Ria Silmane - missing Imperial Palace message?

[Satribe]

Someone asked me about the final dream message from Ria Silmane that directs you to the palace, but doesn't occur in the game. I've heard of that before, and it's listed as as a Bug at The Imperial Palace quest.

I figured it was worth exploring, but felt it would be better to ask here first. What do you know about this message...or lack there of? Other than the above link and a similar entry on the Fandom website, I really don't have any other information. I did a quick google check and glance at the OpenTESArena wiki, but I didn't find anything more. So if you know anything from your gameplay or things you remember reading or specific info, please let me know.

Locations:
When I started this post, I hadn't found the text yet, but decided keep looking before posting.

• TEMPLATE.DAT - includes Ria's dialogues.
• VISION.FLC - is the ghosty animation of Ria speaking.
• 1302_00A.VOC through 1302_11A.VOC - are the voice-over files from ver 1.07. These specifically cover the final message.
• JAGTEMP.DAT - is an interesting side note. It mostly describes chance encounters with Jagar Tharn whose dialogue is also included in Template.dat. It has this at the beginning; "This section for Foroozan:" Foroozan happens to be a name used as one of the game save files listed in the unused NAMES2.DAT file.

Does the message activate in earlier versions of the game?
This seems pretty straight forward to test. I have a copy of ver1.03 and using the patches I can test .04 and .05 if necessary. (I can downgrade using the 1.01 patch since it is just swapping the EXE file, but I consider that more for curiosity because I can't be certain there were not other file changes.) The hardest part is getting a save game file that is close to that point but before the event would trigger. If anyone is willing to donate a save game; that might be helpful. I've considered that I can use the cheat in 1.07 where you can get the staff pieces quickly, however using one bug to test another bug, is kind of bad form. How can you be certain "which" bug is causing "what" changes. It might take me a while to play my way there before I can begin some testing.

Was it a decision or is it a bug?
I'm not sure we can answer that conclusively. I've seen some instances when talking about the code, where an individual will conclude something is a bug because some small change will make it do something else which is uniform to other code in the game. I've written enough code to know how often I'll decide to change something, but only change what is necessary for it to operate the way I want. I have the intention of going back later and cleaning out the useless code, but that doesn't always happen. Just because there is code where it "could" have happened, doesn't mean it was "intended" to happen in the final version. There is code in the game that mentions "Team leader", and Team members 2-4 which appears to be left over from the original Gladiator version of the game.
More compelling to me, is the inclusion of the voice-over acting for this missing sequence. If it was intentionally disabled it seems to be a very last minute change. Although it's also possible that voice acting was done long before the completion of the game and having an "upgrade" version was mostly a promotional thing that was common in the 90's to offer an "enhanced" CD version.

I'd be happy to hear any information, theories, facts, opinions, thoughts you may have on this subject. Thanks.

[SeaGtGruff]

My theory is that it was left out by design, but I have no "proof" to offer-- only the observation that a vision of Jagar Tharn appears to you after you find the final piece, and he basically says "Come and get me! I'll be waiting for you at the Imperial Palace." He doesn't explicitly say where he is-- but we all know he's impersonating the Emperor, so where else would he be?

"I congratulate you on your success. Have you discovered however, what I have known all along? The Staff is drained of all magical potential. I did it myself before scattering the pieces across the realm. It is a useless stick, good for churning butter or rowing a boat, but not for saving the Emperor. Come find me if you dare, and I will relieve you of any further burdens you may think to face. My legions await..."

https://en.uesp.net/wiki/Arena:Dagoth-Ur

It shouldn't be necessary for Ria Silmane to appear again just to tell us that Jagar Tharn is at the Imperial Palace, especially when all of her previous visions basically took the form of "You need to go to a place called Yadda Yadda to find a piece of the Staff of Chaos-- but I don't know where Yadda Yadda is, so you're on your own, kid!"

[SeaGtGruff]

I hadn't refreshed my memory of what Ria was going to say in her final message before posting my previous comment, and I've just reread it.

It's true that she would have given us some important information about the Jewel of Fire, which we have to discover blindly on our own without her message.

She also mentions that she'll try to help us gain entrance to the Imperial Palace by disguising our appearance (perhaps as Jagar Tharn, or maybe just as a trusted servant; she doesn't say) so we can get past the guards. Presumably that would have been an important explanation of why we hadn't been able to enter before (if we'd ever tried and been turned away), yet could do so now.

