Aging

[wazupwolf]

grr

[Jehdin]

You won't be able to kill children (I don't think I could get away with it), BUT everybody else can. So some evil bandits could wipe out a village and kill all the women and children in front of you, so you still get to see some child-guts, but if you order your characters to kill a child, they will refuse. And a child won't count as a hostile unit anyway.

That sounds like a bad idea, honestly, if an NPC can do something, the player should too. If you're looking to get a publishing deal, any child killing at all is not likely to be allowed and if you're not, then you're not really bound to any rules there. So I think it's an all or nothing deal, either everyone can kill kids or nobody can. I would personally find it to be endlessly frustrating if I saw bandits killing kids left and right if I couldn't do the same.

It's worth noting that you can do some pretty horrific things to children in DF, the dev isn't looking for a publishing deal, though.

Maybe for the aging thing I will make it an option:, separate for player and non-player characters: normal, slow, off.

That sounds like the best option by far.

You can force people, children, slaves to join your army, but they will escape or murder you in your sleep now and then. They are not very trustworthy, and your characters will turn evil.

Not having trustworthy "slaves" sounds like a pretty big hindrance.

Obviously, attacks and escapes should be a possibility, but you should be able to make them more loyal, otherwise being evil would be pretty pointless. You should be able to brainwash some, and maybe others could develop the stockholm syndrome.

There needs to benefits and downsides whether you're good or evil, one isn't always better than the other.

[wazupwolf]

yes one is better than the other looks at star wars dark side owns light side

[Hector]

Might I suggest something along the lines of Stockholm Syndrome? Early on, the slaves won't be trustworthy, but later on they'll get used to their lives and will willingly fight to protect people who only months ago they would have loved to kill slowly.

[Zephyr8965]

I would personally create a loyalty stat and fear stat on anyone in your group. Either one will keep them in line, though each one has its benefits. For instance, if they fear you, they're more likely to charge blindly into a situation that almost promises death, but if they're loyal, they'll likely stand up and try to convince you to change your course of action.

Fear also requires little from you in the way of maintenance. Friendship will dwindle if you never do anything to bolster it, but fear just requires a few cracks of the whip and an...example..every now and then. However, loyalty means they won't try to escape, fear does.

So, here you have ups and downs of both sides, and neither really is limited to 'good' or 'bad'. Bad people may still have friends, and good people may very well have captured enemies they use for the greater good. Takes the good and bad out of a simple action and places it back into the broader aspect of things, which is, in my opinion, much better.

As for the killing of children, I would allow it to happen (though I don't really plan to make much use of it, myself...unlike some of the obviously more demented members of this forum. ) but make penalties. I'm not saying to have someone lose money or experience or something for killing a child, but obviously someone's going to be pissed off that you just murdered their offspring. So, killing children could be a massive drop in your reputation with certain people, potentially causing them to take up arms against you as well as drawing some negative attention from others, as well.

Generally, running around killing children makes you look like an individual no one would want around, save for the darkest and most vile people in the world, which can eventually become somewhat restrictive to one's ability to travel about without incident.

[yssarile]

You won't be able to kill children (I don't think I could get away with it), BUT everybody else can. So some evil bandits could wipe out a village and kill all the women and children in front of you, so you still get to see some child-guts, but if you order your characters to kill a child, they will refuse. And a child won't count as a hostile unit anyway.


Maybe for the aging thing I will make it an option:, separate for player and non-player characters: normal, slow, off.

The inheritance idea I already have for something like an iron man mode, when your last character dies, instead of game over you can create a new character as a young relative who inherits all your stuff, and continue playing in that world. Skills would not be inherited.

perhaps your avatar could do what you want, but if your party feels strongly about it, and they dont fear you enough, they might rebel, or try to actively stop you? certainly i think it would ridiculous to assume that random hired lackeys would kill a child because you told them to, but if you were set on doing it, your main avatar should have no qualms

on the subject of fear, if you have a larger party, and they dont like the direction your going in, perhaps conspiracys could start? if you managed to find it out before it came to anything, you could, in front of all of your men, maim and dismember the ringleader to quell further uprising. for.. i imagine rather a while

i agree that you should be able to turn aging off an on for your charecter, but maybe a seperate stat for your main charecter and characters actively in your group? so you could set your avatar to not age and your other members to age slowly or not at all. though to be fair, if you become very powerful, you could have higher end henchmen

like, if you have 300 grunts, they should all age normally, but if you have 5 people under you that you want to age slowly because they are important, that should be possible. maybe two catergories, you, and members of your parties that you have selected, maybe via a tickbox, or something like that?

i also agree very strongly that having the general populace of the world go through a full lifecycle from birth to death is goign to be essential in a self maintaining world. though itd have to be very well balanced, or you might end up with humans dying out, or too many of them for the world to support.

and maybe some sort of life extender should be available for the VERY VERY rich. so if say, an npc happens to start an empire, and becomes like the most powerful person in the world, they should be able to extend their life, at great cost. maybe optionally. this would allow for a natural procedurally generated sort of 'sinister yet all powerful emporer' maybe the way to acheive life involves killing others, somehow. definatly optional, now that i think about it though, and it should be rare that they discover how to do it, itd be no fun if emperor palpatine kept getting spawned every 30 minutes, you know?

as far as loyalty and fear in tandem goes, maybe its worth mentioning that if you have a large host, there will be a different opinion of you, because the higher people of yours, and the general masses. the average grunt might be very loyal, but thatd manifest in blindly doing what you said. your trusted right hand, however, might talk you out of it, or downright refuse.