Bazaar: bringing shopping malls to Tome

[Red]

Shopkeepers don't keep damage if you're at a distance. I used a ranged attack to hit an Arms Dealer from just outside the door of the shop (they don't attack at that range either, despite having an ability with enough range) and after I had done a couple of attacks that were recorded in the log as doing damage, he was still at 100% HP.

As a side note, I see you took my "shopkeepers are too easy" to heart. Jesus Christ, how many stuns, disarms, and 40+ DoT can someone get at level 10?

[Red]

Also, you the first Bazaar quest just crashed ToME. When I entered the city area, the screen went black, and any actions I took resulted in a couple of errors.

Code: Select all

error = "Lua Error: /mod/class/DemonologistsDLC.lua:86: bad argument #1 to 'ipairs' (table expected, got nil)\
  At [C]:-1 \
  At [C]:-1 ipairs\
  At /mod/class/DemonologistsDLC.lua:86 \
  At [string \"return function(l, self, data) local ok=false...\"]:1 triggerHook\
  At /mod/class/Zone.lua:54 onLoadZoneFile\
  At /engine/Zone.lua:685 load\
  At /engine/Zone.lua:113 init\
  At /engine/class.lua:97 new\
  At /mod/class/Game.lua:843 changeLevelReal\
  At /mod/class/Game.lua:728 unload\
  At /engine/Game.lua:379 unregisterDialog\
  At /mod/dialogs/ShowEquipInven.lua:224 \
  At /engine/KeyBind.lua:229 receiveKey\
  At /engine/ui/Dialog.lua:651 keyEvent\
  At /engine/ui/Dialog.lua:419 "
seen = true
reported = true

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error = "Lua Error: /mod/class/Player.lua:797: attempt to index field 'level' (a nil value)\
  At [C]:-1 __index\
  At /mod/class/Player.lua:797 spotHostiles\
  At /mod/class/Player.lua:892 restCheck\
  At /engine/interface/PlayerRest.lua:46 base_restInit\
  At ...ons/faster_rre/superload/engine/interface/PlayerRest.lua:28 restInit\
  At /mod/class/Game.lua:1771 \
  At /engine/KeyBind.lua:235 "
seen = true
reported = true

Code: Select all

error = "Lua Error: /mod/class/Player.lua:1233: /data/timed_effects/magical.lua:932: attempt to index field 'level' (a nil value)\
  At [C]:-1 \
  At [C]:-1 error\
  At /mod/class/Player.lua:1233 playerUseItem\
  At /mod/class/Player.lua:1126 \
  At /engine/interface/PlayerHotkeys.lua:161 activateHotkey\
  At /mod/class/Game.lua:1990 f\
  At /mod/class/Game.lua:1585 fct\
  At /engine/interface/PlayerHotkeys.lua:316 \
  At /engine/KeyBind.lua:229 "
seen = true
reported = true

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error = "Lua Error: /mod/class/Player.lua:1233: /engine/interface/ActorProject.lua:46: attempt to index field 'level' (a nil value)\
  At [C]:-1 \
  At [C]:-1 error\
  At /mod/class/Player.lua:1233 playerUseItem\
  At /mod/class/Player.lua:1126 \
  At /engine/interface/PlayerHotkeys.lua:161 activateHotkey\
  At /mod/class/Game.lua:1990 f\
  At /mod/class/Game.lua:1585 fct\
  At /engine/interface/PlayerHotkeys.lua:316 \
  At /engine/KeyBind.lua:229 "
seen = true
reported = true

[Dao Zeti]

The errors you got result from an empty event.lua file. If you update to the latest version, this error should go away. Sure that the armsdealer didn't just regen back his health?

[Red]

*slaps self*
Welp, that was me being dumb. I'll update next I play.

He did not have any regeneration buff on him when I moused over. I was standing outside the vault at the time, but within sight of him. If it matters, I was using the Telekinitic Core, which does damage and pulls an enemy.

[Razakai]

This is a very cool addon. Some issues though:

- Bazaar generation rate feels far, far too high. On Old Forest I had about 3 bazaars spawn in a single level. They would feel better as a rarer event.
- To tie in to the above problem, their loot is actually too good. Going through Old Forest, there was about 4 artifact quivers, 2 artifact shots, 2 artifact slings and an artifact bow, most of which were T4-5 including the best sling and quiver in the game. This kinda breaks the game lootwise.
- Not a massive fan of the delivery quest as you can quite easily have visited those zones pre-quest. Might be easier if it gets untied from zones to just visit X bazaars, or something else.

I think adjusting the bazaar spawn rates to maybe 1 bazaar per zone on average would be best, as changing the loot generation is tricky. Although this could be tough to pull off with the current vault generation code.

edit: an idea to generate more bazaars without overcrowding existing zones might be trader caravans. Have them rarely spawn on the world map, travel between towns and vanish. If you meet one, it spawns an encounter with a wandering merchant. Makes the world map a little more interesting than just endless patrols of murderous adventurers.

