18 réponses à ce sujet

[Krozam]

Alright, I realize that the chances of this working are next to none, but I wanted to tell you about my heavy RP mod idea in hopes of finding a modder interested in a partnership. The workload is too massive for me alone (although it starts with a shorter prologue) and I'm the kind of person who can't keep up my motivation for long if I'm working alone and only responsible to myself. The idea is almost as old as NWN1, I actually learned the basics of the Aurora Toolset and started working on it, but then NWN2 came out and I scrapped the project. I should've started working on it with the new toolset back then, then I might have actually finished it by now, but for some reason I didn't. Well, in any case, the idea is old, and it's had plenty of time to mature in my mind. I'm convinced it's worth carrying out even if the golden days of NWN2 are long gone, but I can't do it alone.

The basic idea of the story is deceptively simple. You're an orphan living in a secluded little village with your - also orphaned - friend (your only companion in the prologue and story-wise a character almost as important as you). An old wizard and a storyteller dies and leaves his house to you two. In the basement of that house you find a letter with instructions to perform a mysterious magical ritual. As it happens, the ritual brings him back to life as a lich. He has a good reason for that: in this area, he's the last remaining member of a secret society called the Planeguardians, and just as he felt his time was running out, he found out that the Planeguardians are still needed in the area. Their ancient mission is to protect the plane of mortals from invaders, mainly from the plane of Hell. For centuries, no invasions have come to this area, and so the Planeguardians have concentrated their forces elsewhere. Now, however, an invasion is coming, and the last Guardian in the area finds his connection to the outside world blocked. He has no choice but to buy more time, at the cost of his soul's purity, and train new Planeguardians.

Of course, he's chosen you and your friend. You're pressed for time, so he throws you into one dangerous situation after another, forcing you to improve as fast as possible. When the time comes, the three of you will march alone against the demon invasion, attempting to close the portal before it's too late.

This is where the prologue ends. It ends with a choice: you're offered a chance to ally with Hell. The main story has two alternative modules, two alternative storylines: "the evil path" and "the good path" - though actually it's possible to play a good character in the demon path and a total bastard in the mortal path. One of my greatest innovations about this story is that you can join the demons just to betray them and weaken their forces from the inside.

But the main story is still far away, right now I'm just concentrating on the prologue. Like I said, the plot is deceptively simple. The true worth of my idea, at least in the prologue, lies in how the story is told. My main focus is in five things: dialogue, characters, realism, replayability... and coolness.

Dialogue
The number of NWN modules I've played is probably less that twenty, so I can't say I'm a greatly experienced module tester, but based on my experience I can say this: none of the modules I've tried had truly satisfying dialogue. Creating truly good dialogue isn't easy, it's a lot of work, but I'm seriously disappointed in the level of dialogue even in otherwise great modules. It's like people don't even realize the enormous potential of the toolset, in creating dialogue. When I read a book, there are two things I usually enjoy most: action and dialogue. When I play NWN, I only look forward to the action, because the dialogue is usually boring.

Now, how would I make dialogue less boring? First of all, it must be well written: grammatically sound and entertaining. It's sad when otherwise great modules like Serene fall to mediocrity because the author didn't bother getting someone with a good grasp of the English grammar to proofread the dialogue. There's also a lot of unnatural dialogue flow in pretty much every single module I've played - I know it's a tempting shortcut to return the dialogue back to an earlier point, but it's very difficult to do without destroying the flow.

Secondly, it needs enough choice. I'm not talking about 8+ options at every point, but I want to allow the players at least 3-5 different basic personalities to roleplay through dialogue. The funny reply, the serious reply, the cool reply, the rude reply, the intelligent reply, the dumb reply, the wise reply etc. Some of them tied to your ability scores. And of course, there must be enough use for the conversation skills. This is usually something the official campaigns do reasonably well.

