Beyond Within@Posted: Sat Nov 17, 2012 5:22 pm :
I'm not sure if it's Sikk mod or the 1.3.1 patch, but the gameplay is a lot
easier than vanilla Doom 3's.

-- Less enemies, especially in tougher areas (e.g., one Pinky at the end of
Alpha Labs Sector 3 instead of 3-4).

-- Enemies deal less damage. I never die on Veteran, even when playing
recklessly. There's no way I got this much better.

Any way to return to the vanilla Doom 3 gameplay settings? I really, really
miss how hard it was.

Again, I don't know if this is the patch or Sikk mod.



reckless@Posted: Sat Nov 17, 2012 10:42 pm :
Hmm cant say it might be :?: you can adjust some game related settings in the misc panel in the sikkmod menu (like letting monsters agro each other <funny as hell>)



Beyond Within@Posted: Sat Nov 17, 2012 10:50 pm :
Went through the available menus, both vanilla and Sikk, and what I want to
restore is not available.

I presume something is going on in the base folders. Damage reduction is
one thing, but removing enemies and enemy spawn points degrades the art.
There are a few places that I remember as very clever placements, e.g., in
Recycling Sector 1, a Cacodemon that used to appear as the player crossed
some pipes to reach a crucial GUI objective. That Cacodemon was the perfect
monkey wrench.

Indeed, it does seem like a conscious decision was made to remove the
memorably difficult enemies. I'll turn corners I used to dread turning, and
now there is nothing there.



BloodRayne@Posted: Sat Nov 17, 2012 10:53 pm :
Beyond Within wrote:
Went through the available menus, both vanilla and Sikk, and what I want to
restore is not available.

I presume something is going on in the base folders. Damage reduction is
one thing, but removing enemies and enemy spawn points degrades the art.
There are a few places that I remember as very clever placements, e.g., in
Recycling Sector 1, a Cacodemon that used to appear as the player crossed
some pipes to reach a crucial GUI objective. That Cacodemon was the perfect
monkey wrench.

Indeed, it does seem like a conscious decision was made to remove the
memorably difficult enemies. I'll turn corners I used to dread turning, and
now there is nothing there.

This is a bug, because a.f.a.i.k. sikkmod doesn't take away anything, it just adds.
And what it does tweak/change is configurable from the menu, if not from the console.



reckless@Posted: Sun Nov 18, 2012 12:59 am :
I remember that caco :) your right something is definatly weird.
Im starting to think this change was introduced in patch 1.3.1 hmm :?



Beyond Within@Posted: Sun Nov 18, 2012 1:38 am :
Quote:
This is a bug, because a.f.a.i.k. sikkmod doesn't take
away anything, it just adds. And what it does tweak/change is
configurable from the menu, if not from the console.


Do me a favor: go to these spots in Recycling Sector 1 and tell
me if the Revenant and Cacodemon appear for you:

MISSING REVENANT:

http://www.mediafire.com/?f24cmhvxpssq885

MISSING CACODEMON:

http://www.mediafire.com/?33cmtvasabrcx5m

There's also a missing Revenant when I go down the first
elevator. Instead of two (one straight ahead and one to my left),
there is only one (straight ahead). Didn't get video, however.

I can also no longer use the adrenaline item:

ADRENALINE NOT WORKING:

http://www.mediafire.com/?wwlbxcssja5fuz6



BloodRayne@Posted: Sun Nov 18, 2012 5:57 am :
Hey no need to prove anything, I believe.
I'm just saying this doesn't come from Sikkmod a.f.a.i.k.



Beyond Within@Posted: Sun Nov 18, 2012 4:49 pm :
So are these enemies missing in your version? So is this 1.3.1?



simulation@Posted: Sun Nov 18, 2012 4:51 pm :
Beyond Within wrote:
So are these enemies missing in your version? So is this 1.3.1?

