This Book III 'wishlist' began with what Book III requests I had compiled from these forums (and from myself!) through about Oct. 2010. I have added to it and updated it a number of times since then. I feel like this 'wishlist' is mostly complete now, but it may still be missing a few things here or there.
If you feel like the Book III wishlist is still missing a thing or two, please post in the thread below with suggestions.
BW has requested that the most "long-term popular" 'wishlist' requests be highlighted as such - I am making every attempt to do that, either by marking prominent items from the previous 'compiled' Book II Wishlist or by trying to find earlier thread topics or forum discussion on some of these requests.
Anyway, here is the list (so far!):
BOOK III Wishlist-ENGINE:
- Variable game resolution (e.g. 800x600 to 2560x1440) (unlikely due to technical game-engine limitations? - but BW may, instead, add one additional 'widescreen resolution' for certain laptop users (Sorry folks, but this WHOLE THING is moot! now - see this (I'd do 'strikethrough' text on this entry if this board allowed it!))
- Difficulty options (e.g. "Easy"-play mode, and "Hard"-play mode) (POPULAR)
- A faster game mode (i.e. a "run" mode) for movement (i.e. aside from Quick-Travel) (POPULAR)
- Player-customizable Quick-Travel points (at least one, if not more)
- An 'autosave' slot, with the game autosaving every (5, or 10?) minutes (see: What's missing? thread)
- A way to "sort" Save Games in the Save list; also file info on a Save Game when it's clicked on (see: What's missing? thread)
- A 'Quicksave' hotkey (should probably involve a two-key-combination Hotkey, to avoid accidental 'Quicksaving'...)
- A 'Quickload' hotkey (as above? - i.e. also a *two*-key-combination for 'Quickload' Hotkey?) (Request goes back to pre-Book II!...)
- "Are you sure you want to save?" option (me, pre-Book II)
- Screenshots saved to separate "screenshots" folder within "Book III Saved Games" ƒ; screenshot save location changeable vis .cfg file
- Map caching for faster map loading(?!)
- Add a 'map' option for 'level-scaling' of camp 'mob' encounters (i.e. sort of make a 'hybrid' of the Book II and Book I 'mob' camp encounter systems) (also, increase the number of possible camp encounter mobs to 3 from 2?...) (see: Monster spawns thread, here)
- 'Meta' map of all Minimaps (by Right-Clicking minimap?) (POPULAR)
- Randomizability (e.g. random placement of either mobs or items within a map, or even across multiple maps) (see: Some Technical/Engine Questions for BW thread) (requested by: me!!)
- Items that can attract (e.g. cursed) or repel (e.g. "blessed") (certain) mobs, even when they are out of, or beyond, line-of-sight (see: Some Technical/Engine Questions for BW thread; it seems this capability already exists, actually, so it just needs to be implemented...) (requested by: me, and vdweller below)
- Fix the Book II issue(bug) with not being able to highlight loot sacks that are dropped immediately behind a wall-torch, wall-sign, or wall-painting (POPULAR)
- Fix the Book II issue(bug) with identified items not staying identified (requested by: vdweller, below (among others...))
- Work on "Speed" differentials among characters, NPCs and 'mobs' - e.g. if SPEED=25, you start to walk/move appreciably "faster" than NPCs and 'mobs' (original Eschalon game-mechanic planned for by BW?...)
- Improve stocking of items by merchants (e.g. make it a low-level chance to find, say, 1 or 2 high-level scrolls with game's initial merchants, but have the chances slowly increase as the game progresses (while still maintaining the chances of finding low-level scrolls all the way through the game)...)
- Improve maps' weather options so that, say, the "chance" of rain (or snow) can be either "Low", "Medium" or "High" (or, at least, just "Low" or "High"...)
