JRPG module is now at version 0.0.3. New features in this version:

 -Sample dungeon level expanded, several new monsters added. Also there are
  several chests with treasures scattered around the level.
 -Added a town level, with shops and no random encounters
 -Shops - locations where you can buy or sell items
 -Synthesis (aka crafting). You can create new item out of components in a
  synthesis store.
 -Added potions, which you can use to heal during battle or on field.
  Also, you can use healing skills outside battles.
 -Reworked character details dialog
 -Your characters can defend in battle, doubling their defenses until their next turn

Download link:

http://www.mediafire.com/?c1gqok70zv1ex14

Post your feedback, suggestions and bug reports in this thread:

http://forums.te4.org/viewtopic.php?f=45&t=33704

Note: I have trouble posting or replying to comments on blog pages - I can read them just fine, but I'm unable to reply. If you want me to reply, post in the forum thread.

As promised here comes T-Engine4 and ToME4 beta40 ! See http://te4.org/

Don't forget to help ToME by with donations ( http://te4.org/donate ) !

 

Important bugfixes inside!

 

Release highlights:

• Important bugfixes
• Small improvments to Archamge Time & Disruption shields

Expanded changelist:

• Slightly decreased random elite chance
• Random elites must now respect talent levels (roughtly)
• Implode is not usable by NPCs
• Removed Manaflow
• Disruption Shield is now affected By Aegis/Shielding
• Disruption Shield changed; only usable when <25% mana; each hit will regen mana. When at full it will explode as before. So either you get it at one point for a new mana regen or you get it to max for a less nice but still nice mana regen and a shield
• New arcane talent: Arcane Vortex; an arcane DOT that fires random manathrusts
• Time Shield backfire now leaves a dot on the ground
• Animal random elites should not be archers
• Fixed Cyst Burst after Epidemic
• Dark Surprise second hit is correctly a crit
• Various fixes
• Overkill can trigger only once per turn
• Reduced Brotoq all damage output by 40%
• Buffed Corpsebow
• When all resources are full, all talents are up, resting will try to wait for recall
• Rares should have a special tactical border in ASCII
• Fixed a bad bug that could make objects disappear
• Blood Vengeance has a sustain cost

Have fun!

As promised here comes T-Engine4 and ToME4 beta39 ! See http://te4.org/

Don't forget to help ToME by with donations ( http://te4.org/donate ) !

 

A big release, get it while it's hot!

 

Release highlights:

• Full rework of wands system; now split in wands, totems and torques; collectively known as charms
• New weapon kind: mindstars. Akin to staves but for wilders, psionics and afflicted. Designed to be dual-wielded, a new talent tree can even make psionic blade from them
• Many balance & quality of life tweaks
• Many antimagic buffs
• New trees: Corruptions/Torment; Wild Gift/Fungus; Wild Gift/Mindstar Mastery
• Random elites are now wandering the game, beware!
• Dommed rework/buff
• Reavers buff
• Shields grant a Block talent
• New "ingredient" system; you start collecting ingredients before needing to take the brotherhood of alchemists quest

Expanded changelist:

