Detinith's Showcase

[Detinith]

Hello all! I read all about your project from the UESP wiki, and I immediately got Morrowind and Oblivion for PC (I played them on XBox originally). I love the game and its rich lore and immediately wanted in on helping craft the rest of Tamriel.
I figured I read so much about the Temple persecution of the False Nerevarine, I'd make a mod about it. There are a few new interiors reached from a new semi-isolated island. I tried to keep it as clean as I possibly could (manually). It only depends on the Morrowind.esm file and shouldn't interfere with any other dialogue (the first journal entry of my quest is optional and entered when you ask for latest rumors and is filtered out of existence afterward). As long as you don't speak to an Ashlander after defeating Dagoth Ur, it'll be the first rumor you hear.
Hope you like it

edit: took out all those 'edits'. I'm not updating the file any longer.

I'm sorry for constantly changing my upload. I may not have been as ready as I thought, seeing newer criticisms in other threads and knowing I've done something incorrectly. I wanted to change it as well as I could before anyone began reviewing it. So far, I haven't seen any review, and I can't tell if those download indicators are just me, testing to see if the download works. I know you're all busy; it seems like a lot of people have been getting reviews lately. More chance for me to learn mistakes. I still look forward to any criticism. As I've edited this file many times, I'd also be willing to try a different mod according to what you think would be good. Thank you!

[Detinith]

hi, it's been about a week and thought the only unresponded thread should get a little bump

[Shapeshiftr]

Hi, and welcome to TR. I'll take a look at your interiors in a second once I get everything loaded up. Sorry about the wait, TR modders are usually quite busy.

This is just for the interiors, as I'm not an exterior modder.

Clean. I'm not sure about the exterior cells, so I'll leave that to an exterior modder.

Swim's-with-Shark's Shack-

First thing I noticed in here was the light settings. They're...weird. Look at some other shacks to get an idea of a good light setting.

It's pretty sparsely decorated. You should add more detail, like books, lights, food, misc items, etc. A good basis to work off of is around 75 objects for a shack. This one has 20. I like what you did with the rough statics, now spruce them up.

The flin on the doorframe is...unnecessary. While it's an...eccentric touch, it's a little too eccentric.

The argonian has an exquisite robe, but he lives in a almost bare shack? And he has expensive liquor?

Style mixing is where you have _com furniture in a _de house, or _de furniture in a _com house. I think you know what I mean by that. You have a _com wine rack. While you made it _rm, which is good, make it _de, too

As for bleeders (objects running into each other or the floor) and floaters (objects not touching anything at all)-

Rugs and shacks don't like each other. You have to tilt them just right so they touch the ground at more than one point. Right now the rug touches the ground near the wall and floats everywhere else. This is always an annoying one to fix.

Again, with the tilting, the skooma bottle only touches on one point. If you don't know how to tilt, open up the object window by double clicking on it, and change the x or y axis.

Also, to be annoying, that flin bottle is floating as well

Overall, I think you have the basics of modding down, you just need to refine them a bit, and clutter the house up. On to the next int-


Experiment Chamber-

There's not much here. A few mushrooms, a fire, and a dude. Clutter the cave up with vines, rocks, more mushrooms, and other stuff like that.

The mushrooms should have their own lightbulb thing.

There's not much else here to speak of, so on to the next-



No light is just TOO dark. Give it at least a bit of light.

There's nothing here but the quest stuff. Add more stuff like the ones I mentioned earlier.

Rock is an annoying surface, but the chest bleeds.



I feel that you had trouble thinking of what to put in the caves and the shack. Shacks and caves are one of the most difficult interiors to start out with. I suggest starting with a de_r hlaalu house. Make it medium-sized. These are what are most made at TR, and they are pretty simple. Remember to clutter, and about the light. Use what I talked about here and put it into a new interior. Have at least 100 objects. Put in a bookshelf and clutter it with misc items, books, etc. I think you'll get the hang of it. Good luck

[Kiteflyer61]

Hi Detinith,

Sorry it took so long for someone to look at your file, things are a little busy around here.

