default header

Development

Cult Engine 3 (internal codename: TaleSpire)

Moderator: JC Denton

Unread postby icycalm » 24 Jul 2021 14:43

More halfwits are piling on me in the thread, but at least I got one supporter: https://steamcommunity.com/app/720620/e ... 3807324893

Image

I posted a bunch more stuff:

https://steamcommunity.com/app/720620/e ... 3808186200

https://steamcommunity.com/app/720620/e ... 3808229841

Image

I had been meaning to write an "Open Letter to the Developers of TaleSpire" and post it on their Reddit, but now those halfwits teased out all my arguments in that comment thread. Someone should go post them on their Reddit to make sure they see it. It might actually influence them, even if they will probably publicly deny it. When I bitched about there being no snow and desert assets a few months back, they put them in within weeks. A mere couple of weeks later I think it was.
User avatar
icycalm
Hyperborean
 
Joined: 28 Mar 2006 00:08
Location: Tenerife, Canary Islands


Unread postby icycalm » 25 Jul 2021 11:20

Image

I got a warning and I will soon probably be banned. Mission accomplished though, I got their attention. I am not done either, not by a long shot, but the second round will take place on Patreon, and then on Twitter. These devs will learn what’s up from me, whether they like it or not. And so will the entire gaming world eventually.
User avatar
icycalm
Hyperborean
 
Joined: 28 Mar 2006 00:08
Location: Tenerife, Canary Islands


Unread postby icycalm » 26 Aug 2021 05:52

https://twitter.com/TheSplitParty/statu ... 8406797314

Image

This is TaleSpire lol. Don't see it on your phone, put it on a TV. This is what FPD&D will look like.

Image

This looks great too. A city on a hill on fire.
User avatar
icycalm
Hyperborean
 
Joined: 28 Mar 2006 00:08
Location: Tenerife, Canary Islands


Unread postby icycalm » 06 Sep 2021 19:59

Imagine playing Ruins of Azlant with underwater 3D battles powered by TaleSpire.

https://twitter.com/JackieHuchel/status ... 9646819340

Image

Look at the level of detail in this. Every item can be moved, every wall can be brought down due to spell effects or whatever reason. There aren't even any first-person videogames with full destructibility, let alone isometric ones. Even in Rust you can't break apart mountains like a wizard can in TaleSpire.

https://twitter.com/docniccals/status/1 ... 3072299015

Image

This second guy made "The Misty Mermaid: a tavern built into the hull of a wrecked ship":

Image

Image
User avatar
icycalm
Hyperborean
 
Joined: 28 Mar 2006 00:08
Location: Tenerife, Canary Islands

Unread postby icycalm » 27 Sep 2021 03:55

https://talestavern.com/slab/kabuzans-s ... ihilation/

Image

Look at the little floating wood path. It's not a default object, someone made it painstakingly by cropping together little wood pieces. It's so beautiful floating on the swirly water with its shadow underneath. Imagine when they add rain, and the rain makes little wrinkles on the water. You won't want to stop playing.
User avatar
icycalm
Hyperborean
 
Joined: 28 Mar 2006 00:08
Location: Tenerife, Canary Islands


Unread postby icycalm » 30 Sep 2021 14:25

Look at this fucking scene: https://twitter.com/naetheriongm/status ... 3344693251

Image

Or at this Curse of Strahd enemy: https://twitter.com/tattoosandbones/sta ... 8493561858

Image

The first link btw says that Wizards is working on a TaleSpire program for D&D. There have been rumors that they’re working on a VTT but I had assumed it would be 2D. This is the first time I see a rumor that it’s like TaleSpire.

Information sûre à 65%:

D&D travaille sur une version à eux de Talespire, le VTT de mapping 3D.

Plusieurs développeurs le sous-entendent dans leurs publications mais rien que je puisse affirmer :)
User avatar
icycalm
Hyperborean
 
Joined: 28 Mar 2006 00:08
Location: Tenerife, Canary Islands

Unread postby icycalm » 02 Oct 2021 11:21

That modder I was talking to a while back has managed to get “macros” into TaleSpire, meaning he has a working D&D 5E combat resolution system. Previously the DM had to calculate everything in his head as if he was playing on tabletop, but now with this mod combat is largely automated as in Fantasy Grounds. With much lower level of automation to start with of course. Check it out: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NS3wHFoChdw

Moreover there is some rudimentary animation being used. I.e. when someone gets hit he has made the miniature jump up via an emote.