• Fix Arcane Supremacy set
• Fix log lines option
• Fix drag&dropping Prox Halfling Foot in the hotkeys
• Middle-click on the big map will make it disappear
• New artifacts
• Amulets of Mastery now always provide bonus to a tree the player has/can learn
• Fixed quest description of the apprentice mage
• Talent errors are more explicit
• Fixed the "getTarget" bug after a talent bugs
• New weapon kind: mindstars. They are raw natural gems infused with the power of nature, kind of like staves. They are one-handed and can be dual-wielded. Offhand mindstar is not subject to normal offhand penalty
• Replaced Body of Stone's physical and knockback resistance with acid and stun resistance.
• Slightly increased Earthquake's damage.
• New talent: Earth/Mudslide
• Doubled the cooldown of Earthen Missiles to make it less abusable. The damage was increased
• Headless horrors will properly lose elemental resists when the eyes are killed
• Heart of the sandworm queen no longer tells undead they've learned the harmony tree
• Rewrote, rebalanced, and added many weapon egos
• Two-handed wepaons now have a small eqo multiplier
• Daggers now have a small ego penalty
• Gaping maw is now anti-magic
• Withering orbs and allettas diadem now psionic
• Halfling foot now arcane, hareskin sling now nature
• Stop talent now properly accounts for paradox level
• Foresight now properly senses actors
• Greater weapon egos generally less powerful
• Lesser weapon egos generally more powerful
• New anti-magic egos
• Resolve equilebrium and stamina regen more in line with other forms of regen for these resource types
• Added costs to ranged egos
• Set many artifact material levels to be more in line with their level range (should improve drops)
• Buffed many artifacts
• Reduced infravision given by many items
• Infravision and heightened senses no longer stack
• Fixed cease to exist double paradox cost
• Resist penetration no longer affects targets with negative resists
• Reloading will auto-trigger when auto-explore is activated
• Spacetime tuning and gather the threads will now only break on spell cast
• Blood lich rarity is now more in line with other liches
• Fixed anti-magic tree description
• Fixed quivers & pouches rarity
• Fixed killing NPCs with special death scripts on the fearscape
• Combat:attackTargetWith hook passes a dam parameter to know how much damage was dealt
• Typos
• Using an artifact digger should work again
• The Room of Death should not be empty even for low level chars
• Waitbars should look better on windows
• Time Prison mana cost reduced by 20
• Time Shield is now instant cast, the dot duration increases with talent level and while active all newly applied status effects are reduced by a %
• Error repor window has a close all buton, can be closed with Esc and tells if the error is new
• Rewrote, added, and rebalanced many staff egos
• Fade From Time now reduces all status effect durations (good or bad)
• Voice of Telos has new effects (check it out!)
• Increased Quiver of the Sun capacity to 12
• Wards (activatable staff ego that protects against damage)
• Staff's now give a bonus to elemental damage equal to their combat damage
• Most staves now allow the wearer to switch elemental properties using the command staff talent
• Base staff spellpower increased
• Increased base archery projectile speed
• Travel speed in general is now additive (making it in line with the tooltip)
• Travel speed on bows now works
• Fixed ranged project on bows
• Added ranged project to Withering Orbs
• Epoch's level is now in line with the rest of Daikara
• Epoch's Curve is now a guaranteed drop
• Epoch's clones can no longer multiply
• Epoch's cooldown on Multiply increased, making the second clone come much later in the fight then the first
• Changed how Teluvorta's handle teleport; should make getting stuck in the Temporal Rift less likely
• Weapon of Light, Shield of Light, and Hymn of Moonlight no longer deactivate when they don't have enough energy to trigger
• Fix Poison Gas Trap
• Fix flickering black screen bug
• Summoning (Advanced) correctly learnable at level 10
• Weaponset2: Quiver will not provide worn benefits
• If enough lumberjacks are saved they also provide a digger as a reward
• Reloading after saving on the eidolon plane will work correctly when returning to the previous level
• Right click on the resources move handle lets you configure resources visibility
• Plot & Quest items are also auto-pickedup now
• Reverted Quantum Feed and Strength of Purpose to b37 values
• Damage Smearing no longer takes a turn to activate
• Invigorate reworked; stamina regen reduced but it causes talents to refresh faster while active
• When appropriate, the target of the reward of a quest is selectable (like for escort rewards)
• The Alchemist Golem can not learn Harmony
• Quests that add a location to the map now reveal the location on the map
• Crit chance is bound to 0-100% range
• Flamespit description fixed
• Failing to wear an item will not consume a turn
• Negative health is correctly hidden in the new UI
• Surge of Undeath correctly adds to accuracy
• Summon talent now forces a max 2 level OOD
• New option in the main menu: reset interface positions
• The Grand Corruptor will speak to the main player
• Randbosses talent scaling should not get out of hands anymore
• On spell, on melee and on ranged talent procs can only happen once per turn
• Doomed cunning at birth now matches the description
• Mindslayers have one more cunning at birth (bringing total bonuses in line with other classes)
• Mindslayer knockback abilities can no longer hit twice
• Fixed many mindslayer talent descriptions (they scale off mindpower)
• Mindslayer gem bonuses now apply to mindstars as well
• Greater telekenetic grasp now applies it's level five bonus at talent levels beyond 5 (only matters in the Infinite Dungeon)
• Mindslayer auras now scale better at higher levels, deal less spike damage at low levels, have a cooldown of 10, and cost less psi to spike