I'm a relatively new modder here but I can tell you your file won't get you promoted as it is now. TR generaly wants you to showcase one area of modding at a time. You should choose whichever area you think you're best at and do a mod just in that area. I've looked at your file and I can see you have at least some skill in interior modding so you should probably start there. Be sure and read the tutorials on the main page and then work up an interior for one of the velothi or hlaalu style buildings. Make sure it fits the exterior and be sure to set the northmarker in your interior. It doesn't have to be large but it should show you know how to use gridsnap. Make sure it is well detailed and don't mix different styles. It takes a while to learn how to do things just right so don't get discouraged. We're here to help if you need it. Feel free to ask questions at any time.


Edit: Dang! Beaten to the punch!
What I said still applies though.

Good luck and happy modding!

[Detinith]

Thank you for the quick replies. I understand you're busy, it seemed from the other threads that reviewers could only be more hassled if they worked in Blizzard's WoW department.

I think if I explained the particular story behind everything, it might make the presence of some things plausible, if not permissible in the lore-correct setting of TR. I know some things in this mod won't work for the project; I only wanted to demonstrate my imagination

Swims-With-Sharks is the alias of Utadee, a falsely-proclaimed Nerevarine who, when found attempting to break into Vivec's temple, was chased into exile. My vision of Utadee was how I would see my character as a retired and older Hero. He's definitely an alcoholic with no shame (the quest reward for either outcome is one skooma bottle, one of his most valuable possessions). I decided that was enough to allow him a wine rack, and I couldn't find a de_ one.

The interior is rather sparse; he keeps his alcohol inside but his food outside, having no fear of theft. The rug was definitely pushing it, I only felt the bare floor wasn't attractive. Lighting was always on my mind but not enough for me to change it back, it's at the settings I used while testing the mod.

The cave is rather bare, as I didn't have anything in mind other than the quest. I have no problem changing the black lights or adding fungal luminescence. The Experiment Chamber contains only the experiment, a failed attempt of Utadee and Azura to raise Indoril Nerevar accidently combined with several rat souls. Here he was sealed away, in the scantily-clad body he was risen in.

I will try another interior with a different flavor, though I must say I had at least as much fun doing scripting and dialogue (I find I'm rather terrible at exteriors). I have a few ideas though. I look forward to further advice

[Bloodthirsty Crustacean]

"I had at least as much fun doing scripting and dialogue"

If you do enjoy such things, then perhaps in your next file you might include a small (lore-friendly) quest showcase, showing off some interesting dialogue and scripting? Questers are really in high demand (quite more than interiorers, in fact, although there's nothing to stop you joining in with that, too).

[Detinith]

I took to heart your need of questers, Crustacean of the Bloodthirsty kind, but I'm sorry to say I don't have any quests for you yet. This mod doesn't have any but instead is a sort of 'social' mod. It adds a lot of dialogue to existing characters, and a series of scripts that will cause some of the more noble residents to 'party' every few days.
Speaking to anyone in Balmora will give you the topic in a greeting that will never be seen again afterward. You can then speak to anyone inside Hlaalu Council Manor, Nerano Manor, and Tyravel Manor about the party. High dispositions reward you with pleased and deep answers that will tell you if there's a party that day and if that particular person has been invited. Low dispositions will tell you only if there's a party that day, and lower still will hardly respond.
Each person has their own special dialogue, and on the day of the party will respond differently during different times of the day. The party can be hosted in one of the three different manors, and each host has their own preferred invitation list.
If any of the hosts should die (like Ondres Nerano to the Redoran quest), the parties will cease, and mentioning them again will only bring mourning.
If you want a messagebox to pop up on the day of the party with its location, enter 'set PMsetDebug to 1' in console. Otherwise you can only determine it with certain people not being invited, or going in and out of all the manors at 7pm on the day of the party.
Just to put this out there, Hlaalo Manor is not included

[Bloodthirsty Crustacean]

Well, a slightly quirky showcase piece, and one that's a little too far ranging for me to want to look at the whole thing in detail, but all the important bits are that you clearly are very competent in scripting and write decent dialogue.