- Improve maps' weather options so that some maps can have a random chance of either "regular" weather or "winter" weather
- Dynamic shadows & water reflections (requested by: King_of_Death, below)
- "Positional" sound (requested by: King_of_Death, below)
- Similarly, the Player's footsteps volume should be inversely proportional to his/her Move Silent skill (i.e. the more skilled you are in it, the less audible your footsteps will be in-game) (requested by: King_of_Death, below)
- Fallen 'mob' corpses remain in place (requested by: King_of_Death, below; I'm not sure I like this one, actually...)
- Roofs: The player cannot see inside buildings until he/she gets inside (requested by: King_of_Death, below - I suspect this may be beyond the scope of the Eschalon game-engine though...)
- A "notebook" (pad) for the player (i.e. some editable text window that the player can add to as the game progresses)
- Related to the above (perhaps): a "game log" (.txt?) file (e.g. Din's Curse) of the Narrative/Info gametext that can be accessed (POPULAR)
- Color code the Quest Journal, so players can tell which quests they have yet to complete (in black), which quests have been completed (maybe color in Green, or something?...), and which quests they've abandoned or failed (maybe color in Red?)
- A Bestiary 'journal'(?) (e.g. Din's Curse) (see: What's missing? thread)
- Add Date/Calendar to the game(?...)
- Sailing/Boating!!
- Horses/steed riding (I know there are technical issues with this one though...)
- A game 'console' (i.e. to operate game in a 'command line' fashion) - BW is already working on this, I think (see: Eschalon needs a proper console thread)
- Add more hotkeys!! (POPULAR)
- Weapons/Armor sets: switch #1 <-> #2 (key: ENTER/RETURN; or, if there are more than 2 Weapons/Armor sets, then perhaps key: CTRL-# or OPTION-# two-key Hotkey (e.g. CTRL-1 would switch to Weapons/Armor set #1, CRTL-2 would switch to Weapons/Armor set #2, etc.))
- Alchemy Mixer (key: A)
- Game Stats (key: Z)
- Get/Grab All (key: G)
- Close All Windows (key: X (just add to its functionality...), or perhaps CTRL-X or OPTION-X?...)
- Combat Mode (key: ???)
- Make 'loot sack' (key: L?)
- Related to above: Go back to Book I Hotkey system: ENTER/RETURN only changes Primary Weapon <-> Secondary Weapon, and back (then, maybe, CTRL-1, CTRL-2, etc. could switch entire Weapon/Armor sets?...) (see: Weapon swapping - preferred book 1) (POPULAR)
- Have 'switched weapon/armor' go back to the last place they were stored in the inventory, not just automatically to the "top" of the inventory screen (requested by: jwrickert, below, and many others!)
- A way to change your characters facing-direction via the Keyboard (the mouse equivalent is SHIFT-clicking, so perhaps the Keyboard equivalent could be OPTION-[Arrow Key]?...)
- Be able to scroll 'windowed lists' (e.g. the alchemy recipes, the Skills list in the character editor) with the mouse wheel (or the Up/Down Arrow keys?...), or at least being able to drag the 'scroll rectangle' up and down in any window with scroll bars/scroll rectangles. (see: here) (POPULAR)
- Be able to equip or unequip an item by double-clicking it (with autoplacement, as long as you can wear that particular item). (see: here)
- Make Space Key(?) the default key to accept or close all the popup panels, apart from the usual Y(es) or O(k) to accept (and close them). Maybe allow Space(?) to close all but the most important ones (i.e. to prevent the player from accidentally using the Space key to close out the most important pop-ups). (see: here)
- Add 'Origin' (title) to the character info in the 'Player Stats' (window)
- Add info to the 'Game Stats' screen on which "Game Options" were chosen by the player at game's start
- Right/Control-clicking Skills & Attributes in the 'Player Stats' window to get descriptions (POPULAR)
- Right/Control-click Skill Feat 'buttons' in 'Active Effects' Window for Skill Feat descriptions
- Display 'Grayed-Out' Skill Feat 'buttons' in 'Active Effects' Window during 'cooldown' times, so that the Player can click on the button to see how many turns remain before that Feat is 'reactivated'
- Add 'Weather Effects" (e.g. Storm, Rain) button(s) to 'Active Effects' Window, along with displaying the applied weather penalties when clicked on
- Change the color (i.e. 'Yellow' them?...) of 'Buff' button(s) in the 'Active Effects' Windows when they are 5-10 turns from expiring (requested by: brattin, below)
- Some way to get Scroll/Potion descriptions from Inventory (but can't be Right/Control-Click! - latter already used to Read/Drink Scrolls and Potions - maybe OPTION-Click instead?...) (POPULAR)
- Improve Alchemy mixer - e.g. "gray out" recipes that can't be made due to unavailable (or unidentified) reagents (see: What's missing? thread)
- Ditto Spell Book - e.g. "gray out" spell levels that are unavailble due to current character's "magic" Level (see: What's missing? thread)
- "Area Title" for Minimap (see: What's missing? thread)
- Be able to annotate Minimap (tied to Cartography level?...)