• New artifact: Blood-Edge
• Four new random undead uniques
• Burning Hex now also increases the talents cooldowns
• Epidemic is a very potent disease and so is not affected by disease immunity. It also lwoers disease immunity on the targets
• Meditation can not lower equilibrium bellow the sustain values
• Static Field now shows how much damage was done
• Probability Travel now applies a debuff when used to pass a wall that will prevent an other wall passing for X turns (based on distance and talent level)
• Shady Cornac man going away wont fail the achievement for saving derth inhabitants
• New generic tree for Reavers & Corruptors: Torment
• New Wild Gifts/Fungus generic tree. Kind of like a nature based Aegis tree. Available to wyrmics
• Fix bug with the Eternal Night set
• Hydra summoning eldritch eyes can no longer spawn more then one hydra at a time
• Autocasting talents will not trigger when confused/terrified
• Toggle movement mode bound to shift+b instead of just b
• Enabling/disabling stealth will activate the visual effect right away
• Shadowstrike now works as a crit damage bonus
• Sacrifice at the endgame will really kill the main player, not a copy
• Fixed arrows speed
• New achievement: Fear me not!
• Fixed mouse-over for chat frame
• Aura of Silence do not apply on the user, to prevent brainlock
• Shielding talent now only increases shield strength. Shield duration only ever increasaes by max 1 at level 5
• Aegis/Heal renamed to Aegis/Arcane Reconstruction
• Fix Repulsion
• Randarts correctly use the same arcane/antimagic rules as egos
• Fix Outmaneveured
• Orc babies & youth in the breeding pits can be female or male
• Virulent Disease now tries to choose smartly which disease to apply (one that is not on the targe yet and that will reduce a stat that is high. So an
• archer type target will always ge the dex disease first).
• Virulentt Disease damage & stat reducion buffed
• Darkfire cost and cooldown reduced
• Many corruption spells are now able to crit, including diseases.
• Corrupter metaclass renamed to Defiler
• Cyst Burst now spreads all plague tree diseases at once (rotting, decrepitude, weakness and epidemic)
• Mana Clash and Resolve can now crit (mind)
• One With Nature is now instant cast
• Virulent Disease is now instant cast
• Many wild gift powers can now crit (mind); including breathes
• Removed animal encounters in the west
• New "wall" projection type
• Fixed a display issue with Psi cost and fatigue
• Rebalanced luminous horrors
• Dying at the endgame should still let your read the endgame text
• Thalore will not get escorts on Old Forest 5, since it does not exists anymore
• Wands have been redesigned into a new cooldown, chargeless system. All wands are now on the same cooldown, when activating one all are on cooldown for X turns
• Darkness (and other block_sight objects) now prevent projected attacks. (LOS check in Actor.canProject and Actor.on_project)
• Various tweeks (shortened ranges, lowered hate costs, altered damage, etc)
• Added a number of secondary buff/debuff effects to talents: Gesture of
• Malice lowers resistance, Madness increases Mind damage, Darkness allows faster movement, Force of Will increases crit damage, etc.
• Replaced Unnatural Body's Seeth and Repression with two talents that boost power as you take damage.
• Fixed criticals, they work and are applied to all affects.
• Gestures allow use of mindstars and provide some bonuses from them.
• Shadows scale better with leveling and don't rely on defense/evasion (they have a new fade ability that prevents damage for a turn when they are first hit)
• All activable egos use the new charm system with a global cooldown. Artifacts keep their own cooldown.
• Blank wands can be no more
• New "charms" category of items. Wands are arcane charms, Totems are natural charms and Torques are psionic charms
• Entity:addTemporaryValue can use "highest" and "lowest" merge algorithms
• Pausing the level loop for player input correctly pauses & restarts at the right position in the actors list
• DualWield/Precision is now instant and takes less stamina / cooldown
• Weapon & shield/Last Stand now takes less stamina / cooldown and the life bonus is increased
• Pinning Shot limited to 5 turns at most
• Buff Spell Shield
• Buffed Shadow Cunning
• Shadow Ambush also dazes 2 turns
• Corrosive Vapour changed to Glacial Vapour, mana cost reduced
• Illuminate blind durations fixed to 3/4, at level 4 it starts dealing damage
• Phantasmal Shield cost severely reduced
• Fixed stats inherit between base template and npcs
• New hook in Actor:actBase called "Actor:actBase:Effects", to hook on stuff like thunderstorm, ..
• Gestures are now generic points
• Doomed start with two mindstars equipped
• Random elites are in! Each level (except the very first one) can contain random elites. Less powerful than random bosses, should spice things up!
• Reavers now get access to Vim tree. Allowing them to get Vimsense & Leech for vimregen
• Fungus tree is now offered by Myssil after finishing a quest for her
• Antimagic escort rewards chagned to many different (and otherwise unlearnable) generic trees
• New generic talent tree: Wild Gift/Mindstar Mastery. Available from random zigur escorts and summoners start with it locked
• New "ingredients" system. When you do an action (like killing a monster) you can gain a special ingredient which is automatically added to you ingredients list. Ingredients are now part of the normal inventory and are weightless.
• The Brotherhood of Alchemists quest has been updated to use ingredients system; this means you will start collecting needed parts before taking the quests, without risk of loosing some.
• Death in explorer mode will not be reported in chat
• Shields now possess block value. Wielding a shield grants the Block talent that will block the next attack and allows for a counterstrike.
• Riposte talent doesnt provide a free attack, instead it boosts counterstikes
• Little buff to Kryl-Feijan

