Story writing

[ub3rman123]

I'm thinking my way through building a semi-complex plotline with branching segments for (maybe) Skyrim. It's more gaps than ideas so far, but it seems good. The hard part is the thing to incite the player to get involved. I don't want to do what I've done before, which is either overly cheesy (Sundered Keep) or just arbitrary 'Hey, I'm here with a quest!' (Shadowfang Keep). I want this mod to be more of a roleplaying experience than what I've done before. What kind of a hook can I make to make a player enter into a new storyline?

[Pronam]

As we ditched the plan for the empires glory (even the prologue version for skyrim) anyway, maybe you can pick a few pieces out of it for your own story. It has parts of lore and a lots of made up stuff of course. I can't recall it all but this is practically a summary:

 

The emperor died, the amulet shattered, the bond/allegiance between humans and gods are slowly degrading. A dragon is holed up in a wall and the spirits of the old champions of cyrodiil seek your help to prevent the fate happening projected in the trailer. The Coronation wasn't only task of the emperors to keep, with the official sign of the amulet of kings broken the bond needs to be fixed.

 

One of dragon blood is needed with the amulet to prevent this from happening. The representatives of the spirits help you find the pieces, reforge the amulet and your final task will be to move towards the dragon chamber. A minor dragon is there and you will kill it. One Champion has tried the same before and you will meet him there. He has been there for ages with the dragon. The player follows the directions given by the passed champion, with the amulet in their hand they are lured into a trap with promises of being emperor or simply by having to prevent the fate of the plot in skyrim. The player's blood will be mixed of the dragon and soon after instead of preventing the fate, the fate is sealed. The old champion's mind is altered by the dragon, the other part of his mind will help you slow down the fate as it has been in the past with the god of time. The other champions of cyrodiil vow to hunt you down, get you executed and the player is ought to get in hiding. The blades are more understanding and tell you that once upon a time you or your children will have to confront the fate that is set.

Edited October 17, 2011 by Pronam

[ub3rman123]

I'm having a hard time with deciding to keep it lore-based or totally independent, like Nehrim (Which I draw a lot of inspiration from, game- and story design-wise), or making it fit the lore. It's harder to fit it to the lore, especially when someone shows up, "Septim the 128th was dead in the War of the Red Diamond, he can't have built that castle!". It also makes it awkward when you have to add in a new bit, like the Sundered Keep did. You have to grapple with the thought of, "How did nobody notice this before?" This all goes along with worrying about mod conflicts, and limits space you have to make new things.

 

The drawback to making it independent is that, of course, the PC will have to either be brand-new (TC style), or be forced to take a portal/boat/magic airship to a new land, which once again, is awkward. This also applies to taking the player to a new province, etc.

 

Now that I've thought about it more, here's my idea for how the storyline will work. A lot of details aren't in yet.

 

The story is centered on two characters (A and B). They start with a mild distrust of each other for events in the past. Through the player's actions, these two can change their attitudes towards each other, from being friends to trying to murder each other. There will also be storyline-related endings for each, such as their being assassinated or killed in battle. I'm hoping that having the player's actions change the plotline will encourage replay of the mod, which was the only flaw I saw with Nehrim because of its fairly single-track plot.

[ub3rman123]

Okay, wrote out more stuff for it.. By the way, this has some significant spoilers for when I get the mod done.

 

(nobody should read this, this is really just so I don't forget anything and have it written down)

 

Text in Red might change when Skyrim comes out depending on how the lore's been retconned.

 

Setting

Blacklight in the north Morrowind. Besieged by Dunmer house (Telvanni?) angered over an event earlier. Ruled by a dual coalition of Imperial and House Dres forces like Mournhold. This leads to some tension between the factions, as Dres never wanted imperial rule. Later events happen because of this.

-Connected to Skyrim via pass beside Windhelm (Dunmeth Pass), boat travel, carriage ride

 

Characters

Raven Garel: Raven is a criminal type, though she has honor that she doesn't show. She acts ruthless. Leader of a band of highway robbers. Becomes antagonist besides Telvanni. Frames Sathmus Orethi for being a traitor.

Antoni Molvar: The Empire-appointed governor of Blacklight

Sathmus Orethi: The House Dres leader of Blacklight. Accused of being a traitor, hung though innocent.

Major events in the past (Pre-mod)

Telvanni War: With weakened Empire influence in Morrowind, the Telvanni have taken the opportunity to expand their holdings. Dres removed House Redoran from Blacklight to use it as a stronghold for the war, exiling them to a town on the coast.

Reorganization into 4 Acts

 

Act I: Focuses on the player's entry into the world and meeting the characters.

