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Bioware's depiction of Athkatla is terrible


Guest braden

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Is it remotely possible to mod the layout of Athkatla, or at least add some new areas to Athkatla, like the Wave District with the Moonhall of Selune or the monastery of Milil (which baffles me as to why those were left out of the game), or maybe changing how the temple of Lathander looks inside, to make it seem more grand, more befitting of the Dome of the Rose, or the inclusion of the Adamantine Mug tavern. Stuff like that.

 

It's just bothered me that Athkatla was so errant from the accepted canon of the city. Is such a mod possible or is it too hard-coded into the game to edit?

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Is it remotely possible to mod the layout of Athkatla, or at least add some new areas to Athkatla, like the Wave District with the Moonhall of Selune or the monastery of Milil (which baffles me as to why those were left out of the game), or maybe changing how the temple of Lathander looks inside, to make it seem more grand, more befitting of the Dome of the Rose, or the inclusion of the Adamantine Mug tavern. Stuff like that.

 

It's just bothered me that Athkatla was so errant from the accepted canon of the city. Is such a mod possible or is it too hard-coded into the game to edit?

I am glad I don't know anything about Athkatla, otherwise it would disturb me, too. What you suggest is possible but it would mean a lot of work. First there is the graphic work for creating the new areas, then they'd have to be occupied with towns folk, quests, etc.

I know at least of one hidden project that deals with new city parts, although I don't know how cannon it will be.

 

Do you have any links to cannon information about Athkatla you could post?

 

EDIT: I have no idea why I quoted your whole post, and CamDawg was faster.

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I don't know if it's canon or not, but I did blunder across a used copy of Volo's Guide to Baldur's Gate II which included source material for Athkatla and its various districts, notable buildings, etc. It did not bear any resemblance to BG2--for example, it described the Copper Coronet as run by four retired adventurers--and included two districts of Athkatla that don't exist in the game.

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you can find a short depiction of athkatla at sorcerer's place at http://www.sorcerers.net/Games/BG2/Walkthrough/athkatla.php.

 

the districts as described in source material were the wave district, temple district, gem district, trades district, river district, bridge district, guards district, center district, grave district, and scepter district. other differences include the copper coronet being in the river district, the five flagons being in the guards district, the mithrest being a seperate inn outside of waukeen's promenade, inclusion of two military citadels, among others. also in the 'prominent figures' section, there's no mention of them in the game.

 

i have no modding skills whatsoever, but i would like to see some sort of modification of athkatla to bring it more in line with how it was originally intended (such as including new areas or adding characters such as the prominent figures, or maybe such things as relocating some of the inns (the mithrest wouldn't be hard, as the front of it in SoA is non-descript, and you could place it in one of the many random buildings in athkatla.))

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I'd say that it's probably much easier and will find more audience to rebuild Athkatla as it should be with NWN2 and write a new adventure there than try to add more edited maps to Baldur's Gate 2. BG2 Athkatla serves the purposes of this particular game. Yes, BG2 is classics, but by the time such a mod may be accomplished (2-3+ years IF you get a damn good graphic artist and a few prolific writers) you'll have little in terms of audience. Yep, BG1 had a rivival - thanks to TUTU, but BG2 has nothing like that in store for it, I think.

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I'd say that it's probably much easier and will find more audience to rebuild Athkatla as it should be with NWN2 and write a new adventure there than try to add more edited maps to Baldur's Gate 2. BG2 Athkatla serves the purposes of this particular game. Yes, BG2 is classics, but by the time such a mod may be accomplished (2-3+ years IF you get a damn good graphic artist and a few prolific writers) you'll have little in terms of audience. Yep, BG1 had a rivival - thanks to TUTU, but BG2 has nothing like that in store for it, I think.
From all of heard, although NWN2 may be a great game, it lacks the plot richness of BG2. I don't know if this is true, I'm just repeating what others have said.

 

My recent interest in BG1 had nothing to do with Tutu. I bought the Original Saga a while back and never got around to playing it. So when I looked around for updates, patches, etc., I came across Tutu. From what I've seen on other forums, there are at least a *few* other people in the same boat - i.e., they don't rush out, shell out fat cash for the latest game on the day of its release (or earlier) and play through the whole thing in a week or less, then chuck the game or sell it used. :p (Though this is probably true for a lot of PSP/Xbox users... then again... there's little point in playing through something like BG Dark Alliance I or II more than once or twice).

 

Besides, why not expect a BG2toNWN2 or the like? :p

 

But to get back to the original post, yes, area creation is extremely time-consuming... certainly from scratch anyway. Adapting existing material, graphics, etc. would be a lot easier, if such exists.

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But to get back to the original post, yes, area creation is extremely time-consuming... certainly from scratch anyway. Adapting existing material, graphics, etc. would be a lot easier, if such exists.

