Most of you don't know me I am sure. I am a Morrowind and Oblivion house and town modder, and also run Oblivion's Real Estate and Skyrim Real Estate websites.

I am very enthusiastic about modding Skyrim and have been planning a project for a while. Usually I make unique towns, I made 5 for Oblivion, and of course in each town there is always a tavern, complete with unique music, many NPCs with stories to tell, musicians, dancers etc...http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1d0olrn_CN0, if you are interested. Skip to 7:00.

Skyrim's taverns, while nice, could use improvement in the form of more life and atmosphere. So I am going to take one tavern at a time, improve it and release it as part of a large project I am calling Unique Taverns. Here is basically my plan....


*More NPCs. The majority being filler NPCs that don't have a home, they are in the tavern 24/7.

*Unique dialog with NPCs that actually have a chat with you/tell stories/joke etc... In Oblivion we had Elys Silent Dialog mod with OBSE which I was extremely grateful for as I had over 600 lines of new dialog in one town, so I didn't need 600 mp3s. However if I can get voice actors I will.

*Unique musicians and background music. I have non copywrited medieval music from my Oblivion towns, as well as background pvssyr.

*Unique interiors. Each tavern should look unique. At the moment the Skyrim taverns use very few layouts and that means every tavern looks pretty much the same. Not a big deal to use different house models and change interior wall and floor textures. New decor and layout. The only difficulty may be in adjusting the rental script to a new layout, but until we get the CS we don't know how difficult that will be.

*Stables for horses for taverns in the wilderness.

*Release each tavern as it gets done. As soon as one is done then it is released, making the wait for a new tavern less long.



What I need now is ideas, preferences and general thoughts on what could be added, what should be done etc....

Just to let you know that I think this project is a very good idea. Modest and achievable, yet potentially adding a lot in terms of immersion. I'll be interested to see how this goes.

Hi Meek

you can mail if you want my help
ill be interested in helping or at least contributing something (not a great modder). Im willing to help out

Please make the music setting appropriate, you could even expand the bard idea and have bands of minstrels that would allow for more than one instrument tracks. I think each tavern needs a unique setting or a reason to pick that tavern over say, an outside camp, house or guild hall. Some should have that extra level of service and quality whereas a wilderness tavern is filled with shady travelers and more drunken scoundrel vibe.

Nice to see people picking reasonable little chunks of the game to improve. I myself was considering working on some scripts to make sea ports more interesting. I can't wait to see what this game will look like in a few months.

^ What this guy said.

I look forward to whatever you may produce, but personally I like the seedier taverns and bars. Of which seems lacking in Skyrim...

What I found most disappointing was that so many of the taverns and inns have the same interiors. With all the detail everywhere else, I expected the interior architecture to be a bit more unique.

This is a really great idea. If you need any concept art / 3d models for this project I would be glad to help you out. Feel free to hit me up on pixelspaceman@gmail.com

I have a show-reel at pixelspaceman.com
[media]http://vimeo.com/17025005[/media]

Best of luck to you!

Your Oblivion mod looks great, but the dancing people look awkward as hell.

I think the general ideas you outlined all sound great. Beyond those, getting deeper into specifics, what hunter2121 said about setting-appropriateness would be key to me using these mods. I really like that Skyrim isn't just another cod-medieval setting: first, it has that rather cold, Northern vibe--proud but insular--and second, it has its own unique set of background history and current events. I know I'll be choosing to use mods that enhance rather than contradict this atmosphere. So some ideas with that in mind:

- It's cool if there are NPCs in a tavern 24/7, but I'd like there to be a reason for it. There are probably a lot of veteran Nord warriors who came back to Skyrim after the war in Cyrodiil who are now too old to work, or who have war wounds preventing them from working. They may hang around taverns all day and have war stories to tell, if you'll buy them another tankard. (When these older tavern denizens drink, they probably also talk about Talos, in the way that alcohol often brings forbidden subjects to the fore.) Likewise the 24/7 residents might be Dunmer who fled Vvardenfell, or refugees from Valenwood, come to Skyrim only to find no jobs and no welcome. In general, what with a generation lost due to the war, and now with the dragons, the Thalmor, and the Civil War, times are tough in Skyrim: in most towns, I don't picture the default state of the taverns being quite as festive as in the video clip you posted, people not being quite as friendly and welcoming. I imagine Skyrim denizens go to taverns to commiserate with their neighbors, to drink away their worries and remember the past, to let out suppressed aggression...