- Having a player's Inventory sorted into "sections" by Tabs (see: Auto-sort inventories thread)
- Failing the above: A GUI-interface for Key Chain
- And a separate Food/Water inventory ("Food bag")
- Items bought from, or sold to, Vendors should always autostack in player's (or merchants'!) Inventories! (POPULAR)
- Add a "Barter" button to Buy/Sell screen - to bring up a pop-up with multiple slots (and tallied GP totals) - for buying/selling multiple items
- Go back to using Merchant "set slots" more - i.e. in Book I, there were some items that a Merchant would always be selling (up at the top of the Merchant's inventory), but that seemed to be used much, much less in Book II - please bring the 'set slots' back for Book III
- "Held" items by vendor (see: Din's Curse); also, "reserving" items for later purchase? (see: Wish List for Book II {compiled})
- Improved dialogue box navigation (e.g. ESC goes back one); especially make all Dialogue windows navigable by keys (especially closing out of a 'dialogue box' with "*O*K" or "*E*nd"...) (see: What's missing? thread)
- "Fatigue" status (bar), a la Hunger & Thirst (make Optional 'Game Rule') (requested by: me (and others), since Book I)
- "Low Money Supply" option (make Optional 'Game Rule'?)
- Auto-create a 'loot sack' (even without Forage!) - e.g. either above Quickkey method, and/or change "Drop Item" code to: "Do you wish to permanently drop this item (it'll be lost forever)? Or do you wish to place on the ground in a new (loot) sack?" (dialogue options: Drop Item/Put in Sack/Cancel)
- Clicking (say, CTRL-Clicking? etc.) on an NPC or object would automatically 'walk' the character over to the NPC or object (and bring up the action dialogue/etc.)
- Be able to "look" at mobs, even during Combat (perhaps, OPTION-Click always looks at an object/NPC/mob, in any circumstance, even combat?...)
- Monster respawning (or at least a game-option, and/or a map-option, for...) after a map is initially cleared (again - at least, some maps and/or dungeons) (POPULAR)
- Stealing/pickpocketing (both by you (see below), and by certain NPCs/mobs!)
- Give more than just lowest level weapons/armor 'item bonus' - e.g. make so it's not just AR=1 gloves can be Burglar's Gloves, not just AR=2 cloaks can be Cloaks of the Shadow, etc.
- Imbuing Weapons with Skills!
- Findable Weapons/Armor "sets" (requested by: CrazyBernie's suggestion here)
- Weapons/Item crafting! (see: What's missing? thread) (POPULAR)
- Make Poison (more) "stackable" (i.e. make loss of HP's for Poison go higher than just -1 MP per turn) (note: This issue appears to be at least partially dealt with in v1.05 of Book II... so, this issue appears to be moot...)
- Be able to put out torches/candelabras with (special?) ranged-weapons
- Make filled Lanterns worth/cost *more* (25 GP) vs. unfilled Lanterns (15-20 GP); ditto filled Water Skins (15 GP) vs. partially filled Water Skins (5-14 GP)
- Class-specific quests (POPULAR) (and originally planned for in Book II, anyway?...)
- Class-specific items and weapons (requested by: Necromis, below)
- Banks? (to store stuff (and money?))
