Yes, in the above situation you might have the family of the person who was saved LOVE the paladin...and the family of the one that wasnt HATE him.

On the love side you might get items, faction, special training, and more quests from the members of that family.

On the hate side, you might now have a group of people (dont just think of the family, think also of the fmaily's friends, whatever groups (guilds/business, etc) they spend time being a part of that now hate you too...attacking you, giving you worse prices, working against you.

I think what is crucial is to come up with a detailed list of plot arcs. There's a book called 20 Master Plots and How to Create Them that basically breaks down all fiction into 20 detailed plot arcs and illustrates them.

Of course this list of plots would have to be expanded, but this could be the basis of having more than just the kill/protect, craft, and FexEx quests...but a more detailed and intense system of shaping your role (both who you are and what you will be in the future - how people react to you now and how they will react after you do actions).

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Original post by Fournicolas This is a game about being a FARMER!! not exactly what your basic MMORPG player is dreaming about. But people (including me) are prepared to play this one just for fun, and because it only requires your attention for about 15 minutes a day to be fun, but demands for 8 hours of presence to be highly competitive and reach top scores. Simply through the rules.

Mmmm....sounds like Harvest moon. ;) In all seriousness though, I think we should continue talking about how to build proper smart blocks of a dynamic world. One key point is to have NPC planners - the Radiant AI featured in oblivion will include this, but I believe this is possible in an mmo setting too.

Original post by Fournicolas

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But isn't that EXACTLY the kind of failure a paladin would keep reproaching himself? He tried to save two people and only saved one? This is NOT a success in his own opinion, but an utter failure!! Whereas in the same situation, a rogue would be perfectly happy to have saved ONE person, because it means he saved AT LEAST one of them!! But because Paladins and Rogues have different moral values, and should therefore have different rewards for doing the same things. This is why having composite teams is so interesting.

Fournicolas are you referring to this happening to NPC players? The power of MMO games comes from the social rewards of playing with other people. However, these aspects of emoition arent feasible in the current mmos, and if your refering to the player, this is up to his choice of how he wishes to play his character.

Right now MMO's need to progress in baby steps. Right now MMORPG characters are completly static - All they do is give you tests, and offer to trade with you. I think the first building block would to be give npcs a life. Basic routinies like going to sleep at night, or performing errands during the day. An oh how could it would be for the npcs and pcs to meet in the tavern at night. I think it would give the player motivation to spend a night at a tavern if he felt like thats was the games center of attention at the time. This connection between the npcs and the pcs is always a great way to build an mmo story. Our first step though on the great road of mmo development is giving the npcs a life.

If I remember well, some time ago, there were two threads in the AI forum, which talked of, a) animal pack behavioral simulation, and b) village behavioral simulation.

It appears that for both simulations, it required the creation of a scale of basic needs, like eat, sleep, drink, work, mate. I think for humans, to make it more interesting, you could add another valmue, which would be indulge. If an NPC could have a flaw, and that a value of that flaw could trigger events when reaching a certain level, then maybe it could add to the immersion.

Imagine an NPC working in the fields. Maybe his flaw (to make it easier, one of the seven cardinal sins) makes him stop working after some time, and go take a nap under closer tree? (Sloth?) Maybe he stops and goes drinking to town inn? Maybe he is a lusty guy, and is roused by every female character going around him, until he indulges in, and initiates sexual harrasment over a PC? Maybe he is gluttonous, and will eat more or less continously? Maybe he will try to negociate until you give in to his initial price, regularly above others? (Greed?) Maybe he will continuously talk to the PCs about their most expensive visible article (envy)? Maybe he will be seen bursting in terrible accesses of rage from times to times?

What if these elements were added to the routines and subroutines previously mentionned? This would probably create a more deep immersion for the PCs, but it would also require a lot more CPU power, in order to maintain simulation.

For the record, i am one of those who did something in the Animal Pack simulation thread, and I came up with something quite convincing only with Basic programming. There were no graphics, but the animals were reacting more or less correctly. All it took was a lot of balance...

I think the most accurate way to define it is by needs. Each NPC needs to have goals to accomplish, and this is what defines his planner. While this is like saying the same thing, thinging of it in terms of needs makes the system very encompsaing. A farmers need would be to grow the crops and then sell them to a chef or grocer for profit. The grocer then needs to sell it to the npcs who need to buy it to eat. It becomes a huge system of npcs working off each other - Moving and performing actions. And this is what will make a world come alive. The hardest part I see to the system is linking needs together. In essence it is a big web of people working with each other. I will try to diagram later in the day if such time arises.

