Combat Arena (WIP?)

[stoffe]

I've recently been playing with putting together a Combat Simulation Arena for TSL. It's a bit like a minigame that has no connection to the rest of the game.

 

It's an arena where you can:

* Practice fighting against a variety of opponents in Party vs Enemy Group fights, 1 on 1 Duels and Gauntlet matches.

* Watch AI controlled groups of opponents fight it out in the arena.

* Fight in some competition matches where you win credits if you are victorious.

* Bet on few AI vs AI matches, winning credits if the team you bet on wins.

 

It's starting to come together somewhat nicely functionality-wise, but I'd appreciate some feedback when it comes to the difficulty and balance of the arena opponents, and determine if it's worth releasing.

 

If you want to try it out, you can download the current test version here. Don't download if you haven't finished the game once yet, since it contains spoilers in the form of some opponents you can fight.

 

The fights are mostly fairly high level, so I would assume you need at least level 15 characters to have any chance of victory, but that's just a guess. Some of the bigger "bosses" have non-standard special abilities and powers as well, so be prepared for the unexpected.

 

If you want to try it out, install the module linked to above, then go to the nearest workbench and build yourself an "Combat Simulator" armband. Equip it on the Exile and use it, and you'll be taken to the Arena. To exit the arena, use the armband again and you'll be taken back to where you activated the arena initially.

 

Use the computer console next to the arena entrance to set up practice matches and watch fights. Talk to the Hutt in the big room to fight for credits and bet on fights. The Hutt currently only has 5 matches to fight in and 5 matches to bet on, but it's a start at least. The console has much more options to play with, and allows you to pick opponents and game type yourself.

 

If you've tried it out, please let me know what you thought of the difficulty level of the opponents (and what level your character was). If you find any bugs of have other suggestions, please let me know as well.

 

EDIT: First version has been released. See separate thread.

[TheProphet]

Will this be at all like Kotor Arena for Kotor 1?

[stoffe]

Will this be at all like Kotor Arena for Kotor 1?

 

No idea, never tried it. I haven't done much modding for KotOR1 and didn't find this place until after I got TSL, so I haven't tried any KotOR1 mods.

[TheProphet]

It was actually pretty awsome, was the first edited module ever, taught me how to mod. HeHe

[Lorden Darkblade]

Sounds very interesting stoffe!

I'm really going to download it and try it out

[Jeff]

Sounds great stoffe! I'm glad somebody is doing this, I have often thought how it would be cool to have a mod like this

[Emperor Devon]

This is better than the arena mod for KOTOR I! Great work!

[stoffe]

I noticed that I had forgotten to assign the modified AI scripts to a few of the Arena creatures, and I have fixed the missing text describing the game types in the Arena Control Console.

 

Forgot the customary screenshots as well it seems.

Screenshot 1 - Betting on a Fight

Screenshot 2 - Watching a fight

Screenshot 3 - Watching a fight through the cameras

Screenshot 4 - Fighting in the arena

 

If anyone is interested, I have uploaded this fixed version, the link is in the first post in this thread.

 

If you've already installed the first version you don't need to run the installer again (though it should work just as well if you do), it's enough to copy st_arena.mod from the tslpatchdata folder into the Modules folder located within your game folder.

 

I'm still interested in hearing how others find the arena opponents balanced, and if anyone is interested in this mod being released. Seems like it has been done before after all, as Gsccc pointed out.

 

@Uchiha Itachi, DarthMoeller, Emperor Devon: Thanks. Let me know what you think when you've had the opportunity to try it out.

[Darth333]

Look pretty good as always I didn't have a chance to try yet it but I'll do it this weekend.

 

I think everyone is interested in having this mod released! The arena mod that everyone is talking about was made for Kotor 1 only (one of the first kotor mods ever) but the site is down now so it's no longer available... a few other similar mods were done afterwards.

 

I am working on a "combat zone" mod too (can't really call what I'm doing an arena) but it will be very different.

 

I think this kind of mod never gets old and no one will complain about having too many fighting zones in the galaxy

[Tupac Amaru]

Great work, as usual. You surely didn't understate when you said it was fairly high level. The last two fights posed a real challenge without being unfair and it took me several attempts. My character was level 23 and didn't have any of the High Level Force powers yet.