- Day/night shifts for NPCs?
- Have (some) Food (types) "spoil" after a certain (set) amount of time (make a Game Option?...)
- Go back to Book I's system of giving the player 20 Skill points at character creation rather than 15 Skill points like in Book II (I'll leave it up to BW if he wants to leave 20 Attribute points to spend at game's start, or cut that back to 15 a la Book I... )
- "Progressivity" to the 'Virtuous' Axiom (see: Axioms, Why They Are Great... thread)
- Rework Mages: they're too powerful - 'nerf' MP regen. so that Players would need more PER (e.g. much higher than PER=60) to get MP regen. greater than 1-2 per turn
- Also 'nerf' HP regen. in much the same way so that HP regen. of greater than 1-2 per turn is difficult to achieve
- Rework Mage, and esp. Rogue, Title/Skills (see: List of Character "Titles", and Starting Skills & Items thread)
- +1 Armor Rating for every +1, +2, +5 or +10 Levels in an Armor Skill (but see The Armor Quandary thread)
- By the same token rework Heavy Armor (e.g. AR = 2, 4, 6, etc. *only* - always 2x, or 1.5x, of Light Armor AR for same "kind" of Armor...) (but see The Armor Quandary thread)
- See GUI section, above, for Alchemy Mixer improvements...
- Trainer 'quests' for "special" Skill (bonuses) (see: Min-Maxxing... thread)
- Expand Skullduggery to include the ability to lay/set traps (or make that a new, separate skill?...)
- Speed "compliments" Dodge (POPULAR)
- Link together Lore Skill and Weapons/Armor Skills so that a high proficiency in a Weapons/Armor Skill acts like a large Lore bonus for identifying the specific types of weapons/armor associated with that Skill (e.g. having Swords at Level 20 means your character can identify almost any found Sword even if your Character's INT is fairly low and you have little-to-no Lore Skill) (POPULAR)
- Related to the above: Link together Lore Skill and Magick Skills so that a high proficiency in a Magick Skill acts like a large Lore bonus for identifying the specific types of scrolls associated with that Magick (e.g. having Elemental Magick at Level 20 means your character can identify almost any found spell scroll even if your Character has little-to-no Lore Skill)
- Rework Repair (too powerful in Book II)
- Rework Forage: should get Food (& refill Water Skin) (and possibly items such as "regular" and "Jagged" Stones), and fewer Alchemy reagents - problem is, currently, Forage is too much of a "money generator": sort of 'breaks' game right now, so having Forage generate more Food items (and Stones) and fewer Alchemy reagent items would ameliorate the 'balancing' issue arising from Forage being too much of a "money generator" in Book II...
- And, tie Forage into Arrows/Thrown Weapons? (e.g. Fletching; and finding Stones - see above)...
- Also, it would be really great if the types of items that could be Foraged could be set/restricted by map (better: if the type of items that could be Foraged could be set/restricted by grid or grid-type (probably too hard to code for though!)) - e.g. Ambergris only from "beach" maps, no Willow Bark in dungeons, etc. (from: List of recipes and reagents. thread, starting from about here)
- Foraging while just walking around, rather than just during camping (this has been requested a few times over the last couple of years...)
- Refine INT and ID'ing of Items (e.g. can't ID rocks or food with INT~15?!)
- Improve Cartography:
- If you map out an area with a cartography bonus, then your maps should not be "undrawn" when you lose that bonus and go over the same area.
- You should not have to go into every single little cranny of a tunnel or forest in order to complete your maps - simply moving past should be enough. (Tie this feature in with (higher) Cartography Level?...)
- Separate 'dot' color for (open) barrels (in Book II (not true in v1.05 though?...)): open barrels were light brown, indistinguishable from tree stumps, etc.)
- Make 'torch stands' and 'lamp posts' 'Orange' just like wall torches
- Make "fountains" a more distinguishable *Blue* color
- Give up/down stairs a uniquely distinguishable feature color
- Make snow/ice appear as '(pure) White' on the Minimap instead of 'Green'.
