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EverQuest Next Landmark Alpha |OT| Settle in, Trailblazin' is afoot.

Zalusithix

Member
Is there a trick to getting a better pick than green? I would like to eventually start making items, but would like a pick that can keep up. Right now burning all my resources on making picks, hah.

Really, don't sweat it. Just focus on pick advancement until you hit indigo. By then you should have tons of stone, dirt, sand, etc to do quite a bit of basic building. Pretty much any indigo pick should be more than enough to get you by on basic resource collection for the rarer stuff. You'll spend more time finding veins than collecting from them.
 

Iadien

Guarantee I'm going to screw up this post? Yeah.
I really dislike the randomness of the crafting right now. I crafted probably 30 picks with two of the +10 crafting bracers equipped and did not get a legendary until my first attempt at an indigo pick. The crafting isn't final, so hopefully it turns into something where we can guarantee specific rarities.
 

Zalusithix

Member
I really dislike the randomness of the crafting right now. I crafted probably 30 picks with two of the +10 crafting bracers equipped and did not get a legendary until my first attempt at an indigo pick. The crafting isn't final, so hopefully it turns into something where we can guarantee specific rarities.

How are you even equipping two accessories. Whenever I try to put on more than one, the other kicks off.
 

Zalusithix

Member
Just drag the item to each slot, don't right click the item in your inventory.

Ah, I figured it out. I did have two. I forgot my harvest ring existed. It's been glitched as hidden since like the second day I played, so it looked like nothing was there, when if fact there was. Still annoyed that the accessories that have the badge shape don't equip into the badge section. Would love to have the increased run/jump speed and such, but not enough to trade off the other more useful ones.
 

Osiris

I permanently banned my 6 year old daughter from using the PS4 for mistakenly sending grief reports as it's too hard to watch or talk to her
My home, pretty much finished except for furnishing with items/props :)

mZmckt8.jpg


I'm uploading a vid to youtube of a quick walk around it, pretty pleased with the result. :)
 

Zalusithix

Member
Well, I'm done for the night. Going to need to dwell over how I want to breakdown the hanger area into actual floors and connect them via stairs. The area is tall enough to make 3 floors easy, or two very tall floors. Without views to the outside, it's a challenge to make something visually interesting. Heck, I still need to figure out what I'm doing with the upper basement. (The basement I showed was the lower basement.)

That said, I punched out all the windows, capped off the turrets, smoothed out the inner column of the spiral staircase, created offshoot rooms at the rear of each turret, and vaulted the turret entry room ceiling. Still tons of detail work to be done, but at least the general concept is in place now.

vY1LjX9.jpg

s6q1vs7.jpg

YdWFXMN.jpg


Edit: Also, grats to Osiris. Lots of nice fine detail work!
 

Osiris

I permanently banned my 6 year old daughter from using the PS4 for mistakenly sending grief reports as it's too hard to watch or talk to her
Cheers ladien, good idea, I tweeted it to DG and added a quick look around on Youtube :)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jDeo0w7SJTg

Zalusithix: Nice fortress, Good to see an interesting and original take on the idea! :)
 

Vilam

Maxis Redwood
Thought I'd switch things up today and do a little detail work on the interior of my temple... just experimenting with colors right now. That rear wall is entirely sculpted though which I'm pretty happy about! Still so much more detail work to go though... it's amazing how much time this sucks up but I just want more.

 

nubbe

Member
Awesome stuff

Some pics you see or run across in the game are totally insane
Insane stuff will happen when you can merge plots

BgtczI3CcAAuikZ.png


Bgs2ARpCEAAmdSI.png


BgrAodMCMAAaD0O.jpg
 

Theecliff

Banned
Well, I'm done for the night. Going to need to dwell over how I want to breakdown the hanger area into actual floors and connect them via stairs. The area is tall enough to make 3 floors easy, or two very tall floors. Without views to the outside, it's a challenge to make something visually interesting. Heck, I still need to figure out what I'm doing with the upper basement. (The basement I showed was the lower basement.)

