J_R Posted March 10, 2012 Share Posted March 10, 2012 (edited) OK.. title was cut off, but You = Modder. (Note - not sure if this should have been posted in requests, feel free to move it if necessary) Hello fantastic modders of the Nexus!! I have a dream! A dream of using creativity and manipulating what is already in place to create an epic quest line for adventurers to take part in. The overarching philosophy behind this mod is an idea of LESS IS MORE, whenever possible manipulating what's already given to us in game to lessen the burden on the modder and prevent burnout & an unfinished product. One thing I was perhaps a little disappointed about when running through vanilla skyrim was, while the world was so freaking spectacular, the ambiguity of many of the quest lines and the lack of attachment to many of the characters and events resulted in an inevitable result of being king of every organization in Skyrim without any real identity or bother. Prior to mods (and perhaps still), it really took a concerted effort to roleplay and stay in character consistently without giving in to the lure of 'god mode' - being a jack of all trades both in skill sets and in the story lines. The closest thing that came to touching on real immersive roleplay (at least for me) was the civil war, and I RP'd a character who, as a dark elf, didn't really have any investment other than loathing the racism of the stormcloaks. The only thing my character ended up really being passionate about, was his hatred of the Thalmor. And this is where my mod idea will pick up.. What makes a good story? It's the immersion and investment in the adventure, and the emotional attachment to the characters and events. Accomplishing this doesn't require a humongous mod with all the gadgets and gizmos - all it takes is some good characters, some clever writing, and a healthy dose of imagination. This was a large reason why Morrowind and older RPG's were still such great successes - when you don't have the technology, you rely instead on your other 'senses' and essentially tricking the player into believing in the expansiveness and depth of the world. In fact my very favorite quest in Skyrim wasn't complex at all - it was "A Night to Remember" - which illustrates that, when creatively crafted, a good quest doesn't have to involve a massive undertaking by modders - it just has to throw the players into the story and make them want more. The mod I have in mind will require at most 2 new areas/buildings, with only one of those being expansive and require some time to create, and a few unique NPC's scattered around skyrim. I don't want to reveal too much here (I can send a detailed structure & story board to potential modders), but the plot will involve a covert "black operation" spy-games type mission against the Thalmor, issued in secrecy by either the Imperials or Stormcloaks (default imperial if the civil war is not resolved yet). You are to meet with an undercover agent who will provide you with information on an artifact that has been smuggled into Skyrim by the Thalmor to ensure their long-term domination of the region. Through a series of side-quests, you are to gain entry into a secret underground bunker built by the Thalmor and attempt to retrieve said artifact to help dismantle the Thalmor's hold over the region. Yes, when summarized quickly here it might sound a bit cheesy, but trust me when I say the story will -not- be half-assed, and will be as lore-friendly as possible. Again, I want to emphasize that the quest line will be crafted to make the keep the actual work of modders to a minimum, while maximizing the player's immersive experience. It could actually be accomplished with the creation of one large area and 3 NPC's, though additional areas and characters would have course be great as willing by involved modders. So. What say ya'll? Edited March 10, 2012 by J_R Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SinderionsBones Posted March 17, 2012 Share Posted March 17, 2012 (edited) I'm always up for spy games type stuff. Keep in mind making quest is often way harder than making anything else in skyrim. From personal experience I can say that: - Making a town and associated interiors, npcs, navmeshes, etc.. (6+ buildings) or- Making a massive cave, with attached nordic ruin, navmeshing and adding appropriate clutter and encounters or- Making a fully custom interior and exterior(from interior pieces shrunk a little attached to an exterior... it doesn't look bad I promise...lol) or- Well I haven't done a ton of scripting, I'm in the middle of one thing, but it's not that much different since you get to see you're doing, it's mostly all in one place, and it can be replicated throughout gameplay Caused no burn out. That is, however, until I started adding the quests and dialog(also technically a quest) to them, and two or three detailed, good content quests in, started suffering from "ZOMG get me out of here!" syndrome.Try pushing through it, made it worse, try taking a break, or regular breaks... still working on that... Consider it a splash of water to the face if you need it. You're not headed to some pure nirvana of modding where it all becomes simple and lovely because you are appealing directly to the players heart and mind. Appealing to these things(in the form of quests) is many times harder than appealing to their sense of "wow pretty!" or "wow neat!"(try it yourself, look at your own gaming experience). It's almost like the CK, and... human nature... are making you pay the price, and receive diminished rewards, for attempting to create something really moving, and lasting for the player. Yup, that was entirely too deep. Whatever. You started it anyways lol:It's the immersion and investment in the adventure, and the emotional attachment to the characters and events. Accomplishing this doesn't require a humongous mod with all the gadgets and gizmos - all it takes is some good characters, some clever writing, and a healthy dose of imagination. With some purely CK related misconceptions out of the way, I do hope you will pursue this. I don't think there's anything as good as a good spy story. I'm sure someone somewhere will curse me for putting them in the same sentence but James Bond and Burn Notice FTW! Edit: http://skyrim.nexusmods.com/downloads/file.php?id=13056^Play through that mod, it just came out. The little bit of text below will make more sense lol. You'll also probably enjoy it.A first(so far as I know) and shining example of how much you can really do with zero use of the quest manager and a helping of creativity. This was put up almost right while I was writing the above stuff lol. Your idea lends itself perfectly to the sort of thing I think you're talking about. Wouldn't quests be given to spies in a more subtle way anyways? How much talking would someone in a clandestine lifestyle really need to do with those directly involved in his schemes? Not a whole lot. Which could DRASTICALLY reduce how much work you really have to do. No quest markers with the above method is just a bonus! Edited March 17, 2012 by SinderionsBones Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Shadowfoxx Posted March 17, 2012 Share Posted March 17, 2012 J_R, I am not very skillful at modding right now, but I am quite creative and full of ideas. I would love to work along side you. What do you say? :D Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
