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    Maelstrom New Horizons


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dine with the captain

I like the personalities idea. It could really add variety to the game, an officers personality could affect so many things, from crew relations to the way the ship or your fleet is run. It could even determine the relationship the officer has with the player, if you hired an honourable sea-fairer then he could address you politely and with respect, and he could be easier for the crew to get along with, making the crew happier and making your fleet run more efficiently. Whereas if you hired a murderous Pirate he could agitate and influence the crew into fights and mutinites. And your dialogue with him would be more agressive then with a good officer. Perhaps the "personalities" could have different effects on the gameplay assigned to them, and in order to improve game speed any officer you encounter could be assigned a random personality when the NPC is generated. I assume a simmilar thing is used for the naming of NPCS? I think I wouldn't meet a Portugese Jack Sparrow officer with the name Armand Jingo 5 times in a row if I were to enter and exit a tavern. =P Maybe were drifting a little off topic here? xD And as for dining hall (Now reffering to a previous comment. =P ) It could be anything. Idea's are always open to modification. =P
 
To go in another direction . How about making the dining with the officers into more of a pre-set video clip leading to a new quest ?
 
The personalities idea would definitly be one of my biggest wishes for the game. That could add some tremendous gameplay value. I am confident that it IS possible; we'd just need to figure out how to do it. I think some of the main things to take into account here are the officer reputations (I don't think these are actually used for anything right now) and some randomly generated character traits. We'd need to figure out which character traits we'd need and what kind of impact they'd have. And of course we should try to code this all in the easiest way possible. So it would be nice if we could most of this through dialog and add a couple of random events in for good measure.
 
What I can do, and do know, inside and out is roleplaying and roleplaying systems both tabletop and computer. So I'd be happy to offer suggestions with the caveat it would just be that. Someone with a more practical head on their shoulders and a better knowledge of the scripting in the game would have to be willing to shoot some of these clay pidgeons out of the sky!

Here's what I'm thinking. There should be a natural tension based on innate reputations. The closer the reputation (captain to officer and between officers) the less chance of personality based trouble breaking out. Characters would need a numerical loyalty value somehow assigned as well. Loyalty should be hidden and only come out as a factor when there's actual trouble (unless a low loyalty could trigger "warning" or "rumor" events where a First Mate (difficulty based on relative levels) might tell a Captain that someone's acting funny and should be watched). Actions that add to loyalty would be time served (in years - this could be tracked as dates are kept), increasing wealth over time (there is a stat that tracks how much gold each officer has I believe). Actions that decrease loyalty would be the differential in reputation (the further apart the reputations on the scale the less they like each other) primarily.

The main mitigating factor will be Leadership. This should serve to reduce but not eliminate negative effects on an NPC officer's loyalty rating. It can't be a cure all because every captain's going to have a high one and it would just moot this whole mini-game. A truly loyal officer should be a fairly rare thing and, if an events table can be constructed, a very rare treachery out of the blue from a character with even a good loyalty rating should still be a distant possibility.

Once the Loyalty stat of a character hits a certain point there's a good chance for trouble and a very good chance that character will end up betraying the crew or trying to ringlead a mutiny. A mutinous officer will try to gather officers closer to him in Reputation than the Captain as well as a number of the crew to attack (boarding action with NPC Officers on both sides and random crew making up the difference). There should be a check to see if there's a possibility of success before a mutiny takes place. If not the character will betray the Captain in a port or at sea by joining with pirates (or an enemy nation) to attack the captain either on the ground or as an event while at sea. If this character is a subofficer commanding a ship that ship (and everyone associated with it) will turn on the Captain and join the attackers if at sea.

Now, as you can see, unless a given Captain has a crew of people all in perfect harmony with him (identical reputations) he's going to constantly be bailing out moral and loyalty to keep things afloat. And if his reputation ever changes, for good or ill, there could be real trouble. Obviously, for this to be fun, there needs to be a pretty good chance of just that happening whether the player deserves it or not from time to time.

