Badmojo

One thing that I have some trouble with in RPG's is keeping up with all the important NPC's and how they are connected with each other. I will meet some interesting NPC's and have everything organized in my brain, then I will wonder off and do some other quests and/or forget the game for a while and come back later, just to forget who and what had happened. I will be like, wait, was this person a good or bad guy, were they friends or enemies with this or that person..etc. Its pretty minor, but it would be cool to have some detailed description of each NPC, monster, and relationship. There was an (admittedly adult) visual novel Kara no Shoujo that had a pretty cool journal/detective system. Would be cool to see it in something like it. Here are some of the things. Simple, nice and clean interface, shows all the important NPC's, gives you basic info that UPDATES as you learn more about them. In PE, you could have other info, race, gender, religion..etc, I also like there is a portrait/picture next to the info. A lot journals just show the name with the info, which is great if you remember them, sometimes you don't. I think a portrait/picture improves the quality and makes it easier to place names to characters. (I am horrible with names myself, I have to read up on how someone acts to place them in a book). On a related note, might have a section on the right for monsters and another for locations. Ok, this is the evidence list (it is a detective game), although we might call it the quest list in PE (though, wasn't one of the NPC's a detective? if you can become a detective, perhaps you can use evidence list...*shrug*), as you learn more about the quests, you gain more info. This is pretty standard RPG here, although some devs for some reason keep the journal entries together, so you will have several quests piled on top of each other. Keeping them separate and nicely organized is a must in my opinion. Now, this is the one that I really like, a simple diagram using portraits that show how NPC/s are connected to each other and the character (perhaps include factions as well). Like everything else, it updates and changes when more information comes in and/or the character makes a choice. I do not know if the devs have even started on a journal or not, nor if this is feasible or help in any way. Just thought it was cool and wanted to share.

You cannot say this without seeing how it's done in game. Here's the delicious irony: If a game doesn't have the sexism, it's unrealistic. If the game has sexism but the roles are reversed, it's simply dismissed as an unoriginal attempt to mirror it and its point is undermined. I'd argue it's significantly lazier to just use Earth's history as a foundation for how to make the characters. This is a seriously bad reflection of ourselves. You're right, it's true that people justify their perception this way. It's horrifying that it is. This is the problem. We are not wired biologically this way. There are reasons why people assume that we are, but it's not a good thing. There have actually been functioning societies in history that did not have significant gender inequality. Biological determinism would not allow this if it were true. Realistically what you're looking for here isn't gender inequality though. It's borderline misogyny. Being a woman should be more difficult in Project Eternity because it's the only way women should have it. The really horrifying thing is that people say they want it so that they can overcome it. But if the roles are reversed and it's matriarchal, it's just not acceptable. It's not believable. This is awful. Sorry, but as soon as you said the M word (misogyny), I stopped reading. That word has been used, stretched, and abused so much that I think its lost all meaning. That, sexist, rape supporter, pig, etc are just shock words to villianfy a person and I will not have it. If people want to discuss how VIRTUAL CHARACTERS are in a game, lets discuss it, and SOME name calling is to be expected. However, those words are hate filled and right up with calling someone a B or an N in my mind. I refuse to accept it and will call anybody out on it.

They could get around that with 1 line though. "It's easier for women to access their souls." Boom, reverse sexism makes sense and is "realistic." No it doesn't, players everywhere would still call it BS and a lazy reason to include PC mirror "ism" which is exactly what it would be.

I agree, the devs should totally make males subservient and oppressed by the women of the universe. I think it'd be really interesting to have the male character have to face all the adversity of living in a predominantly matriarchal society and all the challenges that that presents. Of course, this means that the setting should properly reflect the improved standing of women. If they can make this type of reactivity in the game, I think it'd be great and very replayable. Not really, that would just come across as lazy dev PC correct mirror image "(insert word)ism". Oh wow, the men are repressed and the women are sexist, gee, that is sooo original/ sarcasm. I could see another species/race being this way. I just have trouble seeing humans being this way, we are sort of wired biologically this way. I am also in the camp who would like to see some realistic "isms" in games, it is a bit annoying that most games have everybody getting along just fine when in real life, people are not like that at all.

Just going to copy and paste what I wrote in another thread.

No to time quest or an option to turn it off in the options for those us who despise them. Why? for main quests it is obvious, but even side quests it would be annoying because the moment you have a timed quest, you pretty much have to drop everything and rush through the game in an on rails situations which I hate. So no, no thanks.