But I still feel-- without any real evidence, just a feeling-- that this last vision was probably left out by design.

It wouldn't be the only thing that got left out; there's a second level to Stonekeep that's said to be in the game files, but it isn't in the game. I feel it was probably left out by design, too.

Even with just one level, Stonekeep can be almost impossibly difficult for inexperienced players to handle (I've watched many a Twitch streamer struggling with it), so the second level may have been omitted to help new or low-level players get through Stonekeep a bit more easily without quitting on the game in bitter despair and frustration.

Also, the parchment we're looking for is on the first level-- although for all I know, it might have been on the second level but then got moved to the first level when the second level was omitted. If it had been on the first level all along, there'd be no reason for us to even seek out and explore the second level, other than a desire to kill the goblin leader who we'd been told about. So now we have to assume that either the goblin ruler is missing from the game, or perhaps that he was one of the many goblins we killed on the first level-- possibly in or around the posh bed chamber near the center of the first level.

Consider the parchment's location on the first level; it's on an island in the northwest corner, and it's possible to bypass most of the level by making a beeline to that island as soon as we enter Stonekeep-- assuming we know it's there, of course. But even if we don't know that it's there (and it seems likely to me that players back in the day might have been told about it by other players), the island can be discovered early in our explorations, especially if we head right from the entrance instead of left. In nearly every other dungeon, the object of our goal is located deep in the dungeon, thereby requiring us to explore most if not all of each level. It just feels like the parchment was deliberately placed in a location that would be easier for new or low-level players to find.

To get back to the missing final vision, Ria suggests that touching the Jewel of Fire to the Staff of Chaos will hopefully destroy the Staff and free the Emperor. I don't remember whether or not the Staff is actually destroyed when you touch the Jewel to it, but the Staff of Chaos reappears in later games, in texts if not in actual form. The texts say the Staff was destroyed, so I guess it was (I'll have to replay the Imperial Palace to confirm that), but I'm wondering if there were any considerations of keeping it intact instead of having it be destroyed? If so, that might have been a factor in deciding to omit the final vision.

Then again, maybe the final vision of Ria, as well as the second level of Stonekeep, were left out because there wasn't time to include them? That seems far-fetched to me, since the resources do exist among the game files, so it's not like they weren't ready for inclusion. But who knows?

If the final vision were originally in the game but then got omitted in one of the patches due to a bug, it seems likely that players would have pointed this out to Bethesda and it would have been reinserted. I didn't see any mention of it in any of the old FAQs that used to be accessible via The Internet Archive, so it seems more likely that it was never in the game.

And if it had been intended to be in the game but wasn't triggering as intended due to a bug, it seems likely that the bug would have gotten fixed in a patch.

So I think it feels like there was a conscious decision to omit it, for whatever reason.

Someone should ask the people who were involved to see if we can get some straight answers.

[Satribe]

It would be nice to have a straight forward answer on that, I agree. Every time I think of a reason for one side to be more likely, I usually come up with a compelling reason for the other as well. Why didn't anyone report it as a bug. What if it has (almost) always been a bug and therefore no one had a reason to notice it was missing. It seems as if you don't have to wait to get the message from Tharn. After getting the last staff piece, you can just travel to the palace. If you're bug testing, you may skip that part...or the Ria message (if you ever saw it before hand) to save time and focus on testing the gameplay in the area and final battle.

This brings up a question I wanted to ask. That JAGTEMP.DAT file mentions what appears to be random chance encounters from Tharn. Does that happen? If I read it correctly, at certain points he would have a percent chance of appearing to you with a taunt and then giving you some random beastie to fight. With both his encounters and Ria's in the same TEMPLATE.DAT file, I wonder if some random percentage is involved in the issue. And If Tharn doesn't always come immediately after getting the last piece, is it possible that players are simply not encountering the trigger mechanism that calls for Ria's final message. (It seems like you mentioned having all the staff components, but took your time before going to the palace. That play style is what I'm talking about and may have essentially proved that thought moot.)

When I first read the message and was thinking about whether it was left out on purpose, I read the part where although she is dead, she has to use the rest of her remaining power. To me it sounded like a final ending for Ria, like it should be considered a heartfelt sacrifice. I thought maybe that seemed too much, to make the player decide to essentially kill Ria. But then I thought of how many times in the other games, your final success also includes something bitter. Sacrifice your special weapon, your friend, some type of loss. Not that this is not some how normal, but it seems like a template. Start in prison and sacrifice your friends for glory and honor. That's adventure!

