Eirik's Joining Dialog

[Miloch]

You may have noticed that a couple of the PC responses were "borrowed." They work, but I need to replace them, less they become over-used.

This is important IMO. A lot of folks spend a lot of time carefully crafting their NPC's dialogue (and it looks great in that respect so far) but pay little heed to giving CHARNAME any personality whatsoever. And that's all that matters to the egocentric PC - who gives a flying gibberling's bollock about what the NPCs are babbling about?

 

I laughed my 'arse' off when I chose this dialog path... mainly because it sounded like something I might actually say in the situation:

Perdue: Hullo. You wouldn't 'ave happened to see a big loutish guy with a dog's 'ead on him around here, have you?

PC: A dog's head?

Perdue: You 'eard me. A dog's 'ead. And breath that could peel paint, too.

PC: Oh, a gnoll!

Perdue: Yeah, a gnoll. There's one 'oled up in the hills due west of 'ere, close to the High Hedge. Damn thievin' ball-of-fur stole my short sword two days back.

PC: Never liked them myself. How much would that blade be worth to a runty guy like you?

Perdue: Yeah, yeah. Lay off the short-guy jokes, they're older than your grandmother's uncle. The damn blade ain't worth nothing. It's a pride thing. I'll give you 50 gp if ya wipe 'is arse with it.

PC: For 50 gold that gnoll can wipe his own arse. Hey, did you hear the one about the halfling who climbed into the ale keg to lick up the last drop?

Perdue: Yeah, yeah, pick on the little 'alfling. You're funnier than a bag-o-whistles, but looks aren't everything, you dumb creep.

Of course, you can't anticipate what every possible character might say in any situation, but the more options you give, the more enjoyable (and replayable) the NPC will be.

 

[N.B.: Call me a stickler for detail, but it bugs me when NPCs have inconsistent speech patterns like this (a la Dynaheir trying to speak 'Olde English' and failing miserably). It doesn't bother me he has a mock-cockney accent and says 'oled and 'ere and 'alfling. But he can say hullo and hills and High Hedge without a problem ]

[EiriktheScald]

Leaving notes implies a certain understanding between him and the PC. I'm not sure that's the best way to approach it given they met on the open road and then parted. I have Kagain in mind -- he hires mercenaries after all -- as a location for meeting again. Eirik (and the party) might learn from kagain that she went with Tranzig. I believe you also learn from the townsfolk about his nightly departures from beregost.

 

@Miloch: I find the PC's voice plain vanilla. Are there some guidlines for voicing the PC?

[berelinde]

I would definitely consider giving the pc the option of making such an arragement with Eirik for meeting later as part of the polite refusal.

 

Eirik: Do we journey together?

1 Yes!

2 We've got a few commitments to see to first, but maybe we can meet up later (no commitment, but possible to meet later, maybe through Korgan?)

3 We've no room at present, but I'd like to meet you later. Can we arrange a spot? (note would be a good idea)

4 You're on your own, pal. (Eirik goes off, and the next time the party should see him, he would be much less inclined to take up with them.)

[Domi]

a la Dynaheir trying to speak 'Olde English' and failing miserably

 

Oh, gods, no, Dynaheir does *not* speak Old English. If she did, it would have been completely uncomprehensible to all but two language majors in the audience. She speaks a stylized speak coined out by her first Czarina with occasional inverses. It tries to be internally consistent, and some three or four people read the files in sucession to make sure she uses the pronouns more or less properly. But it's no secret that she is Common-Second-Language. She was in the original game. She is understandable, she is exotic, so yep, that's Dynaheir.

[EiriktheScald]

2 We've got a few commitments to see to first, but maybe we can meet up later (no commitment, but possible to meet later, maybe through Korgan?)

 

Kagain is the greedy dwarven mercenary who runs a caravan escort service out of his shop in Beregost. Korgan Bloodaxe is in BG2. But you knew that, didn't you.

[berelinde]

Uh, yeah. I just get them mixed up a lot. As in about 30% of the time. Usually somebody catches it.

[Nythrun]

She speaks a stylized speak coined out by her first Czarina with occasional inverses.

 

Hee!

 

Dialect is surprisingly difficult to get right, even obsolete early modern English - as there's always a fluent speaker around somewhere who scans your text as a barberic pidgin rather than the poetry you intended.

 

Speaking of Old English, I've always loved the bits in Beowulf (Bödvar Bjarki?) describing Grendel's mere:

 

Gesawon ða æfter wætere

wyrmcynnes fela,

sellice sædracan,

sund cunnian,

swylce on næshleoðum

nicras licgean,

ða on undernmæl

oft bewitigað

sorhfulne sið

on seglrade,

 

wyrmas ond wildeor;

hie on weg hruron,

bitere ond gebolgne,

bearhtm ongeaton,

guðhorn galan.

Sumne Geata leod

of flanbogan

feores getwæfde,

yðgewinnes,

þæt him on aldre stod

 

Those Angles and Saxons knew how to alliterate!

