Balzu: A Dark Fantasy

http://www.truancyfactory.com/projects/balzu/balzu.html ~ http://balzu.freeforums.org/index.php ~ http://bleakworld.wikidot.com/

"He who fights with monsters might take care lest he thereby become a monster."
Friedrich Nietzsche, Beyond Good and Evil

Pic for http://www.truancyfactory.com/projects/balzu/images/mistyMorning.png: Hiking on a misty morning.
Video added http://www.wegame.com/watch/balzus-immersive-persuasion-system-revised/
Video added http://www.wegame.com/watch/country-road/
Video added http://www.wegame.com/watch/forest-encounter/
Video added http://www.wegame.com/watch/balzu-character-generation/


"Werewolves? Aye, there be werewolves about. But its the Kindrel you need to worry about."
The old man stuffed his pipe and lit it with a twig from the fire place.
"Kindrel?" Avelar asked after a pause. For a moment it didn't appear that the old man was going to continue.
"Aye." He took a drag on his pipe and exhaled a gloomy cloud of smoke.
"It's best not to speak of them," he said finally.
Avelar frowned. "Why not?"
"It's said they're attracted to words. They flit like moths to a flame to the sound of their name being spoken."
Avelar grimaced. "What are they?"
The old man shrugged. "Who knows? Shadows, ghosts, demons, creatures of darkness...none can say. They stalk the woods at night and in the early dawn. A man never sees them but as a shadow in the corner of his eye. And by then...well, it's too late."
"Superstition," Avelar said disdainfully. "If everyone who met one died no one would know of them."
"Not all die," the old man said, suddenly very sad. "I never said that they did. Some live on...in madness."
Avelar hesitated. "Your wife...she went mad; before she died. I heard it from the priest. Did she...?"
"Aye." The old man shrunk in on himself and said nothing for a long while.
"What do they want?" Avelar asked after a time.
The old man took a long drag on his pipe and leaned back in his chair with a creak. He gave Avelar a fierce squint, the light of the fire glinting gold in his eyes. "Light..and life. If they can't take it from your flesh, they'll steal it from your soul. Their touch is very cold. My wife--my wife had a mark...."
The old man paused, visibly upset. He turned and stared into the fire. "I'm a hard man, mister Avelar. I was a soldier for thirty years. I've seen all kinds of horror. More than you imagine. But that mark...of all the things I've seen, nothing can compare. It haunts my dreams. I can see it now, as clearly in my mind's eye as if it were right here before me. And I wish--I pray to the gods--that I could un-see it!"
The old man fell silent and grew very still. Avelar felt a sudden chill and drew closer to the fire, the shadows on the walls lurching unnaturally.

<@>http://www.truancyfactory.com/projects/balzu/screenshots/balzu_bridge_to_the_shining_shingle01.html <@> http://www.truancyfactory.com/projects/balzu/screenshots/balzu_shining_shingle01.html <@> http://www.truancyfactory.com/projects/balzu/screenshots/balzu_evenings_adventure01.html <@> http://www.truancyfactory.com/projects/balzu/screenshots/balzu_boletecave01.html <@>
<@> http://www.truancyfactory.com/projects/balzu/screenshots/balzu_secludednook01.html <@> http://www.truancyfactory.com/projects/balzu/screenshots/balzu_chapel_view01.html <@> http://www.truancyfactory.com/projects/balzu/screenshots/balzu_persuasion01.html <@> http://www.truancyfactory.com/projects/balzu/images/dj_wholeLottaTrees.png <@>

Introduction
Balzu is a dark, Gothic fantasy total conversion that takes place in an entirely new setting inspired by the D&D dark fantasy setting Ravenloft, Bram Stoker's Dracula, and the works of H.P.Lovecraft, and E.A.Poe. The emphasis in Balzu is on role-playing, mood, and atmosphere with a strong horror element. Characters are fully customizable: choose from one of over a dozen playable (human) races, choose one of 13 custom birthsigns, set your attributes and skills and choose from a variety of character traits, perks, and starting origins then struggle to keep your sanity and your humanity in a world where men turn into monsters and unspeakable horror lurks in every corner.