1.3.1 has minimal changes, and certainly does not affect enemies in this way.



bkt@Posted: Mon Nov 19, 2012 5:59 am :
Are you sure you have 'g_skill 3' set?

Sikkmod has modified mapfiles for the following levels: alphalabs4, caverns2, cpu, delta1, mc_underground and monorail.

changes noted by sikk:

alphalabs4 - - Added a monster_clip brush so the door to the vagary encounter doesn't open from a random enemy spawn, triggering the cinematic prematurely. This required a rebuild of the map to update collision and aas data.

caverns2 - - Added key/val pair "autopickup" "1" so the Storage Room 1ll Keycard is picked up when "g_itemPickupType" = 1; entity #: 110

cpu - - Added key/val pair "autopickup" "1" so the door panel item is picked up when "g_itemPickupType" = 1; entity #: 531

delta1 - - Had to move two items that were blocking the outer reactor ring from moving into place due to the fact that items are now moveables. entity # 31 & 123

mc_underground - - Move the security armor at map start two units back to keep it from blocking the door from opening; entity #: 207

monorail - - Changed value of "noDynamicInteractions" key to 0 for compatibility with soft shadows on entity #: 505, 520, 523


Any other changes, you'll have to do a diff on the map files to check.



Beyond Within@Posted: Mon Nov 19, 2012 1:57 pm :
All these things should appear on Veteran (g_skill 2), but maybe it somehow
got set to Marine.



Beyond Within@Posted: Mon Nov 19, 2012 8:50 pm :
There should also be two Cacodemons at the beginning of Recycling Sector 1,
on both Veteran and Nightmare.

So I just did a test: these enemies appear in Doom 3 BFG edition, on
Veteran and Nightmare, but not in Doom 3 with the Sikk Mod. I changed the
difficulty with the console just to make sure, and reloaded the levels
after a quicksave. Nightmare for certain worked, because my health counted
down; the enemies are not there.

Thus it has to be Sikk Mod.

It's too bad, because switching between these versions made clear how much
of an improvement the graphics are. Without Sikk mod, the game looks
blurry, as if the textures hadn't fully loaded in yet.



gb_remake@Posted: Mon Nov 19, 2012 9:29 pm :
Adrenaline should also work regardless of skill, right.



Beyond Within@Posted: Mon Nov 19, 2012 10:17 pm :
I'd like to see someone record himself playing through Recycling Sector 1
with Sikk Mod on Veteran.

I play it on two different computers, and the enemies are missing in the
same locations (and adrenaline does not work).



Beyond Within@Posted: Mon Nov 19, 2012 10:34 pm :
I accidentally uploaded the uncompressed .avis; please download the
(order of magnitude smaller) .mp4s. These should also run smoother
on lower-end machines.

I fixed the original links, but here they are again:

MISSING REVENANT:

http://www.mediafire.com/?f24cmhvxpssq885

MISSING CACODEMON:

http://www.mediafire.com/?33cmtvasabrcx5m

ADRENALINE NOT WORKING:

http://www.mediafire.com/?wwlbxcssja5fuz6

. . .

I really want to pin this down and fix whatever bugs, because -- unlike
most people -- I enjoy Doom 3's gameplay as much as its design and sound.

I admire how challenging it is on Veteran and Nightmare (IMO, Veteran is
harder, because the Soul Cube is a constant source of health and an Excalibur
against tough enemies).



Beyond Within@Posted: Mon Nov 26, 2012 9:16 pm :
So I take it this is a Sikk Mod bug that will not be fixed.



bkt@Posted: Tue Nov 27, 2012 12:58 pm :
I'd say so. After all, I'm pretty sure sikk has mentioned that 1.2 was the final release.

Do check the map files though if you really need to find out. It sounds more like a difficulty setting being incorrect as opposed to sikk removing monsters inexplicably.



reckless@Posted: Tue Nov 27, 2012 2:26 pm :
Are you by any chance using 6th venoms HD menu ? i heard rumors that for some people the difficulty setting is stuck on marine.
Visually it works here but im having a gnawing suspicion that things are not like they should be.