- Multiple 'trainer' books (e.g. 3 books in a *Series* give 4-6 levels in a Skill (e.g. Lore))
- Skill trainers... (what to do with them?!)
- NEW SKILL: Fletching (or tie in with Forage? - see above) (POPULAR)
- NEW SKILL: Thieving/Pickpocketing (i.e. random chance of stealing random 'loot' from adjacent NPC (or certain mobs?)) (POPULAR)
- A "Nature Lore" or "Animal Training" skill - e.g. if high enough, beasties like Wolves (and Lizards) wouldn't attack you
- Have Meditation count in with the 1/2x(INT or WIS) limitation on the number of spells that can be learned (i.e. makes for an added benefit to having Meditation)
- Revise 'Parry': It's too powerful (at high levels), as is
- Finally allow Unarmed Combat the ability to 'Parry' attacks as well (POPULAR)
- Change max/min ToHit's back to Book I's 98%/2% (vs. 99%/1% in Book II)
- Rework Thrown Weapons Skill, combat, and Feat, to make Thrown Weapons a more viable combat choice (see: Thrown Weapons revisited + new ideas thread, esp. for links to two other threads on the subject; see also wishlist entry immediately below this one for another way to improve Thrown Weapons) (POPULAR)
- Recoverable Arrows/Thrown Weapons (based on the Skill?...) (POPULAR) (or, failing that, see above Re: reworking Forage…)
- A player will deal more damage if he/she strikes an enemy when it's not aware of his/her presence: i.e. a "surprise" damage bonus - i.e. some kind of special 'Critical Hit'/Bonus Damage capability (for Rogues, esp.) for a 'first (melee) strike' against an Enemy when the Player is, say, 'Hidden (in Shadow)' (requested by King_of_Death, and several others - POPULAR)
- More Quick-set spells - best: An entire second set of 10 Quick-Set spells, and some way to 'toggle' back-and-forth between the two sets of Quick-set spells (e.g. 1-thru-0 to cast the first Quick-set spell 'set', and CRTL-1-thru-CTRL-0 to cast the second Quick-set spell 'set') (POPULAR)
- Be able to "clear out" 'Quick-Set Spell' (#'s) from the Spell Journal to "EMPTY" (using Shift-Click?...)
- See GUI section, above, for Spell Book improvements...
- Set spells up to automatically "auto-recast" (somehow?... - maybe using a 'check box' in the Quick-Set Spell part of the Spell Journal window?...): i.e. spell "locking" - e.g. this would allow a spell, like Reveal Map, to be automatically 'recast' without the player having to do it manually every 10 turns(!!)
- Speaking of... Rework: Increase the duration of the Reveal Map spell to a flat 100 or 160 Turns, rather than making the spell's duration dependent on level-cast-at (see: Needed Fixes, and Suggestions, for v1.05: LIST Form thread)
- Rework: Draw Water & Create Food spells into "Quench Thirst" and "Satiate Hunger" spells (i.e. have these revised spells just (re)fill the Thirst/Hunger status bars) - this would eliminate the 'balancing' issue arising from esp. the "Create Food" spell being a "money generator" in Book II...
- Rework: Fleshboil (and Sunder Flesh) - should not work on undead (or plants(?) - e.g. Sentinel Stalks(?)...)
- Revise: Sparkling Wonder, to up the chance (to 5% or 10%(?)) that NPC's "save" against it (and if an NPC "saves", it becomes a "crime" situation)
- Have AOE spells (e.g. Compress Atmosphere) highlight the affected grid-square(s) a la Demon Oil throws - will make them work on *objects* too (requested by: CrazyBernie & Kreador Freeaxe in Fixes and Requests for 1.05 thread, starting here) (POPULAR)
- A "Mercantile" spell? (for Divination?)
- NEW SPELL (for Mages): Blink - transports Mage a random number of grid-squares (distance based on casting level) away from their current position (but still on the same map).
