Development

[icycalm]

I posted a scathing review of TaleSpire on Steam, which isn't really a review but just a rant against the management policies of the bearded Norwegian weirdos who develop the program. It is partly an outburst against the terrible way they have treated me, and partly a reverse-psychology gambit to get them to do the right moves before Menyr [ > ] destroys everything they have built. To be clear, Menyr will win whatever the TaleSpire team does, or if not Menyr then another first-person VTT. But there might be still a future for TaleSpire as an old-school retro-aesthetic 3D VTT if the devs MANAGE TO MAKE THE RIGHT MOVES, and, if they pull it off, I'd like to keep running the odd campaign on their program forever.

What I am saying is that none of my savage criticisms will affect our West Marches campaign. I already have all the assets I need for it, so it's going ahead no matter what. What's at stake here are further campaigns in the engine, and the rant below is my attempt to get the devs to wake up and make the right moves. For that reason, I ask everyone who likes TaleSpire to upvote my review because the fanbase will downvote the hell out of it to bury it, and then the devs might not see it.

And before I give you my rant, have an insane TaleSpire pic to reassure you that this thing is the best thing ever and we'll soon be playing one of the best games ever in it: https://twitter.com/juanjoharo/status/1 ... 7177055233



Look at how SOLID that ghoul down towards the bottom looks (this is a high-res pic so enlarge it to see the detail). There's really no other videogame that looks like TaleSpire, and when you see what it looks like when entire castles with THOUSANDS of units on it are depicted you'll lose your shit and understand why it's 2021 GOTY.

With all that out of the way, here's my rant, and let me say in advance that I appreciate your upvote, and the project will appreciate it too: https://steamcommunity.com/id/icycalm/r ... ded/720620

[icycalm]

I'll have more TaleSpire content soon, but for now I need to drop these WOW screens from this Western guy who lives in Japan and apparently plays solo D&D on TaleSpire: https://twitter.com/heimdal_3/status/15 ... 6611236864









Imagine how much better they'd look if he removed the bases.

[icycalm]

Just me or are things moving too slowly?
https://steamcommunity.com/app/720620/d ... 901062978/

Three-page thread of people shitting on TaleSpire. I shit on them too, but then I offer this little counter-argument: https://steamcommunity.com/app/720620/d ... 6739382271

POSITIVITY TIME: I will tell you the ONE aspect that TaleSpire dominates in, even over otherwise superior competition like Menyr.

Minecraft mechanics.

There's no other VTT where your wizard can blow off individual bricks off a wall, and you can show it in-game. No other VTT where you can build up whole castles brick-by-brick and log-by-log as you cut down a forest to clear space. In Menyr, you will be able to purchase a house on the marketplace, and plonk it down in your town, but you won't be able to modify it. Won't be able to burn ships plank by plank, etc.

That's why TaleSpire will be the only engine capable of powering "The World's Most Interactive Game": https://www.patreon.com/posts/64848977

Granted, no one cares about this except me, because I haven't seen anyone else mention it. So Menyr will dominate. And perhaps some day they'll start selling individual bricks and planks on the marketplace so you can build up everything from scratch.

But for now, and for the foreseeable future, the only VTT to offer full Minecraft mechanics is TaleSpire. Not that Bouncyrock realizes this.

They should hire me as consultant. Hell, they should hire me as director. It's SO easy to turn this trainwreck/sinking ship around. It doesn't even take a lot of work, just vision. And vision is what Bouncyrock lacks. Which makes sense since they're programmers (vision and programming are mutually exclusive qualities).

[icycalm]

https://twitter.com/heimdal_3/status/15 ... 7516328960



Picture showcasing how you can use all furniture in combat, such as overturning tables to block off passage, etc. All calculations are also hyper-accurate since you can measure the exact size of the overturned table to jump over etc. None of this is possible in CRPGs, and though it's all possible with 2D VTTs, it's far more accurate and enjoyable with TaleSpire.

[icycalm]

Haven't been posting the last three content updates. One was sci-fi and the other two fantasy.

Early Access Content Pack 14: Insectoid Overlords
https://store.steampowered.com/news/app ... 2542628284

We, for one, welcome our new insectoid overlords.

