A fun little idea struck me this morning; just wanted to know what y'all thought of it.

There seems to be a number of people with Aspergers Syndrome (a.k.a. Aspies, Aspergians, AMs, AS's) in Morrowind (I've met two besides myself). I was thinking how neat it would be to have a race in Morrowind - "Aspergians", with certain skills/attributes that are present in real life. Not only that, but maybe an addition of several 'benign-looking' NPCs that are actually Aspergians, with unique dialog. Unfortunately, they'll only respond to another Aspergian. Ergo, if your PC is an Aspie, and you're talking to an Aspie, you might get neat stuff, quests, or just some fun dialog.

Just brainstorming here, but I can automatically say that an Aspergian's traits would lean more toward the intellectual, as opposed to the physical. Their intelligence would be high (NOT an ego trip here) and perhaps they would be talented in a few colleges of magicka as well. However (sadly) their personality might be lower than average (I've noticed this is sometimes true in real life as well).

I was just curious as to what you all thought of this. I don't want to name the other Aspies I've met because I don't know if they WANT that info released widely, but if they want to come in and acknowledge themselves, I hope they do. If anyone else out there has the disorder, feel free to pipe up as well and share your thoughts. I'm curious.

-JKS

I'm with you.
Not only could this be rather funny, it could even be kind-of educational.
Most people understand what is meant by tourettes or autism, but Aspergers is a lot more subtle and difficult to even notice, sometimes.

Low Speechcraft and Mercantile.
But good at Spear or Marksman (so they don't have to get personal with anyone)
Good with Alchemy, due to all that repetition to find the perfect potion.
no Restoration. (lack of empathy)
Good Mysticism, Enchant. Synesthesia and Aspergers do work well together.

I think writing dialog would be a lot of fun. The dialog I've created before always had to be from a character's "voice" so I could keep it from sounding like myself. It would be funny to just go all out and include the Aspie dialog our friends and family know us for.

latest rumours = "I don't know what that means."
little advice = "What? Your metaphors and figures of speech are difficult to understand. All my advice is of normal size."
little secret = "Did you know that there are exactly 4277 Wickwheat plants on the Grazelands? Yes, I counted." (and yes, I did count)
Solsthiem = "It's over there. Try not to die."

You'd have to make ten different versions, one for each race.

Interesting idea. I'm not sure if I'd play it, but I'm thinking there ought to be a dialog box that pops up after finishing character creation that lets the player choose a savant behavior from a list of skills (probably not all of them, though; I'd leave out the personality-based ones, even Illusion, since we tend not to be good at deceiving people. I'd also leave out any fighting skills, except maybe Marksman). Of course, there would have to be something to balance out the skill bonus; the simple thing would just be to impose a general Speechcraft penalty, though of course it wouldn't have to be as much of a penalty since you'd already have lowered Personality in general.

:blink:

edit: Sorry, this really caught me out of the blue.
Sounds fun, go for it!

Haha sounds great

After reading this ">_____________>" is all that really comes to mind. Take that anyway you like.

I'm seriously considering going for it. It might be a fun side project to work on when I'm about to strangle someone because of GDR. (Seriously, has anyone tried putting Darknut's in_dwrv_tubecorridor meshes together? Aargh!)

-JKS

My earlier post was meant to say "yeah I'm not sure about this", but I do like the idea of having NPCs of the race placed around that will only speak to you if you chose that race as well.

They should still speak to you if you're not, but when they do, they should be more nervous about it and like you less.

I agree. I was tempted to use something like MadMax used in the Ultimate Galleon mod: "I DON'T LIKE YOU! GO AWAY!" It doesn't really exemplify us well, though, and it's rather immature. Although I have to admit, it gets the point across. Sorta. As a gamer I just bribed him.

Although I think I'm going to go ahead and do this, I'll need some ideas for random conversation. Things that fall under the "latest rumors", "little advice", "little secret", "Solstheim", etc. topics, although perhaps a few others for random topics as well. If you're offering one for a different topic, please specify which one. I liked how Pluto set the post up - nice, neat and orderly (just how us Aspies like it).

As for dialog boxes for savant skills, I'm not THAT good at scripting. No way. If you have a script or a way you can help me, please let me know (might be neat) but other than that, I think I'll steer away from it.

I also considered putting speech on other NPCs for random things, saying stuff like "You see XXX YYY over there, he's kind of strange..." or something of the sort. Although I am loathe to call Aspies 'strange', I am aware that this is sometimes the perception by non-Aspies. Ergo, it might add to the realism. Believe me, most folks think I'm kind of strange (who else collects books and reads, catalogs and memorizes them?!)