J_R Posted March 20, 2012 Author Share Posted March 20, 2012 Thanks for the responses guys. @ SinderionsBones I'm very happy you see where I'm coming from, and see why this kind of mod would be so feasible and enjoyable. You really don't need much to bring the player in and get them having fun. As I said, the only real crafting required would be creating a single underground 'base' as it were for the final act. A lot of the reason I chose this route plot-wise is exactly what you're bringing up - it can really work anywhere and with however little or much work the modders want to put in. Anywho..thanks for the mod suggestion as well, I'll definitely give it a looksee. And do let me know if you decide to take up the modding mantle again and have a desire to get on board with this! Cheers! @ Shadowfoxx Any help is appreciated, for sure! I will keep you updated as this project goes, hopefully we'll get a couple more folks on board. :) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SinderionsBones Posted March 21, 2012 Share Posted March 21, 2012 If you really are going a route that's so refreshingly minimalist, then your work really would be 90% design/thought and just a little bit modding. This works. At the end, all you have is a few, mostly world editing requirements (a room here, a note or key there, maybe a person with some odd, non dialog related, behavior in this place etc...) listed out to make the quest happen. As long as there are no ... shall we say... modding black holes... (long, fully voiced, quest lines, new effects that could be a mod in and of themselves and require a fair amount of skill) I would be happy to help in either story or relatively small world building efforts. This could really be a PM, but might as well put it up here to show support :D After trying to see this with an open mind(trying not to let the 'big mod, no skill' theme creep too far in), I see little here that raises any red flags as far as inevitable failure(rofl). I'm ALWAYS up for failing in the design phase, or while thinking up story. What I can't stand is having the *actual* mod half complete and stopping due to being unsure how to proceed or the "OMG get me out of here!" effect previously mentioned. So long as there's something to put together, complete, and simple, before even opening up the CK to start modding, the completed mod can be expanded later and indefinitely. I'll probably PM you anyways, but do let me know what you think. This mod sounds cool, but what I'm VERY interested in are more examples of being able to turn a story into a good mod with as little effort as possible. Not because I don't like effort, but many story mod ideas that could have provided lots of great game play die everyday from misunderstanding how difficult it is to do certain things in the CK. Everyone(myself very much included) has seen skyrim, and now intuitively believes that a quest now must be voiced and polished to provide the gamer(and you, we're making this crap to play ourselves too...) with any real enjoyment whatsoever. Hell, read the intro in my tutorial I linked in my sig... I virtually say 'if you don't do this, ur lame'. I hope it can be shown, and widely accepted, that this isn't the case. blah blah blah. blah blah. blah blah :psyduck: I do love to write too much and ramble. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
J_R Posted March 22, 2012 Author Share Posted March 22, 2012 Hey Sinder, Right on brotha! Sounds like we're on the same page. Admittedly I was hoping to include at least a couple of those aforementioned 'black holes'.. most specifically having a couple voiced NPC's, but the model for this mod allows for it to work without any. How entertaining and immersive it could be without any voiced actors is to be seen. I'll PM you an outline shortly. Cheers! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
barnard401 Posted March 22, 2012 Share Posted March 22, 2012 Hey, I've read through your what you've written, and it sounds mighty good. I have some scripting experience, not too much in quests, though I can easily learn. I wouldn't mind giving you a hand with anything to do with scripting (could also help with quest scripting if need be).If you want to take a look at a bit of my work, just search 'Shifts of Power' on Skyrim Workshop. I'm also making another mod at the moment which allows you to exchange perks between each other, so once again, if you need help with some scripting, I'm happy to help. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
barnard401 Posted March 22, 2012 Share Posted March 22, 2012 Hey, I've read through your what you've written, and it sounds mighty good. I have some scripting experience, not too much in quests, though I can easily learn. I wouldn't mind giving you a hand with anything to do with scripting (could also help with quest scripting if need be).If you want to take a look at a bit of my work, just search 'Shifts of Power' on Skyrim Workshop. I'm also making another mod at the moment which allows you to exchange perks between each other, so once again, if you need help with some scripting, I'm happy to help. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
J_R Posted March 22, 2012 Author Share Posted March 22, 2012 @ barnard A scripter!! Right on! Would love to have you as some scripting could definitely enhance this mod. So, I actually just wrote out pretty much the entire storyboard, and I'm up way later than I should be. Whoops! I think it kicks some major arse though, especially for a very rough draft! I PM'd it to SinderionsBones, would you like me to forward it to you? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NanakoMagojiro Posted March 22, 2012 Share Posted March 22, 2012 This project doesn't interest me personally, but i just wanted to drop in and say The overarching philosophy behind this mod is an idea of LESS IS MORE, whenever possible manipulating what's already given to us in game to lessen the burden on the modder and prevent burnout & an unfinished product. this is a refreshing and good attitude, and will take you far in modding, and the game industry in general ^_^ Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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