In this latest pack, you'll find the following new assets:

• A bunch of Modern Office Props
• Giant Worm Mini
• 3 Insectoid Minis
• 1 Citizen mini
• 2 Chrome statue props
• Music track “Techno Mystics”

We also have a fix and an improvement to current content:

• Improved textures and meshes for the Tavern tileset
• Fixed Industrial ramp - now walkable

Early Access Content Pack 15: Field of Screams
https://store.steampowered.com/news/app ... 0309389216

This Halloween, get lost in a corn maze of terror with these new assets:

• Corn Stalk props
• Scarecrow prop
• Raven mini
• 3 Zombie minis

Early Access Content Pack 16: Bugbear Montage
https://store.steampowered.com/news/app ... 5266341272

Bugbears are training up and ready to face off against heroic adventurers in TaleSpire's latest Early Access Content Pack!

The pack includes the following new assets:

• 3 new Bugbear minis
• Beaver mini
• Ferret mini
• New training props - including targets and a combat dummy
• Some new "grim" props (hanging skull, spiked skull, single skull, and spike)

There have been other developments too. The mass move feature we'll need for the mass battles is now in beta and looking great:

Group-movement is now in Beta
https://store.steampowered.com/news/app ... 0305719660



Hero Forge integration is now OUT of beta, and here's an example of the awesome kinds of scenes you can create if you get to fuse the fantasy and sci-fi sets:

Hero Forge® is officially available in TaleSpire. + SALE!
https://store.steampowered.com/news/app ... 5160284677





And yet another cool feature is that they turned the rulers into permanent area-of-effect markers. Fantasy Grounds has these too, but of course they are 2D, and they DON'T stay on the screen permanently. If you want something permanent to designate an area-of-effect say of a spell, you have to draw it by hand and it looks crap. But in TaleSpire they look frigging amazing, as they should look, and stay on the screen as long as you want to so you can calculate whatever you want. And with full destructibility, we'll have LOTS of things to calculate!

Area-of-effect markers are live!
https://store.steampowered.com/news/app ... 5505715685

With the latest update, any ruler can be right-clicked and turned into an AOE that persists between play sessions and is even included in published boards.

Moreover it is now official that the devs are working on a Ships update, though they will still be churning out smaller content updates in the meantime. The monster roster is filling out nicely, Hero Forge is providing insane variety for character models, and the ships are the only thing missing to ensure we have all the content we need to play at least one campaign in TaleSpire, and possibly more.

It's all looking great for our entry into the game before the end of the year. (It has to be before, because I've declared my West Marches 2022 GOTY, and I can't delay it any longer because if it slips into 2023 it'll lose out to Menyr [ > ], and I won't allow that.)

[icycalm]

https://talestavern.com/slab/clutter-pa ... ndom-stuff





Showcases of TaleSpire's modularity and buildability for lack of a better word.

I can't wait to write the building and destruction rules. They won't be ready for session 1 of West Marches, but they'll come soon after. I have the basic ideas in my head, just need some numbers, and I may even know where to find them.

[icycalm]

Another preview screenshot from Alex Kierkegaard's West Marches, 2022 GOTY coming soonTM.

[icycalm]

Soon
https://www.patreon.com/posts/74374220

You can spend the rest of your life playing CRPGs, and still you won't see anything a tenth as good as what I just showed you. And the same goes for TTRPGs.

The world isn't prepared for what I am making.

[icycalm]

Couple of new TaleSpire pics. Nothing that will be in our world, just cool pics I wanted to share.

https://twitter.com/TabernaDadoRoto/sta ... 4543480832



Mass undead battle. That's the kind of scale TaleSpire allows that you won't see in any CRPG, and rarely even in a TTRPG. Note also the atmospheric yellow fog, and imagine the creatures without the bases, and also a cooler building and location. That's how our game will be.

https://twitter.com/PoorJohnsBrews/stat ... 6563010561



Sci-fi assets are still sparse, but the above scene should give you an idea of the immensity of scale we'll be seeing when more assets are available. I have better sci-fi pics to share than this, and will be sharing them soon, but the above is one of the better ones in terms of scale. Every single room in those skyscrapers is explorable, unlike Cyberpunk 2077 or any other CRPG.

Looking at the above two pictures together, would you have ever thought they're from the same game?

That's why TaleSpire is 2021 GOTY.

[icycalm]

Crazy news came out from Bouncyrock a few days ago, but I totally missed it because they only posted it on their devlog and not on Steam!