 

I ran into a weired glitch once during the duel fight. Even though I had no more health left and was defeated, the fight wouldn't end.

 

Sion fully healed himself three more times and dealt damage in the hundreds.

So, I could just continued attacking and won in the end.

 

Compared to that duel, I found the following epic battle easier, though still challenging.

 

How about having some spectators watching the fights? Just for the atmosphere.

[stoffe]

I ran into a weired glitch once during the duel fight. Even though I had no more health left and was defeated, the fight wouldn't end.

 

Hmm, did you have a bunch of health regeneration equipment on? I guess that could cause it, since the arena controller only checks the player health every few seconds, and if you've healed back up from 1 by then it will just continue.

 

I should probably bump the defeat condition up to 10 VP left or something, even if it's a little unfair it will mostly resolve that problem.

 

Would the fight have been classified as unwinnable if you hadn't run into that problem? Perhaps I should use a less powerful opponent for the contest duel...

 

How about having some spectators watching the fights? Just for the atmosphere.

 

I was considering it, but decided against it since I figured extra creatures and models would cause unnessecary slowdowns during the matches with many combatants. The game gets plenty to draw already if you have 12 creatures fighting, lobbing grenades and using force powers. And the low-res commoner models are so ugly.

 

Perhaps it isn't noticable if you have a fast computer though. I could make it an option where you can decide if you want an audience or not.

 

Thanks for the feedback, I appreciate it.

[Tupac Amaru]

Hmm, did you have a bunch of health regeneration equipment on? I guess that could cause it, since the arena controller only checks the player health every few seconds, and if you've healed back up from 1 by then it will just continue.

Yes, my robe had a biorestorative underlay, so that was probably the reaseon. Is it possible to modify the Exile's Damaged script? I once did a similar check for low hit points and found this event worked best. I only modified the opponents events, though, not that of the Exile.

 

Perhaps it isn't noticable if you have a fast computer though. I could make it an option where you can decide if you want an audience or not.

Yes, I think that would be nice.

[General Kenobi]

Seems like it has been done before after all, as Gsccc pointed out.

Well my 2 bits??? Who cares? I'll take something you do over another ANY DAY Stoffe

 

Play Testing Tonight & I'll post later on with direct feedback BUT in the meantime I'll just say: "Fantastic job Stoffe as always you've come up with a KILLER idea for a new area.

 

Keep up the GREAT work as we all LOVE your mods

 

General Kenobi

[General Kenobi]

I'll start off by staying this is without a doubt the kewlest mod yet for opening up more fun in the game. Right up there with USM

 

It was really cool to be able to load up custom fight scenes where you pick who fights who. I also liked that you left in some lockers and such to give the pickpockets and theives something to do when not getting their butt kicked. The multiple cameras and their viewing pros and cons make for a killer "watch" kinda aspect. If one shot doesn't suit you just switch from a whole list.

 

I really like the "random" duel option that lets you be suprised with every duel as you never know who your fighting against.

 

Bastila way to easy to beat with only Master Flurry with a Level 10 Character

Darth Traya provides a VERY well balanced and "suprising" fight. "Where is she? Where is she"

Darth Nihilus was very easy to beat compared to Traya I didn't even have a chance to see anyforce powers from him.

Darth Sion provided a VERY good fight and he will really wear you down if you don't watch. Love it

Minor Sith Lord was a bit easy and quick

Fighting Darth Nihilus' zombies is a real challenge as well in the gauntlet

 

This is what I've seen so far and I love it.

 

I like the new merchant as well (even the existing game is almost devoid of them).

 

I give this sucker a big ole' thumbs up & a 10/10 Just for being kewl as heck Fantastic job there Stoffe. To be a beta it doesn't appear to have bug one and is fun as heck to play .

 

 

General Kenobi

[stoffe]

Bastila way to easy to beat with only Master Flurry with a Level 10 Character

Darth Traya provides a VERY well balanced and "suprising" fight. "Where is she? Where is she"

Darth Nihilus was very easy to beat compared to Traya I didn't even have a chance to see anyforce powers from him.

