Silver_fox 399 Popular Post Share Posted April 10, 2014 (edited) Somewhere in the world of Ancaria there is a priest who was destined to serve Gods in a remote location. He stays in his half-forgotten temple and rarely sees people except for hunters and travelling merchants who stop once in a while to make offerings to the Gods. This priest spends his free time breeding and training exotic creatures. Those rare times when he goes out of the temple, his pets usually follow him. He thinks that animals make good companions to lone travelers like him... and like you.There are also some rumors that this priest does not mind experimenting with machinery, so maybe if you manage to find him and pay him a visit, he would show you results of his experiments.With this, I start releasing the information about the Elite Mount project that had been in the works for quite some time. It began as a part of CM patch, then halted in its tracks and now is continued by me, Pesmontis and Flix as a part of the CM Items mod. As the mod is undergoing gradual integration into CM Patch, there is a possibility that the mounts would eventually return to CM proper and would be released as a part of CM v150. But it's just a possibility, and the first release, regardless of anything, would happen with CM Items mod, so this is the place to look for new mounts.We are not going to tell you the exact location of the temple where the priest and his pets reside, but this thread would gradually fill you in on his merchandise, so stay tuned. There are plans to create new Elite Mounts for each of the seven playable characters - these mounts would be better than the original special ones, but the opportunity to purchase them would open up much later in the course of main campaign. A couple of Elite Mounts are ready, so it's more than just talk, others are in process.Read on to learn more about the mount variety:High Elf's mount - the Dragon: Introduction and Stats - Video bonus mounts - new Wind Serpents: Introduction and Stats Temple Guardian's mount - the "Buzzsaw" Mobiculum: Introduction and Stats - Video Shadow Warrior Armored Hellhound and Inquisitor Armored Spider mounts - Introduction and Stats Dragon Mage's Armored Draconicicon mount - Introduction and Stats Seraphim's Cyber-Tiger mount - Introduction and Stats Dryad's Armored Lizard mount - Introduction and Stats Download Elite Mounts Mod Edited February 27, 2016 by Flix added links to info, download 5 Link to comment
Silver_fox 399 Author Popular Post Share Posted April 10, 2014 (edited) Recently, the mages of Tyr Lysia began talking about the wondrous animals that appear in the possession of certain powerful mages. These beasts are told to have innate affinity with magic of different kinds, and help their elven companions to speed up spellcasting as well as protect them from the elements. One of these creatures now accompanies the warden of Celioth Tower. It seems to be equally attuned to all elements and protects the rider from all kinds of incoming damage, while allowing her to cast all spells quite effectively. Together, they observe the roads that lead to the tower and quickly fly to fend off every attacker. The Dragon in warden's possession is of a Wild Dragon variety. It is not focused on any kind of magic in particular, but offers good protection from every kind of incoming damage. Other people talk about a mysterious lone ranger who appears in the Desert. In presence of the Lady in Black, this hot desolate place becomes even hotter. Only she and her Dragon are immune to the heat, and they certainly enjoy wathing the fireworks. That's not surprising - the Flame Dragon is perfectly attuned to the Pyromancer's magic, and boosts fire spells while protecting the caster from fire damage. Then, there is a beautiful woman, who is not afraid to visit the most scenic and most dangerous beaches of Ancaria alone, because she knows that her Dragon would protect her while she is catching the rays of the sun. If any danger comes too close, they are always ready to become airborne. This is the Rime Dragon, who has powers over Ice and Storms. And finally, an expert in Ancient Arcane kinds of magic recently came to the Library of the Seraphims in pursuit of more knowledge. While the Elven mage herself is certainly remarkable, the winged ones paid more attention to the Dragon who was circling the skies above their island. The fourth Dragon is, obviously, all about magic and Arcane spellspower. These four Dragons were designed, animated and textured by Pesmontis, so don't forget to thank him for the fact that the High Elf is getting a real dragon in addition to her Fay Drake. They are furnished with stats that match all four of the Elf's aspects as well as provide additional meant of defense. The Dragons are very agile, so they fly fast and can evade attacks. Edited April 11, 2014 by Silver_fox 8 Link to comment
gogoblender 3,283 Popular Post Share Posted April 10, 2014 The skin and story is amazing There has been some great collaboration and productivity with the game's modding side, this one here, with the new mount, delightful. Great job on the story telling Silver, and Pesmontis, thanks for keeping up with these new prezzies My favorites the giraffe spots gogo 2 Link to comment
SX255 630 Popular Post Share Posted April 10, 2014 Yes, please. Having more than 7 unique mounts per class is very much a great idea. 4 Link to comment
AngelShade 53 Popular Post Share Posted April 10, 2014 Wait, flying? how come no one is amazed that you can fly in this game ? Can you realy do it ? 3 Link to comment
