My First Experience with Unity

[Consequence of Grace]

I downloaded an alpha version recently and tried it out.

Wow! The graphics are so much better, even without any mods etc!

But I don't know if the following are by design, bugs or just not been covered yet, but I'd be most grateful if anyone can give me some tips.

In Privateers Hold it was almost impossible to find somewhere to rest. It's like the radius for determining the presence of enemies is several times bigger than normal and I was constantly interrupted when I finally DID find somewhere to rest. For the first time ever, I died to a wandering rat! It got a bit irritating, to be honest, interrupted 6 or 7 times in a row and not being able to heal. Classic wasn't like that. So I made a new character with Regeneration in Darkness, and (assuming I can actually find somewhere to rest), she heals fully in about 1 hour. So is this a design decision, to make the starting dungeon more dangerous?

Touch-based spells, most of the time I can't cast them. In the Fighter's Guild, I can sometimes cast them if I point at the floor. Maybe the spells are targeting people on the floor below? In Privateer's Hold, an Imp's Shock spell killed a rat the other side of the wall in another room. So i wondered is this related to an increased Wandering monster radius?

A lot of the controls don't work. Insert, Delete, Home, End etc do nothing atm. Is that normal for the alpha build?

I am in full screen all the time. Is it not possible to use the default interface, with the grey stone and buttons etc?

Did you wreck The Rusty Ogre Lodge on purpose? There I was, a Teleport anchor set inside the Fighter's Guild, saved the game, stole a bandage and a candle from 4 of the chests, ignoring the cries of HALT! HALT! HALT! And suddenly the room is full of City Guard and I'm dead! I didn't even get a Daedric dagger! Apparently, there are other locations like that, but I've never found them.

I seem to Jump an awful lot higher and faster then I used to, even with Jumping as a Minor skill.

I LOVE the new Climbing Mode!

The Custom class questionnaires seem to actually add the +6 and +3 bonuses now, but only once fully created and the character is in Privateers Hold.

That's all I can think of atm, Them's the main differences I've seen so far between Unity and Classic.

But, man, those graphics! Top Notch job! And so much better and easier than fiddling with DOS BOX builds!

Cheers!

[Interkarma]

In Privateers Hold it was almost impossible to find somewhere to rest. It's like the radius for determining the presence of enemies is several times bigger than normal and I was constantly interrupted when I finally DID find somewhere to rest.

Radius test for nearby monsters should match classic. Unfortunately with enhanced AI and better senses, they can often path a bit closer to player. They also shuffle around more with infighting enabled.

Intermittent spawn rate is technically lower than classic in dungeons. The issue here seems to be that classic has trouble finding a clear spot to spawn enemies, and DFU doesn't, so the perception is that it's higher in DFU. The chance formulas here are modable if someone wants to adjust this.

Touch-based spells, most of the time I can't cast them.

Touch spells can only be cast at a target within touch range, which matches classic. Not sure why you can cast touch spells at the floor, that could be a bug.

A lot of the controls don't work. Insert, Delete, Home, End etc do nothing atm. Is that normal for the alpha build?

All of the controls work. You can bind those keys to whatever actions you like. But if you're referring to actions look up, look down, centre view, these aren't used with mouselook active. DFU only uses mouselook mode, I have no plans to implement cursor mode.

I am in full screen all the time. Is it not possible to use the default interface, with the grey stone and buttons etc?

I seem to Jump an awful lot higher and faster then I used to, even with Jumping as a Minor skill.

Check out the roadmap to see what is completed and what's coming up. The large HUD is in progress, but it has dropped in priority for now. I'll wrap it up early next year. Jumping and movement will get another pass, but this isn't as simple as you'd think. Classic had a lot of timing issues and we all had different experiences with classic depending on the platform we played it on. Your memories are valid, but there's no one answer here.

Did you wreck The Rusty Ogre Lodge on purpose?

Do you mean looting from crates? I'm not sure items if those containers have been matched to shop quality yet.

That's all I can think of atm, Them's the main differences I've seen so far between Unity and Classic.

There's a UESP article here and a forum post here with some more.


Happy to hear you're enjoying the game overall. Thanks for your kind words.

[Consequence of Grace]

Cheers, thanks for that!

