A cool idea someone named Wolfwing had on the Elderscroll Forums -------------------------------------------------------- Original Post by Wolfwing -------------------------------------------------------- A thought that I came up with and it's a interesting way of making a town still be around after it's been whiped out by player or other things. What if ever time a npc dies there is a chance based on their alignment, alignment of the player and if the player or other source just killed them for no reason of becoming undead. And the type of undead would be based on their alignment, level, and class if any. This way you can whipe out a town return a few weeks later and find out it's populated by undead. Maybe they can even grow over time as new victims are gotten. You can base it this way. Good aligned - chance Evil aligned + chance Killed for no reason *killed by theif or random target + chance Justice *theif tried to rob you* - chance. Powerful char + chance. It would roll to see if they become a undead based on this and then they would become a udnead based on their levels alignment and such. So you can have a good varity of undead in a area from skeletons, to maybe even liches if you killed a powerful mage. And if there are still living people around it might have a chance of either being killed or turning others into undead. I realize might be to hard to do or not fully down to earth but it is a dream wish . --------------------------------------------------------- People have some pretty cool ideas on there about the new game in the Elderscrolls series Morrowind. "The road of excess leads to the palace of wisdom." --William Blake "The road of excess also just ends up making me tired because I'm too lazy" --Nazrix Edited by - Nazrix on 8/19/00 10:46:34 AM

Haha this is cool! Talk about having an effect on the world. Excellent!

I'm thinking about doing something similar: Maybe you take the town as a collection of buildings and people. The buildings and people affect each other, and give you what you find in the town. So if you burn down the mage's guild, expect to find fewer mages in the long run. If you root out the thieves guild, you may bring an end to the rampant crime in the area.

Something to consider: In RL, if a bunch of things were happening to a town, the territory itself would respond. For instance, if there's a raging fire in the north of the country, all of the rest of the country responds to it. Same with a ghoul infestation. I'm planning to make my towns into a bunch of nested, interconnected nodes. So a town is a bunch of nodes (buildings), and the realm/country is a bunch of nodes (towns), etc. The nodes affect each other over time.

As far as doability: Test will show for sure, but I think I can get away with update cycles that vary based on what node you're in. Faster for the town the player is in, slower for the realm as a whole. AI design here will be crucial (lotsa piecemeal tasks, I think... a low priority background thread might do the trick...)

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Just waiting for the mothership...

Edited by - Wavinator on August 19, 2000 3:01:23 PM

Yeah, I''d love to see those sorts of things implemented in a game.
I think that idea about the undead is cool too because that way if the player kills key NPCs in the story, there''s ways to continue their involvment in the story.



"The road of excess leads to the palace of wisdom." --William Blake

"The road of excess also just ends up making me tired because I'm too lazy" --Nazrix

I find it interesting how everybody is always having the same idea that somebody else has. But they don''t come out and say it until they see somebody already shared ''their'' idea with the rest of the world, via this forum or any forum for that matter.

Its true what they say...
Ideas are a dime a dozen, or people just copy other peoples ideas? Who knows, When will we start to see truely original ideas? Or will we continue to innovate and expand on the same principals that have made games since the beginning?

Most RPG''s do this, when something happens, it affects this, and that. They are just scripted events. So, you are proposing the technology for things to be created from nothing? For some ''unscripted/unprogrammed'' event that can automatically self-generate from what? Everything in the game has to be made, the dialouge, the graphics, etc.. unless you have random map generation. If you can come up with the technology, ai, for the game to think by itself based on what is happening, you''re gonna be famous

Maybe I just don''t undesrtand what the concept here is, but from what I do understand, its already been done.

Thats my 2 cents, never said I was right.
President
Go Go Go! yeah whatever

Once a professor told me about something he had heard once:
"Every stone that we pick up, affects a star in the sky"

Now that would be something if you could re-create that in a game.

quote: Original post by The President

Its true what they say...
Ideas are a dime a dozen, or people just copy other peoples ideas? Who knows, When will we start to see truely original ideas? Or will we continue to innovate and expand on the same principals that have made games since the beginning?

"The thing that hath been, it is that which shall be; and that which is done is that which shall be done: and there is no new thing under the sun."

"Is there any thing whereof it may be said, See, this is new? it hath been already of old time, which was before us."

"There is no remembrance of former things; neither shall there be any remembrance of things that are to come with those that shall come after."

I''m not a religious man, but I love this bible quote (from Ecclesiastes)



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Just waiting for the mothership...

quote: Original post by The President

Once a professor told me about something he had heard once:
"Every stone that we pick up, affects a star in the sky"

Now that would be something if you could re-create that in a game.

Hmmm... simulation down to the molecular level... I''ll get right one it...

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Just waiting for the mothership...

Okay, I reread your post. Wasn''t sure what you meant the first time, thought you were just saying griping.

quote: Original post by The President


Most RPG''s do this, when something happens, it affects this, and that. They are just scripted events. So, you are proposing the technology for things to be created from nothing? For some ''unscripted/unprogrammed'' event that can automatically self-generate from what? Everything in the game has to be made, the dialouge, the graphics, etc.. unless you have random map generation. If you can come up with the technology, ai, for the game to think by itself based on what is happening, you''re gonna be famous

Maybe I just don''t undesrtand what the concept here is, but from what I do understand, its already been done.

What I''m proposing is changing how a pregenerated event is run. Normally, if you get the Chalice of Whatever from the land of Nod, there''s an script that triggers changes in the rest of the world. That''s hard coded, and not very replayable.

So I''m proposing mixing in the kind of variability that you find in an empire game. Think about it. Why is an empire game so replayable? What if the units were not military units, but things that pertained to an RPG?

There are a lot of inherent problems with this. Story is going to be a tricky one. Processor power another. Hopefully I''ll get some responses to the RPG empire AI thread and solve some of them.

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Just waiting for the mothership...