Arcanum:WIP 6.0 now available

Can I at least use my existing savegame with the new install, or will the bug persist?

 

I can't recall anyone using a save make after a glitch was discovered, and I have advised against even trying it. However - A save from prior to finding the glitch would give you your best chance, but I can't make any promises.

 

Here's a little something to tide everyone over until the 7.0 release.

Having just added a ton of new backgrounds, including those from the Homebrew Backgrounds thread, I imagine a few people would like to see how well their creation fares in the Arcanum enviroment.

So - Either rename or delete your existing Arcanum5.dat.
Download this http://rapidshare.com/files/266892420/Arcanum5.dat directly into its place (Sierra\Arcanum).
Double-click the Drog'sCleanCache.bat.
And start a new game and enjoy!

If anyone's interested, here's a text list of all the backgrounds that are available in my hack.
http://rapidshare.com/files/266888865/Background_list.txt

 

Well, it is possible that I overlooked something (Like using CleanCache), but when I clicked the next background after 'Ancient Blood' the screen goes black and it will give an error.

 

Using the CleanCache forces the game to take a fresh inventory of what's supposed to be there. In this case, more listings in backgrounds and effects.mes.

Edit: Thanks Bob!

 

I found something odd with the two-faced background. I selected a gnome to start with and chose the two-faced background, but when it went to the character screen to choose the stats I found it didn't receive the persuasion bonus and only acquired a alignment penalty of -1.

I replaced the Arcanum 5.dat file and double clicked the drog's clean cache file, did I forget to do something?

 

You didn't forget anything, I'm the one who screwed up - on the persuasion. As you can see, I wrote pe (perception) instead of persuasion.
{442}{pe +4, haggle +2, ch +2, alignment -10, badreactionadj +10, goodreactionadj -10} //Two-Faced - Maloch

Don't know why you're not getting the alignment penalty though. There's nothing in the generic gnome background that would offset the penalty. Odd.

I'll get the listing fixed. And thanks.

Maybe I should have spent a few weeks testing these.....

 

Glad I could help. If I find anything else I'll be sure to post about it.

 

Alignment goes from -1000 to 1000. Thus the penalty should be -100.

 

Ah-ha! Thank you.

 

This is like an expansion pack, finally after all this time!

A few things have been bugging me though.

- Extended path-routing in the town overview seems to be broken. One route usually works but anymore, and my character just stands their. (I have 5 followers)

- Using charged rings on my character allows me to increase my melee without any permanant stat increase.

- Undiscovered Cave, the one with all the Fire Elementals. The prize is way too great at the end of the cave. It unbalances the rest of the game.

- Hunters Lounge, has 2 gun racks with incredible loot. Maybe having incredible monsters would help protect it better? Or remove some of the best guns from the rack, as this location is easily found near the beginning of the game.

I don't know how feasible this request is, but having a hard to use schematic that allows altered ammo to be created wouold be awsome.
(I was thinking of what happens to a bullet when you use a knife to carve an X into the end of it. It makes an explosion on contact.

 

'Undiscovered Cave' is in the original also I believe.

Been noticing some problems with the newer backgrounds, though. Mostly they're just grammatical which just makes them a little harder to read, but some of the others, such as Arrogant Prodigal Bastard don't seem to be applying their respective bonus' - i.e Arrogant Prodigial Bastard doesn't apply the 2X INT modifier. Also unsure as to why some of these are explicit to certain genders like the Tinkerer for example.

I can get you a complete list of the bugged ones that I've found if you want, might take a while though.

 

techyguy: I'm awake enough to answer a couple of these.

Extended path routing - I kept encountering this in the stock game; sometimes playing solo; and figured it was just an annoying bug with the engine. That and the fact I have no idea how to fix it meant I just ignored the problem in my hack.

Undiscovered (Uncharted) Cave: Yeah - the Fireking set is messed up at the moment (my first attempt at a bonus set) but is fourth up on the fix-it list.
One of the Russians created an armor and weapon set that shows me step-by-step how to properly write the scripting.

Hunters' Lodge - I'll take a fresh look at it. Since the Tarant gunsmith is available even earlier, I didn't think anything about adding high-powered weapons except as loot.

Modified bullet schematic - I'll pass. You'd need a new proto to make it work. One small success and a couple dozen complete failures at modifying protos has told me to stay away from them.

Charonte: I'd appreciate any and all feedback you want to give on the backgrounds especially.

For the INT problem on Arrogant Prodigal Bastard I suspect this is the problem - {in *2, in -8, ch -2, cn /2, cn +4, maxcn +10, maxin +10}
I copied this as-is from the original posting even though the INT listings puzzled me. (The CN listings has me wondering as well.)
Assuming I get no call-outs over the next couple days, I should be able to start game-testing this one tomorrow afternoon.
It takes a while to see if some of the modifiers really work.

Gender and Race assignment: That's the way the creators wanted them.

Also, although the Uncharted Cave is in the stock game, it was just a small hole. I expanded the piss out it.