 

Not really. Once you locate a competent area artist (and it's easier than you might think), a decent backdrop can be worked up in a matter of a couple of days. Exteriors are more work, but even so it's not too brutal.

 

What is brutal is the data markup required to make doors and walls work, etc. Not to mention populating content.

 

But ripping graphics saves you very little time on the grand scale of things.

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how would one even go about re-mapping athkatla? can it be done?
It could be done. My advice would be to start small and work up from there. For example, your original post:
Is it remotely possible to mod the layout of Athkatla, or at least add some new areas to Athkatla, like the Wave District with the Moonhall of Selune or the monastery of Milil (which baffles me as to why those were left out of the game), or maybe changing how the temple of Lathander looks inside, to make it seem more grand, more befitting of the Dome of the Rose, or the inclusion of the Adamantine Mug tavern. Stuff like that.
Ok, so let's break this down...

1) Changing how the temple of Lathander looks inside

This would be the easiest, unless you were talking about extending it greatly in size. Just changing how it *looks* you would probably start with the existing map image and rework it, or use it as a basis for the new temple. This assumes you wouldn't have to rearrange NPCs, doors and the like on the interior. This would be fairly easy.

2) Add the Adamantine Mug tavern

Now this would be slightly harder because you're adding a new area, but not what I call a major area... in other words, it's a building within another area. And there are several templates for taverns, bars and the like you can already use. So you wouldn't have to draw the whole map from scratch. Then you'd just have to fill the tavern up with drunks, which is surprisingly harder to do in a mod than it is in real life. In other words, you'd have to create NPCs, dialogs for them, probably a barkeep/store, doors, containers and all that stuff. Then finally, you'd have to add a link from your new area to the parent area - Athkatla in this case. There could be an existing abandoned building you could use, which would be easy, or you'd have to redraw part of Athkatla to include the new tavern, or add a whole new sector or quarter to the town, including your tavern and other buildings, which gets us into...

3) Mod the layout of Athkatla

This would be the hardest, since you'd not only have to come up with the area map, but also do or redo all the buildings, new NPCs, change existing NPC placements, ditto for entrances/exits, containers and so on. And you'd have to take into consideration any existing in-game components or other mods that expect things, people or buildings to be in certain locations. Yes it's doable but it'd be a big project. *But* if you just wanted to add a new "quarter" to the town in the form of an adjacent area, you wouldn't have to mess with the existing area much (except to provide links).

 

...area creation is extremely time-consuming... certainly from scratch anyway. Adapting existing material, graphics, etc. would be a lot easier, if such exists.
Not really. Once you locate a competent area artist (and it's easier than you might think), a decent backdrop can be worked up in a matter of a couple of days. Exteriors are more work, but even so it's not too brutal. What is brutal is the data markup required to make doors and walls work, etc.
That would be the easier part IMO... at any rate it'd take less than doing all the subtle detail to do a sophisticated tileset/major area map from scratch, or even starting with a template and modding it quite a bit to do a city-sized area. But then I wouldn't consider myself a competent artist.
Not to mention populating content.
Yes that would be the tough part... unless you're just replotting existing content.
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Not really. Once you locate a competent area artist (and it's easier than you might think),

 

That's why we see twenty of them jumping at the opportunity every time someone posts that s/he needs help with area creation! Why, we literally are waist-deep in the competent area artists in the community. What, you haven't seen all these numerous mods that add new 'from scratch' areas?

 

From all of heard, although NWN2 may be a great game, it lacks the plot richness of BG2. I don't know if this is true, I'm just repeating what others have said.

 

Setting aside the controversial question of BG2 plot richness, I was suggesting an entirely separate mod, not connected to either BG2 or NWN2. Seeing how one needs to populate new areas and write content for them anyway, why, oh why tie it in into the same tired BG2?

 

Besides, why not expect a BG2toNWN2 or the like?

 

Sure thing, there once in a while comes a guy or three who had never played BG2 yet, but wast majority of the audience for it had played it 20 times and knows every word in the dialogues, let alone the plot progression. Of course, it's always tempting to cash in on the people wishing 'more of the same' and dieing to find out what had happened to the Bhaalspawn's great-grandchildren...

 

It's relatively easy to guess why mods for a new product will get bigger audience. In other words we'll never again see the same enthusiasm as we have seen in the beginning of BG2 modding for the current mods or moreover mods released in a few years.

