Extell's Lair Planner

Greetings fellow Dragons.

My name is Extell and I am a dragon on the Chaos server. Awhile back I got into Lairshaping and started looking for resources to help plan out my own lair once I got one again (see below). I didnt find a lot of info in one place, it was more scattered everywhere. Anywho, long story short, I started a lair planner. You can find it here...

http://www.extell.us/files/planner.xls

It does require Microsoft Excel 2003 or greater to use. I tried porting it to OpenOffice and Google Docs and both just butcher the file. Instructions on how to use the planner are inside the file itself.

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Who am I? Ive been playing MMOs for years. I played Istaria when it was first launched as Horizons long ago. I started out as Nithella (Fiend Spiritist) who is now up to a Shaman. But, in the end, I love crafting and Istaria still has one of the best crafting systems in any game out there. I took a VERY long break (years) when my entire guild left to play Asheron's Call 2 (I think thats why we left, been awhile). I came back again about 6 months ago and got to play for about a month before circumstances came about where I could not sustain 2 games at once (Rift + Istaria).

Now that Im playing Guild Wars 2 and it does not have a subscription fee, I have money to keep a 2nd game going as well. Guess which? :P

In that small 2nd break I lost the lair that I had gotten so Im back to the beginning on building my own lair (got to save up money for one first).


Anywho, now that Im back, I got more data for my Planner and polished it up a LOT. Download, use, and let me know what you think.

PS: Ive had the site the file is hosted on for years and plan to have it for years to come. Not much chance of the link going bad (only a catastrophe would make it go away, like me getting eaten by a grue).

Ah, interesting! I wish I could take a gander to see what it does, but, well... MSOffice? Nope. Haven't had that installed for years now. Alas!

Someone who CAN get it running should tell me what it's like!

It looks good. I like it, easy to use. However its missing some lair sizes. 5x4x7 is mine and I can't use it, but for the normal lair sizes its pretty nice.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Thicklesip

Ah, interesting! I wish I could take a gander to see what it does, but, well... MSOffice? Nope. Haven't had that installed for years now. Alas!

Someone who CAN get it running should tell me what it's like!

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I can open it using open office software, which is free. :) The spreadsheet planner isnt too bad.

Looks nice, I like it. :)

Looks great, Extell. Informative and easy to use. I'll shoot you an email shortly-ish with some info in an excel spreadsheet containing resource details, should you wish to add it. But first, I best try and find out who's it was originally (I'm thinking maybe Chasing) and see if they would approve of such.

Thumbs up :D

Happy hunting, see yas in Istaria :)

Arzel: The missing lairs is only my to do list (which in the file itself). If you can show how the entrance to your lair is setup I can add that lair style. Screenshots would do fine. Im missing a couple of room designs as well.

hallucin8: Any extra data I can put in the file would be great. If you are referring to how much of each resource you need for a room, its all on the "Room Costs" tab, and I got all that data from the Wiki site.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Extell

If you are referring to how much of each resource you need for a room, its all on the "Room Costs" tab, and I got all that data from the Wiki site.

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Actually, that data I did not have, which is excellent too. But I was referring to end result raw resources required. It's somewhat interactive. You tell it how many excoriations you need and it tells you the raw resources required.

ooooo....very nice work, indeed!

My lair is also an odd-size (4x5x7, I think...been too long since I've even looked at it :rolleyes: ) but, could still use the included 5x5 and ignore one column of squares.

As an aside, I'm also using the newest OpenOffice, and it opened, saved and re-opened the file just fine, with no apparent glitches or oddities....:cool:

Thanks for a great piece of work!

That's really impressive. I wish I'd had that back when I was planning my lair.

I also did my planning in excel - but nothing as sophisticated as yours. I like how you have all the info there too. Very handy.

Small correction - I believe the 5x5x5 lair should be 5x5x6. That's the 120x120x144.

If I could make one suggestion... Talk to Kadiya. She's done something else lair related and very clever in excel which might be good to incorporate into your planner.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Andrakhyn

Small correction - I believe the 5x5x5 lair should be 5x5x6. That's the 120x120x144.

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Yesterday I went through http://bristugo.com/freeplotsgmap and just noted all the lair sizes. I am missing quite a few actually.

If anyone has the following lairs and could send me a screenshot of your level 0 (built or not; so I can see where and how the entrance is placed, I'll update my lairs on the spreadsheet). And note if I missed others.

96 x 144 x 144
120 x 96 x 168
72 x 96 x 240
96 x 120 x 168
96 x 72 x 240
72 x 72 x 240

E-Mail: [email protected]

Here you have the plans for my lair (96x144x144) in Guild Tavu, NW of Portal.
The Lair NE of the same portal is (iirc) a mirror of my own. That means the entrance is to the North like my own, but on the East side not on the West.

And I'm sure i've seen at least another layout for the same lair size - before settling with the current lair i've tried also some other 96x144x144 lairs in Tavu, Dralk and Granite hills.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Extell

If anyone has the following lairs and could send me a screenshot of your level 0 (built or not; so I can see where and how the entrance is placed, I'll update my lairs on the spreadsheet).

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I think you'd be wasting your time with this exercise. Level 0 is highly variable.

I've owned two 120x120x144 lairs.

Both had 1x3x2 entrance blocks but they were in different locations.

There was also other space on level 0 which would accept some structures but not others (all of which should have fit in that space) due to terrain limitations. The location of that odd spot was different for both lairs.

Going by other forums posts I've read there can be even more extreme scenarios where most of the level 0 is unusable due to terrain limitations. I believe that's why level 0 isn't included in the lair dimensions. Any use you can make of it is regarded as a bonus.

So I don't think this is something you can lock this into the planner. Lair builders need to experiment to find out what's possible with level 0 and add it to the planner themselves.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Andrakhyn

I think you'd be wasting your time with this exercise. Level 0 is highly variable.

I've owned two 120x120x144 lairs.

Both had 1x3x2 entrance blocks but they were in different locations.

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That's good to know. I was actually thinking of just putting entrance parts into my Tier 1 lair parts. Then the user can just place the entrance as their lair is designed.

As for some lair parts not able to be placed correctly on the 0 Level. I had that with my original lair, could not place a Pawnbroker on the right side even though it was of the dimensions to fit.

I'll make adjustments to my spreadsheet by this weekend and get it uploaded. I'll make note in the original post the date last uploaded.

Ok, apparently, I cannot edit my original post anymore. Anywho, new version of the planner uploaded. Put in all the lair sizes I found to be missing (if I am still missing a size, please let me know).

Also, all lair sizes are completely blank. You will need to get the entrance pieces from the T1 Parts tab and place them as your lair style is setup.

Can still click the link in the OP to get the file.

REally looks great, and kudos for all the work you've done! Now, all I need is the time to really play with it (and, the motivation to actually BUILD what I plan! LOL)