That said, I punched out all the windows, capped off the turrets, smoothed out the inner column of the spiral staircase, created offshoot rooms at the rear of each turret, and vaulted the turret entry room ceiling. Still tons of detail work to be done, but at least the general concept is in place now.

vY1LjX9.jpg

s6q1vs7.jpg

YdWFXMN.jpg


Edit: Also, grats to Osiris. Lots of nice fine detail work!
Wow, that looks so damned cool.

Man, I wish I had a PC that could actually play this.
 

Osiris

I permanently banned my 6 year old daughter from using the PS4 for mistakenly sending grief reports as it's too hard to watch or talk to her
I like this, seeing some interesting builds now that's for sure:

J6W1bAX.png
 

Zalusithix

Member
Awesome stuff

Some pics you see or run across in the game are totally insane
Insane stuff will happen when you can merge plots

BgtczI3CcAAuikZ.png


Bgs2ARpCEAAmdSI.png


BgrAodMCMAAaD0O.jpg

Yep, The statue type ones that people can make are downright amazing. They typically lack fine detail in favor of sheer scale though. It'd be interesting to see what somebody skilled in that sort of thing could do on a smaller scale by coaxing out the maximum from each small voxel.

And yeah, when people can add more to their claims things are going to get absolutely massive in scale. Likewise when we can start using permissions and have multiple people working on the same project... Everything so far has been the work of one person per claim (unless account sharing) and thus limited by the amount of time one person could dedicate to the project. Once teamwork gets in place, I fully expect the attention to detail to shoot through the roof.

I like this, seeing some interesting builds now that's for sure:

J6W1bAX.png

I actually contemplated putting a crashed boat into my mountain at one point lol.
 

Zalusithix

Member

I have a love/hate relationship with the line tool. It's probably the buggiest of the tools in my experience. The amount of times that tool has given me errors about calculation mismatches on lines that were solid green... (This is a different error from the general screw up that all tools have near the boundary of the claim.)

Speaking of bugs, I find it amusing when I delete something that was selected, and the game leaves an odd chunk of it. Select that chunk and delete it and another piece shows up in turn. Select that to delete it and the first chunk comes back. Only way out of the cycle is to use the delete tool without select and delete it piece by piece.

Also, the general wonkiness of the tools not highlighting the active selection to apply them. Sometimes it works great, and sometimes it just seemingly refuses to highlight for application.

I'm really looking forward to the tool updates.
 

Iadien

Guarantee I'm going to screw up this post? Yeah.
Not much info at all from the livestream. There will be a patch tomorrow, though. They're aiming for 2PM PST.
 

Iadien

Guarantee I'm going to screw up this post? Yeah.
Patch notes for 2/20. Only a small patch today.

• The camera no longer collides with loot generated from mining and harvesting. This should help significantly when mining in a tunnel and having the camera constantly moving around as you mined.
• Various optimizations and stability fixes. We will continue to plow through these on a daily basis to get these out to you as quickly as possible.
• Fixed an issue that could make it difficult to click through the area that the material tray would be in when it was opened even when it wasn’t actually opened.
• You can now drop items on to the tabs in the vault to move them around easily.
• Fixed a number of issues with undo/redo that caused unexpected behavior and results. These should now work much more reliably.
• The sphere Delete brush should now be centered on your cursor instead of your cursor being on the edge.
• Fixed an issue that would cause the camera to transition twice while placing a claim.
• Removed the camera shake when chopping down trees.
• Added new icons for a number of items in the game.
• Added splinter particles to tree explosions.
• Changed tooltips to be more informative and to be color coded to make them easier to read.
• Fixed a bug that could cause the first attempt to place a template to fail.
• Changed the default starting distance of the camera from the player so that you can actually see yourself instead of just your back/head.
• Fixed a problem with seeing other people’s light sources when they had them equipped.
• Fixed an issue that would cause a door to reset scale and/or rotation when animating.
• The crafting window will now close automatically when you move away from the crafting station.
• Updated the error messages when trying to build so that they are clearer and more useful to players.
• Fixed an issue where the props that have light sources didn’t always look “off” when they were clicked off.
• Burled Wood building materials have been touched up to be cleaner and crisper.
• Added a message about your inventory being full when attempting to craft something so that players actually know why a craft failed instead of failing silently!
• Added a new hotkey to bring up the game settings (F2).
 

