Total Realism Overhaul

[Mansh00ter]

Just as an example, Spark spell has been transformed from a basic electric damage spell rendered useless at later levels into a very useful crowd control spell. Now it has an 80% chance of a light stagger if the target is already wounded and when dual-casting, and will knock the target completely down in spastic convulsions if it is under 45% health, even with one handed casting. So you could, for example, blast a group of enemies with a fireball, and then proceed to go all Palpatine on them. Doesn't work on Dragons or creatures otherwise immune to paralysis.

If you think that may be overpowered, remember that a lowly bandit can kill you with a couple of axe swings so imagine what three or four Draugr could do. You will need crowd control and lots of it.

 

Oh, and it should also work on you, so watch out. :P

 

A few ideas came to my mind reading this.

 

How do you wish to counter-balance these new, powerful magic effects? For example flame spell is available at the start of the game, if it will be poweful (as can be expected from a stream of fire) then it'll make the game fairly easy even for warrior character types because you can have 1 sword/shield for attack or defense while still having a poweful spell at your other hand. My suggestion would be to make theese spells really magica costy, like fire spell eating up ~50-70 pts of Magicka.

 

Well, for one, you will probably have to dual cast the spell to get the most "utility" out of it. As it is right now, having a spell in one hand and a sword in another would mean you will likely fail to stop a charging enemy (you need to get them down to 45% health for the knockdown to kick in and the spell is fairly weak when it comes to damage dealing) and will not be able to effectively block their (lethal) attacks. If it turns out to be too powerful, I will add a condition that you need to dual cast for all utility effects, and/or tweak conditions for those effects to kick in. That should prevent it going overpowered.

 

Take also a fireball spell - the new version will have a physical impact component to it, meaning it will also toss creatures around. But it will require much more magicka to cast, you will have to overcharge it to send people flying (a single handed version only staggers) and it will require a much longer casting time, meaning it will be an excellent opener, but not much use in the middle of a fight. That way I am hoping to create a system where no single spell is good in every situation and keeps mage play varied and interesting.

 

And of course, everything described above will also apply to you, so going up against a magic wielder will be a whole new experience! ;)

 

I'm currently using the Unleveled World Mod, which makes loot and level of enemies indepentent on player level, but it feels dumb that a high level enemy in leather armor has 10x more health than the lower level one next to him. Would be good to have something similiar in your mod, but with higher skill meaning better attack/defense strategy (more shield bashing, blocking, more powerattacks etc) rather than more health. And of course making hi-end equipment (Ebony, Glass, Deadric, Dragon etc) extremely rare.

 

I've been looking over the leveled lists in the CK yesterday and yeah, getting rid of some of them is definitely on the table. But they are fairly complex, 90% of leveled lists have nested leveled lists in them, so just turning them off would create the experience you described above. So I plan on going over those lists for sure, but it will take more time to do a proper job. And yeah, high-end weapons will be extremely rare - not that you will really need them when it comes to damage, a steel axe will cut just as well as an elven one. The differences will be in other characteristics.

 

By the way, could you share us some info on hows the locational damage and equipment degradation turns out? Is it possible with the engine?

 

The only reference to the old locational damage system from Fallout I have found is in the bodyparts data, where only heads and bodies are specifically referenced. There are damage multipliers for each body part so I plan on testing if at least I can make headshots lethal, that would go really well with archery. Other than that, both full dismemberment and full locational damage seem to be impossible right now, at least until someone successfuly recreates the F3 skeletons and dismemberment data. I am not sure if more body parts can be added at this time, since I have to see if I could reference specific bones required etc. at least so there can be full locational damage.

Also, dismemberment options seem to be turned off in the CK, so yeah, no exploding people right now. :/

 

Ah and have you tried experimenting with this? It shows a great potential.

 

I would love to have weapon damage types, and the above is actually the approach I am considering, but I have to see if it can be done reliably. Theoretically it is possible to do armor type detection, maybe through keywords, and if it is possible to include a on-hit damage modification script to each weapon, essentially you would get a functional damage type resistances for all weapons.

 

There are a LOT of weapons and armor sets in the game though, and each would have to be looked at, so it won't be a quick undertaking, and won't make it into initial releases.

[obren2obren]

After I read about this mod I just can't wait to try it. The same was with the Third Age Total War mod, but it took a lot of time and patience to create something so great like that mod. I guess I need to be extra patient with this mod also if we all want to enjoy it properly. After I saw that the poster is answering almost all questions and suggestions, I realize he is pretty committed to his project and I wish for him all the best with his work. Anyway I started to "simulate" food, drink and sleep requirements in Skyrim and I walk everywhere across the map. :wink: Just a quick question to waste the Mansh00ters time, how will you release the mod and are you working with the Creation kit?

[Maddy21]

This idea is awesome...

 

ALL HAIL Mansh00ter

ALL HAIL Mansh00ter :laugh:

[tomislawus]

Just so you know Mansh00ter man, I never buy Bethesda RPG right after they release it as I just cant play them without realism mods so the "when and if" I buy the game is totally dependent on "when and if" you release your sexy mod. Me and Bethesda (for my money) are counting on you, man!

