the thing i most looked forward to in OB was Radiant AI. after reading about it and seeing the video with the dog, i imagined lifelike NPCs that seemed to have their own lives. i was quite disappointed when vanilla NPCs just had predefined schedules that they would do predictably day after day.

so i struggled to make a mod long ago that gave NPCs dynamic/unpredictable schedules affected by their stats, attributes, social class, wealth, guild, etc but never released it (although it basically did what i wanted) because it was buggy and very inefficient as i was just learning to mod then.

now with Skyrim coming, im planning to make version of my mod for it and figure to use OB for practice and to improve my modding know how. there'll probably be enough similarities between the mod kits that this wont be a waste of time.

so please point me to mods you think has good non-combat ai behaviour that i should take a look at.

also, if you have anything you want to see in a mod like this, id appreciate the suggestions

Great idea for the social realism, the non-combat focused player. Probably nice for a thief too!

I never thought of the idea so do not know any mods that do this.

As for what I would like to see, well, you pretty much covered it, all based on their stats. Perhaps adding some randomness to the schedules would really make it work well. Make an element of surprise for a thief casing the joint

well thieving could be harder or easier in what i did. NPCs were a lot more unpredictable so they could (and usually did) go out of their homes when in vanilla they'd just stay in all day. so you could break in if you saw an NPC outside their homes. but then they could also return while you're going thru their stuff and catch you in the act. i also gave them a very small chance to wake up while sleeping.

the schedules were random but affected by their stats. they had a whole range of activities but were more inclined to do stuff in line with their stats.

but its been a long time since i had a look at the CS so i was hoping to study other mods to learn more and faster. i already have NPCs with jobs and a few other mods.

I actually hadn't thought of this idea. It'd be pretty cool to have NPCs do random stuff based on their stats. Add a little more life to the cities. I don't know of any mod that to this date has that, maybe there is, I don't know.

For what I would like to see in this mod, you guys have pretty much said the basics. Have a lot of variations on the NPCs schedules, based on their stats. Like a NPC with high speed would jog around the city, while a NPC with high strength would challenge others to a duel.You know, things that you would see in real life medieval towns.

Maybe add a laptop and Internet so that I can chat with the NPCs....nah just kidding .

Oh by the way, so this is for you to practice to make a mod like this for Skyrim right? I was hoping someone would come up with such a mod for Oblivion, since Skyrim has different mechanics, modders would have to learn how to create similar programs like OBSE for Skyrim. Although the modding community is now pretty experienced with both Morrowind and Oblivion, I don't see Skyrim as being a big stone in the way.

i'll release it for OB IF i get it working right (get rid of the issues - bugs, crashes, slowdown - i had with my old mod) but my primary intent is to do the same for Skyrim.

One thing i managed to do related to what you said: "fighter-type" NPCs, for example, could decide they want to do something physical. they could go over to the fighter's guild and see what there is to do. once there, they'd decide to either spar with someone or practice on a dummy. if they wanted to spar and the sparring spaces were empty, they could "invite" an NPC in the room who wasnt doing anything (wander package) to spar with them. if the sparring spaces or dummies were occupied, they would go outside the guild (this was in Anvil) and practice on the dummies/targets there if those were unoccupied. otherwise, they'd reevaluate and see if they'd rather do something else or still try to find some other physical activity.

i really wanted them to actually fight each other when sparring rather than the vanilla way of just going to the animation spot and execute a bunch of swings but i couldnt figure it out then and it was really low priority.

also, some members of the fighters guild (chorrol) could decide to go adventuring in one of the nearby caves. he could buy a healing potion if he had one, or visit the temple for blessings or even invite a guild mate to join him before actually setting out. had plans for similar activities with the other guilds but RL took over and i didnt have time to learn more or implement them and still be able to play a little.

the thing i really liked was that the activities werent scheduled like in vanilla and i couldnt predict exactly what an NPC would do. this was what i had in my imagination after the earlier Radiant AI announcements so i really wanted to see them more in game. if done properly, there would actually be less need for mods that add travelling NPCs or NPCs in dungeons because the existing NPCs could do the travelling and adventuring themselves. i once followed a test NPC and couldnt figure out why he was travelling so far away from town. then i realized he had "decided" to go see an NPC (untouched by my mod) who happened to be in another city so he was travelling all the way there just to do that.

Glad to know there's a change of you releasing this mod for Oblivion.

About your ideas, yes, they are all perfect and creative. It would be really enjoyable to go hunt in a dungeon and see a bunch of NPCs already in fighting. Although if they die, there would have to be a NPC respawn, or is that already included in the game? (I think so, because if you kill all the people in one city I think they respawn)

The thing is, there really isn't much to do (non-combat) in Oblivion. But it would be nice to have that little available in the game. It would be fun though, if a random mage or fighter just goes on a killing rampage or randomly attacks you, and it's powerful enough to actually make you struggle and the guards also. Maybe some kind of script that adds a % chance of a NPC turning against you randomly, adding him spells and skills = or similar to yours. I can't really imagine of any other things that I, personally, would enjoy about NPCs. Or maybe it's that I don't know all the things that NPC can do.