- In general, then, more brawling and drinking contests would seem appropriate. I can even imagine faction-like leagues of these things operating out of taverns, so you could work you way up, tavern to tavern, arena-like, to being "crowned" the drinking or brawling champion of Skyrim.

- It would be good if people in the taverns reacted more appropriately to the PC's general characteristics. If you go into a tavern in a Stormcloak-sympathizing city wearing Imperial armor, the tavern folk should want to brawl with you rather than chatting--and vice-versa for Stormcloak armor and Imperial towns. If you're wearing magic robes in a tavern, or are of a beast race, the Nord racism and/or distrust of magic should make itself apparent--you may need to pass speech skill checks to get people to talk with you, instead of spitting at your feet. If the PC is a Nord, people should be more friendly, and ask about your Clan and such. And obviously there should be location-specific exceptions: Winterhold's tavern for example should be a little more accepting of Dunmer, and its denizens should have a greater range of reactions, positive and negative, to magicians.

- Because taverns are a locale for people to exchange the latest news, they should reflect the PCs deeds--if you've completed a quest around the town, the tavern-goers should talk about it. (And special music and dancing could trigger: it feels more special and precious if it is saved for special occasions, in celebration.) If you buy a house in a town, they should call you neighbor. And likewise if you reach recognizable ranks in a public faction, that should be recognized as well in NPC pvssyr.

- It'd be nice to be able to buy everyone a round, and have them toast you, if your level is high enough.

- Some town guards might stop in the local tavern after their work shift (so, say every 8 hours, one would come in and stay for an hour). Also, you see guards on the roads leading prisoners; surely they sometimes stop for the night in an inn? You might see Thalmor stopping for the night in an inn in an Imperial-sympathizing city, which would bring music to a halt...and maybe trigger the opportunity for some sort of mini-quest (free their prisoner, assassinate the Thalmor in their room, etc.), depending on which faction(s) the PC belonged to.

- Traders (and their accompanying mercenary guards), hunters, and other adventurers who who give especially good prices on certain specific items could stay at the inns according to a certain schedule.

- It bugs me that so few people in Skyrim have pets. One tavern owner could have a dog that prowls around, looking for scraps.

- In addition to owners and bards, taverns could have barmaids as a faction, to up the NPC count. Somebody needs to bring the drinks to the patrons, right? (Also more taverns could use kitchens and cooks.)

- You should be able to flirt with tavern-goers (hey, it's a bar) and barmaids and bards--via speech, or maybe by asking them to dance. They in turn might flirt with you, if your race/gender/speech skill is sufficient, or if you have the Allure perk. Of course, if the person you flirt with is married, you might have a brawl on your hands...

- Speaking of bards, I'd love to see more done with them. Since the Bard's College is in Solitude, you'd think a lot of the younger ones at least must be Imperial sympathizers. There might be quests that could be added in that regard, passing on intelligence they overheard, or dealing with hot leads yourself. In general bards, along with proprietors, could be radiant quest-givers based on rumors they've heard. There could also be bard-driven quests for getting them special new instruments, or finding old books of music, that could unlock new songs. And in general yes, I can imagine the taverns in the bigger cities having multiple bards, either playing together or in a rotation.

- Some ideas for more NPCs suggest themselves based on the specific characters already at each tavern, or their location. At the Windpeak Inn in Dawnstar, for example, I could imagine a two-stage quest where you first had to fix up the widowed innkeeper Thoring with the "correct" girlfriend (based on several new tavern-going NPC candidates), and then could find a new "replacement" bard NPC (or group of bards) for his daughter, Karita, so she can go off to get advanced training at the Bard College like her mother did. Or, since the Bard's College is in Solitude, and bards are keepers of lore, the College could host Elder Scrolls Lore Night (aka Pub Trivia NIght) at the Winking Skeever pub in Solitude one night each week. Or would that be too contemporary and thus immersion-breaking?

Hmm, that's enough for now, at any rate; I hope somewhere in there are ideas that appeal!

Thanks everyone for the feedback!

