LE Freelance work

[Cryogenius333]

I couldn't entirely fit the request into the description.

Basically, I think it would be interesting if you could hold your own occupation as an assassin or a fence.

The fencing part might be a bit lucrative, but I've always entertained the idea of just being able to wait in a tavern and have people come to me and offer to pay me for killing people.

I know you can just go to the Jarl's and just ask them for a bounty letter... but somehow, it's not the same.

Same with thieves guild and dark brotherhood. Of course, maybe the reason you can't freelance is because they rub you out the moment you move onto their turf

I tried looking across the Nexus for mods under freelance, assassin, fence, thief, whatnot, but I've come up blank again and again.

If somebody could point me towards something similiar to this, or maybe look into creating something like it, I'd appreciate it.

I just think It would be cool to make your own reputation as a whatever. Even something along the lines of a traveling wizard.

As I seem to recall before Skyrim came out that you were supposed to be able to hold an occupation- or maybe I'm thinking of another game, I may have to look into the previews and reviews again- It just kind of...popped into my mind.

 

Of course, I suppose having random people waking up and asking you to kill someone might get tiresome eventually.

Perhaps as a mercenary, with the addition of actual scaled battles between Stormcloaks and Imperials, not the little tussles you always somehow seem to stumble across in the wilderness. have one faction or the other come to you and pay to take part in their battles.

 

Forgive me, I'm starting to drift. Freelance work. Assassin, thievery, or muscle, without a guild, depending on your combination of stats, like sneak and one handed, or lockpicking and pickpocketing... so on.

[dawnroed]

Interesting idea. It would be pretty cool if more NPCs were pro-active, sort of like Couriers.

This is a very long post. You may want to just read the TLDR at the very bottom.

 

 

A few obstacles to think about though:

- It has to be interesting for the player when they wait if you're not using the "Wait" function to skip it over. However, it has the same problem as the next one:

- Random people walking up to you when adventuring will break the immersion for some: who told them that they would be here at this particular time? If using the wait function above, how can people be confident enough to talk to someone in public in order to kill someone? How can you advertise this? How will NPCs react when you advertise this? Or when they find out? Immersion is something to really consider.

- It has to fit into the lore. The DB is in the assassination business, and would not take kindly to competition. Recall Morrowind with the different criminal factions warring against each other.

(There are sure to be a lot to think about)

 

A few things I've thought about concerning these problems:

1. As was mentioned, adding a script on the waiting function would work. A better solution would be hiring someone (preferably a companion, housecarl, spouse) to hang at a specific place (ie, taverns, abandoned buildings, cleared out castle/tower) with a specified schedule. Every day, or depending on the schedule, this NPC would return to a specified meeting place (like the PCs home) at a time specified by the player-made schedule. Then, at the PC's whim, he/she can go there and talk to see if anyone has a job for the PC.

In essense, this is adding and modifying the schedule of the NPC (activities such as drinking, sleeping, walking, idling, etc) to accomodate for this job.

2. The second problem outlined can be fixed a bit by the above solution.

For advertising, quests can simplify and address the immersion problem a bit. For example: secretly paying the tavern owner, or barkeep (either directly, or indirectly), and depending on the level of your speech, they will do one of these things:

• Reject, and tell everyone (bad rep)
  
• Reject, and tell those who ask (bad rep)
  
• Reject, and tell those who give a little bit of coin (bad rep)
  
• Reject, and tell guards when they ask with coin (bad rep)
  
• Reject, and tell those who give a lot of coin (bad rep)
  
• Reject, and tell no one
  

If the NPC rejects, the PC has the option of either

1. Persuade: Just joking (fail and PC would not be able to get last result. Fail again, and lost next 2, fail for the 3rd time, and he/she'll tell everyone)
   
2. Bribe: Sorry, I was just joking, here, don't take it seriously (only has two outcomes: success gets last one, failure gets second last one)
   
3. Intimidate: Don't tell anyone, or else (fail, lose last 2, fail again, person calls guards, tells everyone, and you get a bounty for trying to make an crime syndicate)
   

• Accept, and will tell those who give a little bit of coin
  
• Accept, and will tell guards with coin
  
• Accept, and will tell those who give a lot of coin, and/or successful intimidate
  
• Accept, and will tell no one, except through a successful intimidate
  
• Accept, and keep a note about it on their person
  
• Accept, and tell no one, even in death
  

For NPCs wanting to kill others, it has to be addressed either by adding more NPCs, adding migrating NPCs, couples who make children who grow up to become adults, adding NPCs living in the wilderness, or only asking to kill those who are bandits, forsworn, or those who live in Imperial or Stormcloak camps.

Clients can come in a few forms:

• Desperate: They will contact the NPC at daylight or night, or even the PC if they can find out who he/she is. Will not care about PC's rep
  
• Needy: They will contact the NPC only at night, will not care much about PC's rep
  
• Revenge: They will contact the NPC when no one is around, will not care about PC's rep. Will insist in coming with PC (Speech check to reject)
  
• Suicidal: They will contact NPC at daylight, will not care about PC's rep. Will insist in coming with PC (no way out of it). When they see target dead, will take suicide. Or, they will make up. It's up to the quest maker to decide.
  