I have experimented with similar system but it really breaks down at the npc/pc interaction (and the lack of this makes everything else pointless), even the most advance speech simulators don’t understand words but just through back patterns, as well even with one way communications I cant get npc to responds intelligently, with the limitless possibility a simulation system offers the npc need a way to communicate intelligently regarding all the possibilities, the pasting pre-made block together system also breaks down here, since reusing elements in speech quickly becomes painfully obvious

I don't think a speech simulator is really needed for all that. I think I could get with something that would let the NPCs tell me what I need to know, and barely nothing more (leave me alone, I don't have time for you and such), provided the NPCs ACTED, that is, they got a life I could observe. If a farmer goes about farming, and I come interrupting, then there is a probability the farmer will stop working for me, and another one he won't because he's busy. Being able to witness it would be enough if it let me in from time to time. If NPCs are movable landscape I have to interact with, then so be it.

Now, how do I interact with them?

Quest hinting? It will require some speech. In Morrowind, you can ask several questions, in some order, in order to trigger some different answers. And the level of appreciation of the person you talked to trigered different levels of answers, or simply different prices. If you added a variable to that, a variable which would let the different NPCs be wary of different knowledges the you would probably get something quite powerful.

Exemple: You

Basic Social Interaction: You have to talk to some NPC. That is a classic part of the most classic quests. But if you allow your NPCs to wander around, then finding them and talking to them becomes a subquest in itself. And if you DO add the different knowledge bases of others NPCs, then it becomes even more obvious.

Exemple: "Quest: Go and tell Murgos Blaarg that Pelan Frost wants to see him. He will probably be in one of the bars of the city, or maybe travelling between them." You get out in the street and encounter a coming NPC.
Q: 1"Do you know of Murgos Blaarg?" 2"Do you know of a nice bar?" 3"Care to share some info, my friend?" Choice 1
A: Nope, sorry.
Q: 1"Maybe you've seen a blue giant lately?" 2"Do you know of a nice bar?" 3"Care to share some info, my friend?" Choice 1
A: Sorry again, no.
Q: 1"Do you know of a nice bar?" 2"Care to share some info, my friend?" Choice 1
A: I know some top notch bars, and some where you'd better not go, stranger. WHich ones are you interested, after all? Higher grade, or lower grade ones?
Q: lower grade ones? (choice 2)
A: You may find Tarik's inn near the outer wall, down Pruvin Alley. And there is also The Bucket, near Pseudopolis Yard.
Q: Thank you.

Then you walk a little further, an encounter another NPC:
Q: 1"Do you know of Murgos Blaarg?" 2"Do you know of a nice bar?" 3"Care to share some info, my friend?" Choice 1
A: Nope, sorry.
Q: 1"Maybe you've seen a blue giant lately?" 2"Do you know of a nice bar?" 3"Care to share some info, my friend?" Choice 1
A: Sorry again, no.
Q: 1"Do you know of a nice bar?" 2"Care to share some info, my friend?" Choice 1
A: I know some top notch bars, stranger. Which ones are you interested, after all? Higher grade, or lower grade ones?
Q: lower grade ones? (choice 2)
A: Don't know of none, sorry.
Q: Higher grade ones? (choice 1)
A: You could try Mr. Chrysoprase's Troll Cave, in Dolly Sister's Lane, I suppose. Although by the look of you, you're not likely to get in. It's very select...
Q: Thank you.


And yet a THIRD NPC:
Q: 1"Do you know of Murgos Blaarg?" 2"Do you know of a nice bar?" 3"Care to share some info, my friend?" Choice 1
A: Could be. What do you want of him?
Q: 1"I got a message for him" 2"None of your business. Where is he?" 3"None of your business. But maybe these coins will let you hint at a place I might meet him? 4"He is in danger, I have to warn him quick." Choice 1
A: You can try leaving that message for him in any of the lower grade bars of the city. He is bound to get it by the morning. Or if it is urgent, you can try to go to the Bucket. It's about time for Millie's show, and he never misses it.
Q: Thank you.

Three NPCs and three different conversations, although you had the same choices in the beginning.

A quick thought that would get around the Turing test issues that arise when conversing with NPCs - have them speak a different language than the PC. Possibly have some "trade-tongue" with highly limited vocabulary or possibly just have NPC speech be largely incomprehensible aside from occasional forays into very broken English...

The big problem with current preset conversation trees is that the individual statements are highly sophisticated, but the range of reactions is very limited - while a dynamic system is able to produce more sophisticated response sets, at the cost of having individual responses much less sophisticated - if the (comprehensible) NPC vocabulary is very limited, then weird grammar etc. should become less noticeable.

This would make of "Linguistics", or "languages", skills necessary to achieve most quests, but to get rid of the treadmill, you'll need more than that.

I remember a game that appeared in a thread, either here or in the AI forum where you had to deduce the language of aliens... it was... interesting. If anyone can find it again, it's worth something.

Let me just explain that from my experience, the whole "deciphering languages" thing can get really old, really quickly.

Just to explain...I love language and words. So you'd think that I would welcome the challenge...and I do but...

For example in EverQuest the fact that you had to learn a language to speak to someone that had a certain quest...was h-o-r-r-i-b-l-e.

I suppose Im just saying that you might want to think twice before you decide on this for core gameplay.