Community VtmB patch controversy quelled and patch reboot

[Amasius]

There is one case where it was clear that some dialogue was simply unfinished, but that it was most definitely intended. That dialogue is clan-specific, so yours truly has been called upon to write a few lines of that dialogue from scratch. Specifically, it's Malkavian dialogue. The other clans DO have dialogue for the situations involved, but the Malk dialogue was never completed. So... I've written some of it myself. Before anyone raises their eyebrows, this is in fact restoring missing content and it SHOULD be included in a patch. As for my part, I'm a skilled writer and I promise that the lines that I have written will be in exactly the same style as those written by Troika for Malks. You'll never even notice. I've been playing Malks exclusively for a very long time and at this point, I'm beginning to think like one... LOL

And there you have it.

Priceless.

 

[Relien]

So now we finally know what Tessera's role in the "True patch" is - modding

 

[MacBone]

@ Kotario - That explains things nicely.

 

[psycojester]

Nice we got that one sorted, now somebody go get the pry bar and remove mathboys head from his arse. he seems to feel that Wesp killed Troika and now he must release patches in penance for his crime

 

[DarkUnderlord]

I don't think mathboy's issue is whether you want to call it a mod or not, it's what's being changed. Wesp, as it's been known in the Vampire groups for quite a while now, made a lot more than just bug fix changes or even adding in extra lines of dialogue. He changed a number of other things. One example being "Making love to Jeanette is now possible regardless of the storyline." Before that, you needed to kill her other personality (IE: Actually make a choice and thereby receive a consequence). With his patch, it doesn't matter. You can just do it because, according to Wesp, "it's better!"

Beyond that, he's moved that fucking katana around more times than anyone cares to remember and then nerfed, unnerfed and re-nerfed a bunch of weapons all at various times, seemingly depending on his whims at any particular moment. As an example of the Wesp patching merry-go-round:

• Troika Version on Release: Completing the tutorial gets you a free set of lockpicks, a baseball bat, and 2 XP. If you skip the tutorial, you get nothing.
  v0.2: Skipping the tutorial now gives lockpicks, the .38 and two xp.
  v2.8: Removed .38 got for skipping the tutorial and added the quest log.
  v3.4: Gave .38 on tutorial completion and an xp but no items on skipping.

We go from the default of getting nothing for skipping the tutorial, to getting everything for skipping the tutorial, then back to getting nothing but end up throwing in a .38 as well while we're at it. The reward has also been dropped down from 2 xp (Troika's decision) to 1 xp for completing it (if I read that right). For starters, it shows that he can't make up his fucking mind as most of the changes in any of the new "fan patch" releases seemed to be changes made to undo changes made in a previous release, second it goes beyond the few tweaks that needed to be done. Either you get a bat, lockpicks and 2 xp for skipping the tutorial or you don't. We don't need to throw in some extra bonuses, take them out, add them back in and then re-settle on what Troika had in the first place.

The reason most people want a "true patch", is because they don't want the weapons re-balanced, the quests changed and extra shit added in. They just want the fucking game and the quests there-in to work. As in, that placing the cameras quest doesn't tell you it failed because you were spotted, even though you never were and someone to fix all those typos that are present through-out the game.

I think it's pretty clear that nobody in the Vampire world can do that though, given the second group seem to be as mentally fucked up as the first lot who released a patch.

 

[Wesp5]

Our goal was to fix the game and to free people from the monopoly that has been imposed upon them, for over two years, by Werner Spahl (Wesp) and his mods... Wesp wants us to yank our patch from sight, so that he can continue to posture himself as The One True God of VTMB.

The tyrant!

Just for the record. I never asked them to remove their patch. I only asked them to include the original readme to provide proper credit and to name it something less offending than "true". Acrimonious agreed to both conditions as can be seen in this thread:

http://www.forumplanet.com/planetvampir ... 1#23065207

Tessera didn't honour his promise and so the flamewar started. Acrimonious then decided on his own to start anew and Tessera announced he would remove their older patches. Again I never was involved with the whole issue and I'm banned from their site anyway.

 

[Wesp5]

... who thinks it's a good idea to force Jeanette's naked body down my throat.

Just don't choose the colourcoded (pink) seduction line during a dialogue in her bedroom, mkay? And you never get to see her naked body anyway.