 

In regards to the Arrogant Prodigal Bastard, I've made similar bonuses before myself, and find percentage increases and decreases work better. When used like this, I find it works flawlessly for me:
{in -8, in +100%, ch -2, cn -50%, cn +4, maxcn +10, maxin +10}

For the record though, I don't think maxcn or in is possible by background alone, or are valid entries at all. You'd probably have to increase the cap of each stat in hex for that, which of course means natural stat-investment could also yield an attribute of 30, regardless of background.

Anyway, for reference, here's a list of background modifiers in raw, unorganised form (pulled from a hex editor, in the .exe file).
Not all are usable in these forms, but I've not tried messing with most yet. You can more or less tell which won't work though -- the straight tech and magick entries for example.

• Begins at 0x1B4DC8:
  maxfatigue..maxhps..therapeutics....smithy..mechanical..gun_smithy..explosives..electric....chemistry...anatomical..temporal....summoning...phanta
  sm....necro_good..necro_evil..nature..morph...meta....mental..force...water...fire....earth...air.divination..conveyance..armtrap.picklock....firearms..
  ..repair..persuasion..heal....haggle..gambling....spottrap....prowling....pickpocket..backstab....throwing....melee...dodge...bow.wp..be..cn..dx..st
  
  Begins at 0x1B9CDC:
  Gender..Injury..Class...Race....xpgain..goodreactionadj.badreactionadj..critfaileffect..critfailchance..crithiteffect...crithitchance...reaction....expertiset
  herapeutics...expertisesmithy.expertisemechanical.expertisegun_smithy.expertiseexplosives.expertiseelectric...expertisechemistry..expertiseanato
  mical.resistmagic.resistpoison....resistelectrical....resistfire..resistdamage....race....gender..age.poisonlevel.techpts.magicpts....unspentUNUSED...fat
  eUNUSED..xpsUNUSED...level...aptitude....maxfollowers....beautyreaction..poisonrate..healrate....speed...ac..damage..carry
  
  Some other references can be found at 0x1B53F8. If I missed anything out, blame memory vs. the passage of time.

 

Cool - You've given me a much better idea of what to do and how to do it. Thanks!

Based on what I've seen in your list and the effects listings, they probably aren't. Hex editing the stats are out, so I may just end up having to remove the final constitution and intelligence listings and references.

The listing from the exe is exactly what I've been needing. Thanks again.
I can cross-reference it against what was used in the effects.mes for my guide.

 

My technical knowledge is limited, but I'm glad to have been of use. Keep up the great work.

 

Minuos, it's not a good idea to post raw ASCII data, there may be other things mixed in there. In your case, not all those modifiers are used as effects, some are reserved for auto-leveling schemes.

Here's the correct listing of all effects (with pointers) in the order the engine reads them:
844F5B00 st
804F5B00 dx
7C4F5B00 cn
784F5B00 be
80085A00 in
A4085A00 pe
744F5B00 wp
A8085A00 ch
189F5B00 carry
109F5B00 damage
0C9F5B00 ac
049F5B00 speed
F89E5B00 healrate
EC9E5B00 poisonrate
DC9E5B00 beautyreaction
CC9E5B00 maxfollowers
C09E5B00 aptitude
B89E5B00 level
AC9E5B00 xpsUNUSED
64045A00 alignment
A09E5B00 fateUNUSED
909E5B00 unspentUNUSED
849E5B00 magicpts
7C9E5B00 techpts
709E5B00 poisonlevel
6C9E5B00 age
649E5B00 gender
5C9E5B00 race
704F5B00 bow
684F5B00 dodge
604F5B00 melee
544F5B00 throwing
484F5B00 backstab
3C4F5B00 pickpocket
304F5B00 prowling
244F5B00 spottrap
184F5B00 gambling
104F5B00 haggle
084F5B00 heal
FC4E5B00 persuasion
F44E5B00 repair
E84E5B00 firearms
DC4E5B00 picklock
D44E5B00 armtrap
4C9E5B00 resistdamage
409E5B00 resistfire
2C9E5B00 resistelectrical
1C9E5B00 resistpoison
109E5B00 resistmagic
FC9D5B00 expertiseanatomical
E89D5B00 expertisechemistry
D49D5B00 expertiseelectric
C09D5B00 expertiseexplosives
AC9D5B00 expertisegun_smithy
989D5B00 expertisemechanical
889D5B00 expertisesmithy
709D5B00 expertisetherapeutics
D44D5B00 maxhps
C84D5B00 maxfatigue
649D5B00 reaction
549D5B00 crithitchance
449D5B00 crithiteffect
349D5B00 critfailchance
249D5B00 critfaileffect
149D5B00 badreactionadj
049D5B00 goodreactionadj
FC9C5B00 xpgain

Also, while there's no maxcn or maxin, there are min and max adjustments. E.g. 'cn max 10'. You can't exceed the stat cap this way, however, only lower it.

 

You outdid me tenfold, but it seems my post prompted your listing so whilst not a good idea, I indirectly served some purpose. At least that's what I'll tell myself so I can sleep at night. One question, though.

Would setting the cap in this way be placed at the stat's location (within your list of read priority), counting as one of the five stat changes per effect?

For example: {st -2, st max 10, critfaileffect +25%}

 

Thanks, it seems that I forgot to use the cleancache, but now everything works.