LE Improving the Blades

[Draco856]

Agnis is marked for Death by the Dark Brotherhood, while you can always choose not to do this quest, it locks out any other secondary brotherhood quest, so while she would have been a good choice if she wasn't involved in any quests, using her would just make doing some quests impossible

[Bretonlover]

i agree about needing to change the paarthurnax quest. and the rest is great!

[Zero713]

  On 12/4/2011 at 7:53 PM, JibstaMan said:

making some sort of puzzle for this would be awesome, but might be hard to implement....

 

In the means of discovering new shouts, perhaps it can be like the alchemy system. You can try to combine shouts and if it works, boom, discovered. Either via experimenting or found out by the lore master, Esbern, ect. Perhaps there could be like a fail shout that gives a penalty to the player. That'll even it out and restrict the player from power combining.

[JibstaMan]

  On 12/5/2011 at 1:20 AM, Zero713 said:

In the means of discovering new shouts, perhaps it can be like the alchemy system. You can try to combine shouts and if it works, boom, discovered. Either via experimenting or found out by the lore master, Esbern, ect. Perhaps there could be like a fail shout that gives a penalty to the player. That'll even it out and restrict the player from power combining.

Creating new Shouts by combining Words of Power is probably a new system that's not within the scope of this project. We might look at whether we could indeed use the same system as Alchemy, but ingredients are now Words of Power and potions are new Shouts.

Although, in my quest, I would think like doing it through dialogue.

Think of putting in your birthday, you have three drop down boxes. Skyrim probably doesn't have drop down boxes, so will use Esbern to ask the first Word of Power, you'll get three options. Then ask the second WoP and there are two options left. Now you'll have an added shout. To know whether it is correct, shout it! When it is incorrect, the shout is unlearned and some sort of penalty is added.

Shout: Life - Flesh - Spirit is corrent

Penalties:

Flesh WoP first: The regenerations of all stats (Health, Stamina, Magicka) is decreased for 1 hour (this duration works like Shrine blessings)

Spirit WoP first: You're knocked unconscious.

Life - Spirit - Flesh: Damage health by 100.

All the shout you learn by trying have the same name.

We could make all shouts with a different effect. Shouts show the Words of Power making them up (in order), so we'll need all the possible shouts anyway.

 

How does this sound?

[Draco856]

I'm thinking the words need to be moved around a bit, Flesh - Spirit - Life seems like a better combo. You give back the flesh first, then the spirit, then you bring it to life. If you bring something back to life without the flesh or spirit, it would just be unduly painful for the being you bring back, having it's flesh come back while it's "living" is just cruel, it can still feel pain, as the flesh comes back it will feel it coming back, at least that's what I think. It should be the reverse of what happens when we kill a dragon, the order that happens in is: Life - Spirit - Flesh, or Life - Flesh - Spirit depending on how you look at it because the flesh burns as we take the soul, so it's either or, for the shout we'll have to decide which order it should be in.

[Drytor]

I think this introduction to the concept of creating new shouts is quite good actually. While I doubt it can be put into this mod I don't see why someone else couldn't pick the idea up and use it. It seems like a good introductory quest for learning to create your own shouts.

 

On Agnis, I think it is pretty imprerative that we don't take any characters that already have a role in the game away and having thought about it would probably remove her as an option. I think we'll all need to do a little exploring and research to find some suitable candidates like Angi who have a limited and uninterruptable role or have newly spawning NPCs on quest start.

[Draco856]

There are always those hunters we see in the wilderness. We could just take one of them and have them be cooks, and since they are hunters, they could also help provide food for the Temple, if we have friendly dragons, they have to eat too you know, so we'd need maybe 3 hunters, minimum to make sure we have enough food for all our recruits as well as any friendly dragons if we have ones other then Odahviing. The hunters really serve no purpose, they go out, kill an elk, wolf, or other creature and act as shops in the wilds. Not too big a deal if we just create a new camp for them and add some more into the game. They are all ready randomly generated within the encounter system.

[JibstaMan]

About Agnis, the problem with her is that she involves a quest of the Dark Brotherhood, am I right? It could be an interesting quest faking her death to the Dark Brotherhood, so you complete their quest and she owes her life to you, kinda. Just an idea.

 

About the hunters. Fine idea. I personally think this could fit in the role of normal members. If you find a hunter, you can recruit him, he'll be a member of the class archer. You can now make him do jobs, like infiltrating civilization for intel, guard duty and then we just add hunting to that list.

 

I say "Member of the class archer" considering this:

  On 12/1/2011 at 9:04 PM, Drytor said:

Instead of recruiting a veteran why not have the option of choosing from among your already recruited ranks? Though farfetched I wonder if the Veteran could also give the option to change a characters skills. I don't mean that in the level up sense of the Player Character. They start as recruits and you can either pay him a sum to make them specialists as an Archer, Warrior or Mage or you can choose who to take with you to hunt Dragons and after they've helped kill so many they can improve to one of those three areas then to Master each.

 

EDIT: Recruits could be sent on "side mission" where they retrieve artifacts, books, etc. if you don't want to

[Logiwink]

First - props to Jibstaman for his recent kick-arse work.

Second - the Creation Kit is out in January according to BethSoft

 

I agree that a build-your-own shout station is beyond the scope of this mod.

 

Also, we definitely want to stay away from any NPC's that are involved in existing content - purely for compatibility purposes. That doesn't preclude us from cloning existing characters, making subtle alterations, and putting them somewhere else in the world to use.