Beyond Within@Posted: Wed Nov 28, 2012 12:57 pm :
Venom.pk4 was indeed the problem.

Removing it also solved the problem of starting without weapons when level
selecting in the console.



reckless@Posted: Thu Nov 29, 2012 12:49 am :
Ouch i wonder why it works for some people but does this for others ? but atleast we found the culprit :)
Guess we need someone with skills in gui sripts to look over this one.



reckless@Posted: Thu Nov 29, 2012 2:40 am :
//Difficulty Choice
choiceDef NGBtnText2 {
rect 110, 35, 100, 10
choices "#str_3666041"
values "0;1;2;3"
cvar "g_skill"
liveUpdate 1
choiceType 1
font "fonts/micro"
textscale 0.22
textaligny -4
forecolor 0.6, 0.8, 0.8, 1
}

cullprit in here it seems g_skill newer gets updated so its stuck on skill 0.
Im no gui expert but i guess we need an OnAction here to trigger the update, liveUpdate does not seem to work with this cvar.



Beyond Within@Posted: Thu Nov 29, 2012 3:38 am :
That explains it. I assumed I was playing on Normal; turns out I was on
Easy!

So glad I am back to Veteran.



reckless@Posted: Thu Nov 29, 2012 4:10 am :
Glad we got it sorted :) i hope someone with a little better understanding of the gui scripts steps up sometime and fixes this, in the meantime use g_skill from the console
to set difficulty.



chimueloeldragon2011@Posted: Thu Nov 29, 2012 4:43 am :
I wouldn't go with a choicedef in this case, this happened to me waaay before trying to set damageScale, while in the menu whenever I clicked the choicedef it returned the proper value in the console, but once a game started it was set back to default.

Now I tried this and seems to work right. It wont return the actual value while in the menu if you write "g_skill", but will set it once you're in a game. It also behaves a little different compared to a choicedef. (Only difference is it doesn't detect the secondary click so it's a one-way cycle only)
Find the choicedef with same name in newgame.pd and replace

Code:
        //Difficulty Choice
   windowDef NGBtnText2 {
      float skill 0
      rect      110, 35, 100, 10
      font           "fonts/micro"
      text      ""
      textscale   0.22
      textaligny   -4
      forecolor   0.6, 0.8, 0.8, 1

      onMouseEnter {
         set "forecolor" "1 1 1 1" ;
      }
      onMouseExit {
         set "forecolor" "0.6 0.8 0.8 1" ;
      }
      onTime 0 {
         if ("skill" == 0) {
            set "text" "RECRUIT" ;
            set "gui::skill" "0" ;
         }
         if ("skill" == 1) {
            set "text" "MARINE" ;
            set "gui::skill" "1" ;
         }
         if ("skill" == 2) {
            set "text" "VETERAN" ;
            set "gui::skill" "2" ;
         }
         if ("skill" == 3) {
            set "text" "NIGHTMARE" ;
            set "gui::skill" "3" ;
         }
         resetTime "0" ;
      }

      onAction {
         set "forecolor" "1 1 1 1" ;
         if ("skill" == 0) {
            set "skill" "1" ;
         }
         if ("skill" == 1) {
            set "skill" "2" ;
         }
         if ("skill" == 2) {
            set "skill" "3" ;
         }
         if ("skill" == 3) {
            set "skill" "0" ;   // Reset the cycle
         }
      }   
   }


I didnt test it exhaustively so forgive bugs if there are any, this is a very crude solution



reckless@Posted: Thu Nov 29, 2012 5:05 am :
Very cool ill give it a spin :) would be nice if we can squash this bug.



reckless@Posted: Thu Nov 29, 2012 5:11 am :
Yep that did the trick :D skill selection works like a charm now, thanks m8.