This is a tremendous improvement on Fantasy Grounds, and I suspect it means that if you import a 3D model from a videogame that has animations you can connect these animations to the various moves and statuses of the rules so that when he shoots his bow you see him shooting, and when he dies he collapses etc. The battles will be unreal if it works this way. The miniatures can already fly for example, since this is a default TaleSpire feature, so imagine them shooting bows or spells from the air.

I asked him if he plans to do the Pathfinder rules too, we’ll see what he says, but I think it might be doable for us to do it ourselves by editing his mod to get basic functionality in if he doesn’t plan to do it.

TaleSpire is getting VERY playable for us now.
User avatar
icycalm
Hyperborean
 
Joined: 28 Mar 2006 00:08
Location: Tenerife, Canary Islands

Unread postby icycalm » 03 Oct 2021 02:01

https://twitter.com/johntigergamer/stat ... 3942216712

Image

Unmatched atmosphere. Better than a videogame’s.

You might say, such and such CRPG scene has similar atmosphere. But when you go down a crypt in TaleSpire you’ve no idea what you’ll find: there could be an army of thousands of undead down there, or of humans hiding from an evil emperor and willing for you to lead them. In the CRPG meanwhile you know it’s gonna be a couple of squad-level tactical fights totaling 20 units at the most, rinse and repeat. In TaleSpire the crypt might lead you to the planes or to another planet. Or it could lead you to an entire underground setting full of entire cities that you end up spending months adventuring in. You just don’t know. All that and more are going through your mind when you’re standing outside that crypt. And no one is forcing you to go down it in the first place. You have infinite other options that you just don’t have in the CRPG which basically “hangs” if you decline to go down.
User avatar
icycalm
Hyperborean
 
Joined: 28 Mar 2006 00:08
Location: Tenerife, Canary Islands


Unread postby icycalm » 23 Nov 2021 04:19

https://twitter.com/talespire/status/14 ... 4014802954

Image

https://twitter.com/talespire/status/14 ... 2852398080

Image

https://twitter.com/talespire/status/14 ... 8464830468

Image

https://twitter.com/culturevg/status/14 ... 1546363907

Image

Despite my criticism, this is still a positive development. Lots of new people will buy TaleSpire for this, and the quality of the assets is very promising. It will be a humongous asset pack when it comes, and the modders will supplement it with imported assets from sci-fi games.

Starfinder on TaleSpire is coming, and it'll be a sight to behold.

I wonder if they can give us... asteroids? I think they can. If they can give us flying towers, why not?

Full devblog here, with two extra pics: https://bouncyrock.com/news/articles/ta ... unk-update

Image

Image

Click for high-res image to see all the pieces.

I am sure the fantasy builders will use some of these pieces too, with good and bad results, but mostly bad. Prepare for tons of ridiculous monstrosities.

And btw, this pack will also include modern stuff. You can already see it in some of the pics.

Bouncyrock wrote:We didn't have plans to lean into pure sci-fi for a while, but in fact, their project helped us outline our initial approach to Modern, Sci-Fi, and CyberPunk. There are many different versions of Cyberpunk out there, and quite a few could easily fit into the world of Starstruck. The approach became, start with some Space stuff, then bring it down to modern Earth. Sprinkle in some grit and body mods to bring it together, and if our calculations are correct, the junction of all this should be something Cyberpunk'y.
User avatar
icycalm
Hyperborean
 
Joined: 28 Mar 2006 00:08
Location: Tenerife, Canary Islands

Unread postby icycalm » 23 Nov 2021 21:37

https://twitter.com/theunamiable/status ... 8290688007

David Carroll @theunamiable wrote:This online D&D is all very well, but maybe juggling two virtual table-tops (each on two screens, for DM view and player view), three browsers, Discord and the occasional use of MS Paint is a bit much. Nah...


