Q : Will there be any increased functionality in the DM client as far as facilitating DM’s handling of more players, NPC’s groups, spawn etc ? And will one be able to spawn and de-spawn placables in the DM client ?
R : The simplest answer I can give to that is that the DM client is currently undergoing a heavy review and a heavy rewrite and we are taking a lot of input from the community on how they want to use it, and what’s the best way for them to use it, and features they would like to see in it. Specifics about the DM client
other than what in does in NWN1 ... I can’t go on into to many more details at this time.
Q : And more information will be available around the time of the release ?
R : Absolutely (*2
).
Q : Can we scribe scrolls on all levels and not just on the 2 or 3 pre-made levels as in NWN1 ? and will we be able to craft items with different levels on them set be toolset Vs preset ?
R : That a good question I'm sorry I don’t have the answer to it.
Q : Will the creation of static feats be possible aka : can you make feats like weapon focus for new weapons.
R : Short of how they were moding it through NWN1 ; To add new feats ? The answer is no. A least not through the toolset which is what I think they are looking for. So think the answer is no.
Q : What classes, PrC’s, subraces, skills and monsters are definitely in ?
R: Ok so, some of the new classes we’ve added for NWN2 include, the Warlock as a base class, the duelist as a prestige class, the NWN
nine which actually is three prestige class, there’s a Warder for the fighter oriented class, a Magus for the spellcasting oriented class and the Agent for the sneaky-crafty cunning rogue-type class. There’s the divine champion, the arcane trickster and there is so more that are slipping my mind at the moment. New skills ? Was that a part of what you asked for ? new skills ? [yes] I just know we have the skills from 3.5 (I don’t know if there’s) It’s the 3.5 skills. There’s a lot of new feats, a lot of new monsters. Some of the new monster’s have been already been talked about like there’s the bone spider. [I’m sorry did they mean new for like “not DnD creatures” or did they mean like … I’m not sure I understand the contest of that question]. Ok so some of the monsters I think that have been announced have been you know like, there’s various dragons, zombies, ghast, ghouls, mummy, goblins, orcs, trolls, balors, other type that I think there’s call slads. Trying to remind some of the other creatures there are so many I just like trying to pick in a lot.
Q: How easy will it be for members to implement their own ?
R : Obviously they can customize the templates, and make new templates through the toolset. As far as adding new ones, that depends on how adapted they are on like creating new models, and the implementing and the using of a the Granny, using of new meshes, textures.
Taking existing content and changing it into template through the toolset is of course doable fort creature you know you just can just modify the template or create a new template.
Creating new classes ? not accessible through the toolset but I know the community would probably figure out a way to do it on their own they did it for NWN1. […/…] Skills ? probably not at all. Monsters again adding it to the toolset and again they can [implement – I’m sorry they can] import new meshes and models that they’ve done using correctly Granny system. And I believe one of our plans is at some point was to release a model exporter to helm them. I don’t know what the deadline or the schedule is but I know it’s on our plan.
Q : Can you tell use percentage-wise how complete or incomplete is now.
R: This is just my opinion of the game I’m not sure what the … [Voix feminine : the game is actually schedule for fall] Correct, it’s September release, the next 2 to 3 month are just gonna be a lot polish, features, bugfix and stuff like that. […/…] I know my schedule, I don’t know everybody else’s schedule but it is due for a September release I think we are way on track.
Q: Will there be any actual discernable difference between vision-types this time around or will they be all the same again. [what you mean by vision-types ?] [I believe it’s the way you see the world … I think … Fhe way fearghus answered it last time is that you can switch vision type but … the difference like, on the screen wasn’t apparent] I’m actually not sure about that. I mean I know that we have a lot of tools that we’ve exposed so that [like] … a creative moder could say [like] I have this level and I wanna play as a night Elf (WoW spotted
) with special vision and then they could use the various graphics option we have and sort of , for like a specific module they could maybe like adjust color of the level so like, I don’t know Night elf has nightvision so you can give like more red or something like that… a creative community, a creative moder could do something like that …as far as actually looking through them, it’s not a first person point of view game so I’m not really sure what they mean by vision other than that.