Thirdly, sometimes the spoken line isn't enough, there needs to be description. Good description can make a dialogue much more lively and interesting, as well as impart the players a lot of information about the characters that you wouldn't be able to give them otherwise. I seem to remember that at least The Maimed God's Saga used some description. No wonder it's my favourite module so far. Still, even there it was under-used.

Lastly, the dialogue should take into account your race/class. Occasionally it's cool to realise that you wouldn't have got this line option if you weren't a mage, or that the character you're talking to knows that you're a halfling and his behaviour is a little different because of that. It's a lot of work, but even if it only shows every once in a while, the players are sure to appreciate it. It's a great feeling when you realise that your race/class choises have an effect on the story, however minor.

Characters
I can count the modules and campaigns where I actually got somewhat attached to the characters with the fingers of a single hand. Serene, The Maimed God's Saga... oh wait, that's it. The OC of NWN2 came kinda close with a few characters, much thanks to the voice acting, but I can't really count it. This is something I want to get right in my module, no matter what. I've done extensive planning on the circumstances and personalities of several important characters in the prologue, and I'm just getting started.

Dialogue is the main tool with which you can get the player to care about the characters. There are no tricks to this, you just have to create interesting personalities, and give them enough dialogue. Much attention needs to be given to character dynamics: good character dynamics create entertaining dialogue. Character development is nearly as important, and something that way too few modders seem concerned with. Suffice to say, I can do it. My weaknesses lie elsewhere.

Realism
I have a bunch of ideas how to increase the realism, such as eating, sleeping, highly customized economy, non-random loot, repercussions to breaking and entering, no carrying weapons in the open when nobody's supposed to know you own one, explanation to why sleep heals you so fast etc. I don't know if all of them are feasible, but I believe they are. The key feature I'm rather proud of is how levelling up is implemented into the story. The lich, in addition to teaching you things himself, gives you books to read between every level, and when you finally ding, the sudden power-up is explained by you gaining a deeper understanding of the concepts presented in the books. This, combined with a few well placed time-skips, should give the development of the main characters exceptional realism.

Realism, the carrying out of at least some of my ideas, is important, because it makes the module clearly different from all the others. It might not significantly improve the gameplay, but it makes it different. It's something I can put in the features when I present the module to attract players, and it'll give the players a sense of novelty. The thing is, some of these ideas might be difficult or laborious to carry out, and unless we're careful, they might actually degrade the gameplay. Too much micromanagement and such will definitely become annoying. This part is where I most need help, not only because I'm a complete newbie when it comes to using the toolset, but also because I don't trust my ability to judge how much realism too much.

Replayability
Abundance of dialogue options. class-specific quests. A branching storyline. Secret areas. Making every skill useful. Things like this will lead to great replayability at the cost of a lot more work than what it would require to make a linear, option-poor campaign of the same length. I've seen very few mods that aim for high replay value, and I think it's a little sad. If the story is good, it can be enjoyable when experienced multiple times, but it's always better when you can shape it into a little different story with each new playthrough. As a bonus, the abundance of options allows a greater number of players to play in their own preferred style. Of course, the fact alone that this is a heavy RP mod limits the playerbase greatly, since quite many are more interested in simple hack&slash, but I'd like all the rest to to enjoy the story as much as possible.

Coolness
I'm personally very fond of cool characters. It's more difficult to make the entire story cool instead of just a character, but I'd like to try. First of all, there must be the "cool" option in the dialogue whenever it's applicable. Then there must be cool scenes. Music plays a big part (anyone know a good composer who might give me permission to use their works? ) Power is important: the world is generally pretty low on power, few NPC's are high level, because a lot of ancient knowledge has been lost - to all but the Planeguardians, keepers of all knowledge that might help them fight the invaders from other planes. This makes lvl 20+ character truly epic, and not just in name. Already after a few levels, the mysterious main character will be able to play cool not only in their small, secluded village, but anywhere in the world. To put it short, the whole world is designed to emphasize the main characters of this story, they're among the very few people in the world capable of dealing with the demon threat.

