Telepathy Revisited [Coding Heavy!]

Priority: 

Stage: 

  • Closed

Development Progress: 

90

Claim Type: 

Description

This is a followup to the "Guars and Guards" quest that became part of the Spring Release: https://tamriel-rebuilt.org/claims/guars-and-guards

Basically, in this new quest, Ernandre Nermin can be convinced to re-enchant the telepathy amulets that the player found. (Currently they are a defunct item in the Spring Release quest). Ideally, once at full power, these amulets can be given to any NPC, and the player will get a little bit of their stats as a buff/debuff.

Notes/Problems to Solve:
--Buffs/debuffs to the player must be handled through use of Constant Effect Spells applied to the player, as any kind of "ModStat" or "SetStat" breaks with reloads. This may also be true of Fortify Fatigue and Fortify Magicka effects, whether in spell form or not.
--There must be some sort of filter so not every NPC is getting the topic to take the amulet. Disposition unfortunately still makes the topic show up for everyone, so something else must be used.
--As the player may have misplaced or sold the telepathy amulets from the original quest, Ernandre should ideally offer the player new ones
--Similar to the above, this quest may be more suited to an Andothren release, where Ernandre might have travelled to after being kicked from the Mages Guild.

Comments

Needed to test: use Andothren

Rot's picture

Needed to test:
use Andothren section file with as usual the internal Tamriel_Data TR Addon
Console: do these things in order to move him to andothren first

Journal TR_m3_MG_OE_Guards1 80
coc "Old Ebonheart"
coe -1, -17

jump over the railing down to a stall with the NPC, then talk to him about the amulets to test the quest,
to test the amulets only:

player->additem tr_m4_q_tlrev_Ernanadres_note 5
player->additem gold_001 5000

buy two inert amulets in barter window then complete quest and get amulets

Tested using Openmw -In the

Dev Shah's picture

Tested using Openmw
-In the greeting the dialogue is '"..So you would like to use telepathy amulets?" It should be "...So would you like to use telepathy amulets?" Also, 'using' the amulet is too vague. Something like activate makes more sense.

-On selecting the telepathy amulet, the next topic is added using brackets(Ernandre notes, which should be Ernandre's notes but i've heard editing topics is hard), which seems pretty ugly.

-In the first journal entry (journal 10) "... He proposed me to...." should be "... He proposed to me that..." or along those lines. The ugly bracketed topic is here too.

-Using Ernandre notes when Journal = 10 yeilds "Haven't I described the situation clearly? Maybe you can ask the guard in the tower who shot the cliff racer." . "Thats all I know! Maybe you can ask the guard in the tower who shot the cliff racer to get more information about that." Sounds better.

-On talking with the guard in the east tower, the greeting is "What do you mean by saying Ernandre notes?" it should be something different as the topic will already be there and this sounds odd, especially if you had the quest but did't wanna complete it.

-North-west should be northwest in further dialogue with the guard and on its left should be towards/by its left.

-Journal 20 typos, NW->northwest ; itslef-> itself ; above building -> above buildings ; a guard -> the guard.

-the notes are at pretty hard to reach places (i had to look in cs to even see where they were)(You need jump/levitation for atleast 2 and some acrobatics for another 1). Too frustrating to the player IMO, and with basically little to no directions, i would say it needs to be in better places. I know this is supposed to be a succesor of the MG, but even if you can levitate these things are pretty easy to miss. This is just my opinion and can be disregarded.

-Journal 30 "I brought all Ernandre notes to him." suffers again from the topic thing.

-After giving him the notes, the dialogue for topic 'Ernandre Notes' is "I've had this bad handwriting since I was child. I cannot help it." Awas child->was a child. Also seems like a copout, instead, maybe have the notes written in code or something like that?

-After giving the notes, the dialogue for the guard is "I've heard you have found them for Ernandre. Was it worth to jump and levitate here around on the buildings and walls? I should give you a fee..." I've heard -> I heard ; was it worth -> was it worth it. He says that he should give you a fee, but it doesn't. Either give some gold, or change it as "You should've gotten something nice from him"

-Journal 40 "Ernandre wants 1500 septims for one telepathy amulet. Is it not too much?" "Is it not too much?" seems a bit odd for a journal, and if the pc is wealthy. Maybe remove that line or rework it. Maybe "After all I did, he still asks 1500 septims?"

-Journal 100 "Ernandre Nermin enchanted telepathy amulet for me. Now I can give it to any person..." Anyone sounds better than any person.

-Maybe add a bit of dialogue on how the amulet works?

-The amulet script seems to work great, I don't know anything about it, but i got not issues.