Pesmontis 168 Popular Post Share Posted April 10, 2014 (edited) > ".. this hot desolate place becomes even hotter.." And then she's wearing black clothes.. must be a furnace.. That dragon is obviously much more at home :-) Nice write-up Silver_fox, and unique screenshots! > ".. that you can fly in this game ?.." It's 'fly-walking' really: it's not possible to fly off a bridge, or to reach areas that can't be reached by foot. Edited April 10, 2014 by Pesmontis 4 Link to comment
Flix 5,188 Popular Post Share Posted April 10, 2014 I'm working on this project and even I'm amazed at reading all this. This is a really great write-up and introduction to the Elite Mounts, Silver Fox! 2 Link to comment
Robi Dean 8 Share Posted April 10, 2014 That fire dragon looks amazing. Keep up the great work guys. 1 Link to comment
Yoshio 91 Popular Post Share Posted April 11, 2014 That is, as all of the CM Item Mod, just too cool! Great write-up and introduction to the new elite mounts! Just one question, why do I need to go to work when there is so much new stuff to be discovered in the near futur in Sacred!? But hey, easter is coming!!! 4 Link to comment
Pesmontis 168 Share Posted April 11, 2014 > ".. why do I need to go to work.." You know, the three of us spend so much time on creating the next version of the CM Items Mod that it's overshadowing our current jobs.. Link to comment
Silver_fox 399 Author Popular Post Share Posted April 11, 2014 Thank you for your kind comments! I'm glad that you like the introduction and hope that you'll like the creatures themselves even more. I updated the Dragon post to include the stats of the new mounts. You can see that they are more powerful than High Elf's original special mounts. That is exactly the idea behind the Elite Mounts - they are not meant to be just an alternative for the original beasts, but rather a late-game upgrade for them. In the original Sacred 2, you get your special mount in Artamark, and stick to it till the next difficulty. There is no way to imporve this creature - it levels up with you, but the bonuses it gets with levels are not worth likewise increasing penalty. The Elite Mounts were created to change this situation for the better. 2 Link to comment
Yoshio 91 Popular Post Share Posted April 12, 2014 > ".. why do I need to go to work.." You know, the three of us spend so much time on creating the next version of the CM Items Mod that it's overshadowing our current jobs.. Then I dearly hope that our comments can cast some light on you three to take away the shadow which had been fallon on your jobs. Please keep up the great work you all do for us fans of Sacred II! 2 Link to comment
Dragon Brother 619 Share Posted April 13, 2014 Flight! Excellent. Always wanted to ride around Ancaria on the back of a dragon Link to comment
AngelShade 53 Share Posted April 21, 2014 (edited) Okey , the mounts are super awsome and dont get my wrong on what am I about to say but ,but doesnt the mounts purpose supose to make you move faster ? How come you get like a crappy increase of speed from them, I dont want to take Riding just to get a xx% of movement increase while on mount, but having that ammount of speed on the mount would make more sense, THEY ARE MOUNTS for crying out loud they should make you move faster, altough the increase in casting is +10% either negate or remove the Combat arts regeneration or make it -10% cus having fights on mounts is awsome XD. specialy if you are a caster. But I beg all creators of mounts do please add a increased run speed % , it realy defeats the purpose of having a mount. Edited April 21, 2014 by AngelShade Link to comment
Flix 5,188 Share Posted April 21, 2014 >"How come you get like a crappy increase of speed from them?" Where are you even getting this from? Silver Fox said "The Dragons are very agile, so they fly fast and can evade attacks." A run speed % bonus on the mount would do NOTHING since those bonuses only apply if you were on foot. Mount speed is set in creatureinfo.txt, and these new Elite Mounts are all as fast or faster than the normal mounts. What I need to do is make a video and show you the High Elf soaring around on one of these dragons. Link to comment
AngelShade 53 Share Posted April 21, 2014 (edited) I didnt want to create a tension on what I wrote, probably because my native language isn't english, but I do saw ingame mounts that had the most 6% increase in movespeed , would it be possible to add a more realistic faster way without having the Riding skill. Something along 25 or 30% increase. I was hoping for that to happen so I can hop on my awsome mount and go exploring without having to walk for days XD. Oh and im sorry if that offended anyone in any way. Is this awsome dragon actualy flying , cus I see him in the air and all , theres no ground or ground glitch that could prove otherwise. Edited April 21, 2014 by AngelShade 1 Link to comment
Silver_fox 399 Author Share Posted April 22, 2014 >"But I beg all creators of mounts do please add a increased run speed %" Like Flix said, adding this bonus to mount's bonuslist would have no effect, because it's run speed bonus - it increases the movement speed on foot. More to come, it's one of the bonuses that don't work correctly on mounts (even if you try to add them, they don't appear in the tooltip). However the new mounts are faster than the old ones, even without Riding. The speed change was made in the creature description. To give you the numbers, High Elf's speed on foot is 160 digits, Fay Drake's is 230, Dragon's is 250. There is no creature in this game that is faster than the Dragon Mount. Making them even faster is possible, but is not an incredibly good idea, because Riding increases mounts' speed by percentage. The Dragons are already fast without Riding, if we make them even faster, with Riding they might become uncomfortably fast. >"...these new Elite Mounts are all as fast or faster than the normal mounts..." Except that I slowed down the Shadow Warrior's armored means of transportation. This beast looks so heavy, I can't imagine it running as fast as the Dragon flies. Still, it's speed is not bad (better than vanilla tiger). >"...Is this awsome dragon actualy flying..." The Dragons do fly, because that's how they are animated. Sadly, the game does not have a definition of flying. All it has is running and walking. All creatures who look like they fly, actually are considered running at that moment. It means that even though they fly, but they still can not cross a river without using a bridge and can not fly above walls. Putting it simple, the Dragon Mount flies the same way as Dragon Mage's Dragon Form. It's impossible to make it otherwise. 1 Link to comment