Osiris

I permanently banned my 6 year old daughter from using the PS4 for mistakenly sending grief reports as it's too hard to watch or talk to her
Oh man that's a killer bug to introduce, that's got to be hotfixed really quickly.

On the positive side, I got a Prime Grappler last night, shame it'll only last as long as the Alpha, it's speed and reach are nuts! :D
 

Zalusithix

Member
Oh man that's a killer bug to introduce, that's got to be hotfixed really quickly.

On the positive side, I got a Prime Grappler last night, shame it'll only last as long as the Alpha, it's speed and reach are nuts! :D

It's a bit annoying, but you can still get by with select tool + delete. More annoying to me is the lighting change. They're pretty much useless now as they don't throw off hardly any light. My claim is depressingly dark now even with lots light fixtures.
 

Stuggernaut

Grandma's Chippy
This may be a stupid question...

Is pick progression basically, make a new pick, farm better mats, make the next pick, farm the next level stuff, etc. etc.

I keep hearing about people making tons of picks, which I assume is just farming for better stats?

Right?
 
I think I'm done with the game for now until more features (such as mobs, etc) are introduced once beta starts. It's a good core of a game, but there's only so much running around and mining that I can do.
 

Iadien

Guarantee I'm going to screw up this post? Yeah.
Same here. I won't be playing much at all until they introduce some new shit.
 

Zalusithix

Member
I think I'm done with the game for now until more features (such as mobs, etc) are introduced once beta starts. It's a good core of a game, but there's only so much running around and mining that I can do.

Give me more claim space and improved build tools and I could do this for another year as is... They're pretty much my only limitations right now as combined they kind of pinch what I can do vs what I imagine. There's a certain challenge to building within the constraints, but I'd kill to expand here and there and not be prisoner to odd tool limitations.

Edit: The next set of screenshots of my claim progress should probably be ready by the end of the weekend. After taking a couple of days off to think about stuff, I went back and rehauled 90% of my main floor. I now have it properly linked to B1, B2, and U1. U1 is currently a multi-tier design under heavy construction. That'll link to U2, which will in turn link to U3 (turret entry). Currently experimenting with non-right-angle architecture (but not curved either).
 

Zalusithix

Member
Well, all the floors are finally linked via staircases (no more grappling hook needed!), so the focus is now on floor partitioning for rooms and detail work. Kind of hard to work with lighting though as nothing really casts light currently.

Anyhow, here's a screenshot of the throne room in progress (floor U1):
lQ491OS.jpg
 

Stuggernaut

Grandma's Chippy
I goofed around for a week or so on this, then yesterday I finally decided it was time to actually do it right.

Build all of the design tools.

And just now finished my first Indigo Pick...

SBs0W4Y.jpg


Wow what a difference this thing makes lol.

Now I am going to make all the crafting stations I need.

Do we get to keep all the tools/picks we make through wipes?
 

Osiris

I permanently banned my 6 year old daughter from using the PS4 for mistakenly sending grief reports as it's too hard to watch or talk to her
Nope, the only thing we keep between the Alpha and Beta wipes are any templates we make and your character (no items or progression), everything else is going to be wiped.

FAQ said:
End of Alpha Wipe

  • Timing: Occurs at the end of Alpha testing, which begins on or before 2-28-14
  • Character: Your character will be retained, however all progression will be wiped.
  • Claims: Your claim(s) will be wiped. All claims will be templated so that you have blueprints of what you built.
  • Resources and Collected Objects: All resources and collected objects will be wiped.


End of Closed Beta Wipe
  • Timing: Occurs at the end of Closed Beta testing, which begins on or before 3-31-14
  • Character: Your character and all progression will be retained.
  • Claims: Your claim(s) will be wiped. All claims will be templated so that you have blueprints of what you built.
  • Resources and Collected Objects: All resources and collected objects will be retained.
 