Ack, this is exactly what I do not want. I posted this on my fears when they mentioned having a sequel/expansion. Basically, cliffhangers,cut content to be sold as DLC, open mysteries/unresolved issues left to the next game, etc are just cheap tricks to force people to buy the sequel. Whenever I see games that have this, it just saddens me. It tells me the devs do not trust their own skills and/or the game is not that good. If the game is good then people will WANT to buy the sequel and do not need any other motivation. I really do not like games that have unbeatable boss/scenario. I don't mind if its really hard, but flat out making an immortal unbeatable character is not really fun and just leads to frustration. Hey, I am attacking this being with everything I have, yet the health never goes down..WTF?!?!? oh, one swing of its sword of doom and all my party die...yea, no thanks. I do not mind if its really strong (but not one swing party killing strong), but it should be deafeatable. I also have issues with saying that being original and have downer ending, um, did you play mass effect 3? Yea, how fun was that ending? Or fallout 3? Its not really new, and also leads to the problem of people pointing out obvious flaws "Why didn't my character do THIS! and avoid the issue" or "WAIT! that totally goes against my characters personality, there is no way he/she would do this" Or "WTF?!?!? That makes no sense!" or "you kidding me?!?!? they said my choices would matter, yet no matter what I do we end up in this same ending! what a waste of time!". I know I will get pissed if all the choices we make go down the drain to the same endings regardless of what we do. I really hope we will have many branching endings so it will feel like we made a difference and not all forced down one path with only the two dreaded all good or all bad ending. I also want the game to finish as a COMPLETE game that doesn't make you feel like you have been shortchanged or forces you to buy the next game because important stuff was left out or the dreaded cliffhanger was put in. I think the majority of us paid money for a complete game, not an incomplete one. If the kickstarter had said, "Hey, we are going to give you half a game that you have to buy the sequel to finish" I think few people would have donated to it.

I like the multiple factions route where you have different factions that go across the spectrum of clearly good, evil, and shades of grey, and within those factions are sub factions that can make those factions lean more toward good/evil/grey. Having too much of either can make the game dull, you either go with the clear choices of your alignment of its clearly good/evil, or you start flipping coins if they are nothing but shades of grey and either choice both rewards and screws you at the same time. Especially the "oh, the villain was really doing this horrible things for the greater good" trope is way overused. Games like new vegas where you did not have one big bad, but you had multiple factions competing against each other are the best games. Although, I do think they were a little to grey where their was both good and evil to all of them, with some clearly leaning one way or another. Some factions that are clearly good an evil should be present.

I would like to see quests that have evil path to actually be evil for a change and not just be sorta bad, or just doing bad things only to evil people, or worse, the evil path is exactly the same as the good path most of the time, its just minor insignificant stuff that changed. Then there is also the dreaded grey paths which is becoming a fad in many games now where all choices are grey and they are not a good or bad path. That in itself is not bad when used sparingly, but when every major choice is like that, then you feel like your choices really do not matter since its going to be a 50/50 split of good and bad for either decision so might as well flip a coin. Most games now are like: Good - save the village by killing the dragon and bandits for free and be known as a hero bad - kill the dragon and bandits, then demand payment from the village (Where is the actual evil bit?) Grey - kill the dragon and bandits who were fighting the dragon take over the village and sell the villagers to slavery, kill the bandits and the dragon burns down the village and eats the survivors. A lot of modern games are lazy and just suck. The best games are the ones that give the most freedom to choose your paths, good paths, grey paths, and evil paths without forcing you down a particular road (at least not to often). The best grey choices are those that have loopholes to change the grey choice into a clear cut choice for players who were willing to spend time and effort researching the problem and finding another solution besides the only no-win solutions. It might take time and effort, but it is sooo rewarding when you come up with an alternative solution that was not presented before and works to your favor.

PS:T for me.

I love this back and forth. Heh, I suppose those who hate the unliving (living unchallenged is too long to say) probably think that marriage and love is only for the living. If a living person and a dead person find love together, who is it for us to impede it? I so want to see this in the game as a joke. Young man next to undead girl "I LOVE HER!" Parents "SHES DEAD! You heard the rumors of what...THOSE kind are like, and besides you have an arranged marriage with the beautiful LIVING girl that isn't rotting or stinking!" Young man "only anna understands me, your just bigots! You know she can't help her skin condition!" Parents "As long as you live under our roof you will do what we say!" Youg man "Then let us fix that right now!" *pulls out vital of necromatic potion and drinks it* Undead girl and parents *NNNOOOOOO!!!!!* *young man convulses,parents cry, undead girl looks sad* *young man comes back as undead* Young undead man "It is done, now we can be together forever my love...wait, what is this strange feeling...I feel empty...and...hungry for something" Undead girl "I did not want to tell you this, but we have to feed on the souls of the living, I am sorry. I already drained the soul out of your neighbors earlier or else I would have spared some for you, they should be araising and joining us soon...I am sorry, but you have to feed, you cannot fight it and the only souls nearby...are your family" *Undead young man looks at parents and stumbles towards them with a glazed look in his eyes* "soulllssss" Parents *screams*

Still got the same problem, doesn't explain how a person can magically sleep off major wounds and if its so rare pretty much nobody uses it, then the world really should be filled with mass graves and the average people should be sickly to make the world believable.

