Face Stealer's Lair

Priority: 

Stage: 

  • Merged

Development Progress: 

100

Merged into: 

Claim Type: 

Area: 

Description

Half Daedric ruin, half cave, where the Face Stealer of this claim resides: http://tamriel-rebuilt.org/claims/face-stealer

Some things to include:
--A locked, pitch-black or near-black room for the Faceless Ordinator to appear in
--PC will be escorting an NPC through this, so floor obstacles should be kept to a minimum
--scattered ritual implements

NPCing phase, or things waiting on assets (interior dev can proceed without these):
--a corpse of a Dunmer in Ordinator armor, with an Ordinator-mask face, if only because the thought of the player removing the Ordinator armor to find another Ordinator "face" underneath amuses me
--Face-Stolen Cultists as created through this asset: http://tamriel-rebuilt.org/asset/faceless-ordinator-and-other-beasties
 

Relationships

Parent Claim: 

Comments

Once I finish up my current

InfallibleDres's picture

Once I finish up my current claim and I can try taking this on since I know it's high priority, but only if better devs feel I'm up to the task and only if no one else wants it in the meantime. 

Granted; I assume not since

Rot's picture

Granted; I assume not since the message you're replying to is a couple months old and they haven't claimed it since
 

I've found no exterior for

Jani's picture

I've found no exterior for this int, but going by the description, it should be located somewhere near a smaller settlement in the Sacred Lands. This gives either Sailen or Hlersis.
The nearby area is in Mainland, and I don't think any major changes would be justified (like adding a daedric ruin), so I'd prefer to go with a simple cave entrance somewhere, which leads into a hidden shrine.

The caves in the area all have different tilesets, so I'm not really sure which one should I use.

I've wondered about the length of the cave, too. If it's too long, escorting NPCs would get really annoying. Too short would mean an unsatisfying experience for a high level quest. I think Kaushtarari should be of ideal size, but feel free to correct me.

One last thing I'm not sure about is who the shrine is dedicated to. Boethiah would match the quest with his deceitful nature, but I'm open to better ideas.

Entrance: It's a hidden

Kevaar's picture

Entrance: It's a hidden shrine, so I'd go with a cave entrance, that leads to an underground or collapsed Daedric ruin.

Tilesets--pick any from the nearby caves.

Length: The NPC can have a smart-follow script added to it (there's one that teleports it to the player if it gets too far behind while actively following), so I wouldn't worry too much about length, just clear paths where the NPC would be walking or fighting. I personally would make it longer than Kaushtarari, or at least less of a straight shot. Examples: Weepingbell level in Arkngthand for a more complicated layout; Shulk Egg Mine or half of Illunibi for length.

Shrine dedication: when I wrote this I imagined the Face Stealer to be an unaffilitated Daedra, or related to Vaermina. That said, I don't think you need to add an actual shrine with a statue. The Face Stealer Daedra more or less repurposed an abandoned ruin to its own purposes.

Uploaded the first Work-In

Jani's picture

Uploaded the first Work-In-Progress ESP. The basic layout of the dungeon is done, it can be accessed via console (coc TR_FS_1). For some reason the PC spawns at the end of the first part of the dungeon, I don't know why that happens. The lighting is set so that everything should be visible in the caves. It will be changed later on.

I need some advice whether the size, compexity, and layout of the int is right. There are 2 paths that can be taken: a long and a short one. During the quest, the Daedra-in-disguise escorts the player through the long path, which is littered with enemies and random loot. After the player finds the Ordinator, escorting him should be done via the short, linear route with few enemies and some more valuable loot.

The last room (TR_FS_3) is going to be pitch black. It will be done with a dozen or so dark lights, and with the lighting settings turned down to black. With those, the PC shouldn't be able to see anything without a torch, and 100+ pts Light and Night-Eye spells. And even then, only a few outlines.

Uploaded today's work. Messed

Jani's picture

Uploaded today's work. Messed around with lighting in the third room, still experimenting with getting it right for later scripting work.
Lighting settings done for the first room. Added rocks, waterfalls and some fires to light up the cave a bit. Flora and ritual implements to be added later, cultists still need some thoughts.
Progress set to 30.

After the first room is done, I will move on to the second, the daedric interior. I've got some questions though:
Are there any mushrooms or small flora that are unique to the Sacred Lands region, or at least to Eastern Morrowind? It might make the cave stand out a bit more if I didn't use generic Vvardenfell plants.

The cave is nearing

Jani's picture

The cave is nearing completion. The interiors have been mostly detailed and had their lighting set, but I've got a feeling that it's still missing something. I plan to figure out in the following days what exactly needs to be done.

The third cell will need scripted light sources, but I'm not sure if I should be the one writing those scripts, or someone who is going to eventually create the quest.

Minor update, as I don't have

Jani's picture

Minor update, as I don't have much time to work on this one with finals coming up. I've fixed the placement of some statics, added lights with unique IDs to the dark cell, and placed some dead adventurers. The only thing left to do is to add some loot.

Sorry this took so long to

Koma21's picture

Sorry this took so long to complete. I actually had it done the first day just took forever with a move and some other things at home to get this posted but the review is complete. There were very few issues and I also added a couple of things after discussing them with Jani. 

Bump. Please merge this

Kevaar's picture

Bump. Please merge this soonish to section file, plus it's entrance, so that we can get the related quest finished.

Merged to Sacred Lands (37,

Atrayonis's picture

Merged to Sacred Lands (37,-12). I left the cell names as they were (TR_FS_1 to _3) for ease of modding.