Who should monsters/NPCs talk to? Your opinions please.

Sounds very, very reasonable to me.

 

There is an obvious reason as to why the character at the front of a party is called the party leader.

 

Just a little thing, if anyone spots this problem occuring with an NPC could they post the name here. I can then go in and hook them up with the script.

 

I always make my party face the leader. It's a habit from games that do initiate dialogue with the party leader. Especially since the party order has no actual effect on party formation, except on map changes. (Which is annoying, but dealable.) So I'm all for getting dialogue initiators to address the party leader when possible.

I'm not sold on the stopping combat as soon as the party leader gets close, though. It seems too ripe for abuse, as it makes the baddie flat-footed twice in the same combat. (Lareth typically gets iced by my rogue's sneak attack immediately after he tries to surrender.)

@Cuchlainn: You do know you can rearrange your party order by clicking and dragging the portraits, right? There's no need to add you "face" man to the party first.

 

True about stopping combat and it should only happen in very specific circumstances (eg Lubash) as Spike said earlier on in the thread. I've got a modified script which doesn't stop combat for the gnoll leader up for testing. So future tinkering would most likely primarily use the final version of that. It checks for party leader out to 20 feet (or whatever distance doesn't result in talking through walls) and then checks for anyone within 15 feet.

In most cases I'm coming to realise, the stopping combat bit is unnecessary as most proactive NPCs do not initiate dialogue as soon as you enter a map. Lubash is one of the exceptions to this because if you enter via the secret staircase with a large party, a party member will inevitably trigger conversation and it is guaranteed not to be the party leader.

edit: this thread is proving to me the value of feedback. Thanks guys

 

Just for the record, if you initiate dialog with the whole party selected, the party member closest to the NPC being talked to is the one that does the talking. That's why when you have the whole party selected and an NPC in your party is closest, you can't initiate dialog.

As for the stopping combat issue, dialog, if it actually occurs and isn't just rudely overrun by the combat continuing (as used to happen in the Hedrack/Iuz encounter before it was fixed), always stops combat. Combat may automatically ensue again (whether you want it to or not) after the dialog is finished, but initiative is re-rolled. This really doesn't give the party any chance to do anything during the dialog, as you can't do anything while dialog is active, but it will change the combat order when combat recommences.

That being said, there may be a way to actually move the party leader into range and have the dialog before combat starts. I will help Zeb look into it if he is willing.

 

Definitely

 

Is there any way to fix this? Pretty much every other RPG defaults to the party leader whenever the entire party is selected.

I know the party can't do anything during the dialogue, but everyone starts off flat-footed again, which means any rogues get new chances at sneak attacks without having to be flanking.

 

Ummm, I do now. Thanks Kalshane, that will definitely come in handy.

Cuchulainn.

 

Blue's designed a new script which prevents the problem of initiating combat and then stopping it again in the original script for Lubash. Won't help with dialogue which is intended to occur during combat though (eg Lareth).

 

Okay. Cool.

 

I'd have to agree that the character in position 1 should always be the "party leader" ... i.e., the spokesperson. The character can be placed in the party formation anywhere that you wish by re-arranging the formation but leaving character position 1 as the spokesperson.

 

How would an NPC or monster know who is leading the party if you're not an organized military force wearing easily recognizable insignia of rank?

Barring some reason (racial favoritism as in an ogre prefering to talk to a half-orc than to a gnome, emnity against a particular class wherein a knight might not be willing to speak to a common rogue, preference for a certain sex and/or charisma score, or cultural norms such as the eldest male in some real earth societies is considered a spokesperson), an NPC/monster is going to talk to the person closest to him. In addition to the possible preferences of the speaker towards race, sex, or class there is the possibility of a language barrier.

An ogre may not want to speak to an elf, especialy a female one, and would rather talk to a male human because at least it's not a female, but if nobody else speaks Ogrish?

Point is, it's going to be the closest party member al lese being equal, but all else is never equal, so the preferences and predjudices of the NPC will dictate who he/she speaks to most of the time, weither or not it's whomever the party designated as spokesperson.

That is of course asssuming that it isn't in fact an organized military force, where the leader would seek his counterpart to speak with.

 

I agree, Jerry. Which is why we haven't just taken the easy route and made it be the party leader who the NPCs always speak to. The party leader, however, could always "butt in' and take over the parties end of the conversation, providing he or she is close enough and such prejudices as you mention don't exist (they don't so far in the game, but it would not be too difficult to add if deemed necessary). With the new script, we have given the player a choice to call for the party leader if they want.

 

That's a great idea Blue. I like the idea of the NPC speaking to the closest character by default, and true, the party leader could then take over. I do think though that in some cases, but not necessarily all, a particular NPC might choose to speak to a character based on some criteria individual to the NPC.

That would introduce this element, without requiring changes to all of the NPCs. If we could make some few NPCs that would only speak to certain PCs if they meet certain criteria. For example a male character with a minimum charisma (i.e. Bertram), And some few others would prefer to speak to a certain character type but would then default to the generic rules if that type isn't present. Maybe the orc prisoners would ask a half-orc for help in releasing them first, because they'd rather talk to Uruk Hai than manfolk, but they do want to be freed enough to talk to a human and ask to be released if there aren't any Orcish folk present.

The obverse of this could be present in one or two characters also, so you could have one of the Elven prisoners who wouldn't talk to a half-orc under any circumstances, not even to ask for release from the temple cells.

I think it would add flavor to the game, and require some further thought during party creation, if maybe 10 percent of the NPCs reacted differently to you based on race, gender, character class, social class, religious affiliation (particularly a requiremant by some NPCs that you be either old faith or a follower of Cuthbert to receive the most favorable reactions), or some other criteria.

There is precedent in the game, like Meleny's high standards as one example.