NPC AI

From: Archantes
Date: 2002-02-26 13:50:20
In-Reply-To: 966

These ideas work. The point however is that the NPC AI part is a important component of the game. It creates atmosphere and if it is well made it prevents some of the malpractice commonly seen in online RPGs.. think of a city guard system for example.

Just my ideas, but I don't know why we need to worry about them, we barely got the test landscape running.

That is because it have to be done some day. :)

If you start it tonight it will be more ready when we need it. Well ok, maybe it is too early to start doing it, but why not to start the conversation.

From: Zaxim
Date: 2002-02-26 13:58:29
In-Reply-To: 968

Well before we start the conversations we still need to know about specific NPCs. For example a blacksmith will say something diffrent than a farmer

From: raeky
Date: 2002-02-26 19:51:21
In-Reply-To: 969

And blacksmith in town whatever will say something different then the blacksmith in another town.

Also blacksmithing will be a player skill and player operated shops... They may have NPC shopkeepers to sell there wares while there offline, but the player manages what is up for sale and for how much.

From: Takomtor
Date: 2002-02-27 09:49:12
In-Reply-To: 971

My introduction is coming, I just can't make up my mind, what to tell...

"NPC shopkeepers to sell there wares while there offline, but the player manages what is up for sale and for how much"

This is good concept. Player could determine the price limit and also the amount limit. NPC should try to bargain, by just simply stating bigger start price (could be set by player) and lowering it according customers offers.

These NPCs should also require salary, so the shop owner, should really be making money and take care of basic accounting.

Earlier was mentioned the guard system of cities. Land of a city would be owned by the city and players could rent it. This income would then be used to cover guards salaries.

Renter of a land could build a house on this piece of land and maybe rent the house for a artisan. Artisans might also be taxed by the city. This would create a nice chain of dependencies.

Of course every city could have different practises.

J

From: raeky
Date: 2002-02-27 22:31:58
In-Reply-To: 972

A city guard wouldn't have "pay" because no one really "hires" it. A city dosn't need $ in the game. Players can rent houses in a city, or buy them, or if there is land avaiable buy the land and build. But outside of a city any land is fair game, no property ownership outside of citys should be established, players can come up with property ownership rules/laws and if you want someones house just go fight him for it and take it. If you want to protect your house hire npc guards to protect it. Inside a city property ownership would be enforced by city guards, if your house was broken into and a guard sees it, he will try to stop the intruder.. Donno how that would work out, the player would have to specificly name to the guards who is allowed to enter there house when the player isnt present. And if a guard sees someone not on a "list" enter a house they presume its a burgler and try to kill them. :P

And yes npc shopkeepers, guards, mercs, anything you want a npc to do for you specificly, whill require pay.

From: Takomtor
Date: 2002-02-28 07:29:54
In-Reply-To: 974

I'm afraid that these "no upkeep needed" cities might turn out to be very flat. Isn't it so that running a city would be a challenge for all of us, instead of just creating a almost selfsufficient city.

Instead of actually building some big cities readily available, we could design a nice demographics, where it would make sense, for players to start building their small shops or "industries". This would create a need for law and order and therefore all cities would have slightly diffrent administration and functions.

This would fit into your vision - But outside of a city any land is fair game, no property ownership outside of citys should be established, players can come up with property ownership rules/laws and if you want someones house just go fight him for it and take it." - and would also enable same simple principle to be used with cities.

From: raeky
Date: 2002-02-28 08:12:16
In-Reply-To: 976

yes but, how much management do we want to do, I don't see A LOT of players wanting to sit down and run a city, when they can be off doing things that are considderd more fun? Being a mayor or judge on a online rpg game isn't as fun as being a warrior off killing monsters and finding treasure?

From my understanding the cataclism didn't destroy many buildings and citys that where once occuppied can now sit empty devoid of people. But quite a few people surrivied it, and citys still exist. So it seems quite logical that players would start in an already existing city with npcs running arround doing things and selling/tradeing. Then as players start joining the game some of the npc shop keepers can be replaced with players, like a npc shop keeper might have his buisness/shop up for sale, and a player might buy it. Then that npc would go back to his home whereever it is and do whatever he wants to do.. or just dissapear.

I don't really invision the game starting with absolutely no buildings or citys, since it would be much better game play, and allow for storys and plots, if citys already exist. There needs to be alot of quests and such right off the bat for players to start doing.

Absoultely everything can't be done by players. And we need a good strong story line, plot and a solid game play that presents many many many hours of new adventures for the players. So if they start off in a city they can start talking to ncps and find out about ancient lore and old stories that might really be true, thus a quest. "I heard from my great grandfauther of a cave on the north side of nemen, that contains riches beyond belif, and monsters that can make your skin boil by just looking at them." And this cave can exist, maybe not such monsters, but treasure can be found there, if a player is brave and strong enough to find it and explore.

