Hellfire Patch v1.02.A5: Classic HF with less bugs and more polish!

[Zephkiel]

Hello again,

I'm gonna try to set up it all today, since it week end!
I still think i'll pull it off. somehow.

Edit : done on first try, no cd, and correct version number is showing

I'll grab the animation too, i remember playing a bard but DW was not my thing, but i might be tempted.

As for the website, well, my bad, but if you maintain it with files, you deserve some credits too.

Edit 2 : I've seen a lot of "colors fixes".
There is the registry key in your patch, the Ddraw dll thingy from khanduras that i should put in the directory...wich should i use? or both? WHat do they do ?

Edit3 : the Ddraw dll is nice since i can change resolution with it, the registry key seems unecessary since i have no problem with colours, tried with and without, no changes, i guess its useful when everything goes "ALL PINK".

I'm all set :3

Diabloooo

[Belix]

Happy to hear you got it working.

For the sake of anyone else with these questions, I'll answer these:

Edit 2 : I've seen a lot of "colors fixes".
There is the registry key in your patch, the Ddraw dll thingy from khanduras that i should put in the directory...wich should i use? or both? WHat do they do ?

Some newer versions of Windows (particularly Windows Vista and Windows 7) have a problem displaying colors properly in 256-color palette games, which makes the screen look like a confetti explosion of neon colors in random places. It isn't pretty and makes the game unplayable.

I don't know exact numbers right now but I'd guess roughly one-third of Windows PCs active at this time are running Windows 7, so the problem is common enough I wanted to include the color fixes, since having them and not needing them hurts nothing (they're very tiny files) and do nothing unless used.

Most people will want the 64-Bit color fix, but a few users may have an uncommon 32-Bit version of Vista or Windows 7. If you're not sure which you have, try the 64-Bit first, then the 32-Bit; using the wrong one will do no harm.

Anyhow, enjoy!

[rlsprite]

Hey, Belix.

Let me start by thanking you for updating your great mod!
Now.. I have been using it for quite sometime now and everything is working like it should, except... I can't get the final movie to play, in fact, I can't get ANY movie to play using the mod.
Sierra Logo, Hellfire Intro, Lazarus little movie clip when you enter his level and the final cinematic when you defeat Diablo, none of them play.
Even more, on the game menu if I hit "Replay Intro" I get a 1 sec black screen and then I'm back at the main menu.
I already enabled the final cinematic in cowqueston.dat, also Sierra Logo and stuff and still.. no luck. I tested Vanilla Diablo 1.09 (No Hellfire) and both Blizzard logo and intro played just fine.
I'm doing something wrong here?

[Belix]

Let me start by thanking you for updating your great mod!

You're very welcome, I am happy someone is enjoying it.

Now.. I have been using it for quite sometime now and everything is working like it should, except... I can't get the final movie to play, in fact, I can't get ANY movie to play using the mod.

This isn't actually an issue with the mod, but with Hellfire itself - or more specifically, the older version of Smackw32.dll it uses seems to have issues on newer operating systems. I intended to include an updated .dll that resolves this in the mod package, but it seems to have been misplaced as I don't see it included.

I have updated the first post with an attached zip containing the updated Smackw32.dll file, and here's a direct link to that attachment: Smackw32.zip

Simply deposit the contained .dll file into your Hellfire folder (back up the original first if you wish), and your videos should play again. Thanks for bringing this to my attention! My apologies for forgetting to include this preemptive fix.

[rlsprite]

Thanks for the quick reply, Belix!
Movies are playing once again

[Thenryb]

The longevity of the Diablo based games is really amazing. A lot of Diablo players back in the day turned up their noses at Hellfire, but my old pal, King Jim and I always enjoyed playing it and later renditions. Many a night was spent on laggy old Kali, KJ and his monk and me and my barbarian. The original Hellfire was a bit buggy but still fun. I would probably have played the monk or even the warrior more but for the fact that they could get block-locked so easily on witch levels. Hopefully, this mod does not force characters to block spells when they have resistance. My old barb had a nearly perfect Kings Great Axe of Haste.

