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Buildings, Procedural NPCs, and what's next
🕑 Added 2016-12-18 21:22:22 +0000 UTC So I know I've been quiet these last days, mainly because I didnt wanted to spam everything I did until I have something more meaningful.Beware, super long post!
First, a TL;DR: Procedural NPCs are working now and will populate the city at the start, you can either let them be or deal with them with coercion or persuasion. The new framework will improve the actual followers and help us create more efficient content for them than just scene after scene.
Well, this is meaningful because its what can be expected soon in the game. I've worked on a way to procedurally create NPCs, it stills needs tweaks and improvement, but right now it can create human, furry/monster girls, goblins and succubus/incubus.
Every NPC has 2 traits (15 in game already, but will be expanded), 2 backgrounds (two categories, 45 for the "childhood" background, 45 for the adulthood background), 1 class (there are 24 right now, from farmer to inquisitor) , among other things. Not everything will be showed in the information screen at first, but it will be used to check the NPC performance when doing their job, either giving them bonuses or penalties, so of course assigning an inquisitor as an inquisitor will work better.
So that's done, and generating these NPCs I think is working well, I am kinda ambitious about certain features but they will be worked in the future, not right now, but nonetheless the structure I hope is well done for when the time comes.
This framework for NPCs is going to help us to develope better followers too, making the progress more interesting than just spamming actions in 3 days in game, although we want to keep the pace fast enough to avoid grinding.
And now I've been working on the buildings, the first one will be the church, for now I think I will only work in 1 position, thats the priest, but others will be added (The plan is to have 1 priest, 5 acolytes, 1 head inquisitor and 5 inquisitors, etc. ).
Buildings will be critical, since the city will have 4 stats: Prosperity, happiness, security and corruption, and these buildings will affect those stats, and of course they will have their own policy. I.e Right now the Priest can do two things: Corrupt the church (the only requeriment is for the priest to have high corruption and help you) and Skimpy attires. This requires the church and priest to be at corruption 50, but if the priest is helping you to corrupt the church the requirements are reduced to only 35.
So when the game starts, the idea is that the city will already be populated by random NPCs, making each run different. This also means that there wil lbe a lot of NPCs that you will hate or dislike, what you can do, just remove them and put another one on place? Well, that sounds good, but really if you came into a city as an unknown lord and tried to remove the high priestess from her position people would hate you, and there would be chaos.
Which brings another mechanic I hope you guys will like. There will be 3 ways to remove an NPC from its position: By force, persuasion and blackmail.
First thing tho: NPCs have reputation, the higher the reputation, the more esteemed they are, which increases or reduces the effects of removing them.
Now the three forms.
By force is the most straightforward: You can always do this, but this will always affect you in two ways: First, it will reduce your reputation, and you will be considered "evil". And then it will affect the stats of the city, reducing security, happiness, and prosperity.
Persuading them: Well, so long you have a good relationship, and both have similar reputation (in the sense that both of you are either good or bad), you may just persuade them. It will also give you an option to buy him out, or just bribe them to leave, but the more reputation they have, the expensier this will be.
Blackmail: For this you will have to investigate them first sending other NPCs to do that, which is why you will have detectives, inquisitors, and more in the future. They will give you up to 3 pieces of evidence against them generated at random although probably using their own traits, and you can comfront them. Of course, if their reputation is already bad, they may not give a shit about a new escandal, but if they are reputable they will secede at your demands more easy. Of course is almost redundant to say this, but this is the most complex of the three and therefore will be implemented at the end.
Once removed, you can fill the position with a retainer of your liking, and one who will be more eager to accomplish what you want...
So thats pretty much the concept of buildings, right now I am almost done with the priest position of the church, and probably I will leave it like that to see how you guys like it and do changes before I do others, which means the rest of days I will we working on adapting the old content to the new framework and addapt the older NPCs to the new system and add them new content too!
What you guys think about it? I know it is ambitious maybe, but you can trust me what I may lack of knowledge or skill I put on effort and time, so hopefully I will not dissapoint you!
Comments
Outdx
yesss, intrigue! I love it.
DuoDevelopers
Well the NPCs are already working and just a step away from implementation :P and buildings too, although the only problem with them is that of course is a lot of work and its not as spicy as, lets say, scenes with a follower (there are already 2 sex scenes with the priest so, there is that!), but overtime that content will fill and let the game feel more alive. About bribes and so on, since the NPC format has a lot of stuff already in it, it may be a lot of work but not sure if hard. I.E when you want to bribe someone you just need to check several factors, i.e there is a trait of greedy, so I just need to add that if the char is greedy, the bribery is easier to proceed, and stuff like that. Not hard maybe but again, tons of work :P Yes, you can increase your stand with them by flirting, complimenting them, bribing them and giving them gifts too! (well the gifts part wont be there right now, but its planned already haha) Also some of the NPCs will be already working on the city and technically working for you, is jsut they may be either incompetent, or maybe too pure or corrupt for your taste, or maybe just not the right gender. Eitherway, it creates conflict and drama, which I hope is fun!
Like you said very ambitious. But If you can implement this, it'll be great for the game in the long run. Removing/seducing/bribing npcs to leave their post is a complex thing to do. But it seems like you guys have a plan for it. Will we be able to convince the npcs to work for us if we don't want to remove them (by sending them gifts or seducing them?)