Thanks for the offers of help, once I get the CK and get started I will have a clearer picture of what is needed.
The animation in the video are basically the only medieval style dancing animations in Oblivion. Unfortunately I am not an animator so went with the resources others made. For their time they were really good though. That tavern was a small town tavern so it was what I consider light and family friendly, because the town was light and family friendly.


This is what I did in my Oblivion towns...

*If you bought a house in town the local residents opened up and welcomed you acknowledging the fact that you own the house.

*Depending on the clothes you wore you were treated differently. Very easy to do in Oblivion's CS, hopefully the same for Skyrim. But this is a must for the Skyrim taverns. The rection is different for different folks of course, For instance if you were wearing Imperial Armor in a Stormcloak-sympathizing city then some NPCs will get angry, some shy away and not want to interact with you, some just don't care, some are closet Imperial lovers etc....

If you are in an upscale tavern you shouldn't be served if your attire is cheap or at the least the staff will remark on it.


Definately the dialog should reflect the Player's local deeds.


Not sure if this can be implemented, but maybe. Certainly NPCs can buy you a drink and vice versa.


This one is a must. Perhaps in a specific tavern at a specific time a trader selling very rare ingrediants can turn up.


Definitely, I would also like the tavern staff to acknowledge your pet companion. Some may love pets, others may ask you to remove the filthy animal.


The taverns need more kitchens and cooks for sure. I always wanted to implement actual serving at a tavern and am wandering if it could be done. The player sitting at a seat triggers the barmaid to approach and start selling dialog. What would be cool is if the drink was put in front of you like in the video, rather then added to your inventory. I figure it all can be done, the only issue being the sheer number of potenital chairs the player can sit at. But if there is only one or two chairs vacant at a any time then it could be pulled off.


That would be fun dialog to do.


The bard setup really interests me. Ideally I would like a few musicians each playing a different instrument so I am curious as to how the current bard AI is done.


Small quests like this could be fun and not too difficult to implement.

Thanks very much for your great ideas.

Another thing that I want to add is faction based dialog, something I had in my Oblivion towns. Basically if you are Dark Brotherhood and you see other Dark Brotherhood in a tavern then the dialog should acknowledge that and you should be able to have an assassin related chat with your brother/sister assassin. If you are not Dark Brotherhood and you approach one then you obviously are not going to get a good welcome.

An imperial should greet another imperial differently then if they were a nord or breton and there should be more dialog. The very fact that you are of the same race should be reflected.


On seedier taverns

One of the funnest parts of my town modding in Oblivion was doing the Cloak n' Dagger Tavern in my Pell's Gate town. The surly, large orc barman. The Dark Brotherhood in one dark corner and a solitary vamp with severe consequences if you are not a vamp and get too close. General drunkeness and debauchery. Shadey characters looking to con you out of your money or smooth talk you into doing their dirty work. You can rent a room but you have to share it with another patron who is sleeping off a drunken night. Say the wrong thing or look the wrong way and you have a fight on your hands.

Sorry to keep harping on about my Oblivion mods, but I want to take what I did there and take it much further and more indepth for Skyrim.

We MUST have some taverns like this in Skyrim.

The blood splattered floors, is that actually part of someones finger there!?! Broken bottles, dark lighting and smokey atmosphere, scantily clad ladies of the night,. Better watch how you walk cause someone might just take a dislike to you for no reason whatsoever and no one else is going to help you if you get pummelled. Don't mess with the tough scarred up barman, that one has been dealing with rough customers all his life.

I am looking forward to doing the seedier taverns.

What I would like to know is what taverns in particular should be seedier?

Put a friendly dragon in a tavern. You know you want to party with it.

Somehow I don't think a dragon would fit nicely inside a tavern. Someone on my forum was talking about whether we can make the dragon model smaller and have a pet dragon.

I would love to expand on the dragons and retexture them, set up clans of dragons with baby dragons and eggs. Making the eggs an extremely valuable commodity in Skyrim and worth raiding a den of dragons to get one. If we had golden/blue/green/red dragon and their temperment and value of their eggs would vary. Gold being priceless and incredibly rare.

That would be awesome.