• Prank: They will contact NPC at daylight or night time when no one is around, will care about PC's rep. Hit will be a friend, spouse, or rival. Can sometimes be waiting at the place to watch the person's reaction. If PC carries on with hit, will be sad, call the guards, and start attacking PC or running away depending on cowardice level. Or be at their home. If this is so, if PC carries on with hit, will do the same thing when PC personally returns. NPC may die. High speech will give hints on why they want this particular NPC 'killed'. Listening to the target will give hints if this is a prank. Going on with the hit, and failing to remove bounty will result in guards investigating.
  
• Curious: They will contact NPC when no one is around, will avoid PC only if rep is bad. Will be a recurring client
  
• Curious 2: They will contact NPC when no one is around, will avoid PC only if rep is really bad. Requires completion of previous request. Recurring client.
  
• Curious 3: They will contact NPC when no one is around, will avoid PC only if rep is at the very bottom. Requires completion of previous request. Recurring client.
  
• Curious 4: They will contact NPC when no one is around, will not avoid PC. Requires completion of previous request. Recurring client. Can ask for multiple hits. Will recommend PC to others.
  
• Recommended 1: Same as above, stats of Curious 2
  
• Recommended 2: Same as above, stats of Curious 3
  
• Recommended 3: Same as above, stats of Curious 4 Will begin to spread the word to common people
  
• Common: These are random. They can either be desperate, needy, wanting revenge, suicidal (truly suicidal cases are rarer), or prank
  
• Sting 1: Will contact at night. Random, same as common, but not suicidal
  
• Sting 2: Will contact at night. Random, same as common, but not suicidal, same place or close
  
• Sting 2: Will contact at night. Random, same as common, but not suicidal, close to their HQ
  
• Sting 2: Will contact at night. Random, same as common, but not suicidal, close to their HQ
  
• Sting 3: Will contact at night. Random, same as common, but not suicidal, close to PC's home/hq
  
• Sting 4: Will contact at night. Revenge, close to PC's home/hq or their's. If at PC's, hit will try to run to PC's home, where he/she will put up a fight. Then the backup arrives from all doors. If at their HQ, person will be at HQ near bright lit place, and when the PC fires first arrow, or comes close, revengeful NPC will strike PC, and backup willl arrive. Automatic 1000 bounty or something similar to that hold. Will have to undergo the bribe guards, Jarl quest in order to go peacefully in the hold again. To bribe guards, will have to go through the Thieves guild, where they will put a note to the head of the guards that PC will pay a specific amount per week for a month or so, OR a courier will give a quest per day which must be completed that day, or else the month of 'testing' wil be extended by 5 days. After all that, hold's guards are now peaceful, and will not care about PC's criminal syndicate rep. Then, the PC can now start a quest to bribe Jarl, etc etc etc
  
• Lure 1: Will contact at night. Suicidal or revenge. At the place, there will be no one, and a number of NPCs will attack.
  
• Lure 2: Will contact at night. Random, not suicidal or revenge. At the place, there will be the target. On the way back, a number of NPCs will attack.
  
• Lure 3: Will contact at night. Random. At the place is a target of the DB. A day later, there will be DB attacks (3)
  

For how NPCs react, it really depends. If you use your spouse, you will easily get bad rep if they find out (and they will very quickly if you make any mistake). Difficulty of them finding out goes like this, from easiest to hardest:

• Spouse
  
• Housecarl
  
• Paid common
  
• Intimidated common 1 (low level, threatening just their life)
  
• Paid mercenary
  
• Paid intimidated common 1 (low level, threatening just their life)
  
• Paid intimidated mercenary
  
• Persuaded common 1 (low level, promised food - only works with beggars)
  
• Highly paid mercenary (weekly pay - they will come to you automatically - it's in their schedule)
  
• Paid persuaded mercenary
  
• Intimidated common 2 (high level, threatening their friends and family - can be a mini quest)
  
• Highly paid persuaded mercenary (weekly pay - they will come to you automatically - it's in their schedule)
  
• Paid highly persuaded common 1 (persuaded by saying these people need to die or else people won't want them dead - can be a mini quest to prove it)
  
• Paid highly persuaded common 2 (persuaded by agreeing to help their family - can be a mini quest to give them what they need)
  
• Paid highly persuaded/intimidated common 3 (persuaded by agreeing to help family, and initmidating by saying that you will kill them if they don't do it - can be a mini quest)
  
• Paid highly persuaded/intimidated common 4 (persuaded by agreeing to help family, and intimidating by saying you will kill them if they don't do it. Also creating bonds with the rest of family, bringing them into the same business as this NPC {although they start as common 2})
  
• Paid highly persuaded common 5 (persuaded by agreeing to help family. Done radiant quests in protecting from other assassins, bandits, or rescued their family members)
  
• Paid highly persuaded common 6 (persuaded by agreeing to hlep family. Done radiant quests in securing future for their children)
  
• Paid highly persuaded common 7 (persuaded by agreeing to help family. Specific radiant quest of creating a butler family - rare)
  