You get this with both OOO and MMM who both have Adventurer "overhauls".

very true. however, afaik, both OOO and MMM add these adventurers to the game. my plan was to make existing adventurers, FG members, and Blackwood company guys go out and do the adventuring themselves. imho, its more fun to see an NPC you actually know from town inside a dungeon or even just travelling on the roads.

an issue i had though was that NPCs didnt seem to run the packages (or stop doing them) unless the player was in the same area. dont remember if it applied to all packages or just those added by script (AddScriptPackage iirc) but it seems to me to be the latter. hoping to find a fix for that if the problem is still there.

Not to hijack the thread, but are there any Adventurer overhauls/expansions that are independent of a larger overhaul like OOO/MMM? That just add more dungeon encounter, I guess?

Also, reading about the OP's plans for Skyrim--has it been comfirmed that the new "Radiant Story" or whatever AI system for Skyrim won't have NPCs with varied schedules? You'd kind of expect Bethesda to build on what Oblivion did instead of just having NPCs that do the same thing every day once again.

True. But then you'd run into the issue with named NPCs dying, esp. when using overhauls.



But then it would be, like, "Hey, didn't I see you get slaughtered the other day in that Bandit cave?"

Anyway, http://www.tesnexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=5338 was an extremely ambitious project but the release only affects farming IIRC.

i had generics (guards, new FG NPCs) respawn. And the named adventurers did tend to die so, for purposes of gameplay, i set them to essential (except when in combat vs the player) while adventuring then had them flee home after regaining consciousness.

NPCs with jobs was way more complex in many ways. it had lumberjacks, fishing, farming, with animations to boot. i only wish they brought it to tamriel npcs instead of a separate landspace.

http://www.gamesas.com/index.php?/topic/1060697-wipz-npc-ace-npc-advanced-control-engine/ was a proof of Concept created by QQuix. I am pretty sure that's what you are looking for

That's the one I really was thinking of as well. Mixed them up.

NPC Ace is exactly what im looking for. i actually remember that when it was first posted. that's oodles more complex than what i had in mind though. he's speaking of algorithms when i have difficulty with algebra! :blush: while that actually seems to be going for AI, mine was just a hint of a semblance of an appearance of AI still I'll see if i can learn anything. thanks!

I have never found one, one of the reasons for using OOO, MMM, or Frans. If you do find one please post it.

I'll be sure to. Searching on tesnexus doesn't return anything but it might be hiding somewhere under an obscure name. It just seems like something that would have been attempted by now, outside of a major overhaul.

But dammit it's just making it harder for me to stick to my no-balance-changes vanilla game. I mean, adding adventurer NPCs that will ostensibly make it easier or more difficult for you (depending on their disposition) will technically alter the balance in a small way, but it's minor enough that it doesn't violate my rules, hehe. I've managed to find lots of stand-alone stuff that you might also find incorporated into one of the major overhauls (hooray for farm animals), but there are always a few odd things that frustrate me. Yeah, I'll do FCOM eventually, but for now I just want my game expanded as much as possible without altering the core vanilla experience.

http://www.tesnexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=24847
Not quite what you are looking for but it does add more hero npc's good concept which could have been expanded much more

Thanks, this looks to be very much like what I had in mind. Have you tried this yourself, and do you know how well it works? Like are the heroes just standing around waiting for the player to show up, or do they have specific AI routines? Do I have to worry about them running amok in towns or killing essential NPCs or something elsewhere? This is why I wish people made their readmes more descriptive, as this seems to only include descriptions of characters copied and pasted from the submissions people made for their specific characters to be included. So I don't even know if the location listed for each character is just the submitter's preference or if they actually ended up in that spot. And hopefully they aren't all just hanging out around towns.

Only just installed this myself got interested after ready this topic and ive been having a look through nexus to see if there are any similar mods but from what i have seen so far i dont think they have much of a ai package which is a shame as it was what i was looking for too

I remember when that project started. Might give it a look.

The adventurers introduced by OOO, Frans and MMM work really well. It is a good thing in a tough dungeon to have them clear the way partially and help in a fight. Their AI though needs some work. Great source of lockpics.

I would be interested in your mod list as I am creating a game exactly like that (on the side). You could PM it or post here. You are the first person I ran into who has mentioned doing that.

why anyone would want the core vanilla experience is beyond me really

not to be a forum police, but im hoping we dont get too far off topic here as i'd really like to work on this in what little free time i have