My main problems would be that you get some very harsh responses ("insufferable person") merely for having below 80 or something disposition. Generally, 50 is 'amiable', 60 or 70 is usually enough to get them to spill the beans, and 80 is normally 'best friend' kind of status.

The new 'party in Balmora' greeting might break some quests, but probably not important ones. You did put it in a suitable Greeting category, which is good (5 for quests, 7 for generic stuff).

The 'party in Balmora' topic should be set to NotLocal | NoLore | = | 0 , because generally we don't like topics that anyone and everyone can get, without filters. (e.g. if I'd created a drunk guy and put him in Balmora with all unique dialogue, he'd still show up as perfectly alright when I spoke about the party)

You use an unseemly amount of global variables, which we really try to avoid at TR. In this case some of them might be necessary, but we really try to avoid them if possible. (To give you an idea, Map 1 and Map 2 of TR between them contain only one global apart from those used to rent rooms and expel the player permanently from factions, and some Data based ones)

Also, it can be quite hard to work out where the party is. Even having boosted everyone in the Council Hall to 100 disposition, and spoken to everyone, it was only apparent that there was going to be a party and a lot of people hadn't been invited. I had to roam around the other manors to actually find where it was by speaking to the host.

Some guests at the party I hadn't met previously and so didn't have 100 disposition, they just told me the standard "there might be a party tonight" without any regard to the fact we were both there.



Anyway, there were these slight problems, but that probably just comes from your rather unorthodox showcase. If you get a 'normal' quest up and running, even a relatively simple one, I'd be willing to promote you. All you'd really need to include over the basics would be some choices in dialogue, perhaps a 'second path' to the solution of the quest, and demonstrate a knowledge of TR naming conventions (which if you don't know, I tell you, and you then demonstrate you're not stupid enough to forget ).

Of course, if you still don't want to do a quest showcase just yet, that's fine. But know that you'll probably need to provide a slightly more orthodox showcase if you want to get promoted, in whatever department.

[Detinith]

Thanks for the input Bloodthirsty

I'm glad you think I'm a competent scripter. Now for your request of a true quest showcase with a couple features you specified.

CrimeMod:
Pelagiad may be a comfortable retirement village, but extortion is happening inside the Fort. Angoril, the ranking officer of Fort Pelagiad, is being pressured to keep quiet about the real goings-on, but has recently become very flaky.
Tee-Lan, a humble Argonian resident of The Rat in the Pot in Ald-ruhn and of no apparent importance, now needs some help keeping Angoril quiet.
Seeing something in the Player, Tee-Lan asks him to hear out a proposition. This request can end with quiet force, enraged desperation, or a new life for Angoril. The Player must decide who truly needs help: Tee-Lan or Angoril, while both sides pray Angoril isn't pushed over the edge and does something stupid.

This mod mostly takes place in Pelagiad, with the quest received in Ald-Ruhn, and possible success in Ald-Ruhn or Ebonheart. Get that coc function ready
After listening to Tee-Lan's proposition, the player may either extort Angoril into submission for a criminal's reward, attempt to help Angoril but fail and drive him into a frenzy of a trapped animal, or successfully convince/bribe Angoril to ask you for help.

There are a few steps of quest progress for either side that end with reward. Talking to Angoril about it when he isn't trusting or after partly completing the Extortion side will end the quest with no reward but a very angry Altmer. Don't forget the delicious dialogue I so love doing. I hope this is satisfying for you, Bloodthirsty

[Nanu]

I almost want to promote you for writing off of that description alone.

[Detinith]

I almost want to promote you for writing off of that description alone.

And I almost wanna hug you

edit: Really though, I do enjoy creative writing, but trying a few parts of modding made me realize I like arranging quests, plots and personality quirks more than creating whole histories. I'll conform to history, but if I were to make it, I would find *some* way to bring back dragons

[Bloodthirsty Crustacean]

Okay, pretty nice. There are some issues:

Your topic being called 'Tee-Lan's proposition' is a little bit dodgy for the man himself. LGNPC covered for you miraculously by making him a recent captive from Black Marsh, speaking in the third-person, but I have no idea if you knew that or not. Regardless, you then went on to speak in fluent first person, as most Argonians should. So the topic looked dodgy.

