_Artano_'s Quest Showcase

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_Artano_
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1 year 9 months ago

 

I made this quest for my dev showcase - A Missing Associate. It was tested using the latest release candidate of OpenMW 0.48.0.

Step-By-Step Guide

The quest begins by speaking to Hlarys Drethan in the Morning Sun Cornerclub in Hlan Oek. He and his associate, Loryn Harvys, planned on staying a single night in the town on their way to Almas Thirr. The night of their arrival, however, Loryn had one too many bottles of Shein and wandered out of the Cornerclub. He hasn’t returned, and Hlarys is too scared to search for him. He asks you to look for his associate, and gives you 85 gold coins to bribe the locals.

When speaking to any merchants in Map 7, they’ll recall hearing Loryn’s name in connection to a mercantile conflict in Narsis. Supposedly, two merchants of the same names swindled a high-level business-owner and fled the city. This business-owner had connections to the Cammona Tong and the upper echelons of House Hlaalu.

The locals will direct you to the southern gate, where you can speak to the two traders there about Loryn. With high disposition, they’ll tell you that he was beaten up by Tong members and dragged into the Council Club. At this point the quest splits:

Path 1 - Help the Cammona Tong

Go into the Council Club and, with high disposition, get pointed to Rarys Sadryn. He’ll offer to reward you if you can lure Hlarys to the Council Club. If you refuse he’ll attack you, if you accept he’ll promise an immense reward. During this conversation, Rarys mentions a glass katana delivered to him by a “friend in Narsis”.

With high disposition, Hlarys will agree to follow you to the Council Club. Bring him there, speak to Rarys for your “grand reward” of 50 gold, and leave. This finishes the quest. Afterwards, you can find Hlarys’ body south of Hlan Oek, containing amulets and a shard of raw glass. This is more profitable than the actual reward.

Path 2 - Help Hlarys

Instead of going into the Council Club you can return immediately to Hlarys. Or, you can go south of Hlan Oek and find Loryn’s body on the river-bank. He’ll ask you to get him a scroll of Divine Intervention so that he can leave town unseen. Once you finish speaking with him, a 24h timer will begin. 

If you get the scrolls before the timer finishes, he’ll teleport away leaving you with a pair of Shipal-Arai pauldrons, quest finished. If you bypass the timer, Hlarys will be gone when you return. Anyone in the Morning Sun will tell you that Hlarys was beaten and carried off by members of the Tong. This finishes the quest - no reward.

 

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Binary Data TR_m7_LostAssociate_2.esp27.42 KB2023-01-29 21:05
_Artano_'s picture
_Artano_
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Made some small dialogue edits. Removed glass from Hlarys and swapped scroll of Divine Intervention with a scroll of Invisibility.

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Binary Data TR_m7_LostAssociate_3.esp25.9 KB2023-02-04 13:45
_Artano_'s picture
_Artano_
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Small update. Instead of immediately disabling, Hlarys will now turn invisible and disable upon cellchange.

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Binary Data TR_m7_LostAssociate_4.esp27.01 KB2023-02-12 12:45
pralec's picture
pralec
Senior DeveloperWriting ReviewerExterior DeveloperQuest Reviewer
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57 min 19 sec ago

Hey, nice work on the showcase. I like your characterisation of the Tong especially. You've given them a gritty, crime-drama feel. I do think that some of the dialogue needs tuning to cut out some repetition or awkward turns of phrase, but apart from some specific instances it's hard for me to give feedback on. So this is just a general note to always go back over all your dialogue with a fine-toothed comb to edit it for flow and readability. For the most part, though, the dialogue is good and doesn't need much editing. Specific notes to follow:

Topics

My missing associate:

  • "I arrived in Hlan Oek..." You have both "hard to tell" and "hardly tell" in the same sentence, which doesn't read well.
  • "I'll be sure to reward..." The last phrase is a comma splice, take a look at our style guide.
  • "Have you found..." The second choice will show even if you never find out that Loryn was killed, and just go straight to talking to Rarys and then reject his offer. There's an implication that Rarys killed Loryn, but it might be better for the purposes of this choice making sense to alter Rarys' dialogue so he confesses to the murder when he attacks the player.
  • "Get that scroll..." "mentioning" is a bit of an odd word choice in this dialogue. Also giving the scroll could afford to be a "Have you got that invisibility scroll I asked for?" Yes/No dialogue choice.

