12 replies to this topic

[Unmei]

I am sure that charname's pretty darn busy hunting wizards, killing dragons, and discovering his/her divine heritage. Regardless, god child or not, you still have to walk everywhere. That amounts to a LOT of time on the road. All that time walking, resting in inns, stopping for supplies, don't you think that the party could find just a little bit of time for a life? I bet they could.

I think an interesting idea for a mod would be to bring a little bit of your party's life to light. Not their tragic past or anything; you get enough of that! I'm talking about hobbies, guilty pleasures, and the occasional mishap. Does Imoen have a gambling problem? Is Yoshimo addicted to chocolate? Do you REALLY think that Aerie could make it through Athkatla without a kitten "following" her back to camp?

My idea on how to implement this would be for events to trigger in certain areas, some of them when the party rests. Here's an example: You have Jaheira in your party and the first 3 times you rest in an inn in a city she leaves the party in the morning and promises to meet up with you in a few hours. She leaves and returns as promised. The fourth time you are of course very curious aren't you? You will get the option to follow her and see what she is doing. Low and behold she is shopping for clothes! You follow her more and discover her secret stash of gowns. Hmmm... The druid has a soft spot for satin? When she meets up with the party again you could talk to her and ask her where she'd been, make fun of her, ask to go shopping with her maybe? This is just one idea.

How many people would be interested in playing having a mod like this? What do YOU think the NPC's are up to when they aren't wading through sewers? What else would you like to see? If I'm not the only one interested, I might just try to write it!

[Belladonna]

Seems complex to do if you ask me.

[Unmei]

Do you think so? I would think it would just work on a timer when the area requirements are met. Is that not right?

[theacefes]

Well lets see.

You would to have to actually write all the dialogue, and mind you, there are several NPCs in the game, so I'm guessing you would want an encounter of sorts for each, perhaps even two.

Then you'd have to code it.

But you'd have to figure it so that you don't get half you party going on on mysterious adventures without you at the same time.

Not an impossible mod I don't think, but it does sound overly complex. I for one would be more up to the NPCs gathering around a campfire at night and just talking. To me, that would seem more realistic than Jaheira going shopping.

[Unmei]

That was just a silly example off the top of my head, but you make a good point. Maybe when you go to sleep someone could remark about the strange behaivor of another member and you would get the opportunity to talk to them about it.

It just seems to me that we are missing out on some of the more domestic issues, or things that would naturally pop up when you're spending a lot of time with people you dont know very well. For example I just moved in with some new roommates and found out that one person, who I thought was only interested in video games, has a secret passion for agricultural product distribution. Who'd a thought? Its not mindblowingly exciting, but I thought it was interesting to learn.

[jastey]

This is a reason why I just loved the NPC-banters berelinde wrote for my BGII Ajantis mod. While I was going crazy about thinking what philosophical, etc. discussion Ajantis could have with the other NPCs, she wrote brilliant day-to-day banters: About cooking, looking at plants, Ajantis and Keldorn exchanging comments about their training routines.
Sorry if this turned out a promotion for my mod in progress, it's just that those banters hit exactly the nerve you are talking about.

So, in principle, I like this idea. It would have to fit the characters, though. Jaheira shopping is something I couldn't imagine. Aerie collecting a bunch of poor ill animals for nursing very well.

[Unmei]

This is a reason why I just loved the NPC-banters berelinde wrote for my BGII Ajantis mod. While I was going crazy about thinking what philosophical, etc. discussion Ajantis could have with the other NPCs, she wrote brilliant day-to-day banters: About cooking, looking at plants, Ajantis and Keldorn exchanging comments about their training routines.
Sorry if this turned out a promotion for my mod in progress, it's just that those banters hit exactly the nerve you are talking about.

So, in principle, I like this idea. It would have to fit the characters, though. Jaheira shopping is something I couldn't imagine. Aerie collecting a bunch of poor ill animals for nursing very well.

Wow, you're doing an Ajantis mod??? Where? I would love to take a look and learn more.

In principal though, after getting feedback and thinking about it, I think your way of doing it is probably much more efficient.

[Solar's Harper]

It doesn't sound like a bad idea in my opinon.
And it could be possible to implement, undoubtly complicated tho.

Good thinking Unmei, maybe ambitous, but good thinking nonetheless.
And I'm sure there'll be people willing to help out if you decide to go ahead with this.
I know I would.

Anyways there's just my opinion. Its all a lot of work regardless.