It's difficult to explain, but trust me, I'm pretty good at cool.


Cookies to anyone who actually read through that wall of text. Any ideas, questions and criticism are welcome, though they're pointless unless I find a partner. I'm sure you see now that this is too ambitious for one person with limited time and somewhat short attention span. I can do the planning, I can do the dialogue, but I'll need someone else to work the toolset and to keep my motivation up. I know pretty much everyone who reads this area is working on their own mods, but I figured it wouldn't hurt to try.

Edit: Forgot some important things. Added one paragraph to the dialogue part and a couple of things to realism.

Modifié par Krozam, 13 décembre 2011 - 08:08 .

[kamal_]

You are willing to write dialog/ quests + your choices from hundreds of area prefabs = farther along than you think, hop to it.

Also, I'd like a cookie.

[M. Rieder]

I like what you say about characters. I have taken your suggestions on TWA1 to heart and have tried to spend a great deal of energy on character development and dialogue. TWA2 currently has a little over 90,000 words of dialogue with three companions, two of which are romanceable. You could try to romance the third, but that would be illegal in any realm (play the game, you'll see what I mean.)

I agree with your comments on dialogue options. It is good to have a selection. I believe that being part of a development team makes this more achievable. As a solo modder, I simply don't have the time resources to give 5 options. I aim for 3 and usually can get that. Even with this limitation, TWA2 will have taken 18 months to develop, and that with me working almost constantly on it.

[M. Rieder]

...also, modding is 99% dogged determination. The people who have released modules all share this characteristic. You have to just keep on plugging away day after day even when you may spend what seems like a whole week on just 5 minutes of play time or on just one conversation. If you want to partner, I recommend you release a short, high quality module with some of the characteristics you outline above. Probably keep it under 4 hours so you can get it done in a reasonable amount of time. If you hit a home run, you will have a much easier time in finding a partner.

[Dann-J]

Feel free to use any of the scripts or items from Isle of Shrines.

It has food (meat, fish, peaches, grapes, gull eggs), which are really just Lesser Vigor or Vigor 'potions' that regenerate the player slowly (an idea I stole from The Witcher). Food items can be caught or gathered as well as bought, and raw meat or fish needs to be cooked over a fire before you can eat it.

You might also be interested in my exhaustion system, that runs as a module HB script. Players become fatigued after being awake for 16 hours, plus or minus their constitution bonus (so different party members get tired at different times). Restore spells or potions only stave off exhaustion for an hour before it returns.

My resting script also causes the party to gather around a fire and sit down, before fading to black while the hours pass. There's none of that five-second-squat nonsense from the OC.


The sleepable beds system by Barnabas will also add an extra touch of realism.

[Krozam]

@kamal_ : *Hands a cookie* Here you go. You deserve it.

Prefabs? The thought never crossed my mind. I wouldn't want to use them for this mod, unless I happen to find something perfectly suitable, but if I were to build a small sample mod as suggested, those would certainly make it more possible.

@M. Rieder: Curse you, Mr. Rieder, for making me look forward to TWA2 even more than I already did. How soon do you expect it to be in shape for public testing? Seriously, though, I'm happy that you consider my advice worthy.

At first I actually wanted to make the prologue short and simple enough to work as a sample module and perhaps reel in a partner for the main story, but I kept getting ideas, and eventually it became what I presented above. Now, I suppose I could design a small prequel mod that takes place during the last big Planewar some 60 years ago. If I find suitable prefabs, it should be doable in a decently short time.

There's still the problem that I don't know much about the toolset. It seems to have quite a lot in common with the Aurora Toolset of NWN1, so I suppose I could learn the basics quite easily, but there's a long way to go before I could make anything "high quality". I find most tutorials boring, I learn much better with someone to teach me, someone available to answer my questions...