However, back to the taverns. I have been thinking about compatibility in towns and cities. It is inevitable that people will expand towns and change them (I might do one myself). So Unique Taverns must be compatible and the only way to ensure compatibility is to not change anything outside a tavern that is located inside a town. So people can use a town overhaul and hopefully such large mods will keep us in mind and maybe leave the taverns. Ours would then fit seamlessly in as nothing outside is changed. If town revamp mods do change the tavern I think we can still fit in, possibly with load order change.

I'd definitely be interested in a mod like this. I realized pretty early on that virtually every tavern had an identical interior and layout and that really bothered me.

Thanks Valkry!

For those taverns in towns that the exterior must remain untouched, therefore the interior must be the one that matches....there is so much that can be done to make an interior look incredibly different, New walls, different textures, completely different furniture layout etc... So despite the compatibility concessions we must make for taverns in tows, the interiors will still be completely unique.

This sounds great. (And I'm definitely going to have to give your Oblivion towns a try, they sound very good as well--I think I avoided them in the past mainly because of issues of compatibility and lore.)

In Skyrim, I wonder if NPC reactions wouldn't be reversed in some ways from those in Cyrodiil--like, if you enter most of the Skyrim taverns in expensive clothing, you'd probably get laughed at. "You think you're a Jarl, dressing up all pretty like that? Bah, you're Jarl Milkdrinker!" I don't have the sense that Nords would be much impressed by strangers flaunting their finery. Some Nords in the rural taverns might also mock you for wearing expensive heavy armor: "What, is fur or hide armor not enough to protect your delicate skin?"

I don't know if there are upscale taverns in Skyrim, in other words. Maybe the one in Solitude, since it's right across the street from the fine clothier? But then, I haven't visited all the taverns yet, either. (If there isn't already, there should be a "Pub Crawler" achievement that is gained if you buy a drink at them all.)

Like I said, I haven't visited them all yet. But the public Riften tavern is an obvious choice--the town residents all complain about what a dismal place Riften is, so a seedier tavern would fit right in. Plus some thieves, like Sapphire, do their shady deals there already.

Although the existing NPCs aren't a great fit for it, the Dawnstar tavern is a candidate, too, because Dawnstar is supposed to be a big port city (hah!)--so rowdy sailors (including pirates and/or smugglers), prosttutes to cater to them and the miners, and so forth would all be in character.

Cheers!

Would it be possible to have the player singing? Maybe somehow associate that with the Bard's college?

I Love this idea!
Skyrim is so immersive and I am really enjoying exploring new towns... right up to the point that I walk in the tavern and get pulled out of the experience because, oh... this place again...
I will be watching this project with much interest!

Just wanted to say: great idea for a mod. I hadn't really noticed until you brought it up but each of the tavern's are quite painfully identical.

Bar brawls please! Not often, but I would like to be able to start one whenever I like =P

And I love the idea of finding work at a tavern. Either as a bard, playing music to earn coin, trekking across Skyrim from tavern to tavern for food and board. Or as a Mercenary, hiring out my services to traders/scholars/nobles/less-than-savoury-types that require a little muscle for a journey they are about to make.

Just a quick note, the barmaid serving is already possible. I don't know if you've ever tried (I dont know if you have to rent a room or not) but sit down at a seat in the inn near the general goods store in whiterun, I've had the barmaid come up to me offering me a selection of drink and food (same as the innkeeper stocks).

kinda hard for a tavern to feel like a tavern, when a 'city' has 20 residents, and only 4 of them ever visit the taverns.

Thanks everyone.

I am not sure whether allowign the player to sing can be implemented or not and won't know until we get the CK. But maybe it can.


Didn't know that, thanks. That makes it much easier.


That is true.

In order to create the illusion of residents coming and going a tavern, without altering the outside of taverns in cities, I should be able to simply place a door to a holding room right behind the regular door into/out of the tavern. Then NPCs will walk to the door and through it looking like they have left or arrived, however they are actually going in and out of the holding room. Using that I can have as many NPCs as I want keeping an eye on FPS of course.

Edit, just remembered the new door animations. So the above will not work unless the opening animation of the door is not important to people.

I really dig this idea and I'll definitely be tracking the progress of this mod,

Great mod idea. But yes, for the sake of compatibility, might be best to only change interiors.

Instead of making fake NPCs, why not get on board with the inevitable Better Cities mods? Plenty of NPCs with actual lives there. I'm intending to do Windhelm, and I'm sure others will follow.