Blood Ties - small improvements in mind (spoilers)

[Alehazar]

While I usually take a liking to Lucy West -and I'm willing to help her out with her personal quest- I really dislike Evan King.

Also, once you arrive in Arefu, you have very limited dialogue that appeals to me as someone who loves to roleplay. If you haven't accepted Lucy's quest, you can either be thrilled to help King out; you can ask him for payment -which he downright refuses- and you can then tell him you just love to help him out anyway, or you just tell him he's on his own. If you have accepted Lucy's quest, you have the dialogue option that you have a message for the West family. Dialogue then devolves according to the previous breakdown.

Now what really bugs me -abd here's the mod request- you can only continue Lucy's quest, if you decide to help Evan King. I thought I could simply bypass this by checking the West residence, finding and examining the corpses and subsequently reporting back to Lucy that her family is dead. (Hoping she would then prompt for either an update of the quest -if you agree to further investigate- or its termination, if you turn her down).

The point is, even though you found her family dead, you cannot directly communicate this to Lucy. You have to go through Evan King to have the quest progress.

I'd like the original option to remain, but would love it, if someone were able to create an alternative solution to Lucy's quest, without breaking the original quest, or the game itself.

 

What I had in mind:

1. you have agreed to help Lucy.

2. you have refused to help Evan King

3. you have checked the West residence and you have activated one of the corpses in the house.

4. you report back to Lucy.

5. use Lucy's original dialogue (if you would normally help Evan King and check on the other families in Arefu and report on the deaths of the Wests to King; he would ask whether Lucy's brother was among the corpses. Then the quest progresses and you need to find Lucy's brother. At this quest stage, when you tell Lucy about the state of affairs regarding her family, she has a bit of dialogue, imploring you to find her brother -possibly her only living relative.)

6. Have the quest update to the next -alternate- stage; "Lucy has implored you find her brother and to make sure he will be able to live safely within the Arefu settlement; so put your resentment aside and help Evan King and restore peace to Arefu."

7. Talk to Evan King and agree to help him.

8. Quest updates: find the "Family" (based on your medical skill when examining the West family, you will have gathered certain clues that may prompt additional dialogue -which makes it easier to narrow down the location of the Family.)

9. Make sure you get Lucy's brother out alive and try to solve things peacefully; you may need some Speech skill levels, Medicine level, etc. to stay on the Family's good side and not turn it into a massacre.

 

10. Optional: (for those who think the Family consists of a bunch of creeps); you can use shotgun diplomacy -bye bye Family- and then convince Lucy's brother to go back to Arefu when you show him her letter. (Normally this plays out quite differently).

 

11. Those who have a desire to fail the quest, can still opt not to help Evan King and not help Lucy West by refusing to continue your investigation of her brother's disappearance.

 

I do not know what is possible or impossible for this mod to work. I realize you cannot add new -fully voiced- dialogue, but if you carefully plan the PC's answers to existing dialogue, I think you can go a long way.

Personally, I have excruciating little experience in Quest modding, so hence my request for someone to step up and make the alternate solution to Blood Ties. It may seem convoluted and redundant, but for me it would add more roleplaying value.