Beyond Within@Posted: Sat Nov 17, 2012 5:22 pm :
I'm not sure if it's Sikk mod or the 1.3.1 patch, but the gameplay is a lot
easier than vanilla Doom 3's.

-- Less enemies, especially in tougher areas (e.g., one Pinky at the end of
Alpha Labs Sector 3 instead of 3-4).

-- Enemies deal less damage. I never die on Veteran, even when playing
recklessly. There's no way I got this much better.

Any way to return to the vanilla Doom 3 gameplay settings? I really, really
miss how hard it was.

Again, I don't know if this is the patch or Sikk mod.



reckless@Posted: Sat Nov 17, 2012 10:42 pm :
Hmm cant say it might be :?: you can adjust some game related settings in the misc panel in the sikkmod menu (like letting monsters agro each other <funny as hell>)



Beyond Within@Posted: Sat Nov 17, 2012 10:50 pm :
Went through the available menus, both vanilla and Sikk, and what I want to
restore is not available.

I presume something is going on in the base folders. Damage reduction is
one thing, but removing enemies and enemy spawn points degrades the art.
There are a few places that I remember as very clever placements, e.g., in
Recycling Sector 1, a Cacodemon that used to appear as the player crossed
some pipes to reach a crucial GUI objective. That Cacodemon was the perfect
monkey wrench.

Indeed, it does seem like a conscious decision was made to remove the
memorably difficult enemies. I'll turn corners I used to dread turning, and
now there is nothing there.



BloodRayne@Posted: Sat Nov 17, 2012 10:53 pm :
Beyond Within wrote:
Went through the available menus, both vanilla and Sikk, and what I want to
restore is not available.

I presume something is going on in the base folders. Damage reduction is
one thing, but removing enemies and enemy spawn points degrades the art.
There are a few places that I remember as very clever placements, e.g., in
Recycling Sector 1, a Cacodemon that used to appear as the player crossed
some pipes to reach a crucial GUI objective. That Cacodemon was the perfect
monkey wrench.

Indeed, it does seem like a conscious decision was made to remove the
memorably difficult enemies. I'll turn corners I used to dread turning, and
now there is nothing there.

This is a bug, because a.f.a.i.k. sikkmod doesn't take away anything, it just adds.
And what it does tweak/change is configurable from the menu, if not from the console.



reckless@Posted: Sun Nov 18, 2012 12:59 am :
I remember that caco :) your right something is definatly weird.
Im starting to think this change was introduced in patch 1.3.1 hmm :?



Beyond Within@Posted: Sun Nov 18, 2012 1:38 am :
Quote:
This is a bug, because a.f.a.i.k. sikkmod doesn't take
away anything, it just adds. And what it does tweak/change is
configurable from the menu, if not from the console.


Do me a favor: go to these spots in Recycling Sector 1 and tell
me if the Revenant and Cacodemon appear for you:

MISSING REVENANT:

http://www.mediafire.com/?f24cmhvxpssq885

MISSING CACODEMON:

http://www.mediafire.com/?33cmtvasabrcx5m

There's also a missing Revenant when I go down the first
elevator. Instead of two (one straight ahead and one to my left),
there is only one (straight ahead). Didn't get video, however.

I can also no longer use the adrenaline item:

ADRENALINE NOT WORKING:

http://www.mediafire.com/?wwlbxcssja5fuz6



BloodRayne@Posted: Sun Nov 18, 2012 5:57 am :
Hey no need to prove anything, I believe.
I'm just saying this doesn't come from Sikkmod a.f.a.i.k.



Beyond Within@Posted: Sun Nov 18, 2012 4:49 pm :
So are these enemies missing in your version? So is this 1.3.1?



simulation@Posted: Sun Nov 18, 2012 4:51 pm :
Beyond Within wrote:
So are these enemies missing in your version? So is this 1.3.1?

