GECK dialogue help

[ThatOtherUser]

I think you'd have to ask someone from Bethesda that, because I haven't a clue. I've checked through the dialogue for the VNPCFollowers quest while writing up the script for my own travel buddy, and it all honestly makes sense to me. It's possible that the quest does all the processing on its own, and all you have to do is include the lines you want it to use.

 

Are you talking about general follower dialogue though, or specific dialogue? Like asking someone to trade with you, as opposed to asking Boone about Bitter Springs?

[ilayoeli]

I think you'd have to ask someone from Bethesda that, because I haven't a clue. I've checked through the dialogue for the VNPCFollowers quest while writing up the script for my own travel buddy, and it all honestly makes sense to me. It's possible that the quest does all the processing on its own, and all you have to do is include the lines you want it to use.

 

Are you talking about general follower dialogue though, or specific dialogue? Like asking someone to trade with you, as opposed to asking Boone about Bitter Springs?

Anything really, I just don't understand how come setting no choices or topics in their tabs still makes the you able to choose other dialogue options

[madmongo]

Conversations start at the top level, then branch out to different topics based on what gets selected. If a branch ends, then the active topic just bumps back up the tree. The key to making this work is that you have to have conditionalized conversation options at the point where the conversation returns to.

 

It can be done, but it can also get really, really confusing.

 

This sort of thing made a lot more sense back in the days of Morrowind. In that game, numerous different NPCs could all give you the same conversation options about particular topics (all of the NPCs in a certain area or of a certain faction would all have conversation options about that area or faction, for example). In modern games though, even though several NPCs may comment on a particular topic, they tend to do so with their own unique dialog. So doing it the old way doesn't make quite as much sense.

 

What you are calling more efficient also tends to make things more confusing. Take a look at Cass's dialog for an excellent example of this. It tends to use these types of techniques a lot. You don't see very many mods that overhaul Cass's dialog, other than minor tweaks. This is because her dialog is just a jumbled, confusing mess that is really difficult to unravel and modify. You can't even stick in top-level conversation options for her because she very rarely speaks from the top-level and anything you add there usually won't show up in-game.

 

Bethesda also likes to group things by topic rather than by NPC. While this definitely makes some things easier (like quests) it can make some things much more difficult as well. Veronica's fist is a good example of this. Several people have made mods to have her unequip her power fist, just because they find it annoying. A lot of times in conversation though, she'll mysteriously re-equip the power fist. To make her never re-equip the fist, you have to dig through all of her conversation options which are scattered all throughout the GECK's quests to find every single instance where she re-equips the stupid thing. It's a royal pain.

 

Stick to simple topics. It's much easier to debug and modify. Simple dialog trees are your friend.

[ilayoeli]

Conversations start at the top level, then branch out to different topics based on what gets selected. If a branch ends, then the active topic just bumps back up the tree. The key to making this work is that you have to have conditionalized conversation options at the point where the conversation returns to.

 

It can be done, but it can also get really, really confusing.

 

This sort of thing made a lot more sense back in the days of Morrowind. In that game, numerous different NPCs could all give you the same conversation options about particular topics (all of the NPCs in a certain area or of a certain faction would all have conversation options about that area or faction, for example). In modern games though, even though several NPCs may comment on a particular topic, they tend to do so with their own unique dialog. So doing it the old way doesn't make quite as much sense.

 

What you are calling more efficient also tends to make things more confusing. Take a look at Cass's dialog for an excellent example of this. It tends to use these types of techniques a lot. You don't see very many mods that overhaul Cass's dialog, other than minor tweaks. This is because her dialog is just a jumbled, confusing mess that is really difficult to unravel and modify. You can't even stick in top-level conversation options for her because she very rarely speaks from the top-level and anything you add there usually won't show up in-game.

 

Bethesda also likes to group things by topic rather than by NPC. While this definitely makes some things easier (like quests) it can make some things much more difficult as well. Veronica's fist is a good example of this. Several people have made mods to have her unequip her power fist, just because they find it annoying. A lot of times in conversation though, she'll mysteriously re-equip the power fist. To make her never re-equip the fist, you have to dig through all of her conversation options which are scattered all throughout the GECK's quests to find every single instance where she re-equips the stupid thing. It's a royal pain.

 

Stick to simple topics. It's much easier to debug and modify. Simple dialog trees are your friend.

Thanks for the detailed response.

A question: Just what is this "top level" and how do I make a topic a "top level"

You know of a good dialogue tutorial which explain this all affair (and not just for quests)?

[madmongo]

Top level topics appear in response to the NPC's greeting, assuming that the topic quest is active, the topic's conditions are met, etc. The way you make a topic top level is you simply click on the Top-Level check box (on the upper right, next to the topic text) when you are creating your topic.

 

I don't know of a good tutorial, sorry.