General JADE ideas, races, classes, weapons, skills, etc.

[CloudKing]

ok a few more ideas, this time town related.

GOVERNING NPC:
have a chance to generate a named NPC such as an elder or
leader in towns
TOWN DUNGEON:
if town generated an elder or leader than have an additional
chance to generate an in-town dungeon that the elder could ask you to
clear (similar to Ogre cave in dwarf town)
TOWN DUNGEON ALTERNATE:
if town dungeon generated than have an additional
chance that named leader of dungeon gets generated (maybe named
leader might request the town get cleared)
TOWN REBELLIONS:
if town elder or leader generated than have additional
chance that town rebellion is generated.perhaps some citizens are
secretly rebels and leader of said rebellion might ask you to assist
in getting rid of the old elder or leader so that he may take his place
alternatively the current elder or leader might ask you to rid the
town of the rebels
MIGRANTS:
if town elder or leader does get generated have an additional chance
of him requesting you "steal" citizens from other towns.
LOCAL RAIDERS:
if town elder or leader gets generated than have additional
chance the he requests you "rid the countryside" of raiders or orcs
or something of the sorts (similar to "Kranach quest" in terinyo
GAURD:
if a law does get broken it would make sense there might be a gaurd
or two around to keep the peace.
HIDDEN TOWNS:
maybe the presence of some towns were not advertized(perhaps
if inhabitants wanted it that way) and would not be revieled unless
directly walked into.
SUBTERRANEAN TOWNS :
in the case of dwarves,orcs,dark elves,etc. these
towns could be generated randomly inside dungeons.

I am curious as to what other peoples ideas for possible town features might be.

[Cass]

I would love those dungeons in towns, and the subterranean towns too. Also, your other ideas

I'd like to see:
- Nomads, a town that moves around regularly. There could be quests to find them with a urgent message or something.
- Regular caravans between towns (that could be ambushed by raiders). Protecting a caravan could be a quest.
- Now that there are are going to be armies, I'd also expect destroyed and abandoned towns, where you could find loot or help survivors, maybe try to rebuild. Hey, you could maybe become the leader of such a town yourself.
- or towns taken over by a army. You could try to free the citizens, or aid the warlord.
- Cemeteries in towns that are haunted or other trouble with a local necromancer.
- Most towns would have defenses such as walls, spikes, water or swamp. And guards or hired soldiers. Though for some races, every citizen might be a combatant or caster.

[Aielyn]

ok a few more ideas, this time town related.
<snip>
I am curious as to what other peoples ideas for possible town features might be.

You know, your ideas mesh really well with an idea I posted as a comment on one of Thomas's facebook posts.

Basically, a rudimentary NPC AI system could be implemented that establishes "motivations" for each character. For most common folk, the possible motivations would be very restrictive. However, for leaders and other such characters, there would be a broad range of motivations that influence behaviour to such an extent that they generate stories. With such motivations created, the game could be coded to specifically generate certain combinations of characters and motivations in order to set certain events in motion.

For instance, as you say, each town would have a reasonable chance of generating a leader, with larger towns having higher probability. The leader's motivation would typically be something like "town safety". With this motivation, if there are a lot of marauders around, the leader might ask you to do a "local raiders" quest. If the town is generated with a town dungeon, the same leader may instead ask you to clear that dungeon (or explore it). However, other motivations would be possible, such as "convert others to own religion", "build an army", or "enjoy self". In this last case, the leader would likely spend a lot of time at an inn if one is generated, would be seen as lazy and useless by the people of the town, and would be risking rebellion.

And to up the ante, it would be possible for some townsfolk to have the "rebel" motivation. Rebellion motivations would have a tendency to spread, but would depend on the townsfolk's "loyalty", which would be a combination of leader charisma and the town's alignment. If a rebellion is in progress, the rebelling townsperson with the highest charisma would be the rebel leader. Other factors, such as willpower, would influence timing and results of such rebellions. However, rebels would be very rare in orderly towns to begin with, and even in chaotic towns, they'd be uncommon.

So, to use the example of Fnuk III, the "king" would be generated with the "enjoy self" motivation, while Fnuk would be generated with the "rebel" motivation and a particularly high charisma. However, the king's charisma would be chosen at random, and thus may ensure high enough loyalty to keep Fnuk in his place, for instance.