1.3.1 has minimal changes, and certainly does not affect enemies in this way.



bkt@Posted: Mon Nov 19, 2012 5:59 am :
Are you sure you have 'g_skill 3' set?

Sikkmod has modified mapfiles for the following levels: alphalabs4, caverns2, cpu, delta1, mc_underground and monorail.

changes noted by sikk:

alphalabs4 - - Added a monster_clip brush so the door to the vagary encounter doesn't open from a random enemy spawn, triggering the cinematic prematurely. This required a rebuild of the map to update collision and aas data.

caverns2 - - Added key/val pair "autopickup" "1" so the Storage Room 1ll Keycard is picked up when "g_itemPickupType" = 1; entity #: 110

cpu - - Added key/val pair "autopickup" "1" so the door panel item is picked up when "g_itemPickupType" = 1; entity #: 531

delta1 - - Had to move two items that were blocking the outer reactor ring from moving into place due to the fact that items are now moveables. entity # 31 & 123

mc_underground - - Move the security armor at map start two units back to keep it from blocking the door from opening; entity #: 207

monorail - - Changed value of "noDynamicInteractions" key to 0 for compatibility with soft shadows on entity #: 505, 520, 523


Any other changes, you'll have to do a diff on the map files to check.



Beyond Within@Posted: Mon Nov 19, 2012 1:57 pm :
All these things should appear on Veteran (g_skill 2), but maybe it somehow
got set to Marine.



Beyond Within@Posted: Mon Nov 19, 2012 8:50 pm :
There should also be two Cacodemons at the beginning of Recycling Sector 1,
on both Veteran and Nightmare.

So I just did a test: these enemies appear in Doom 3 BFG edition, on
Veteran and Nightmare, but not in Doom 3 with the Sikk Mod. I changed the
difficulty with the console just to make sure, and reloaded the levels
after a quicksave. Nightmare for certain worked, because my health counted
down; the enemies are not there.

Thus it has to be Sikk Mod.

It's too bad, because switching between these versions made clear how much
of an improvement the graphics are. Without Sikk mod, the game looks
blurry, as if the textures hadn't fully loaded in yet.



gb_remake@Posted: Mon Nov 19, 2012 9:29 pm :
Adrenaline should also work regardless of skill, right.



Beyond Within@Posted: Mon Nov 19, 2012 10:17 pm :
I'd like to see someone record himself playing through Recycling Sector 1
with Sikk Mod on Veteran.

I play it on two different computers, and the enemies are missing in the
same locations (and adrenaline does not work).



Beyond Within@Posted: Mon Nov 19, 2012 10:34 pm :
I accidentally uploaded the uncompressed .avis; please download the
(order of magnitude smaller) .mp4s. These should also run smoother
on lower-end machines.

I fixed the original links, but here they are again:

MISSING REVENANT:

http://www.mediafire.com/?f24cmhvxpssq885

MISSING CACODEMON:

http://www.mediafire.com/?33cmtvasabrcx5m

ADRENALINE NOT WORKING:

http://www.mediafire.com/?wwlbxcssja5fuz6

. . .

I really want to pin this down and fix whatever bugs, because -- unlike
most people -- I enjoy Doom 3's gameplay as much as its design and sound.

I admire how challenging it is on Veteran and Nightmare (IMO, Veteran is
harder, because the Soul Cube is a constant source of health and an Excalibur
against tough enemies).



Beyond Within@Posted: Mon Nov 26, 2012 9:16 pm :
So I take it this is a Sikk Mod bug that will not be fixed.



bkt@Posted: Tue Nov 27, 2012 12:58 pm :
I'd say so. After all, I'm pretty sure sikk has mentioned that 1.2 was the final release.

Do check the map files though if you really need to find out. It sounds more like a difficulty setting being incorrect as opposed to sikk removing monsters inexplicably.



reckless@Posted: Tue Nov 27, 2012 2:26 pm :
Are you by any chance using 6th venoms HD menu ? i heard rumors that for some people the difficulty setting is stuck on marine.
Visually it works here but im having a gnawing suspicion that things are not like they should be.