@DannJ: Thanks, that looks interesting. I'll try out your mod as soon as I finish A Fairy Tale (a decent mod, but I liked Serene much more). Looks like the scripts might be something I could use. I was planning resting limited to certain areas (home, the lich's house and pre-placed campsites); 8 hours of sleep; fatigue to kick in after 24 hours of no sleep. Eating either with some family in the village, or travel rations on the road; possibly the option to cook your own food; hunger to kick in after 6 hours.

Modifié par Krozam, 14 décembre 2011 - 10:50 .

[The Fred]

Krozam wrote...
Prefabs? The thought never crossed my mind. I wouldn't want to use them for this mod, unless I happen to find something perfectly suitable, but if I were to build a small sample mod as suggested, those would certainly make it more possible.

I find that area building is one of the trickiest and most time-consuming parts of module creation. Particularly having come from NWN1, the interiors use tilesets just the same and so aren't too much harder, by and large, but the exteriors need quite a bit more work, and finesse. You can get much nicer areas, but they require a greater time investment.

Personally I'm reluctant to use prefabs also, but remember that you can modify them as much or as little as you want after you get them. With a bit of work you can cut and stitch things too. For exteriors, you can simply replace one ground texture with another, and you get a whole different feel to the area. This can give you quite a good base to work off. For example, I took an offset piece of one of NTB's valley sets (four corners stuck together) and replaced the textures with NWN2-only ones (I didn't have the ones he'd used at the time) and started adjusting the texturing and walkmesh. I doubt that the final area looks like anything else ever made from the same prefab, even before placeables and trees are added. Of course the flip side is that this still took me a fair while to do.

[kamal_]

Good area building is by far the most time consuming part of a typical module unless you're rewriting large chunks of the ruleset (adding resting, food etc is not that). You will be massively better off if you use prefabs as much as possible, because the odds of you finding someone to custom build all the areas needed (this sounds like a fairly large module), to a quality level you would probably prefer, are right around zero. Just being honest, most people building areas now in the community are doing it for their own stories, and are not going to spend significant time on your story when they can be doing theirs.

As to what was said about just texture swapping, this is by far the easiest way to get a new look for an area. All the prefab encounter areas I released as prefabs are texture swaps on a base I made. Snow, desert, deep forest etc, same textured base, then just swap.

[M. Rieder]

Iveforgotmypassword wrote...

ps. glad you liked my characters.

A little off topic, but I really liked your characters too, much more than the OC. 

"All right, who wants some then!" 

Very memorable.

[Krozam]

Don't misunderstand, it's not like I have some principle against using prefab areas, it's only a question of finding something that's close enough to what I want that I can modify it with my poor skills into something acceptable. I don't necessarily need someone to make custom areas, I'd be quite happy with someone who can modify prefabs better than me. I've yet to actually have a look at them, so I don't know yet how much needs to be done...

@Iveforgotmypassword: First of all, which module that I mentioned is yours? I'm guessing Serene and A Fairy Tale, because your example sounds like something I recently played in A Fairy Tale. (Right now I'm kicking myself over not going back to see the witch after I slaughtered the villagers...)

Thank you for your input, it's definitely appreciated. One of the reasons why I need a partner is that I need someone to tell me when I'm being too ambitious. Another one is because I am ambitious, too ambitious to be content with something I can do by myself. I'm fairly well aware of my own strengths and weaknesses, and I know that what I want requires more than my strengths.

Concerning replay value: I believe well made conversation that offers an abundance of options does add to the replay value. However, personally I'm actually more interested in doing it because it allows for better role-play. I want to tell a story, but I also want to make it an RPG, as far as it's possible in NWN2. I also enjoy writing dialogue, it'd no doubt be the part I most enjoy in making the module. Reason enough to give it special attention.