Custom creatures, sanity system, role-playing persuasion system, and enhanced NPC AI where NPCs actually observe and remember your character's words and deeds complement a painstakingly detailed environment spanning multiple dimensions. Open-ended quests allowing you to choose whether you want to play as a hero or a villain with consequences for future quests and the potential to make powerful friends and enemies ensure that your experience in Durs, the world of Balzu will be unlike any other.

Announcements
I'd like to welcome stratman1 to the team. He's been working on designing the soundscape for Balzu: title theme, ambient regional music, battle music, etc. Stay tuned for some samples of his work. It's fantastic!

I'd also like to thank MorganaNiNuala for her generous contribution of edited and retextured meshes.

Team

• MorganaNiNuala: NifSkope Alchemist
  
• stratman1: composer
  
• TheMagician: everything else

Recruiting

• Character modeler for hair, clothing and race cosmetics and custom creatures
  
• Concept artist for concepts, menu icons, maps, and environmental art (frescoes, mosaics, etc.)
  
• Animator and rigger for custom creatures and NPC behavior (ambient activities)
  
• FX artist for particle effects for custom magic effects (NifSkope experience)
  
• Scripter, especially someone knowledgeable in the use of OBGE shaders (for sanity effects)

Features
Balzu makes extensive changes to Oblivion's default gameplay. Most of these changes are in the area of NPC AI and the persuasion mechanic which has consequences for combat, magic, companions, etc. All of the features below are currently WIP. Many of them have working prototypes in-game. Some of them are still in the design phase.

• Custom Character Gen. Balzu allows you to set your own attributes and skills when creating a character. In addition, you can select from a range of perks and flaws and choose from a variety of origins (determining starting location, gear, etc.). Balzu uses all-new races (only human at this point) and birthsigns, and adds a number of new classes (and changes some of the vanilla classes).
  
• 'Luminous' AI. Balzu uses custom AI enhancements which allow the actor to form an opinion of the player based on his or her observed actions. Actors will now notice what the player is wearing and the weapons they have equipped (quality, condition, amount), their current state of health, and the activities they are currently engaged in and make decisions based on this data. These decisions will influence what they say to the player, whether or not they will attack them, report them for a crime, pick their pocket, etc. Be careful: NPCs will remember what you wear, so if they see you commit a crime, they will give your description to the authorities!
  
• Persuasion Overhaul. Balzu completely replaces the vanilla persuasion mechanic with a custom scripted mechanic using the enhancements provided by the AI overhaul. Players now persuade other actors through the dialogue menu by selecting topics. There are eleven persuasion techniques (some are context sensitive). How adept a player is at any particular technique depends in part upon factors like Strength, Intelligence, etc., though all are based on the Speechcraft (or Mercantile) skill. In addition, each actor has a different 'personality': some techniques will work better on some actors. Some examples of new persuasion techniques include intimidation, taunting, seduction, gift giving, and begging.
  
• Disguises. Players may now disguise themselves as a member of a faction. Chance of success depends on a variety of factors, including the quality of the disguise, the intelligence of the actor being deceived, distance, light, and the player's Sneak skill. Suspicious actors may interrogate the player, requiring a knowledge of the faction on the player's part and a Speechcraft test. Disguising yourself as a member of a criminal faction will get you arrested by a guard, so be careful!
  
• Combat Decision. Enemy actors will no longer automatically attack the player. They will now evaluate the player's apparent threat before engaging in combat. Most animals will ignore the player unless provoked as long as the player keeps their distance. Bandits will not attack players if they appear to be stronger and better equipped unless they have superior numbers. Some undead will only attack players who trespass on protected zones or steal protected objects. Many enemies can be reasoned with, bribed, etc. Players may also request a truce, demand surrender, etc.
  
