Spell Visual Effects

[Keryn]

Ok guys I'll ask you all to forgive me since I realized the whole firework thing I was seeing the other day that made my machine cringe in pain, was the actual effects while casting, which are sort of redundant and when several PCs plus critters get to it, its like the 4th of July...

after the casting is done the effects of most spells like mentioned seem to have been toned down.

Would it be viable to remove the casting effects as well? and just let the sound effects in which allow to determine the casting of the spell plus the info that we get in the log bow where it shows the spell was cast.

[I-KP]

Would it be viable to remove the casting effects as well? and just let the sound effects in which allow to determine the casting of the spell plus the info that we get in the log bow where it shows the spell was cast.

I would hope not. It's hard enough telling who is doing what, compounded by the oh-so-often null name entries in the event log. No flashy lights would make it triple-hard to identify the caster.

[Audark]

I'm with I-KP on this one.

We have toned down the permanent glowy, wandering light show effects that did potentially hinder performance continually, but upon casting spells I would hate to see these effects diminished in any way. Their hit to performance is limited beyond a brief timeframe, and I for one judge that as minimal when compared to being able to clearly and easily identify what is going on around you in a chaotic game environment. The text window simply does not provide enough information, and that information can be rapidly passed by if there are multiple attacks going on.

[CloudDancing]

One thought. Turn your video settings to LOW in the Advanced options tab.

[Swift]

Would it be viable to remove the casting effects as well? and just let the sound effects in which allow to determine the casting of the spell plus the info that we get in the log bow where it shows the spell was cast.

Just...no.

Unless you want to take all the fun out of being a mage, that is.

[Keryn]

It was just a question/idea, I am not a tech person and I certainly have no idea on the performance hit it takes, I just see what happens at certain moments and it might be coincidence that some people have problems when several people start to buff at the same time.

I can see the points Audark and I-KP being quite valid and I had not thought about it in that way. It certainly makes sense and the input if greatly appreciated, and I guess it would indeed make quite hard on a real time environment. Thanks guys.

On other hand, I'm sorry to say Swift that if the fun of playing a mage is to see glowing lights while casting...

I have the setting on min already Cloud not because that during normal gameplay I have issues but because I do favor the gameplay over the graphics. The situation I was reporting here was not specific to me since I've heard some folks complain about the same, though Curm also said it might be of the not so stable connection we've had to TSM at late. We will see in the future. Obviously having 4 or 5 PCs buffing at same time also create a not so, lets say.. common situation.

Once again thanks for the input and I guess we can consider this whole thing a non-issue and pretty much a dead discussion.

[Zelknolf]

VFX has almost nothing to do with connections. Everything that your client needs to display a VFX already lives on your machine (requiring only a very short message from the server to say "show that one"), and the performance hit you're seeing is your rig not being up to snuff. I know you've said that your laptop's numbers look promising for NWN2, but I would note that ALFA's modifications to VFX have been overwhelmingly to reduce and cut. If you still see a performance hit related to their display, there's not a whole lot we can do.

[Ithildur]

Somehow the topic shifted from removing over the top visual effects like SS/barkskin to removing AOE visuals for fireball and such... I didn't even know fireball AOE visuals were taken out in ALFA; that would explain why Laniara launched one in the middle of the party last week.

The former I can understand and be fairly supportive of; SS/BS are failry easy to keep track of even without the obnoxious visuals, especially stoneskin, you can see that 'slash' next to the PC's portrait.

Getting rid of the aoe visual for stuff like fireball seems... well, I simply don't get it, maybe I'm misunderstanding something. In pnp you even have AOE markers cut out of paper or using strings, etc to make it clear beyond a shadow of doubt where the periphery of the AOE is; no one has to guess at it. So why did we make it even harder in a realtime platform to guess where the AOE is??

The targeting UI is still in game.

So what you're trying to achieve is that non-casters can't learn where to stand in safety from observation?

I think this bias in favour of primary casters is getting just a little over the top, heh.

What? Can you please clarify this?

Seriously, wth are you smoking Veilan?

I've never played a primary caster in my life btw. So much for 'bias'.

Thanks for clarification regarding use of 'AOE' Zelk; I obviously misunderstood.

[Veilan]

I wasn't referring to you wanting that, Ith, but to NES saying that if only the caster can see what he's targeting, then we're all good - in short, I agreed with you .

The following ideas of this thread to make casting indetectable just furthered my lul.

[Ithildur]

Ugh, I'm getting a headache from reading this thread. Apparently lots of confusion spells being cast and some failed saves.

[Zelknolf]

Summary of thread:
-- There are rigs that think they're uber enough for NWN2, but NWN2 is far more intensive than it claims to be and lap tops respond poorly when their limits are pushed.
-- The term "Area of Effect" causes much confusion and befuddlement among everyone associated with NWN2 (which we'll probably have to live with, unless we want to publish an ALFA style manual to clear up the ambiguity).
-- It's very easy to misread a three-nested-quote-deep post (and the resulting accusations are both hilarious and ironic).

I'm not sure that there's anything to really take away from this, except maybe a reminder that NWN2 lies about its minimum specs, and you really want to exceed them by a couple generations (and even that's not a shoein to squash your performance problems).

[NESchampion]

NES saying that if only the caster can see what he's targeting, then we're all good.

Presently only the caster can see what he's targeting, same in vanilla, and I'm not sure it's possible to transmit that to other players. I wasn't making an argument for removal of spell vfx. I was pointing out to Ithildur that the targeting UI still exists in ALFA because he misinterpreted my example (about the lack of targeting UI in NWN1 showing how making players estimate information punishes players in an imperfect game world) as a position statement.

In other words, we all three seem to be in agreement that vfx are important.

[Ithildur]

What do you guys think about these?

http://nwvault.ign.com/fms/Image.php?id=148526


http://nwvault.ign.com/fms/Image.php?id=148528

The mod link is

http://nwvault.ign.com/View.php?view=NW ... tail&id=63

[Ithildur]

This is rather nice too, but then, anything's an improvement over the original game's aesthetics 9 times out of 10.

http://nwvault.ign.com/View.php?view=NW ... tail&id=61


I still prefer the mod that gets rid of all skin altering effects; it looks much nicer.

[Keryn]

This is rather nice too, but then, anything's an improvement over the original game's aesthetics 9 times out of 10.

http://nwvault.ign.com/View.php?view=NW ... tail&id=61


I still prefer the mod that gets rid of all skin altering effects; it looks much nicer.

So much better Imo...