[SeaGtGruff]

Regarding the JAGTEMP.DAT file-- could those be the normal times that Tharn appears after we find another piece of the Staff? His appearances seems to be somewhat random in that he does appear, but not necessarily the first time we sleep after our vision of Ria. In fact, I'm trying to remember if maybe Tharn can appear while we're awake, such as after we've gotten another vision from Ria and then traveled to a city. It seems to me that I vaguely remember having Tharn appear unexpectedly while I was awake, especially later in the game when I had most of the pieces. But I might be wrong about that; my memory is a bit hazy.

I looked in my saved games from the last character I played, but I had already saved over the slot from before I went to Dagoth Ur and retrieved the final piece. I wanted to visit each city in the provinces, and after I completed Dagoth Ur I still had a few cities to visit in Morrowind before heading to the Imperial Province. And then after I completed the Imperial Palace I started traveling again, before deciding to just begin a brand new character, so I still have several saves before the Imperial Palace and a few after, but one of the saves after I finished the Imperial Palace must have been on top of the saves just before and during Dagoth Ur.

[Satribe]

So looking more at JAGTEMP.DAT and TEMPLATE.DAT and walking through my first normal game play of some of these actions, These are some of my thoughts.

This isn't really "new" information. It's to help me keep my thoughts organized and give space for any others that may have information or thoughts on the subject.

Both Ria's and Jagar's messages are to appear based on the number of staff pieces you have. Ria's are to appear on the first Camp/Rest after retrieving each piece. Jagar's are to be a random encounter, but forced before reaching the next piece. I've only had one encounter so far, while in a city at night. (Does this occur in the wilderness or in dungeons or during the day?)
Although Jagar's are random, you are supposed to only have one after locating a staff piece. If you are about to go after the next piece and haven't had an encounter yet (not exactly sure how that is triggered just yet) it will force the single encounter. This way you will have 1 Ria and 1 Jagar encounter between each staff piece.

According to the JAGTEMP.DAT file, it appears that after finding the first staff piece, a Jagar Tharn encounter is added to the random monster encounter. The more staff pieces you have the more likely you will get that encounter. 20% chance for the first encounter and an additional 5% per staff piece. I've only tested once and had it occur once in my natural play through. After the first staff piece, Jagar was my first monster encounter. that seems more than a 20% chance (v1.07). Maybe I'm just lucky. But this would also mean that Jagar encounters would occur mostly in cities at night followed by wilderness encounters at night, and most rare would be wilderness day encounters. I did a lot of wilderness walking around and finally had a couple of monster encounters.....it was very rare.

There is the exception with the first two Ria messages. This occurs on your first Camp/Rest after your first level up. She gives the "strengthened your arm" message which then switches to the First Staff piece location message. While I have not yet had the second message fail to occur, the music will often start and then be interrupted by the second message. I want to test if the Morning Star bug interacts badly with that delay and this causes the second message to fail under certain circumstances.

Both Ria and Jagar have the same number of messages that are to appear. 1 after each staff piece is found. So why does Ria's not play? Is the number of staff pieces check not listed correctly. Does finding a piece cause a sub program trigger, but the last piece doesn't set up for Ria? Either way, I need to find the triggering mechanism in order to say more than...."It doesn't play."

[Satribe]

Thanks to info on the OpenTESArena wiki, I know that info on the state about the number staff pieces you have and whether you had a vision or not are located in an area of SAVEENGN.00x that is 2609 bytes long after the first 1054 bytes of the file. Unfortunately this is a part the programmers encrypted or scrambled. OpenTESArena shows the formula for the key, but right now I can't figure it out. This in conjunction with knowing where the "camp" code checks are located, is what is needed to answer what is going on. During camping/resting is when the program asks (do or don't do "Vision").

Anyone know how to make use of this?

