining the hit)
* The better equipment you are wearing, the more mana you need for casting a spell
* Spells have a cooldown period before you can use the same spell again
* Spells won't be added which make existing items redundant (e.g. cannot heal self; this is what potions are for)

=== Spell types===
* Healing (others but not self)
* Attacking (fireball, water blast, etc)
* Teleport away (to a random choice from preset locations)
* Freeze creature for short time
* Cloak of invisibility for short time
* Boost skills for short time
* Weaken creature
* Summon friendly creature
* Raise dead creature
* Revive player (i.e. if you are near corpse you can bring them back so they don't have to walk from afterlife - require confirm from dead player)
* Return to private house 
* Make campfire

Extended suggestions and other discussions at [[Ideas for Stendhal/Magic]]

==Pets and Sheep==
* Sheep rewards not scaled to time to feed them - make hungry faster (harder on logic?) or increase money or?
* Pets and Sheep should use RPLink
* Pets and Sheep code repeat should be refactored out

== Graphics ==
* Herald NPC (plassy)
* Pied Piper NPC to look like a male version of catman?
* Still some corpses (plassy)
* Santa Claus NPC
* Map for Henry to give and player examine
* Sketch maps of dungeons for Zynn Iwuhos - ''0.83''

== Continuous world ==
* Zone change invisible to player
* Creatures must be able to cross zones
* Creatures must not be dragged to newbie zones
* Zones keeping creatures out need a natural barrier, or use protection
* Client refactored first?
* Marauroa requirements unclear

== Drawing ==
* Vector graphics would allow smooth walking and resizing of client
* Expense on CPU on client side unclear
* Hardware acceleration can't be relied on
* Outfits may be fairly easy to redraw
* Movement frames can be prerendered (at the expense of memory)
* Client refactored first?
* Partial support would be possible (i.e. not all drawings)
* Modular approach may help Marboard

== Achievements ==
* Achievements are something a player earns when a goal is reached
* They can be displayed on the website and in the game
* An achievement will have a title, description, condition to get it and a category
* Some examples:
:* Visited all zones in Semos/Ados/etc region
:* Visited all regions
:* Visited all zones in all regions (meta type based on achieving each region)
:* Reached level 50, 100, 200, 300 etc
:* Accumulated (at one time) 1M money, 2k Karma, etc
:* Done daily monster/item quest at least 50, 100, 250 times
:* Raid hero, Nice Player award
:* Got married
:* Got rare item in a drop
* More details on [[Stendhal Achievement Ideas]], [[Stendhal Achievements]] and [[Stendhal Achievement Development]]

== Bug fixes ==
* Open JDK chat bubbles - replace line + solid image with solid image + bigger solid image {{Tracker|2972839}}  - ''0.82''
* Jerky double click walk {{Tracker|1677733}} - ''0.83''
:* is same algorithm used client and server side?  
:* else add penalty in changing direction 
* Is map caching being used? {{Tracker|1885142}}, {{Tracker|2941848}}
* Does summon crash the text client? {{Tracker|2972847}}

== Controls ==
* Ctrl + click and Alt Gr + direction key are not documented or known by anyone except kymara and kiheru :D
* Check where Alt Gr is a bit buggy (diagonals, sometimes walk instead of action if target isn't a collision)
* Double click not necessary in all cases - ''0.83''
* Use single click for attack, move, open chest, pick, harvest, inspect but not Use (else players used to double click will use twice and drag+drop may accidentally Use) {{Tracker|1825062}} - ''0.83''
* Question on how double click mouse events are processed - a single mouse event?
** creates two MouseEvents for clicked: one with click count 1 and one with click count 2
* Tab complete of usernames - uses /who now but could at least also use buddies fixed in {{Tracker|2983381}} - ''0.83''

== Client code ==
* Java applet (browser play)
* Facebook application using java applet
* RPEvent GUI and entity is coupled, decouple with a class and factory for RPEvent
* Split j2DClient into smaller classes

== Support answer ==
* Ability to randomise the standard strings inside each shortcut (see e.g. Experienced Warrior NPC)
* Add strings to either side of shortcut
* Have a target for shortcut

== Misc ==
* 'Dance dance revolution' requiring player collaboration
* More things should drop wooden spear (new creature: orc spearman?) - ''0.83''
* NPCs addHistory method (already a request)
* More items with both attack and defence (check if website display is supporting this)
* Missiles and ranged weapons should have a rate effect also

==Documentation==
* Advertise that we have over 200 NPCs and over 500 maps
* Say something about standard Linux distributions and why we can't use for Stendhal
* Open Tasks on wiki ''(see [[StendhalOpenTasks]] which has now been updated)'' 

= Marauroa = 
Marauroa had two talks dedicated to it including one on the future of Marauroa, which you can see slides from, but also the following topics were discussed:
* Zone prefetching - awareness of entities in neighbouring zones
* Client loads map data after character but game screen can't display until map data given - delay character loading or switch order?
* See also Continuous world topic in Stendhal

= Marboard = 
* GUI for create account {{Tracker|2842919}} and login {{Tracker|2842918}}
* Extension of vector graphics capability - see Stendhal discussion

= JMaPacman =
* Would be nice to have a game server running but requires:
:* GUI for create account {{Tracker|2893979}}
:* Fixing the bad lag - likely some hole rather than design

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