Wow, that is really good.

That is just because messing with the dead is taboo in most cultures, so it is automatically seen as desecrating the dead which is evil in most eyes. Which, to be fair, does have a point. I mean, you die, then you are aware again in your own rotting corpse and forced to do what the necromancer says does seem pretty evil. However, some necromancers might not try to create slaves, but bring the dead back as a service. In some cultures, it is common to pray to family ancestor spirits, well, in those cultures, the necromancer can be seen as a high ranking status because of what they are, opening communications between the living and dead as a medium and/or bringing the dead back to help the family/country some way. Perhaps instead of offering the living to go to war, a family can send a reanimated dead to fight instead, this could be a normal custom in some societies, which makes more sense, to send the living to war or to send the already dead?

ok, more thematic/logic problem than gameplay wise. I just find it hard to believe that nobody has worked on healing at all in any field in the setting. That the only way to heal/cure something is to literally sleep it off. oh, got shot by an arrow, let me sleep it off. Just does not compute. Before medicine like antibodies, people died all the time from the simplest infected cut. Not to mention how easy it is to spread disease. I am just trying to figure out how the game world will explain it without some vague "oh, the gods did it *waves hands vaguely in the air*" moment. I also get the suspension that sleeping is part of the plot, like having dream visions, or being visited by a deity, or just to move time forward. Not really complaining, It is just something that has been nagging me in the back of my mind.

Ah, this thread also reminded me of my own setting I have been working on. Its the same one as artificial elves I mentioned way earlier in another thread. Anyway, necromancy is very common in this setting, in one location reanimated dead are basically robots, with bound souls/ghosts serving as personal assistant A.I.s. There is actually two great necromancer wars that sort of mirrored world war one and world war two. The second war caused the near destruction of the world. One of my complaints I have had with necromancy is how it is always the same, raising rotting corpses/zombies to attack enemies with some minor differences regardless of the time frame which always felt kind of meh to me. Looking at magic the same way as tech, it should evolve and change with the times. Anyway, in my setting, the first necromancer war had the good old fashioned raise zombies and rotting corpses, slow bumbling unthinking creatures that look right at home in the original movie night of the living dead. The second war had evolved them, they were no longer slow bumbling creatures, they were more like fast zombies, and were less skeletal and had more intelligence (could use weapons) working in groups and even some minor self repair (there is much more, but don't want to dwell). Anyway, in my setting a faction opposing this group using them released a new weapon that was supposed to mirror the bomb that was dropped on japan. However, this weapon was untested and nearly destroyed the world, chaos reigned for a few hundred years and only the mega cities/powers survived. Anyway, jumping to the current time period, raising the dead for one faction is common and is a business. Necromancy has become industrialized, corpses/skeletons/ are put in a special necromantic vats where it rebuilds their bodies, growing tissue, flesh, hair, etc and turning the corpse into the optimal age (usually 20 ish, although special orders can change it). The chemicals have reanimated the corpse into a mindless puppet that can understand simple commands and waits to be imprinted. Imprinting is the captured soul/ghost that has had its identity stripped away and artificial created memories/skills/personality implanted, then infused into the reanimated corpse. Which act like whatever artificial personality was implanted, the reanimated dead created by this process do not rot(they actually smell nice, their skin is warm and feels alive and releases a nice flower fragrance, although people can have their smell changed to something else in their order), and act alive thanks to the memory/skill implants. Although low level reanimated are a more robotic because they are made cheap. Their bodies even repair minor damages, do not need to eat, sleep, or anything else the living has to worry about. These reanimated are sold as cheap labor, the only real competition is the doll factory who make living custom organisms (like the artificial elves) for those who do not like the idea of something dead walking around, but they are MUCH more expensive and only the nobles and rich can afford them. These undead are on display where people go in and purchase them, no two undead are exactly alike physically (unless twin corpses), because the bodies bone structure and cells decide what it looks like, they sometimes do some physical surgery to alter defects that the person had in life and pretty them up for the part they serve. Not to mention each soul imprint still retain some quirks of the original ghost/soul that come out every so often. Like a sailor soul that became a labor dead, will call his owner captain, no matter how many times the owner tells him to stop calling him that. these 'bugs' are usually minor and not as bad as they used to be in early development, like the infamous murder Mary, who was a reprogrammed soul of a woman who killed her husband when she caught him cheating, after she was put to death her soul was wiped and reprinted in a new undead body, but something from her past stuck and the new soul would seek men who were unfaithful and kill them while she went out to get groceries for her master. Things like that rarely happen now. Anyway, give you an idea of different types Basic: Laborer - general friendly attitude and eager to work Security - basic gruff personality, will offer basic protection to your premises General: Maid/Butler - can take care of your house, make meals, watch/tutor the kids, and with a small upgrade fee can double as a security guard. Soldier - perfect soldier (accepts orders without questions), good fighter, tough, and hard to kill, the military gobbles these up. Companion - Is a sad fact people are lonely and sometimes for whatever reason they cannot find whatever they are looking for in the living, even something as simple as friendship...or more is needed. The company does not question and will not never ask since this is their hottest selling item. High Class: Elite unit - top of the line reanimate, can speak just about all languages, Has multiple personality settings that can serve as medic/doctor, soldier, assistant, scientist, etc. Fast body regenerating, strength, speed, etc. Also has the ability to change its physical form (slow though, takes a day to do) to another form of a person of similar hight and mass, (good for espionage). Extremely expensive, but the military has been buying more of them up lately that have made people nervous (what does the army know that everyone else doesn't?) One note, for an upgrade fee, you can implant more features like extra personality traits and other add ons. There is a growing rift between the factory owners and the unions because factory owners are buying more and more of the cheap dead laborers and not hiring the living. This has lead to blows and attacks on the laborer dead who are seen taking jobs away from the living. There is also bound ghosts that serve as personal assistants, making notes, appointments, etc, they do not have bodies, BUT you can buy an physical manifestation upgrade where they can interact with the living (think star trek halo deck). There is even a cyberspace/internet of source that uses lovecraftian like babbage machines that are connected to living brains that are psychically linked creating an an artifical astral dimension that people can jack into using a special connection to seperate their astral form from their physical and enter this artificial universe. But I digress. Anyway, this gives an idea of what I have been doing with necromancy in my setting. Necromancy can be soo much more than the stereotype it has been given.