I noticed that one of the Archers, instead of hiding in their two rooms, one of them wandered round a lot. So considering my own game intelligence, I turned enhanced AI off!

I think Home used to work for look ahead centre screen, even in mouse mode. But that was not particularly useful. I assume float up and down will work when I Levitate? I think they are PgUP and PgDn.

In classic, when you cast a Touch-based spell from the spell book, the magicka was used to prime the spell and then you either cast at a target or cancelled with E and got the magicka back, but it counted as casting for a skill check. In Unity, the magicka is not used to prime the spell so can't be used for training, unless I manage to cast it at the ground, then I can Q to Recast and E to Cancel.

The Rusty Ogre Lodge is a small town not, too far from Privateer's Hold, with an Inn called The White Goblin Inn. Upstairs is a large room with beds and chests/footlockers and many of them contained Daedric weapons, and the Town Watch couldn't get up the stairs! Great fun! But this time, they came through the walls and killed me! Even MORE fun!

Cheers, I have to thank you for making this fantastic game look so awesome.

[Jay_H]

Well, you'll find that some things implemented in Daggerfall were ambiguous as to bug or feature. The Rusty Ogre Lodge is most definitely a bug (no one at Bethesda could have possibly approved big free lockers full of daedric equipment at level 1), so it's not really an issue for that to be omitted. Same with the training/casting issue you mention; a lot of these things are on a sliding scale between "intentional" and "accidental," and the devs had to make a lot of tough decisions about what to include. Some things are just bug fixes Much of the question is, "What would Daggerfall look like had they implemented their plans properly?"

[Consequence of Grace]

But how do you decide if it's a bug or a feature?

Or an Easter Egg?

In Morrowind, there is a dead adventurer in a mountain cave with a Daedric Dai-Katana and you can get it at very low level if you just run and jump fast, avoid being hit and get out quick. Sure, probably meant for higher levels to find, but once you know it's there...

Apparently, there were other locations in Daggerfall that gave free Daedric weapons, but I never found them. I'm not sure if there was Daedric armour available like that.

But I get the idea that you are making a beautiful world that is also free of bugs and has features that all work properly, so it's your call. I can't even get my head around the skill it must take. I suppose I could console weapons and gold in, but that would be cheating! If I grind it, I feel I earned it! LOL!

As for the spell training, spells cast on Self work and a Sorcerer can train like that at the Mage's Guild, get all their magicka replenished and repeat. There's never been an even, level playing field for all classes and skills.

EG, as you know, running and jumping everywhere and climbing up every wall and attempting every lock in town once trains those very easily. But a failed Pickpockets brings the guards.

Selling lots of items individually and talking to everyone Polite and Blunt improves PER skills. I think I got a few Stealth points by sneaking up behind Townsfolk in towns. I think it needs to have someone that could detect you, not necessarily a monster.

Casting spells over and over trains those. But weapon skills, you have to actually hit stuff that can hit back.

I think Backstabbing, Critical Strike, Dodging, Medical and languages are the hardest to train. But, as I say, it's your call. I would like to see Backstabbing work a bit more often, though!


I noticed a lot more differences than I mentioned in the OP. The informative tool tips and pop ups, the scrolling and zooming map etc. I can’t believe that Dodging protected the enemies instead of me and they just left it like that!

Two other differences I remembered:

None of the Signposts at the city gates say anything. I think they always said at least the name of the city. not a big deal, though.

I like to sell items individually to boost my Mercantile skill. So I’d click Select, item, Sell and press Y. Pressing Y no longer works so I have to click the YES button. It’s just a quality of life thing that made trading easier and faster.

I don't mean to quibble, though! Really, you’ve done awesome work with this thing!

[pango]

But how do you decide if it's a bug or a feature?
Or an Easter Egg?

That can be the result of reverse-engineering (understand how things worked and how that lead to a specific result), crossing with other information sources (has such feature been described or at least suggested in other official documentation, older releases,...), but also consistency with the rest of the world and impact on gameplay. Opinion can also changed if the community makes good cases one way or another.

I noticed a lot more differences than I mentioned in the OP. The informative tool tips and pop ups, the scrolling and zooming map etc. I can’t believe that Dodging protected the enemies instead of me and they just left it like that!