• Companions. Using Balzu's AI overhaul, it is possible to convince many types of actors to join the player on quests, hire retainers, acquire familiars, or develop romantic relationships with other actors. The actor's opinion of the player, and the types of activities they will engage in depend on a variety of factors including personality, skills, background, etc. Hire porters, mercenaries, alchemists, healers, enchanters and armorers. Meet a cute wench at a tavern? Ask her out on a date. You might be her type! (Sorry, relationships are restricted to spicy dialogue! )
  
• Extended Dialogue Trees. Players will now be able to query actors on a wide variety of topics, including their occupation, family, community, local landmarks, local services, religion, political views, etc. Players familiar with Morrowind will find themselves at home with these topics.

In addition to these features, you can expect a whole slew of spells and potions that tie directly to new AI features (like memory wipe spells and love potions!). For more information about how these mechanics work visit the mod's homepage.

Other Features
These features are in an earlier state of development, so I'm not going to say much about them except that I plan on implementing them eventually.

• Sanity System. The sanity system is on my 'must have' list but still exists at a theoretical stage at this point. All I'll say about it is that psychological disorders can be acquired through trauma (just like a disease), through a magical mishap (by casting a spell you're not able to handle), or by visiting one of the alternate dimensions. Your primary resistance to insanity is your Willpower, though they will be curable via spells, potions, etc. The effects of insanity will be emphasized through custom shaders (which I haven't really played around with yet).
  
• Dynamic Quests. I haven't really started working on the quests yet, but they will be implemented in a more web-like and less linear way. They may also interconnect, with your actions in one quest affecting the outcomes of other quests. Again, still pretty theoretical at this point.
  
• Custom Creatures and Tilesets. These are pretty labor-intensive, so don't expect to see these until a little later on. Suffice to say, I want 'em, so I'll make 'em.
  
• Custom Magic Effects. Again, something I want to do, but haven't gotten around to yet.

Requirements
The following mods are required to play Balzu:

• Oblivion v1.2.0416
  
• OBSE v0020
  
• OBME v1.0
  
• AddActorValues v1.beta4
  
• OGE v2
  
• Elys - Universal Silent Voice

Optional Addons
Balzu will support the following music configurations in addition to vanilla:

• Sound Commands
  
• Enhanced Music & Control
  
• Better Music System

Each platform builds on the one before it. For maximum music enhancement, use BMS.

Durs: The World of Balzu
Balzu is a mod created by an immersionist and role-player for other immersionists and role-players. When I play Oblivion, I like to take my time, wander aimlessly through the wilderness, talk to random strangers, eat, sleep, and read lore books. I also like a good story with atmosphere, challenging puzzles, and unpredictable combat with realistic consequences and effects. I'm also a svcker for eye-candy. This mod is my attempt to create the kind of game that I always wanted to play, that Oblivion came close to in many regards, but never quite achieved.

Balzu is not a light fantasy. It has dark themes, complex characters, and mature subject matter. Plague, civil war, necromancy and witchcraft, moody, desolate environments, and twisted, shambling horrors are the mainstays of this world. In Balzu, the difference between a man and a monster is often one of perspective.

Progress
Release Date: TBD
The most up-to-date information can always be found here: -> http://www.truancyfactory.com/projects/balzu/balzu.html. There are several pages of text describing all of the features in more detail.

This mod now also has a home on http://www.moddb.com/mods/balzu-a-dark-fantasy.

Fun Facts
The Tamriel world space has 28,086 exterior cells. Balzu currently has 100 cells. That's 0.356% the size of Tamriel.
Oblivion uses 1,025,617 references (placed objects). Balzu currently uses 13,300. That's 1.297% the number used in Oblivion. Then again, all of mine are hand-placed.

P.S. What the Hell is Balzu?!
'Balzu' means Hell in the common tongue of Durs. Heaven and Hell, and the decisions the player makes to get there, play a large role in the mod.

Interesting. The land really does seem nice, at this point, and the concept solid and, to be honest, addressing many things that I (And I think a lot of others) have found nagging at myself for as long as I've played the game. I'll be monitoring this...