As far as choice in class and race goes, I do want to allow the player at least all of the normally available classes, though I might limit the race choice. The reason for limiting anything at all is because I want the choices to actually matter, story-wise. I'm considering several slightly different backstory options for the PC, and one thing I most definitely want is dialogue that occasionally takes your race and class into account. Not to mention class-specific quests, though there might only be one for each "type" of class (for example, wizards and sorcerers would get the same quest, because they're both arcanists). I don't know about Kaedrin, I don't have it yet, but I'm planning to try it out at some point and see how much good stuff it actually adds.

As for romance, I actually don't intend to give the PC a proper romance in the prologue. The main characters will leave the village after that, and they'll take no one else with them. However, your companion will have a bit of a romance, and while he'll have to leave the girl, she'll become a part of his character as a reason why he wants to return home once the Planewar is over, as well as someone he'll frequently talk about. You do get the option to sleep with a few characters, though, if you give your character a decent charisma.

Anyway, my mind is already spinning new ideas full speed, to the short prequel mod I might try to build by myself. It's name is "The Tale of Sorim the Survivor", and it's a story that the old wizard tells the village's children some 10 years before the Planeguardians prologue.

Modifié par Krozam, 14 décembre 2011 - 07:03 .

[PJ156]

I've been reading this with interest and I want a cookie too.

I like seeing new stuff come up and your ideas sound like strong ones. I agree on many aspects of what you are trying to do and disagree on others. In the main though if you can get your story in with half the ideas you have implimented then you will have a good product.

I certainly agree on the npc issue. I have not found the time to play Maimed God or Serene but I think mods that strive to have good npcs are good mods on the whole. I am testing hilltop2012's mod at the moment and he is doing a pretty good job on that front so don't despair thet the two mods you have cited are the only ones with decent npc interaction I know a little of M Reiders forthcoming TWA 2 as well and it wont be disappointing on the npc front either.

The main thing I would agree on in this thread though is that if you don't like area building (or are not very good at it) then you should go with prefabs. There are lots out there and a good area of any decent size can take weeks, pick the ones you need to be of a certain style for you mod, make a good job of them, and take the rest as prefabs.

Good luck with this. It is a long haul but ultimately the sense of achievement you get at the end, I think, makes it worthwhile.

PJ

Modifié par PJ156, 14 décembre 2011 - 10:09 .

[kamal_]

Self pimpage: Speed Building - Quickly getting an Adventure up and running social.bioware.com/forum/1/topic/167/index/8558944

[M. Rieder]

3 cookies = 1 beer.

Since I've read this thread six times, I think I deserve 2 beers.

[M. Rieder]

One thing that I really like is when companions banter between themselves. I think it makes the characters more interesting. In the OC when Neeshka, Khelgar, and the druid are bantering about the ship voyage to neverwinter, I thought it was pretty entertaining. Eguintir Eligard did a good job of having inter-party banter in Islander campaign as well. It is also nice when NPCs deal with serious things. In Dark days of waiting, one of PJ's NPCs deals with a serious atrocity which I think lends realism to the story. Also, in Last Days of the Raven, one of the charactes' backstory makes for one of the most enjoyable quests I have had in NWN2.

If you do plan on doing a prelude module, I suggest making one or two really good NPCs.  It is a lot of work to make sufficient dialogue to make them believable and you need time to let it happen naturally.  TWA2 is 10-12 hours of playtime an it feels like just enough time to really get to know the 2 companions that you meet along the way.   To be honest, a simple single-player module with no campaigns may be best for starting.  TWA1 was plenty challenging without the task of making a believable companion.  Just getting efficient with the toolset is quite a task.

Modifié par M. Rieder, 14 décembre 2011 - 11:24 .

[Krozam]

@Iveforgotmypassword : Yes, well, I know the race issue is easy compared to many other features I'm planning, but I've got to draw the line somewhere. The story/world would probably shut out at least a couple of races...

The prologue wouldn't take you higher than lvl 6, I think, and one sidequest most certainly wouldn't give enough xp for a whole level, so I don't think I need to worry too much about the balance issue. Still, I'll keep this in mind.