The very first bit of dialogue was a little bit sloppy, and a little rushed. I don't know what "convince him of my special kind" means, and I suspect most players won't either. Always give your dialogue a proof-read, and imagine how it would sound as a player reading this for the first time. Take it more slowly. Are you a native speaker? If so, imagine a relatively formal conversation, and keep it at that level except in exceptional circumstances.

You overuse commas, at the expense of sensible punctuation. A lot of the initial dialogue with Samia is frankly unintelligible ("it wants Angoril to stop crying about his position"??). Take it simpler, and also make sure you're introducing the player to ideas correctly. It was unclear what this proposition was, and then suddenly 'here's where you come in'. It wasn't really clear where 'here' was ("keep his trap shut"? About what?). Both paragraphs were also riddled with grammatical and syntactical errors.

Having handed over the crab meat, Samia doesn't respond properly to 'Angoril's surprise', saying I should speak to Shadbak.

Never use 'Enter'/'Carriage Returns' in dialogue, except when writing poetry.

Lack of journal entry when 'scaring' Angoril would be confusing for some. Most major quest events should have journals.

You kept on calling Tee-Lan "it". Only the odd bad-English Argonian or Khajiit calls things "it". For every other race, Tee-Lan is obviously a "he".

The entire quest on the Tee-Lan side is certainly rather obscure (I didn't test the other side, because everything seemed perfectly functional, and I'd seen enough dialogue to know what to expect). It's very hard to know what's going on. This hopefully won't matter if working for TR, as you'll be working from carefully planned and approved plotlines and plans. But do please try and give the player some kind of indication as to what on Earth is going on.


Overall, very functional, but the dialogue seemed very rushed, and was most certainly not up to our standards, unfortunately.

If you're not a native speaker, I'd probably suggest you'd be better off showcasing for another department, as there's probably little you could do to improve in a sensible timeframe.

If you are a native speaker, please make one last showcase, as simple as you like, just showcasing some well thought out and well written dialogue. Do that, and I will promote you if the dialogue is up to standards. Also do some stuff with TR name systems. So a dummy script, journal and item.

[Detinith]

Thanks for the review. It was definitely less seemly than I thought with all of those issues.

Tee-Lan's side of dialogue was definitely rushed in a way. I finished the showcase with the original quest giver being the mudcrab merchant (I wanted to play off of M'Aiq the Liar's take on them - running Pelagiad) and decided at the last minute that you probably wouldn't appreciate such a thing on an easter egg character.

To fix it I exported all of the dialogue and changed everything I could see from two read-throughs and notepad's replace function. The topic "Tee-Lan's proposition" was how I wanted the topic (mudcrab's proposition) as the word 'proposition' was used at least once for other topics, and I didn't want the parser to be confused. I couldn't find a way to fit that into dialogue (it was easy for the mudcrab) except to briefly have Tee-Lan refer to himself in the third person. I read it as a humble-sounding request rather than dialect, though it's equally possible I just made myself think so. I will make certain to stay in character from now on.

The use of "it" referring to Tee-Lan was originally for the mudcrab but I left it in, trying to pass off the agent Samia as at least slightly racist and Angoril as aggressive in the face of danger, though I can see it might take a stronger hint for that kind of thing.

My use of line breaks in dialogue were either accidental artifacts of importing dialogue from altered text or because I'm used to separating large texts into some kind of paragraph form. I'll be sure to pay attention to that from now on.

As for the lack of information, I was hoping to provide enough to imply shady goings-on while leaving enough out to make it seem plausible the player would be approached in such a way (player 'presence' being valued over trust by Tee-Lan). I didn't develop the story deep enough for certain things (what Tee-Lan actually has Angoril do for him under coercion) as I'd think getting that far into the story would involve a plot outside the scope of a showcase.

