LE Need someone to help with quest dialogue and behavior.

[kryptopyr]

I'm looking for someone to help me out with a relatively small quest edit. I suspect that it should be a fairly simple change, but I don't have a lot of experience setting up new quest dialogue and linking it to scenes and package behavior, so I've been putting off these changes simply because I haven't had time to figure out how to do it. If there's anyone willing to help who has experience with quests and dialogue, that would be fantastic.

 

What I'm working on is an alternate start for the Dawnguard quest that would allow players to side with the vampires without first joining the Dawnguard. In doing so, I'm resurrecting a fair bit of existing dialogue that for some reason was cut from the DLC (or in some cases, simply not linked up properly). I pretty much have that part of the mod finished, but what I still need to do is finish implementing an initial scene/dialogue that was originally cut by Bethesda and which I'd like to use as an additional option to start the quest.

 

Basically, I'm trying to make a wounded character shout for help when the player gets within a certain radius. Then once the player approaches within a few feet of the wounded NPC, I want to use a different forcegreet package to actually initiate the dialogue. After the player heals the NPC, there is a short conversation (mostly finished), and player & NPC part ways.

 

It's not a huge project, but I'd like to see it get finished. Since I've been having trouble finding the time to sit down and figure it out myself, I thought I'd see if there's anyone interested in partnering with me to get it done. Once finished, this quest will become part of the mod "The Choice is Yours".

 

 

[ThatGuyYeah]

That sounds something up my alley but I am overhauling my mod for 1.0 so I don't have the time anymore to take on another project. :/

 

From what I understood about Dawnguard (through digging around and reading some Japanese websites) was that there were a lot a of features Bethesda were trying to implement but either they wanted a DLC out sooner than expected or Skyrim engine issues. Some examples include:

 

-Vigilant Tolan (the guy that goes to Dimhollow Crypt ahead of you and gets killed) was meant to live.

-You were supposed to be able to enter the Crypt without even starting Dawnguard (going in beforehand in the main game now will just have a blocked path).

-Serana was supposed to have some 'relationship' mechanic where your responses to her would dictate her future responses (remains of that is still her dialogue package, just not as polished)

 

But we'll never know the whole story.

 

If I wasn't working on this overhaul, I would like to jump on this. Good luck though.

[kryptopyr]

Thanks. Yeah, I know what you mean. I'm in the middle of working on several overhauls myself, which is one of the reasons this keeps getting pushed aside in favor of those. While I haven't gotten into much concerning Serana's relationship, your first two examples are definitely correct and those are the options I've decided to resurrect. With my modded version, Tolan may indeed live depending on the choices the player makes and how they start the quest. Personally, I think the cut versions make a lot more sense, or at the very least they open up more role-playing options for players who aren't playing straight-up good-guys.

[skinnytecboy]

Were it me, I would do it like this:

 

Create a dialogue branches for soldiers shouts and his conversation

On his dialogue I would use the braced in pain idle.

 

 

I would then create a scene for the scream that simple uses the say package. Point this package to his scream dialogue.

 

Then I would set a large trigger box around the NPC to launch the scene.

 

On the actor, I would place a forcegreet package with a small radius to launch his conventional dialogue.

 

Apologies if I've missed the point here.

[skinnytecboy]

If my text appears somewhat scruffy, that's because I'm using my mobile... Not great with long text and predictive is a pain :(

[skinnytecboy]

On a PC now. Good lord my grammar is simply awful. Note to self: do not use mobile phones to post comments..

[kryptopyr]

Thank you for the suggestions. I'll look at the braced in pain idle. Right now I'm using the wounded furniture marker.

 

I've been trying to get the dialogue to work without using a scene (just a combination of forcegreet and/or say packages), but it looks like nesting the package inside a scene might be the solution I needed. I haven't had time to test it yet so keeping my fingers crossed that it does indeed work.

[skinnytecboy]

Cool. Wasn't sure if I came across as "teaching you to suck eggs".

 

There are a few idles that hold the NPC in position until the idle is changed via another dialogue idle. Braced is just one of them. Have a play around. The TG06 knockout and Getup are good also.

 

Scenes are really quite useful, but work best if kept simple. I find that having too many packages often causes trouble. A simple scene to launch his screams is all you need. You can even set it to loop, with an end condition triggered by a setstage on your "conversational dialogue" :cool:

[kryptopyr]

No, not at all. It never fails, no matter how much I learn about the CK and modding, there are still new things I run into that just make me want to beat my head against the wall. In all my modding, I've done next to nothing using scenes and had just assumed that they were mostly for more complex NPC interactions, so that route didn't occur to me. It appears that there's always something new to learn.

:)