When someone finds out, someone will investigate, usually someone assigned by the Jarl. If PC is a Thane, this will not happen unless the rep becomes really bad, or when people are afraid of the PC. Jarl will remove PC's thane status forcibly, by assigning a very high bounty, that even if payed, the PC will go to jail with nothing, and will have to escape from jail. Over and over again. Only way to fix this is to bribe all the guards, mutiny, and place a Jarl that is friendly to the PC. This can be a quest. Or the PC can pre-empt this and be given a quest to bribe the Jarl, and his/her subjects. When this happens, Jarl will authorize the use of the PC's NPC's meeting place, and place a few guards there. It will only be a front, say, a consulation business, but everyone knows what that means. When this happens, not everything is perfect as various do-gooders will hire various groups to hit you. Going this way however, will stop all attacks by the DB, who will only attack three times if you accidentally kill someone who is a target of the DB.

 

 

For the third point of the lore, it can be fixed by doing something ilke Morrowind where multiple factions fight each other. The PC will be tasked to protect their business as he/she will have to fend off assassins not only trying to kill them, but their hired NPCs and spouse as well. Also, what the PC is trying to is is basically something like a criminal syndicate, and the hold will act accordingly.

 

This small thing, to make it satisfying and immersive, needs a lot of work. Voice actors/actresses or at least dialogue are needed, especially for the quest related things.

 

 

TLDR: Getting cilents solution: Hire NPCs to work on the 'front'. Lore solution: DB will attack. Hold will investigate.

 

In any case, these are just advice. Have a nice day.

[TheDarkPrince]

Awesome ideas.

[Ashven]

Or someone can mod in mailboxes, and every once in a while, you'll get a letter from someone offering a potential job, and asking you to come meet them if you're interested. The quest would only start once you read the letter, and could be gotten rid of by telling the person you're not interested, if you're not interested, and that way the person offering the job wouldn't pester you until you read the letter.

 

There are couriers, but no basic postal system. Even going to a new NPC in a castle and asking "Any parcels in my name?" would be cool.

[Cryogenius333]

Damn....

 

That's pretty much the rundown of it. Got everything right there. Excellent ideas, and very well thought out.

Just one problem...

 

I don't suppose you can find somebody who can build this for me... because I certainly can't. I don't know how to write script... and that's A LOT of script writing. Hell, you could make a standalone GAME off of that.

Also, while the title is focused freelance assassination, I'm aware that some people... like my friend Timer5, bless his golden little heart, don't like assassinating people. Both him and my friend Jon went out of their way to expose and destroy the Dark Brotherhood. Jon even tried to slaughter the Thieves guild, and found out they were all essential.

From that, what happens with all the Dark Brotherhood involvement if you took the quest to wipe out the Dark Brotherhood and finished it? It is known to some that there is only one sanctuary left, and they won't want to commit three or more separate attacks against you Ingrid is brutally protective of her family.

Enough reason for them to allow a standalone cutter? Perhaps attempt to recruit you, instead of kill you, like with the Aventus Aretino incident?

Just things to look into.

Some people will want to look into work as thieves, treasure hunters, mercs, enforcers, caravan guards hell, maybe bakers, farmers and smiths. I'm sure lots of people wouldn't mind having people pay them to make armor (Though I can see the fluidity and lore issues in that. Not necessarily just illegal occupations. I titled it Freelance Work.

I just personally prefer assassination, because all my high level characters are focused on assassination.

Great ideas though. I appreciate the input. You have a lot of ingenuity.

[TheDarkPrince]

Any news?

[Sanbru]

Or someone can mod in mailboxes, and every once in a while, you'll get a letter from someone offering a potential job, and asking you to come meet them if you're interested. The quest would only start once you read the letter, and could be gotten rid of by telling the person you're not interested, if you're not interested, and that way the person offering the job wouldn't pester you until you read the letter.

 

There are couriers, but no basic postal system. Even going to a new NPC in a castle and asking "Any parcels in my name?" would be cool.

 

Well, not sure about mailboxes. The idea that came to me was perhaps instead of having to go the Jarls for missions like that or a courier, perhaps have wanted signs posted on the walls of the taverns or somewhere around town. Kind of like Oblivion had with the Grey Fox.

 

http://images.uesp.net/5/56/WantedPoster.jpg

[Cryogenius333]

Any news?

 

Err, news? Sorry, I haven't looked at the forums in Eons. had too much to do. I think this one kid of falled off the map, as it were. lots of request do that. I'll keep people posted if anything happens, yes?

[littleork]

So you want those people to come to you and offer you the jobs right? not you come to them? Because I have a mod that I do that offer more professions in Skyrim BUT you have to go see the npc to get jobs, I have that one job that makes you kill people and I still had a long list of jobs to include in the mod (like thieves,bodyguard,mercenary,barkeeper, priest etc).

 

Having the people come to you to offer you the jobs probably requires to work with events in the CK and unfortunately, I am still too much of a beginner to work on those.I think it is a great idea though, I always thought that people would come to you to ask you to do things like these but looks like it was never included.