Can anyone confirm this mods compatibility status with mods like Tambrield Rebuilts and Morrowind Rebirth, and as a mod is it still a-okay in tip top shape?
I just discovered the mod for skyrim and loved it. I started morrowind a little bit ago and this was the mod I missed the most. Glad to see you made it for morrowind! I love how specific it is about situations, it seems prime for tinkering with configs
This is a borderline essential mod for me. Absolutely love it.
One of the biggest issues with the post-Daggerfall games is the sense of scale. Morrowind felt big when I first played it, and it still does relative to other games, but it’s quite tiny. This can’t completely fix the issue, but it improves the simulation a massive amount. It makes Vvardenfell behave more realistically. The wilderness is large, and it takes longer to go anywhere.
* Because they're about the same speed, walking should induce the same timescale as sneaking, with both depending on environmental variables. For instance, if the Wilderness timescale is 120, its Walking/Sneaking timescale would be 115 (or whatever the set fraction). I think that's a good balance between realistic time/distance ratio and not feeling rushed into always running.
* Options to toggle off the Sneaking, Combat and Wariness timescales since I really just want the Location and Standing mechanics. No matter the Walking/Sneaking numbers, it's still an unnatural time/distance ratio. Combat timescale is even more exploitable, since you can just let an enemy chase you forever to keep the timescale low. Plus, most Combat and Wariness mechanics are performed while standing still anyway.
* All Location timescales (slightly) slowed by lower Encumbrance and higher Speed and Athletics. After all, a sluggish person with heavy luggage is going to take longer to reach their destination than a conditioned athlete who travels light.
* I would also shrink the timescale message from "Timescale is now [number]" to a nice and subtle "TS [number]".
I had to leave off a couple planned features for now to get it posted before Modathon ended. I'll be working on an update shortly.
Because they're about the same speed, walking should induce the same timescale as sneaking
I'm skeptical about changing timescale based on movement rate in general (except for slower timescale on standing still, so people can enjoy a nice view without time passing too quickly). If you walk, it'll take more time to reach your destination, and if you run, you'll get there faster. Slowing down the timescale on walking as opposed to running could mean that walking from Seyda Neen to Balmora takes no more time than running, or even less time.
In other words the difference in the amount of in-game time it takes to get somewhere walking as opposed to running is controlled by the difference between walking speed and running speed, not a timescale difference.
(Interesting fact I learned in testing: as far as the game is concerned, if you're in sneak mode, you're also technically walking, even if you're not actually moving. BTW the sneaking timescale applies whenever you're in sneak mode, whether you're moving or not.)
For instance, if the Wilderness timescale is 120, its Walking/Sneaking timescale would be 115
Originally I had thought about using multipliers (e.g. sneaking reduces the current timescale by some configurable percentage rather than setting timescale directly). But I decided to base this more on the Dynamic Timescale Oblivion mod. My thinking is that if the player is sneaking (or wary, or whatever), they're paying careful attention to what's going on around them, and that wouldn't change depending on whether they're sneaking in a dungeon or an exterior.
Options to toggle off the Sneaking, Combat and Wariness timescales
This is planned. It's only not included in 1.0 because I was in a hurry.
Combat timescale is even more exploitable, since you can just let an enemy chase you forever to keep the timescale low.
Sure, but a player who wants the timescale to be low can just set the wilderness timescale to 10 and be done with it. I'm not too worried about players "cheating" and exploiting mechanics to keep the timescale low, because that's more easily done by changing MCM settings.
All Location timescales (slightly) slowed by lower Encumbrance and higher Speed and Athletics.
If the player is highly encumbered, their movement speed is slower, and it'll take them more time to reach their destination anyway. No need to muck around with that via timescale changes in addition. (This would be kind of the opposite of lowering timescale for walking rather than running, increasing the time-elapsed difference rather than decreasing it.)
I would also shrink the timescale message
I personally find the messages annoying, and would regardless of how they're formatted. I only use them for testing purposes. "TS [number]" would make it shorter (and therefore it would stay on the screen for less time), but I don't think it would be any more subtle or less annoying, and might be less clear to some.
BTW I really appreciate all your feedback on my mods. :)
Fair enough on all points. It's difficult visualizing what's appropriate and fitting for rather abstract time-to-distance mechanics, but you cleared those up pretty well. As such, I'd be quite fine with toggled options and using just the Location and Standing timescales.