[Belix]

Thanks to the underlying mod this extends (Marsh's Unofficial Hellfire mod), by default there's no more blocking stuff you have resistance against. Also relevant is the order of Shield and Armor now behave as Diablo, so you're no longer constantly blocking everything if you have good Armor Class.

I still play regular Diablo v1.09, and enjoy that as well (I recently beat Ironman on Nightmare as a Warrior with a Rogue partner - that was intense). Hellfire is a fun diversion once in awhile for casual games, or just to play different classes. The new areas and spells add a little extra variety too.

Anyway, if you try this out, I'd be happy to hear any feedback from either of you. It is highly customizable though, so odds are if I made a change you don't care for you can put it back.

Thanks for the quick reply, Belix!

Of course. Enjoy!

[AltheaLBL]

Nice patch! Although i was just playing single player with a bard and got to cats, clicked on a Blood Fountain and black screen/game crash.

Any way to fix?

[Belix]

That's a very serious issue, but my best efforts haven't been able to reproduce it; as far as I can tell the Blood Fountain works as intended. I will contact you privately and see if we can't determine why you're experiencing a crash.

[Thenryb]

I tried playing the mod as well. Unfortunately, I had to replace my monitor and found to my chagrin that my new monitor does not support "fixed aspect ratio" and so the game is spread all over my wide screen. I just cannot stand to play it that way and have been unable to figure out a workaround to get the "square" picture I need.

[Belix]

Hello. What do you mean the monitor doesn't support it? Just curious, as I've never heard of such a thing.

Some monitors have an option you can set in the menu that controls whether the image is stretched to fit on the screen's end. If you meant that your monitor doesn't have this option, you should be able to change the scaling behavior on the other end - at the video card settings.

Likewise, if your monitor does have this feature and you don't know about it, it could override whatever scaling option you set on your video card, which might make it seem like the monitor is incapable of showing a fixed aspect, since it is stretching whatever input it gets.

[Belix]

clicked on a Blood Fountain and black screen/game crash.

Any way to fix?

After experimenting with variations of the 10% Life/Mana fountain code, I have been unable to determine what causes this crash. It seems limited to certain PCs, but I was able to write a new, similar behavior for Life/Mana fountains that does not seem to cause this crash.

This new code restores 25% of your Vitality or Magic as life or mana, respectively. The affect on the amount restored per sip is generally negligible, and still much faster than 1 point per click.

However, I need some time to test the code to make sure it doesn't cause any new problems before I release an updated version with it. In the meantime, if anyone else experiences this strange crash, you can give the new code a try and report if it solved the crashing or not. To try the new code, open the .dat file with a text editor, and change the existing code to this:

Code:

start HF1.01 "Blood Fountain & Purifying Spring - Restore 25% of Vitality or Magic per click"
4536B5 838438AC010000408D8438AC010000A1 53508B9C386C010000C1EB0231C0B040
4536C5 14AE6E00838438A4010000408D8438A4 0FAFD858019C38AC010000019C38A401
4536D5 010000A114AE6E00 00005B9090909090
453759 83843898010000408D843898010000A1 53508B9C387C010000C1EB0231C0B040
453769 14AE6E0083843890010000408D843890 0FAFD858019C3898010000019C389001
453779 010000A114AE6E00 00005B9090909090
end

[Thenryb]

Hello. What do you mean the monitor doesn't support it? Just curious, as I've never heard of such a thing.

Some monitors have an option you can set in the menu that controls whether the image is stretched to fit on the screen's end. If you meant that your monitor doesn't have this option, you should be able to change the scaling behavior on the other end - at the video card settings.

Likewise, if your monitor does have this feature and you don't know about it, it could override whatever scaling option you set on your video card, which might make it seem like the monitor is incapable of showing a fixed aspect, since it is stretching whatever input it gets.