-JKS

Another question, here: should I include Beast Races in this? I'm not sure if Khajiit and Argonians are biologically CAPABLE of having AS, but then again, who's to say Dunmer and Altmer can? What do you all think?

-JKS

Not to sound racist against our cat and lizard friends, but they don't seem to have the emotional capacity of the other races.

It wouldn't hurt to leave them out I think.

Racists. :mellow:

J/k, though I think you should include them.
edit: chaos_effect, with the kinda stuff they have to put up with, it's no wonder they're emotionally numb.

Oooooh, now I REALLY want to finish Nakoma. :stare:

Okay, so there's one vote for in and one vote for out. So far, it's a tie.
I just started work on the Altmer. This looks like it'll be fun.

-JKS

Edit: I was working on "powers", and "spells". One Power I thought would be neat is "Focus" (NOT Matrix). Essentially a heavy "fortify intelligence/willpower, but at the cost of personality and something else (can't decide yet). But I need ideas for other spells/powers. I considered something like a "4D Information Overload" offensive spell, but it sounds cliched.

-JKS

Ok, now I have to know, what is this thing anyways? I looked up the syndrome on Wikipedia, but honestly, the way it's explained makes no sense to me.

So can I get an explanation from the best source? One of you?

What if, instead of a race, maybe it was a Birthsign? Or integrate it to something like http://www.elricm.com/nuke/html/modules.php?op=modload&name=Downloads&file=index&req=viewdownloaddetails&lid=281, ala Daggerfall's character creation...

Let's make one for clinical depression, too!

I definitely think the Beast races should be included. Khajiits and Argonians are natural outsiders, and most of them have odd mannerisms or obsessions to begin with.

It's a form of high-functioning autism. An Asperger's sufferer (I do not use the term lightly; mine has DEFINITELY caused me to suffer) has a brain that is wired differently from a normal person, in ways that is most prevalent in social situations. We tend to develop intense interests in narrow fields and go out of our way to learn everything there is to know about that subject, because we think it's the coolest thing in the world ("savantlike behavior"). We don't pick up the social cues that come naturally to neurotypicals - I mentioned in a previous thread that sarcasm tends to escape me, fir instance. Sometimes we display what others deem "inappropriate" facial expressions, but that's usually because either the situation reminded us of something else and our train of thought led us to that expression, or because we're simply not paying attention to what's being displayed on our faces (people often ask me if I'm upset, when in fact I'm feeling perfectly fine and my face only looks downcast because I'm not using any muscles in it). In conversation, we often get fixated on one topic and are hard to shake from it; this effect is greater when said topic relates to our choice of savantness.

To get a good idea of it, read "Look me In The Eye," the autobiography of an Asperger's sufferer who turned his savant behavior for building circuits and stuff into a career as a roadie for KISS and alter a toy designer.

Speaking only for myself, it has a lot to do with difficulties in social interaction. Not because I am shy, but many of the subtle facial expressions or body language or vocal inflections (like sarcasm) that everyone uses and notices on a subconscious level, are missed by me.
I tend to over compensate for this, and that makes me seem eccentric, and I usually don't realize it until days later.

Have you ever watched the TV show "Bones"? She is a good example of what it's like for me.
Literal to the point of being rude, and not even knowing it.

There are other aspects that are similar to Obsessive Compulsive Disorders, but they tend to not be as pronounced.

NPC's don't have birthsigns though do they?
This would probably be the best way to go about it for the player though I think.

Yeah, like how I don't feel right when riding in a car unless my eye blinking follows some kind of pattern.

Feel free to use the examples I have already suggested, and any others that I may come up with.

I remember a time where I got totally hooked up onto the love life of a couple video game characters and it was all I would talk about for quite some time. Now, I know there's no video games in Morrowind, but there are CERTAINLY works of fiction...

"Do you know where I can find an uncensored copy of 'The Real Barenziah: Volume II?' It's so annoying, I want to know what happened!"

Hey guys, I'm Italian and I've got borderline dementia. Can we make a race of sixy, curly-haired tan guys with cool mustaches that have +5 in pizza making skills, +10 to the obnoxious laugh attribute, and -5 to their speechcraft, and who like to take all their clothes off and beat NPCs over the head with large loafs of prosciutto and paintings from Da Vinci?

Thanks!