Neverwinter Nights Forum Update

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(Originally posted by Vile)

Here's some more info from the Black Isle message boards. This one has a lot of info on strongholds in NWN.

David Gaider, Senior Designer:

Strongholds:
OK, peoples...time for you to get a bit more direct involvement in the creative process, here. Your suggestions in the other NWN threads have so far been very enlightening, thank you very much. Now it's time to get a bit more specific.

You guys who played BG2 know what they are. It was tough to get ideas on them before BG2 came out because few people knew really what to expect...a lot of people had notions of controlling a castle's armies a la a RTS game or similar types of misunderstandings. Since you know how the strongholds worked in BG2, it is now much more feasible to get direct input.

OK, so...first thing: these are not BG2 Strongholds.

The idea is not going to be that you 'own' a particular place and start operating it in complete ignorance of the overall story that's going on. ("What? Oh, yes, that important quest. Well, I'll get to it someday once my inn starts making a profit...") The idea we're looking at right now (and keep in mind this is not guaranteed...this is something we're considering implementing) is to implement five types of organizations that you can get involved with to a degree. You help them out, perform services for them, you get benefits in return...maybe it involves actually joining the order and rising in their ranks, that hasn't been decided yet. But the quests involved should be short enough that the player can do a considerable number, should they wish...and that these quests exist as a result of and are therefore part of the 'overall story obstacle' (whether it be the plague that was mentioned as part of one of the modules, some uber-boss who's having a dire impact on the area or whatever).

The organizations will be of the following types:

1) smuggler/rogue
2) nature-based
3) mercenary
4) magical (arcane)
5) religious

So? You want to contribute some ideas? Here's some questions you can pick from, or put your thoughts in on them all:
Think of a short quest idea that would be applicable to one of the above organizations. You don't have to fit it into the overall story (as you won't know that, of course), but if you can come up with some interesting plots that aren't too complex that would be very keen.

What sorts of things would you want to be able to do in that organization/stronghold? Now...keep this reasonable, as a single one of these cannot be extremely huge. The strongholds in BG2 could have been improved by making them more useful and more accessible (you didn't have to go out of your way to return to them all the time), and while we've got the accessible part covered, I bet you guys can think of a lot more uses than us.

If you have an idea for a specific organization. Maybe there's a specific type of stronghold you'd like to see. Keep in mind that the quests involved have to be fun (not tedious) and they have to be something that can be made readily relevant to an epic plot.

Or, of course, if you have any other thoughts you'd like to offer, we'd be happy to hear them.

(Just another reminder that this is not an announcement of a feature...this may or may not be going into the game, right now we're trying to judge how fun it would be and how much it'd be wanted, and we're asking you to help us out with your educated opinions).

I saw your last couple of posts. I especially liked the cleric quest regarding the angry spooks in the graveyard. We had a running joke when we were discussing that, wondering if we could get Manny from Grim Fandango to be the ghosts' negotiating representative with the PC. Probably not, but it was a fun idea at the time.

The class-specific quests are already starting to solidify a bit, which is a good thing. According to our working theory, more attention needs to be given to some classes than others. Why? Well, here's sorta how it goes:

Fighter classes get to feel like fighters all the time. They go around whacking things throughout the module. "Look ma, I'm a fighter!" Fighters don't need much else, although given them class-specific stuff is easy.

Magic-users also don't need too much. They cast spells all the time. However...players with magic-users like to feel special and want a place to work on magic stuff. Easily done. Throw in some quests that can specifically only be done by magic-users and there you go.

Clerics, paladins and monks are a bit trickier. The classes can all fight, but their alignments differ (clerics and monks can also be evil) and coming up with a generic stronghold isn't easy. I think we've done it, but the quests that would be involved here are a bit iffy. Best thing to do is give them multiple paths in how they can be completed...so Mr. Lawful Good Paladin can feel just as vindicated as Ms. Chaotic Evil Cleric.

The most work, in my mind, has to go to the rogue stuff and the nature stuff. Why? Thieves never get to feel very thiefly in most adventure games. Wandering around dungeons and disarming the occasional trap is OK, but the thief feels most at home in the big city strutting his stuff in the guild. And druids and rangers rarely get to feel very druidic/rangery. It's important that their class makes them feel distinctive.

The druid stuff is probably the hardest. We're looking at the possibility of letting druids and rangers talk to any animals in the game (which no other class could do) and get extra hints & quests that way. We may also be putting a small grove right in the city...might seem a bit odd, but what better place to bring nature to than a city? Seems pretty visionary to me. So far the quests for druids are a bit thin...there's been a couple of interesting ideas earlier, but nothing we've been able to fit in.

Still...when I sit back and look at the level of detail on all fronts, it's looking pretty good.

Alex Scott, SFX Artist:

Faeries:
Its all and more then you ever could have wanted. At first I just did it as a particle effect that could be used like you had first planed.

But I added a poly body to the effect, and now it looks WAY KOOL! It will be a real Creature that you can pick and place at will in the module. Scripting encounters will be the same as with NPC's or other creature types.

They could be woodland helpers and all kinds of things now! Evil even! Wooohahaha. It will take a while for me to add all the anims, as I have to do it on my own time.

Mark Brockington, Lead Research Scientist:

Command Parameter:
"Command" isn't really a variable. In the current implementation, a command parameter takes the state of the running script and saves it for execution by another object (in the case of AssignCommand) or at a later time (in the case of DelayCommand).

However, it is on my list of things I am considering adding to the language (time permitting, and if it can be done without breaking the scripts that the designers have already done!)

One of my concerns would be when the parameters are evaluated. Does OBJECT_SELF always refer to the object that created the command, or should it refer to the object that is eventually running the command? And if you assign a command to someone, should it check their locals, or your locals. What about variables that fall out-of-scope between the evaluation and their execution?