Have fun!

Yesterday I was driving (to see a doctor, the irony) when suddently I am not quite sure how I hit the grass on the side, it was raining too, trying to get back on track I got shot to the other side of the road where an other car hit my side (the side I was in) sending me back to the other side wihtout any control left, I passed the road and ended up 4 meters bellow, upside down.

I was hanging from my seat, only suspended by my seatbelt (which probably saved my life) with blood dripping from my head. Not a very fun moment. I managed to untie my belt, fall on the floor and get out and then I waited for help. They got me to the hospital, had me examined and I seem to actually be very lucky, I didnt break anything. Just a not too bad headwound and many many bruises. I can not raise an harm without much pain, or move, but it shall get better (and look, I can still type!).

Sometimes the human mind is weird, I as I was untying my belt, and getting ready to get out I noticed water on the floor and thought something like that: "Oh shit water, I'll wet my shoes!" Yes .. silly given the events .. :)

That's what left of my car now, after it was moved out of the way and put back "on feet". Poor car, she sacrificied her life to save mine.

 

So basically, I am glad to still be with you in the world of the living and you'll have to bear with ToME for quite a while yet :)

PS: and if you wish to donate to help me get a new car, I'd be very glad; I kinda need a car :/

Lately I was working on creating a JRPG-like module for T-Engine, and I managed to recreate most of my beta-4 module in beta-38.

Impemented features are:

Party-related:

 -You control a party consisting of several members
 -You can open a party menu, which shows HP and SP of all your party member
 -You can view information about individual party members
 -Party members can gain experience and level up, increasing their stats
 -Party members have individual skills

Skills (named 'Attacks' internally):

 -Can be physical or magical based
 -Can be elemental
 -Can heal allies
 -Behaviour can be customized further
 -Damage calculation made more JRPG-ish - now characters and enemies have
  Attack and Defense stats, and damage is calculated as ATK - DEF / 2.
  Of course, this behaviour can be changed in the corresponding file.

Battles and enemies:

 -Supports random and predefined encounters
 -Battle process is handled in a separate dialog, with a few helper dialogs for player input
 -Enemies attack party members
 -Enemies can have elemental weaknesses or resistance
 -Active turn-based battle system. All combatants - players and enemies - gain energy on each tick. When a combatant's energy reaches 1000, that combatant can perform an action.