Q : Are Archmages and Shadow adept in there PrC’s and are Genasi in the subraces.
R : The Genasis were cut out, but that might, you know the future is wide open. Shadow adept ? I don’t believe this in … and I don’t believe the Archmage is in either. But we have added. I know why they want the Archmage, we have added a lot of PrC’s for casters that allow them to boost up there spell level and have all the extra … I think in NWN1 – even though it was a great game – I don’t think there was many good PrCs for casters. So that why we’ve added like the Divine champion, the Arcane tricksters and … some of the other one that are actually slipping my mind right now. We could actually pull up character generation %#$?? And go through em. I don’t think all of em are listed but can at least show you the one that are there for this press release.
Q : And will animal companions and familiar be close to what the book says ?
R: Yes !
Q : Will there be an improved familiar feat
R : The IF feat is still on the table, I’m not sure what it’s final result will be that’s not my area, that’s a design decision. The familiars now operate closer to what they are in the PnP, they are small animals, they are not tanks. They can be killed, you take a penalty when then die … but they don’t die permanently because we thought that affected gameplay to negatively. The animal companion are still very stout animals like the boar, the bear, the wolf, there’s a giant spider … the familiar are things like a weasel, a little beetle, a rabbit, a cat, a bat, a rat. There’s a lot, so the familiars now when you tap them out, they are vulnerable, they can be killed. But while they’re out they give you bonuses to whatever it is that familiar does.
Q : Will Bioware be aggressively supporting community efforts to provide solutions to features and will there be some sort of MSTN access for specific community developers ?
R : I’m not sure how much Bioware will be involved with that, I’m not saying they’re not, I’m not sure. As far as … they continue to support for the application, the toolset, new content…I mean that’s definitely something that Atari, Obsidian and I’m sure Bioware everybody wants some supporting, we want to keep pushing the boundaries with, and adding new content …. Oh the MSTN type acces like a wikiepedia or something … I’m not sure what the plan is, there’s talk of, we have wiki internaly and there’s also the NWN1 wiki that already exist… I’m not sure how those are gonna handled like they’re gonna merge, they gonna become two separate things. I’m not sure. But there is plan to of course release support in some sort of accessible format like that.
Q : What is your view on the development of larger PW such as ALFA in terms of area numbers, and will it be possible, with the existing hardware on the market today, will it likely become more possible with improved hardware over the years or does the 64bit encryption means we’re kindda stuck ? Are there any stream lining tricks you can advise us ?
R : Well the first thing I can tell you is that … the game engine … because as fare as the game engine is concerned everything is pixel-based and not polygon-based, it will all scale with new hardware, as the hardware comes out the game’s gonna get faster and faster, and better and better and… you gotta remember like 3 years ago not everybody had broadband or something like that, nowadays broadband is a lot more prevalent … as time goes on I just think the community is gonna become more persistent world friendly … I’m sorry the “application”, the toolset and the game will become more and more persistent world friendly … obviously because there’s so much more to the game it will require severely stronger hardware, it will require larger pipes a bigger broadband access to play the game… it is still playable from the client point of view I believe … I don’t wanna say cause I’m not sure with the lowest level as far %#$?? Goes will you be able to play it … […/…] The one thing I want to let them know is that as the persistent world comes online to NWN2, we plan and we want to continue supporting them, giving them things that they want. […/…] It’s been a top priority of Feargus and Darren who’s the Obsidian producer and of course Josh and all the programmers that we want the get the persistent world in the community onboard with NWN2 … make it as easy and as accessible for them as possible but it is still… it’s a cutting edge game and it will require stronger hardware there’s no other way around that…
Q : Like everything else is practically open source it’s constantly being developed it seems…
R : Well it’s the community I thinks keeps a goin’ cause they’re the one who are like, making the mods and people download, you know once they beat our campaign or beat NWN1’s campaign there the one who will keep the interest in the game level high… and you know they also give us the most feedback and they are biggest fan so we wanna do as much as we can for them. That’s certainly our goal. How much that’s gonna happen and how fast that will happen ? Probably not fast enough it never is … but it’s definitely the point.