Yea, there is no Resurrection (come back to life) in the game, but bringing the character back as a zombie/undead/vampire/lich/ghoul..etc would be cool and could be a one time thing. Although I did suggest having a 'dark' ritual to bring someone back, but it required a sentient sacrifice of the same level as the dead character and had a high chance of negative affects for fun.

Crossroads keep was fun also divinity 2 ego draconis was good also. I would like to customize my stronghold and surrounding places with my characters tastes. Good Orphanage - for war orphans, to be taken care of and treated well Temple of good deity - place where people worship a being of good (or at least neutral). Neutral Brothel - can be good, neutral, evil, can make it clean with mandatory medical/magical testing for disease and protection of the workers (of either sex, decided by the player). School - can be open for everyone, only the noblility, military school, or a propaganda place Mage Tower/lab - should have different rooms for different works, an elemental room should be very different from a necromancers room. Speaking of, I want to go all frankenstein/genius in creating new things/creatures/monsters/spells..etc. Would like to be able to research and discover new things and do weird experiments and create all sorts of monstrocities that should not exist. isn't that the whole point of having a lab and large book archive. Should also have a summoning circle. Hire adventurers, both ego draconis and keep did this. Although I like the idea of upgrading adventurers so they have better equipment and training so they could go on more dangerous missions along with getting higher in rank. barracks/training - used to train soldiers tavern - every place needs a tavern armour/weapon smiths - use them to upgrade your soldiers, even creating magical wepons/armour Evil Temple to dark deity with a sacrificial alter, you can demand the peasantry to sacrifice to your deity or send your enemies to them. Perhaps even getting a bonus/rewards from your deity when you sacrifice. Having cultists walking around worshiping the deity etc. Perhaps have a summoning pit to summon dark legions from the deity you worship. Slave /prison for your captured enemies/innocents to be turned into slaves to work around the keep and/or sold. Torture Room - send in people to torture to break them for important information, punishment, or just twisted amusement. Those are off the top of my head, I am sure there is much more that could be done.

