PaxLair Player Owned Town Scene Design and Test

Discussion in 'Player Owned Towns' started by Winfield, Mar 31, 2015.

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  1. Ghearrid

    Ghearrid Avatar

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    is this where I need to go to get access to paxlair forum?
     
  2. Miracle Dragon

    Miracle Dragon Legend of the Hearth

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    Now that's an interesting thought, a vast cavern with various sized pillars of rock scattered throughout.

    It will be so crazy-awesome to see underground keep/castle lots...
     
  3. Xenar

    Xenar Avatar

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    Winfield, do you feel that the standard "scene" is the 1000x1000 meters? Many of us, we'll we are anyway, looking at using a scene as the basis for our PoT. Having dimensions to start from would be helpful.
     
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  4. Winfield

    Winfield Legend of the Hearth

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    Welcome Ghearrid! Welcome to the SotA forums and to PaxLair!

    Sean Silverfoot and Ashlynn can help you get set up on Enjin: http://paxlair.enjin.com/ Please register an account there and join PaxLair. (Oh, anyone can register on Enjin too, and join PaxLair or many of the other UO/SotA places on Enjin.)

    We have forums and events there too. Much of the Enjin portal is for Old Britannia (Ultima Online) where we still enjoy a nearly 24/7 presence, weekly meetings every Tuesday night, and lots of great people to adventure with. We've been in UO for 17+ years and still going strong. We will be in both UO and SotA as PaxLair.

    We have plans to build new websites, forums, and media centers (not sure how to do this, but would be great!) too before Episode 1.

    Again, welcome aboard!
     
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  5. Winfield

    Winfield Legend of the Hearth

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    I talked with @Darkstarr and he indicated any PoT scene (geography) can be 1 km square (1000m x 1000m) since the PoTs purchased are for "lot space" not "scene space". Entrances/exits might be moved towards the housing areas as needed to avoid long "runs" for the avatars.

    Sean Silverfoot got information from him too when Darkstarr visited a PaxLair Working Hours sessions last Wednesday. So for now, it may be safe to design on 1 km square. Keep an eye out for more information though, and toss in your scene ideas here publicly, or send to me privately to look at (I am not vetting ideas for Portalarium though; I may be able to offer you some insight if you desire).

    Great question!
     
  6. Miracle Dragon

    Miracle Dragon Legend of the Hearth

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    Hmm.. I wonder if we could hold our own community contest to make PoT templates based on these parameters.
    The most popular template designs would reasonably be the ones worth designing for real, since a majority of PoT owners would choose them?
    All in the spirit of crowd-sourcing, of course. ;-)
     
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  7. Sean Silverfoot

    Sean Silverfoot Avatar

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    Perhaps it's already underway! Nothing official of course. As Winfield posted, use this thread to get some ideas going having the support of other groups would probably go a long way in the decision process. Pax Et Veritas and 4B are already collaborating on an island scene they hope other will find useful.
     
  8. Jatvardur

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    Yep. That's all making sense. This is a great idea and I was hoping something like this would exist.

    It would be a pain if you were completely stuck with one fixed lay out for lots. Especially if you under / over estimated the popularity of the various lot types. It would have meant either being disappointed, or paying a lot more to have the devs manually fix the layout. By giving some power to the POT owner then lots can be sub-divided or combined to meet demand. I don't think I could be happier with that news, it is also a reasonable compromise between nothing and full on-the-fly customization.

    I can see how this could be tricky, especially for row lots. You basically need the entrance to be on the perimeter.

    A town lot could be turned into 8 row lots, but you wouldn't be able to place that town lot directly adjacent to another town lot or you would be blocking some doors, or wasting some space of the adjacent town lot (?). I'd be keen to optimize the space to maximize usage but to have an eye towards flexibility. Inevitably some areas can't / won't be back to back town / city lots.

    I also see that a town is the smallest sub-divisor a castle lot which still allows for maximal lot usage. There needs to be a term for that... (there is something on the tip of my tongue but my memory is failing me... ugh).

    Although I also see you could potentially mix lot types too. Maybe I'll sketch out some layouts for fun. EDIT: previous statement may not quite be true. Doing some testing in Paint and it isn't quite working as I thought it might.
     
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  9. Winfield

    Winfield Legend of the Hearth

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    Here is a sample of putting Row Lots into our downtown area:

    [​IMG]

    We cannot put roads under the city lots though, but the entire surface can be cobblestone I think. (I still have to fix the streets a little on this.)

    The scene templates should have a lot of extra City Lot space than can be used in any scene, thus allowing owners to subdivide the housing in a number of ways - making them unique layouts. So some parts of the City Lots will be unused when placing row houses. All of them do not need to face out either, they can be flipped to face inward, as long as the lot sign itself does not end up on another subdivided lot.
     
