[RELz] Snowy Dreams

[Dwip]

I'll see about looking it over tomorrow. For the moment, two things:1. It's slightly less annoying for people like me if you don't have that random Snow Dreams dir holding everything inside the archive. BAIN can, I have just now learned, deal with it, but it's extraneous and a pet peeve of mine.2. Edit had a slight bit of cleaning it wanted to do.[edit] Why am I always the one starting pages, it feels like?

[Arthmoor]

Lol @ Dwip always starting new pages I feel the same way sometimes on BGS.@Hana: A really quick check, your "new interior" cell needs a path grid. Also agreed on the subfolder thing. BAIN handles it better if you aren't nesting into an internal folder. I'll have more to comment on tomorrow after I've had time to look at it.

[Conner]

Eww, bared mountain lion bones... ;)Oh, I was about to download a copy.. how much cleaning are we talking about? :(Maybe I should hold off til after Samson and Dwip offer a few more comments and you have a chance to make adjustments?

[Hana]

Sorry about the extra directory, it actually annoys me too. I didn't do it on purpose, I guess that's how winrar grabs a folder and zips it up. Or I should learn to use it properly. Or I should welcome 7zip with open arms. Something like that.Path grids, cleaning..... yes, yes, I said it wasn't finished. Just need you guys to run through the quest and make sure it works for you.

[Dwip]

So if you have WinRAR, the thing to do is make a directory with all the crap you want to distribute in it, laid out in the way you want it to be distributed. In the case of AFK_Weye, I have an AFK_Weye dir, then an AFK_Weye 2_21 BAIN dir inside that. The BAIN dir holds all the distributable stuff, while the main AFK_Weye dir has other subdirs for notes, backup files, and whatever else.When I want to package it up, I open up the BAIN dir, select all the files in there, and use the Add to RAR shell command, like so:See red dotted option.When I get done there, I move the RAR file up a level to the AFK_Weye dir and rename it to, say, AFK_Weye 2_21.rar. Old versions of that file get to live in an old versions dir I created for the task.There are other ways to do things, but that's how I do it.

[Dwip]

So far so good. Just a few things:- Your quest icon needs a blue background. I'm not sure if the transparency was on purpose or not, but the effect is blurred and very difficult to see.- The black background on the santa hat icon? Baaaaaaaaaad. Speaking of the santa hat, we don't get to see it?- That new oak retex is pretty hot. I don't care for the white furniture much, but the other is really nice and I kind of want to steal it.- In the initial greet by the ghost, "Thank the Nines!" should be "Thank the Nine!"- You should probably rethink the food clutter in the delapidated version of the chalet. Skeletons + food? Odd.- You should check the normal map on your fireplace stone texture. Needs a bit of heightmapping.- A couple of trees or something out front of the chalet might be nice. Also shading around the house if you get that far. Yes, I'm a bit of a purist. Obviously the interior needs fixing too, but you knew that.- Do remember to hop into Bash at some point and fill in the name and desc fields for the esp.

[Hana]

Great feedback, thanks!lol about the quest icon. Apparently I left a visible transparent layer in front of the blue background (that it does have) before I flattened it to save. It looked perfectly fine to me because I use DarkDarnUI with blue menus! lolI didn't make the santa hat icon, but eh, will fix if I have time. Otherwise not worried about it. And yes, I forgot to put the hat on Santa.Help yourself to the oak tex. I'm pretty fond of it too.

[Conner]

Wow, after seeing feedback from Dwip, I almost have to wonder if there's a point to my trying to help beta test, he's way more detail oriented in-game than I usually am. I tend to play more along the lines of noticing when things actually jump at me as wrong enough to hinder or seriously distract from actual play, if it just looks a little odd or something feels like it should be there instead of here, I'm not that likely to even notice it.

[Hana]

Wheee... I made a Christmas tree

[Conner]

Very pink, er, nice.. are the ornaments near the top supposed to be slightly above the branches hey're "hanging" on?

[Arthmoor]

Took a run through, everything worked out fine. Although the guy in Chorrol seemed a bit rude for someone about to spread holiday cheer.The "new" interior could do with a bit more lighting. Not sure if you were done with that part or not.The white oak furniture is nice, and I like the two beds too. The retex for the cabin itself is awesome.I'm with Dwip on trees and bushes. The exterior could use a bit more, not sure what you might have had planned. Hopefully the reindeer end up white at some point. The grave effect was cool too.The area you picked in general is awfully tempting to exploit for a village at some point too

[Conner]

So, how much cleaning does it need? Can I run it without cleaning just to see what y'all are talking about safely or will it not even load as-is?

