Character Manager

[Zephyr8965]

Okay, so I was reading up on the discussions about leveling, today, and it gave me an idea. Someone mentioned a quest to find a swordmaster to allow the person to surpass the normal limits on the sword skill. While I don't quite agree with setting a scripted quest to find a particular npc, (especially since, in Kenshi, that npc could probably be killed at any moment, given the right circumstances) I do agree with npc's of exceptional skill being able to aid the player with those skills. I also think that, should no npc's possess those skills, the player should be more than able to make them.

This is where they character manager comes in. Basically, a little screen reached from the main menu where a player can choose to mix and match which of the character's he/she's created to decide who all they're going to control in any given game session. Also, a little check box on each character allows that character to exist in the world, controlled by ai while not being played. This is very risky as that character is subject to all the dangers that other npc's are subject to, and will perform actions just like an npc.

For instance, if a village is evacuated and its inhabitants move miles across the land to a new home and that character is an npc and you left them in that village, they might just go with them.

The advantage to this, however, is that there is no limit to how many of these characters you can have run this way. You could leave behind a defence force for your favorite town that you needn't control, you could leave behind a raiding party with the nearby bandits to aid them and collect loot for you and many other things. You can also leave behind a person to train your characters similar to the 'quest' mentioned previously.

Hell, you could create a group of 50 men and women, have them all practice things like farming and construction, maybe even a little combat, then turn them npc in the middle of nowhere and watch them construct a new village.

This would give players a whole new level of influence over the world of Kenshi. You can not only shift the various aspects of the world, but you can add to it, it just takes work to get the characters built up that you want to add.

[Captain Deathbeard]

Well, I intend something similar, instead of selecting who you control, you can just give a character orders to do something and then just leave and forget about him. I mean broader orders, like run this shop, or defend this town.
You can divide characters up into squads, so you won't have like 100 character portraits on your screen, just the current squad.

[wazupwolf]

lol whatdu mean "run this shop" like grab and run?

[Captain Deathbeard]

If you buy a building in a town you can set up your own shop and have a character run it.

[Zephyr8965]

So, basically you can set your characters to run stuff for you. That has a lot of potential. I'd imagine whatever version includes stuff like that will probably be pretty limited in what all you can have your characters handle in your absence, but with time, that could really expand into something interesting. Lol, you could have a booming metropolis all controlled by your people.

Lol, tempts me to start out with a bunch of farmers and hunters and stuff, building a community, start my own city, start building the city up so it becomes all successful and wealthy, then BOOM! We start taking over everything. XD

[wazupwolf]

lol cool...speaking of my last comment will we be able to steal junk?

[Captain Deathbeard]

Yeah you can do that, if the bandits and governments and militarys and creatures and various factions let you.

[Zephyr8965]

Lol, so the ability to steal junk will be there, but the consequences, as well.

Lol, I'm so making a thieves' guild. I'll just set my people to go around robbing everyone in town. XD



Hm...speaking of things like this, how will you run hostility in the game? For instance, if one of my characters kills someone, are ALL my characters going to be blamed for it? What if they're in two separate towns and not even in range of each other? Perhaps you could set a stat of some sort that represents their connection in the world. Like, the higher that stat, the more they're recognized as being associated and any kind of reputation alteration on one affects the other, but to a reduced degree, depending on the association.

[Captain Deathbeard]

I was thinking it would affect all characters, as you're essentially seen as a faction. What factors could make the association stat increase or decrease?

All the same it would take time for the news to reach neighbouring towns, so that other character would not feel the consequences for a while

[Zephyr8965]

Well, I was thinking things like being seen together increases association, and current actions could affect that influence. For instance, if the two characters were to fight together against an enemy, their association would be increased. Two characters seen saving a town from bandits together would also have their association increased. Time spent apart slowly lowers that association, but it's very slow. This would open up options such as a player being a crime lord and using patsies to take the fall for them. You keep people from seeing you associating with another person and have them commit the crimes, however, the moment anyone finds out you're working together, bam, your reputation plummets.

An alternate way of doing it might be association with factions. Your actions influence the reputation of a faction based on your association with it. Your association increases the more you're seen with known members of the faction (the higher their association, the more they increase yours). Also, various conversations could lead to increasing/decreasing your association.
[bluff] "Black Forest Bandits? Never heard of them." -association: Black Forest Bandits.

I just think stuff like this could introduce a lot of deceptive political influence into things, giving the character a whole new level of influence in the world if they put the work into it.

Also, I was thinking, a way you might run news is actually have npc's carry knowledge and passing within a set radius of another npc passes that knowledge on. For instance, news of your actions traveling from town to town would actually require people traveling to that town that know of it.

A player could even contain the news of his actions for at least a span of time by preventing anyone from that town from leaving it. (station your characters in various paths leading out from the town and stop anyone from getting through) Mind you, such actions would obviously have consequences, but would also have quite a bit of use to someone taking large scale hostile actions.

[yssarile]

This is where they character manager comes in. Basically, a little screen reached from the main menu where a player can choose to mix and match which of the character's he/she's created to decide who all they're going to control in any given game session. Also, a little check box on each character allows that character to exist in the world, controlled by ai while not being played. This is very risky as that character is subject to all the dangers that other npc's are subject to, and will perform actions just like an npc.