Sheesh. Alot of good mods I'm just learning about on my return!

Best of luck. If you ever need a tester (but not one with exceptional technical skill), just shoot me a PM.

Looking good! Excellent landscaping, great idea - hope you pull it through!

Will this require AmpolX's textures? I love them and have them installed anyways so I guess it doesn't matter to me but that might be relevant for some people. And I like the idea of keeping it small and doing everything by hand. I agree that some of the other Conversion mods kinda just generate a huge landscape and then aspire to fill it, then falling short and giving up.

Anyways, it looks great, keep it up :thumbsup:

Ravin

Something worth working one. Keep up the good work!


Cheers,
Pushkatu!

Just a bump to let everyone know I'm still working hard on this. I've started creating a second farm, and some of you might have noticed my other thread about the chicken coop. (An essential addition to any farm, imo!) I've also started outlining the first quest. It's a short quest, just to get my toes wet, but it's necessitated a bit of an expansion to the land area, which is at about 40+ cells, now. The first release will probably be at least 48 cells, just large enough for the first quest (or two), a couple of dungeons, 3 farms, an inn, and a couple of cottages. The second release will probably expand in the direction of the first town, Bartleburg; but I'm getting ahead of myself.


Thanks for the interest and the generous offer of support. Sorry about the delay in responding, but I've been quite, quite busy. I will take you up on that offer someday, but I have a bit of work to do first before the first beta testing.


Thank you for the encouragement. Someday I'll learn how you make those delightful creatures! Of course, mine will probably look a little less delightful.


Only if you want it to look exactly the same. If you use other textures they will work just as well, they just won't look like the screenshots. I had a bit of a tough time settling on hand-crafting everything, especially after spending months learning how to use the heightmap editor and region generator. But no matter what I did, I couldn't get them to produce the kind of results I was after. The environment is very important to me...probably the most important part of the mod, so there is no skimping on quality.


Thank you! I confess, this mod has become something of an obsession for me. Good for the mod, bad for sleeping. No need to worry about the progress. Rarely a day goes by that I don't work on it.

I am interested in this as well, I dont think there are many mods that actully make vanilla quests more interesting or npcs deeper. I would really love to finally truely be evil, or at least have a different option that being a hero most the time...

Finally added the official http://www.truancyfactory.com/projects/balzu/balzu.html to my website. Added a couple of screenshots, but it's essentially the same information.


You should find that you have more flexibility in your approach to quests in Balzu. It's a dark place, so it doesn't make sense to restrict player choices too much. Of course, it's not Tamriel, so that won't help with vanilla quests.

Just another quick update.

Progress is slow but steady. I'm working on it for at least a couple hours a day, but the workload is tremendous. :wacko:

I've added the mod to the ModDB, done quite a bit of landscaping and pathing, started blocking out my first small quest, and refreshed myself on exporting animations from blender. The part I'm most excited about, however, are the improved NPC interactions, which I've just begun working on.

To refresh: the enhanced NPC interactions consist of a couple of simple key components: additional dialogue options (Morrowind-style), Classifying Factions, and Animated Response.

The additional dialogue options are really self-explanatory: players will be able to ask NPCs about themselves, their families, occupations, communities, religion, etc. The player's response to some of these topics may impact the NPCs opinion of the player: disregarding the things that the NPC holds dear, or adopting a diametrically opposed position may hurt your relationship with the NPC. Sharing goals and values may improve it.

Classifying Factions, or 'stereotypes', allow each NPC to have an individualized opinion of the player based on their own values and agendas. NPCs who value physical strength and combat ability will not think highly of characters who rely on 'black magic'. Likewise, a brawny warrior may find a scholarly wizard looking down their nose at him. Classifying factions are intended to cover a wide range of behaviors and lifestyle choices so don't be surprised if a conservative church-woman tells you to 'put some clothes on' or a drunken pirate makes unseemly advances.

