Romance in rpg games

Artemis · Post by **Artemis** » Mon Aug 13, 2007 12:05 am

Hello,
I've done a good search in da forum for a thread concerning "romance" and the interaction developing between party members. But I got tired and in the end I gave up my search.... this forum is huge!!!
So, if there is a similar thread in the forum .... I apologise for posting another one and continue -->
I've played BG II "Shadows of Amn" along with "Throne of Baal" and some NPCs are involved in romance situations. I kinda liked it (I'm a girl .... lol).
So, my question is:

Is there romance in Icewind II?

See ya!

dragon wench · Post by **dragon wench** » Mon Aug 13, 2007 12:23 am

There is no NPC interaction in IWD/IWD2 since you create all of the characters yourself, and thus there's no romance either.

However, a mod has recently been made that allows you to actually recruit NPCs into your party... It is still in Beta, but from what I hear it's quite good.

p.s please don't use acronyms to get around the filter, your post has been edited accordingly.

Curry · Post by **Curry** » Sun Aug 19, 2007 7:38 am

Artemis wrote: Is there romance in Icewind II?

Who needs romance when you can CUT THROATS ? :mischief:

Rabain · Post by **Rabain** » Mon Aug 20, 2007 1:49 pm

See here for Domi's IWD NPC's, good work and worth a try if you've played IWD2 and want to try something different or liked BG2 but not IWD1.

This will make IWD2 more like BG2 and has the 3e conversion that is IWD2.

The Gibberlings Three Forums -> IWD2 NPC Project

dragon wench · Post by **dragon wench** » Mon Aug 20, 2007 6:51 pm

Rabain wrote:See here for Domi's IWD NPC's, good work and worth a try if you've played IWD2 and want to try something different or liked BG2 but not IWD1.

This will make IWD2 more like BG2 and has the 3e conversion that is IWD2.

The Gibberlings Three Forums -> IWD2 NPC Project

Yes indeed! Though this is still in Beta, it is excellent work. There are still a few rough bits, as you'd expect in a Beta, but it has a very professional feel to it, nonetheless.
I only recently found my long lost player disc, and was delighted since I'd been keen to give this mod a try... A definite must for anyone suffering from BG2 withdrawal, or if you just want to add a different flavour to the game.

Domi_Ash · Post by **Domi_Ash** » Fri Aug 31, 2007 1:51 pm

Thanks for the positive feedback, guys.

I'd like to add that some roughness cannot be avoided, because IWD2 is not designed to handle the in-party dialogue the way BG2 is. In other words, timers will never be as good as a random banter generator, for example; or I will never be ale to add the talks at hoitting the rest button, instead they will all happen as you wake up. But I am doing what I can to work around the limitations.

And yep, there are romances. Atm, there are two per each gender.

dragon wench · Post by **dragon wench** » Fri Aug 31, 2007 4:46 pm

Domi_Ash wrote:Thanks for the positive feedback, guys. I'd like to add that some roughness cannot be avoided, because IWD2 is not designed to handle the in-party dialogue the way BG2 is. In other words, timers will never be as good as a random banter generator, for example; or I will never be ale to add the talks at hoitting the rest button, instead they will all happen as you wake up. But I am doing what I can to work around the limitations.

And yep, there are romances. Atm, there are two per each gender.

That was my impression, since the majority of conversations seem to happen upon waking... I figured it had something to do with the IWD2 engine.
That you have done as much as you've been able to is pretty extraordinary. Now.. I actually want to finish the game, which never occurred before. Instead, I would get through about 75% of it, and then the endless, often grueling, battles would simply wear me down and I just didn't care anymore.

I'm even developing a much greater appreciation for the third edition rules and the nice way they balance game difficulty.
I just needed that something extra that adds life and a break from the nearly constant fighting.

In terms of dialogue triggers, would weather work at all? I know absolutely nothing about modding, so please forgive my ignorance if I've suggested something utterly impossible.

Domi_Ash · Post by **Domi_Ash** » Sat Sep 01, 2007 10:33 am

The banters mostly trigger after rest intervals, because IWD2 does not have the RealGlobalTimer, only a GlobalTimer, ie it only tracks the "game" time, not the "player" time, so you have a huge chance of the timer expiring after 16 or whatever hours passed while you rested. You can combat it somewhat by periodically selecting the Player-initiated option yto listen to your party members. While it does not advance individual timers, it advances a generic timer that prevents the banters from running back to back. Er... there are a LOT of timers in the mod. :speech:

Weather is actually not a trigger at all, even in BG2 variant of the IE. Weather was an action. So, basically what you did was set up a script to 'turn on' a required weather, hope that the area when that trigger came up had a high chance of raining/snowing (or scheduling it in the arae with 100% chance of percipitation initiation) and finally kicked in the banter, keeping your fingers crossed that the weather would match.

In IWD2 I would not go in that level of complexity; I want as basic coding as possible, to be honest, to make things as robust as possible. Perhaps, someone who codes say one NPC to add to the pack would want to play with a little bit of extra complexity.