First I want to open by apologizing that I haven't been nearly as attentive as I usually am. I won't go into details (this is not really the place) but life has been busy and difficult and I've been focused both on other mods and life shit (i.e. getting engaged). But let me thank everyone for their continued support, feedback and attention even in my...hiatus, of sorts.
Now let me reply specifically to some peeps!
Captain J wrote:Messages, Consoles, Status Bar, Fullscreen HUD and Alternative HUD all reach 8 because it would get much bigger if it had like 11 limit. On my end, the HUD appears just fine with User Default Scale on Fullscreen HUD.
Maybe it's because the resolution? Mine's 2400x1350. And i think the logo is rather big for the version 4.5.0's menu screen.
And Heavy Machine Gun looks way too HD compare to other weapons, Hard to aim with throwing a boulder and i can't do Defile spell(because of balancing i guess?) on Corpse props!
4.5.0 changed a lot of the menu scaling stuff, and I'm not 100% what I can do on my end to fix it. I've noticed it too, but its not something I consider super important to dive into.
Also, eventually, I plan on doing a redraw of all the sprites so they are all consistent with each other, at some point down the road. For now, weird wacky res inconsistencies with the weapons sprites is just something we'll all have deal it. It bugs me too, and its in the pipeline to get "fixed", I just have other things I want to do first. Boulder aiming is intentionally difficult to do, but I have gotten a lot of complaints about it, so I will do something to make it a little easier. And not being able to Defile corpse props is 100% intentional, as editing props like that is outside of the scope of the mod. Defile is getting removed anyway.
Venetin wrote:So I wanted to post my opinion here because I see you're very keen on getting feedback. Some may agree, some may not, and what I'll say is not to sound negative, but rather give insight to what made BARON special.
I fell in love with this mod back sometime between beta 11 and beta 12 when ICARUSLIV3S's video came out. Maybe it's just me when it comes to this mod, but that window of BARON's development was when the mod really shined for me. Hell, if I had the option to go back and download that specific version, I would. The sprites were consistent and equally charming, the spells, while some not as usable in certain WADs, had a wide range of ways to expel rage at the other demons both creatively and effectively, the weapons all had some wicked personality, and I especially loved the wind-up for the Type 95, and the mod even scaled rather nicely despite having all that content to offer and making you a full-on war machine.
The ease of the mod came from how effective the *player* could utilize their spells and weapons and not just plainly given to you. I can respect your decision on truncating a lot of BARON down to make it more lean and straightforward, but I also personally feel like it's lost the point just a bit. iirc the whole point was you were an ancient Baron of the old ages, a magician far, far more skilled than any other Baron or Arch-Vile that existed, even a spell writer yourself to an extent, and even then, weaponry was an advantage at your disposal. The sheer insanity of all those things combined, and the creativity of thinking, "Oh, I can ENCHANT it, too," or, "Hahaha, I can put a SPELL in this Autocannon" just dripped personality.
What you do with this mod is ultimately up to you, as it's yours (obviously), and maybe there's something about it you know that I clearly don't, who knows?
I really appreciate your concerns, and want you to know the decision to cut so much down was not made lightly, and was done as carefully as possible preserve the spirit and progression of the mod. That said, it was done based on my perspective, so it might be different from what others might consider. So I want to try and ease any potential concerns as best as I can.
So I want to say thank you for your kind words. It really means a lot to me to see people enjoying the mod, and hearing from people who are playing regardless. I want to say I'm trying to keep a lot of those wide variety of options and progression by having spells grow more with Baron Level, and adding more effects to Max Level to help make up for the loss of stuff like Necromancy. I can't remember what all features I talking about in that video, and what ones I've only talked about in Discord, but another thing to make up for not being able to put spells in the Azazel is now its new Magic Shot scales and gets new effects based on what spells you have learned. Its not quite the same, I know, but the old system was too clunky to execute for my tastes, and very VERY hard to work with code-wise. TBH, a lot of my decisions were made based on stuff code-wise and me wanting to return to simplicity. Old Baron was getting too complicated for my tastes! That isn't to say I don't like complicated mods, I like HDest a lot and am making a new mod in the same vein, but it isn't what I wanted for Baron. That said, I do want to remind people reading this that Apex and Enchants are
not removed, just simplified to a single button press instead of being a mode toggle.
I dunno if I'm getting my point across effectively or if I'm being too long-winded or vague, but I hope you understand what I'm trying to say.
EDIT: I also want to say that progress on the new update is behind, so more apologies for that. Said life circumstances and I've been more focused on Revenant and the new mod lately.