LE Lore friendliness question

[blennus]

I'm almost done making a mod that somewhat alters stealth based game-play. Besides dynamically adjusting stealth to fit the local time and weather, I also added various types of detection to the enemies in game. First was the addition of heat-vision" to undead, second was smell-detection to animals in the wild as well as falmer (to compensate for their blindness), and finally I added magicka detection to dwemer constructs.

 

I was just wondering how lore-friendly those three detection options are. While they are optional I would like to keep things as fitting as possible. I'm assuming giving smell detection to animals isn't an issue, though I'm not so sure about falmer, though that is entirely configurable in the MCM menu.

 

Likewise heat detection for undead doesn't seem unreasonable, though it might be closer to "life" detection, like the spell? I could change it to react to the player's HP level, but I didn't like that idea game-play wise.

 

Having to stay nearly dead, or not investing in health to be more sneaky seemed like a bad design choice for stealth. That's why I thought that working with Frostfall's cover system and temperature would be more interesting and rewarding, though my mod doesn't explicitly require Frostfall.

 

Obviously the big issue here are the Dwemer constructs having magicka detection, that and the magical anomalies. I mainly added it to balance the stealth mechanic, so that ethereal voice doesn't get too overpowered when in a dwemer-dungeon. I made it so that ethereal voice grants a bonus to hide from smell detection, but to make it not over-powered I made it make the player more easily detected by dwemer.

 

Anyways. I was wondering what people's opinions were concerning these mechanic, and if they seem out of place in Skyrim. Thanks for your time.

 

 

PS. I'll need help localizing my mod when it comes out, so I'll be asking for volunteers then. Thanks.

[icecreamassassin]

I like the sound of all of this. It's been well established in both vanilla and in mods that undead can detect the presence of life and are drawn to it, so having them be able to smell you out based on the warmth of life makes sense. Animals are a no brainer there as well, totally works (just make sure to include werewolves and vampires as well).

 

Light level and weather also are great for concealing and boosting stealth, kudos to that.

 

Dwemer Automatons I have always seen as having vibration sensors which is what activates them when you draw near, but since they have soul gems in them, id's say it's reasonable lore wise to think that the soul in the gem is drawn to living things and magicka is very closely tied with soul, so I think it makes sense.

[blennus]

Thanks. I'm glad you like the idea. I've made sure that werewolves and werebears are included in the proper lists along with their less human cousins. Vampires too have been taken into account.

 

In fact as long as the actors have the right keywords it should auto-assign the proper detection abilities, even for newly added enemies from other mods. Hopefully it will work as advertised.