[Unmei]

It doesn't sound like a bad idea in my opinon.
And it could be possible to implement, undoubtly complicated tho.

Good thinking Unmei, maybe ambitous, but good thinking nonetheless.
And I'm sure there'll be people willing to help out if you decide to go ahead with this.
I know I would.

Anyways there's just my opinion. Its all a lot of work regardless.

Thanks for that. If I were to write any mod I would undoubtedly need help lol. I have no experience.

I've put a lot of thought into this and decided that this is probably unrealistic for my first project. Maybe I'll come back to it when I have a better idea of what writing a mod really takes. I am thinking about doing an NPC mod. Possibly even more work than this, but there are a lot more resources on how to do it, and it sounds like even more fun lol.

Do you write mods? Any advice?

[jastey]

I do not mean to discourage you, but do not underestimate the amount of work that comes with a (fully designed and outlined) NPC mod. I can't find jcompton's quote, but it went something like "start coding with something easy, see your text in the game, and jump up and down in excitement"
I strongly recommend WeiDU and it's readme, which has a lot of examples in it.

And here a link to my Ajantis mod in progress (threads in English are marked as such): http://www.rosenrank...ex.php?board=68
Thank you for your interest!

[Rabain]

If I was you I would just start writing dialogue in the BG2 format and see how much you come up with before you run out of steam.

A lot of modders and regulars around here will be happy to help you out with the coding side of things, it's the actual content that tends to be the biggest slowdown. Funnily enough most people think it is the coding that puts people off but really once you get used to the basics it's pretty straight forward. Coding all the conditions might seem problematic but that too can be resolved fairly easily so long as you outline what you want clearly in a post here.

BG2 format:

NPC SAY ~something~
Player Reply Option 1
Player Reply Option 2
Player Reply Option 3

NPC Reply to Option 1 SAYS ~something else~
Player Reply Option 1
Player Reply Option 2
Player Reply Option 3

NPC Reply to Option 2 SAYS ~something else entirely~
Player Reply Option 1
Player Reply Option 2
Player Reply Option 3

etc

Or at least that's the basic premise.

You'll find that for some people it's not as easy as it seems to write in this format. You always have to be thinking: the player must be able to reply and I cannot put words in their mouth (as in it is generally unacceptable to have a Player Reply with only one option to choose).

[Unmei]

I do not mean to discourage you, but do not underestimate the amount of work that comes with a (fully designed and outlined) NPC mod. I can't find jcompton's quote, but it went something like "start coding with something easy, see your text in the game, and jump up and down in excitement"
I strongly recommend WeiDU and it's readme, which has a lot of examples in it.

And here a link to my Ajantis mod in progress (threads in English are marked as such): http://www.rosenrank...ex.php?board=68
Thank you for your interest!

I'm not underestimating the work it takes to create an npc mod. I'm just brainstorming right now. I know it would be much harder, but I think it would also hold my interest much longer. Plus coding comes kind of naturally to me. I write html, css, and a little bit of java, php, and vb lol. I'm not underestimating Weidu, but I think I could do it if I was passionate about the project.

And yeah, I'll definitely be checking out your Ajantis mod.

[Unmei]

If I was you I would just start writing dialogue in the BG2 format and see how much you come up with before you run out of steam.

A lot of modders and regulars around here will be happy to help you out with the coding side of things, it's the actual content that tends to be the biggest slowdown. Funnily enough most people think it is the coding that puts people off but really once you get used to the basics it's pretty straight forward. Coding all the conditions might seem problematic but that too can be resolved fairly easily so long as you outline what you want clearly in a post here.

BG2 format:

NPC SAY ~something~
Player Reply Option 1
Player Reply Option 2
Player Reply Option 3

NPC Reply to Option 1 SAYS ~something else~
Player Reply Option 1
Player Reply Option 2
Player Reply Option 3

NPC Reply to Option 2 SAYS ~something else entirely~
Player Reply Option 1
Player Reply Option 2
Player Reply Option 3

etc

Or at least that's the basic premise.

You'll find that for some people it's not as easy as it seems to write in this format. You always have to be thinking: the player must be able to reply and I cannot put words in their mouth (as in it is generally unacceptable to have a Player Reply with only one option to choose).

Thanks for the tips! I'll keep it in mind. I think I have the way of writing mostly figured out. I did a sample dialogue in my Khail NPC brainstorming session. It looked right to me, but then again, I always think I'm right until someone comes along and corrects me lol.