Hmm, I would also like a cursed object that actually changes the character in some way. Say you kill a powerful ghoul with and it has a sword of shadowfeed. Like I mentioned above, each time you attack someone you feed off their death. However, each time you use its ability, you slowly transform, you find you do not like sunlight, your skin gets pale, you find you are hungry...for...something. It should be obvious whats going on, but the swords ability gets more powerful with each use and its just sooo tempting. Perhaps have it keep returning like the old games. There should be a point where the character must decide to see a priest (perhaps have one in his party) remove the curse (but it will destroy the sword), or hit a point of no return where the character becomes a full fledged ghoul or other monster. Then there is the old cursed item actually has the soul of the previous owner. Wearing it and the PC eventually is possessed and taken over by the defeated enemy. Now you will have to take on one of your own companions (maybe even the former PC main character itself!) Now would be a good time to kick yourself if you never put any effort in taking down a character in a non violent means. This would be a fun encounter I think. There should be cursed items for every type of class, perhaps have a party using nothing but cursed items, perhaps earning the name "the damned ones"

What about, the immovable aspect is a bit of a cooldown/chance. When you use an item, that item activates a timed lock, during this time, there is a chance the negative aspect will kick in, the more you use it, the longer the lock and the greater the chance. Eventually the cooldown will run out, hope you have not slaughtered any innocents (unless you are evil and do not care, then its a bonus!) during the time. But since we are on cursed items, I like super powerful evil stuff that requires specific cost to use. Like a sword of demon vein will grant you superhuman swings whenever you kill a certain amount of people (starting power). No problem, you could do that whenever you are in your regular fighting. However, after a while another ability unlocks that is the power of soul eater, whenever you kill a someone, their soul is sucked in the sword and your health starts to regenerate and you gain more strength for each kill you do during the time of activation, the price though is that you have to kill x number of innocent people to activate this power. And their might be stronger powers/abilities that tempt you to do more darker things to gain more power. Tempting powerful objects are fun, but are rarely used sadly. I think there was a book of evil spells in one of the old games that gave you more powerful spells, but required to do evil deeds to gain them, been a while since I played so my memory is a bit fuzzy.

The one power that has always freaked me out was people who could read and manipulate minds. I mean, knowing someone could invade your mind and find your most personal, deepest, darkest, embarrassing, secrets is the worst type of personal invasion. On top of that, the person can manipulate your mind on a memory and emotional level, changing your memories, wiping your memories, or creating totally new ones. A character like this could make you believe you always loved them and make you hate the people you loved, or they can make you forget your life and create false memories. That is why characters like charles xavier and jean grey always freak me out and I could never work with them. I would always suspect (usually justifiably in the comics) they were reading my mind, or manipulating my emotions, or something else. I think if characters like that is in the game, I would think they would be feared, hated, possibly even more than wizards. Possible causing hatred and witchhunts for those who show the ability. Some would hide their ability, some would see it as a curse and try not to use it, others see it as a gift, and others would obviously abuse it. It would be good to play it up in the game.

Always fun of speech, especially the charisma/seduction route where you can go all james bond on a target and convince them to do anything for the potential to be with you. Vampire the masquerade did this really well. Although I like all speech types, although I rarely go the intimidation route, that always felt like a step away from violence. Lets see - Charisma/sedution - intimedation - bribe - blackmail - lie - diplomacy/logic then there is good old taken out a target by other means - Pay/convince another group to attack the group, so you do not have to do anything but clean up the mess and survivors - poison, planting a bomb, sniper from shadows..etc without having to fight everybody and most times nobody knows who did it. Some of these are fun, but I do prefer avoiding physical fights whenever possible. However, I would like to see something done with magic and psychic abilities. Perhaps altering memories, or turning the character into a thrall under your control, etc. Something new.

Why can't it be both? Since souls are unknown, you might have some who view it as a form of religion while others see it more as a tool. I do that that necromancy/liches are cool. We know necromancy is in, I hope becoming something like a lich is in.

Oh, on a side note, perhaps have it where obvious lower level creatures avoid the PC's if there is the difference in levels is high. A level 6 will attack a level 7/8 PC, but a level 4 (unless in large group) and below should run for the hills from the PC. That will help from having to slaughter every single thing we come across because they want to attack the party, even if the party is obviously overpowered compared to it. On related, do not have different/creatures and enemies all band together against the PC when the PC enter the field. Why would a bandit, zombie, and wolf all gang up against the player group and not fight each other? They wouldn't! It would be a free for all for all the groups and every group attacking every other. I hate lazy game designs where all enemies stop fighting and all gang up on the PC group.

Another annoying thing is that sometimes you do not have an option to join the bad/other side. There have been a few games where the "bad" side looked more logical and/or appealing than the "good" side, but there is no way to switch sides. You were forced down a particular road. It would be nice to have that darth vador moment where the bad/other side offers you a chance to join them...and you DO(or take it over instead of destroying them)! Having other options outside of combat makes games more fun.