Zalusithix

Member
I love the whole claim templating thing myself. My construction uses up 80% of the claim box and hundreds of thousands of materials - far more than you could ever hold at once, and a lot of it being rarer resources. There would be absolutely no way to build it again via a monolithic template. Not that I'd want to mind you - it would only work in exactly the same claim location with nary a single voxel to spare in any direction. I imagine most other people who have dumped a lot of time into the building process are in the same boat. It just strikes me as a bit pointless. If you're at the scale that the monolithic template build would be feasible, then you probably don't need it templated to begin with.

Templating is really only useful for smallish things that can be easily placed and/or reused IME. Like the quad arrow-head-esque motif in my last pic, or the more complex woodworking parts of Osiris' house, or the carved wall of Vilam's temple.
 

Osiris

I permanently banned my 6 year old daughter from using the PS4 for mistakenly sending grief reports as it's too hard to watch or talk to her
I love the whole claim templating thing myself. My construction uses up 80% of the claim box and hundreds of thousands of materials - far more than you could ever hold at once, and a lot of it being rarer resources. There would be absolutely no way to build it again via a monolithic template. Not that I'd want to mind you - it would only work in exactly the same claim location with nary a single voxel to spare in any direction. I imagine most other people who have dumped a lot of time into the building process are in the same boat. It just strikes me as a bit pointless. If you're at the scale that the monolithic template build would be feasible, then you probably don't need it templated to begin with.

Templating is really only useful for smallish things that can be easily placed and/or reused IME. Like the quad arrow-head-esque motif in my last pic, or the more complex woodworking parts of Osiris' house, or the carved wall of Vilam's temple.

The whole house templates quite easily, but doing a template back-up of a house sized object is definitely the limits of the template tool, I think mine requires about 120k dirt and 60-70k plain wood, so easily held in inventory, but I can see how some people are going to be templating claims/structures that are later unrecoverable due to simply being unable to hold the amount of materials needed in various inventories/vaults.

Whole structure templating also shows up another flaw in the engine, I can template a structure, delete it (thereby claiming back it's build materials) and use the template to put the structure back down, but not all material is recovered though at the delete stage, so between deleting and sticking it back down you actually need more material than you used to build it.

This is simply a bad math / bad overflow issue though, you can test it yourself by building a 300k dirt block on your claim, and delete it, you'll lose some random amount of material doing so.
 

Zalusithix

Member
The whole house templates quite easily, but doing a template back-up of a house sized object is definitely the limits of the template tool, I think mine requires about 120k dirt and 60-70k plain wood, so easily held in inventory, but I can see how some people are going to be templating claims/structures that are later unrecoverable due to simply being unable to hold the amount of materials needed in various inventories/vaults.

Whole structure templating also shows up another flaw in the engine, I can template a structure, delete it (thereby claiming back it's build materials) and use the template to put the structure back down, but not all material is recovered though at the delete stage, so between deleting and sticking it back down you actually need more material than you used to build it.

This is simply a bad math / bad overflow issue though, you can test it yourself by building a 300k dirt block on your claim, and delete it, you'll lose some random amount of material doing so.

Deletion is bugged in a lot of aspects. If you start doing a lot of basement work or anything that requires deleting existing world voxels, there's a chance for them to either not delete fully, or stranger yet, to come back from the dead when deleting player added voxels in the same area. (Typically only happens with larger selection sizes.)

Undo is also bugged, and probably shares some codebase with the deletion tool. Some things will flat out refuse to undo, even if that undoing should remove their existence from the world. This seems particularly repeatable with subvoxel modeling.

Deletion bugs aside, as far as template placement/replacement goes, hopefully that'll be less of an issue when they detach placement from mouse movement. Placing any large structure right now is a royal pain due to only having a single perspective point to work with. The chances of being off by a voxel or two in any given direction is quite high. If we could easily move our vantage point around the phantom copy before finalizing it, we wouldn't be subject to the undo/deletion bugs as often.
 