That would have been my reply altogether. Probably mathboy never played that part in the first place. But I think about raising the Seduction conditions for this so people who are not playing that kind of role won't stumble over it. What do you think?

Though if Therese is killed, and one does visit Jeanette after her email bootycall, the sex seems inescapable. Perhaps it was always like that? Either way it felt kind of buggy to have every conversation end in the 'blackout sex moaning and giggling'.

I never changed that part as far as I remember and it sounds like a bug, maybe I will look into the issue.

 

[Wesp5]

Wesp aims for consistency in the game, and to be honest, based on Jeanette's freakishly slutty personality, it makes sense that she'd fuck you, if only to serve as further encouragement to slash the paintings for her, and it improves her attitude towards you. Role-playing wise, it seems plausible to me.

Thanks, that's exactly the way I see it.

As for the true patch, the fact that infinitely respawning enemies appearing right in front of you would be back in the game (since that's appearantly what Troika wanted), I'm already turned off by it.

Who knows if Troika really wanted this? The respawning gets more on more towards the end of Bloodlines and this could just mean they were rushed to finish the game and didn't had the time to do something better than use it to prolong the end.

 

[Wesp5]

With his patch, it doesn't matter. You can just do it because, according to Wesp, "it's better!"

No, see Rat Keengs great comment on this.

Beyond that, he's moved that fucking katana around more times than anyone cares to remember

Yes, three times. I think we all agree that the original solution with it just lying around in an enemy invested level unused on the ground while people attack you with humble knifes was just stupid. But where to place it without unbalancing the game? My first solution with Chastity owning it offered it to much to soon so I changed it. The second solution with Yukie giving it to you didn't make any sense anymore after I restored her appearance at the temple. Nobody has yet complained about the current solution !

• Troika Version on Release: Completing the tutorial gets you a free set of lockpicks, a baseball bat, and 2 XP. If you skip the tutorial, you get nothing.
  v0.2: Skipping the tutorial now gives lockpicks, the .38 and two xp.
  v2.8: Removed .38 got for skipping the tutorial and added the quest log.
  v3.4: Gave .38 on tutorial completion and an xp but no items on skipping.

Lets clear up this issue a bit. Dan gave the items on skipping in 0.2. I stayed true to his view but removed the .38 in a later patch because I wasn't aware that you could get one from the enemies. I was informed of this oversight and people convinced me too that it would be more consistent if you got nothing when you skipped it. So that's the way I corrected it. I just gave one xp for skipping because I added a quest state describing what happened and after all you did experience an important Camarilla gathering.

So the whole process was just the result of trying to improve the game with feedback from several sources. I'm no tyrant at all. If you don't like something in my patches, tell me and I will think it over. That's how most of the bug fixes were done in the first place, I never had time to replay the game, people were stating them to me. Sometimes though someone will view something as a bug that others see different, but I'm always open to suggestions! My aim is to make the game more consistent and enjoyable overall...

The reason most people want a "true patch", is because they don't want the weapons re-balanced, the quests changed and extra shit added in.

I have no problem with that and offered Acrimonious again to use my patches as a base as long as it gets proper credit.

 

[mister lamat]

fuck troika's 'original intent'. dead men get no say. it's all 'true'.

dark undergarments, take tessera's mangina from out thine mouth.

 

[DarkUnderlord]

Tessera didn't honour his promise and so the flamewar started. Acrimonious then decided on his own to start anew and Tessera announced he would remove their older patches. Again I never was involved with the whole issue and I'm banned from their site anyway.

Oh for fuck's sake. What's Tessera's involvement? She's just hosting? Tell Acrimonious to give the patch to me and I'll fucking host it on Terra-Arcanum. With readme file.

So the whole process was just the result of trying to improve the game with feedback from several sources. I'm no tyrant at all. If you don't like something in my patches, tell me and I will think it over. That's how most of the bug fixes were done in the first place, I never had time to replay the game, people were stating them to me. Sometimes though someone will view something as a bug that others see different, but I'm always open to suggestions! My aim is to make the game more consistent and enjoyable overall...