Beyond Within@Posted: Wed Nov 28, 2012 12:57 pm :
Venom.pk4 was indeed the problem.

Removing it also solved the problem of starting without weapons when level
selecting in the console.



reckless@Posted: Thu Nov 29, 2012 12:49 am :
Ouch i wonder why it works for some people but does this for others ? but atleast we found the culprit :)
Guess we need someone with skills in gui sripts to look over this one.



reckless@Posted: Thu Nov 29, 2012 2:40 am :
//Difficulty Choice
choiceDef NGBtnText2 {
rect 110, 35, 100, 10
choices "#str_3666041"
values "0;1;2;3"
cvar "g_skill"
liveUpdate 1
choiceType 1
font "fonts/micro"
textscale 0.22
textaligny -4
forecolor 0.6, 0.8, 0.8, 1
}

cullprit in here it seems g_skill newer gets updated so its stuck on skill 0.
Im no gui expert but i guess we need an OnAction here to trigger the update, liveUpdate does not seem to work with this cvar.



Beyond Within@Posted: Thu Nov 29, 2012 3:38 am :
That explains it. I assumed I was playing on Normal; turns out I was on
Easy!

So glad I am back to Veteran.



reckless@Posted: Thu Nov 29, 2012 4:10 am :
Glad we got it sorted :) i hope someone with a little better understanding of the gui scripts steps up sometime and fixes this, in the meantime use g_skill from the console
to set difficulty.



chimueloeldragon2011@Posted: Thu Nov 29, 2012 4:43 am :
I wouldn't go with a choicedef in this case, this happened to me waaay before trying to set damageScale, while in the menu whenever I clicked the choicedef it returned the proper value in the console, but once a game started it was set back to default.

Now I tried this and seems to work right. It wont return the actual value while in the menu if you write "g_skill", but will set it once you're in a game. It also behaves a little different compared to a choicedef. (Only difference is it doesn't detect the secondary click so it's a one-way cycle only)
Find the choicedef with same name in newgame.pd and replace

Code:
        //Difficulty Choice
   windowDef NGBtnText2 {
      float skill 0
      rect      110, 35, 100, 10
      font           "fonts/micro"
      text      ""
      textscale   0.22
      textaligny   -4
      forecolor   0.6, 0.8, 0.8, 1

      onMouseEnter {
         set "forecolor" "1 1 1 1" ;
      }
      onMouseExit {
         set "forecolor" "0.6 0.8 0.8 1" ;
      }
      onTime 0 {
         if ("skill" == 0) {
            set "text" "RECRUIT" ;
            set "gui::skill" "0" ;
         }
         if ("skill" == 1) {
            set "text" "MARINE" ;
            set "gui::skill" "1" ;
         }
         if ("skill" == 2) {
            set "text" "VETERAN" ;
            set "gui::skill" "2" ;
         }
         if ("skill" == 3) {
            set "text" "NIGHTMARE" ;
            set "gui::skill" "3" ;
         }
         resetTime "0" ;
      }

      onAction {
         set "forecolor" "1 1 1 1" ;
         if ("skill" == 0) {
            set "skill" "1" ;
         }
         if ("skill" == 1) {
            set "skill" "2" ;
         }
         if ("skill" == 2) {
            set "skill" "3" ;
         }
         if ("skill" == 3) {
            set "skill" "0" ;   // Reset the cycle
         }
      }   
   }


I didnt test it exhaustively so forgive bugs if there are any, this is a very crude solution



reckless@Posted: Thu Nov 29, 2012 5:05 am :
Very cool ill give it a spin :) would be nice if we can squash this bug.



reckless@Posted: Thu Nov 29, 2012 5:11 am :
Yep that did the trick :D skill selection works like a charm now, thanks m8.