You gotta have interaction with npcs and players and players and sages, to give quests, and fullfill meaningless mindless jobs, like a janitor to keep the streets clean, or a carpenter to build the buildings. (unless you just want a command like "build building" and poof a new building appears before the player. I doubt a player would want to specalize in buidling buildings in a rpg games, some rolls players might not want to do.)

From: Takomtor
Date: 2002-02-28 08:49:59
In-Reply-To: 977

"How much management do we want to do, I don't see A LOT of players wanting to sit down and run a city, when they can be off doing things that are considderd more fun?"

True. I just do feel that running a city if far more interesting than running, for example a blacksmith shop.

I would like to have a shop by myself, I would also like to go to the mountains and figure out where to get metals, I would like to have some NPCs to run my shop, make my sales items, mine my metal and do the transportation. I would also need to have NPCs to guard my properties. If something extra ordinary should happen, I could hire some players to handle them for me, or do it by myself.

I see the fullfillment of playing coming from those things that my character can do, not from improving the character.

I could imagine an ambitious person to assign himself as a mayor and appointing some close allies as heads of "state, security, treasury". They could then hire NPCs to be guards or administrators for simple routines which would run the city and economy at large. It would be their problem to balance the income and cost so that people would feel worthwhile staying it that city.

Personal wealth or City's benefit? There would be probably lots of people ready to claim mayor's place, if he decided to give up or accidentally got assassinated. So mayor's real job would be to stay in power and handle diplomacy. Go to war to help allies etc.

Administration could have NPCs, as one has to pay monthly lease, taxes etc. Monthly reports would then show situation for every contracts, therefore making clear if there is need for further actions like debtcollecting or just banishing a merchant from marketplace. This kind of "more" interesting jobs could be handled by player, since there would not be actual/strict timelimit for such an action.

Taxes etc. don't have to be complicated, maybe just a fixed sum.

I agree that starting with no cities at all would be wrong choice. However, some of the quests should actually include assignments that need building, instead of slaying. Quest could be to found a medical shop in an perilous area or to assemble a guardforce for a small town. Now, there is no need to actually do the building or concrete action. Objectives could be met by gathering enough NPCs and pooling up enough money and resources.

We could guide the development of the gameworld by creating this kind of quests. As a reward he could have a honorable title or be granted yearly income from the village. If somebody would then destroy the village... no income, so players would consider their actions in a slightly different way.

But as you implied, no micromanagement should be programmed in to the, if players want to have even more complex relations, they are able to accomplish it by making agreements between themselves.

From: sweatshop
Date: 2002-03-01 03:24:56
In-Reply-To: 978

After the cataclysm, it seems to be the general agreement, there will be no cities; it allows for other role playing opportunities for the first players who set out to construct the first city, and I believe that is the intent of most of the majik team.

Taxes, government, everything, should be built or concieved (or whatever verb is necessary to bring them about), by the players, however, they might need 'encouragement' in certain directions at times, and that is precisely the job of the sages.

From: Takomtor
Date: 2002-03-01 08:19:08
In-Reply-To: 983

I got bit drifted away with this topic, sorry. So, NPCs interaction and intelligence.

If players build everything by themselves and NPCs do the actual and boring work. How do we teach NPCs to do their tasks?

There was nice imaginary conversations in the early part of this thread, but I don't think interaction (conversational way) with NPCs is too important as long as they can carry out some tasks.

Some sort of commanding system would be nice to have. I could hire NPC and put him in front of an owen. I would request he should use his cooking skill (Yes, I have read the debate if there should be cooking skill or not) He would then bake breads, until he would run out of raw material. Given more material, he would continue. His skill would improve slowly, just as characters skills and finally after training him for a year, his breads would be eatable :).

Outside the working hours, he would either sleep in the bakery or in a nearby rented place. Simple and rewarding NPC-life :)

Guiding of an NPC should have some sort of macro/teaching-mode, where we could assign NPC into a location and to use a selected skill to certain objects.

Transportation also plays crucial role in this. Don't have any suggestions for that.

As a conclusion I could say that it is the doing, not feeling of a NPC that makes me appreciate them. I hope, I can get my dose of good interaction from other players.

From: Nahl_Shadore
Date: 2002-03-02 01:43:47
In-Reply-To: 983

okay, to respond to these messages, I'm going to have to refer to another game, which I was signed up to beta test for, called Dawn. The game release is still planned, but from what I've seen it's probably not coming out any time soon, but it had a lot of things in common with majik (classless, permadeath, etc.), and I'd like to take this from what I learned there.