[Dao Zeti]

This is a very cool addon. Some issues though:

- Bazaar generation rate feels far, far too high. On Old Forest I had about 3 bazaars spawn in a single level. They would feel better as a rarer event.
- To tie in to the above problem, their loot is actually too good. Going through Old Forest, there was about 4 artifact quivers, 2 artifact shots, 2 artifact slings and an artifact bow, most of which were T4-5 including the best sling and quiver in the game. This kinda breaks the game lootwise.
- Not a massive fan of the delivery quest as you can quite easily have visited those zones pre-quest. Might be easier if it gets untied from zones to just visit X bazaars, or something else.

I think adjusting the bazaar spawn rates to maybe 1 bazaar per zone on average would be best, as changing the loot generation is tricky. Although this could be tough to pull off with the current vault generation code.

edit: an idea to generate more bazaars without overcrowding existing zones might be trader caravans. Have them rarely spawn on the world map, travel between towns and vanish. If you meet one, it spawns an encounter with a wandering merchant. Makes the world map a little more interesting than just endless patrols of murderous adventurers.

I agree that bazaar generation in the old forest - and to a degree in Dreadfell - is sometimes too high. As the generation is tied to the random function also used for general vaults, it was hard to tell for me upfront if enough bazaars/zone would spawn to fulfill the quest. Regarding loot quality, I wanted the bazaars to provide some interesting offers, but certainly, giving access to t4/t5 items in a t2-zone is bad for progression.

I think some adjustments are in order. I am toying with the idea to limit offers to max. 1 golden artifact/vault not higher than t3 and adding in a higher possibility for t1-t3 randarts to spawn. I will also adjust spawning rates somewhat - your idea about caravans is fantastic. I will have to check if I can get it to work without hampering the spawning of zigur-followers/adventurer groups too much. I am also not really happy about the current mechanism of vendors: a) stealing is very easy, when you just teleport out of the vault after unchaining an item without paying (the vendor can't follow you), b) fighting the vendors is either trivial if done late game or neigh impossible early game, leaving not many options.

Regarding the questline: in my experience, the only zones I have visited before getting the final quest are kor-pul/rhaloren camp. I could take those out and maybe replace them with an order to visit a caravan.

[Razakai]

Looking at your vault code, I'd probably use uvault/gvault a little less, depending on how common bazaars end up being. Taking the forest one for example, we have 9 gvault items. A deadly vault like the acidic vault (the one with worms that walk and venom wyrms) gives 10 gvault items, so 9 seems a little high even if you do have to pay for them.

Although if bazaars end up being rarer, gvault items won't be an issue, so I guess the question is how often you want to spawn them? If we were going with 1 per zone on average (maybe 2 for bigger areas like Dreadfell) I'd be inclined to leave it at 9 gvault and see how that goes. I would be very hesitant to use uvault for any standard bazaar though.

I wouldn't be too worried about the impact on patrol spawns, but I think caravans should be pretty rare. It might be an idea to somehow limit the amount that spawn, otherwise people might feel obligated to wander around the world map for hours to get all the best loot. Not sure how would be best to pull that off though.

Another interesting idea for a vault would be a great bazaar, similar to the massive great vaults like bandit fortress or lich lair. Have the entire central part of the floor (leaving hostiles outside) be taken up by multiple bazaar vendors. Would be a fun encounter.

As for the issues with theft, there's a couple of ways I can think of solving it. First would be that on stealing an item, the vendor teleports the remaining items away into vendorspace, gone forever. Might need a function so that artifacts aren't gone for good and get re-added to the loot table, but that will make people more hesitant to just loot everything. 1 free item vs buying the rest?

For making shopkeepers harder, I'd be inclined to do one or more of the following:
- Place a stasis field that blocks teleports and seals the player inside the shop so you can't just grab a few items and run
- Keep the shopkeeper relatively weak, but have the store protector summon be a randboss-equivalent scaled to your level. It'll always be a challenging but winnable fight then
- Rather than stasis fields and store protectors, make the standard store security device be a magic item that banishes the would be thief to THE VENDORSCAPE (name may change). A pocket dimension where they have to fight the aforementioned randboss store protector to escape. On returning, they'll find the shopkeeper has fled, taking some of their stock with them but leaving behind a few items

I actually like the vendorscape the most out of these, even if the concept is silly. It guarantees a hard fight that's not easily exploitable, and gives good loot but less than what you'd get if you bought stuff honestly.

[Dao Zeti]

Thanks alot for the detailed ideas. I will try out the vendorscape idea, am just a bit short of time at the moment. This and the caravan idea. A great bazaar could be integrated with a quest and some lore to the eastern part of Eyal, I will toy around with that idea too.