Precident for this model come from a strategy-rpg called Romance of The Three Kingdoms where your military units and cities are run by hundreds of officers and each one (depending on the version of the game) has innate traits that effect how loyal they are to you. For the most part keeping your kingdom functional will require very talented people and not all of them will see eye to eye with you all of the time. So you'll be keeping an eye on them and sending them gifts or trying to behave in a manner that encourages them - but to encourage some you'll be alienating others. It ends up as something of a balancing act ideally but not an overwhelming one.

The organizing, mitigating, factor here should be the Captain's Leadership rating and his ability to sniff out signs of trouble around his captain's table. Random events and practical options (some of the latter surveyed above by another poster) should populate these meetings. And maybe some gambling as well? When someone's complaining, that's a hint. When two officers argue, maybe you let them fight to get it out of their systems (and maybe one dies unless there's a Doctor on board) or maybe you break it up? Maybe a character confesses he has a personal enemy that's hunting him leading to an encounter with a hostile fleet (but gaining that officer's undying loyalty in return - his Reputation sets to your current one). Maybe you hand out some gold as a reward to buck up complainers. But maybe that will lower the loyalty of all the officers you haven't rewarded? Could be best to bribe them all just to be safe?

The big loyalty killer should be lost fights (measure crew at the end of a battle to the crew at the start of it, perhaps, or there could be a better measure) and low gold-over-time stats.

So what actually happens around the table? Things that effect officer Loyalty (group or individually) and officer and captain Reputation. What kinds of things might these be? Cheating at cards? Perhaps fighting over a female crew member or female crew members fighting over a male crew member? Just think about all the piratical stuff that can come up here on a long sea voyage. And pray the provisions don't rot and the rum doesn't run out!
 
Some very good ideas there! One thing we shouldn't forget though: The mod shouldn't become annoying. It's shouldn't be like "oh no, not ANOTHER mutiny because of a disloyal officer". Also I can imagine many players wouldn't want to spend too much time on talking with their officers. In the Build 14 Alpha mod, we now have the VISIT_DECK mod. With this mod, when seting sail, rather than going straight to sea, you go to your ship's deck first. I did this with the idea that we could add an event here where an officer of yours comes to talk to you about the morale of the crew and officers and any worrisome relationships. So if nothing intestering is going on, no officer will come talk to you and you can just set sail straight away. If something worrisome is brewing, usually you'd get some warning from an officer so you can try and straighten out relationships a bit.
 
How fast loyalty drops is something that would have to be tweaked and I agree, the idea of randomly rebelling officers was a quick idea that might not be fair or practical in practice.

People would need to play and see how they felt about the rate of loyalty changing. But one thing I'm certain of is that this needs to be an OPTIONAL mod. Some players will have zero patience for any of this. An expansive game like PoTC will attact many different kinds of people with different reasons for playing. This kind of mod should help roleplayers (obviously), character modellers, simulationists (who want an authentic piratical experience) and strategy gamers (assuming we get the underpinning mechanics down to something manageable). It won't help pure ship modellers or people who just want to sail a ship around and it might drive some of them nuts!

And it just occured to me one way to "cheat" would just be hitting a tavern over and over again until you get compatible officers. This will get annoying fast to people. The way to fix this is two-fold. Only allow one new officer to show up a month in a tavern (which means most recruiting will be random off of captured ships or via story NPCs) and, again, make this mod optional so people who don't like it won't have to deal with it. <img src="style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/biggrin.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid=":D" border="0" alt="biggrin.gif" />

The Deck mod sounds good too. Like we've been thinking along similiar lines. But if we could merge that with the captain's table somehow. There's something archetypal about a "Captain's Table" and the idea of "bringing them to the table", a phrase meaning negotiate and bargain, all fits together very nicely. You'd feel a bit of a scummy and underwashed King Arthur sitting at the head of your own round table...
 
If you look through my past posts, you'll see I've commented on character personalities before. I really do think that would add a lot to the game. Of course the captain's table idea should be implemented if we try and add this mod into the game. I have been doing some thinking on "micro management" before and came up with the following idea:
- If you don't manage anything at all, everything will work OK, but not at the best effiency (useful for players who don't want the mod).
- If you do manage, you can get things to work better (or worse) than by default.
- You can set "standing orders" that would help prevent you from doing the same thing over and over again.