Image

I love how there are "emotes" that turn the miniatures into dead bodies. You can have whole battlefields filled with corpses this way. You can't do that well with 2D VTTs. You could even stack bodies so that movement in the battlefield becomes difficult. You just have to get rid of the bases, but I've been told it's easy to do via modding.
User avatar
icycalm
Hyperborean
 
Joined: 28 Mar 2006 00:08
Location: Tenerife, Canary Islands


Unread postby icycalm » 24 Nov 2021 00:13

https://talestavern.com/slab/tomb-of-the-lost-king/

Image

Look at how beautiful this is. At the hands of a good designer and photographer, TaleSpire can look like the best isometric game ever. Nothing else can touch its best scenes in detail and scope. It is the be-all end-all of isometric gaming.
User avatar
icycalm
Hyperborean
 
Joined: 28 Mar 2006 00:08
Location: Tenerife, Canary Islands

Unread postby icycalm » 24 Nov 2021 00:22

Image

Image

This noble estate is from one of the campaigns we're running right now. I am not giving you the link to the Tales Tavern page to avoid spoilering it.

Look how elegant the design is, including the terrain design. Random GMs can't design stuff like this, and neither can random TaleSpire builders. You need professional adventure writers and cartographers for the design, and you need dedicated TaleSpire builders to transfer it faithfully to TaleSpire. And the result is inspired.
User avatar
icycalm
Hyperborean
 
Joined: 28 Mar 2006 00:08
Location: Tenerife, Canary Islands


Unread postby icycalm » 24 Nov 2021 20:54

One of TaleSpire’s two greatest weaknesses was solved a couple months ago and I only now realized it: https://www.reddit.com/r/talespire/comm ... er_tokens/

I made some paper tokens!

Image
examples of how the tokens look. Monster images are for reference only

Hi guys. I've seen a lot of people asking about paper style tokens, so I went ahead and made some! You can download them from our patreon if you like. You get 3 different sizes - medium, large and big. You can actually resize them even more in TaleSpire to get the right size you need - for example, the giants in the picture here have been scaled up to 2x2 using GM resize.

They work with any jpeg image and they are super easy to customise. You can use creatures, stat cards trading cards etc. We do not supply images.

We have a post explaining how to use them and there's going to be a video walkthrough in the next couple of days.

You can get them at https://www.patreon.com/Skyden_and_Wrenick

Note: You need to be running modded TaleSpire using the excellent Lord Ashes Custom Mini Plugin for these to work


This means that, though you still can’t have any kind of terrain and building and prop that you want—which is TaleSpire’s remaining great weakness, which is why we won’t be using it for adventuring but only for city-building—at least now any NPC and creature from the entire TTRPG world can visit you in your domains. Any character from any adventure, even sci-fi ones. Any creature at all. Plus, your own character can look like anything you want, like any image you pulled off the web. We could take advantage of this right away with your current characters: instead of being cropped and shown on the maps as tiny cropped squares, they can be strutting around the world at their full height with every detail of their bodies and clothing and equipment shown. Our parties would look dramatically different right away, and tiny spiders or giant dragons would show at their proper contrast, scurrying around the floor or towering over them. You can already do this in Tabletop Simulator btw, but it doesn’t do any math, so that’s why we stuck with Fantasy Grounds and we’ll keep sticking to it. But at least the paper minis are now available in TaleSpire, so we’ll be getting that feature that way—at least in the city-building phase.

Come to think of it, Tabletop Simulator could be used to deal with TaleSpire’s remaining weakness. Because in TTS you can import 2D maps. So if you want to city-build in Dark Sun or Planescape, or any crazy setting not covered by TaleSpire, you can do it in TTS while importing full 3D paper characters. So it would be a step up from using Fantasy Grounds, where everything including characters must be 2D. So we found a use for TTS after all, and I will make it unlockable when some group starts city-building in a region not covered by TaleSpire’s assets. What we can do at that point is this. Let’s say we want to city-build in Dark Sun. The DS map assets have a particular style to preserve, which is why we avoid using TaleSpire for DS. So we send some of these maps to an image-editing expert on Fiverr to isolate from the maps the various assets: walls, doors, props, that sort of thing. And then voila: you can city-build in 2D, with all the Dark Sun characters, NPCs and creatures appearing like 3D paper minis.