Act II: The war starting, trebuchet nuking

Act III: Figuring out who the traitor is

Act IV: Endgame

 

Act I

 

1. Player enters city via a previous method listed above, wanders the city (Maybe surrounding countryside)
   
2. Rumors are given to the PC about a town on the fringe of Blacklight's countryside where people have been disappearing and strange shadows seen at night. These shadows, on investigation, turn out to be Telvanni agents scouting the town out as a staging area.
   
3. Player talks to the imperial governor. He instructs the player to investigate more to find the culprits.
   
4. Outside of the governor's mansion, he meets with Varo, who asks about helping the player. He comes along to help with the investigation, and knows where to start looking.
   
5. At the place he suggests they look, they're attacked by a band of Telvanni mercenaries.
   
6. After a short time in the battle, a group of fighters from Arano's group attack as well, joining on the player's side. When the mercenaries are dead, Arano talks to the player and brings him back to his ruined keep/camp.
   
7. Player meets with Raven, Arano's master. She tells about the Telvanni's attack plans and grants you Arano as an aide. Arano dislikes being forced to travel with Varo, but goes along with it.
   
8. On meeting the governor again, he's concerned about the plans. Mid-speech, the attack begins. How dramatic.
   

 

Act II

 

1. The player goes outside to find that a group of Telvanni mercenaries are attacking the city, making time for a larger army to get in place.
   
2. Varo is outside, fighting off a number of the mercenaries alone. The player helps him to kill them and they continue to fight the mercenaries. When the threat is temporarily ended, they return to the governor.
   
3. Governor tells them that they'll need to prepare for war, and that he's making Varo an honorary legionnaire to make up for his losses in the past. He tells you to talk to Varo or Areno for things to do.
   
4. -> From this point on the city is under siege. The wilderness outside is patrolled by Telvanni agents, as is the gate of Blacklight.
   
5. A number of these quests ensue. Potential quests:
   - Destroying a Telvanni forward camp (Varo)
   - Intercepting a courier of the Telvanni carrying orders (Varo)
   - Setting traps up in the town (Rathyn)
   - Stealing a shipment of food from a Telvanni storage house (Rathyn)
   - Convincing a merchant to give his ship for the war effort to transport supplies (Varo)
   - Assist in torturing a Telvanni agent (Rathyn)
   
6. After doing 3 of the quests, a new quest is unlocked where you have to assassinate a leader of the army. You sneak out of the city to meet with your contacts, Arano and Varo. While leaving the city through a passageway, it collapses, dumping you into an abandoned mine. You go out and find yourself behind the enemy lines, just near the siege machinery. You can either escape to find Varo and Rathyn or go ahead alone to kill the leader. Either way, you're successful and return to the city through a different passage.
   
7. On completing the last three quests, the city is hit with missiles from the siege machinery. The governor tells you that you have to find a way to destroy them.
   
8. To destroy them, you'll first need Dwemer satchel charges. These can be found in a dwemer ruin outside the city.
   
9. When you have the charges, you have to back into the collapsed mine and set them up in the location underneath the trebuchets. Boom!
   

 

Act III

 

1. 
    
   
2. When you return to the city, the governor talks to you. Apparently the message from the courier revealed that there is an informant high up in the city who's been feeding the enemy information. However, the siege of the city is at a standstill as both sides rebuild their forces.
   
3. The governor tells you about a trick he learned from an old book for rooting out spies. He'll put out a dinner party with all of his suspects present, reenacting the events of A Game at Dinner.
   
4. At the party, a servant of his is poisoned and dies. Searching his quarters reveals incriminating evidence that shows he was hired by Sathmus Orethi.
   
5. Sathmus is taken away protesting to the dungeon.
   
6. When you go to talk to Sathmus, he insists that he's innocent. He tells the player to find a former aide of his who ran away in the night and is hiding out in the forests.
   
7. Turns out the aide fled to a town on the coast and is hiding there.
   
8. Turns out that bandits kidnapped him. You fight your way into their camp and find him tied up. On escorting him from the area, he'll tell you about what he saw.
   
9. Sathmus isn't a spy, but in the aide's opinion, he deserves death. He's made decisions in Raven's favor for some reason, and has ordered people executed to help Raven with crime. He suggests that he deserves death.
   
10. The informant flees to the town and takes a boat away from the area.
    
11. Outside the city, you're confronted by Raven, who offers you a large payment to allow him to die.
    
12. You return to the city to tell the governor about your discovery. Just in time to see Sathmus about to swing from a rope.
    
13. Path splits. You can save him, in which case he is shot by Raven who is sniping from above. She flees.
    
14. Otherwise, he hangs. Raven will give you the gold later.
    

 

Act IV