Code: Select all

scramble(data, length) <-
   buffer <- length
   i <- 0
   while i < length
      key <- ( ror16(buffer, buffer&0xF) & 0xFF
      data[i] <- data[i] xor key
      i <- i + 1
      buffer <- buffer - 1

(EDIT: It seems that "ror16" is assembly language for shifting to the right 16 bits. Most of this is probably the function for moving through bytes 1055-3663 and scrambling. I'm assuming it's working one byte at a time, but that's a grasp at straws. The main question is what is "length"? Is that 2609 bytes or the length of something else? Buffer equals "length" (buffer <- length) and before going to the next byte we subtract 1. (buffer <- buffer - 1). The (i <- 0), (while i < length), and (i <- i + 1) is the function that causes the loop.
So I don't exactly know what is going on right here; [ror16(buffer, buffer&0xF)]. I keep forgetting the "0x" is just "hex". So I'm going to move (buffer, buffer&0xF) 16 bits to the right. I don't know what the [ , buffer&0xF] means. Often "&" just means you tag it onto the end, but I'm not sure how you tag "F" on to "buffer" and how this modified value of "buffer" affects moving the value of the standard "buffer" by 16 bits.
But then after we move it 16 bits we tag on an "FF" and that becomes the value of "key".
Finally we do a XOR function (which I can't remember right now how that works--AND,OR,NOR,XOR logic functions) and use it to change what the data really is. (data <- data xor key)
/EDIT)

[Satribe]

Well, I did some last minute rough checking about "XOR" and it's main function is a use like = TRUE if only X or Y is true, but FALSE if both X and Y are both True or both False. BUT, there was something about it being used as a function to do Binary addition in computers. That would mean that scramble function produces a value called "key" and then that key is added to the Byte in binary. ---But I still don't get it.

So I decided to put the horse before the cart and count my chickens before they hatch and ignore whether or not the egg came first. I found the code that marks the number of staff pieces and learned how to manipulate it for testing. I'll put that info in the next post. Because I found that info, it helped me to figure out more about the Scramble issue. So I'm going to put that down first.

I don't know yet how to unscramble everything, but based on what I CAN unscramble, that may later lead me to applying that to the formula to have a better understanding.

SAVEENGN.0x - Player's Gold
Player's gold they are carrying is in the Saveengn.0x file using 4 bytes: (0x041E, 041F, 0420, 0421). Because of the way numbers are stored in the game you have to read them backwards and add them together. You can read more about that and how to convert HEX values, in the Arena Technical Reference. (basic info and specific to Arena)

So a byte is two characters; 00-FF counting by 1's from 0 - 255. When you add a second byte, it's like moving up to the 10's position or 100's. "0100" = 256 and "1000" = 4096. Add a third byte and "100000" = 1048576. So with 4 bytes the max gold you can carry in Arena is "FFFFFFFF" = 4,294,967,295. I don't know if anything else would limit it, but that's how much the bytes can add up to. Without doing any math, I can make the initial starting gold say "4042322160". If they only used 3 bytes you could only have 16.7 Million, so you know; They expected us to be playing this game for YEARS.

SCRAMBLED
Instead of 0 gold being "00 00 00 00" it's "B8 5E 30 18". In the code its listed backwards as "18 30 5E B8". Each byte has it's own unique scramble code.

Basically if 18 = 00 then 19 = 01 and 1A = 02. This looks fine, but it also kind of jumps around. 17 = 0F and 28 = 30 (all hex values). So I'm going to just list what I call the 10's. 18,28,38 and the decimal value they equal. You can actually see patterns. Because each byte uses the next increment in the scramble formula, I may eventually be able to find a layman's formula for figuring out the rest of the bytes in the section.

(EDIT: The in-between values: Normally you count single Hex digits from 0 through F and after F you roll over back to 0, but increment up one (10). When counting with bytes (two hex digits) you do the same thing. 00, 01, 02..0F and then roll over to 10, 11, 12..1F When unscrambling you have to look at the "10's" as a single unit. 00..0F and A0..AF Because in the scrambled version it doesn't roll over to the next "10's" section until you've used up all the 1's in the previous section. In the first section below, the hex value 18 equals decimal 0. Which means scrambled hex 18 equals unscrambled hex 00. This section represents 00..0F. but it starts with hex 18 instead of 00. So you count up from there, but when you reach 1F, you start at the beginning and move up until you've used up all the values in that 10's section. 18, 19, 1A, 1B, 1C, 1D, 1E, 1F - then roll over - 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17 - and since 18 is where you started, then you jump to the next 10's section which starts with hex 08. So Hex 18 = decimal 0, and Hex 17 = decimal 15 and Hex 08 = 18.)