Of course these thoughts were related to a different mod, but we might be able to (partially) apply them here. I am thinking that the most important problems can just be automatically briefed to the player by an officer when visiting his deck when going to sea or anchoring in port. So if you make the right decisions in those dialogs, nothing really bad will happen. However, you can also choose to invite your officers for dinner, where things are a bit more elaborate and complicated. Here you can solve problems much better and come to better efficiency or, by doing the wrong things, actually cause unrest amongst the crew and officers.
 
The more I think about it the more I think simple is best. Either things are working fine (at least on the surface) or things have just gone to hell. But there'd be an intermediate point before everything goes to hell where a First Mate could warn you about trouble. A captain would generally know, in a vague way, that people who have Reputations like his are probably going to stay loyal longer through rough patches and if he's a successful captain all his officers will be less likely to cause trouble. He should also know that voluntarily gifting treasure to one officer will raise that officer's loyalty but lower that of other officers. The other option is gifting them all but that should be very expensive to the point a captain's really going to want to keep his number of officers fairly small or simply be really good at what he does.

I'd say honorable characters (characters with positive Reputations) should be cheaper to bribe on a salaried crew so you can play as an honest merchant or naval officer without the treachery and backstabbing of a pirate crew. Maybe toggling the "Sign Articles" would trigger the mod itself. Unless you "Sign Articles" people will generally behave and do what you say. But once you go pirate, or privateer, it's every greedy cutthroat for himself?

A key for this to be interesting would be Crew Events and those should center around Captain's Table scenes and could include discrete adventure hooks as well as randomized events. Someone's stealing, someone's cheating at cards, someone's flirting with someone else's woman. Generally speaking too much talking in an action game, especially as a way of resolving disputes, is counter productive. So there should always be some kind of combat as a resolution. Whether it's a mutiny, a duel, an ambush in an alley or at sea - the threat of violence and treachery and sheer bloody-minded betrayals should inform every chat and chats should be short. Enough to convey the situation and the options but not extended, branching, dialogue trees or anything. This isn't Planescape: Torment! (That'd be a mod for another day!).

We might even be able to get away without introducing a loyalty stat at all and just sticking to Reputation alone to manage relations. The "happier" a crewman is with you and the longer he's with you the more likely he'll move one Reputation closer to your own. The less happy he is the more likely he is to move away from yours until he revolts.

In order to keep captains on their toes, a character's Reputation may be secret or even false and an event or a skilled First Mate could reveal this.

Consequences for various Captain's Table events could be material (a gift from a crew member or, alternatively, an item stolen by one), adventurous ("My grandfather said his old captain left a treasure on this uncharted island" or "My enemies have caught up with me! Help me!"), or adjust Reputations closer or farther away from the Captain's.

I dunno. You're the one with the coding chops here, Pieter. But I think the less technical a Captain's Table/NPC Personality mod is and the more narrative/cinematic it feels the better. A good captain can manage events to an extent which has a strategy element but he shouldn't worry about, say, his skills or ship stats going up or down a point here and there because someone had a bad day. That might feel micromanagy. I'm thinking more on the lines of Jack Sparrow and how he dealt with crew. Not a huge amount of love and trust there but I doubt he was dotting every "i" and crossing every "t". More crisis management, fast talking and dirty fighting to keep everyone in line. Oh, and treasure. Success. That's the real key.
 
pieter isn't that much of a coder, actually. (his words, not mine) still, this would be a great oppurtunity to have something to do while using directsail. i like it.
 
Some very good thoughts there, OddjobXL! <img src="style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/w00t.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid=":woot" border="0" alt="w00t.gif" />

<!--quoteo(post=225972:date=Dec 15 2007, 05:03 PM:name=Morgan Terror)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(Morgan Terror @ Dec 15 2007, 05:03 PM) [snapback]225972[/snapback]</div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->pieter isn't that much of a coder, actually. (his words, not mine)<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->Very true. I will be the last person to claim I'm a great coder. Whenever I code things, I HAVE to keep it simple, otherwise I don't understand anymore myself. <img src="style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/wacko.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid=":wacko:" border="0" alt="wacko.gif" />
 
<img src="style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/hi.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid=":gday" border="0" alt="hi.gif" />

Hey guys. Wow! Look at all the replies already! Sorry, I'm waking up early tomorrow to go on a ski trip, so I won't be able to post anything or really read anything right now. I'll look into it when I get back.