Animated Response is essentially an attempt to add diversity to NPC encounters. NPCs will not only reply verbally to what you say, but may act out their moods and desires, stealing kisses, slapping you in the face, or spitting at your feet. This is one aspect of the mod I am really excited about implementing and which represents one of its greatest challenges. A great deal of work has to be done in this area still, so I won't make any definite promises about it.

Anyways, back to work for me! More updates soon.

Thought I'd post another update, since it's been a couple of weeks. First of all, I'd like to thank all of the tremendous support you guys have given me...er...um...well, never mind.

Yep. Still working on it. Having a good time, though a lot of it has been on the technical side of things. Found out I won't be able to implement the NPC interactions quite the way I hoped to, since I made a foolish assumption about the way factions work. Not a big problem, since I can still implement it in a more round-about way. The end result will still be the same. Also looking into implementing NPC ACE for Balzu, but I haven't really had time to crack open the scripts on that yet, so that's still pretty much up in the air. Lot's of ideas and inspiration, not enough time to work on it. The usual.

Yeah, I guess that's my update. I'll be back in a couple of weeks to annoy everyone again.

It's still looking good!

I'm interested, lurking, watching and waiting.

I'm looking forward to it. I've always wanted a darker, more realistic Oblivion. I'm slowly losing my intrest with Oblivion as I work more with UDK, maybe this will bring me back when it gets done :shrug:

Ravin

@Ashven: Thanks for the encouragement! You'll be happy to know that I am planning on implementing a few jobs in Balzu. Unfortunately, you're going to have to work at them.

@RavinXX: UDK is slated for one of my other projects, as soon as I get a new rig. Just can't do some things with the Ob/FO3 engine. :shrug: 'Darker and more realistic' is pretty much what I'm going for with Balzu. (Well, 'realistic' may not be the right word. NPCs should feel a little more real, and the world should seem a little more grounded, but a lot of weird s**t is going to happen in this mod. You see, the problem with most characters in Oblivion is that they're just too darn cocky. I'm going to do my darnedest to scare some respect into them! Expect screen effects!)

Another update just to let people know I'm still working on this.

I've been doing a lot of work on the actor AI side of things which has required a complete overhaul of the Vanilla persuasion system. Balzu will now use an immersive persuasion system with up to 10 different persuasion techniques which are context sensitive (depending on the actor and quest). The 'spinning disc' mini-game has been removed. Speechcraft will now come into play in dialogue and skill increments will come from using persuasion techniques within dialogue. The new actor AI essentially replaces the existing unilateral Disposition index with a number of different indexes which can be tested and manipulated independently. In Balzu, it will be possible for an actor to like you, but not respect you, or fear you and be attracted to you at the same time depending on how you act and what you say and their own predispositions. The implementation details are still being worked out, but I am making progress on it daily. It should be fully compatible with NPC-ACE as it does nothing to AI packages and affects dialogue and disposition only.

I have also been working on the landscape and have a good portion of the first 49 cells more or less complete. The total area is about a quarter mile in length and breadth and completely shaped, textured, and cluttered by hand (several thousand references). Path nodes are being extensively tweaked (the CS sometimes makes funny decisions about node placement) and still require a bit of work. About the only things relatively untouched are the placement of flora/harvest containers and spawn points for creatures.

I still have a tremendous amount of work to do: Perks, Origins, Birthsigns, quests, dialogue, scripting for the persuasion overhaul, etc., etc., but I am making steady progress. Please take some time to comment on this if you have any interest in it because the feedback is very useful to me and will help me spot potential problems and opportunities. I have been working on this since November and, while ambitious, I have accomplished a lot, so don't discount it as vaporware (yet ).

Note that the information on the home page isn't entirely up to date, since I tend to change the details more often than the web site. If you have any questions about the mod, just ask them here.

