Iris2.de

I am curious to know, are there plans to support Stygian Abyss content in Iris? I see it on the TODO list but it's a long list and I was wondering how serious you are.

The 3d client was officially discontinued just before KR, therefore Stygian Abyss lacks the sort of models that came with previous expansions. There's also a load of new tilework and of course things like flight and the race ability books.

It's not all bad news though. I think this could be an opportunity for Iris2 to really shine. Many people, including a friend who does 3d artwork for my projects, balk at the idea of gargoyles having a completely seperate weapon list. To a degree the armor restrictions make sense given the size and shape of winged gargoyles but they aren't that much bigger and a strong human should be able to wield gargish weaponry. Likewise the gargs may find human weapons a bit small and delicate but they are perfectly useable. Wingless gargoyles are about the size and build of a stout male human and have always seemed to share gear with their winged cousins. The only reason for the weapon restriction is sprite incompatibility, an absurd reason in this day and age.

Iris2 can easily use the attachment point system in 3d mode to handle weapons. I've used this before in Iris and the old 3d client to equip skeletons and giantkin. 2d mode poses more problems but if the client were configured to support it, I don't see why you couldn't switch the displayed sprite animation based on body the same way paperdoll sprites for some items change based on gender. 2d mode isn't my major concern though.

From what I understand you need artists and an art manager. I have at least one skilled devoted artist and would be happy to do the management. I am a novice programer/skilled scripter though I have enough projects and wouldn't want to get heavily involved in the code. However, if you guys are planning to support SA, me and my friends stand ready to help with the art.

We have a streamlined (ie as low poly as I could convince my artist friend to make it) rotworm model that just needs animations so far but if you guys are into this I'll talk to my friend about more stuff. As a 3d modeller he's gotten very frustrated with the limitations of the sprite system and would be eager to help finish this 3d client. Non-Stygian Abyss artwork is also in order since a full list of models is needed for a complete Iris2. Beyond copying EA content, new racial models with equipability (wingless garg, orc, goblin, naga, dwarf, fairy, etc.) are a priority for my team as well some more monstrous creatures from the old Ultima series that still won't have made it in as of SA. 2d animations for the 2d mode can also be captured from the models.

So if you guys are into this I'll start planning, if not I guess I'll just hope for the with the classic client.

hi !

is there a freeshard that supports stygian abyss and can be used for testing ?
otherwise it'll be hard to test since the server/shard needs to support it too, and you can't connect to the original osi servers with iris.

what's also needed is documentation about the network protocol changes for stygian abyss, for example the source code of the server/shard modifications would be good to read.

also if iris should be able to load stygian abyss datafiles, there has to be documentation for them, we have to rely on the uo community to come up with that.

overall i'd say the uo community first needs to develop serverside-support and document the datafiles before we can make an attempt to support the new stygian abyss content. the vetus-mundus shard is already experimenting with stygian abyss and allows stygian abyss clients to connect for a closed group of betatesters.

current priority for iris is rather performance improvement and usability (especially a ingame dialog for setting hotkeys)

depending on what you want from stygian abyss it might be already possible by modding iris, and without needing the stygian abyss client data if you want to make the 3d models yourself anyway :

the iris walkcode can be changed to allow "flying" for certain playerbodies, but the server needs to support it too.

Making gargole bodies available to players and attaching weapons to them is also possible, see
http://iris2.de/index.php/CharacterModelOverride

There could be. Apparently the SA client can log into Sphere if decrypted and I assume it would log to RunUO as well. I work with Sphere so we have to wait on official updates but contrary to popular belief they tend to be good at keeping up with minor changes, it's getting in major features that takes forever. I'd bet basic support for SA packets and such is in Sphere in a month or two, but they'll leave it to shard admins to script all the actual behavoir.

I did find a Russia server that has apparently already partially reverse engineered SA and has partial support and a relatively up to date packet list. http://ruosi.org/packetguide/index.xml

As far as client data, I believe the Classic client has not changed radically and map data and tile art would still be usable. InsideUO and Fiddler are currently haphazard but they are at least partially capable of reading it so it can't be too far gone.