[EiriktheScald]

I can see I'll have to pull out my english translation of beowolf.

 

Does Miloch have a point regarding PC dialog? Admittedly, I never gave it much thought before.

[berelinde]

Miloch has 2 points.

 

One regarding PC dialog, one regarding NPC dialog.

 

It is always thoughtful to give the PC as many dialog options as possible. According to Domi, it is a good idea to write PC responses using several PC "voices." She means that you might want to try to anticipate the types of PC Eirik might encounter, and give them appropriate reply options.

 

For example, with Gavin, I am pretty much sticking with:

 

Mature, well-adjusted PC who is interested in Gavin

Mature, well-adjusted PC who is neutral toward Gavin

Immature, more self-centered pc

"Wild card" pc responses that vary with the situation - fall into 3 categories, and I use 1, 2 or all 3: quick exits that get the PC out of dialog in two clicks, obvious pc reply options that don't fit one of the other categories, and the voice of reason that tells Gavin he's getting too emotional.

 

Sometimes, I've got a lot more than 4 PC responses. Sometimes, there are less than 4 PC responses, but I usually restrict these to cases where the PC really only can be expected to answer yes, no or maybe.

 

It means that dialog takes longer to write, but it means that the player *gasp* might be able to enjoy playing the mod a second time.

 

Regarding Miloch's second point, about NPC voice consistency, that's a tough call. I understand why NPC voice consistency is sometimes sub optimal. NPC dialog is usually spread across several files, which can lead to continuity hiccups. In my mind, it's akin to watching the scar on Frodo's cheek flip sides as he and Sam trudge across Mordor in Return of the King: annoying, but not tragic.

[berelinde]

@Nythrun: where do the half-lines fall? That was the biggest stumbling block I had to Old English: half-lines as independent entities that did not necessarily have to relate to the half-line before or the half-line after. Well, that and the irrelevance of sentence structure. For those that have not had the pain of studying Old English, that means that word order does not matter. All the clues that tell you which is the subject, which is the object, and which adjective applies to which noun are all conveyed through conjugations and declensions. I hated it and loved it by turns, and with great feeling.

[Nythrun]

It'd be:

Gesawon ða æfter wætere
wyrmcynnes fela,
sellice sædracan,
sund cunnian....

 

For PC dialogue, having options in multiple voices is important even if your mod is something that's only going to be played once.

 

As a hypothetical, lets say you've had <CHARNAME> and friends accosted by a stranger in some random encounter area in the wilderness, and the stranger says:

 

"Ho, travelers! I've lost my way in these dark woods - can you not direct me to the city of Trademeet?"

 

And you have the PC response:

1. "It's far too dangerous to wander here alone. Accompany me, and we will escort you there safely."
   
2. "You'd best be handing over all of your money, fool, or I'll be directing you to your grave."
   

Some players are going to want to say "Yeah, it's off to the west - can't stop to chat, the archmage who robbed my soul is razing Suldanesselar and I've got to go stop him." and not get involved in this subquest at all - and if they aren't given that dialogue option, they'll feel forced into something they're not interested in.

 

Which is not to say that you need to include "I AM TALKING ABOUT POOP NOW BECAUSE I AM SO CRAZY AND WILD" as a dialogue option in every conversation just in case someone wants it - that's distracting, and you can't cover every possible reply anyway. But cultivating the illusion that you can say whatever you like really helps immersion.

[EiriktheScald]

I understand this for a bioware NPC. A polite refusal makes more sense for a custom NPC, than does response 2 or even "Yeah, it's off to the west - can't stop to chat,..." response. Someone would actually go to the trouble of installing, just for the opportunity to be rude or steal the NPC's possessions?

[berelinde]

Some people play more than one game at a a time. Last time I played, I had a good party led by a ranger and an evil party led by a fighter. I would have recruited Eirik with one party, robbed him with the other.

 

I know of one person who took the trouble to download a mod just to kill them a different way each time.

 

I am not saying that you should include a robbery attempt as a PC response option. But you are going to have to allow for a little flexibility in playing style. As I've said before, once your mod leaves your hands, you don't know how people are going to play it.

 

The DM of my PnP campaign is eagerly looking forward to downloading Gavin so he can put the girdle of masculinity/femininity on him and send him down to the docks.

 

Edit: One of the reasons some people go to such lengths to customize items meant for a particular NPC is that they *like* to download mods, recruit the NPC, take their goodies, and then drop them off for someone else.

[EiriktheScald]

Ah-har! That be downright skullduggery!

[berelinde]

What can I say? He had a hard time getting his head around a femaly player with a male character. Once, I used spirit gum and hair trimmings to give myself a fake beard ala Viggo Mortensen and sat through the entire gaming session like that just so he'd stop calling Ian, as he was then known, "she." He stopped calling Ian "she," but he spent most of the gaming session having giggle fits.