That's the thing though. I, and semingly a few others, don't want you to change anything based on someone's feedback. Just do the typo's. Just fix the quests that are there. Don't write any of your own dialogue. Just leave all that shit alone. Release that as a patch and I'd play that. I'm quite happy to play the game the way Troika released it, balanced as Troika balanced it. I don't need the flamethrower nerfed or the crossbow nerfed or the zoom nerfed or sex with Jeanette based on a few people thinking it'd make a better RPG experience.

If then, at some later point, I decide I'd like to see some more content and a few extra lines of dialogue, and have sex with Jeanette because gosh darned it I just couldn't do it the first time, then I'll download that mod at that time.

The reason most people want a "true patch", is because they don't want the weapons re-balanced, the quests changed and extra shit added in.

I have no problem with that and offered Acrimonious again to use my patches as a base as long as it gets proper credit.

Awesome. Given the extra lines of dialogue that already seem to be creeping into their first release, I can't say I trust them though. Why can't any of you fuck's just make a simple patch? That's all I an mathboy want. Keep your fucking extra lines of missing dialogue and your weapon re-balances out of it.

dark undergarments, take tessera's mangina from out thine mouth.

It helps if you read what I actually wrote before replying. Look for my comment about what I think of "the second group" (Tessera and Co).

 

[mathboy]

DarkUnderlord, thank you for managing to say exactly what I was meaning to say while being in my nerdrage. And the rest of you could just pretend DU is me and read his replys as if I wrote them.

The added dialogue in Tessera's patch makes me feel bad about telling you to get it and calling it a "true" patch. It's just as bad as Wesp5's (a bit depending on the dialogue of course).

And Astromarine, I'm sorry if I said it was Tessera's patch, I know it's not, but I can't remember the name of that other guy.

 

[Wesp5]

That's the thing though. I, and semingly a few others, don't want you to change anything based on someone's feedback. Just do the typo's. Just fix the quests that are there.

But what would be the point in that? Who really cares about typos in a game that old? I played Bloodlines through with the official patch 1.2 and to be honest I never even noticed 90% of the stuff I fixed afterwards because these are just small details compared to the overall gameplay. Improving the game with unused lines, models and weapons on the contrary increases the replay value and I would always recommend playing the 1.2 original first and then my patch to experience the stuff that was left unfinished because Troika closed down.

 

[galsiah]

...I never even noticed 90% of the stuff I fixed afterwards because these are just small details compared to the overall gameplay.

Of course you don't notice - errors that no longer exist aren't supposed to be noticed. That's the point. Most patched errors ought to blend in seamlessly with the game. A load of typos in dialogue can be distracting/annoying - no-one's going to notice when they're gone, but they don't need to notice to benefit.

You might consider tweaks and balance changes to be more important. Perhaps they are. Would it be too hard to separate the two though? Couldn't you simply have a patch section and a tweak section? I doubt you'd often need to access the same files from each(???).

Perhaps doing this now would be a pain in the arse, but originally it wouldn't have been (presuming you weren't often both patching and tweaking the same files).

Oh and:

Who really cares about typos in a game that old?

Me. They're distracting interuptions reminiscent of internet forums (not a good thing).

 

[Diogo Ribeiro]

Maybe in a magical land where leprechauns prance around pot’s o’ gold, use rainbows for toilet paper, and farts smell like pretty poetry could your news post not be construed as picking sides or not slighting wesp. But in this land, the world we live in, any fair minded person will see that it does both. So, maybe I don’t have one of your magical gayland factual points, I have an actual factual point based on actual fact straight from the horses mouth.

No. what you have is conjecture. Simple as that. As before, the news posts was simply pointing out the state of things - there's been a series of patches which many not be to the tastes of others - and someone was developing a patch that didn't muck about as much with the game. Take it or leave it. That you can't tell the difference bewteen fact and your assumption of things is your problem, not mine.

I know what wesp’s mod does, half this thread is the patch notes, and I also know what the One True Patch does, and they both modify the game. So calling one a patch and one a mod when one is more modish than patchish just seems a little retarded to me.

Funny.

After you spent all this time with your trite semantics and neurotic accusations you've just made my point. By calling Wesp's work a mod and Acrimonious' work a patch; and by acknowledging one modifies more than it patches; by admitting one is more "modish" than "patchish"; by claiming there's no difference between a patch and a mod but then pointing out just how different they are, you've just rendered your bullshit argument useless.

And as per your own rules, made yourself sound a little retarded in the process.