SX255 630 Share Posted April 22, 2014 Or simply put, the dragon is not flying, its hovering. Link to comment
AngelShade 53 Share Posted April 22, 2014 (edited) Usualy devs are using a no colision "mechanic" (I have no ideea how to name that process.) in a game to test stuff, and maybe, but maybe its still there, if you could find it then flying in this game can become more then just a dream XD. Edited April 22, 2014 by AngelShade Link to comment
Flix 5,188 Share Posted April 22, 2014 It feels more like flying than you'd imagine. And you can always increase the speed in creatureinfo.txt if you really want to. I'll try to get a video up today, but my upload speed is ungodly slow. Ideally we'd have some way to add something like the Dragon Form's Jump CA while mounted (but it's not possible). Then the illusion of flying would be complete. 1 Link to comment
Silver_fox 399 Author Share Posted April 22, 2014 >"...Ideally we'd have some way to add something like the Dragon Form's Jump CA while mounted..." The only way something like this can be done is by replacing one of the CA slots while mounted, like the horse CAs do. It might be possible, but I don't see a reason to do it. The Dragon is HE's mount, and adding a jump CA to it would create just a differently animated version of Shadow Step. Is there a reason to bother so much with the creature scripts to mod in a mount CA that won't be much different from the rider's one? Link to comment
Flix 5,188 Share Posted April 22, 2014 (edited) Well, no. Which is why I just mentioned it here rather than PM'ing you about it as something we needed to start planning for the mod. The point of the idea was about how one could maintain the illusion of flying, which Shadow Step does not do. People don't know this yet, but even though the Dragon flies, when you stop to use a combat art, it lands on the ground. Sacred 2 did not maintain the awesomeness of Sacred 1 where you could launch attacks while still riding in motion. So the Dragon would land when the High Elf used Shadow Step, then teleport to the target. Whereas the Jump, with its flying animation, is a good bit more seamless in the transition. Also Shadow Step has a Cooldown and all kind of benefits through modifications. Jump could be given no Cooldown and a low regen time, but nothing else, just an always-ready utility CA. Edited April 22, 2014 by Flix Link to comment
Silver_fox 399 Author Share Posted April 22, 2014 >"...Well, no. Which is why I just mentioned it here..." Ok, I'll put it more clear: It is possible to allow a Dragon's to have its own CAs if we make it a horse-type mount. But who would want it after that? Even if it was possible to replace only one slot with Dragon's CA, I'm still not sure that many people would have liked it, and not preferred to keep all slots for themselves. >"...The point of the idea was about how one could maintain the illusion of flying..." Well, I understood it. The point of what I said was that making a jump-looking CA requires qute a bit of effort and results in a mere illusion of flying, which can be seen on videos but in game does not feel like it, because you know that you have to use a CA to cross a river, not just fly over it. And this illusion is just visual, it adds no new mechanics because HE already has a teleport CA, it's just differently animated. >"...even though the Dragon flies, when you stop to use a combat art, it lands on the ground..." As opposed to DM's Dragon Form that never lands. The CA execution animations are always started from idle state. For DM idle is animated like hovering and flapiing wings, for the mount it's a grounded state. So even if the mount gets jump-like animation, it won't be seamless - it would land, than take flight for a distance and land on the opposite side, before taking flight again for the running state. We can get a seamlessly flying look for the mount by changing the idle animation, but then the process of mounting the flying dragon would look quite awkward. Link to comment
Flix 5,188 Share Posted April 22, 2014 >"It is possible to allow a Dragon's to have its own CAs if we make it a horse-type mount." This is why I said it wasn't possible to begin with. We can't conjure up a brand new CA to add to all the existing ones- there's no where to put it. No one wants their CA slots replaced with others, which is why no one rides horses in Sacred 2. >"The point of what I said was that making a jump-looking CA requires qute a bit of effort and results in a mere illusion of flying..." Well, then it's a good thing no one is suggesting that we actually do that work, isn't it? Link to comment
AngelShade 53 Share Posted April 22, 2014 How did the devs moved through the game with no collision? I suppose those mechanics should still be there. Maybe add one of the mechanics that the devs were using to the mount ? If its possible ofcourse. Link to comment
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