Loryn Harvys

  • General note: filter the generic entries and the ones for quest side-characters to stop showing up after the quest is complete.
  • "A drunken merchant..." that the deserved to get whatever came to him is a bit harsh, espeically since this will be filtered to other outlander NPCs. Maybe he was "asking for trouble".
  • "Where have I heard..." This entry is missing a NotID filter for Drals Hler, meanng that his entry below will never fire. It also doesn't need the NotID filters - just put it below the unique entries for Indriri and Drals. Dialogue works by scanning from the top of the topic to find the first applicable entry, based on the filters.
  • "Rarys dealt with..." another comma splice in this entry.

Hlarys Drethan

  • Lots of comma splices.
  • One entry uses %PCName and is filtered to everyone in the cell, so everyone in the cell knows PCName's name.
  • Filter the general lines to Journal < 45

give his friend a similar gift

  • This topic could have just been called "a similar gift."
  • "Where Hlarys..." is filtered to Hlarys. I think it's supposed to be filtered to Rarys.

Greeting

  • "How goes..." should use the topic phrase "my missing associate" rather than just "my associate".
  • "Please, get that..." still says "Scroll of Divine Intervention" rather than "Scroll of Invisibility"

Journal

General note: this is a personal preference, but I like to have 10 as my first entry, and 100 as the first of my finished entries. No need to change the entries now, since that will require script edits, but I think it's a good practice to get into. It helps me remember what my different quest stages mean without having to refer back to the Journal page all the time.

Missing Associate 1

  • Entry 45 says Hlarys was carried off, but if Rarys is dead the patrons tell you Hlarys was murdered on the spot.

Scripts

TR_m7_HlarysDrethan_sc

  • Needs an OnDeath condition which sets a journal entry to complete the quest (which doesn't trigger if you've asked him to follow you, of course, because then you can end the quest by talking to Rarys).
  • Should probably put something in here which stops him Hlarys from following you once you're in the Council Club. It's a bit weird if you can lead him there and then lead him back out.

TR_m7_RarysSadryn_sc

  • You could potentially put something in here to Forcegreet when the player returns with Hlarys. Not necessary, but might help to up the pacing at the conclusion.
_Artano_'s picture
_Artano_
Joined:
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Last seen:
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Thanks for the feedback, Pralec. Most of these issues are cleared up, but there are one or two things that I'm not sure about. 

"This entry is missing a NotID filter for Drals Hler, meanng that his entry below will never fire" - The line shows up fine in-game, I'm not sure what the problem is here.

"Filter the general lines to Journal < 45" - Could you explain this, please. Filtering the lines to < 45 would result in the topic disappearing in the dialogue window. 

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Binary Data TR_m7_LostAssociate.esp27.29 KB2023-02-17 17:43
pralec's picture
pralec
Senior DeveloperWriting ReviewerExterior DeveloperQuest Reviewer
Joined:
2022-04-18 15:48
Last seen:
57 min 19 sec ago

If you don't filter the line, it will never leave and it applies to everyone.

Also you need to add Not Local NoLore and T_Local_Nolore filters to your generic lines. Your generic lines are showing up on NoLore characters

I just gave it a test play. I convinced Hlarys to follow me to the Council Club and then spoke to him about his missing associate. I told him the Camonna Tong was looking for him. Then I went and spoke to the Camonna Tong guy and he acted like Hlarys had been killed. You need to make it so if you convince Hlarys to follow you, you can no longer follow other lines in the quest. And also you should make it so he stops following you once you enter the Council Club.