ToME: the Tales of Maj'Eyal

Hi all, I'm new to ToME so... please be nice.

I'm not new to roguelikes, though, and I'm used to seeing a wide variety of vaults in them. However, in ToME there are so few that I typically see them repeated in consecutive games and sometimes in the same area! My record so far has been 3 copies of the exact same vault in one area. This strikes me as a big oversight, given how easy (and fun!) it is to create devious vaults. Or at least, this has been the case in similar games.

Is it intentional for ToME to have so little vault variety?

If not, I'll go and make a bunch.

Nah, we had a guy that was super into making vaults.

Then he had a kid

So go forth!!

I think the situation is that there are many greater vaults, but only a few lesser vaults.

*Cheers on vault making*

There's a decent variety of greater vaults (I think I've only ever seen a repeat once in the same game), but yeah, the lesser ones are fairly repetitive. I think it works well enough, but if you want to throw some more variety into the mix, I'm all for it.

Ah, that makes sense! Free time does come and go.

Danton wrote:There's a decent variety of greater vaults (I think I've only ever seen a repeat once in the same game), but yeah, the lesser ones are fairly repetitive. I think it works well enough, but if you want to throw some more variety into the mix, I'm all for it.

Yes, this is what I've noticed, too. I am new to ToME and I prefer to play on roguelike, so I've noticed the same lesser vaults being used over and over in some tier 1/2 areas (i.e. Trollmire). While I do like a summoning honey tree, or bear glade, or skeleton mage rune cache as much as the next person, I also like unpredictability. My take is that more lesser vaults = less predictability which contributes toward the whole "do I really want to open that door?" feeling that an unknown vault brings with it.

How would one go about making new vaults?

BASLogin wrote:Is it intentional for ToME to have so little vault variety?

It's not intentional, it is a main problem of the game - it is very repetitive.
This game is more tiring than all other big roguelikes.
Content is so limited, that you get tired very quickly.
Dark God enjoys creating new skills and classes, but not new content, or a little more diverse old.
I love this game, but alas - it is true.

cttw wrote:How would one go about making new vaults?

Sadly, you don't, as it turns out. Vaults aren't documented in the T-Engine4 wiki or via the LuaDoc auto-documentation. Meanwhile, I can only find wall layouts in the 1.3.0 source code so I don't know how the vaults are a) restricted by zone type, b) populated with monsters, c) populated with loot. Traps are a grey area, also. It strikes me as bizarre and unhelpful to separate these related functions given that other roguelikes make their data so accessible. For example, editing all of a vault in Angband (and variants thereof) is just a matter of editing one text file. Maybe there is a design decision I'm not aware of, but it isn't stated anywhere so to me it makes no sense.

ToME allows modding in new vaults. But the base data is so obfuscated as to make this a horrible task.

Eh? Vaults are under data\maps\vaults and they look pretty self contained to me.

What vaults can appear is listed in each zones zone file. Monsters, loot and traps are clearly and easily defined.

Indeed

For example, in the file :

game/modules/tome/data/zones/trollmire/zone.lua you see the generator described. In particular you see :

rooms = {"lesser_vault"},
lesser_vaults_list = {"honey_glade", "forest-ruined-building1", "forest-ruined-building2", "forest-ruined-building3", "forest-snake-pit", "mage-hideout"},

Then this list, you cross reference to the folder :

game/modules/tome/data/maps/vaults

Inside you find the files like forest-ruined-building1.lua or honey_glade.lua

Those files themselves are rather simple to understand altough a few points seem still obscure like why ^ becomes traps in honey_glade.lua (although I know ^ is the trap symbol in Angband :p) I suppose it's the defineTile function parameters that need explaining.

There's instructions for making vaults here.

http://forums.te4.org/viewtopic.php?f=39&t=25574

In response to a comment above that Darkgod doesn't like to make content; every time a new race or class is added he makes a new zone for them. He's also working on a new campaign and recently released DLC. So I don't think that's quite a true statement.

Now personally, I focus a lot of time and energy on classes and loot. I've made a lot of fun monsters and contributed some of the vaults but I haven't really trusted myself much with zone design. I'd like to get into it but I've always had a fear that my ideas wouldn't be any good or would turn out clumsy.

Anyway for anyone that wants to contribute zones there's an add-on contest going on. The intent is for some of this content to make it into vanilla and there's even a cash prize for the top three add-ons.

http://te4.org/blogs/darkgod/2014/01/ne ... ntest-2014

And of course, ideas are more likely to be implemented if they can be easily added to the game As far as the subject of this thread goes just take a look through the formats in the vault design thread. If vaults are posted like that I imagine Darkgod, myself, or one of the other developers will take the time to implement them into the game

Part of the vault repetition problem isn't just that there aren't many vaults, it's that they're all zone restricted. Most vaults only appear in one zone, the little oval appears in Kor's Fall and the Rhaloran Camp, the big oval also appears in Tempest Peak. The orc prides share the same vault set that I think is also used by the desert with the ritches. I think all the Troll Fells, Old Forest, Daikara, and Dreadfell vaults are exclusive, though.

edge2054 wrote:
Anyway for anyone that wants to contribute zones there's an add-on contest going on. The intent is for some of this content to make it into vanilla and there's even a cash prize for the top three add-ons.

http://te4.org/blogs/darkgod/2014/01/ne ... ntest-2014

I am pretty sure that contest expired...unless the duration was extended again and I did not notice?

As for me, before adding new vaults, I would replace a few 'bland' ones, such as the forest one that is simply a building with a courtyard and a tree in it (unless that was replaced already and I did not realize?)

yes this issue really is what I experience. It makes it boring like, die, do same thing, die.... repeat. At least letting people make them to put in would be a great addition to fix this! and yeah, whats a room with a tree in it, lol? replacing that with some kind of faeri realm with a bunch of enchanted trees around the place and some boss causing the area to be that way and you have to defeat them and do something would be much better than a tree in a room....