The monitor adjustment buttons are tiny little things on the bottom of the monitor. You click on the menu and by the time you fumble around to find the right little tiny button to try to adjust the image disappears. I have an Nvidia card. When my old Samsung monitor was working one of the options in the Nvidia control panel was to select "use Nvidia scaling with fixed aspect ratio". If you selected that option, old games like Diablo and Hellfire would be displayed as if they were on an old square monitor with black bars on each side. With the new monitor, the Nvidia control panel does not have that option so the Hellfire display is spread all over the screen and makes the game unplayable for me. I have done a lot of surfing trying to figure out how to get that option back with no success. One of the things I read was that the option does not appear if your monitor does not support that-hence, my conclusion. The only solution I can think of is to add an old cheap monitor as a secondary one for playing such games.

Edit: As it turns out, the scaling options do not appear in the Nvidia control panel if you are using the monitor's native resolution. So what you have to do is to change the resolution to some number lower than the native resolution. That triggers the scaling options to appear and enables you to select "fixed aspect ratio" and Hellfire is displayed as it should be and the rest of the screen is blacked out. You can then restore the monitor's native resolution and it retains the "fixed aspect ratio" you selected.

Anyway, I fired up the version I had 102.A3 and started a rogue. There was a Needler in Gillian's stash which a tried briefly. It shot no faster than a regular short bow so I guess that version still has the old Hellfire mechanic of "swiftness=arrows flying faster". These old naked eyes cannot tell the difference. It appears that you fixed that in the latest patch which I am going to download and install.

[Belix]

Glad to hear you sorted the monitor out. I have had friends with a similar issue not being able to set the scaling behavior in their ATI settings program while running at the native resolution, but until now I thought that was an issue limited to the ATI software. Thanks for posting the solution here in case anyone else stumbles across it.

One more question that might be relevant - is your monitor connected to your PC by a VGA, HDMI or DVI cable, and is that the same way your old one was hooked up? I haven't seen this issue manifest with my NVIDIA drivers yet and I'm wondering if it only pops up when using certain video interface(s). It seems peculiar it would surface just because of a different monitor model alone, so I wanted to eliminate this possibility.

Anyway, I fired up the version I had 102.A3 and started a rogue. There was a Needler in Gillian's stash which a tried briefly. It shot no faster than a regular short bow so I guess that version still has the old Hellfire mechanic of "swiftness=arrows flying faster". These old naked eyes cannot tell the difference.

That's right, I wasn't able to implement Diablo style bow speed until A4, so you should find the only bow unaffected by this change is the Gnat Sting, which after some consideration I felt would be far too powerful if it had Swiftness - at least for the Rogue, where 1 frame makes a significant difference.

Let me know if you encounter any problems.

-------
I recently discovered another overflow bug I missed. Cursed affixes that modify both To Hit and Damage (like Warrior's or Kings affixes) can rollover from a small negative penalty to an insanely high Chance To Hit bonus. I'll aim to fix that in the next version, which will be a relatively small update to fix a couple more Hellfire bugs.

EDIT: Turns out the bug isn't with that certain type of affix. It seems when I fixed the durability issue with items in MP, I unfixed the rollover bug with cursed To Hit items exchanged between players. This bug should still be fixed in all SP games. Hopefully A5 will mark the end of this cheesy bug once and for all!

[Thenryb]

One more question that might be relevant - is your monitor connected to your PC by a VGA, HDMI or DVI cable, and is that the same way your old one was hooked up? I haven't seen this issue manifest with my NVIDIA drivers yet and I'm wondering if it only pops up when using certain video interface(s). It seems peculiar it would surface just because of a different monitor model alone, so I wanted to eliminate this possibility.

That's right, I wasn't able to implement Diablo style bow speed until A4, so you should find the only bow unaffected by this change is the Gnat Sting, which after some consideration I felt would be far too powerful if it had Swiftness - at least for the Rogue, where 1 frame makes a significant difference.

Let me know if you encounter any problems.

-------
I recently discovered another overflow bug I missed. Cursed affixes that modify both To Hit and Damage (like Warrior's or Kings affixes) can rollover from a small negative penalty to an insanely high Chance To Hit bonus. I'll aim to fix that in the next version, which will be a relatively small update to fix a couple more Hellfire bugs.
[/quote]

The monitor is connected to the PC with a DVI cable, as was my old one.
I updated to the latest version and the Needler works as intended. Good work. I agree about Gnat's Sting. That is a fun bow without Diablo-style swiftness.

