Summary

Hello, everyone!

Today, we are shipping patch 8193.13 to the stable branch of the game.

This patch is crossplay-compatible with all 8193 game releases, but we recommend upgrading to the newest version to gain access to the latest features!

We'd like to thank you, our faithful and patient community, for your help in providing feedback, reporting bugs, and testing our development branch in between!

Patch Notes

Fixes

• The .lod file parser now parses files not ending in a newline correctly.

Art

• TNO01_V02_03: Fixed splash VFX on waterfall (not on its own animloop, waterfall animation still intermittent).
• TCN01_E09_01: Bad orientation on meshes caused shifting and blank spots.
• TNO01.SET: Pathfinding, Orientation & Visibility Fixes.
• TN_GDOOR_08: Reverted to original art, addresses non-clickable area transitions at edge of map.

Toolset

• Creature Wizard: remove stray "-1" text #50
• Area tile light color picker no longer shows blank colors #49
• Inventory window now renders icon backgrounds properly #47

Premium

• Tyrants of the Moonsea: Fixed 3 shifted cliff sets (placeables) in Elmwood

In addition, this patch includes the previous development builds .10, .11 and .12, summarised here:

Pathfinding

Pathfinding performance has been improved drastically; especially on big areas with a lot of static placeables (up to 90% reduction in CPU time spent on pathing).

A new configuration toggle has been added: server.experimental.enhanced-pathfinding; it defaults to on. With this option, combat AI will be much smarter in pathing to their target and thus impact the module experience/difficulty somewhat. We appreciate your feedback on this change. If you need this OFF on your server for whatever reason, just turn this flag off in settings.tml.

Features

• Script errors are now logged to the server log.
• SSAO performance and accuracy has been improved.
• Dynamic contrast performance and accuracy has been improved.
• Depth of field performance and accuracy has been improved. A new configuration value can be used to set the amount in addition to turning it on and off.
• Sharpen performance and accuracy has been improved.
• Visual effects, emitters, lens flares are now subject to post processing.
• CLI nwserver now shows proper help for NWSync-related parameters.
• Framebuffer: View and projection matrices are now accessible properly.
• Framebuffer: Alpha testing on FB effect pass was disabled; fixes background colour appearing erroneously on low alpha.
• Framebuffer: Depth testing was disabled on FB effect pass; fixes background colour appearing erroneously for objects close to screen pane.
• Framebuffer: All lights (static and dynamic) are now enabled for FB effect passes; fixes them not applying to tinted emitters.
• Many more .ini options have been migrated to .tml.

Fixes

• Savegame support for offline NWSync modules has been fixed (by shuffling CURRENTGAME resman priority for NWSync only). Effectively, offline NWSync modules now have a lower HAK priority. HAK priority for non-NWSync games is the same as before.
• VM: SetEventScript properly returns TRUE on success. #9
• VM: SetEventScript no longer crashes when passing in invalid constants.
• VM: GetCampaignVector now properly returns the Z value of stored vectors. #10
• ActivatePortal no longer erroneously shows character selection if a character is sent along. #2
• Chargen now allows lowering stats back under 11 for non-caster primaries. #3
• Texture caching was improved.
• Script/effect timers no longer overflow when the duration is more than a day.
• PostString() strings are no longer hidden when the radial menu opens. #11
• settings.tml is no longer erroneously half-truncated when the game crashes while saving out the file.
• BootPC() no longer crashes the server if called twice on the same player #6
• Fixed textures getting erroneously evicted between module loads #7
• VM: We fixed a memleak in AssignCommand, DelayCommand, ActionDoCommand
• VM: We fixed a memleak when removing effects from objects
• NWSync: We addressed an issue where sqlite3 would fail to open NWSync databases on non-ANSI path names
• Lighting: Light priority selection was improved. Distance/far dynamic lights should no longer override closer - more important - lights. (This can be turned off with the option graphics.experimental.enhanced-light-managing)
• Config: A corner case where server favourites and history was not saved was fixed.
• VM: GetSpellSaveDC now uses the SpellcastingAbility column, instead of the PrimaryMod column. #27
• VM: A pathfinding issue in RandomWalk() was fixed, where calling the function sometimes did nothing.
• VM: PostString() strings are now rendered in sort order.
• A heap buffer read overflow in pathfinding was addressed, that could previously have resulted in some jerky movement when blocked by a door or placeable.
• SSAO fbo: We exorcised some spooky ghosting that manifested when panning the camera.
• [NVIDIA] Toolset: It should no longer be necessary to force threaded optimisation off manually.
• Toolset: Music and Ambient Sounds can now be loaded from ResMan (haks) if listed in the 2da.
• [Linux] Server command line help now includes nwsync-related args.
• Server: We optimised gff validation performance. Even very large character files with lots of local vars should no longer hang needlessly.
• Fixed an issue that were causing custom dynamic race models to always use the human texture variant. #31
• Changed the movie render scale to fit-to-window.
• Fixed renderaabb not showing up properly on all tiles. #43
• Fixed skylight beams (forest sunbeams, etc.) not rendering properly in all cases.
• VM: Fix script commands not properly accessing area UUIDs. #41
• CampaignDB: Fix RetrieveCampaignVector returning zeroed out vectors. #44
• Fixed a heap overflow read when spawning a encounter list.
• Linear filtering on post processing passes has been disabled. This takes care of yet more (subtle) ghosting.
• [Windows] OpenAL: Fix crash when no sound devices are available.
• [Windows] OpenAL: DLL was replaced with OpenAL Soft, fixing launch crashes when OpenAL was not installed.
• [Windows] OpenAL: Address issues with sounds disappearing during long play sessions.
• [Windows] OpenAL: Fix issues with sounds disappearing when too many sounds are playing at the same time.
• VM: DestroyArea() now behaves the same as DestroyObject(): Instead of destroying the area immediately, it schedules it for removal immediately after script exit. This fixes accessing freed memory when destroying an area from an area event.
• VM: GetCasterLevel() now returns 0 for AOEs instead of crashing. #34
• classes.2da: fix not using SpellcastingAbil for non-memorising casters. #39
• [Windows] nwhak.exe: Add support for ktx, ttf, sql, tml, sq3, lod file types.
• [Windows] We fixed settings.tml sometimes not being written out properly.