Two other differences I remembered:

None of the Signposts at the city gates say anything. I think they always said at least the name of the city. not a big deal, though.

In some releases of Daggerfall I think they also included news, similar to rumors feature. Some early game advertisement mentioned current political state of affair with neighbor regions, famines, epidemics,...
So if billboards are currently unused, I think that's mainly because nobody knows what billboards should be used for exactly, and how to make them useful gameplay-wise, and not be redundant with just asking commoners around.

I like to sell items individually to boost my Mercantile skill. So I’d click Select, item, Sell and press Y. Pressing Y no longer works so I have to click the YES button. It’s just a quality of life thing that made trading easier and faster.

I worked on better keyboard support, so maybe soon

If you're looking for differences, the most comprehensive source for now is here: viewtopic.php?f=4&t=1662

[Consequence of Grace]

Thanks again!

I wasn't so much looking for differences as such, I just wanted to say that I finally tried a build after following this project for over a year or more and it's as amazing as everyone says! I don't want to waste your time reporting bugs that aren't bugs etc, but I wanted to leave some feedback.

Cheers!

[mikeprichard]

In Privateers Hold it was almost impossible to find somewhere to rest. It's like the radius for determining the presence of enemies is several times bigger than normal and I was constantly interrupted when I finally DID find somewhere to rest.

Intermittent spawn rate is technically lower than classic in dungeons. The issue here seems to be that classic has trouble finding a clear spot to spawn enemies, and DFU doesn't, so the perception is that it's higher in DFU. The chance formulas here are modable if someone wants to adjust this.

This issue has been raised very often on the forums and in gameplay videos. Although it's been argued that classic was "bugged" in the sense that monsters that perhaps were intended to spawn during rest often didn't, by fixing this "bug", DFU has significantly changed the gameplay - not only its perception. Is this only mod territory from now on, or will another pass eventually be made to adjust the resting spawns to make them better match classic's actual behavior?

[Interkarma]

Yet actual testing shows that DFU's spawn rates are not significantly higher than classic. We're even using the same reverse engineered timings and chance formulas here.

Both versions converge on a spawn rate of roughly once every 6-8 hours - with the exception of cases where classic can't place random spawns at all. And for that, we have already adjusted dungeon spawn rates down by 20% compared to classic to give some relief.

But I don't agree that it's desirable to find "safe zones" to rest without interruption. That's what I keep trying to explain: classic doesn't have a lower spawn rate than DFU - it's either the same chance or zero chance. And it should never be zero. Resting in and around dungeons should be dangerous.

But we don't have to agree, that's why I added mod support for this. Refer to this topic for the formulas to override. At this time, nobody has created a mod for this. As you seem to feel strongly about this Mike, maybe that's your mod to create and share with everyone.

[Consequence of Grace]

Yet actual testing shows that DFU's spawn rates are not significantly higher than classic.

And yet, actually playing the game shows that they are very much higher. And you say they ARE higher, just not "significantly" higher?

How do you define "significantly"?

I bought the original CD in 1996 and use all the official patches and DOS BOX. I play Daggerfall several times a year, so it's not like I have failing memory from 20 years ago.


a) The radius in Unity for determining if a wandering monster is in range to prevent resting is MUCH much bigger than in Vanilla. In fact, the first Imp killed a rat in the next room, the other side of a wall, so maybe the collision or something is off? If you've just cleaned out a section of dungeon, there's no reason why it should not be safe for 2 or 3 hours to get your breath back. It's fine for Iron Man Mode and playing Dead is Dead.

b) The number of times I am interrupted while resting (6, 7, 8 times in a row until a rat kills me) does not make for a fun game and really is NOT how Vanilla has ever been since 1996. I have to have Regenerate Health in Darkness so I heal in 1 hour instead of 6 to 8.

Just saying.

Maybe the spawn rate needs to be reduced a bit more? Every 8-12 hours, or 8-10 instead of 6 to 8, since DFU is able to add monsters in circumstances when Vanilla could not? Even 7-9, whatever.

This is an absolutely fantastic project, so I'm really not attacking it or you, but when my actual experience in-game tells me something, you can't just say the numbers don't support my actual experience.

You might as well say:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WOdjCb4LwQY