Still following this whenever you post an update. I like how you're making the NPC's 3-dimensional. I hate it when games just give you one bar of "disposition" and a few ways to fill it up, and then that's it :shrug: If it's full they're in love with you and if it's not then they hate you.
The way you're doing it is really how it should be in a game.
I wish I could offer any kind of advice or idea's, but I've been burnt out for the last few days trying to find time for work, learning to texture, learning to use UDK, personal relationships and a big trip I have coming up in two weeks <_<

Anyways, once again I say good luck, try not to get ahead of yourself and don't be like me and tire yourself to death

Ravin

Update: http://www.wegame.com/watch/balzu-character-generation/

Still plugging away at it. I have most of the landscaping done for the 7x7 chunk of cells that are part of the first beta release. Just a couple of empty cells left to fill and then some harvest containers, path nodes (over half done) and creature spawn points. Then I can do the LOD and get a good look at the landscape from a distance to see how it's working out.

The first official release will hopefully be quite a bit bigger. The current world space covers a small chunk of land just to the south of Bartleburg, the first town I plan on building, so it's just farm houses, a country chapel, an inn and a couple of cottages with forest to the west, south, and east. Kind of like the Weye/Wawnet Inn area. My first official release will probably be at least twice the size and include the town on the north.

I've started brainstorming ideas for quests and come up with quite a few. Nothing too complex, yet, and they will probably be tightly linked to class selections during the chargen process, so if you like one of the classes there will be a premade quest for you when you start the game. This means I'll probably only release a couple of classes at a time and bundle quests with them. Of course, you won't have to take the quests, but those of you who want an immediate, sensible role-playing experience will have the option.

I've also been playing around a bit with OBGE shaders trying to come up with a unique artistic style for the mod. I'm definitely leaning toward a 'film noire' style: think old black and white horror movies with sharp contrasts and dark shadows, but probably not entirely desaturated. I'll release the shader as an optional add-on and you can take it or leave it. Some of you might want to use it just to play the mod the way it was 'intended' to be played. I'm still experimenting with all this stuff, so I might completely change my mind, but there you have it.

I've also started implementing the Perks mechanic and have one Perk and one Flaw up and running. I'm planning several more, so if anyone has any ideas, let me know. I'm thinking more or less realistic talents and handicaps, like the Rage perk, which allows you to go on berserk rampages, and the Rake perk, which makes you more attractive to women (and a corresponding Coquette perk for female characters). I don't want anything like water breathing or infravision since I haven't even started thinking about the non-human races yet.

Time for another update:

http://www.truancyfactory.com/projects/balzu/images/roughingIt.jpg
http://www.truancyfactory.com/projects/balzu/images/stalkingTheMoon.jpg
http://www.truancyfactory.com/projects/balzu/images/dj_farm.jpg

The last couple of weeks have been devoted to modeling and poking around in NifSkope, though I have spent some time filling out the last few cells with statics, placing path nodes and adding flora. I spent a couple of days trying to get a custom static water mesh with transparency working and I think I've got it figured out now. This is for a water trough resource I'm working on, but I also plan on using it for rain barrels, fountains, ponds, etc.

I've also reverse engineered the grass meshes and have a crude custom grass mesh working. I just need to come up with some decent textures for it and tweak the vertex painting so they animate properly in the wind. The custom grasses are for crop fields, like wheat and barley, though I have some other ideas for them as well. On the topic of plants, I've also been giving some thought to custom animated trees. That may be a while down the road, but I'm starting to see how they might be implemented.

Ideas for the mod are still coming in droves, but feel free to share your thoughts if there's something you'd like to see in the mod. Keep in mind that the mood is dark fantasy horror, complete with vampires, werewolves, witchcraft, and ghosts. Anything that really sends a chill down your spine is something I'd be interested in hearing about.