0x041E
HEX = DECIMAL

• 18 = 0
• 08 = 18
• 38 = 32
• 28 = 48
• 58 = 64
• 48 = 80
• 78 = 96
• 68 = 112
• 98 = 128
• 88 = 144
• B8 = 160
• A8 = 176
• D8 = 192
• C8 = 208
• F8 = 224
• E8 = 240

0x041F
HEX = DECIMAL

• 30 = 0
• 20 = 4096
• 10 = 8192
• 00 = 12288
• 70 = 16384
• 60 = 20480
• 50 = 24576
• 40 = 28672
• B0 = 32768
• A0 = 36864
• 90 = 40960
• 80 = 45056
• F0 = 49152
• E0 = 53248
• D0 = 57344
• C0 = 61440

0x0420
HEX = DECIMAL
(EDIT: The in-between for this section is more complicated. You can't just roll over the 10's section until finished with all the 1's. For this one, we have the first section which represents Hex 00..OF. the scrambled hex starts at 5E and proceeds in this order: 5E, 5F, 5C, 5D, 5A, 5B, 58, 59, 56, 57, 54, 55, 52, 53, 50, 51. So, you still use all the "1's" before moving on to the next "10's" section, but this one jumps around more. The rest of the "10's" sections follow the same patter.)

• 5E = 0
• 4E = 1048576
• 7E = 2097152
• 6E = 3145728
• 1E = 4194304
• 0E = 5242880
• 3E = 6291456
• 2E = 7340032
• DE = 8388608
• CE = 9437184
• FE = 10485760
• EE = 11534336
• 9E = 12582912
• 8E = 13631488
• BE = 14680064
• AE = 15728640

0x0421
HEX = DECIMAL

• B8 = 0
• A8 = 268435456
• 98 = 536870912
• 88 = 805306368
• F8 = 1073741824
• E8 = 1342177280
• D8 = 1610612736
• C8 = 1879048192
• 38 = 2147483648
• 28 = 2415919104
• 18 = 2684354560
• 08 = 2952790016
• 78 = 32221225472
• 68 = 3489660928
• 58 = 3758096384
• 48 = 4026531840

[Satribe]

Main Quest On/Off Flags
Because the flags are simply On/Off you don't have to worry about the scramble. 1up is ON, 1down is OFF.

..................................................................Exit 1st....Accept parch...Picked up ...Returned....Picked up
.......................Hex location....NEW...1st vision...Dungeon.......quest.........parchment...to Queen...1st piece..
Can Have Vision....... 0DD2......... E8........ E9........... E9............ E9............ E9........... E9............ E8
#Staff Pieces........... 0DD3........ C0........ C0........... C0............ C0............ C0........... C0............ C1
Dungeon Loc. Known.. 0DD4........ 60........ 60........... 60............ 61............. 61........... 61............ 60
Accept parch. Quest.. 0DD5........ 80......... 80........... 80........... 81............. 81........... 81............. 80
Had Vision...............0DD6........ 80......... 81........... 81........... 81............. 81........... 81............. 80
Talked To Ruler......... 0DD7......... 0........... 0............ 0............ 1............... 0............ 1............... 0
Step Done............... 0DD8......... 0........... 0............ 0............ 1............... 1............ 1............... 0
Has Parchment......... 0DD9......... 1........... 1............ 1............ 1............... 0............ 0............... 1
Has Staff Piece........ 0DDA.......... 3........... 3............ 2............ 2............... 2............ 2............... 3
Show Key............... 0DDB.......... 7........... 7............ 7............ 7............... 6............ 7............... 7
..............STEPS......................0........... 1............ 2............ 3............... 4............ 5................0

I've highlighted what changes at each event. The green highlight is the change that adds the staff piece to your inventory and this flag determines which vision to give. It increments by one each time you get a new staff piece. I'm not entirely sure what the "Has Staff Piece" is used for. I'm also not sure why both "Can Have Vision" and "Had Vision" are needed. They both update at the same time. NOTE: several of the titles were taken from OpenTESArena's wiki. I've changed some to be more descriptive to match this project. The ones I mention not being sure about, may have titles that aren't accurate to what they actually do.

If you change the GREEN value to C1 it will say you have 1 staff piece in your inventory. If you start a new game and then save; then change this value and start again - when you gain a new level and then sleep and get the vision you normally get - You will actually get the initial message stating "I see you have strengthened your arm", but the second message will be about the 2nd staff piece instead of the 1st. Each value higher you change the GREEN value, the higher the staff piece message. If you change it to C8, showing that you have the final piece, when you rest to get your first vision - you won't get ANY vision. Somehow when you gain the last piece, it disables the Vision function altogether.

