Part 111: Behind the Scenes

Chapter 81 - Behind the Scenes - The Fall of Ferol

I'll explain what I did for each of the images in turn. So avoid reading this if you don't want the magic "spoiled".

1) Zandalor and General Alix



This one was easy. I got a shot of Alix facing Jeremiah, then I took another shot showing a clear area where Jeremiah was standing, and used that to cover him up. Then I grabbed images of Zandalor and Arhu. This scene was a last-minute addition, I wasn't planning on having it.


2) The army's defeat


(Click for original)

I actually borrowed most of this shot from something I did for Chapter 26. That one already had a lot of human corpses. It also had orc corpses, so I decided to make a human-orc alliance (in case you hadn't figured it out, Kroxy is the orc leader who ended hostilities). Unfortunately, it also had a great big HUD at the bottom, so I covered it up with fire. I grabbed shots of demons and demon corpses from images we'll see in Chapter 82. I found various images of fire. I also covered up a distinctive red charm which was from the Chapter 26 body pile, to make it look a bit less stolen. This scene was a last-minute addition, I wasn't planning on having it.

The original image was a PSD file, so I just removed the layers showing the living soldiers and the cat.


3) Showdown at Stormfist



If I had to actually be in the audience chamber to take screenshots, this would have been much harder - thanks to the people who are always in the audience chamber. It would have been a nuisance getting the guards and such out. But because you can scroll the screen, and because the game doesn't render NPC's who are not in the same room as you are, I was able to get clean shots easily. Most of the rest was cutting and pasting. I grabbed the dead Stormfist guards from Chapter 46. If you look in the upper-left corner, you see a dead guard added for detail. If you look in upper-center, you can see Arhu. He's partially invisible. I added Arhu because I had an idea for some dialogue, but that required a witness. This scene was a last-minute addition, I wasn't planning on having it.


4) Homer's farmhouse


(Click for original)

The game has a lot of burned-up houses for use. It's tricky getting them to match. You also need to remove the roofs of the buildings from the background. This one was surprisingly complicated. The paved path didn't look that great, the green grass clashed with the burned ground, so I tweaked it to replace the green with black, and darken it up. The burning cart is a cover-up for the cart which sits outside Homer's house. Gareth, Isolde and Homer do not have corpses and death animations, so I had to take pictures of them alive, and then copy the torso and head, but without any limbs, which I copy and rotate separately. The blood on the ground was also from elsewhere.


5) Rivertown Market


(Click for original)

This one was a bit of a pain. There were so many trees, and Elrath's house was a huge thing in the way. I had to clone pavement over most of the scene, and find burned trees and carefully grab those as well. Most of the dead guards were really there, though. I started attacking random people and murdering them to get the guards angry. I also removed all the items from the carts - and in one case, I had to remove the cart itself to show it burning. I also killed the cow at the upper-center.


6) Aleroth


(Click for original)

I decided that keeping it simple here would work. The only burned houses in the game have brick walls, so burning them all down wouldn't look right. Besides, Joram's house has that annoying dip in the side which would have been a huge pain to duplicate. You can't kill Joram at all, which is why his body isn't here. You can murder Otho though, so I did. I got Lanilor's body from the scene where I didn't rescue Mardaneus's sanity before he needed to go to the Council of Seven. Since I couldn't burn the houses to the ground, I settled for showing them on fire. I created a window into Joram's house and put it in front of a layer containing fire. The fire shooting out of Lanilor's window was a piece of fire I'd cut on an angle, and spun on an angle. Simple.


7) Glenborous


(Click for original)

This one was mostly real. I went hostile and slaughtered the village. Most of the bodies in this scene were real. I chose this spot because it's memorable, and because it meant I didn't need to worry about showing a wrecked house. I added in a few more bodies to fill the place up a bit, but that's it.


8) Fiu Nimble


(Click for original)

This one was also easy, because of the Sword-in-the-Stone spirit that slaughters the village. But I'd already shown that in the day, so I did it again for a night scene so it didn't look like I'd just copied an earlier scene (I needed to do that anyway because I had left the HUD up there). The night scene made getting the lighting on the burned houses tricky. The burned elven buildings were burned elven burial pyres. I added in some extra elf corpses.


9) The Evacuation to the Underground



This one was trickier than you'd think. I didn't need to show any burned buildings, but I did need to carefully copy and hollow out the chain it would look right, and copy the trees to put them in front. Some of the elves have minor injuries, which I added. If you look in the windows of the Dwarven Halls, you can see guard dwarves. They're there to snipe with crossbows in case an attack comes (that's also why there are so many dwarven soldiers there). I added those. The elf looking southwest is gazing wistfully up at the sky, knowing that after he enters, he may never see the sun again.


10) Verdistis


(Click for original)

This one was a lot easier than I had expected it to be. It was originally a shot from outside of Leptine's Market.I copied the streetlamps, the rocks, and the sign. There were also bushes, which I ignored and paved over. Then I copied the street as a layer. I took a layer from a burned house and carefully aligned it to match Leptine's shop, and I added in a layer showing a doorway (also aligned properly) I copied another layer of the burned house to put in front of the fire. I rotated Leptine's sign, placed it on a pile of rubble and darkened it to show slight fire damage. I had to tweak Leptine to make him appear dead. Most of the guards lying face-down were really there, I slaughtered them. Most of the other bodies I got from elsewhere to fill up the street.



I find this hilarious, but I cannot explain why, but you might understand after reading the first half of my next LP.


Yeah. The Good Gods plan clearly didn't account for their enemies being SMART. I mean, this WHOLE MESS started because the Black Ring was smart enough to attack the Divine Being before she/it chose a Divine One. They tried to off her/it while she/it was sleeping, and came darn close too.

Without Zandalor, the prospective Divine One's apparently wouldn't have any idea what to do, because they don't get a helpful voice in their heads. The next two games have people accompanying the main character who have a plan about where to go and what to do, so Zandalor doesn't need to hand-hold them.




Shennanigans? Maybe, although I can't promise you anything. There isn't really a lot of room for shenanigans. It is 60 images even cutting out 95% of the dungeon  Well, 95% of the portion of the dungeon covered in the update .

There will certainly be a lot of content, at least - both screenshots and videos.

I forget - did I ever post the video of Moriendor the rabbit in the Council of Seven Chambers? I don't think I did. I'll post that. I'm wondering if I should look for a sound clip of the rabbit scene from Monty Python and the Holy Grail, but that's TOTALLY ORIGINAL so I just might not worry about it.


I also discovered that if you have music playing in Windows Media Player when Fraps is recording, Fraps records that as well. The music is distinctively NOT from Divine Divinity, but some people here may recognize it.

If I had known that Fraps records mp3 music, say, YESTERDAY, it would have saved me some grief with a stopwatch [spoiler]trying to get the final boss fight to last long enough to get the entire song "Bitva" to play.


I'm putting together the videos now, but the update isn't likely to be ready before monday. (Besides, I'm secretly hoping I'll be able to post Updates 83, 84 and 85 on consecutive days), and I still need to do a bunch of work

Nope, no leggings or boots. Magic Leggings and Boots are pretty rare - there are only about 3 pairs of magic boots - the Shoes of the Scorpion from the Aleroth catacombs, the Leather Boots from the Assassins' Guild, and the Boots of the Vampire from the vampire cave. The only magical leggings I found are in the Imp Castle.