For instance, if a village is evacuated and its inhabitants move miles across the land to a new home and that character is an npc and you left them in that village, they might just go with them.

i have an addition to that, there has been a lot of talk about exit stategies for this, and lots of interest in keeping a perpetual world, dwarf fortress style, how about, if you get bored of playing another charecter, you can 'retire' him, in which case he becomes an npc, as does anyone else under his control. you then have the option of starting fresh, or being his/her child.

a point on this, if you do take the go into as a child of the previous charecter, either from retirement or death, does it affect your start point? like, if your father/mother is a rich kingpin, do you start out with more money, and 'connections'?

would you inherint land? you could play through a noble dynasty from start to finish. would you be the only child? would you vie with your siblings for inheritance when your parents finally die?

i like the retirement idea though, it means you can either play as the noble linaege type, or you could place a charecter exactly as you want for a rival before starting a fresh one. or play a prince that stages a coup and overthroes his father.

also, when doing world generation, at the start, does the player have an option to set some parameters for the starting world, as well as a completely random option? and could you start a charecter as a child of a significant npc?

Well, I was thinking things like being seen together increases association, and current actions could affect that influence. For instance, if the two characters were to fight together against an enemy, their association would be increased. Two characters seen saving a town from bandits together would also have their association increased. Time spent apart slowly lowers that association, but it's very slow. This would open up options such as a player being a crime lord and using patsies to take the fall for them. You keep people from seeing you associating with another person and have them commit the crimes, however, the moment anyone finds out you're working together, bam, your reputation plummets.

I just think stuff like this could introduce a lot of deceptive political influence into things, giving the character a whole new level of influence in the world if they put the work into it.

Also, I was thinking, a way you might run news is actually have npc's carry knowledge and passing within a set radius of another npc passes that knowledge on. For instance, news of your actions traveling from town to town would actually require people traveling to that town that know of it.

A player could even contain the news of his actions for at least a span of time by preventing anyone from that town from leaving it. (station your characters in various paths leading out from the town and stop anyone from getting through) Mind you, such actions would obviously have consequences, but would also have quite a bit of use to someone taking large scale hostile actions.

i agree with the above, most definatly, though i would class the second bit about news spreading as essentialy, rather than just damn awesome.

and to link off from before, would thre 'influence' carry over to a degree down the line, since especially in dynasty type situations connections are kept

[wazupwolff]

omg dude u like stormed the forums

[yssarile]

omg dude u like stormed the forums

its because im awesome

[Suta]

Could I have a democracy instead of a monarchy?

[yssarile]

that is a very good point.

and, how exactly does one enforce a goverment style regime? are there going to be any special setups you can use, like run various aspects through buildings, similar to business, or would you have to define everything to be as close as possible to how you want by eye?

and on that note, do you have to purchase a town building to be able to run that kind of business? could you just like.. spread a blanket on the ground and sell from there? set up a camp and trade from it? hell, assuming the business type dident NEED to be inside, could you just have your people work on it outside? i realise there should be penalties to this type of running, but itd be a welcome ease in starting up.

also, cant remember if this has been asked, could you personally set up and run a trade caravan? and if you had a big enough cart, or whatever, could you use it as a mobile building? i mean, back in trade caravan days, they WERE mobile houses, after all

and, if you have a problem getting camels or whatever, you could always have low skill-low value employees pull the carts (y)

[Captain Deathbeard]

To run a business you need a building or you can rent a spot in the market on the floor, but you wont make as much money that way. And you can be a trader, and I'd like caravans/wagons but I dont want to do animals, so I'm trying to think of a feasible way for them to be self powered without being fast or hi-tec.

Until then you can buy these huge backpacks for trading, and lugging them round helps improve your strength and fitness too.

[yssarile]

steam? i mean, its feasable, i suppose

and as for business's, are you limited to manufacture then sell, or buy/aquire and sell, or will there be services, like, security, or construction? maybe even logistics, if caravans get implemented.

another thing, mostly at random, but going off from news travelling, will rulers employ networks of spies to keep up on this sort of thing? and what would the procedure be if one of these 'disapeared'?

and how does construction work, can you just roll up to a random point in the desert and tell your people to start building? and how much control do you have over the type of building? are there going to be a few preset ones availabe, or a whole range? even any dynamic alterations? (hey, you did mention building destruction, so why not) and can you do anything from anything, like, run a foundry in a building that before you bought it was a house? or do they have to be special structures? and if so, can you modify previous ones, or would you have to knock down and rebuild?

and when you buy a building, do you have access to just the structure or possibly surrounding lands? if you bought a just structure, and knocked it down, can you then do whatever you want on the land?

and how does tax on things like trading work? im well aware you could easily have a government run in the same way a player would when running a protection racket, or the like, but will it vary from ruler/government to the next? and will laws be global or whatever is enforced? and if so, and the player ends up in charge of a village/country/world can you set your own? and if so, would you have a number of ancilleries to do these things with through dialogue? and if so what sort of ancillery roles are there?

[Captain Deathbeard]

it will all be buy/sell/manufacture. I like the idea of starting your own guild, but cant think how it would work, it would be the same as doing jobs for people anyway.

You can either buy a building in a town (fixed, no demolish), or you can roll up and build anything you want in the desert. Make an outpost, or a full size base.

Traders would get taxed on their way in or out of a city. Laws vary, mainly independant city-states, they are all different unless a big faction owns/conquers a lot of them. Villages have sheriffs or militia and lynchings. Villages are weak but usually owned and sometimes protected by larger cities.

[yssarile]

what happens if the desert slowly fills up with buildings then, if you cant demolish them? O-o

and what happens to the ownership of a building if the owner dies, according to the ingame legal system, i mean

[Captain Deathbeard]

You can demolish anything you build yourself, and dead owner would mean the building goes up for sale