I tried this out on my save actually getting the first staff piece. Minus the initial message you get in the game-start dungeon, it behaves exactly the same. Sort of. I haven't made exhaustive tests. In the first dungeon, I didn't get any message when changing to C8, however at the first staff piece location, I would sometimes get the final Jagar message.

NOTES: The first Jagar message mentions using the same method as Ria, however; her's will occur on your first NAP after getting a staff piece. Whether you sleep for 1 or 20 hours. Jagar's on the other hand don't show up when you REST, they show up when you have a random ENEMY encounter. They occur when you are awake. Now this LAST Jagar message occurs when I'm RESTING, but not always the FIRST time like Ria's messages occur. It's almost like this is a 3rd function. EX: "Final message shows after 8 staff pieces collected with a percent chance of triggering during CAMP."

This occurs the same way in ALL version. 1.07, 6, 5, 4, 3, 1

Version 1.07 creates an extra file during visions VISION.EMS. I'm not sure what this is for.

We can never be 100% sure if the behavior is intentional (exclude Ria's last message), but I'm becoming inclined to believe it WAS intentional. It's still speculation and I would really like to look at the functions that check these flags in the SAVEENGN file. I don't know where they are in the game-code and I'd probably need to understand assembly computer coding even if I could find them. Maybe something will pop up; someone will share more information, or I'll just get lucky. Until then, my journey probably stops here.

(EDIT: The Never Ending Story - ...We really need someone to look at the code. Maybe it's not a third function. Jagar's final message is kind of a mix of the two message systems. It has a percent chance of occurring during the event, but the event is CAMP instead of RANDOM ENEMY. Whether this is a glitch or intentional, really depends on how close Ria's vision message system is to Jagar's. If they are very close in the code, then a small trip could skip Ria's and call for the Jagar fuction. If they are far apart then it seems more likely that a glitch would break the game, not perfectly call Jagar's function which just so happens to tell you where to go next.)

(EDIT2: Realized later, Jagar's encounter is normal. Nothing changed. It is a random monster encounter with a percent chance for a Jagar encounter. The reason it didn't happen in the starter dungeon, is because I was on my resting ledge and no monster encounters were occurring. When it happened at weird times during Camping near pickup of the staff piece was a monster encounter that interrupted Camping. So Jagar's all happen as they are supposed to. But something after getting the 8th staff piece turns off the VISION mechanism for Ria messages.)

(EDIT3: Realized that I produced these with 1.07. We know that 1.07 has a glitch that keeps showing the parchment and you can cheat. That probably means one of these triggers isn't doing what it's supposed to at some point. (I also noticed that most youtube videos that show this....are starting with a game that they glitch before even starting. They create a new character after loading another one. That introduces the Morning Star bug.) (EDIT4: 1.06 and 1.07 do the same things with the flags. This isn't the cause of the respawning parchments. Also It's not just the StoneKeep parchment. The first staff piece also respawns. Probably all of the initial quests and staff pieces.)

[Satribe]

EDIT: This needs further testing. While changing this value allowed my game to have another Jagar encouter after already having one, these values aren't consistent. They are different at the beginning of my game. It's not a simple on/off flag.
(EDIT 16FEB2021: This byte is definitely related to a Jagar Tharn encounter, but I'm not sure how. If you've picked up the first staff piece, the next monster encounter will almost always be a Jagar Encounter (I haven't had anything other). If I use cheats to get the first piece, I don't have an encounter unless I change this byte. It seemed like hex 3x anything would allow it. (31, 3A, 36) There "seemed" to be a relationship to how likely I would get a monster encounter. Certain values seemed like I might sleep longer without any encounter, but with hex 3x I would eventually get an Jager encounter, and if it was something like A6, it was always a standard monster encounter.)