- NEW SPELL (for Healers): Summon Undead - basically, the Healer equivalent of "Summon Beast" spell (requested by brattin, below)
- NEW SPELL (for Healers): Enfeeblement(?...) (requested by brattin, below)
- RESTORE (old) SPELL (for Healers): Poison (Healers started with Poison Spray in Book I, before it was moved over to just Mages' Toxic Element in Book II - Healers should still have a spell like this too, in Book III) (requested by brattin, below)
- Must. Have. Dragons!
- Either Thieves that pickpocket and steal items (from the Player), and/or Gremlins that steal Food and/or Water (skins?) from the Player
- (More) Thug/Outlander 'chief' or 'boss' types (these were sorely missing from Book II, outside of 'Jawbreaker'...); also Thug/Outlander archers and/or spear/dart-throwers (hey! if these guys often yield up Bows & Arrows or Rocks/Darts/Spears as droppable loot, at least some of them should actually use these ranged-weapons!!) (requested by: me, and Asgard The Elder below)
- Some beast/mob that uses electricity as its primary attack
- Magic-using opponents - e.g. evil Wizards and/or Warlocks...
- More 'explodeable' enemies, a la the Goblin Bombthugs and Acid Grubs from Book I
- The return of the Barrea[n] Mercenary!!
- While we're at it, I wouldn't mind seeing Goblins make a return appearance in Book III either...
- More clickable stuff!!: (POPULAR)
- Bring back clickable skeletal remains!
- Put in some (more) clickable bookcases
- Put in some (more) clickable shelves
- More clickable (hidden!) treestumps!
- More character picture portraits - e.g. combine all the character portraits from Book I & II, along with some new ones for Book III? (esp. more female character portraits needed...)
- Greater customizability of the Player's avatar - e.g. if nothing else, more color choices (e.g. see Xed from Book II, and how his avatar had different colored clothes than anybody else - so, at least, more color choices like this for the Player and his/her Avatar) (see: Things I'm hoping for in Eschalon Book III thread)
- Bring back flowers and gardens!! (one of the biggest things I missed from Book I, that wasn't in Book II, was flowers and flowering plants/trees!)
- Flags that flap in the wind! - i.e. realistic (basic) "physics" (requested by: me, and King_of_Death below)
- Also grasses that flap in the wind! (imagine how cool it would be if your character could walk through waist-high golden grassland that flapped back & forth in the wind!!) (requested by: me, and King_of_Death below)
- A "pirate" town w/ shop - to buy things like "Stumpy's Cocktail for Locks" potion recipe!
- Just more secret places to find!! (requested by: hermitt, below)
- An arena?... (requested by: severian, below)
- Rework "Hidden in Shadow" 'status' so it's just "Hidden" 'status' (so, it can work with more than just Dark+HideInShadow - e.g. "Hidden" 'status' could also be obtained using something like Dark+ChameleonSpell...)
- Items!:
- Bring back a Gravedigger's Flame item - esp. a Gravedigger's Flame helm!
- Bring back Cartographer's Sandals, as well(?)
- Higher damage staffs, and higher damage daggers
- Gloves with Unarmed Combat, and ToHit/Damage, bonuses, please!
- More Robes (with (higher) Armor Ratings) for Mages
- Be able to purchase house (requested a number of times, over the years...)
- Insanity(?!) (see here) (see also, the request by: King_of_Death, below)
- Go back to two tiers of Diseases, a la Book I (?)
- Be able to join a Guild (?)
- MINOR: Get the Goblin Dice (and the Sextant?) to "work" when "used"
- Allow 'importing' of Book II characters(?) (at least their rudiments?...) (I've got lots of great stuff in my cabin in East Willow!!)
- Be able to not just "drop" torches, but place them in barrels, etc.
- Pets?...
- Take us back to Mistfell!! Take us back to The Underground Repository!!!
- Render all of Eschalon game world using Book II/Book III engine (including Thaermore)
- MAP EDITOR! so we can all make our own new scenarios!! (POPULAR)
- And allow us to have 'strikethrough' text on these forums!