8 replies to this topic

[Tempest]

Hi folks,

 

 

I've been gone from the modding community for a couple of years now, mostly due to personal issues. For personal reasons, I've long felt the creative wellspring for Valerie badly poisoned and it always drove me away from revisiting the work I've done on her. In addition, I always leaned heavily on assistance from other modders with some technical aspects of modding, and am not good at diagnosing problems with mods. However, I am seriously considering sitting down and starting work on Valerie's BG2 module again.

 

That being said, there are a few things I must mention if there is interest, particularly from anyone willing to work with me on some of the technical aspects.

 

1. Due to the personal events that came up during Valerie's writing and between me and other modders, I will be axing the PC romance. There is a possibility that during ToB you will be able to talk Valerie into agreeing to give things another shot after the games' end, but as it stands I will not complete Valerie's romantic relationship with the PC.

 

2. Likewise, Valerie's planned crossmod romance with Sarah by theacefes will be scrapped.

 

3. I will probably need someone to talk to and work with concerning some technical elements of coding and making the NPC mod functional. Please PM me if you are interested.

 

4. Valerie's planned small quest will be scrapped. It was planned to be part of the romance and I have tentatively decided to integrate its events into Valerie's normal friendship track as having happened between games. A few people have noticed certain oddities about Valerie in BG1, and her personal quest would have involved discovering and addressing them.

 

 

I cannot at this time make any promises regarding finishing Valerie's BG2 component, but I am revisiting the idea with caveats.

Edited by Tempest, 14 July 2015 - 01:40 PM.

[Tempest]

An addendum:

 

This is what is currently written and coded:

 

12 lovetalks for the track where you've met Valerie for the first time in BG2. 2 additional lovetalks for the track where you were friends with her in BG1. At least two lovetalks will be scrapped due to my tentative decision to not write the romance from personal considerations and removal of her romance-related quest.

 

If I do proceed to work again on the mod, I will continue a friendship track.

 

3 banters with Minsc, 2 if they weren't friends in BG1.

6 banters with Imoen, though only 4 will fire on a given playthrough - there are different banters for whether they were friends in BG1 or never met.

4 banters with Jaheira, divided evenly between tracks.

4 banters with Aerie

3 banters with Nalia

2 banters with Korgan

3 banters with Anomen

2 banters with Haer'Dalis

3 banters with Viconia, minor differences in two depending on whether they knew each other in BG1.

2 banters with Yoshimo

3 banters with Cernd

4 banters with Keldorn

2 banters with Jan

2 banters with Valygar

3 banters with Mazzy

 

.tp2 file

 

Intro/joining dialogue

 

Portrait

[Bill Bisco]

I think you should definitely continue coding your NPC.  A Cowled Wizard NPC is unique and very welcome!  Modding is a hobby and fun so it's okay to take a break!

 

I would start small.  One dialogue at a time.  Whenever you have a technical issue, just ask for help for that one issue, one at a time.  There still seems to be some support and help on the G3 forums for example.

 

So, glad to have you back!

[Fiann of the Silver Hand]

I would very much be interested in an NPC that has no romance (or even BFF) track.  If she were also a well-adjusted adult, without a screwed-up childhood, and had no personal side quest, well... that'd be just dandy.

[cmorgan]

Fiann speaks for a whole ton of folks out there, I bet... lots of mods with all that stuff. Not so many for folks who just want to play the game and have a simple companion Glad to see you are back; hope you have some fun writing!

[Tempest]

For now I've been altering many of Valerie's existing lovetalks to conform to removing her personal quest and romance, but the big stumbling block is going to be needing some help with the technical aspects of coding, mainly some scripting issues I never really learned how to do on my own.

 

But fair enough, I'm tentatively resuming work.

[Tempest]

Soliciting feedback now, on how to treat the termination of Valerie's romance. As I'm currently editing things, the flirtation leading up to what would have been the start of the romance remains in place, but Valerie ultimately decides she can't be involved with a Child of Bhaal. Under this treatment, Valerie would not interfere with any other romances.

 

However, another possibility is simply having Valerie politely but firmly stop any flirtation with her from the beginning.

 

 

Any strong feelings one way or the other?

[cmorgan]

My (useless) two cp is write what feels right for your character, and if your concept has changed, mercilessly slash anything you want and leave it cold and dead on the cutting room floor. All the film folks do tons of footage that never sees the light of day, novelists write, scrap, and rewrite chapters and scenes - even fanfic writers revise and edit (sometimes).

 

You don't lose anything by writing something and not putting it out for other folks. You gain something by having fun writing. Whenever you think your NPC is experienced enough or is smart enough to realize hanging out with the potential Next God Of Murder is a bad idea, shut that puppy down hard and *walk* *away*.

 

You can always add content back in or repurpose/rewrite it for v2, if you really like the story.

[Fiann of the Silver Hand]

Give her her own motivations for adventuring.  Keep the relationship business-like.  Let her have some personality traits that make her inherently incompatible with Charname, and who won't magically change into a butterfly simply because Charname is so <awesome> and kind to her.  If she's just another one of Charname's lapdog NPCs, it's going to be difficult to make her stand apart from them.  [edit: cmorgon brings up a vital point:  editing can be harder than creating.  Keep the best stuff, the core of what she is.  Then imagine playing with her in the party.]

Edited by Fiann of the Silver Hand, 16 July 2015 - 02:49 PM.