Another update:

I've been working really hard on the Enhanced AI scripting, which means I've had to learn a LOT. I've had to add user functions, pluggy INI files, arrays, strings, and better bug fixing techniques to get it all work, but it is finally starting to come together. I can now add the new disposition indexes and other dynamic variables to arrays for safe, efficient storage and initialize all of my NPC AI traits in an INI file for easy editing and tweaking. The Enhanced AI doesn't really do anything yet except identify when the player moves between cells, changes his or her clothing, equips or unequips a weapon, casts a spell, or sneaks, but it's a start. It can walk the actors in a cell, look for and initialize a new dynamic array, and update the array when I tell it to, but I still have to implement the persuasion techniques, dialogue, NPC 'memories', etc. Now that I have a better understanding of scripting, however, I'm hoping that things will start to progress a little more smoothly. All of the details have been updated in the first post at the start of the thread, but I'll mention a couple of possible scenarios arising from these changes:





It should be clear from the examples how the interaction between the player's character's personality, the personality of the NPC's, and the persuasion techniques used can combine to form a more realistic and immersive role-playing experience.

In other news, I have also been in communication with another modder who is whipping up what looks to be an awesome custom creature. I can't give you the details, yet, because it's a bit of a spoiler, but I think you're going to like it.

And lastly, a shout out to the other total conversion modders out there who are slaving hard at making their dreams a reality. Keep up the awesome work. You guys amaze me. :tops:

This looks really interesting. I seems like a very large job, and I'm normally quite pessimistic when I see such large WIP ideas, but from what I've seen of your posts I think you actually know what you're trying to do, so good luck

Wow... This looks incredible! :wub:

Another quick update and some replies.

I've updated the pictures with some newer ones. Sorry about how dark they are. They're dark to begin with, but photobucket likes to darkify them even more. I tweaked the brightness to improve visibility at night, but day is kind of washed out now, so no day pics at the moment. That's a shader issue, has nothing to do with the mod. I've also expanded the world space by a few cells, added custom bandages and a script so you can bind your wounds immersively, and created a couple of more meshes.


It helps to be a little obsessed. I'm still mastering the intricacies of nif files and scripting but I know how to do pretty much everything else. It also helps that I'm not trying to create a massive world all in one go. The initial world space size won't be very large, but can be expanded as needed. The hardest part is going to be scripting the enhanced AI. But it's intimately linked to the quests, dialogues, birth signs, perks/flaws, spells, etc., so it's going to have to be completed before I can release it. That alone will take months. (Though I may be able to release it incrementally. Still working on it.)



Thank you. It's a labor of love.

Another update. New videos and screenshots can be found on the mod's homepage: http://www.truancyfactory.com/projects/balzu/balzu.html as well as some lengthier description of the mod's current progress, etc.

I'll update the first post with the new data as soon as I get a chance. Unfortunately, I have to head off to my real job right now. :yuck:

Sweet. Thanks for keeping us posted.

Balzu is essentially my attempt at doubling vanilla Oblivion's inherent awesomeness by

• doubling the amount of landscape detail
  
• doubling the distance between locations of interest and the size of each location (npc head count, dungeon depth, etc.)
  
• doubling the amount of dialogue npcs can engage in
  
• doubling the length and complexity of quests
  
• doubling the number of options available during character generation
  
• doubling the number of different types of creatures you can encounter
  
• and doubling the range and sophistication of actor AI

Obviously this is a huge task, but it's one I've been taking on with relish and I am happy to say that I have finally started making some progress on the AI side of things.

Anyone who's been following my project knows that improving the vanilla AI is a major focus of the mod. Well, I've written a number of user-functions to get and set various custom values and the first fruit of my labor is a custom disguise system that works in a more or less intuitive fashion and has a certain flexibility and range.

In Balzu, you will be able to disguise yourself as a member of any faction larger than a domestic family as long as you can get your hands on the right clothing, armor, weapons, and other objects associated with a faction. You do not need to have a complete disguise to pass muster, but the more complete your disguise is, the better your chance of disguising yourself. Your success depends on a number of other factors as well.

The time of day (amount of light), distance from your observer, the observer's intelligence and faction rank, your luck, an element of randomness, and whether or not you are sneaking all play a part in the success of the disguise (sneaking will hurt your chances, as it's highly suspicious behavior). Additionally, the observer's Suspicion attribute (a new AI attribute for Balzu) and your Personality attribute play a role (using the assumption that characters with a high Personality generally have a good understanding of psychology, better acting skills, and a greater inherent ability to manipulate the impressions of others).

