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How to use the camera?

Discussion in 'Neverwinter Nights 2' started by The Great Snook, Sep 12, 2008.

  1. The Great Snook Gems: 31/31
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    I'm new to this game, and the camera seems to be driving me crazy. I've figured out that * changes between two views. Moving the mouse appears to change the view, but I can't seem to get a full 360 degree view. Especially, if my character is walking the camera only seems to want to stare at his back. Is this the way it works or am I missing something?
     
  2. Blackthorne TA

    Blackthorne TA Master in his Own Mind Staff Member ★ SPS Account Holder Adored Veteran Pillars of Eternity SP Immortalizer (for helping immortalize Sorcerer's Place in the game!) New Server Contributor [2012] (for helping Sorcerer's Place lease a new, more powerful server!) Torment: Tides of Numenera SP Immortalizer (for helping immortalize Sorcerer's Place in the game!)

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    There are different settings for the camera in the options. I was able to get it to be the same as the original NWN camera. I haven't played in months though so I don't remember the details. Just play around with some of the options setting until you get what you like.
     
  3. nunsbane

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    Snook, you can free the camera up by going to game options > strategy mode > camera focus > free camera.
     
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    I'm still not happy with the way the camera works, but I'm learning to live with it.
     
  5. hedron Gems: 7/31
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    Try setting these in nwn2player.ini in the my documents folder:

    Camera_Lag_Min=0.000000
    Camera_Lag_Max=0.000000
    Camera_Lag_Default=0.000000
    Camera_Lag_Current=0.000000

    This edit is only for the character mode. It always kept following me until I manually changed them.
     
  6. Stefanina Gems: 18/31
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    I have just gotten this game and the camera mode is driving me nuts as well. How fortuitous that I saw this topic when I came here to write postg complaining about the camera. I can;t seem to control it at all, and gave myself eyestrain trying to follow things. I'll keep plugging at it, since Blackthorne has said you can get it to resemble the NWN1 camera. I just hope it doesn't drive me batty enough to quit the game first!
     
  7. The Great Snook Gems: 31/31
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    If you figure it out, please post your fix. I've been struggling with it.
     
  8. Blackthorne TA

    Blackthorne TA Master in his Own Mind Staff Member ★ SPS Account Holder Adored Veteran Pillars of Eternity SP Immortalizer (for helping immortalize Sorcerer's Place in the game!) New Server Contributor [2012] (for helping Sorcerer's Place lease a new, more powerful server!) Torment: Tides of Numenera SP Immortalizer (for helping immortalize Sorcerer's Place in the game!)

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    OK since you are both having trouble still, I took a few moments to load the game up and take a look at what I did.

    I leave the control always in "Character Mode", never "Strategy Mode".

    What I have for options under the Character Mode tab:
    Control Options:
    • Move Forward when Left Mouse Button is Held (unselected): I just want movement when I click.
    • Click to Move (selected): That's what I want.
    • Take Control of Companion on Left Mouse Click (unselected): If this was selected I often selected companions to control when I didn't want to, so I unselected it and clicked on the companion portraits on the right of the screen to select them for control.
    • Turn Camera on Mouse Hitting Edge of Screen (selected): This causes the camera to rotate left/right (or equatorial) around the selected character when the mouse leaves the side of the screen and up/down (or polar) around the selected character when the mouse leaves the top/bottom of the screen.
    • Invert Mouse Up/Down (unselected): Not what I wanted.
    • Invert Mouse Right/Left (unselected): Not what I wanted.
    View Options:
    • Ceiling Always On (unselected): Very important one for me. If the ceilings are always on, the camera if too often forced too close into the selected character. With this unselected, if you zoom out past the ceiling, the ceiling disappears allowing the camera to continue zooming out (which is definitely what I want).
    • Object Fade (selected): Causes objects (like trees) in the way of the camera (between the camera and the selected character) to fade from view so you can see through them.
    • Movement Target Marker (selected): What I want.
    • Cameral Follows when Turning in Place (unselected): Another important one for me. I want the camera to stay at the same view aspect that I put it. If this is selected, the camera auto-rotates to stay behind the selected character.
    So this allows me to rotate the camera around the selected character in any direction by moving the mouse to the screen edges, and use the mouse wheel to zoom in and out. With the ceilings not always on, if a wall causes the camera to get in too close to the selected character I can rotate around and/or up through the ceiling to get the perspective away from the character.