TaleSpire Dev Log 360
https://bouncyrock.com/news/articles/ta ... ev-log-360



They're basically adding water tiles that people have been asking for for months. For years maybe, really. So there will still be the sea-level slider that you raise up and lower down, but you'll also be able to add freestanding blocks of water for stuff like lakes, rivers, waterfalls, etc. Even water conjuration spells or whatever. Your spellcaster could flood a room this way. And eventually you'll be able to make rivers of blood, or maybe flowing lava, etc. And the best part, which I'd been worried about, is that the characters will be able to submerse just like with the sea-level water! You can already see this in the demonstration videos below.

If you check the comments on that page, the creators are ecstatic. We should see a flurry of activity on Tales Tavern when this update hits, maybe even some old sets updated.

I still don't quite see how you can make a river with square water tiles, but maybe they'll clip through the banks and you won't be able to see the extra water. Clipping stuff appropriately is how the best creators manage to avoid everything looking Minecrafty.

Demonstration videos:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=37sXEHU4LwA
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hviKroxCsts

[icycalm]

https://steamcommunity.com/games/720620 ... 8863813172

Mini Feature: Water Tiles (Resin Blocks)

Today we're releasing the highly requested Water Tiles! It is far from a perfect solution, unfortunately. There will be some oddities when entering the water tiles with your camera, as well as other quirks players will become familiar with. We might be able to address some soon; others will have to wait for a future water solution.

We're looking into doing some non-geometric water shapes for an upcoming update, so keep an eye out for those.

Patch Additions and Fixes:

• Added ability to toggle picking of "transparent" tiles in Build Mode.
• 2 Water tiles (1x1 and 2x2)
• Shadow offset on Skull on Pike, and some Office Props are fixed.

Thank you all for your patience and persistence.
Till next time! Have a great one.

They just added them! Not even in beta, straight to live! Can't wait to see what people will make with them. One thing I am worried about is that they say this isn't a final solution, I am worried that when they do add a new system, that all the sets people will have created with the old one might be ruined. At least the best creators are pretty diligent about updating their sets when the need arises, so at least our best sets won't be affected.

[icycalm]

These are the kinds of complex situations the new water tiles will make possible: https://steamcommunity.com/app/720620/e ... 1216188183

This new update is going to help me a lot. In the adventure Salvage Operation (Chapter 4 of Ghost of Saltmarsh) a ship is attacked by a giant octopus while the player characters try to escape. The port side will be flooded more than the starboard side and gradually the ship will sink. Thank you very much for your work, I am very grateful.

Also fountains, ponds, wells. And your characters will be able to jump inside these water volumes.

As more features are added to TaleSpire, it will be able to depict more and more rare situations.

What I realized I want now is a climbing solution. Climbing is a pretty frequent occurrence in D&D, and TaleSpire’s fully 3D environment will inspire players to climb more. But the models don’t have a climbing pose, so we’ll have to use the flying feature and pretend that they are climbing. I don’t see an easy way to fix this. If we could add “bones” to the miniatures we could create a climbing pose for them. Also a swimming, sitting, riding and sleeping pose. That should be all the major ones. It doesn’t sound like a LOT of work for someone who knows what he’s doing. Maybe I could hire an animator to teach me the process.

Menyr models should have all these animations as standard.

[ysignal]

I spent a bit of time setting up the Houdini plugin this evening:



This is just an example that came with the plugin. I'll play with the node system more once I have a better idea of what we want to generate.

[icycalm]

I just need you to show me how to generate terrain. At that point your job is done.

The crazy thing about this plugin is that it generates better terrain than what 90% of people are handcrafting.

[ysignal]

I'll experiment with the example that comes with the plugin and see which things are easy to modify. Bear in mind that it's a full-blown professional tool and it's not just a matter of adjusting some knobs and seeds. But by modifying the example we might be able to bypass a lot of that complexity. That's a good way to start learning the system at any rate.

[ysignal]

In the meantime, if you want to start experimenting right away the first thing to do is to set the tool up and export an example slab. You need to first make an account here:

https://sidefx.com

Then go to this page to download Houdini:

https://www.sidefx.com/download/daily-builds/?production=true&python3=true

You can't download it until you're logged into the website. Make sure you get a 19.0.x version. Other versions may not work with the plugin. You don't need to buy anything—when you run the installer or start the program up you should have the option of using a free license.

Once you've installed Houdini, download the plugin:

https://github.com/Baldrax/Houdini_TaleSpire_Terrain_Generation_Toolset/archive/refs/tags/v0.13.0-alpha.zip

Then follow the instructions under "Installation" here:

https://github.com/Baldrax/Houdini_TaleSpire_Terrain_Generation_Toolset#installation

Once you've installed Houdini and the plugin, you need to link the plugin to your TaleSpire installation. The easiest way to do this is to open the Houdini project "example/example_Forest_Gully.hipc" inside the plugin installation directory. That contains an embedded tutorial that explains how to link your TaleSpire installation and export the example into TaleSpire as a collection of slabs.

