I choose the third as most people have up to this point but I am not sure people visiting the forums all the time make the most diverse sample of gamers.
The respawns in the introduction sound interesting. Do they mean spawning a new NPC fulfilling the same function or resurrecting the dead one. New NPC sounds like a really cool feature.
Killed the NPC with an quest X? The quest goes to another (alive) NPC with some alterations like “[I heard that original_NPC_with_quest died | You think you are some mastermind kill at will?], fortunately [they told me that…|they gave me this item for safe keeping…|etc…]”. Or maybe with the NPC killed are a letter with that starts/continues the quest.
In that precise moment the sharp end of my sword is through this guy… and another respawns… and another… and [blood everywhere, my Henry’s karma subzero] hell this is boring, I should have played World of Goo instead.
I can imagine that in real world blacksmith’s place would take another blacksmith, fisherman’s another one… but that should take some time and WH would need to develop some pretty smart character randomizer that will regenerate population. should the quest continue with the replacement NPC? that would not make much sense unless it’s a generic quest like fetching wood for a charcoal producer or a blacksmith. But I can’t imagine any suitable way of replacing main NPCs, I think they should be called characters, as they have a role in the main plot. … and don’t believe that WH would like to do that…
I said that the quest goes to ANOTHER NPC, no the same that just got back from the dead!
Let me try to explain better: there are the NPCs A, B, C… Z; the player needs to talk to NPC A, C, E in that order, but he killed by accident the NPC C (or A, or E, or all) then the part of the quest that belonged to C (enable to continue quest to E) will go to, for example, P. This P NPC will acknowledge that C is missing/dead/kill by the player and give the “vital information” that he “just happen to have” so he can continue with the quest ACE (now APE).
It may depend on how likely a NPC is to die (multiple quest solutions) but I don’t think replacement NPCs are worth much more effort than randomized appearance and name and they should definitely take some time to spawn. (some where out of site) Aside from being more Immersive you also have to punish the player for killing an NPC like that.
@Tomohare I think it’s just that the idea of an endless chain of respawns and deaths without the characters learning not to trust the player is funny.
How do you handle voice-overs? In such case every voice actor would have to voice nearly every sentence in the game script. How do you handle name addresing? How do you guarantee to the system the system that P isn’t doing something incompatible with this new role? It is easy to say “let it pass to other entity” but there is much design and technical work behind this.
Yes, it is possible to design quest like this and handle all option within its boundaries but it is not a systematic solution to the problem.
Why not an option with a switch in setup - “protect important NPC” on by default and if you turn it off you get a warning after killing important NPC. In skyrim I run into a problem where I joined with rebels and later in the game wandered into imperial outpost - they attacked me on sight and of course I killed them all… all but the commander who was important unkillable NPC that kept attacking me - annoying as hell that I couldn’t simply kill him even tho he wasn’t important NPC for me.
That’s option 3. you can like it (=vote for it)
Please put option 3 in the game. I’d appreciate it a great deal.
That is why I made two suggestions: the other one being that the NPC “gain” an item, so when the player killed him/her this new item enable him to move on.
But the NPC A C E could be know by P Q R, the actors for the roles of P Q R should in some instance said the names of A C and E; and they could just say “It’s a shame that C died.” (noting that it doesn’t matter if their are trying to continue the quest, they are just reacting to the death of someone that they knew), the following sentence could be “Listing… I need to tell you something.” P is whispering in the ear of the player (whispering sounds)
Why not both 2 and 3? edit: let player choose when starting new game.
I like 3rd option most.
What if you you kill ACE as well as PQR? What if you kill everybody except one guy? All quests and quest items would go to the last man standing? That’s not a bulletproof system although it seems stable from purely technical viewpoint.
It seems one ends with either ultimate fail (morrowind) or ultimate immortality (skyrim) systems. Workarounds are too costly (but much easier in sci-fi or fantasy settings) or you have to restrain your design to a barebones generic stuff which is impossible to break. Which sucks.
