Ask the Devs an MXO question v.3

**Rarebit**

[Previous editions of the "Ask the devs" thread can be found in the Archive Construct.]

Hello, and welcome to the "Ask the devs an MXO question" thread, version 2! This is where you can ask a question relating to MXO, and have us respond with an answer of some sort. Ground rules:

1) Only the first question after the last dev/admin reply will be considered. This means that if I make a post, then Player1 makes a post with a question, and then Player2 makes a post with a question, only Player1's question will be answered. Player2's post might even be deleted to keep the thread clean (*makes mental note to remind self to beg Walrus for post-deleting power*). Player2 will have to try again later!

2) This also means that if Player1's post contains two questions, only the first question will be answered

3) Keep in mind that it is community/designer people we have here, so don't expect anything other than obviously made-up answers to highly technical programmy questions.

4) The answer to most "why isn't [feature] in the game" questions is "because we don't have the budget for it." So you might not want to waste your chance at an answer on a question like that.

5) On the other hand, questions about quirky MXO things are encouraged! Why is Ghost bald now? What does Walrus keep on the wall of his cubicle? The answers to these and other such questions could be yours

6) We may not know the answer to a question, or we just may not be able to answer it for some reason. But we will, at least, say that we don't have the answer, which is sort of an answer, in a way.

7) Responses may not be timely, because we may hard at work on something, such as sleeping. Please have patience, and do not spam the thread.

8) We can't answer questions relating to future releases!

9) We can't answer questions relating to story spoilers.

10) Questions that have been edited are automatically disqualified!

11) We can't answer questions regarding specifics of SOE staff; we also can't answer questions that really belong to other SOE departments, such as Marketing or Customer Service.

So, who's got a question?

Seperioth

did the event with tantalos, veil and the fire virus go as planned? it was an awesome event.. but i think people were more intrested in spreadin the virus :p

WGAnubis1

How exactly does going about making the critical missions work and how much time do you spend on that batch? Would you say you spend more time on the missions then other projects or what?

**ZippyTheSquirrel**

You bugger butt! Right in the middle of a question, too! *shake fist*

How much can you edit the City without requiring a really big patch? Tweaking textures, tossing some benches around a bit, blowing up the Uriah/Stamos bridge?

**MxO-PhanthomZtryker** · 11/14/2006 14:45:58

=D Omgz I got the fourth reply!
Gimme medal!

*waits patiently for Rarebit to reply so he can post a question*

**Aquatium.**

So what was Seraph and Orcale doing on Recursion not long ago?

**Rarebit**

Seperioth wrote:

did the event with tantalos, veil and the fire virus go as planned? it was an awesome event.. but i think people were more intrested in spreadin the virus :p

Aside from me forgetting to set Gray's first wave of Agents to disappear after killing their initial target, yeah, it pretty much went as expected.

The little slip with the Agents' setting was probably for the best anyway, since they stuck around and cleared out the area in a hurry. ;)

WGAnubis1

WGAnubis1 wrote:

How exactly does going about making the critical missions work and how much time do you spend on that batch? Would you say you spend more time on the missions then other projects or what?

**Jurymen**

Do you enjoy killing the forums with a single post that amounts in thousands of posts SMILEY

? (Grats on making a 3rd questions thread SMILEY

)

Fatmop

I may be late in asking, but gosh darnit, someone's gotta see this!

Would it be possible to implement cypherite/EPN missions without doing criticals every month and make a 5-org system? No new content, but new org tags and new controllers?

**UniToxic** · 11/14/2006 16:11:26

Fatmop wrote:

I may be late in asking, but gosh darnit, someone's gotta see this!

Would it be possible to implement cypherite/EPN missions without doing criticals every month and make a 5-org system? No new content, but new org tags and new controllers?

one problem left to fix.....
archives.....they will need their own vendors (yeah theres plenty of book shops), and then set up the new archivists in the archives..

Sykin

Sykin approves this new, faster, and better version of the "Ask the Devs an MXO question" thread.

**Rarebit**

WGAnubis1 wrote:

WGAnubis1 wrote:
How exactly does going about making the critical missions work and how much time do you spend on that batch? Would you say you spend more time on the missions then other projects or what?

I think I've gone over the mission-making process in one of these "Ask the Devs" answers before, so I don't know if I want to type all that out again, but basically it involves a lot of...uh...typing. We have a custom mission design tool called "Missile" that has lots of tabs and drop-down fields and panels and so forth, and I put in all the text and objects and NPCs, and set some triggers based on events the player accomplishes (killing NPCs, opening doors, getting/giving objects, etc), and voila! Missions. Then there's all this really complicated batch processing that calculates where the missions can send you and such and such. How long... Hm... Assuming I'm not killing myself at it, I get about one to one-and-a-half critical missions done a day (that's in addition to all the regular bug fixing, minor feature adding/tweaking, meetings, events, forum posting, etc), so a regular subchapter batch of fifteen takes about two to three weeks.

**ZippyTheSquirrel**

ZippyTheSquirrel wrote:

You bugger butt! Right in the middle of a question, too! *shake fist*

How much can you edit the City without requiring a really big patch? Tweaking textures, tossing some benches around a bit, blowing up the Uriah/Stamos bridge?

Sykin

If you could make ANY / command in the game... What would it be?