Another way we could do this is to get on the voice chat and have me step you through it.

[icycalm]

No, let's do it this way, no need for voice chat unless I get really stuck. Also this way others can learn to do it too if they're planning to get into TaleSpire.

I'll try your guide and report back with my results.

[icycalm]

New Tech! I can now generate different Biomes with one click! So all maps I will release from now on will have a Fall and Winter version. So the pesky players stop bothering about the color of the leaves when they return to the same map a couple of months later. What a relief! Phew!
https://www.reddit.com/r/talespire/comm ... iomes_with









Stunning tech. Nowhere near as easy to use as Menyr's changing seasons via a simple slider, but by TaleSpire standards it's revolutionary. And by CRPG standards too: how many CRPGs can you name that change seasons? Since the stories typically take place over a few weeks at most, they don't bother with seasons, or even worse, they have the "snow biome" right next to the "forest biome" and they are 3 minutes' walk apart for the duration of the game lol.

The question is how much of this tech we can use in our campaigns, since most of their sets/boards are already made, and they don't have this tech. I am actually working together with this guy now, and we'll see whether he can begin adjusting individual boards for us. It's not easy because the dozens of individual creators have blended their buildings with the nature, and you can't just rip out and replace tress and foliage for example; often that stuff is supporting structures or artistically covering TaleSpire's blockiness etc. It can be done, but it'd be almost as much work as making the board from scratch. Moreover, the best of the best creators often create their OWN biomes—their own tress and bushes and grass or whatever—so across the hundreds of boards we'll be using, we have dozens of conflicting biomes to harmonize in a way that makes some kind of ecological sense.

Building and running the TaleSpire campaigns themselves is already a huge effort even before these terrain and seasonal considerations were taken into account. Suffice to say no GMs are actually using any of this stuff I am telling you now: they just teleport their players between a collection of haphazardly related slabs and boards. And we MIGHT have to do this too, if all the above end up being too demanding to practically implement. But I am hopeful I'll be able to do better than this, with the help of this guy and perhaps others. Stay tuned.

[icycalm]

How is TaleSpire sci-fi coming along? I haven't shown you much of this, if anything, since the release. Well, I'll be showing you a bunch over the coming weeks. No worries about spoilers: we're a couple years at least from playing this stuff, so you won't remember anything by then. Keep in mind also that sci-fi RPG has a mere 10-20% of the playerbase of fantasy RPG, so developments in this field are even slower than normal. It will take for-fucking-EVER until we have enough material for what I really want to run with these assets: a sci-fi West Marches campaign.

This scene is from the Starfinder campaign Fly Free or Die: https://paizo.com/store/starfinder/adve ... yFreeOrDie

A crew of scoundrels, rogues, and misfits finds it hard to survive in a galaxy where everyone has a price. Targeted by a crime boss and his army of enforcers, preyed upon by faceless mega-corporations, and hounded by rivals, the crew of the Free Trader Oliphaunt line up the big score that will at last make them rich beyond their wildest dreams. But when their many enemies join forces and the crew loses it all, they find out there's two things in the galaxy that can't be bought: freedom... and revenge.

I think it looks stunning. Remember also to visualize the models without the bases. Blows away any isometric sci-fi CRPG I've ever seen, and this is merely a small set that doesn't show off TaleSpire's scale. More to come soon.

[icycalm]

https://steamcommunity.com/games/720620 ... 0124368976

Early Access Content Pack 17: Misc Modern
BUILD-ID: 10051751 - Download Size: 140.0 MB



Hello again - it's time for another Content Pack release! In this pack, we're offering some new minis, props, and some fixes/changes to existing assets as listed below:

• 4 new modern minis
  
• 1 raccoon mini
  
• Bathroom props (including a flushing toilet, shower stall, light fixture, and openable medicine cabinet)
  
• Other misc props (including wood pallet, gas can, tire, and an old mattress)
  
• Removed collisions from ground foliage so that minis can walk through them instead of on top (no more Legolasing on cornstalks or reeds)
  
• Fixed the size of the square and round wooden tables to match their prefabs
  
• Moved City Day (modern) ambient SFX back to its own category.

Work continues on the Ship tileset. As we get closer to release, you may see another smaller pack or two so keep an eye out.