A few suggestions I forgot to mention: 1. Apply the Town timescale to fort, cave and dungeon exteriors (and rename it "Exterior timescale"). For instance, if you're on the steps of a Daedric ruin, you're not traveling across wilderness at that point, and these structures are more accurately scaled than the surrounding landmass. 2. The Charma's Breath cave cell should use the Wilderness timescale instead of Interior, since it connects two distant exteriors (Kogoruhn and Red Mountain) and would therefore be much longer than depicted in-game. 3. Paid travel is still vanilla and should also be tied to Wilderness time (except those Vivec gondolas, which only travel between cantons).
Another minor suggestion I'd make is setting the default Standing Still delay to 0 or 1 second. If you're not moving, you're not covering any distance, so the timescale should immediately reflect this. Again, just a minor nitpick since it's easy to adjust on your own.
Applying the town timescale to those other exterior locations is tricky. Right now the mod determines whether an exterior cell is a town/city cell by whether it's legal to sleep in. If it's illegal to sleep there, then it's a town/city, otherwise it's wilderness. (I don't remember whether it's legal to sleep in the fort exteriors btw.)
I'm not sure how to determine whether or not a cell has a dungeon like a daedric ruin in it, or (a better way of doing it, if it's possible) the player's distance from the nearest load door, or certain load doors.
All I could think of is to create a list of cells specified in the mod's data (maybe with a configurable whitelist), with any cell on that list being treated as a town cell. That would be doable, but I'm not sure it's worth it. The town timescale would apply in the whole cell, not just in the exterior ruins, etc.
The Charma's Breath thing is doable though. I'll make it an option. It does make sense, though the distance isn't too long. The distance from the actual stronghold to the Red Mountain exit is about the same as the distance from Vivec FQ to Vivec Palace (though the distance scale is surely distored from "reality" here).
Adjusting fast travel time (optional) is planned, in a similar way to how Pass the Time does it, based on the wilderness timescale. I think this would actually apply to the gondolas too, but I'll test it. Morrowind determines travel time by dividing the distance traveled by fTravelTimeMult (I think that's the right GMST). Guild Guides take no time because Morrowind can't calculate the distance because they're inside. I think the only reason gondola travel takes no time in vanilla is because they're so close. (Travel time is always an integer number of hours, that's hardcoded by the game.)
I've adjusted how the still timer works so time with the menu open no longer counts. But yeah the timer length is just a matter of personal preference. I'd prefer something like 2-3 seconds myself.
Just rechecked and forts are indeed illegal to sleep in and respond to the Town timescale, so no need to change those. As for other exteriors, I would just manually include Daedric and Dwemer ruins, if that isn't too much trouble (I don't mind it affecting the whole cell, either). Cave and tomb names don't seem to show up until you're inside them, so you can ignore those as well.
I think you'll like the new version. I was able to resolve the gondola issue so gondola travel will use the town exterior timescale instead of the wilderness timescale.
For exteriors other than towns, there's now a distinct timescale for named exterior cells, things like major ruins and strongholds where Morrowind gives the cell its own name. This was easy because it just required checking whether or not the cell has a name on cell change.
Applying a separate timescale in the vicinity of every dungeon would require doing lots and lots of checks and calculations every single frame, which would have a real performance impact. I think this is a better way of doing it.
14 comments
One of the biggest issues with the post-Daggerfall games is the sense of scale. Morrowind felt big when I first played it, and it still does relative to other games, but it’s quite tiny. This can’t completely fix the issue, but it improves the simulation a massive amount. It makes Vvardenfell behave more realistically. The wilderness is large, and it takes longer to go anywhere.
Some suggestions after testing:
* Because they're about the same speed, walking should induce the same timescale as sneaking, with both depending on environmental variables. For instance, if the Wilderness timescale is 120, its Walking/Sneaking timescale would be 115 (or whatever the set fraction). I think that's a good balance between realistic time/distance ratio and not feeling rushed into always running.
* Options to toggle off the Sneaking, Combat and Wariness timescales since I really just want the Location and Standing mechanics. No matter the Walking/Sneaking numbers, it's still an unnatural time/distance ratio. Combat timescale is even more exploitable, since you can just let an enemy chase you forever to keep the timescale low. Plus, most Combat and Wariness mechanics are performed while standing still anyway.
* All Location timescales (slightly) slowed by lower Encumbrance and higher Speed and Athletics. After all, a sluggish person with heavy luggage is going to take longer to reach their destination than a conditioned athlete who travels light.
* I would also shrink the timescale message from "Timescale is now [number]" to a nice and subtle "TS [number]".