Misc.:

 -Waypoints, a way for the player to instantly teleport to a certain spot
  Not really utilized just yet.
 -Savepoints, locations where you can save and recover your party
 -You can't save normally

What's not here yet:

 -Status effects - poison, paralysis, buffs and debuffs and so on
 -Interface probably can be made more user-friendly
 -Speed (the character stat) is not used yet
 -No dialogs on party member levelup
 -No chat system implemented
 -No equipment
 -Can't choose characters to form a party
 -Maybe there's a better way to handle locations

I already have a test demo, where you can walk around a small room fighting random encounters.
The save point in that room also allows you to fight two different opponents. There's not much to see in actual gameplay sense, but I think this module demonstrates the features I've implemented.

The player party characters I'm using in this module are from Touhou Project (a Japanese shoot-em-up series). It doesn't really matter that much - this is a test demo, not an actual game.

Keybinds:

  In the dungeon:

  Enter - Open party menu
  m - Start a battle, for testing purposes

  During a battle:

  Escape - End a battle immediatly, for testing purposes

All other input is handled with List and ListColumn objects - you're presented a list of possible options, and you choose one with arrow keys & Enter, or with the mouse.

I think this module already can be used to make an actual game - the basic RPG elements are here. Keep in mind, though, that it is still currently in development and might contain bugs. If you want to make your own module based on this one, feel free. Just remember to give me credit.

If you're interested in this module's inner working, take a look in the .team file (it's just a renamed .zip file). I've tried to write enough comments in order to make my code understandable. If something is unclear to you, ask away.

Post your suggestions and bugs you discover on this blog entry, or contact me:

astralslicer(at)gmail(dot)com

The module can be downloaded here:

http://www.mediafire.com/?cl3cc9vhn3n0ccj

As of the writing of this post, there has been 20058 days 18 hours 1 minute of recorded ToME4 playtime by registered players!
That is very very nearly 55 years.

I am happy to have given 55 years of happiness to mankind and hope to provide many more centuries ;)

You can view stats there: http://te4.org/game-statistics

I'm interested whether T-Engine4 can handle modules with non-roguelike gameplay well. For instance, I wonder whether you can create more RPG-like modules, where you control a party of adventurers and walk around predefined maps, battling monsters and gathering treasures - and you control all of them directly. Here are some of my thoughts on this:

1. Making a module with more RPG-ish gameplay would probably be simple enough. The main change from standard gameplay would be that you now control several characters instead of one, and the battle system would probably need to be altered as well.

I did experiment with making a JRPG-like module, where you walk around a dungeon with random encounters. When an encounter started, the battle between the party and monsters proceeded in a separate dialog. Your characters could level up, you could use spells in combat to damage enemies, heal yourself or to temporarily power your characters up. It was back in beta4, and now I'm considering porting it to the current version.

2. A turn-based tactical RPG - think Fire Emblem, where your characters and enemies take turns moving around the battlefield and attacking, would be harder to implement. I've seen this idea proposed on this site before. In such a module, the combat situations - the area where the fight is happening and the enemy combatants - would probably have to be stored in a separate file, and loaded when required.

3. Speaking more generally, in such non-standard modules death and saving would probably have to be handled differently. Death no longer should be permanent, and saving probably can be made possible only at certain spots - in a town or at special locations in the dungeons.

As I can see, a module with RPG-like gameplay would be easiest to create. I've managed to get the basic elements working, so it looks possible.

Disclaimer: This post has been misinterpreted as an attack on DarkGod, which was never my intention. DarkGod is no racist; indeed the narrative of his game already shows a level of social awareness that elevates it above all other roguelikes in terms of depth and realism. I love this game and have enormous respect for its creator; I signed up to be a Silver Donator a couple of weeks ago and am providing ongoing financial support for its development. My concern isn't that anyone involved with the game is a racist, but that certain of the game's mechanics seem to accidentally sponsor racist thought. My suggestion is that the narrative and character descriptions be updated to accommodate these concerns (i.e., "Highers aren't actually a superior race, they just think they are."), thus removing any potential misperceptions.