 

Back to the mod itself... I hate when playing a mage comes to running 'n' gunning people - running away from warriors while hurling fireballs. I would like to see the mage as an intellectual type with weak body and strong mind, not the athletic one that depends on outrunning melee fighters.

 

For me, mage is someone who relies on crowd control spells (telekinetic push, paralyze runes, illusions etc) to keep the melee fighters away from him (for inspiration look at how Dragon Age mage plays out). I hope this is the way you want magic to work in your mod. If it was already mentiod somewhere else, please forgave mah:D

 

One more thing, have you considered making use of magic for non mage characters harder than it is? I hate that my fresh new character - a nord warrior - can cast spells right from the start just like any breton or altmer. Shouldn't he have a much lower starting magicka and no spells in its book at the start? I think you could modify the amount of starting magicka by modifying racial traits - give a nord only like 10 (or something, its just an example) magicka but balance it by increasing its starting stamina by 90 (in that particular situation). Being a nord mage should be hard, right?

[seanxx]

Will this mod make somethings mutually exclusive? I think Smithing and enchantment are fine...but they should be mutually exclusive.

[TheRagMan]

i like everything...but... arent you covering too much MODS possibilities preventing others to start their?

i ll be happy if u ll done all this work... can u start a new topic with a First real project?

i dont want to be mean!!! IMHOIMHOIMHO

[Mansh00ter]

Just a quick question to waste the Mansh00ters time, how will you release the mod and are you working with the Creation kit?

 

The mod will be released in a modular form, meaning there will be separate .esp's for various features, and later it will also come with a built-in config menu so players can set some preferences of their own. And yes, I am working with the CK.

 

Just so you know Mansh00ter man, I never buy Bethesda RPG right after they release it as I just cant play them without realism mods so the "when and if" I buy the game is totally dependent on "when and if" you release your sexy mod. Me and Bethesda (for my money) are counting on you, man!

 

Back to the mod itself... I hate when playing a mage comes to running 'n' gunning people - running away from warriors while hurling fireballs. I would like to see the mage as an intellectual type with weak body and strong mind, not the athletic one that depends on outrunning melee fighters.

 

For me, mage is someone who relies on crowd control spells (telekinetic push, paralyze runes, illusions etc) to keep the melee fighters away from him (for inspiration look at how Dragon Age mage plays out). I hope this is the way you want magic to work in your mod.

 

Pretty much. A pure mage will be very vulnerable to "cold steel", so I plan on giving them plenty of tools to offset that. It should also make NPC mages more interesting to fight against. Many spells will be buffed in power and lethality and there will be lots of utility changes like the ones I outlined a few posts above. Warriors taking on mages will have to rely on shields to deflect damage, or arrows to engage and kill them at a distance. A single warrior blindly charging a mage head on will not fare well unless they can do it real fast. I think that's actually more lore friendly as well than the way it is in vanilla game.

 

One more thing, have you considered making use of magic for non mage characters harder than it is? I hate that my fresh new character - a nord warrior - can cast spells right from the start just like any breton or altmer. Shouldn't he have a much lower starting magicka and no spells in its book at the start? I think you could modify the amount of starting magicka by modifying racial traits - give a nord only like 10 (or something, its just an example) magicka but balance it by increasing its starting stamina by 90 (in that particular situation). Being a nord mage should be hard, right?

 

Not necessarily. Nords are not bad mages by default, it's just that their culture frowns on magic and thus very few Nords break from the mold their society imposes on them. In fact, as far as lore goes, no race is singled out as being inept at magical arts. TES lore goes more in the way of "who *excels* at what", not "who sucks at what", so some races have an aptitude for certain things, but no race has a special ineptitude for various skills and arts.

 

 

Will this mod make somethings mutually exclusive? I think Smithing and enchantment are fine...but they should be mutually exclusive.

 

Why? I can think of a lucrative career as an arcane smith, and that's enchanting and smithing combined. :)

It won't be so easy to max out either though.

 

i like everything...but... arent you covering too much MODS possibilities preventing others to start their?

i ll be happy if u ll done all this work... can u start a new topic with a First real project?

i dont want to be mean!!! IMHOIMHOIMHO

 

Well, it's not a competition. In fact, I am sure others will very likely make specialized mods dealing with some things before TRO gets around to it... who knows, if they're good enough and the authors are willing to give permission, I might end up incorporating those mods into TRO and saving myself some work.

[Oomo]

i like everything...but... arent you covering too much MODS possibilities preventing others to start their?

 

 

How does Person A releasing a mod prevent others starting theirs? ~baffled~ Unless the other person is very insecure who falsely views the modding scene as a competition.

[TheRagMan]

Cause im a Noob and manshooters is a Nasa programmer...it is useless if i do the same mod.

im 32 years old...OLD!!!! i do competion for money and girls and my only mod is released under WTFU licence...so...wrong way guys ,:) i just want to know what HE DOES NOT (focus priority obviously!!) and i hope he ll do everything!!

sorry for misunderstanding ...

 

and for info... my only pragmatic project is a dungeon quest related to my slaughterfish retexture.....so ...i think it is more embarass then competition ;)

[lupuslupus]

Great ideas :thumbsup: . I can't wait to try this mod. I have a simple idea to add a little more realism: you can't change any armor piece or clothes in the middle of the battle.