In the meantime, I have read some of the replies. One of the main things that I was thinking the dining would do is increase your leadership stat. Of course you would have to manipulate the dialog correctly and the better your leadership status the easier it is (and the less your stat can improve). It would also cost some wine and food. Another thing is that I want to make some good, believable dialog. I want it to be an immersive mod. So that's what I'm working on right now. I'll just try to get the dialog in right now and then add the effects. Then I'll worry about the cabin.

Anyway, I look forward to reading all the replies when I return.

<img src="style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/sailr.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid=":sail" border="0" alt="sailr.gif" />
 
Well you guys are now rising above and beyond the grounds of my limited crative concepts so I won't be able to participate much more in this. xD

But I would like to push one thing forward, even if it is off topic. Would a paint job for the ships be possible? Even something as simple as the sails option but limiting the selection to paintjobs for your ship. (I.e. So you can't select a Black Pearl or Dutchman Paintjob and put it on a Tartane.
 
All off-topic discussion moved <a href="http://www.piratesahoy.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=11308" target="_blank">here</a>. The topic is interesting enough to not be derailed... <img src="style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/rolleyes.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid=":rolleyes:" border="0" alt="rolleyes.gif" />
 
I posted some interesting thoughts <a href="http://www.s31clan.com/privateftps/pietersmods/ideas.htm" target="_blank">here</a> quite a while ago. Might be worth a look. <img src="style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/smile.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid=":)" border="0" alt="smile.gif" />
 
At risk of going somewhat further off topic I'll respond at length here to the ideas presented:

<!--quoteo--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE</div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->1.1 Gameplay vs. Realism

This is a topic that is being brought up very frequently. A common misconception is that these two are each others' polar opposites. Realism doesn't necessarily mean bad gameplay. And a fun game doesn't necessarily have to be completely unrealistic. I think that our number 1 priority should be gameplay, but we can turn to realism and history to figure out new ways of improving that gameplay.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->

I think we'd be fairly safe to focus on realism as it relates to the Pirates of The Caribbean films and that's not so much realism as internal, thematic, consistancy. Blurring a century here or there, including mystical items and characters, isn't going to cause too much pain. It's only when something really jumps out at us as something The Black Pearl isn't likely to have run across (such as Napoleanic era ships and militaries) does it not fit. Many games have "Realism" mods that focus exclusively on getting the nitty gritty details down at the expense of all else. That's appropriate as an alternate mode for PoTC's build patches but the focus should be just enough realism that it adds to immersion into the world of piracy. Superstition's always played a huge part in that but so do some details like the ballistics of cannon fire or the different kinds of damage to a ship a captain should deal with (fires, taking on water, so forth). If it adds to the Piratical experience then it's got versimilitude. If it's too technical or reaches for an element that doesn't fit well into the mythology then there's a potential problem.

The trick, of course, is more art than science. Knowing when something close to the line fits or doesn't, is too technical or more off-putting than immersive.

<!--quoteo--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE</div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->On Officers

What could be done:

- Give each officer type at least one truly distinct use that no other officer type has

- Have officer types that remain aboard your ship and will not follow you ashore ever

- You can talk to these officers on your deck and you can use their special uses through dialog with them

- Officers allow you to automate certain aspects of the management part of the game

- Make good officers rare and expensive<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->

I think the first is a good point. We do, after all, have Gunners that will automatically refill our, and our officers, ammo and powder pouches assuming we've any left in the weapons locker. Every character should have such a role.

In addition to what you discuss other options are also available and some are issues unless other aspects of the game are addressed. For example, you suggest doctors healing characters after fights. How many characters are still wounded after fights? I tend to find myself with gobs of healing potions on hand on top of my natural ability to regenerate. This would work better if we didn't have natural regenerative powers and there were no healing potions. In fact, this might make for a more exciting bit of gameplay. Folks would have to be much more careful in a battle! But afterwords having a doctor around could auto-heal you and yours up so the downtime is minimal.