I don't know why, but to me Serene is the superior one of your works. A Fairy Tale is better balanced gameplay-wise, you don't gain levels and equipment so fast and the battles are more entertaining. However, I think the plot isn't as good (so far, anyway) as in Serene. I'm also not connecting with the characters as well, for some reason. The dialogue is still hilarious (loved the conversation in the upstairs room of the dwarven tavern ), but the punctuation problems bug the hell out of me. I'm actually considering offering to fix it once I'm done playing it through. Still, I greatly admire your ability to write humorous dialogue, as it happens to be one of my most serious weaknesses as a writer.

@PJ156: Alright, here you go. *Hands a cookie, then gives his dwindling cookie reserve a worried glance.*

I'm always on the lookout for mods with good characters and dialogue. I know TWA2 will be good (pressure? I'm not trying to increase his pressure, what're you talking about? ) and I'm really looking forward to it. I liked my halfling wizard, too. One day he'll be a great archmage and show the world that size doesn't matter!

Seriously, the thought of using prefabs never crossed my mind until kamal brought it up here. I can practically build the prequel module around what prefabs I find in the Vault. The Planeguardians campaign is a different matter, I have several areas planned and I'll not easily accept a completely different substitute, plus my quality requirements will be higher... but that's a problem for another time.

@kamal_: As I said earlier, I don't learn well from tutorials, I prefer either learning by trial-and-error or having a proper teacher (as in, someone with enough expertise and with whom I can talk, if not face-to-face, then at least on MSN), but I'll take a look.

@M. Rieder: ...You drive a hard bargain, but alright. Two beers it is. I don't care about beers so much as cookies anyway. But don't expect to get any more from additional readtroughs! *Gets two cold beers from the fridge and hands them over.*

Companions bantering among each other is something I like, too, and will not neglect. I have currently 4 companion character ideas to the prequel mod, I might not do them all, I might replace some of them if I get better ideas, but this is what I have so far:
- A creature from the plane of Heaven, an ally the gods sent to help in the war against the demons. Probably a paladin. Not a particularly pleasant person, very arrogant and somewhat lacking in emotion, looks down on mortals. Still, in battle (s)he will have your back without fail.
- A halfling assassin, who actually manages to scare most of the bigger members in the group. Closest to evil in the group, though probably chaotic neutral. Rather mean and cruel, but often a source of some dark humour. Clashes a lot with the paladin. He's getting paid for the mission (pretty much the only way to get him to do anything), but he has professional pride, he'll carry out a mission he's getting paid for no matter what.
- An elven healer, heavily yandere towards the PC (means she loves him so obsessively it's clearly on the side of a mental derangement, a sane man would stay away from girls like her). Probably a druid. The PC can decide whether to start a romance with her or to try and stay the f*** away from her. At times even scarier than the assassin, she'll kill without remorse anyone whom she perceives as a threat to the PC, or their "love".
- An old dwarven fighter. Very talkative - for a mute. His constand demand for attention (since you have to actually look at him if you want to make out what he's trying to communicate with his sign language and expressions) will probably be rather annoying to everyone else. Still, compared to the others, he's probably the most likeable companion.

They're all, save the ally from Heaven, Planeguardians. The PC will unfortunately have to play a male human wizard (or possibly sorcerer), because the flashback-nature of the story requires it. I'll strive to make up for the lack of choice in other areas. Starting level probably 12, they're all pretty exparienced, though not at the top of the ladders in the Planeguardian hierarchy.

Modifié par Krozam, 15 décembre 2011 - 05:24 .

[The Fred]

PJ156 wrote...
I think mods that strive to have good npcs are good mods on the whole.

Most NPCs are peasants. Peasants are pretty worthless. Spending time on NPCs (as a whole) is therefore a waste of time. More time should be spent on samurai.