  10. Winfield

    Winfield Legend of the Hearth

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    The Roll-Out Plan
    of the
    PaxLair Player Owned Town Scene (Metropolis)
    on April 30, 2015 - Release 17

    I started a parallel thread on the Player Owner Towns forum. It focuses on the planning and activities for using PaxLair in Release 17 and other releases too.
    • We can allocate lots to many people to live in PaxLair during the releases, move around, set up shops, hold events, etc.
    • The intent is to help our communities grow and gain experience with a PoT until more are developed.
    • It is also to stress test the PoT, find any problems with the template design, and generate more ideas for template scenes.
    So please look at this other thread and toss in your ideas. Thanks!
     
  11. Jatvardur

    Jatvardur Avatar

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    Yeah, I had wondered this. Makes sense.


    I had also wondered about this, and from your diagram (which I saw before) I figured that perhaps the lots could face 'inwards' but you wouldn't be allowed to block the entrance.

    I'd be keen to do some sketches though, I hope it is still early enough that they might have an influence on design. I wouldn't want templates to be too restrictive. I'm also wondering if the template is just the lay of the land (mostly fixed), but that POT owners can still choose the lot lay out (not fixed). I suppose on the latter they can't allow too much customization given the amount of time it would potentially take.
     
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  12. Jatvardur

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    Did some lot size testing / comparisons of my own in Paint. Previously I was thinking that the lots were square. Actually it would make a lot more sense (no pun intended) if the lots were square. They would pack better and would allow for better optimization! (wait til Spoon reads this ;) ).

    In the below you can see a castle lot that I subdivided into town lots. One of which became two village lots, another I tried to fit in row lots but there is no easy way to do that and still allow access (entrance needs to be on the perimeter in that design).

    (I'm interested in space optimization / usage maximization but I appreciated that not everyone else will be. :p)

    [​IMG]
     
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  13. Themo Lock

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    The example where you have "wasted space", i do not think we can turn them like that (could be wrong)
     
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  14. Jatvardur

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    I wasn't sure tbh. You could remove that additional lot for even greater wastage. :-/
     
  15. Themo Lock

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    hey boss, that row lot is half the size it should be BTW
     
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  16. Aartemis

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    Negative Ghostrider, there are 4 Rows per Village Lot. I believe the image is correcto.

    edit...LOL, now I need to recheck myself because the housing page contradicts that but I swear that is how it works....time for research...

    Edit again: YEAH, Simple math, need more coffee - thinking too much I confused myself even though I knew it was right. LOL

    Well... The PoT Holdfast reads:

    • Lot Selection: Determine which lots of which size you want. For example at this size:
      • 21 Village Lots
      • 5 Village Lots + 1 Castle Lot
      • 20 Row Lots + 1 Castle Lot
      • 13 Village Lots + 1 Keep
      • 13 Village Lots + 4 Town Lots
      • etc.
    Indicating that the Village to Row ratio is 4:1. However On the Housing page it states...

    Row Lots are 10×15 meters and are great places for an ambitious adventurer to hang their hat but offer little in terms of yard space. These lots are plentiful in urban locations.

    Village Lots are twice the dimensions, 20×30 meters, and are the perfect size for a simple home with some yard space for decorating. These lots are plentiful in smaller, rural locations and sometimes found bordering larger towns and cities.

    BUT Looking at the Kingsport Map, its VERY clear it is a 4:1 Ratio Village to Row Lot.


    [​IMG]
     
  17. Spoon

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    Well... Not wanting to be too downer, but I have difficulties with the square-criss cross-US feel of all of our options for row lots.

    You can see how the devs have tried to break it up a bit in Ardoris, but the feel of 90' angles everywhere with straight lines in all directions gives this a "created" feel, instead of an organicly grown one.

    One can easily see the difference when they move from a village like Braemar where the lots outside the center are at very many different angles.

    Compare this to high-middle age to enlightenment towns and settlements.

    For instance Ardoris has a Venice influence but when we look at Venice there are almost no straight streets.
    [​IMG]

    This is why I'm advocating a tile approach to cluttered Row housing. Such tiles could still comply to the flat City lot sizes but they could break the monotony of the 90' dogma.
    I want there to be alleyways and shorts throughout between lots, not just the wide organized street X avenue Y like things.
    It doesn't take much if we can have some 45' every now and then within that City tile.
    [​IMG]
    even better would be if we could have 60' as well, but that is usually tougher.
     
  18. Net

    Net Avatar

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    Yes twice the length and twice the width, it makes 4 times bigger area, simple math, folks.
     
  19. Katrina Bekers

    Katrina Bekers Localization Team

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    VL has twice the dimensions of RL. 10x15 is half the height and half the width of a 20x30, for a total of 1/4 of the area.

    The text is correct and consistent, and Themo is wrong. :cool:

    Edit: oops, Net beat me to it. Still valid. :D
     
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  20. Sold and gone

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    Will the flexible placement allow to have buildings at skewed angles later?
     
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