Skyrim is clearly based off Norse-style fantasy (Beowulf, The Broken Sword, etc.) which stylistically is incredibly stark and borderline depressing. It comes from the cold bleak winters. Repeating motifs of death followed by harsh rebirth. Skyrim captures this incredibly well. However, I can understand why some people can be turned off by this rather dismal death-centric style. I mean, it's kind of depressing in a way Oblivion wasn't. Yep, there were caves and ruins in Oblivion, even the occasional crypt, but here one of the most common dungeons are Draugr-filled crypts, or caves filled with necromancers and hagravens performing unspeakable atrocities. It's bleak.

It's also awesome and I love it. But I get it. Not everyone is going to want this style of fantasy. Sometimes I miss the good cheer of Oblivion, if that makes sense.

If the devs wanted to implement something but couldn't sure they failed.If you or I want something in the game and it is not that is not a failure.May be dissapointing but not a failure.

on DnD
It is well nigh impossible to replicate in a video game what you can do in a PnP game.Not a fair standard to hold them to.

Voila. Morrowind makes me think of how Raymond E. Feist turned a classic medieval fantasy story, into an interesting, different, captivating saga. He went off the beaten path and experimented.

That's why Morrowind was and still is so successful. It experimented with the tried and true fantasy formula, at least aesthetically.

You're delving into semantics. If something isn't delivered, whether it was asked for prior or not, it is still a "failure." I keep using quotes for a reason. It is not a failure in the sense that they took a math quiz and got all the questions wrong, it's a failure in the sense that "why didn't I think of that before?"

Hindsight is always 20/20. Games usually are produced based on what you've learned from those done before you.

It is impossible to replicate pen-an-paper Dungeons & Dragons to video games. That doesn't stop Dungeons & Dragons from being the benchmark however.

I did also give an example of a thing that could be done in both Dungeons & Dragons and Oblivion; changing NPCs disposition towards you through conversation. That is removed in Skyrim for whatever reason. Thus, an aspect that made the game deeper and gave you more freedom is now gone, which was the point.

Too alien a landscape would ... alienate... a lot of new players. In any case, there is no lack of fantasy settings in Skyrim. Just fewer trippy acids trips.

I said this in the comments on the artical, and I will say it here.

I can see where he is coming from. I had the same sort of problom with Oblivon. Oblivion was my first TES game, and I don't know what I was expecting, but I could never really get in to it much. However, I am much more in to Skyrim even tho its the same sort of thing.

on the NPC disposition
The way it was implemented was less than perfect.Easily exploitable and most importantly not fun.
What would you suggest as an alternative.

I also wonder about this as the Skyrim method feels lacking (though the CK would suggest it's more unrealised potential) and the numerical method of the older games felt far too artificial... also, it's kind of something that's hard to do, after all, it's not the focus of the game and so should not be worked on too much lest it detract from the rest of the game... I can sort of see how Bethesda might have been challenged by it.

The pie chart mini-game was atrocious.

An alternative would be the same as Mass Effect, without having to implement a Paragon/Renegade or some type of global "karma" system.

Simply talking to vendors, those conversations could open up into other dialogue. For instance, one thing that absolutely nagged me was when you first walk into Whiterun and the smith is talking to the guy about having to get an order filled and how she would do it but it would be very difficult.

That would be a perfect time for you, the player, to be able to walk up to her and say "hey, would you like some help?"

That could open further dialogue options, not to mention get some brownie points for helping, which could then open up more dialogue options in the future.

That in turn could start a chain of dialogue, along with frequent shopping, doing a quest, maybe even doing work for them, that could make them like you more and thus give you access to cheaper prices, more stock, other quests, etc.

A simple system of giving the player almost the same thing that Dragon Age: Origins or Oblivion did, just without the pie chart, a number of different responses that the NPC will have a varied degree of disposition for.

Hi sixy +3 disposition
Top of the morning +1 disposition
Your butt makes your butt look big -10 disposition
Have you bathed recently -3 disposition

And so on.

Reach a certain level of disposition with someone, gain something.
Go too low, lose something.

Free off the interent google it. Its a great game

I mean I have never played Morrowind, and I don't think you can get that free. I have played and greatly enjoyed Daggerfall, if that's what you mean.

Darkside would it be your intention to give every NPC in game a disposition towards the PC.
I ask because the possibility for unforseen conflicts arrise.

Say you are the Harbinger of the companions and you steal from Eorland.He starts fighting you and calls the guard.When the guards arrive and attack you Eorland attacks them because you are the Harbinger.

Now you have to prioritize which faction trumps what faction for each NPC in the game.
In this respect the fewer moving parts the better.