Darth Sion provided a VERY good fight and he will really wear you down if you don't watch. Love it

Minor Sith Lord was a bit easy and quick

Fighting Darth Nihilus' zombies is a real challenge as well in the gauntlet

 

All arena opponents should scale with your level since they use the game's autobalance feature. It's possible that some of the "bosses" get too little Vitality to be a challenge if you play against them with a very low level character with good weapons and equipment.

 

The problem with the autobalancer is that they get insane amounts of health at higher levels if you boost them too far to avoid making them one-hit kills at lower levels. I have only tested with a level 30 character (the only one I have available) and for her Nihilus had around 1600 Vitality. Took a while to take down.

 

I'm using a tweaked autobalance.2da though so the enemies probably have a lot more Vitality in my game than they would have otherwise. Hmm... might be a good idea remove that file from Override when I'm testing.

 

Are you using any difficulty boosting mods that use the autobalance.2da file, or did you play with standard game difficulty? Also, which difficulty did you have the game set to in the Options?

 

I'll see what I can do about too easy enemies at low levels. Perhaps artificially boost their Vitality if it comes out too low...

 

Thanks for the feedback and comments, I appreciate it.

[General Kenobi]

Game options Hard and Hardcore MOD installed as well

 

And your more than welcome. It's a GREAT mod and I'll definately be using it

 

General Kenobi

[Jeff]

I just tried it out and it was loads of fun for the first fiew battles but when I faced the 50 sith, i couldn't even attack because, even with being a level 20 jedi master, with force immunity and wisdom 20, they would cast fear, force whirlwind, and all this other stuff, over and over and over, and I couldn't even attack! Something is not right if a Jedi Master cannot withstand those force powers.

 

But besides that, a very, very cool mod and I look forward to its completion.

[stoffe]

Game options Hard and Hardcore MOD installed as well

 

Hmm, if it's set to Hard I'll have to make sure it is hard, but it's probably best to wait for a few more opinions first before I make too drastic changes to the specifics of some opponents.

 

The Hardcore mod will have no effect on the Arena combatants though. They don't use the game's generic creature AI, but a specially tweaked variant of it to (I hope) make them a bit more agressive and a bit less stupid. But autobalance.2da tweaks will still affect their difficulty (vitality, defense, saving throws, damage output etc).

 

EDIT: Oops, there was quite a difference with and without my modified autobalance.2da that I had forgotten about... Without it Bastila was level 26 and had 562 VP... putting the file back she became level 35 and had 897 VP. Seems like I have some major UTC tweaking to do to fix everyone's Vitality and level...

[stoffe]

I just tried it out and it was loads of fun for the first fiew battles but when I faced the 50 sith, i couldn't even attack because, even with being a level 20 jedi master, with force immunity and wisdom 20, they would cast fear, force whirlwind, and all this other stuff, over and over and over, and I couldn't even attack! Something is not right if a Jedi Master cannot withstand those force powers.

 

Well, people were constantly complaining on the forums before that there were so few force users in TSL, and the few that were there rarely ever used their powers. So I upped the use of Force Powers a bit in the arena AI and made them a bit less stupid in how they picked powers, but perhaps I went a bit over the top with it.

 

I usually start out as a Sentinel so I haven't noticed much annoyance from Stun, Fear and Paralysis when testing. Those class feats are very nice. I'll see what I can do about that, perhaps reduce the frequency that the heavy force users are spawned in favor of the saber-focused ones in that Gauntlet match...

[stoffe]

I have just uploaded a a new version here which will hopefully fix some of the issues that have been posted about. If you already have installed the mod previously, you only need to copy st_arena.mod to your Modules folder, like the last time.

 

@DarthMoeller: I adjusted the gauntlet match a bit to increase the odds the primarily saber-fighting opponents spawning. It should hopefully reduce the number of heavy force users spawning in that gauntlet match (though it's still pretty much a matter of luck since it picks the enemies semi-randomly).

 

@Tupac Amaru: I added some scenery spectator NPCs in the spectator galleries. They'll do little more than stand there and cheer when a match is on. You can speak to one of them and ask them to leave if they cause slowdowns with intensive fights.