Now that I look, I found the error why scaring Angoril didn't enter a journal; I had it update to index 15 rather than 14. I'll be careful with journal entries now that I see how badly it affects progression.

Sorry if it didn't seem up to standards. I made very large alterations with exporting/re-importing dialogue and combined with eagerness to upload and laziness have apparently fudged some things up. I'll try to make another simpler one with your specifications. And yes, I'm a native English speaker.

[Bloodthirsty Crustacean]

Okay, this makes slightly more sense now.

Anyway, I await your next showcase.

[Detinith]

Ok, I just finished testing this next showcase.

At the foot of the Balmora silt strider is where you'll find Endali Drolan, a dark elf afflicted with a strange illness. She asks you to go to Nalcarya of White Haven and request a cure. You then bring her the custom-made potion to end the quest. Very simple compared to my other showcases, but with TR naming conventions for the quest and items, some simple scripts, and proof-read dialogue.

I couldn't figure out what the "Q" in "TR_Mx_Q_name" stood for in the naming convention thread I looked at, so I left it as Q. I sent you a message about that, Bloodthirsty, but I couldn't wait to post this up. Again, I hope this meets what you asked for.

[Katze]

The q is the quest number. You don't have to worry about this until you're doing an actual TR claim, as far as I know.

[Bloodthirsty Crustacean]

Okay, this looks fine. Your dialogue is a lot better, in fact very good (I frankly dunno what went on in your previous showcase ).

Regarding naming conventions, I PM'd you, but just for future reference, the conventions are for an object, script, NPC etc: TR_mX_q_123_myobject (TR_m3_q_8_RewardAmulet)

and for a journal TR_mX_[Initials]_Name

(TR_m2_FG_GraBogtheOrc (Fighters Guild Quest) or TR_m3_Me_Alchemist (Merelag based misc quest))

If in doubt, check a Map 2 quest, and copy that.

A few teensy issues that are just coincidental to this quest, but still worth pointing out are that your journal doesn't need to keep reminding the player where Endali is. The continual repitition of "by the silt strider" seems a bit obsessive.

Putting your Greetings near the bottom of the list is a bit unorthodox. Always place them at the top of Greetings 5 (but underneath TR's 'you smell like a nix-hound' greetings), except in exceptional circumstances.

Again, it's slightly unorthodox for the 'quest topic' not to be hyperlinked by the greeting. It's good that you are aware of the problems of simple topics, as I've been repeatedly inconvenienced by the work of bygone modders who were completely ignorant... However, you should always aim for the hyperlink. Either make a really distinctive unique topic (with a name, or something else unusual) or use an existing 'small topic'. Any topic used by Bethesda it's perfectly acceptable to you to add on to. That can't cause any new conflicts. Just be sure to clean your mod! (but you don't need to worry about that either, cos this file is fine)

"At least she sought my help rather than an actual healer." It seems you just can't make these things without one bizaare throwaway line. I see that if you have 70 disposition she elaborates that "They treat symptoms well enough, but this is another matter altogether", but it's a rather bizaare statement without that follow up. Not really a problem, but it's something I would have told you to change in an actual claim, so just bringing it up.

"[She spends some time mixing ingredients.]" This stage direction is fine, a personal tip of mine is that I like to put that in place of "Continue", so that the player clicks on "[She spends some time mixing ingredients.]" to make things proceed. It seems neater to me, but it's just a stylistic thing. Just a tip, you don't have to pay any attention.



Aanyway, this is very well dialogued, you're very competent at questing and scripting, what's not to love. Promoted for Quests. (And admin will have to give you your Modder tag and stuff, but I think you should be able to do everything else now)

Welcome to TR, and good luck!

[Detinith]

Thank you

I never thought to have anything continue the conversation other than "Continue". Your suggestion opens up a lot that I can make sure to implement. All your guidance is appreciated and I can't wait to fill up the world with some interesting plot.

[Thrignar Fraxix]

I have hit the requisite buttons, so you should be good to go.

Congratulations

[Kiteflyer61]

Congradulations! Welcome to TR.