EDIT2: Okay - this one is just weird. When you start the game it's "AA", When you kill your first baddie it changes to "BA". (not for any other reason). Nothing else in the dungeon seemed to change it again. Leaving the dungeon it changed to "B0". traveling around didn't change it but traveling to Rihad changed it to "B6". I went to test this again and it kept changing to "B6" when I exited the dungeon and to something else when I went to Rihad. I wanted to make sure it wasn't just something to do with the time or weather so I went to a dungeon where I could camp for free on a ledge. Entering the dungeon changed it to "EE" and changing time had no effect. --- and yet when I load my save before getting my first Jager encounter it's "36" and after the encounter it's "A6". I changed the "A6" back to "36" and rested and immediately had another Jagar encounter and the game changed it back to "A6". Now when I was in the "EE" dungeon, I decided to rest for a month and when I came back out ..."A6". .....who knows?)

Jagar Tharn Encounter Flag
This one isn't an obvious up/on down/off flag.

0x425
"A6" = no encounter
"36" = chance of encounter (has always occurred 1st time for me)

This requires you to have at least one staff piece. Identified earlier as 0x0DD3.
"C0" = no staff pieces
"C1" - "C8" = number of staff pieces.
The number of staff pieces determines the message Tharn will give.

After the encounter message, you are attacked and the flag is reset to "A6" (no encounter) until you obtain another staff piece.

[Satribe]

BRUTE FORCE:
Since I can't read assembly code, I brute force my way. (Make an assumption and test that theory by looking at every hex value that matches my theory and then modify it and see what happens.)

Something changes when you have 8 staff pieces compared to having 1-7. It also happens if you change it to "anything" greater than 7. So ....look for something checking for ">7". Even more lame, is I'm just looking at every hex "07" and seeing if changing it does something. Which brings me to my post. I haven't found one that matches my theory, but several interfere with visions. They may be completely unrelated, but if you can understand assembly and you don't know where to start, these might be areas of interest, because changing them from Hex 07 to Hex 01 messes with visions.

V1.06

• 0x1C93B
• 0x1DF04
• 0x1E08B
• 0x20ED0
• 0x20ED4
• 0x2560A

[Satribe]

Key BYTE in SAVEENGN.0x

• 1.06/1.07 - 0xDD3

This byte controls several things that check how many staff pieces you have collected. The default is 0 (C0). When the value is "1" or greater, it will show in your inventory. It is located in an encrypted part of the file, but it will always be C0 through C8. (I have heard some seeing "staff pieces:9". I assume that is either a glitch or when you get the jewel of fire as part of the end of the quest.)

Key BYTE in executable

• 1.06 - 0x20D40
• 1.07 - 0x22BEC

This byte is set to eight (08). During testing, it operated as if part of a function that states: "If number of staff pieces is equal to or greater than 8, then turn off Ria VISIONS". If you set this to 9 (09), then the final Ria vision occurs, if you have the 8 pieces.

Older Versions of the Game

• 1.01, 1.03, 1.04, 1.05 - all appear to operate just as 1.06 with almost identical code in this area with the byte set as (08) and do not show the final Ria VISION.

Testing Conditions

• A fresh game was started in both 1.06 and 1.07 and played in the first dungeon until reaching level 2.
• The character was returned to the starting cell and positioned on the raised platform and the game was saved.
• A hex editor was used to change the values mentioned in the HEX locations above and the game reloaded and CAMP until fully healed was used.

Notes of Interest

• In the French version of the Arena Player's Guide, in the final paragraph we find the following phrase:

  Jagar Tharn then broke the Staff into seven pieces...

• It uses the French word, "sept" (7) instead of "huit" (8). This could be circumstantial evidence that the number of staff pieces was mis-numbered at times which could lead to setting the code to stop displaying visions after "SEVEN" instead of the actual "EIGHT" pieces.

• During my testing of v1.07 after receiving the FIRST staff piece, I changed the code to show the final vision and the game would lock, though it would show during the starting dungeon with the same changes. I have not yet tested v1.06 or other NORMAL staff points within the game.
• Ver1.07 was difficult to find the proper BYTE. While it is clear there are many changes in the code for ver1.07, I was assuming that several bytes to the left or right should be identical to 1.06, but this was not the case. Though there are similarities, there is quite a bit that's different and I couldn't just search for a string of bytes like I was able to do with all the older versions.

[SeaGtGruff]

I'm floored by how you were able to track this down, especially if you don't know assembly code. The bit about the French manual is probably a big clue as to what might have happened. I think the thing to do now is hunt down some of the key people from the development team and ask them if the staff was originally going to be divided into seven pieces plus the jewel, with seven provinces plus the Imperial Province.

[AKB]

This is amazing.