Toolset

• Access violation when compiling scripts with nested structs has been fixed.

New Script Commands

// Returns the build number of oPlayer (i.e. 8193).
// Returns 0 if the given object isn't a player or did not advertise their build info.
int GetPlayerBuildVersionMajor(object oPlayer);

// Returns the patch revision of oPlayer (i.e. 8).
// Returns 0 if the given object isn't a player or did not advertise their build info.
int GetPlayerBuildVersionMinor(object oPlayer);

Art & Content

• Doors on area edges have been fixed. #13
• TTF01_T13_01, TTF01_S13_01: Fixed torches to work properly w/ Source Lights & w/o glowing meshes, and a campfire emitter that never shut off
• TTF01_P10_01: Restored missing waterfall animation, with an animloop to control it
• TDC01_Q02_01: Restored missing animated meshes from Bioware Source files, and merged them back into the tile
• TWC03_C43_02 (SET File): Set the X-position to 0.0 instead of a negative scientific number
• TNO01_M53_(11-14): Repaired a bad texture assignment, and closed a seam running along two tile edges
• Bad campfire animation on TTF01_T13_01
• Fixed stringy shadows on Driftwoods 1&2, Market Stall 01, Dragon Statue, and Castle Rural tiles TNO01_A06_01, TNO01_B51_02, & TNO01_C01_02
• Driftwood 2, TNO01_A06_01: Fixed Shadows (again)
• Alchemist Apparatus 1 & 2: Shadow, UV, Mesh & Walkmesh fixes
• TN_SDOOR_02 Fixed a broken/missing animation (#26)
• TN_SDOOR_19 Reclassified as Type=Door (#29)
• TNO_V00_09 Fixed ground texture (now set back to Grass) (#25)
• TNO01_Chain01.DDS Cleaned up the alpha channel and texture shape, resized to 2x (512 x 256) (#23)
• TNO01_B70_01 Repaired misplaced geometry (#22)
• TCN01_J17_01 Repaired misplaced geometry, fixed animation to use an animloop (and allow shutdown)
• TTZ01_EDGE.2da Added an entry to accomodate elevated stream with grass (used to show up blank-edged)
• NW_IT_ARMHE007.uti Removed the unnecessary 50 charges for Thieves' Hood (#24)

Premium Modules

• Kingmaker: Missing assets from 1.0 have been restored, including script sources
• Shadow Guard: Script sources are now included
• Witches Wake: Script sources are now included
• Darkness over Daggerford, Tyrants of the Moonsea: New door tiles to replace the Placeable Doors; assorted tile fixes to enable drive-through transitions
• Darkness over Daggerford: Replaced a missing door in the Stronghold
• Darkness over Daggerford: Fixed stringy shadows on the Kocharan model
• Tyrants of the Moonsea: Fixed a bad campfire animation on TTF01_T13_01 (Facelift version)
• Tyrants of the Moonsea: Fixed door with bad orientation in TCM02, as well as Melvaunt Shipyards (Entrance to Resting Place of the Whip)
• Darkness over Daggerford: Fixed a crash with the Kocharan model (only when compiled and spawned via script)
• Tyrants of the Moonsea: Rearranged placeables that shifted and blocked a doorway in Zhentil Keep (when the door was opened).

Toolset

• Removed the warning dialogue that shows when opening a module with haks.
• Added a setting to always open module directories.
• The outdated and unused registry read + warning UI has been purged.
• Conversation editor opening time has been optimised.
• Modules are now sorted alphabetically and the last-opened module is selected by default.
• Modern UI skinning has been enabled.
• The tabbed UI is now on by default.
• Fixed a crash when pasting objects from a closed area.
• Fixed a bug in placeable properties UI where it would open the wrong dialogue file.