Mod req.. we desperately need one to shut people up

[marinfrs]

FO4 had one called 'you talk too much' and it substantially reduced the amount of gabbing that goes on.

Starfield does the same stinking thing, every person you walk by has to make some comment, every. single. time. And going into a crowded area is just insane, every nearby npc has to recite their piece and many times you have 3 or more talking at once. PLEASE someone with the skills, please fix this.. I had forgotten how bad the constant yakking was in FO4 due to an incredible mod, it needs to be here too! I left a comment to the author of that mod, not sure if he is even interested in SF.

[mauvecloud]

I found three mods that already do this (or at least claim to, I haven't tried them yet):

https://www.nexusmods.com/starfield/mods/1809

https://www.nexusmods.com/starfield/mods/3015

https://www.nexusmods.com/starfield/mods/1470

 

The top one lists the game settings involved in the install section of the description, so if you already have a startup script, you could add the commands there and tweak the values to your liking without actually downloading the mod.

[marinfrs]

thanks Mauvecloud, my searches just brought up weapon sound changes. Hope one of those works for me!

[zanity]

This issue was sometimes a problem in early Beth games, but is utterly broken in Starfield. Current hack mods are a poor solution to these kinds of insanely faulty mechanisms.

 

It seems as if not only is the latest script system far more hopeless than earlier iterations, it is also programmed by people without a clue, and is also a terrible match for the threading systems of modern PCs.

 

From a sound environment POV, the spoken speech system should be PLAYER centric. In Beth's genius, it is NPC centric - rather like real life. So NPC speech is not motivated by what the player needs or wants to hear, but rather crude, badly coded NPC behavioral loops.

 

Therefore a real fix involves fixing the script system, fixing the threading of script code, and writing proper script code for the NPCs. Hopefully all of this will prove possible when the official tools release, BUT with previous games, a ton of scripted behaviour was baked into hard coded functions that could be be changed.

 

I would suggest that people start to think about the ideal version of NPC talking behaviour, in case it is possible to make heavy changes. One idea would be FOCUS- in other words background chatter is maybe quieter and ambient unless the player engages in FOCUS on a speaker or group of speakers, at which point the NPCs speak as they do currently, allowing a MISSION to be generated from the hints in their dialogue.

 

You see, Beth would argue they have an ORGANIC side mission system, where the mere passing by of an NPC leads the player to naturally discover a new NPC linked mission, and this is actually a good thing. It avoids the explicit "mission giver" design when an NPC stands there with an exclamation point over their head- not exactly immersive. But the way in which Beth implements this 'organic' system is the worst possible- and could be so much better.

 

I would argue the player should be in charge of whether they want to pick up new missions in a given area from 'randos' just by listening to what said randos are saying. Maybe this could even be done via a 'mood' button, where you switch into overhear and pay attention to the NPCs around one function- which would be a match for real life. Sometimes you wanna rush thru a crowd and ignore everyone. Sometimes you wanna stroll, and earwig for anything 'interesting' someone may be saying.

 

What we can all agree on is IN YOUR FACE repetition of a handful of stock phrases loudly by the same NPCs is immersion breaking, and an unnecessarily crude method to draw attention to available side missions.