It’s not a PERFECT system, but a perfect system would require an army of 3D modelers to model all the thousands of Dark Sun assets, and that may never happen. Maybe AI can do it. Or maybe someone who loves Dark Sun as much as Beneos loves Ravenloft, and happens to know 3D modeling and be good at it, decides to do it. Or maybe I will get rich and hire people to do it.

Until then, this combination of TTS + 3D paper minis finally unlocks city-building—and thus 4X mechanics—for us across the entire Battlegrounds.

Now I would like to see someone figure out how to import 3D models of buildings into TaleSpire. If we could do that, we still wouldn’t be able to use TaleSpire for every setting, but we should at least be able to use it for the majority of medieval Europe-inspired situations as there are shittons of assets for those in videogames. That is the next step for TaleSpire while we wait for user-created native building blocks to become possible. I will ask the modder if he can do it.
User avatar
icycalm
Hyperborean
 
Joined: 28 Mar 2006 00:08
Location: Tenerife, Canary Islands


Re: PC TaleSpire

Unread postby icycalm » 30 Nov 2021 14:10

Patreons are popping up specifically for texturing models to put in TaleSpire: https://www.patreon.com/user/posts?u=3789235

Image

Not bad, especially the dwarf.

One of the modders told me that the ENTIRE 5E bestiary exists, though many of the models are untextured. But with specialist texturers popping up, I think this will be addressed soonish. And anyway, I don't mind playing with untextured models if at least they represent exactly what I want them to.

And this all before the official asset-creation program for TaleSpire, TaleWeaver, is released. We're on the cusp of a huge wave, by the genre's standards at least.

I want to start a Trove for assets. Someone has to do it, and I am not seeing any interest because of the legal angle. But there's no other way. Without a central library of this stuff, we will never get to play official adventures properly, unless the companies themselves develop and sell the assets, which is a long way out. Could be five years or more, though I hope I am wrong and it's less.
User avatar
icycalm
Hyperborean
 
Joined: 28 Mar 2006 00:08
Location: Tenerife, Canary Islands

Re: PC TaleSpire

Unread postby ysignal » 04 Dec 2021 00:22

Some progress on the paper minis:

Image

I used the CustomMiniPlugin mod mentioned above. One issue with the mod is that you can't add your custom mini directly to the board. Rather, you first need to add one from the library and then use the mod to replace it. The original mini also appears briefly when the board is reloaded. You can work around this a bit by replacing an unwanted library mini with a blank base and using that as the starting point, which avoids displaying random characters during setup and loading.

Another issue that we'll need to deal with is distributing the models to all the players. The mod itself doesn't download anything from the GM's system, so we have to take care of that ourselves. We could use zip files to start with.

Having said all that, there's another mod by the same guy that allows you to expand the library with new assets:

https://github.com/LordAshes/TaleSpire-ExtraAssetsRegistrationPlugin

If it works it might make the CustomMiniPlugin mod obsolete and solve some of the above problems, but I haven't tried it yet.
Image
User avatar
ysignal
 
Joined: 28 Jan 2017 02:07
Location: Sydney, Australia

Re: PC TaleSpire

Unread postby icycalm » 04 Dec 2021 00:35

Looks incredible, and I'll post some thoughts on paper minis in general soon.

In the meantime, I have a couple of questions.

1) Is the aspect ratio of the paper standard? Or changeable?

2) I noticed that the paper minis made by the guy who presented the mod hover at different heights above the base. Some of them touch or almost touch it, and others float a considerable distance above it. Yours even digs into the sides of the base a bit, I think. Is there a way to fix the height to be identical in all of them, or will we have to eyeball it for every mini, which for me will be an OCD nightmare?
User avatar
icycalm
Hyperborean
 
Joined: 28 Mar 2006 00:08
Location: Tenerife, Canary Islands

Re: PC TaleSpire

Unread postby ysignal » 04 Dec 2021 00:52

The aspect ratio won't change automatically to fit the picture, but we can edit it in Blender. It should be possible to fix the positioning relative to the base and have it be identical for each mini. If you want different aspect ratios or sizes, whoever makes the models for those will just have to get the positioning right. After that there's no reason why it should vary between minis.
Image
User avatar
ysignal
 
Joined: 28 Jan 2017 02:07
Location: Sydney, Australia

PreviousNext

Return to Development