It strikes me that there's a bit of racism built into this game, though it doesn't appear intentional. It's all fun and games when there are differing races of nonhumans with differing traits, even if some seem superior to others. I think D&D used to divide the elf race into "wood elves" and "high elves," for example. That's fine, because elves and dwarves are not human beings and different rules may apply.

In Tolkien the Men of Middle Earth are not to be confused with the human beings of the real world, and Tolkien himself unequivocally denounced racism in all its forms. The Dunedain, controversial though they may be, are therefore little different from high elves. Tolkien intended them as an allegory of Atlanteans rather than Aryans, though given the supposed roots of the latter the distinction may be somewhat fine.

Cornacians and Highers are explicitly defined as different types of human beings, however. Not metahuman, or demihuman, or psuedohuman. Not "Men." Human. They're people, like ourselves. So we run straight into a problem that the fantasy genre has so often flirted with, which is that we're saying that certain people are inherently better than others from birth. This is the very definition of racism.

Highers are described as refusing to breed with other kinds of humans in order to keep their race "pure," and they possess racial traits such as "Gift of the Highborn ('Pureborn' in their intro)," and "Overseer of Nations." Note the plurality. They are naturally stronger and more agile than other humans, and have greater willpower, stronger senses, and a closer connection to the magical forces of the world.

Highers are so superior to other human beings that to play them necessitates an experience penalty. Cornacians, by contrast, are supposed to be more "adaptable," and can learn different skills more readily, making them the perfect servant race to the longer-lived and more powerful Highers. That the Shockbolt interface literally turns Higher characters' hair blond really drives home the point: Highers might as well be called "Übermenschen," and Cornacians "Untermenschen."

I'm not saying that the Highers should be removed from the game, or that their presence will encourage racist beliefs in the real world. But I know I can't be the only one to have had the thought that they are an inherently racist concept, and that it's probably best to not make it seem as though racist ideas are actually valid. Perhaps a good solution would be to make the racism a part of the narrative, a social problem in the context of the game itself rather than a biological superiority ordained by the laws of the universe.

Highers already refuse to breed with other humans, let's hear what they think about them! Let's hear about what the Cornacians think about the Highers! Let's hear about the history of interaction between the two, and how it has shaped their societies. And instead of simply calling them “Highers,” as if their only distinction is their superiority, let’s call them something else. In this manner, not only would any concerns about racism be removed, but the story of Mag'Eyal would be enriched, and feel all the more realistic.

If you don't know what a 7DRL is, let me explain. Sleep deprivation, shunning all social interaction, and a lot of dishes. And coding. Lots of coding. A 7DRL is an annual contest to create a Roguelike game (similar to ToME) in just a week. I've worked a lot on the tactical AI for bosses and uniques in ToME and wanted to take base an entire game on intelligent, 1v1 fights. The result is "Equal in Death", my 7DRL using the T-Engine and outright stealing the beautiful UI from ToME b38.

Here is the module file (drop it in "game/modules" folder): http://db.tt/Ugf023r1

Here are some pre-packaged downloads to help get you guys going.

Windows:http://db.tt/sXcDORMA

Linux: http://db.tt/aBXKMAaH

I would love any feedback (and the eventual bug reports) on the Forums, over here: http://forums.te4.org/viewtopic.php?f=40&t=33172

Cheers!

Well after 6 or so days I have gotten my 7drl finished (there could be hidden stuff). The premise is you are a necromancer and you can build customizable undead. So you can select what arms and other body parts you can use. The game is short and is a coffee break rougelike so it would be nice if you could test it out.

here is the link to the forum thread where the module is available and you can post feedback. I have about 17 hours left from the time of posting so I can fix bugs and add tweaks
http://forums.te4.org/viewtopic.php?f=40&t=33375&p=130227#p130227

here is the module
http://www.mediafire.com/download.php?aig6jbndib16enj
and here is the standalone
http://www.mediafire.com/download.php?vcsh1q245l5wkmf