Great work, chuckles. But this has very much been your swan song. Take your hysterical nonsense and your kiddie insinuations someplace else. Your 15 minutes of fame have just expired.

 

[foneco]

So who can tell me wich patch/mod or else gave the oportunity to see the player in 3th person view from any angle?
I used to have that mod/patch or whatever instaled but nowdays I only have the true patch and it lacks that funtion, the most important for me!

 

[Wesp5]

Of course you don't notice - errors that no longer exist aren't supposed to be noticed. That's the point.

No, you misunderstood me. People mailed me about hundreds of small issues that I fixed but which I never noticed on my own walkthrough because the game itself was so compelling !

Would it be too hard to separate the two though? Couldn't you simply have a patch section and a tweak section? I doubt you'd often need to access the same files from each(???).

That's not easy because indeed the same files need to be accessed. So I would have to keep two versions and do any fix two times which I just can't afford. Even Anaximander never bothered to re-patch my never releases as this would have meant doing all changes all over again. Especially in the dialogue and map files you can't even leave a comment of what you did.

 

[Wesp5]

So who can tell me which patch/mod or else gave the opportunity to see the player in 3th person view from any angle?
I used to have that mod/patch or whatever installed but nowadays I only have the true patch and it lacks that function, the most important for me!

Strange, they "borrowed" this setup from my autoexec.cfg and it should still be included in the latest of their patches...

 

[galsiah]

No, you misunderstood me. ...but which I never noticed...

I see. You need to pay more attention then!

That's not easy because indeed the same files need to be accessed...

Fair enough. Of course it'd be ideal to have the two versions, but I recognise that would be more work, and difficult to update correctly.

 

[Diogo Ribeiro]

Speaking of which, Wesp, how hard would it be to mod in more different ways of solving quests? One of the recurring - and valid - complaints about Bloodlines is that later areas are combat fests. Would you consider adding in other possibilities for non-combat characters?

 

[Roqua]

Maybe in a magical land where leprechauns prance around pot’s o’ gold, use rainbows for toilet paper, and farts smell like pretty poetry could your news post not be construed as picking sides or not slighting wesp. But in this land, the world we live in, any fair minded person will see that it does both. So, maybe I don’t have one of your magical gayland factual points, I have an actual factual point based on actual fact straight from the horses mouth.

No. what you have is conjecture. Simple as that. As before, the news posts was simply pointing out the state of things - there's been a series of patches which many not be to the tastes of others - and someone was developing a patch that didn't muck about as much with the game. Take it or leave it. That you can't tell the difference bewteen fact and your assumption of things is your problem, not mine.

I know what wesp’s mod does, half this thread is the patch notes, and I also know what the One True Patch does, and they both modify the game. So calling one a patch and one a mod when one is more modish than patchish just seems a little retarded to me.

Funny.

After you spent all this time with your trite semantics and neurotic accusations you've just made my point. By calling Wesp's work a mod and Acrimonious' work a patch; and by acknowledging one modifies more than it patches; by admitting one is more "modish" than "patchish"; by claiming there's no difference between a patch and a mod but then pointing out just how different they are, you've just rendered your bullshit argument useless.

And as per your own rules, made yourself sound a little retarded in the process.

Great work, chuckles. But this has very much been your swan song. Take your hysterical nonsense and your kiddie insinuations someplace else. Your 15 minutes of fame have just expired.

I don't, and never have, cared if something is a patch or mod. It means nothing to me. What is important to me is that the hard work of someone who tried to improve a game for free isn't invalidated for nonsense. You can't pick and chose what you think is a valid fix and what is a mod. Wesp took offense at the term True Patch, you perpetuated the situation, slighted him and his hard work, invalidated it, and picked sides. Bottom line.

No matter how much you dislike the changes in the original patch, your news posting was picking sides and invalidating his hard work and slighting him, which is fucked up. That means you fucked up. You can twist it any way you want, and side track the topic. Wesp calls his free work a patch, so its a fucking patch. If he charged for it you could call it whatever the fuck you want. The True Patch is based off of his hard work, and Terresa did the same thing you did to him but not keeping their agreement for bullshit reasoning.