Giving every "class" a role and function might be some work, and it would have to be carefully balanced, but I agree it would pay off in spades.

The other way each unique class could fill a special function would be via "Captain's Table" events. Some could be conditional on a certain kind of crewman being aboard a Captain's ship or in his active party. Also the fallout or consequences of some events could be adjusted by the fact a certain class of character is around. The effects of a "Crewman Stealing" event could be minimized if there's a quartermaster aboard unless, of course, he's the one stealing in which case you're really in trouble! I don't know if you're familiar with an old roleplaying game called Darklands but it'd go through your abilities and come up with custom options for various events. In our case, instead of abilities, it might go through crewmen. A "Fire Aboard" event could be mitigated if there's a Gunner aboard, for example, and if there's not a Quartermaster might limit losses to cargo while a Doctor could minimize losses to crew.

You see where I'm going with this. We'd look at what each kind of officer actually did on ships and figure out how they'd play into these text-based events.

I'd say all officers should be potentially treacherous and the more powerful, and effective, a character is the more treacherous they should be. Being a captain should be harder over time not easier. The more success you attact the more jealousy from those around you. Perhaps a compensating fact for Companions not having any special "role" might be that they're actually loyal no matter what. First Mates should also, while not necessarily loyal, be key to ferreting out trouble with the crew. Unless, like the Quartermaster in the "Crew Stealing" scenario, they're behind it. And this trouble should have a face. Generic crew leaving is a problem but an actual mutiny lead by your own Officers ending in a "boarding action" on your own ship is much more dramatic. However, to give these lesser lights a chance of success (so they're not cannon fodder) they should be the last thing a captain faces - like when we board an enemy ship but only face the Captain at the end. Also that officer should get bonuses to combat abilities representing desperation (up to a cap of 10 Melee).

Hum. Wandered I did. More to come later. Good thoughts there, man! <img src="style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/me.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid=":onya" border="0" alt="me.gif" />
 
Some good thoughts there. What we'd need to do is to actually write down all possibilities and choices in such a way that it might be translated to computer code quite easily. To try and get the logic behind all random events pinned down already. For example:
IF doctor aboard THEN crewlosses 20% lower
IF first mate aboard THEN chance of mutiny 50% smaller UNLESS the difference between your and the first mate's reputation is too big in which case the chance is doubled instead
Etc.
 
Agreed.

I suggest we focus on the events first and even create event type categories to break it down further.

Background Events: Events that arise from NPCs. Can be conditional based on Reputation, Class or National Origin (or Loyalty if we decide to include that element).

Shipboard Events: Events that arise from life at sea.

External Events: Events that effect the ship but arise from other sources than the crew or shipboard life.

What's most important, I think, would be focusing just on the most interesting and fun kinds of events and then, if needed, fleshing out other events to include other classes or cases.

Now while there will be a good deal of coding and writing to put this together from the point of view of the player it should be totally transperant. Once a week (and you could make this period longer or shorter in the configuration - or disable the mod altogether) there will be a "Captain's Table" scene. In addition to assorted things like gambling or assigning tasks to officers (as was mentioned by someone else earlier) a roll would be made on the event table.

How the event table is structured could well revolve around the concept of crew/officer loyalty or some other factor. Or it could be structured along NPC types or event types.

Hmm. I wish I knew if what I'm talking about made as much sense to coders as it does to me or whether it's practical.
 
you know... leaving out the potions is actually a REALLY good idea. right now you can basically keep on going forever, or you're unavoidably dead if you can't win. i'm totally for leaving out healing items, except maybe a bandage once in a while.
 
Perhaps making potions EXTREMELY rare and tuning down bandages even more?
 
well, that's what you tried last time, wasn't it? <img src="style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/rolleyes.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid=":rolleyes:" border="0" alt="rolleyes.gif" /> then it turned out that every bandit had at least one potion. <img src="style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/rolleyes.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid=":rolleyes:" border="0" alt="rolleyes.gif" />
 
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