 

I was thinking about unique items and quests in this mod and it occurred to me that a good way to unlock something like the Armory/Museum might be to go on a quest to retrieve another Dragonstone like the one from the main questline, which might be the key to opening the Armory. Or perhaps we could do something like treasure map around the new SHT culminating in pressing a hidden button on Alduin's Wall to open up the Armory. I'm ripping this off shamelessly from some of the Dragon Age Mage Tower quests like The Watchguard of the Reaching or Summoning Studies.

 

Also, I've been thinking about the Karthspire as a human town stuff (we had talked about it evolving along with the Blades order reforming). I spent the weekend doing some 'research' playing Real Time Settler for Fallout New Vegas and have concluded that something like that is just not in the cards. Someone will port RTS to Skyrim in a heavily modified form (I hope) and that will be that. A separate Karthspire mod might be fun but will have to be done either after this mod or by someone else. If anyone is interested in doing the Karthspire mod and wants to work with Reforging the Blades to ensure compatibility, let me know.

Edited December 5, 2011 by Logiwink

[JibstaMan]

  On 12/5/2011 at 1:47 PM, Drytor said:

On Agnis, I think it is pretty imprerative that we don't take any characters that already have a role in the game away and having thought about it would probably remove her as an option. I think we'll all need to do a little exploring and research to find some suitable candidates like Angi who have a limited and uninterruptable role or have newly spawning NPCs on quest start.

  On 12/5/2011 at 7:34 PM, Logiwink said:

First - props to Jibstaman for his recent kick-arse work.

Second - the Creation Kit is out in January according to BethSoft

 

I agree that a build-your-own shout station is beyond the scope of this mod.

 

Also, we definitely want to stay away from any NPC's that are involved in existing content - purely for compatibility purposes. That doesn't preclude us from cloning existing characters, making subtle alterations, and putting them somewhere else in the world to use.

Thanks. Good to know what I'm doing is well received.

And considering compatibility I totally agree.

 

I will edit this post... I think it'd be good to start making decisions on when is what. How and when do things start? So I'll be changing this post with what I (and using the suggestions already in this topic) have come up with.

Saving precious topic space, put it in a spoiler!

 

 

  Reveal hidden contents

Reforging the Blades

After Alduin’s Wall Delphine will allow you to restore Sky Haven Temple and shape it into a base for the Blades. I think it would be most realistic if we would leave it totally up to the player how and when to do that.

Once you've talked to Delphine and she allowed you to restore Sky Haven Temple for the Blades (you don't own anything, the Blades do), there will be a board listing the possible improvements and/or restorations. You can choose which option you want to do, starting the corresponding quest.

I believe it be good to make some tools (like Working Bench) a matter of finding the right person who can sell such a tool and getting enough gold to pay for it. Others can either be bought (for speed) or you'll have to do some errand for the seller to get it cheaper or maybe even free (could be the case for an Arcane Enchanter). A recruit can in some cases have the right contacts to buy a tool, so giving that recruit the money to buy the tool is also possible (like a smith knowing where to get a Smelter). For the more special tools (like when we want to make a special forge that allows the crafting of Akaviri weaponry and Blades armor) there can be special quests.

Recruits that do a specific job require a certain set of tools to do their job. Without these tools, you can still recruit him/her, but he/she can’t perform his job (and in this case the quest tier level won’t increase until the tools are present).

 

Realistically speaking, an operation like this requires funding. Thought it would be really cool to implement some sort of guild funds system, this is probably low on the priority list. This will mean that the player will have to fund everything by him/her self. Considering this, recruitment quests could use some sort of money reward. Like, thinking about what Delphine said: "Know that being a Blade is a lifetime commitment", people who accept your invitation to join the Blades, give you what their property is worth to you (or the Blades once there is a Guild System) to allow you to fund the/more improvements of Sky Haven Temple. Quests like Loyalty above all (see my Design Document) involve more people, not all joining the Blades. In this case, you might be able to convince some of 'em to give you some money for funding your cause.

 

The Paarthurnax quest is the time on which you have a decision to make. Either kill Paarthurnax, allowing the Blades to continue their path towards annihilation of the dragons. Or take a stand for Paarthurnax, convincing Delphine and Esbern of their poor judgment. This will lead on the second path, one with allied dragons.

What both paths have in common is the Thalmor problem. They continue to be a pain in the ass. They continue to seek out the Blades.

 

The Path of the Dovah Kriid (Dragonslayer):

After killing Paarthurnax, you will be allowed to join the Blades. You've proven your loyalty, but by tradition you'll have to take the Dragonslayer's oath. After this oath, you're a member and can start the recruitment process.

Every member you bring has to take the Dragonslayer's oath, a lifetime commitment. Your judgment alone is not enough to make them members, you have to run things by Delphine.

 

The Path of the Dovah Fahdon (Dragon friend)

This path needs some way to convince Delphine and Esbern of their poor judgment, to believe dragons can be allies. Some sort of debate / meeting with them could be nice, but also quite hard to make. This debate or convincing stuff should have multiple outcomes. One being you become Grand-Master and determine the new direction in which you take the Blades. You could then make your own oath. The other being Delphine changing her mind about "all dragons are evil" and will lead the Blades on their new path. After those outcomes, the recruitment process starts.

This path will lead to allied dragons, but of course the Dragonslaying is not completely over.

 

I think Drytor's idea (fourth paragraph) is very good way to start the recruitment process and gradually rebuild the Blades.

 

 

Edited December 5, 2011 by JibstaMan