If your disguise is very good, and the conditions are right, observing actors will assume that you are a member of whatever faction you are equipped for. The consequences of this will follow naturally, whether that means allowing you access to restricted locations, services, and information or whatever else is appropriate, just as if you really were a member of the faction.

If your disguise is less than perfect, or the conditions are not optimal, actors will stop and question you, and you will be forced to pass a Speechcraft test in order to convince them that you are, indeed, a member of the faction in question. If all goes well, your disguise may still succeed even if it is not strictly dress-code: all you need is a good excuse and some natural acting talent.

If your disguise is poor and conditions are working against you, your disguise will fail and one of two things may happen: if your disguise is close to the faction in question, they will draw the proper conclusion that you are trying to infiltrate the faction and respond appropriately by arresting, attacking, or whatever other response is appropriate for the faction in question. If your disguise is very far from the faction uniform, they will not even realize you were attempting to disguise yourself and treat you the way they normally would.

This disguise mechanic has a couple of other uses in Balzu: it allows actors to make a judgment about your social class, it allows you to bind bounty and infamy to a concealing disguise as long as it conceals your face (like a closed-faced helmet or mask), and it may allow you to escape guards attempting to make an arrest.

Social class is inferred by other actors by the quality and value of your equipped clothing, armor, weapons, and jewelery. Your social class faction thus fluctuates based on the clothing that you wear. This makes it possible, for example, for a rogue to infiltrate an aristocratic social function to gain access to some valuables, or an aristocrat to conceal himself from the daggers of assassins by blending in with the peasant rabble. Note that it does not obliterate your social class, which is determined by birth and selected during character generation, it merely allows you to disguise yourself as a member of another class on a temporary basis. People who know you or see through your disguise will be able to identify your real roots.

Concealed identities allow you to tie bounty and infamy acquired during gameplay to the concealing disguise. This can be any kind of concealing headgear, but note that witnesses to crimes will remember everything you were wearing at the time of the crime, so even if you do not have the headgear equipped, if you have everything else equipped that you had equipped at the time of the crime, guards and witnesses may still be able to identify you.

This ties directly to the new ability to escape from guards by successfully hiding from them and then changing your equipped clothing, weapons, and armor. The more you change about your appearance, the less likely they are to identify you when they see you next, but note that this tactic is very risky. If they find you in the same general location as they lost you and you're behaving suspiciously (say, by sneaking) they will almost certainly identify you properly. Even if they don't identify you at first, they will almost certainly question you, providing you with another opportunity to test your Speechcraft, Personality, and Luck.

Not all of these features have been worked out yet (like the bounty/infamy/concealed identities bit), and they will certainly require a significant amount of testing, but a big chunk of the work has already been completed, specifically, functions to determine whether or not your disguise succeeds in deceiving an actor. Stay tuned for more updates on the Enhanced AI component of Balzu, because I have a lot planned for it. (Shadowing, combat decision, got lute? play for money, etc.)

Abbreviated for TLDNRs:

Balzu now has a working faction disguise mechanic (a prototype: needs a bit of elaboration and tweaking, tho) and illegal faction uniforms. I expanded the landscape to make room for a prison (the worldspace is now 8x8 cells, but not complete anymore), and has a working prison and guard that will arrest you for committing crimes, impersonating a guard or dressing like a hooligan. (Fines for being indecently exposed shouldn't take long to add.)

I've also expanded the Enhanced AI framework to allow for different kinds of AI enhancements to different types of creatures and different kinds of factions (think faction 'families' like guards, criminals, etc.) I haven't worked out the details yet, but I have hooks for animals, humanoids, undead, guards, criminals, criminal spellcasters, beggars, healers, companions, etc. It's just a matter of plugging in code appropriate to each type of actor.

More updates soon, I'm sure.