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Why, we literally are waist-deep in the competent area artists in the community. What, you haven't seen all these numerous mods that add new 'from scratch' areas?
(Heh.)
I was suggesting an entirely separate mod, not connected to either BG2 or NWN2. Seeing how one needs to populate new areas and write content for them anyway, why, oh why tie it in into the same tired BG2?
I'll agree there seem to be far too many mods for BG2. But... connected to what then? Tutu? IWD2? Which is still a four-year-old game I think. :p Anyhow it's all IE, so easily ported from one to another. Or some new engine still in development (and therefore a bit hard to mod for)? Or let's work in reverse and mod it for Eye of the Beholder II or Pools of Radiance! :p
It's relatively easy to guess why mods for a new product will get bigger audience.
That all depends on the quality of the product. And extensibility. And its popularity, which isn't always directly linked to quality. Maybe I'm wrong, but there didn't seem to be a huge modding community for NWN1. Do you think NWN2 will change that?
In other words we'll never again see the same enthusiasm as we have seen in the beginning of BG2 modding for the current mods or moreover mods released in a few years.
That seems logical but... so? Just taking something like BGT-BP alone, I hardly think all those folks are going to give up their mega-multi-installs anytime soon. Or if they do, it'll only be to create a new massive-multi-mega-super-duper install. :)
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But... connected to what then? Tutu? IWD2? Which is still a four-year-old game I think.

 

Connected to nothing; using Aurora-2 set. BG modding is used to piggy-backing on BG2 success. What we do is "another NPC" or "another quest" added to BG2. Moving away from the "mother-story" will stop a modder from recruiting a player who by downloading your product is agreeing to play BG2 yet again to see the nuggets of the new content. Of course, "selling" your own story that is a stand-alone is more difficult but I think that a pay-off is greater in the end. In other words, you'll stop being a fan-fictioner and stop measuring your success by just how well you fit the mold.

 

Maybe I'm wrong, but there didn't seem to be a huge modding community for NWN1.

 

Actually, I think, it is quite large. Another fine tradition of BG community is dissing Aurora - and there is indeed much to hate about NWN1. It remains to be seen if NWN2 is a better toolset, but I'd say that if someone wants to start modding today, IE is an inferrior way to go.

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Not really. Once you locate a competent area artist (and it's easier than you might think),

 

That's why we see twenty of them jumping at the opportunity every time someone posts that s/he needs help with area creation! Why, we literally are waist-deep in the competent area artists in the community. What, you haven't seen all these numerous mods that add new 'from scratch' areas?

 

You weren't reading very carefully. There aren't a lot of area artists loitering around IE modding forums because it's so difficult converting from the flat map to a usable in-game area. The artists, understandably, don't want to do that work themselves, and with a few notable exceptions nobody else has stepped up to the plate either, so why should there be lots of environment designers hanging around waiting for somebody to use their talents?

 

When I went out recruiting for area artists for TBH on the open market, I had a difficult time reaching a final conclusion because I had three or four perfectly serviceable choices to fill one slot. Granted, I was willing to pay these people, but I suspect someone with the right level of charm and the right project could find an area artist to work for the usual modding stipend of $0--if, and please read this carefully so I don't have to repeat it a third time, the process of turning that flat map into game content wasn't so discouragingly onerous. It's hard and inconvenient, and the engine fights you in many ways, not the least of which is failing to provide very helpful debugging information when a WIP area invariably refuses to load properly the first X times you try it. All that adds up to the strong likelihood that an artist's hard work will never see the light of day, and there's nothing which discourages doing work for free so much as suspecting that nobody will ever see it.

 

There are some area artists doing interesting work for TOEE now despite data markup methods which are, somehow, even more clunky (I'd go so far as to label them "outrageously complicated and borderline insane") than those offered by IE mod area tools. So it's hardly impossible in 2006.

 

(and yes, Miloch, I don't know where you're getting your information but the size of the NWN1 modding community dwarfs IE. We've done all right for ourselves, considering, but on sheer numbers there is simply no comparison.)

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Connected to nothing; using Aurora-2 set. BG modding is used to piggy-backing on BG2 success. What we do is "another NPC" or "another quest" added to BG2.
Well, technically you could also do an IE conversion or standalone project in the spirit of Classic Adventures or other such projects. Though that perhaps makes what the original poster requested (a pretty complex task) even more complex. On the other hand, you could argue it makes it easier, since you could ignore a lot of structures and relationships within BG2... though then you'd have to build your own such elements if you wanted to give it any depth.
Maybe I'm wrong, but there didn't seem to be a huge modding community for NWN1.
Actually, I think, it is quite large. Another fine tradition of BG community is dissing Aurora - and there is indeed much to hate about NWN1.
I wouldn't know, I haven't played it. Maybe I'll get around to the IWD and NWN series in another four years. :p I certainly wasn't dissing Aurora, not having familiarity with it. I was just going off of what I googled as far as IE modding vs. AE modding. If SHS is anything to base that opinion off of (since it came up as several of the top ten links) it's a pretty poor showing for AE modding vs. IE modding. Though that could be an argument for AE modding in itself (its lack of mods). But if you know of other communities, I'd be interested in checking them out. Though only for informational purposes at present, to start planning my mega-multi-Aurora-install for 2010. :p
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