So, how do you use motivations to actually generate stories? Simple - motivation chains. If a rebel successfully leads a rebellion, that rebel will become a new leader. But what is the new leader's motivation? It can vary, but one type of rebel, of which Fnuk would be one, could naturally take the "build an army" approach as the next step. When Fnuk runs out of local warriors, he would naturally then go seeking other towns to conquer or win over to his cause. When Fnuk has an army, he gets another new motivation, and so the chain continues. Intentional stories would essentially be constructed by having certain motivations and character traits be much higher probability in certain characters than in randomly-generated characters.

In short, these "motivation chains" would create the pre-designed stories, but other storylines would be able to form through emergent behaviour, arising from interactions between motivations.


As for a simpler suggestion regarding town features, I'd like to see towns established on special grounds - for instance, one town could be located at a special point of convergence of magical power, causing a higher than usual PP regeneration rate, easier learning of spells, and a preponderance of wizards and other scholarly NPCs. Another could be built on an ancient burial ground, and see ghosts rise each darknight, only for them to disappear in 24 hours (which could then motivate a quest to in some way calm the spirits and free the town from their curse - could be done, for instance, by blessing four different wells in the town with holy water).

Another kind of special ground could be that the area carries abnormal corruption issues. The residents of such a town would likely be suffering from the effects of this corruption, and it could even impact the town's structure. Another town could be generated with a gold mine beneath it - accessed by digging where the elder tells you to after accepting his quest. The elder might offer 50&#37; of the gold you find down there... try to take off with it all, and the townspeople will be pissed off (and it would, amongst other things, be an unlawful act, and may even curse you).

Towns could even be found on sea locations, as floating towns, with wooden "bridge" paths between wooden houses, and water everywhere else. In such a case, the water could, for instance, be unusually aerated, allowing anyone to breathe in it (but still cause water damage, etc)... with a "sea floor" dungeon that could hold treasure beneath the floating town.

There's lots of ideas I could come up with for this.

[CloudKing]

@cass,
I like the ideas of nomad towns, in town cemetery(really like this one)(had similar idea(randomly generated graveyards in dungeons, and on world map)), and of finding attacked towns and helping survivors and such. keep them flowing, I have fun thinking about what JADE could be.

@Aielyn,
your "motivations" infrastructure, to me sounds like a good idea, my only crit. would be that it is fundamentally different from the story arc infrastructure that TB plans to implement....."you can't have two number ones, that would make eleven" on a different note, gold mines,(maybe even gem mines?),yes, I'll go get my pickaxe.

[CloudKing]

ok, some more ideas, this time some random dungeon features.


MULTI-LEVEL VAULTS:
a vault wherein which the downstair is generated in a
special room located in the vault itself. that downstair
would lead down to another level that would be a continuation
of the vault (might take up the entire level,or might not
depending on whether or not the vault ends on that level),
and could continue on for multiple levels. A sort of "super vault"

GRAVEYARDS:
special rooms (or maybe even entire levels) that would be
littered with graves.

LOST CITIZENS:
randomly generated workers,farmers,children,etc. that
would request to be escorted back to safety
"please sir I am lost and in need of your help"

MINING EXCURSIONS:
one might stumble upon a level that is riddled with dwarven
miners hard at work. (c)hatting with one could give a
special response such as "I don't get paid to sit around
and chat" or in the case of a dwarf "Well, what are you
waiting for? Grab your pick and lets get busy".I think these
would be very rare considering the amount of pickaxes they
would yield.

ADVENTURING PARTIES:
one might come across a party of adventurers working together.
it could be in classic combinations like; a thief, a wizard, and a fighter.
in rare cases they could be powerfull named heroes. and over
the course of time they might even move from level to level,
or from dungeon to dungeon, town to town, town to dungeon.(or at least
the named ones anyway.to expand on this, once generated they
might have an additional chance to have some effect on a story arc.
for example a powerful lawful party might be rumored to have
put an end to the reighn of a certain orc king. of course
these interactions would have to be limited so as not to take
away from the fame and glory awaiting the true hero of ancardia
"you of course".

any ideas?