[Satribe]

I just thought this was interesting and related to info in the starting post:

There's an interview with Ted Peterson on youtube where he mentions that the Ria Silmane actress was one of the programmers on Arena.
The youtube video is located here (watch?v=ZzjvWQCND54) and it's just a brief mention at about 37:00 minutes in.

Development Team
Jennifer Pratt (Ria) is on the left and Foroozan Soltani is on the right. Foroozan is mentioned in the JAGTEMP.DAT and NAMES2.DAT files.

This doesn't mean anything, but I was thinking about something that I use to do with practical math and relating it to the french version mentioning breaking the staff in seven pieces. Well to get eight pieces, you have seven breaks. Is it saying he broke the staff in seven places or broke it into seven pieces? I'm pretty sure it's "into 7 pieces", but it's still fun to throw that out there.

[MrFlibble]

Apologies for the bump, but does anyone have any saved games close to getting the final piece of the staff (or immediately after, but before resting), so that one could try loading that in a pre-1.06 version of the game and confirm if Ria's final vision plays or not in a "natural" way, without resorting to save game hacking?

I appreciate all the in-depth research made here, but as I understood it a straightforward playthrough of the game in a version below 1.06 wasn't tested yet, right?

[Satribe]

It is true that my testing didn't include any full (non-modified) play throughs; however, the only reason I bothered to go through all this testing was because of the consensus that the final RIA vision was not seen during normal (non-modified) game play. It surprised many to find an extra (unused) Ria vision in the data files.
That being said: you are correct. I don't have this experience or evidence, and it would be best to have it tested. I was testing the question; "Why doesn't this final vision play during game play?" But you are correct that we should ensure that the question itself is in fact valid. "Do all the visions in the data appear during normal play; even if it is only occasionally or under certain conditions?" I would argue that the game save should also be created with the same previous version being tested and that it was specifically created to avoid save file bugs; namely the "Morning Star" bug caused by using the "NEW GAME" option and the bug caused by pressing ESC during character creation gender selection. Both cause unpredictable game behavior by accidentally shifting data in the save file causing the EXE file to read incorrect data. I'm not sure either of these bugs can be easily detected until they cause problems. What if one of the problems is a missing vision? I don't bring this up to make it more complicated than necessary, but to avoid false negatives.

[Antonio40k]

So I was testing other stuff and were around Dagoth-ur when I saw this post
I use a decompressed version of ACD.EXE 1.07
What I did was change the offsets 0x22BEC from 08 to 09 but Also 0x22BD2 from 76 to 7A
That made the final cutscene show without having to modify the SAVEENGN, and worked as any other normal vision.
I tested in my normal played save but also in a new one where I just used the stonekeep parchment exploit until I reached the final staff piece

[Satribe]

but Also 0x22BD2 from 76 to 7A

What does changing this offset do? At the time of my testing most people only had free access to 1.06, and currently I don't have all my notes.

I agree that it is unnecessary to modify the SAVEENGN file. I used that as a quick cheat to tell the system how many staff pieces I had "collected". I could then increment the number for each test to see that it indeed played all of the visions. But it would not be necessary if you used the exploit you mentioned or obtained them as intended.

I only needed to change the offset 0x22BEC to allow all the visions; but if memory serves correctly, I had some difficulty with some game crashes. My purpose was simply to find the triggers, so I was not focused on actually playing with the change. So, I'm very curious why you changed 0x22BD2 and what it affects. From your comment, it sounds like making both changes allowed progression and that would be great. I'm still not sure whether this would be fixing a bug (accidentally skipped the vision) or it is restoring "intentionally" cut content. I'm hopeful any insight into that offset might sway our understanding.

[Antonio40k]

When I was playing in my normal save the game didn't loaded the last vision, later I realized that it may have been because I already had saved after getting the last piece and after getting Jagar last vision.

Since there haven't been many tests I thought the final vision only triggered because the save files had been edited, which after doing another test I learned it was not the case at all, the final vision will come out in a normal game if 0x22BEC is edited, I can now corroborate

But for me if the offset wasn't changed before getting the last piece/doing the first resting, then the final vision won't load, changing 0x22BD2 "fixes" that

I found a sequence around 22BD0 that addressed it searched for similar references until I managed to work.
My best guest is that the game checks if the vision has been already delivered it and since I got the 8 pieces already then skips it, changing that byte to 7a should make the game interpret as the vision to "haven't end the playback yet" It was just a long shot xd