Osiris

I permanently banned my 6 year old daughter from using the PS4 for mistakenly sending grief reports as it's too hard to watch or talk to her
Yeah, I've taken to using "registration" marks on my templated items, just a couple of extra voxels, one each side of a corner, and use a mark painted in position where the template is going to be placed to line these extra voxels with.

The registration marks are the green blocks attached to the wall and part of the template, and the two painted marks are on the block I'm placing the template on:

7RXGjN0.png


Doing this I can get voxel-perfect placement every time.
 

Zalusithix

Member
Yeah, I've taken to using "registration" marks on my templated items, just a couple of extra voxels, one each side of a corner, and use a mark painted in position where the template is going to be placed to line these extra voxels with.

The registration marks are the green blocks attached to the wall and part of the template, and the two painted marks are on the block I'm placing the template on:

7RXGjN0.png


Doing this I can get voxel-perfect placement every time.

I've done similar things, but sometimes a template or the area it's being placed in just doesn't lend itself well to the technique. Either way, it's a hack to get around a basic tool limitation. For the life of me, I don't know how the devs got this far without one getting fed up and saying "this has to change!". Seems like a pretty simple fix too. Allow mouse placement of the object, but when you nudge it with the mouse wheel in a given direction, decouple the placement movement from the mouse movement. That way the mouse handles the course initial movement and the wheel can do the fine adjustments while you move around it.
 

Iadien

Guarantee I'm going to screw up this post? Yeah.
Update notes for today:

Here's what's going in with today's update!

• Added Chests in to the game! You can now craft 2 different chests (Ornate Small Chest and Simple Large Chest) at the Copper Reinforced Saw Table and the Cobalt Reinforced Saw Table. They can be placed on your claim and you can use them to store props, items and resources.
• Fixed the issue with embedded Intel chipsets that caused the world to only render with completely black textures. Laptop users can rejoice!
• Moving props around your claim should be easier and be more reliable. We will continue to improve this with upcoming updates.
• We added a tooltip to the recipe icon in the crafting window to show you what you would craft with that recipe.
• Fixed a number of client crashes and optimized a number of trouble spots as well.
• Dragging icons between windows should now be more reliable.
• The Force Hoop recipe was erroneously requiring 200 Elemental Rubicite. It now only requires 9!
• The teleporter window at the hub wouldn’t always pay attention to the first time you clicked on a world. Now it will.
• Templates and copy/paste will no longer grab procedurally- placed props from your claim.
• Fixed an error in the description on the Silversteel Pick.
• The mouse cursor will now update appropriately when over the light source props that can be turned on/off.
• Updated a few of the marble textures to look better/clearer.
• Fixed an issue where the location information wasn’t updating when you switched zones consistently.
• Now when you change zones it should clean up any oddities with animations from grappling to the spires.
• Updated most windows in preparation for localization. Please let us know if you see any weird or missing strings.
• Added a feedback message to the player when they submit a bug. Now you know when it successfully sends the bug!
• Several windows will now save their positions properly when closed using the Escape key.

And now for some of the stuff the team is hard at work on for next week’s update!

• A new smoothing tool that should allow for much more intuitive behavior and results!
• Claim permissions! When this is in, you’ll be able to work with friends to make even more amazing things!
• 12 new islands and 2 new biomes! This will include new materials to build with, new props and new areas of the world to explore.
• Attached claims! The ability to place another claim directly attached to an existing claim you own. This will allow for bigger builds or space to do more builds next to one another.
 

Trouble

Banned
Update notes for today:

I'm assuming attached claims means we still won't be able to get a whole new claim. My claim is the top of a mountain, so any attachments will be just hanging in the air above other claims. I'd much rather get a fresh claim on a new island. I might have to pull up stakes and take part in the landrush if I can.
 

Zalusithix

Member
Holy hell, all the marble based stuff is white like the general biome stuff now... that totally fucked with my color palette. Now my marble areas look way the hell out of place being such a stark white. I guess I'll be getting tens of thousands of marble back as I swap it out for something else...

Still day time so I'm not sure if they stealth fixed the lack of light casting on props.

Edit: Lighting still seems to be borked.
 
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