I am not at all against performance improvement and I'm not asking for huge changes, just support for the flight commands and other client additions and knowing that my models will work how I want them to.

ok i haven't played around with the stygian abyss client and since i'm mostly under linux that is a bit troublesome, but i think we can work something out if you help me with that part =)

a) flight : how from a players perspective ?
As far as i know gargoyles can fly somehow. i don't know much more about how.
Could you please describe a bit how flying works from a players perspective ? what kind of terrains can you fly over and is there a key to lift/land or do you just move over the terrain like you could walk over it ?

b) gargoyle bodyids
we'd need a list of all gargoyle bodyids, both male and female, you can see them in iris by pointing the mouse at them and looking at the bottom line, for a human male it says artid=0x0190=400

c) gargoyle flight : test server
could you organize a test account on one of the servers where the stygian abyss client works ?
send me a forum pm with login-server-ip, port, username and password please.
If possible with full spellbooks for any new magic systems (mysticism?)

d) "...just support for the flight commands and other client additions" what else is new ? could you make a list please ?

e) you mentioned "race ability books", could you give us a short description of how those are used (like bushido/ninjitsu spellbook or differently ?)
and a screenshots of each page ?

f) "...and knowing that my models will work how I want them to"
could you please describe in detail what you need here that isn't in iris already ? maybe we can work something out =) also one possibility for 2d would be to use 3d models in 2d mode directly.
I'd suggest using the ogre.mesh format for newly created models (see CharacterModelOverride) rather than the granny format of the original uo data, which is old and far more limited (material...).

a) I haven't done this yet myself but my understanding is that you open the race ability book (like the combat maneuvers book) and activate the flight ability. You become effectively mounted and can also cross certain specific "fly over" areas in the new map. An option for servers to support the more radical sort of flight you mentioned as well would be nice.

b) Roger

c) I'll see what I can do. I only know of closed servers so far but I might be able to get into one. If not I will try and code my own.

d) The race book. In addition to activating flight it provides descriptions of passive racial abilities. This would ideally be customizable on the server end. Need to look more at how this is structured client and packet wise. This book opens up a world of possibilities for special ability interfaces.

e) More like the combat maneuver book. See above.

f) Wow, porting to 2d directly would rock for equipment animations. Mostly I was just concerned because the link specifically said it doesn't work with players or equipment but if that's possible but trickier or could be made possible I'm fine. Like I said, I really want to abuse 3d for equipping different creatures and adding races. And yes, we'd be using .mesh over the granny format.[/code]

Oh, here's a link to some screen shots from that Russian shard I mentioned. http://ruosi.org/forum/2-41-1

Ok since I can not read Russian, I would like to know if this server software is available. Our educational project could really benefit from some of the new things in SA such as the throwing skills.

No, he seems to something of a jerk. He worked with those who decompiled RunUO before it was open source and now hypocritically won't give out his own software (as if users of RunUO had much to do with their dev team). Honestly Sphere is now only a couple steps behind so he can keep his shard for all I care.

As of yesterday Sphere support for 7.0.0 is basic. The racial book shows up, mobiles can be scripted, but new account features don't work just yet. Effectively it's like being on EA right now without buying SA, you can see the new stuff but not make gargoyles or visit the new lands just yet.

I have a list of the new mobiles at home. My graphic artist has been a bit lazy since he just graduated and apparently would like to do something besides make 3d models constantly for a couple weeks. Hopefully I will have some pics for people to look at shortly.

Gargolys Male is 666 and Gargoyle Female is 667

thanks =)

Map5 is now specified in default iris configuration.

So now it's useable in Iris2 unstable (trunk).

If you have no server, but want to view Map5 using Iris2, just add Map5 as starting map in config.lua and choose "Offline Mode" in Mainmenue.

Add:

config.lua


now load Iris2 and choose "Offline Mode".

You can switch the Cam by pressing Key: "c" (charview, 1st person, free Cam).

After the RunUO devs got Razor working with Client 7.x, they've come across a couple of packet changes from the 6.x series to the 7.x series

Staff text getting clustered, poison bar not showing green, character creation getting mixed up, etc


Iris shouldn't have any issues with this on existing emulated servers (since it's not likely to log onto OSI anytime soon ;->) but when/if servers update to support the new client packets, Iris will need to update as well to work on those servers.

_________________
Time is a plaything; But if it breaks, you're f*****.

Maybe, most server also support old Client packages too.

We may have to add new packages.

I have a Stygian abyss shard in my backup files some where Id test it out but when you upgrade fully to 7.0.11.2 iris moofs like it does if downloading the new clients from ea... Ill have to reinstall and try to see which client is latest to use by testing and backing up before each patch

in the meantime http://vetus-mundus.de as well as http://pandorauo.com have stygian abyss content, including gargoyles as playable race, for testing.
I'm afraid i won't be going to have time to work on any stygian abyss issues anytime soon.