Hopefully, no one gives a fuck on your opinions of where a patch starts and a mod begins, just as the shouldn't care about mine. All I've done, since this started, was defend someone who worked hard for free to make a game that was released broken more enjoyable. You can make this about you and me, like a little cry baby kid on medication for being a little spoiled whinny bitch, or you can man-up, admit you fucked up, appologize to wesp, and move on.

I made wrong assumptions about wesp making changes with a pnp narrative, I admittted it when I saw it. I'm not in this to win or make anyone look bad, I'm just trying to make everyone see things normally. The True Patch adds content and changes the content of the original game, thats a fucking mod. You do not see any modifications made in regards to restoring content or adding content that might have or should have been there as a mod, I do. But, neither one of us has put in an ounce of work to fix or make the game better. Wesp has, and he doesn't deserve to be attacked for it, or have his work underminded, or to not recieve credit.

This is my message to you: I don't care what a mod is, or what a patch is. Either they are both mods or both patches, if wesp wants to call his mod a patch or patch a mod, as long as its free thats his right, if wesp takes issue with the name True Patch or them not including the orginal readme, and its based 100% off of his work (and the work of the other original guy), basicaly discrediting him and slamming him and his work, he should have everyone normal's backing, regardless if you take issue with the name of his patch or the content of it. When and if the a-guy remakes a patch from start (which he will use wesps patch as a walkthrough and save countless hours of work) he can name it what he wants. But anyone attacking people who spend their time fixing games we like are idiots.

I've really tried hard to be reasonable and adult about this, a lot harder than usual. You can keep being a blind, dramatic crybaby bitch spouting gibberish, or you can grow some nut-hair and cowboy up and admit you were wrong from the start. You went about the whole thing wrong.

I'll admit I'm wrong to get the ball rolling. I'm wrong. It wasn't hard. I'll even appologize. I'm sorry role-player and mathboy for the mean and hurtful things I said. It was wrong and childish of me. Now stop being a bitch and appologize to wesp for picking sides and slighting him and admit without his hard work there wouldn't be any precious True Patch to even start this nonsense.

 

[Diogo Ribeiro]

Wesp took offense at the term True Patch, you perpetuated the situation, slighted him and his hard work, invalidated it, and picked sides. Bottom line.

Wesp and you can very well take it up to whoever decided to call it a True Patch. Again that was the name chosen by its developer. This wasn't the case of the patch being called "Acrimonious' Supah Dupah Patch" and me calling it "OMFGTRUEPATCH". The patch is labelled and distributed as "True Patch". Deal with it. There was no situation until you started blowing this out of proportion. There's no slight, no poor judgement, no insult, no falsehood about saying what Wesp's patch contains - Wesp recognizes his patch is not only a patch but also a mod. If you have an issue with that, then take it up to him because I'm only pointing out what it is.

No matter how much you dislike the changes in the original patch, your news posting was picking sides and invalidating his hard work and slighting him, which is fucked up. That means you fucked up. You can twist it any way you want, and side track the topic.

You're the one who keeps coming up with the same idiotic semantics and accusations, kid. It's funny that since your entire point was shot down you're now trying to claim you weren't the only one to "fuck up" in an attempt to minimize your self-appointed retardness. Last time, kid, and this time it better stick: I made a news post about a new Bloodlines patch, which has a different set of goals than Wesp's modpatchingie. I pointed out just where they were different so that people could decide which would better suit their needs and tastes.

You're free to keep insisting on the same bullshit and accusing me of "taking sides" which, not only is idiotic considering I've installed Wesp's mod on a previous Bloodlines run and have yet to install Acrimonious' patch, it's also complete and utter teenage nerd rage.

 

[dagorkan]

What's with all the bitchiness on the RPGCodex all of a sudden? Has hanging out on IRC synchronized your periods or something?

There are a few people who put a lot of work into something, trying to make/improve RPGs and are kind enough to let other people try them out for free. You don't encourage them, you don't tell them how they could do better, all you can do is moan. Until you get over your present crisis please just shut the fuck up.

 

[Quigs]

This game worth picking up?

As a rule, im more on the warewolf side of thing then vampire. I never understood the appeal of eurotrash with funny teeth.

 

[mondblut]

Why don't you folks just plug an installation wizard with lots of checkboxes into patch?

Fuck Jeanette - y/n
Move around katana - y/n
blah blah

Doesn't sound too hard after all those scripts.