suggestions for live release.

[Xaos]

I propose that we eliminate ALL magical items from stores except for healing potions. this includes magic bags/bags of holding, ioun stones, wands, staves, rods, runes, enchanted gems, summoning items, Misc Magic items, magical traps (non-magical OK), and all equip-ables.

All magic items should come from loot and quests.

Don't get me wrong, I love my magic items. But IMO I would appreciate them more if I had to earn them rather than just buying them. It would make things like the sorting tables, Blacksmith (imbueing), and auction house more useful...

What do you guys think?

[Gromph]

I don't think having NO magical items in town would seem unrealistic as far as the world of Faerun is concerned. Many people in this world make a good living by making magical items to sell, they go through years of learning the techniques to create them. I think lowering the chances of them being sold should be lowered.

It would make sense that some mage shops could carry a wand or two. Or in some cases prestigious magic shops like a very popular one in Murann could maybe sell a Rod or in some extreme cases a staff. As for runes, gems and other Misc. Magic Items should almost always be found in treasures.

Magical weapons might only be found in Masterwork or lower form at the blacksmith in Mosstone, while Steeleye's shop might only have a couple +1 magic items.

Places like Mosstone should have more Ranger/Druid oriented magic items.

Magic in the world of Faerun is not rare, it just cost time and money. But like I said up above, nothing over a +1 enhancement bonus would probably be found in Mosstone just on display. The chances of a magic shop in the Amn Army base having a Staff of Power would just be very improbable. On the other hand, in the most renown Magic shop in all of Murann ( and along the western coast until you hit Baldur's Gate ), you might be able to find that they have a Staff of Healing for sale at an inflated price.

Just my 2 cents.

[Gromph]

Gah missed the double negative up above in the first sentence. Alow me to clarify on this "I feel having ZERO magic items in stores seems unrealistic". There, sorry about that, I was never much for grammar.

[Xaos]

I agree with your reasoning. a few +1 weapons/armors would be ok as special display items (like rare comics in a comic book store ), but there are way too many as it is in the PW right now.

[Gromph]

Aye, I agree because *Give super awesome reasoning behind all of it*.

[Dolomel]

Agree

[Ima Dufus]

Your timing sucks.

I have just spent MANY hours over the last two weeks (like about 50) redoing the stores. So I can't say I'm too keen on the idea of doing it again

What I have done is gone through and made sure ALL of the items in the game are sorted into appropriate stores (mostly in resupply stores), and that the best of the items are only in special "reward" stores. The shops in towns will only have access to the resupply stores, not the reward ones, which can only be gained by adventuring (ie. there is a chance to use them for random treasure).

This means you will still get a large number of random items in the town stores with a spread of levels (with the lower level ones much more common of course). But if you want the top-of-the line items you need to find them adventuring. I've tried to make sure this includes all of the "must have" items, the ones that anyone would use in preference to all others of the same type. But if I have missed any they can be moved across later.

I was also intending to go through and add a bunch more stores around the place sometime soon (probably for the next update), but to probably lower the number of items in each store a bit (so more stores with less items in each).

I also think you need to take into account that if we ever get more players this will sort iyself out to some degree. At the moment all the best items that appear in town are being shared between a handful of characters, so we can all get pretty much whatever we want. If we had 30 times the number of characters running around we would get 30 times less each... or to put it another way, all the good stuff will get snapped up quick.

One thing that might help with this also is that at the moment the stores are completely restocked whenever the server restarts. This happens often enough that there is nearly always good stuff in the stores. However, if the contents of the stores are made to persist, then this will not be the case, and the stores will end up mostly full of the stuff no one really wants. I haven't done this yet because it is a little tricky, and might create some lag (but hopefully not).

