If any of you have read the Atomic review, during a fight with a dragon, one of the player spells hit someone during the battle. I can see this easily happening during a fight since things could get pretty crazy. After the fight was over, a guard run up to the player and arrested him for hitting a towns folk. I was hoping this kind of thing would be fixed. Kinda svcks to be arrested after helping the people defeat something.

I suppose it's difficult for the game to guess your intentions based on context. Maybe it could've used a 'I'm on your side!' warning once or twice if the battle was still going on though. Unless the villager was actually killed in the accidental hit.

Townsfolks need to gtfo when im stomping dragons.

Whatever the case, Bethesda needs to figure out how to make their design work in this regard. It's pretty backwards that I'd rather fight battles by myself, and stop fighting if friendly NPC's get involved because I don't want a bounty.

This is kind of what I'm thinking as well. I used to to that in Oblivion. The other fighters tend to bunch in close on a target, and I would back out to avoid hitting them.

I think the game should recognise if there are enemy NPCs in the area when you hit a friendly NPCs. If so then guards should come up to you and say:

'I'm keeping an eye on you, you attacked/killed someone in the chaos of a fight the other day and we're not sure if it was an accident but we have no proof either way.'

Naturally this could be exploited by the player to kill NPCs and get away with it. But then again setting up a scenario where an NPC is nearby an enemy NPC just to kill them is much harder to sneak-killing them. So I doubt many people would exploit such a system.

Also they could make friendly NPCs immortal to player damage if enemy NPCs are nearby. However I can see such a system being exploited.

Oh look, it's oblivion again, there was a reason any quest involving a killable companion svcked.

Either you had to be extremely careful in order to not kill them on purpose or they would run off on their own into a mine filled with baddies and die.

Even from a narrative point of view the "get away with murder" side works out more dramatically.

Imagine the two scenarios:



Guard: "...you, killed them all"
Dunmer: "Yes. And I saved your village nord"
Guard: "Uh..."





As opposed to



Guard: "STOP RIGHT THERE CRIMINAL SCUM!"
Dunmer: "You oaf, the village would be DEAD were it not for me"
Guard: "THEN PAY WITH YOUR BLOOD"
Dunmer: "...really, you guys are really going to..."




I'll tell you which is more awesome

I remember something similar in Oblivion during the big battle outside Bruma, the one in which also Martin took part. Once the battle was over and I headed back to the town, one of the guards came to arrest me! I ran away, then checked my bounty and it was as high as if I killed someone!

Apparently -in the heat of the battle- I landed a fatal blow to one of the soldiers fighting there, thus being framed for murder!!!

Watch where you swing and save often.

lame.

The second one was best, no doubt.

but in Oblivion you get 3 shots, why wouldnt this be the same as skyrim?

This saddens me only because I'm really really rubbish and not hitting everyone. When I was playing oblivion I killed so many guards by accident. It used to really annoy me. Although that was mostly because they used to run out in front of me when I was trying to sneak and shoot baddies from afar. But NPCs don't understand stealth. My first character is going to be an evil evil elf anyway, so I guess if I kill a few innocents it will fit with my character.

You would get 3 shots until allies started attacking you and invoking the assault bounty. It lead to the full 1000 gold bounty if you killed them accidentally.

I think the reviewer was just a dumb ass and probably hit the same guy 3 times. I'm pretty sure I saw it confirmed to be just like Oblivion where you have to hit them 3 times then it's considered a crime where you engaged combat.

I'm actually okay with this.

If every friendly was immune to your attacks during enemy fights, it would svck. If you didn't get bounty for friendly fire, people would just spam attacks with complete disregard for the safety of themselves and others...

We're not some two-bit hack mage here, we're the savior of the world! Learn how to control your weapons and spells, or go sling mead in the pub for a living.

I'll learn to control my weapons and spells if the AI learns to not jump in front of me while I'm controlling said weapons or spells.

I wish there were a way eliminate the possibility of friendly fire in combat situations only. In Oblivion, I found the best way to avoid it was to only use my bow when fighting alongside friendlies.

from a developers perspective, its hard to judge intentions. you could, if u really wanted to, engage a dragon, drag the fight to the nearest town, slaughter the townsfolk, kill the dragon, and claim innocence due to dead dragon. thats not exactly cool... murder is murder imo.

The AI is pretty realistic in that aspect though, friendly fire happens in real life, some times it's your fault, sometimes it's not.

I think it is fine, just watch out. This could happen in a realistic event too, sometimes you just hit people by accident. Just reconsider using your crazy AoE spells if you intend to fight in an urban area.

Considering there is definitely an "aggro" state involved when the player is being attacked. They could also implement aggro-radii for large enemies like dragons, so that if you're within that radius (or generating aggro from an NPC/creature) that hitting a friendly is more forgiveable. That seems to be how it works for the 3 strikes rule but does the single strike take into account DOT effects? So if you light someone on fire accidentally and they take damage from the fire more than three times do they turn on you?

Also, is the yield option still available?

So soldiers who kill enemy soldiers need to be arrested too?

see thats that bullsh*t i be talkin bout right there....thats just flawed. i hate it when that happens