BTW We can’t go wild with letters as most people in those tymes were illiterate so we cannot pass questgiver status to items holding information - books, letters, recipes, holotapes, daguerreotypes…
You’re forgetting that P,Q,R knew A,C,E and the other did’t so that quest is in failed state if ACEPQR are dead before completion. (and if only A is alive?.. failed quest or completed quest?)
Well, If you kill everyone then is clear that the player doesn’t want to do quests, he will be living in a desert island. (with the animals?)
My suggestion was more a player killing accidentally the NPC. I was thinking more like how the brain works, when there is a problem in a particular region the brain make new connections, but if you remove the brain … well.
If is to choose among those 3 choices, i would go with 3. I want to feel responsable for the action in game.
Compromise between 2 and 3 (sorry for my english):
Player attacking important NPC - Henry saying for example: “That I should carefully consider” and doesn’t attack. But when player continue in attacking- then variant 3.
I would do a combination with a social warning like Dekssan mentioned, but if you would go all out badass in maybe a next playthrough, turn of the protection and just kill the lot like a maniac. Personally I wouldn’t use that option since I enjoy a good story driven game better then an ultimate sandbox where you can basically do anything yet break main story lines too. Doesn’t do the game enough justice to do so and frankly doesn’t add much to the game. Make it a sandbox mode or something but I would focus on not be able to kill vital NPC for at least the main story.
I feel that this game the player should be able to kill any NPC even the necessary ones but not without an warning upon first attack or an icon that appears when the cursor passes over the designated NPC displaying that they are a key
character or important to a quest. I think this would add a level of authenticity to the game and prevent too many NPCs from being immortal.
i never understand why some players think being able to kill all npc is part of meaningful game design.
i don’t see it as “story” issue, but design issue. realistic world, realistic consequences…then you have “maniac” gameplay. just not necessary imo.
I would not say all NPCs but rather any NPC. I think that if you kill some key NPCs then you should end in unwinnable scenario where the rest of NPCs will attack and kill you. I mean, it should be possible to kill king or anyone who invites you to their castle/house/tavern but because they are surrounded by loyal servants and friends who will attack you you would have no way of escaping, you simply can not kill bunch of people alone unless you have superpowers and I hope that in this game we will not have them.
I still do not know why would anyone attack a king (or any other important NPC) just because he can, but if he does so, he should face realistic consequences (i.e. death).
P.S. If the player managed to somehow beat all the NPCs then he would not need to do quests anymore, he would be the last man standing in that part of the world, he obviously is not person who cares about story, so I would add condition to the game (IF all NPCs are dead THEN roll credits). As you can see the game would not be broken then and whoever manages to kill everything would be still able to finish it.
Well, games can be played in different ways. Many RPG’s does allow the player to play the game differently than intended. Take Skyrim for example, there are multiple ways of playing the game without completing it, without the purpose of completing it. If you read on the Bethseda forums you can see there are many people “playing the story” of a character they’ve just created. Doing some of the quests in the game, but not all, or doing none of the quests.
I can see myself trying to do “other things” in KC than just following the story line. Doing things outside the storyline, doing things you’re not meant to do is all part of playing a sandbox game. The strenght of a RPG, in my opinion is when you can do more or less whatever you want. You get “another game” in the first game so to say.
I would prefer the 2nd option. with a dialog like “He is too important for me” “He wouldn’t worth the price” etc…
another option could be that, if you kill some very powerfull NPC, you would be chased by a lot of other NPC (gard, villagers, etc…) with no other option but to try survive (which should be somehow impossible). In other word, you will be publicly linched to death.
But it depend of NPC. For example, the girl who wake up us at the beguining of the story, if this girl is important for the narration, you should have a stop like “It’s my sister/she save me, I can’t do that” after all, we don’t create our character and much of his bond. For others (may be, at one time, the weaponsmith is crucial for the main quest) do the character impossible to kill discretly/with no witness). In that situation, the caracter would be named as a a murder, and would be chased, and avoid by all the population. With no way to came back. And no way to do anithing else thant fleeing, or being chased, arrested, and hang on a proper place.
