IDEAS FOR RYZOM

I want to enumerate the technical and Lore reasons why a tribe could not steal Kara AntiGravity technology and sell it to players with a healing or offensive (or forage) Mastery.
Rendering a player at a specified height is not the problem, I want to find out what are the "Actual" problems associated with flying:

• Lore: Players are meant to experience Atys from the ground but after they get to level 250 it might be cool to fly?
• Technical: Collisions are handled at ground level - disable collisions where the player is above the object (players minimum Zpos is greater than the top of the bounds (skeleton?) of the object being consider for collisions)?
• Technical: The altitude of the player needs to be added to the "Properties" of the player so other players render them at the correct height.
• Technical: what will happen to shadows??
• Technical: Boundaries - I suggest that a flying player will be affected by strong downdrafts as they near boundaries, the player will be forced to the ground and prevented from crossing the boundary. Crossing a 2cm high boundary might be nice.
• Technical: Can a player fly when indoors - how to prevent a player from descending through a roof? Can the collision system force the players altitude to increase when they try to descend into an area where a collision is detected.
• Lore: What is more appropriate "AntiGrav Boots" or a "Flying Mount"?
• Social: When a players account reaches level 250 can his "Alts" fly also?
• Technical: Animations need changing. Do the boots need any particular visual properties - rocket exhaust flames or a glow or sparks...
• Technical: how is the roof height defined in PR and how is the "upper levels" defined so we can handle or prevent collisions at high altitudes?
• Monetary: Can unsubscribed level 250 players still fly?
• Technical: Can flying players be attacked by magic.
• Technical: Can flying players be attacked by melee.
• Technical: Can flying players use magic to attack NPC's or mobs on the ground?
• Technical: Can flying players use melee to attack NPC's or mobs on the ground?
• Technical: Can non-flying players initiate AntiGrav during a fight?

I've never seen a Karavan NPC flying, only their vessels...

Zorai people know also some levitating technology, but it seems not mobile...

The flying mobs cannot really fly. They must avoid obstacles like ground mobs...

There was the flyner events which provide flying experience -but in imagination only-.

...

You demonstrate a lot of enthusiasm about the game !
But you'll have only disillusionment with those kind of ideas.

Know the game and its community better, and start with simple improvement projets. Are you a developper ?

Ryzom was never designed with a z axis in mind. Let's say you overcome the technical difficulties with collision, data structures, network code, animations, models etc., who is going to re-balance the whole game?

If a player can jump around, mobs should be able to do the same. If you can fly, mobs should be able to do so aswell. While the idea of a kincher jumping at me down from a cliff is very thrilling, it will lead to a huge set of problems which need to be solved. Simply adding god mode and bunny hopping won't do.

You should never implement a substantial feature as an afterthought imho.

arc

I am a retired C# developer but i have never used c++ at all.


I looked through the forums for requests that never got implemented and I started to extend the SPropVisualABC structures to allow the storing of multiple models and colors of underwear (as a way of learning c++). It became apparent that the restriction of 256 models of armor is currently a problem so I decided to raise that to 65535 models of armor. That project is taking me into many layers of the game where the xPos and yPos are used so I also tested the addition of an AntiGravity property at the same time.


My characters on my test server are quite happy using their 'antigravity boots' (but i can't figure out the keyboard input to change height yet) so i thought that someone might want to do a Ryzome Core game (like 'Jupiter Ascending') that has Antigravity Boots. Hence my questions in the Ryzom Game forum in case anyone here wanted to fly.

Both good points.

Any addition needs to be thought about before it is implemented but that can't prevent us from making additions.

My highest level is 115 so I have never seen the end game environment but I was hoping that restricting flying to level 250 players would not unbalance the game much.

If a flying player cannot enter combat and a player in combat cannot enter flying mode then the impact is less. 

The downdraft that forces players to the ground at boundaries should prevent any problems with maps that are not contiguous with each other.

I will continue to fly my characters around Silan to find out what are the technical issues but I thought I should start a dialog with the community about the Lore and how to avoid breaking anything.

The game is not and will never be designed for OOC stuff like that.
There is far much thing to take in mind than you think and making a post like that here won't really help you figure it out that easily.

Game design is a job on it's own and stuff like that will take much more brainstorming and experience than a forum post can really give.

Most of game that "allow" flying rarely offer a real flying stuff and are made from the ground with it in mind.

If you really want stuff like that you should better thing about starting your own game.

Ryzom is mainly made with roleplay in mind not stuff that just seam "cool", for that there is a lot of game which offer it.

Swimming should be more something we could think for ryzom, since it's something than was planned.

Adding jump/fly on ryzom and it's game over.

Even mounted fight could be a better idea to add something new.
Or making use of all the already made magic animation, facial animation for emote making mont more interresting against teleporter,
making all those planned stuff like training, taming, painting, cooking, fishing, resistance training, submarine fight and exploration, ...

But clearly all those stuff are just to much step forward, there is more work to do that would unstuck thing for ryzom core but that aren't directly adding visible stuff in game but still are needed before really be able to think about big gemaplay change, like cleaning the code or making asset workflow more viable.

And for the topic the main reason would be that karavan would not allow that to happen and would probably just kill people stealing tech they won't share and kami would just don't care about homin having cool gadget.

And don't forget the primary ennemy of gamedesign: players.
Fly will as everything else be using to destroy game mechnic and cheat.
And that is something you have to keep in mind when thinking about stuff like that if you don't want all your effort be wasted in a blink of an eye.

In my opinion:

1: That is the way the game was designed.

2: If the game allowed flying, it would allow jumping, and that would result in hopping around like a rabbit on caffeine and cocaine, and that is not a dignified thing.

2a: If the game was to allow flying, then we would be able to fall...Aaaahahhhh!!!!! {SPLAT}

Hi Nubios!
It is exciting to see your enthusiasm to contribute substance to the game!
The Devs have regular meetings all players can attend in internet relay chat. The next meeting is August 21 at 21:30 hrs.
Check the Forums under "Ryzom Forge" to find the link. Plus, on your home page it shows the date. Here is the link on it: http://forge.ryzom.com/wiki/Main_Page
This appears to go to a dead page, but just go to 'Navigation>main page' and you will be at the main ryzom forge page in wiki. You might also be able to access it on rocketchat, I'm not sure if they changed it or included it there.
Hope you can attend because they discuss all things they need help on and sounds like you can contribute! They have a number of projects they are always working on.
I have been a bit out of the loop due to work, so I am not sure what they are up to these days, but they are always busy in the background! Maybe you can help with one of their projects. I am not a programmer, so I cannot in that respect, but I will try in other areas. Thanks for your help!

Thanks everyone

I will continue to work on the bugs and check it into a branch when I am done.

It sounds like it may only be of use to the events team where one of the event characters could use this ability.

I will think about making birds fly a bit higher also.