[Belix]

Investigating two other Multiplayer bugs that appear to be native to Diablo or Hellfire. Not sure if I can do anything about them, though.

Bug #1: It seems joining games when players are not in town can sometimes cause Hellfire to hang/disconnect.

Bug #2: Sometimes items may tun up with weird stats like 0/0 durability, 0 armor class. This seems to be caused by items forcefully generated by the game for quests, e.g. Theodore, Cathedral Map, Auric Amulet, Celia's amulet reward, Na-Krul's drops, Torn Note, and anything similar I can't think of at the moment. These items can erroneously respawn after they've already been taken, and messing with them again at this point seems to have a chance to cause this weird glitch, as if a bad 'update' is being sent out to the other players for the wrong item ID on the network (most quest items have 0 armor, durability etc.). I'm doubtful my knowledge will provide a means to resolve this bug short of finding a way to deposit the items directly into a character's inventory - suitable for the amulet, bear etc., but problematic for the treasure trove that Na-Krul drops. Suspect this is a problem in vanilla Diablo as well, but unnoticed since normally no specific items are forcefully dropped by monsters or NPCs in Diablo MP.

[maplestoryfall]

Hi, I'd like to know if it fixes sorcerer's firewall spell. Monsters get through the firewall easily and unharmed.

[Belix]

I'm not sure exactly what you're asking about. I will assume you are aware some monsters in the game (especially later) are Fire Immune and can stroll through Fire Walls casually, and will guess you're asking about why all enemies can walk right through Walls cast directly, East, South or West of your character.

If so, you're asking about a really old quirk with Diablo that stems from the grid used by the game engine. Although you can't see it on your screen, every object, character and piece of level structure in the game is laid out on a grid like this:



When you cast a Wall spell diagonally from your character, e.g. towards a corner of the screen, it stretches out to form a solid wall that fills every square in its row neatly. But when cast in a straight direction, it crosses between the corners of squares, leaving crossable gaps where other characters can walk between the flames unharmed.

There's no simple way to fix that. Ideally walls cast in these directions would be shorter and wider to fill the gaps, but without Diablo's source code that's far above my ability to implement at the moment.

Try to cast all your Walls so that they form diagonal rows on the screen. It takes a little practice, but you'll get the hang of it, and only Fire Immune enemies will waltz through them. If you really need one that isn't diagonal, practice casting two walls in slightly different positions so you get 2 rows thick, leaving no gaps.

Alternatively, a new spell added in Hellfire, Ring of Fire, creates a Fire Wall in a circle around you which doesn't have any gaps. If you have Teleport, you can easily move outside of it away from foes after casting it.

[Thenryb]

I never played enough mage (and never in HF) to master proper firewall casting. I remember ROF being a bit worthless but that may have changed with this patch. And speaking of the patch, I do not suppose there is a version where Leo does not resurrect skeletons in MP. I found that to be pure tedium with a level 10 rogue with a decent (for that level) knockback bow.

[Belix]

I never played enough mage (and never in HF) to master proper firewall casting. I remember ROF being a bit worthless but that may have changed with this patch. And speaking of the patch, I do not suppose there is a version where Leo does not resurrect skeletons in MP. I found that to be pure tedium with a level 10 rogue with a decent (for that level) knockback bow.

I've seen some Sorcerers combine Ring of Fire with Teleport to 'trap' monsters inside, then after teleporting out, Fireball them to death while they're stuck in it. In a situation where trapping them with a wall is difficult it's a nice alternative to have at least - and you don't have to worry about precision placement. You can cast Ring of Fire while moving the cursor to your teleport escape location.

I do intend to undo Marsh's change of Leoric resurrecting in MP, but I haven't yet been able to pinpoint the change he made in the executable code (one of many) to put it back. Hopefully that will make it into the next version, but I may not have time to look into this until after New Years. On the bright side, at least I was able to fix all the bugs with the Warlord of Blood in MP (Warlord invincible, book re-reading every time you come back to the floor).