NWN Birthright Project

[soudhadies]

Hello All, It seems this would probably be the apropriate venue for me to annouce my BR project and ask for a couple of suggestions.

I am already fairly far along in making a birthright module. The core principle of this module is that other builders will be able to take the scripts and objects contained therein and use them to implement their own BR modules. For the moment this module concentrates only upon the bloodline aspects of the birthright rules. I find that regency itself would be a pain to implement, not the least because of the AI programming that would be required for NPC domains. (This does not mean to say that a PBeM that uses a persistant world module for a roleplaying forum would not be interesting).

I have decided to implement the bloodline rules of the original rulebook as best as possible. I see it as the most fitting because it layers the aspect of bloodlines onto characters instead of making it an intrinsic part of the characters (such as making them expend a feat to be blooded), and thus making players able to use their characters in birthright and non-birthright modules. (Besides, I'm pretty sure its impossible to design your own feats, even with scripting).

Thus far I have implemented code that can assign a character a bloodline, and roll him/ or her blood abilities according to the tables in the rulebook and based upon the limitations of the bloodabilties (that is distinguishing between derivations and blood ability levels). I have also found an admittedly roundabout way to avoid the fact that characters do not carry local variables with them from one module to another. This means that a character using my implementation of the birthright rules could carry his bloodline information and abilities with him to any other module using the same implementation.

I have yet to implement the effects of the bloodabilities, and am running into questions with several of those, I would appreciate suggestions:

What effects should Battlewise, Detect Illusion, Poison Sense, and Unreadable Thoughts have?

I'm also not sure how to deal with bloodtheft. In a game where a character is permitted to respawn, what effect should bloodtheft have on such a character? I thought perhaps a loss of 1/3 of their bloodline score . Any one else have any suggestions?

Bearcat (Barvas in the NWN community)

[Daelin Rekar]

Well nice going lad, but i don't know enough of Birthright itself to suggest something.

[Ariadne]

Originally posted by Bearcat

II have decided to implement the bloodline rules of the original rulebook as best as possible. I see it as the most fitting because it layers the aspect of bloodlines onto characters instead of making it an intrinsic part of the characters (such as making them expend a feat to be blooded)...

I'm your oppinion. To be a regent is a privilege, no disadvantage (to "kill" an extra feat for that propose would make any BR-regent less good than a commoner. May be, a fighter has no problems with it, but any other class has)! And to play a commoner is equal to playing in any other setting (it would simply destroy the "feeling"). In our campaign this idea isn't very popular (and that's why "killed" too).

What effects should Battlewise, Detect Illusion, Poison Sense, and Unreadable Thoughts have?

Battlewise is normaly only usefull with the BR card combat, if you don't have it, the blood ability is useless. Then those cards lead by him get a +1 bonus to attacks.

Unreadable Thoughts have the advantage, that the person simply has "hidden" Thoughts (Immunity to ESP and such thinds).

Scions with Detect Illusion get a saving throw every time they see one automatically.

Deal with poison sense like the spell (originally the scion senses poison with 90% of the time).

I'm also not sure how to deal with bloodtheft. In a game where a character is permitted to respawn, what effect should bloodtheft have on such a character? I thought perhaps a loss of 1/3 of their bloodline score . Any one else have any suggestions?

Normaly the "winner" scion gets 2 points of bloodline, if his bloodline is weaker and one, if his bloodline is stronger. To get 1/3 of the "looser" bloodline would be a little bit to strong...

[Birthright-L]

On Fri, 25 Oct 2002, Ariadne wrote:

> Bearcat wrote:
>
> > I`m also not sure how to deal with bloodtheft. In a game where a
> > character is permitted to respawn, what effect should bloodtheft
> > have on such a character? I thought perhaps a loss of 1/3 of their
> > bloodline score. Any one else have any suggestions?
>
> Normaly the "winner" scion gets 2 points of bloodline, if his
> bloodline is weaker and one, if his bloodline is stronger. To get 1/3
> of the "looser" bloodline would be a little bit to strong...

Bearcat isn`t suggesting a change in how much the winner gets -- he`s
talking about changing how much the loser loses in an alternate setting /
game engine for BR, in which (effectively) resurrection is an everyday
occurrence.

I`ve not played Neverwinter Nights myself, but I`ll say that the amount
lost should probably be related to how frequent you think character death
is; the more frequent death is, the smaller the loss-per-death should be,
and inversely. Stating a loss ratio is really the same thing as saying
"given a bloodline score of X, you can die and respawn at most N times
before it goes away entirely." For a loss of 1/3 and a starting score of
100, this happens on respawn 12; starting at 30 means you go to 0 on
respawn 9; 10 zeroes at 6 (or 11, 8 and 5, depending on how you round).

In "standard" BR, resurrection is assumed to almost never happen, so the
loss is generally considered to be total if it does. This is also a good
idea in a setting (again, such as tabletop RPGs) where "respawning" is
externally controlled, to prevent someone capturing a scion and killing
and raising them 5-10 times to get an additional point or two each time.


Ryan Caveney

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[soudhadies]

Thanks all, thats given me something to think about. Admittedly, the one third penalty does seem a little steep. But I think that was sort of what the bioware people were going for as well. They have you lose 10% of your gold and 50 xp /Level when you respawn. It needs to be a trade-off to respawn or to load and lose anything you may have gained since you last save, but not lose the xp, gp and bloodline points (and possibly abilities).

As for the challenges posed by certain blood abilities, this was not so much a question as to what those abilities do (I have the rulebook), but what they should do in the "alternate game setting/ engine" presented by Neverwinter nights.

Taking Battlewise as an example, it turns out to be extremely impractical to have armies in the game, at least on the scale the birthright rules suggests. As a means of making the ability remain useful I instead applied the +1 attack and defense bonuses to all the members of the scion's party. I figured such a scion might be adept with small unit tactics as well.

Another problem is the limitations placed on certain options available to the scripter. I had to make compromises based upon what was available, but always trying to keep to the spirit of the original. Masela's scions with the Great Animal Affinity ability won't shapechange into dolphins, for example, but into penguins (Honesly, it was the best I could do).

The majority of the module has been completed at this point. All i need to do now is finish off a smattering of blood abilities.

Barvas

[soudhadies]

Well, its done. I just posted the module and readme file to Neverwinter Vault (nwvault.ign.com) under the title Neverwinter Birthright. According to the message I got from them it should be available some time tomorrow morning.

Barvas