    Hope that helps.
     
  9. The Great Snook Gems: 31/31
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    It still doesn't do what I would like it to do. I also never use strategy mode, I use characte mode. What I don't like is that when I am moving I don't have full control of the camera. If I'm walking forward and I spin the camera to the right because I want to look to the left, as soon as I'm done spinning it, the camera starts spinning back. For some reason the game thinks I always want to stare at the back of my character. I do not like it at all when I'm moving as half the time my party goes running off to fight some enemies, that I haven't even seen yet. The same is kind of true in combat, while my selected character is fighting I'd like to be able to swivel around and see what everyone else is doing.

    Maybe I have to start giving strategic view a shot.
     
  10. Blackthorne TA

    Blackthorne TA Master in his Own Mind Staff Member ★ SPS Account Holder Adored Veteran Pillars of Eternity SP Immortalizer (for helping immortalize Sorcerer's Place in the game!) New Server Contributor [2012] (for helping Sorcerer's Place lease a new, more powerful server!) Torment: Tides of Numenera SP Immortalizer (for helping immortalize Sorcerer's Place in the game!)

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    Deselect "Camera Follows when Turning in Place". I hate that too.

    EDIT
    Oh, wait, you don't want the camera to move behind the character even when the character is running? I see. Either you can turn down the camera lag in Character Mode so that the camera rotates slowly behind the character and it's easy to overcome with the mouse, or use Strategy Mode.

    Strategy Mode with the camera Centered on the Character and selecting "turn camera" instead of "scroll camera" when mouse to edge of screen should give you the same thing as Character Mode, but the camera doesn't change when you run.

    I like the camera to move behind when the character is moving because I like to see what he's running into :)
     
    Last edited: Oct 9, 2008
  11. Stefanina Gems: 18/31
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    Hmmm, I've got all the settings as same as you describe, Blackthorne, but it still isn't what I'd like. In NWN 1, I had the camera set to top down, and at full zoom out, it was easy for me to simply rotate the camera to the viewpoint I wanted: ie, looking straight at a door. This game does not let me rotate the POV the way I could in 1.
     
  12. Blackthorne TA

    Blackthorne TA Master in his Own Mind Staff Member ★ SPS Account Holder Adored Veteran Pillars of Eternity SP Immortalizer (for helping immortalize Sorcerer's Place in the game!) New Server Contributor [2012] (for helping Sorcerer's Place lease a new, more powerful server!) Torment: Tides of Numenera SP Immortalizer (for helping immortalize Sorcerer's Place in the game!)

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    I'm not sure what you mean. If you turn off ceiling always on, the only thing that restricts the camera are walls as far as I remember. So, what is keeping you from looking at a door? At worst the camera will be forced in close to the door if there is a wall close by and your POV takes the camera into the wall instead of the ceiling.
     
  13. Stefanina Gems: 18/31
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    I don't know if this is something in the settings or a bug with my copy of the game, but no matter how I set things, the camera will not rotate at all. I will scroll, but not rotate so I cannot change the camera POV at all. Nor will the * key change views.
    Now, I have installed this game to a USB hard drive, and play it on a Vista system. Dunno if that's messing things up, but from reading this thread, there is obvoisly things that the camera is supposed to do that it's not doing for me.

    Edit: Never mind. I had a messed up file apparently. I backed up my saved game, re-installed the game, and I can get the camera to switch views now. What was frustrating me was that it was stuck in Strategy mode, and I couldn't get it to switch to Character Mode.
     