[Knyte]

i like the idea of the adventuring party...there's a ton of things that could be done with them...you could hear a rumor that they were defeated in a dungeon and that the only survivor is recovering in a random town, when you meet him he could give you a quest to avenge his fallen friends, maybe even asking to come along as a companion, or even hiring you to be His companion. they could give item hooks: "we've been seeking the sword of hellfire for the past few years. last we heard it was deep in a dungeon near here, but we haven't found it yet", or you hear a rumor that they've found it and you can track them down and steal or buy it from them. maybe they've heard of you in the same way and are tracking you down for an item you own, or they've been hired to kill you for slaughtering an entire village or to stop you from completing a quest. at any rate, it gives yet more of a chance of having friends, enemies, followers (since he's enabling armies, maybe we can gather enough adventurers and hirelings to form a mercenary company or an army of our own too). there's really too many ideas to list, but i'm sure you get my drift

[dallonj]

i had an idea for a relatively easy and common quest you could do. shop keepers or whoever else you sell goods to could request more of a certain uncommon item you sell to them

you sell the herb (or whatever). shopkeeper says, "this is something that is very hard to come by in these parts, if you can bring back 20 more of these i will give you a 5000 gold pieces tab here at my shop" an alternative could be if a citizen was in the shop he could make you the same offer, with a different reward.

another good quest, bringing back live animals, this would be a good way to encourage use of the music skill. i bet you could find someone in the public square of the city willing to pay top dollar for a live tamed wolf or bear.

[CloudKing]

Dungeon of the Djinni Lord,

When generated the world map could have a very very small chance to generate the Dungeon of the Djinni Lord.A very deep and very dangerous dungeon.

some of its features could be:

a slightly higher chance of finding a ring of Djinni summon,
a lot of Djinn get generated,
and lastly, if you do manage to make it to the bottom you will be
greeted by the Djinni Lord.

if you have killed no Djinn and have made no wishes he will be friendly and grant you a wish.

if you have killed a Djinni or have been granted a wish before he will be hostile.

if you were granted a wish before the dungeon, he may still be friendly if you wished for: your freedom

[CloudKing]

@Knyte

I like your ideas on the subject of adventuring parties and I think your right about there being "A ton" of things that could be done with them.

[CloudKing]

ok, some more scrolls,

first, some not so useful scrolls that could have been scribed by a wizard that had a "chaotic" sense of humor. For the sake of this post we'll call him Kejo the wizard.(think Tywat Perr)

SCROLL OF KEJO'S PIT,
a pit opens up beneath you
SCROLL OF KEJO'S STONE,
a stone block hits your head
SCROLL OF KEJO'S FIRE,
you are engulfed by the roaring flames
SCROLL OF KEJO'S ARROW, ACID, WATER, etc..... (you get the point)
SCROLL OF KEJO'S NEW FRIENDS,
all NPC's in sight become hostile including companions and slaves
SCROLL OF KEJO'S FEAST,
all food in your inventory rots away
SCROLL OF KEJO'S FALSE WISH,
what do you wish for:
after you type in what you want and hit enter you get the message "your equipment suddenly feels heavier", but don't bother searching for the AoLS you asked for because the scroll will always give you an apple.
KEJO'S FAVORITE SCROLL,
you die.

I think these would be very rare but very funny and/or frustrating if read.
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ok, now some useful scrolls,

SCROLL OF MUSIC,
same effect as playing a blessed instrument with music skill at 100.
NECROMANCERS SCROLL,
lets you choose a corpse in your inventory to be animated and turned into a slave.
SCROLL OF MAJOR CHARGING,(rare)
adds 1 (2 if blessed) charge to all wands in your inventory.
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ok, now DIVINE SCROLLS,
scrolls that can only be read while standing on a co-aligned altar and while in good standing with your deity.

SCROLL OF DIVINE SIGHT,(rare)
allows PC to see through walls for 5D10 turns
SCROLL OF DIVINE FAMILIAR SUMMONING,(rare)
summons deity specific companion. for example Loth might give the PC a powerful spider.
SCROLL OF DIVINE ASSISTANCE,(rare)
all non co-aligned monsters in PC's sight get struck by a bolt of lightning
SCROLL OF DIVINE BLESSINGS,(very rare)
blesses all equipped items. (has a chance to curse all equipped items as punishment for asking so much)
SCROLL OF ALTAR JUMP,(very rare)
teleports the PC to another co-aligned altar of choice, as long as the PC has already stood on that altar.
SCROLL OF DIVINE GATE,(extremely rare)
teleports the PC to the deity's home realm.