 

@General Kenobi: I boosted the level and hitpoints of all arena combatants. Hopefully they should last a bit longer now. Let me know what you think about their current strength so I haven't overdone it.

 

Other than that, a few bugs I noticed have been fixed, and I added a "jukebox" function to the Arena Control Console where you can pick which battle music is played when a fight is on.

 

As before I am very interested to hear how you find the strength and balance of the opponents. Other suggestions are also appreciated.

[stoffe]

In case someone cares to try it, I've uploaded another test version.

 

In this version I've done a major rewrite of how creatures select targets to attack in the combat AI. Instead of just picking one at random like the standard AI does, they will now make a quick assessment of all nearby enemies before they pick one they prefer. They'll try to finish off those who are badly injured now for instance, rather than leave them around to deal unnessecary damage to them. They should also focus more on the enemy they've currently picked and only choose another if the situation warrants it.

 

I've also done some other minor tweaks and optimizations of the combat AI and creature abilities. As such, if you find any strange behavior from the creatures fighting in the arena, please let me know so I can look into it.

 

On another note, if the modified creature AI does seem to work well and there is interest I could put up a more generic, stand-alone variant of it that will work for all creatures in the game, like the previous (mostly party-related) AI tweak I uploaded before.

 

Sorry about all the posts about different versions the last few days. I'll probably not post more versions until I hear some feedback on how well things work currently, and if the opponents are too hard/too easy/good enough. A bit hard to do meaningful testing when the opponents constantly change.

[General Kenobi]

Just downloaded the newest trial version and I'll be playing through it over a couple of days & I'll post my thoughts and such after playthrough Thanks a MILLION Stoffe this is really KEWL my friend

 

I do have one sorta request if you don't mind. How hard would it be to gain access to the Combat Arena with ChAiNz.2da's Hack Pad???

 

I know RedHawke has allowed his RedHawke Correction Armbands functions to be accessed (as long as you have his armband in your inventory)??? It would just be cool to go to our new area you've made for us via the pad as well since it doesn't have to be on your body but just in your pack inventory.

 

Anywho, I'll post more after some playthrough

 

General Kenobi

[yohan]

~

Great Mod Stoffe! This was exactly what I was looking for...

 

Unfortantly my PC/NPC's are too weak and I got my butt handed to me by the droids... x_x

 

Also when we watch the fights between the NPC's you could make it possible to actually go into the ring? (Maybe a reward after defeating everyone)

 

I'll comment again after I gain some more levels...

~

[stoffe]

I do have one sorta request if you don't mind. How hard would it be to gain access to the Combat Arena with ChAiNz.2da's Hack Pad???

(snip)

It would just be cool to go to our new area you've made for us via the pad as well since it doesn't have to be on your body but just in your pack inventory.

 

Well, from the perspective of the arena mod it wouldn't be that hard, you'd just need to modify the armband script to not check that the armband is equipped on the Exile. (I do this check to prevent the problems that would arise if you entered the Arena without the Exile in the party. Like from G0T0's yacht or the Dxun Jungle/Tomb, or any other time when you "solo" another party member.)

 

How hard it would be on the Hack pad part you'll have to ask ChAiNz.2da since I have no idea. (While the hackpad sounds nice I already have a rather extensive Debug Helper force power, so I haven't gotten around to test the hack pad yet.)

 

 

Unfortantly my PC/NPC's are too weak and I got my butt handed to me by the droids... x_x

 

Also when we watch the fights between the NPC's you could make it possible to actually go into the ring?

 

The droid group you fight for the Hutt? What level was your character, and do you have any mod installed that uses a autobalance.2da in your override?

 

Why do you want to go into the arena during a spectator match? Doesn't seem to safe to let spectators in where grenades, force powers and blaster bolts are flying around. And if it's on one of the matches you can bet on you could interfere with the fight to tilt odds in your favor.

 

 

Thanks for the feedback both of you.

[TW4000]

Where are the dlg files?

Because I'm a german and have the german version of TSL and without converting the dlg files I can't read the dialogs. Can you help me?

 

PS: sry if my english is not the best.