    Last edited: Oct 13, 2008
  14. Blackthorne TA

    Blackthorne TA Master in his Own Mind Staff Member ★ SPS Account Holder Adored Veteran Pillars of Eternity SP Immortalizer (for helping immortalize Sorcerer's Place in the game!) New Server Contributor [2012] (for helping Sorcerer's Place lease a new, more powerful server!) Torment: Tides of Numenera SP Immortalizer (for helping immortalize Sorcerer's Place in the game!)

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    Ah. You can also have Strategy Mode rotate the view instead of scroll if that's what you want. You just have to deselect the "scroll when mouse to edge" checkbox.
     
  15. hedron Gems: 7/31
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    You need to use strategy mode during chaotic fights. But I already posted the fix to your problem. I had the same irritation until I edited that file.
     
  16. The Great Snook Gems: 31/31
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    That fix didn't work for me. When I changed the file, the game would crash and never load. It scared the crap out of me, as I was afraid I was going to have to start over. :)
     
  17. hedron Gems: 7/31
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    I think you edited it wrong. You need to change the lines, not simply add them. They are located in the Character Mode Options. The nwn2player.ini file is located in the My Documents folder not the install/programs folder.

    The fix stops the camera from following you all the time. You also have to set "Cameral Follows when Turning in Place" to off. I would make sure this setting is turned off first.

    I know it's kind of irritating because the settings are in the options menu but for some reason the menu won't set it to zero. Maybe you can manually set the sliders all the way to the left. Maybe your configuration will allow you to do this in the menu, mine did not. I think it's probably a bug they never got around to fixing, but I'm not 100% sure.

    This is what the Character Mode Options looks like in my file:

    Code:
    [Character Mode Options]
    Mousewheel_Speed_Min=1.000000
    Mousewheel_Speed_Max=10.000000
    Mousewheel_Speed_Default=6.000000
    Mousewheel_Speed_Current=5.860000
    Mouse_Turn_Min=0.050000
    Mouse_Turn_Max=3.000000
    Mouse_Turn_Default=1.000000
    Mouse_Turn_Current=1.141500
    Edge_Turn_Min=3.000000
    Edge_Turn_Max=10.000000
    Edge_Turn_Default=5.000000
    Edge_Turn_Current=8.670000
    [b]Camera_Lag_Min=0.000000
    Camera_Lag_Max=0.000000
    Camera_Lag_Default=0.000000
    Camera_Lag_Current=0.000000[/b]
    Fade Objects=0
    Show Move Cursor=1
    Mouseover Highlight Flags=74
    CameraMode=0
    LeftClickAction=1
    Ceiling Draw Mode=0
    PossessAsDefault=0
    CameraFollowAlways=0
    MouseMovement=1
    Enable ScreenEdgeCameraTurn=0
     
  18. The Great Snook Gems: 31/31
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    @hedron

    I bow to you. That worked like a charm, and now it does exactly what I want it to. I nominate you for "Genius of the Week".

    BTA and Stefanina, you should both try this out.
     
  19. Blackthorne TA

    Blackthorne TA Master in his Own Mind Staff Member ★ SPS Account Holder Adored Veteran Pillars of Eternity SP Immortalizer (for helping immortalize Sorcerer's Place in the game!) New Server Contributor [2012] (for helping Sorcerer's Place lease a new, more powerful server!) Torment: Tides of Numenera SP Immortalizer (for helping immortalize Sorcerer's Place in the game!)

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    Snook - You mean the Strategy Mode with rotating view instead of scrolling view didn't do what you wanted?

    As I mentioned above, I don't want the camera lag to be 0 in Character Mode; I want the camera to slowly rotate behind the character as they move forward, so I have the lag set to something low (via the slider of the Character Mode options GUI), but not 0.
     
  20. The Great Snook Gems: 31/31
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    No, strategy mode didn't do it. Having it this way gives me the ability to look at the walls and down halls while moving.
     
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