Improved Vanilla Quests

[meh12345]

(Since everyone may not have completed everything, please use spoiler tags where appropriate.)

 

I'm late to the party and only now playing through the main quests. Aside from actual bugs, I've bumped into various quests that could be significantly improved, often with (seemingly) very little work, and without producing opinionated results.There're a few broad categories in this, roughly in increasing difficulty of implementation:

 

- Alternative dialogue options. I, for example, found quite a few of the statements to be unnecessarily rude, obtuse, or otherwise inappropriate for the type of character I was trying to play. These are pretty low-hanging fruit since quest objectives and stages don't really need to be altered. (It'd be great if these could be tied to some type of alignment/playstyle metrics, but that's beyond the scope of this… just letting the player choose from a bigger list is fine). There's *tons* of these.

 

Example (main quest):

 

Demanding the shout from Paarthanax (even when the earlier dialogue has exposed it as a potentially very bad idea, and not to mention you're talking to a dragon…), and later demanding the scroll from orcy sorcy in the library.

 

 

Example (Civil War/Markarth):

 

Related slightly to factions, even though it would have no *actual* effect (yet! Maybe at some point), the player could for example only join the Imperials if Gen. Tullius agreed to help the Reachers take back Markarth.

 

 

- Readjusting when dialogue options become available. There're a lot of problems with this, being able to ask about people who you've never met by name, and so on. Riften seemed particularly bad about this. Similarly, sometimes NPCs spill the beans on quests a little too readily.

 

- Alternative means of advancing/completing quest. For example, bribery/intimidation/persuasion/sneaking rather than killing (or bribing/intimidating/persuading/sneaking, whatever the option is).

 

Example (Orphans):

 

Really? The dragonborn can't intimidate a decrepit lady? Or report to authorities? Or, I dunno, physically carry the crone to the nearest seafaring vessel bound for a different continent?

 

 

- NPC reactions. Sometimes they're a bit awkward in relation to quest events, or they inexplicably over/underestimate the player's power.

 

Example (Dark Brotherhood):

 

If you kill Astrid, the prisoners could be a little less unappreciative.

 

 

Example (East India Trading Co Simile):

 

Umm, you just assume I'd be joining you in this fight? Because of…?

 

 

Example (Markarth):

 

Nepos, old codger, you seriously think an octogenerian, a waif, and…a cook? can take out this very dangerous-looking guy or gal? With you warning them, no less?

 

 

- Railroading. There are several quests where you're lacking reasonable options (especially in a certain city, surely drawn up by the same designer or group of designers). Don't get me wrong, I think it's perfectly fine to put the player in bad or no-win situations, even with very little warning, but they must be reasonable and without logical faults (less restrictive quests can be more lax about that too).

 

Example (that Certain City™):

 

Player shouldn't get thrown in jail without being able to plead case or somehow sneak to warn the appropriate authorities. Especially if they're already a Thane! (See below, too).

 

 

Example (East India Trading Co Simile):

 

Why can't you tell the nice, oppressed dark elf lady that the competing organization is out to get her? Maybe she could cut a deal with them, or organize a little pause to let the dust settle…

 

 

- Factions, honorifics (thane/military ranks), skills, and friendships. Should be more (or in some cases less) important, and allow more dialogue options (possibly just with same results) and/or alternatives to advancing quests.

 

Example (Civil War):

 

Being a Whiterun Thane could maybe be a bigger impact in getting Balgruuf to listen to whichever side you're on. (Again, you don't even have to touch the actual gameplay, it'd just be nice flavour and make the player feel more important.

 

 

Example (Markarth):

 

Forsworn still hate the player. While it'd be a little unrealistic to assert that the notoriously disorganized Forsworn could all be contacted to relay the info, it's still better than having them attack the player. In reality, the player should be able to try to persuade them even in an ambush, maybe by shouting and showing the reward gear (or whatever). Side idea: implement some kind of a “stop fighting, let's try to talk this out and if we still don't agree, then we'll continue” mod.

 

 

- NPC relations in quests. These are mostly fine, but in some cases it's questionable how the enemies coexist.

 

Example: Blackreach

 

Falmer and unsentient dwemer constructs living peacefully side by side? Am I missing some lore? Even falmer aren't sneaky enough to build unprotected right next to traps and constructs.

 

 

- Random NPC speeches. Need more of these, sometimes they're too oblivious, sometimes too knowing.

 

 

Additionally, there are some probably reasonably simple (but less specific) changes:

 

- Timed quests that fail (completely, or forcing a retry at a later point). Some quests have NPCs hanging around inexplicably long just waiting for you.

- Removing or hiding unnecessary dialogue options/questions.

- Time-dependencies. Some quests aren't appropriately restricted.

 

 

I tried searching around, and doesn't seem that even PISE or TRO are addressing these particular issues. Is anyone already working on this? And/or people willing to collaborate? The nice thing is that these can be achieved completely piecemeal even though they all fall under a broader umbrella (logistically, mods could be grouped as optionals or be separate with a central compilation mod for the users).

Edited February 28, 2012 by meh12345