[BenAthar]

I have a decent suggestion. Why don't we all get as many people as we can (mostly members and prospective members as well) and see if we can crash the server. Not to sound mean, but it would test out the server to see how well it would handle with that kind of load and bandwidth test. If we do have a winner on our hands wouldn't it be worth it to see how many people it can handle??? I do notice that it says either 0/40 on server, I am thinking that the max is set at 40. Am I right in thinking this (looking at the IT guys in the corner coding, yet again the simple answer!!) or can it be set to a higher number or just what the server can handle??? I kind of want an answer on the last part of this thread so I can get an idea what to expect when advertising. Thanks.

[Ima Dufus]

I do notice that it says either 0/40 on server, I am thinking that the max is set at 40. Am I right in thinking this (looking at the IT guys in the corner coding, yet again the simple answer!!) or can it be set to a higher number or just what the server can handle??? I kind of want an answer on the last part of this thread so I can get an idea what to expect when advertising. Thanks.

NWN servers can have a maximum of 64 players. However, in practice (from what I have read), most servers start bogging down around the 30-40 mark. For that reason alone we have currently set the max to 40.

There are technical reasons why we cannot currently raise this above 50 (but I just need to create a few more base conversations to do that, so only a bit of work). At anyrate, since we don't have anywhere near that number of players at the moment, it is academic. If and when we start approaching the 40 player limit we can look into raising it (providing it is all running smoothly).

[Gromph]

Whats wrong with being an Information Technology major...we have lives too. We spend them playing NWN and going out on cyber dates. Don't be so quick to judge usnext time

[BenAthar]

Uhhh.... not to sound sarcastic, but all information Tech people are and how it was explained to me from an ITT grad. was that IT guys know how to fix the computer and can read a white sheet and a computer book, knowing what it all means. But in theory it is all just information in it's purest form and how to manage it and move it around on a computer. Whether it be technical info, garbled info, or even personal info. you get the idea.


BTW Ima thanks for the answer to my question. I have been wondering about that for a while now.

[Gromph]

The way I was explained was that Computer Science people write the code, Computer engineers make the code run, and Information Technology people keep it running. Its a ladder, IT doesn't do all of it, we just maintain it. And as for programming in the corner, I have you know my computer desk is in the middle of the wall, my laptop is in the corner. If anyone is to be made fun of for being a code monkey, its Computer Science majors. We can also handle networks, data communications and databases, but only a little of our experience is in real programming. Most of the programming we do is learning how to make programs more user friendly and easier to use for other programmers ( ie. Sub classes, super, interfaces, blah blah blah ). Just my two cents in being an IT major, former CS major and having friends that are CS majors.

PS: There are two kinds of people in this world. Those with friends, and those who can read binary. And then there is Ima, he is a special case

[Ima Dufus]

And then there is Ima, he is a special case

Not really. Most of my friends can read binary too

[Gromph]

I felt bored so I came up with a reason for Ima to redo what all the stores sell (Another 50 hours of work)

But anyway, back up above with what stores sell should sell to people, I was thinking that it would make sense that maybe the merchants won't show all the wares to adventurers. I magic shop might not show a tall figure in black spikey armor a one of a kind soul stealing greatsword ( Exaggerated Example ) because it could cause some trouble if the tall figure would want it and not have the money.

So I was thinking that maybe to see those "extra special" items, perhaps the adventurer would have to show his trust to the store owner ( Being a regular customer then brings in alot of profit or going on a quest the store owner ). This is prolly a little too late to bring this up, but it is just something I thought of.

[Ima Dufus]

So I was thinking that maybe to see those "extra special" items, perhaps the adventurer would have to show his trust to the store owner ( Being a regular customer then brings in alot of profit or going on a quest the store owner ). This is prolly a little too late to bring this up, but it is just something I thought of.

What I might be able to do with little effort is set a "max level" for the random store items (on each store I mean). And "min level" too I guess. That way you could have a standard store that tops out at a certain level, and then a "special" store that is only accesible after you have done a quest (or have a high enough PR or whatever) that has all the higher level items.

The only major down-side to this is all the extra work required to set it up (and make the quests and such).