Thanks again for making this. :)
I'm skeptical about changing timescale based on movement rate in general (except for slower timescale on standing still, so people can enjoy a nice view without time passing too quickly). If you walk, it'll take more time to reach your destination, and if you run, you'll get there faster. Slowing down the timescale on walking as opposed to running could mean that walking from Seyda Neen to Balmora takes no more time than running, or even less time.
In other words the difference in the amount of in-game time it takes to get somewhere walking as opposed to running is controlled by the difference between walking speed and running speed, not a timescale difference.
(Interesting fact I learned in testing: as far as the game is concerned, if you're in sneak mode, you're also technically walking, even if you're not actually moving. BTW the sneaking timescale applies whenever you're in sneak mode, whether you're moving or not.)
Originally I had thought about using multipliers (e.g. sneaking reduces the current timescale by some configurable percentage rather than setting timescale directly). But I decided to base this more on the Dynamic Timescale Oblivion mod. My thinking is that if the player is sneaking (or wary, or whatever), they're paying careful attention to what's going on around them, and that wouldn't change depending on whether they're sneaking in a dungeon or an exterior.
This is planned. It's only not included in 1.0 because I was in a hurry.
Sure, but a player who wants the timescale to be low can just set the wilderness timescale to 10 and be done with it. I'm not too worried about players "cheating" and exploiting mechanics to keep the timescale low, because that's more easily done by changing MCM settings.
If the player is highly encumbered, their movement speed is slower, and it'll take them more time to reach their destination anyway. No need to muck around with that via timescale changes in addition. (This would be kind of the opposite of lowering timescale for walking rather than running, increasing the time-elapsed difference rather than decreasing it.)
I personally find the messages annoying, and would regardless of how they're formatted. I only use them for testing purposes. "TS [number]" would make it shorter (and therefore it would stay on the screen for less time), but I don't think it would be any more subtle or less annoying, and might be less clear to some.
BTW I really appreciate all your feedback on my mods. :)
A few suggestions I forgot to mention: 1. Apply the Town timescale to fort, cave and dungeon exteriors (and rename it "Exterior timescale"). For instance, if you're on the steps of a Daedric ruin, you're not traveling across wilderness at that point, and these structures are more accurately scaled than the surrounding landmass. 2. The Charma's Breath cave cell should use the Wilderness timescale instead of Interior, since it connects two distant exteriors (Kogoruhn and Red Mountain) and would therefore be much longer than depicted in-game. 3. Paid travel is still vanilla and should also be tied to Wilderness time (except those Vivec gondolas, which only travel between cantons).
Another minor suggestion I'd make is setting the default Standing Still delay to 0 or 1 second. If you're not moving, you're not covering any distance, so the timescale should immediately reflect this. Again, just a minor nitpick since it's easy to adjust on your own.
Happy to help out with this. :)
I'm not sure how to determine whether or not a cell has a dungeon like a daedric ruin in it, or (a better way of doing it, if it's possible) the player's distance from the nearest load door, or certain load doors.
All I could think of is to create a list of cells specified in the mod's data (maybe with a configurable whitelist), with any cell on that list being treated as a town cell. That would be doable, but I'm not sure it's worth it. The town timescale would apply in the whole cell, not just in the exterior ruins, etc.
The Charma's Breath thing is doable though. I'll make it an option. It does make sense, though the distance isn't too long. The distance from the actual stronghold to the Red Mountain exit is about the same as the distance from Vivec FQ to Vivec Palace (though the distance scale is surely distored from "reality" here).
Adjusting fast travel time (optional) is planned, in a similar way to how Pass the Time does it, based on the wilderness timescale. I think this would actually apply to the gondolas too, but I'll test it. Morrowind determines travel time by dividing the distance traveled by fTravelTimeMult (I think that's the right GMST). Guild Guides take no time because Morrowind can't calculate the distance because they're inside. I think the only reason gondola travel takes no time in vanilla is because they're so close. (Travel time is always an integer number of hours, that's hardcoded by the game.)
I've adjusted how the still timer works so time with the menu open no longer counts. But yeah the timer length is just a matter of personal preference. I'd prefer something like 2-3 seconds myself.
Best of luck on the gondola issue.
For exteriors other than towns, there's now a distinct timescale for named exterior cells, things like major ruins and strongholds where Morrowind gives the cell its own name. This was easy because it just required checking whether or not the cell has a name on cell change.
Applying a separate timescale in the vicinity of every dungeon would require doing lots and lots of checks and calculations every single frame, which would have a real performance impact. I think this is a better way of doing it.
No, only 00 00 80 3F in Morrowind.esm, only hardcore.)
SpaceDevo
But floating time is generally unrealistic and very strange, like some kind of anomaly.