[Dao Zeti]

Updated the bazaar with new content (see updated content notes), hopefully bugfree. The archive is a couple 100kbs too long as I sadly forgot to remove three psd.files - I will delete them with the next update. Glad to hear about any bugs or improvement advices.

Also: items inside bazaars won't have a higher tier level than the zone allows anymore. Less golden artifacts will show up in shops, but much more randarts (roughly every 4th item) with a high variability in quality.

[starsapphire]

o((>?< ))o
Brilliant works beyond my imagination.
It's so excited to see it come true.

[Calodine]

Undead wearing the cloak of deception get lua errors instead of 'do you want to buy this item'. Removing the cloak fixes it. This means getting the cloak upgrade renders the bazaar unusable, which makes me thing it's related to faction. I'm not sure if the problem is here or in zomnibus, though.

Code: Select all

Lua Error: /data/rooms/bazaar.lua:29: attempt to index a nil value
	At [C]:-1 __index
	At /data/rooms/bazaar.lua:29 check
	At /engine/interface/ActorInventory.lua:136 super_pickupFloor
	At /mod/addons/zomnibus/superload/mod/class/Player.lua:165 pickupFloor
	At /mod/class/Player.lua:248 describeFloor
	At /mod/class/Player.lua:309 move
	At /engine/interface/PlayerMouse.lua:61 mouseMove
	At /engine/interface/PlayerMouse.lua:133 mouseHandleDefault
	At /mod/class/Game.lua:2056 fct
	At /engine/Mouse.lua:56 

[Dao Zeti]

Thanks for the notice, I will check this.

[Dao Zeti]

Undead wearing the cloak of deception get lua errors instead of 'do you want to buy this item'. Removing the cloak fixes it. This means getting the cloak upgrade renders the bazaar unusable, which makes me thing it's related to faction. I'm not sure if the problem is here or in zomnibus, though.

I played a Skeleton using both zomnibus and bazaar and tried to recreate the problem visiting various bazaars both pre- and postquest for the cloak, but found no issues. The error you posted seems to be a result of an invalid faction-reaction check. I am a bit clueless at the moment, how this happened. Did you maybe have any addons installed that overload some of the pre-existing factions?

[Dracos]

First impressions:

Currently on my first run with bazaar, almost done with tier 2.

This is really nice add to the game. Perhaps a little too present, but it has impact. The sellable ingredients are a nice idea, providing a good early game decision bit on getting potions sooner if you're lucky. The sellable treasure maps are also clever as little expansions, though unfortunately that sets more content in the beginning (where the east is really where it is lacking). An actual quest line with multiple events is just a nice thing to see in an addon, and the reward of small amounts of money help keep it so that the player doesn't feel starved by the extra encouragement to spend.

It is unfortunate that in early game at least, the maps are mostly treasure loss (Cost more than they're likely to earn). At least as far as I've seen.

First experiences (scummed out of) with trying to attack or steal delivered an overwhelming 'get killed for it'. So far that I haven't tried it since, as both attempts basically read as impossible anywhere near my level rather than just 'really difficult'. Thankfully it was on the defensive side instead of the offense, or I would've just gotten killed by it. Reflective skin on 'anything' pre level 30 is just mean, especially given that it's not infrequent not to have an answer to it by late game as it is. I actually do have disperse magic now, so I may try it again just to feel it out, but nominally that'd go on my 'never bother with again' list from the difficulty in both cases with getting away from the shopkeeper or the mirror dimension golem (They aren't very friendly for try/fail situations). I'm not quite sure what I'd recommend that'd work better, but I can't say I particularly find theft/robbery that interesting in the setup as it is. Would almost prefer the option not be there, but that's not very roguelike. It certainly feels odd to have from a 'this is a faction' situation, but then I haven't tried it since beginning that questline anyway.

It does feel one sided on the trade bit. An idea to consider: Have bazaars ask for a random standart, offering x5-x10 price for bringing it. Close the circle that we're also bringing in goods that they sell. Sure, most of the time we won't be able to, but since it is at the beginning, it can provide a hook for later returns.

Overall, aside from the combat side of it, I liked it quite a bit

[Dracos]

Continuing on, in dreadfall:

At this point, I actually find the shopkeepers to be of more threat than the anti-theft deterrent (who is getting mauled, whether or not I tear down his sustains). So on early end, it ended up so threatening it wasn't worth trying at all, and on mid game, it feels like not a threat, so I don't worry about robbing.

I think it is a bug, but if you have all the treasure maps, and ask about it, you can recognize that it is a fake map. If you ask again though, you get offered a map, and if you buy it, it is fake.

The layout of some unholy antiquties dealers makes it kind of a pain to walk to all the treasure, since some have no routes that aren't with treasure on them.

It is definitely unfortunate that a lot of the time when a bazaar spawns, they just take over the floor/area with 2-4 of them showing up.