Thanks again for your support!
BouncyRock Team

BUILD-ID: 10051751 - Download Size: 140.0 MB

I always love new content packs even if we won't be using the particular assets any time soon. Well, there's the raccoon and the wood pallet that might come in handy.

Can't wait for the ships, and the other smaller packs they mention. The ship stuff won't be just ships, I am sure, there'll be all sorts of naval/dock etc. stuff that will turbocharge development in these sorts of themes and settings. I am looking forward to entire dock districts and pirate islands!

[icycalm]

Blackwolf Majik – Bathroom Kit Set 4 – Modern
https://talestavern.com/slab/blackwolf- ... kits-set-1







Someone already made some bathrooms with the new assets. It's like The Sims isn't it? Only here you have full combat and tactical mechanics from fantasy to sci-fi that may at any time erupt anywhere around you or jump out of your bathroom mirror. You have no idea what may happen next because the game contains assets for absolutely anything to happen.

[icycalm]

https://steamcommunity.com/games/720620 ... 7485197822

Group-movement is live!



With group-movement, the hoards are now under your sway!

Simply left-click and drag to lasso your creatures. You can then move, rotate and act upon them.

Big thanks to the lovely folks checked out the Beta and gave insightful feedback. This feature is better because of all of you.

Along with this feature, we also have also fixed cases where player magic attacks did not ask GM for permission.

Until next time everyone!


p.s. Have some more shots of some of the things you can do with groups:

With this feature, TaleSpire officially becomes able to run wargames like Warhammer on top of roleplaying games. And it was also the last feature we needed to start my West Marches campaign that fuses the two genres and will make possible wars on a scale never before seen in a roleplaying game.

I love that the feature is quite more sophisticated than the hacked mod approach that previously existed. You can see in the first gif how the facing of ALL units in a group can change as you move them around, the same way a single unit's facing changes, so you can have a whole squad weaving its way through twisting roads and thick forests with ease. Very smooth, classy stuff. When you see this feature in game with numerous squads with hundreds of units across massive battlefields, you will understand why my game, on top of everything else, is the best SRPG and tactics game ever. And it's all made possible by the power of the TaleSpire engine that no one else in the world is smart enough to use besides me. Imagine huge wars at THIS level of fidelity:

Third Teaser | Alex Kierkegaard's West Marches (2022)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p_9rZIzZs28



That's what's exploding over the internet SOONtm, only at https://dndbattlegrounds.net

[icycalm]

Baldrax, the creator of the Houdini plugin terrain generator, is progressing the power of his tools. He can now import a 3D model which will then shape the terrain!

Titan's Dome Highlands – The ancient skull
https://talestavern.com/slab/titans-dom ... ient-skull

This map was made in about 45 minutes with my terrain generation tools utilizing importing a 3D object of a skull and placing it on the terrain.

This features my Highlands Biome.

People have tried to build handcrafted skull mountain faces before, and they look mostly awful. This tool is just sheer perfection and opens up infinite possibilities.

In addition to the above, he is building a tool that will allow you to import any slab posted on Tales Tavern and automatically meld it perfectly with randomly generated terrain. Unfortunately, this feature is still "3-12" months out. I am hoping it is 3 months, as it would help me immensely.

Either way, the power of these tools keeps growing and already far exceeds anything we've ever seen or will ever see in a CRPG. A handful of smart dudes pitching in to these projects in their spare time utterly demolish the efforts of thousands of programmers across decades.

That is the power of intelligence. And no amount of autism can beat it.

[ysignal]

This plugin should be able to hide the compass: https://talespire.thunderstore.io/package/LordAshes/HideUIPlugin/

Lord Ashes says it should be simple to make a mod to save the chatlog to a file and that he'll look into it for us. But he also asked if we wanted the log to persist inside the game between sessions. That might be harder to implement. He'll start looking into it once I tell him exactly what we need.

[icycalm]

Persistence between sessions isn’t an issue. There’s no persistence in Fantasy Grounds either, and it’s not been a problem for us. It would be nice if you could also scroll up to see all the chat since the beginning of the session. Currently it doesn’t seem like you can.

Something else to ask him regarding the chat and the chatlog: how does the GM post descriptions of the environment to the players? As in, “You enter the room and three assassins attack you”, etc. Currently it seems the only way for the GM to post in the chat is to speak as a character, but we need narrator chat too...

And I suppose secret chat/whisper to specific players isn’t possible?