Improved Camera Mod for NWN HotU 1.69 + Camera Height Control System

UPDATED 2015-10-24!

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+ Camera Height Control System v1.1 (now riders-friendly!) 



Improved Camera Mod works best when used along with Camera Height Control System - and that's why they were uploaded together in single project.

The both patches can also work independently of course and are fully compatible with the great majority (if not all) of NWN modules, no matter: custom, or "Premium" ones, and with CEP1, CEP2 & Community Patch Project (CPP) by Shadooow as well.

The manual for the applying Improved Camera Mod v1.3 to the Linux version of NWN client (HotU-1.69) - also included.

Improved Camera Mod has been inspired by: 

Camera Mod Hack by Roma_CZ (v2), Camera Mod for Linux NWN version (slightly modified parameters - when compared to both v1 and v2 by Roma_CZ), HG's (Higher Grounds) version (yet another approach and another set of parameters), and finally by my 1.1 version (which was based on Roma_CZ's Mod Hack v1, only slightly improved: min. distances in particular).

In contrast to Roma_CZ, who chose to use a shady Universal Patcher v2.01b (probably contains a trojan), I used a non-controversial patcher for mine: the script interpreter that is built-in excellent XVI32 Freeware Hex Editor by Christian Maas.

For my Camera Height Control System (CHC System) I took the initial inspiration from Camera Control 1.0 by The Munchkin Lord, but the system has been completely reworked and refined.

It works WITHOUT conversation (which was one of few major inconveniences of the original system) and is focused on improving the game experience, when playing a PC of the most common races (Humans, Elves, Half-Elves, Half-Orcs, Dwarves, Halflings, Gnomes - both males and females!). Thus I've decided that enabling the view from 50 m (or 20 m or even 10 m) above the ground is pointless when first person view is our priority: in this case it's much better to enable view, eg.: from 1,3 m - for a Gnome (1.3 m is the level of his eyes) instead. And it's essential for FP view, because BioWare's default camera height levels are either too low or too high (camera was apparently never meant by BW to be used in FP mode) - for a comfortable 1st person view. Eg. human male, eyes level = about 1.8 m; default Camera Heights are: about 1.5 m in Top-Down Mode and about 2 m in Driving / Chase Mode; as the result: we look either from below or from above - at the other humans.

Additionally: my Camera Height Control System  can be used in virtually all modules WITHOUT need for adding any hakpak / rebuilding, thus my system can be used as well in premium modules as in any custom (community) module. E.g. I tested it with the Pirates of the Sword Coast - and it worked like a charm!



The detailed manual for installing Improved Camera Mod v1.3:  

- in Windows: is in the ZIP archive: cammod_nwn_hotu_169_v13.zip (in four formats: rtf, txt, odt and pdf), along with all required files;

- in Linux: is in the ZIP archive: cammod_nwn_hotu_169_v13_linux.zip (pdf, odt, txt).

Notes:

#1 First Person view is obtained by pressing Home key (=max zoom). To exit FP view, hit End key.

#2 You can open the script used to patch nwmain.exe with notepad (or any text editor) to see what changes exactly these scripts are doing to the binary.

In short, they are changing the following parameters of the camera (Top-Down Mode / Driving Mode) and fog distance stored in nwmain.exe file:

min distance:	-0.45 / -0.35 [meters] (slightly changed in v1.3)
max distance:	30 / 30 [meters]
max angle:	150 / 150 [degrees]
fog distance:	50 [meters]

Important note regarding the Fog Distance setting:

BioWare set fog distance to 45 by default; almost all existing camera hack mods for NWN1 set it to 60 (Roma_CZ v.2) or more: 74-80 usually (74: v1 by ROMA_CZ, 75: HG version; my previous version of Improved Camera Mod left it at 45 - v1.2, or optionally set it to 80 - v1.2F), but since this setting also greatly widens camera angle, resulting in heavy fisheye distortions when increased to 60 or more, I’ve decided to set it to 50 in v1.3.

As far as I know, NWNCX (patch+camera) mod leaves it at default 45, which is good, though a bit wider angle of FOV (Field Of View), without too much perspective distortions, would be desirable IMO. When the setting is raised very slightly: from 45 to 50, the distortions remain on the minimal level, while the FOV is a bit wider, which is a good compromise.

 

As for the installing and using Camera Height Control (CHC) System - the full manual is in the archive CameraHeightControlSystem_v11.zip.

Notes:

The CHC System has been adopted to mounted Player Characters in this version.

Since this version CHC System exists only in the one variant - universal; it has evolved from v1.0P (Premium). Variant C has been discontinued (v1.0C being the first and the last one released).

CHC System v1.1 doesn't require any modified 2da file to be placed in the override folder; only 1 (one) modified script and 5 custom items - to choose one from among them (or to use two or more these items together - in any combination).

Additionally, the only script, that CHC v1.1 is utilizing, has been modified in such a way that hasn't broken it - the script is still functioning and working exactly as expected - with the item it was originally written for ("Deck of Hazards" a.k.a. "Deck of Many Things") by BioWare.

Alternatively, it also could be easily imported to any custom module (via erf file) and used without any file copied and pasted into the override NWN folder. Of course: all the required files are in the ZIP archive mentioned above.

 

Any feedback will be highly appreciated!

 - Sawark