-In the process of giving the amulet to NPC, if you haven't worn it yourself, NPC says you need to wear it, instead of it being in brackets or something of that sort.

-When gifting it to NPC, two amulets are taken out and one is added. Might be to make scripts work, but feels a little odd.

-While the amulets are awesome and very interesting. The (for me) tedium and the improper(or just lack of) instructions means that player can feel that the skill bonuses are more or less random without some trial and error. Again, this is just my opinion.

Take care!!

Also, in Unexpected gift

Dev Shah's picture

Also, in Unexpected gift topic , there is a typo "... same samulet as you" -> "... same amulet as you"

Take care!!

Dev Shah corrections

wojtek's picture

Dev Shah corrections changelog:

-changed topic "Ernandre notes" to "Notes on enchanting"

-Journal 10
changed "I met Ernandre Nermin in Andothren. He proposed me to enchant telepathy amulets I recovered from the guar and Bildam Danoran. To do this, he needs his notes on enchanting [ Ernandre notes ] that were grabbed by a cliif racer. Maybe the guard in East Guard Tower would know more about it."
removed the bracketed stuff as no longer needed

-Journal 20
typos fixed

-journal 30
changed "I brought all Ernandre notes to him."
to "I brought Ernandre remaining pages notes on enchanting to him."

-journal 40
changed "Ernandre wants 1500 septims for one telepathy amulet. Is it not too much?"
to "Ernandre wants 1500 septims for one enchanting one telepathy amulet."

-journal 100 changed "Ernandre Nermin enchanted telepathy amulet for me. Now I can give it to any person..."
to "Ernandre Nermin enchanted the telepathy amulet for me."

-topic "unexpected gift"
>changed "You should wear it first before asking others."
to "[You should wear it first before asking others.]"
>corrected typos (I am glad to wear the same samulet as you. Thank you.) samulet changed to amulet
     and (This is unexpected gift for you. Please, take it.) an added between is and unexpected

-topic "notes on enchanting"
>changed "I've heard you have found them for Ernandre. Was it worth to jump and levitate here around on the buildings and walls? I should give you a fee..."
to "I heard you found them for Ernandre. Was it worth to jump and levitate here and there all around the city? I sure hope he made it all worthwhile."
for 'tr_m4_q_tlrev_Mednil_Hl' after journal >= 30
>changed "I remember the situation you describe. I hit that cliff racer with arrow, then it flew above the building you see on north-west, next it went away to the direction of the waterfall, on its left. Do you need to know something more"
to "Yes, I remember that.. I hit that cliff racer with arrow, then it flew above the building you see on northwest and then went to the direction of the left of the waterfall"
for 'tr_m4_q_tlrev_Mednil_Hl' when journal =10
>changed "What else do you want to know?"
to "That is all I know. You might find the notes on enchanting along the path."
for 'tr_m4_q_tlrev_Mednil_Hl' when journal >=20
>changed "You would't believe me! I traveled from Old Ebonheart to this place. When I was to enter the town, some cursed cliff racer attacked me! Me! I used what I had at hand to chase it away and it were my notes. It garbbed my notes and flew away when it was hit by a marksmen from the East Guard Tower. Fortunatelly I collected most of my notes that were scattered here around, but five pages are still mising. Can you find them for me?"
to "You would't believe me! I had just traveled from Old Ebonheart to this place. When I was just enterring the town, some cursed cliff racer attacked me! Me! I used what I had on my hands to scare it away and those were my notes. It garbbed my notes and flew away when it got hit by a marksman from the East Guard Tower. Fortunatelly I collected most of my notes that were scattered here around, but five pages are still mising. Could you find them for me?"

-topic "telepathy amulet"
>fixed typo (I hope you can change your mind.) can removed
>changed "You save my life for a second time. I don't know even how could I repay you."
to "You saved my life for a second time. How would I ever repay you?"
>fixed minor typos
>removed the bracketed [Ernandre notes] as they are no longer needed

-Greeting 5
>changed "what do you mean Ernandre notes?"
to "Huh, so you are looking for Ernandre's notes on enchanting?"
>changed "Do you want me to join the Mages Guild again, %PCName? No? So you would like to use telepathy amulets?"
to "Do you want me to join the Mages Guild again, %PCName? No? So you would like me to enchant the telepathy amulets?"

This claim requires at

Dev Shah's picture

This claim requires at minimum changes to the placement of all notes, and the guard to updated locations after the andothren change. It also requires some dialogue changes and rewordings, as well as the changing of the quest id.

While that is the minimum, in my opinion the loop of the quest, finding 5 papers on the rooftops, is just not interesting. Such grind might be good for lower levels, but it should be something a bit more interesting and less monotonous for such a unique reward.

Take care!!