The beta testers had message boards, including ones specific to each race (sub-boards for town/clan)
in the gnome clan I was in, we had our entire city structure planned out, with no NPC's involved. city guards (and ranger/lookouts), miners, smiths, diplomats (including magistrates, a council, and emissaries to other towns/races once we interacted), carpenters, architect masons (of which I was one, designing and building houses/castles/whatever). Of course we also had the regular warriors and mages and whatnot.

that's not to say that there wouldn't be NPCs, but they would at least not be a major part of life. the most I'd say NPCs should be for is store clerks. the smithing should be done by the players (employ other players, if you want). my point is, we had around 1000 players on that message board (between all the races) and all of them were able to fit into the community somehow and be there for the roleplaying and interaction, not just the hack'n'slash. Now a goblin city and a gnomish city would of course have different philosophies, governments, and societies. I say that none of this should be a problem if we get the players to meet in forums, get to know each other, and work out a roleplaying society a couple months before the release date. There will always be someone willing to fulfill a need in the community.

From: Nahl_Shadore
Date: 2002-03-02 01:54:24
In-Reply-To: 987

oh, and I believe that cities should not exist, except for ruins, ancient landmarks, small villages (where players start perhaps?) that the summoned cataclysmic demons didn't deem worth the effort of demolishing completely, and of course cities special to (and under the protection of) a god, demigod, or powerful sage

From: Takomtor
Date: 2002-03-03 08:59:38
In-Reply-To: 988

Sounds like an interesting experiment with this Dawn-game. Dawn seems to have proven that it is possible to do without many NPCs. What if NPC characters would not be included at all, instead, player characters would have relative autonomy, while not in player control (I believe this is sort of a goal already).

This could result into:

1. Oldbies would start a bar (example).
2. Newbies being hired to do work in bar for 8 hours a day.
3. Finally getting financial

Player could leave his/her character to work and after work it should be his/her free time to really play the game and go experiencing. He/She could of course decide to play some of that "boring" interaction too. In this arrangement, newbie would gain salary to support his/her living, also some of his/her skills would increase. He/She would not be able to start mindless wondering around the world, since there is this responsibility... so instead he/she would learn about the world and get a role for himself/herself, there would be appreciation and most of all, well working economy that would have strong basis.

From: Archantes
Date: 2002-03-03 17:51:42
In-Reply-To: 995

This is a nice thought, but I really doubt it. Of course it would be lot easier, no AI code at all etc.

But do the players have responsibility? And do they have patience to play in their role? I know, some do, but.. some don't And the question is, will this be a disadvantage or not.

Yes, on the other hand, it may still be an option. Think of a city guard system for example. A player who rules the city hires a skilled player to take care of the city safety. Then the other player would hire some not so skilled ones to be guard commanders. They hire newbies to be guards. And all the time the player ruling the city buys clothing for guards from city clothier, who buys his raw materials from there and there...
And bread for guards from bakery, who buys from mill etc. etc.

Settlers I II III IV anyone? :)

And if someone has no responsibility.. oh, well.. that happened a lot in medieaval times. The worst bandits were the city tax collectors and soldiers.. they robbed not only for the baron but for themselves.

From: Nahl_Shadore
Date: 2002-03-03 21:25:57
In-Reply-To: 996

well, for Takomtor's method (offline PCs become (basically) NPCs at their jobs (if working when they log off) then there would still need to be AI code for them, although a minimal amount (buy/sell, if a bartender and a fight breaks out how to deal with it (aggressively stop it, let it go on, etc)
this kind of thing could even be somewhat player-programmable
what I mean is, a player could have a submenu with options for how to act when offline (stay still, wander within a certain distance, join a nearby battle if one starts, etc) and proprietors of a business could set their offline employees the same way (wander within building, ask customers if they want to order anything and display a menu, stay behind the counter and show what's for sale to whoever talks to them, not sell any weapons to elves, etc)
employees would know how their character must act while offline, so they know if they might get into a fight

I think it would be a good idea to try during the beta, and if it doesn't work then we could always implement NPCs later

From: Archantes
Date: 2002-03-03 23:24:28
In-Reply-To: 999

True. Then we do need AI code. And this script language for offline character thing.. well I have always thought that. The biggest problem might be that players just put their character to train and study(tm) line. And then, by doing nothing, the players get a skilled character for hack'n'slash for example. We may always include some kind of variable to determine how much a char is able to train per day while in NPC mode, some kind of stress value for example, so they could get better results when online.

And another thing. Since we allow players to play multi chars, it may end up like this: I have 8 characters running offline to work for money and then giving it to me. Am I smart or something? I get better equs!