I like the idea for helping the Blacksmith if you include Eorland in the mix.Even better would be have who you helped have some,not necessarily huge, impact on the faction you back.Maybe that faction gets slightly better weapons in that hold.

New Vegas UE. It brings DT back!

Unless you can talk to every single NPC in any amount of depth, no, not every NPC would need or receive disposition. That would in fact be too difficult to manage I believe.

However, the example you gave is something you have intentionally tampered with. If you drop Eorland's disposition with you low enough to where he calls the guard then he won't defend you against the guards... because you dropped his disposition of you low enough to call the guards in the first place.

Thus, there would be no confusion in the first place.

In the situation of Eorland calling the guards, you then however bring Speechcraft into the mix.

If Speechcraft is high enough, and Eorland calls for the guard you could do the following:

Stop him to talk.
Run.
Fight the guards.

If you stop him to talk you could, with a good enough Speechcraft, persuade him that you were only teasing him, and this his disposition would go up slightly.

If you run or fight, his disposition could stay the same or even go down, to the point where he might attack you on sight anywhere, or if not that, then simply cut off his shop from you and never speak to you again.

Every NPC in Skyrim already has a disposition towards the PC in the form of relationship rank, they also have factions, just this time around they are more based on doing some retrieval quest rather than a minigame. And I have become the harbinger and once ended up having all the companions endlessly attacking a child, just because I accidentally stole something when I was trying to start a dialog, because of the disposition.

Edit: So in summary, it's already there and already broken. ^.^

I know I rigged the game with Eorland.
But I was wondering how you would handle a conflict of factions.Sorry wasn't meant to be rude it was more out of curiosity.
The guards are still attacking a member of the companions.would companions be trumped by a "self" faction?

On the flip side if I tell him he needs a bath and his disposition drops and I get attacked by a bandit will he then refuse to help because "self" trumps companions?

I know people hate the term streamlining but in this case the fewer variables the better.

Self should logically trump, hell it would even add a bit more depth and morality to the game.

Piss of Eorland enough and then get attacked by guards? The other Companions, if you are in good standing with them, will defend you while Eorland sits back and does nothing because well... you don't deserve his help.

In the case of the Bandit, his disposition would already have to be fairly low for him to simply let you be attacked.

Say we go on a 100 system. At 50, he's neutral, doesn't like you, doesn't hate you. Only reason he'll fight along side you is if a monster is simply attacking the city.

If you join the Companions, your disposition with him would go up by default, say by 10-20 points if he was still at 50 and you never had any kind of interaction with him. And we'll say that previously, when you were not a Companion member, his disposition to never sell to you would be 30, while his disposition to attack you would be 20.

Now that you are a Companion, his unfavorable benchmarks would lower because you are on his side. So, to get him mad enough to not talk to you or not sell to you, instead of lowering his disposition to 30, it would be 20-25, to attack you it would now have to be super low at 10-15.

I must be too tired to comprehend what you're asking, I don't think I'm getting it entirely. I think the best answer would be, the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few.

The factions and dispositions need to be there though, for stuff like marriage and companions to work.

That article epitomises the difference between playing TES, and roleplaying TES. When you roleplay, you dont need quests, setpieces, memorable characters or any of that jazz. Roleplaying is what makes these games timeless. Just an hour ago I built an Argonian hunter in morrowind. Skyrim? meh.. I got some kwama hides to collect.

Oblivion ruined the whole series for me!

Sure, the games continue and they`re `ok`, but the depth and beauty of Morrowind and its expansions is probably lost to us for a lifetime now.

And so few will even ever realise it.

I would love to see someone try to RP without quests or characters to identify with... because it's not really possible at all.

Morrowind spoiled me, not so much Oblivion and same goes for Skyrim, don't get me wrong i love those two games but Morrowind is still the clear winner to me, and still play it to this day. we need to get back to those roots.

Eh, idunno about you, but sometimes I roleplay at night in my head when I can't sleep right away. I'm prolly just crazy though. Hell, sometimes I roleplay job interviews in front of the mirror before I go to them. ^.^;

Edit: I also do more intimate roleplays, and those never involve quests. =p

Clearly you dont roleplay One of my early Skyrim characters was a miner, he simply went into the hills and searched for ore veins as part of his job. He didnt need more and didnt want more. Playing a character like that is imo a far richer experience than [censored] all the best loot, armor, buying every house and 1 shotting everything from bunnies to deathlords.

As a miner, your quest is to mine.

Quests don't have to be limited to just adventuring for loot. A "quest" is nothing more than a job.