[Dwip]

@Samson - Right after Faregyl. @Hanaisse - Very...pink. But neat. Also, I had not previously connected rainbows to Christmas.Oh, and what Samson said about lighting. I forgot to mention that. Nudge it up a tiny bit.@Conner - I spent too many years doing area checks for Alsherok. (thank god we don't have to proofread as much now. Or deal with mudprog errors and missing tildes)

[Dwip]

Works perfectly fine as is. The cleaning is just me making a minor bitch rather than anything that's actually much of an issue.

[Conner]

Yes, thank goodness you're not having to search for missing tildes or parenthesis miscounts or missing semi-colons. :lol:Ah, if that's all it is, I'll have to fire up the new mod tonight sometime.

[Hana]

Go ahead Conner, check it out. It won't hurt anything. :)I love the area I picked. The views are awesome with Brumbeks Sky Pack and Phitt's Falling Stars. In fact, I've already decided after the holidays I'm keeping the cabin and removing all holiday decorations. Might release it again minus quest as a regular player home. I may be able to be talked into adding a small village around it. ;)You guys are all colour blind. The garland on the tree is purple not pink. However, now it's blue. I've added a couple of trees and bushes off to the sides. I really prefer the open space in front to not block the view.Guy in Chorrol is a bit rude, cause you took your time delivering the presents. He has holiday cheer to spread and you've made him late! Eh, it works for me. So yeah, let's discuss lighting and the best way to brighten up the chalet without the glaring reflections because it is a bit dim (but I like it, it's warm and cozy). I've used orange light to keep it ambient at 256 (I think). A couple more in corners, maybe? Do we prefer real lights or fake lights?

[Arthmoor]

I'm not color blind, but I'd have called it lavender or something. It's about halfway between purple and pink :)Took my time?!? I'll have him know I slogged for hours through the deep snow in those mountains for his silly sack! Well, actually since I was just testing, I fast traveled. So he's just a meanie!You could probably do with each major room having a decent sized overhead chandelier, radius 512 in your favorite flavor of orange. Accented by candles of 128 or 256 radius in any corners that aren't getting decent coverage. Try not to overpower the main area with the fireplace though, because too much light blinds us HDR users. And yes, I at least prefer real lighting sources.

[Conner]

Sounds good, I will. :)Fine, but it was an awfully pink she of purple. So, where's the blue version?Are you saying that there's a way to not "take your time" completing what Samson describes? :blink:I agree with Samson (having not seen it myself yet), real lighting is preferable but dim is good as long as it's not too dim because too bright creates almost as much problems as not bright enough.

[Arthmoor]

So have you already turned this in? It looks like everything was due in by yesterday?

[Hana]

No, I had already messaged Shezrie and told her it would be late and she was fine with that.But, omfg, it looks like I just screwed it up, bad. And I want to cry. :cry:I had just finished an hour ago, and everything was perfect. Then stupid me didn't make a backup copy. From the CS I tried to edit "Data..", you know, where it says Created By and Summary. Well that hung up the CS. Tried again, and again. Didn't like it. Next time I tried to load it in the CS I get some weird error message basically saying the file is oversized. Suddenly, my esp is over 30,000k. And I don't know what to do.Guess I'm going back to my backup from a week ago, and re-clutter all over again.

[Conner]

Don't hold off waiting for me, please, seriously.Oh man! Condolences.

[Dwip]

Oh dear. Totally should have mentioned that, and totally didn't think to. Sorry.

 

Unfortunately, I don't know that it's even possible to fix an esp you've fragged like that.

 

In the future, use Bash for that stuff. If you click your esp, there will be a place to input name/description stuff over on the right. Bash is happiest if you use the format:

Random description text.
 
{{BASH:tags}}
 
Version x.x

Although I think Bash tags can go anywhere. Version should be at the bottom.

[Arthmoor]

Well you could try uploading the broken file to 4shared or something and let me see if it can be salvaged.

 

Lesson learned though, don't use the CS to update the description field. Wrye Bash is far safer for that. Somehow I suspect this needs to be added to the CS tutorials or something so more people don't get bit by it. I completely fragged someone else's mod doing that without thinking once.

[Conner]

So, by using the CS to add the credits instead of Bash it adds 30 MB?!?

 

That's quite a list of credits...

[Hana]

 

Sent it to you at TESA.

 

No worries Dwip, it's not your fault. And I'm with Conner on the confusion. What the hell did it do?