Paladin Mod
The Hand of Arkay
by Pimpskinny


"Now you see that Good will always triumph, because Evil is dumb."
- Arkay, the God of Birth and Death

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Description
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Upon completion of the most honorable outcome of the vanilla quest The Order of the Virtuous Blood, you will soon find a book that initiates the Paladin Mod, which sets you on the path to serve Arkay, granting you powers befitting a Paladin and rewarding good deeds along the way. The Order of the Virtuous Blood has two possible outcomes. You need to achieve the one that results in the true vampire being slain.

I also use this mod as an excuse to make the Speechcraft skill more useful, and to make it more fun to level-up the very-very-slow Restoration skill. The powers immediately granted are detailed below, along with an explanation of what good deeds can grant you.


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Initial Powers
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Intimidate
Lesser Power (touch)
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This is similar to Oblivion's "Demoralize" spell, but it's not magic. Rather, it's speech. When you "cast" this on a hostile NPC, your Speechcraft skill and the difference in Level between you and your target will determine how much their Confidence drops, and therefore determines how much health they can lose before running away from their opponent. With a high Speechcraft skill, this can be a significant advantage.

Timing is key. The effect lasts only ten seconds, after which their Confidence returns to its normal level. And each time you "cast" it on the same target, the negative effect on their Confidence diminishes more and more each time, so spamming it doesn't help much. Using this power on a valid hostile target levels up your Speechcraft skill (thank you, OBSE!).

Screenshot: http://i46.photobucket.com/albums/f101/iwatson/intimidate.jpg


Battle Cry
Lesser Power (Self - Area of Effect)
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Just as you can intimidate opponents, you can also inspire your allies. Your rallying cry has a large area of effect. Any friendly NPC (not including you) within earshot who is in combat will receive bonuses to their Confidence, Health, and Armor that last for 30 seconds. The magnitude of these bonuses is determined by your Speechcraft skill. Using this power on a valid friendly target who is in combat will level up your Speechcraft skill.

Screenshots: http://i46.photobucket.com/albums/f101/iwatson/rally_self.jpg, http://i46.photobucket.com/albums/f101/iwatson/rally_other.jpg


Pray
Lesser Power (self)
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A role-playing alternative to casting restore health spells on yourself. The healing received depends on your Restoration skill. It also might grant additional bonuses. These bonuses come more often according to the quantity of your good deeds. Praying levels up your Restoration skill.

Screenshots: http://i46.photobucket.com/albums/f101/iwatson/pray_no_weap.jpg, http://i46.photobucket.com/albums/f101/iwatson/pray_weap.jpg


Lay On Hands
Greater Power (touch)
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Once per day you may heal another person or creature of injuries, disease, poison, and all other debilitations. If cast on a friendly target who is injured, performing this act is a good deed and will make karmic returns to yourself more likely, and also level up your Restoration skill.


Lay to Rest
Lesser Power (touch)
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Use this power on a "dead" undead creature, and you will release their tortured soul to be at peace. Performing this act is a good deed and will make karmic returns to yourself more likely. Using this power levels up your Restoration skill.

Screenshot: http://i46.photobucket.com/albums/f101/iwatson/lay_to_rest.jpg


Redeem Vampire
Lesser Power (touch)
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Use this power on a dead vampire, and you will ensure their soul has a safe journey without danger of being snared by Molag Bal, the father of Vampires. Performing this act is a good deed and will make karmic returns to yourself more likely. Using this power levels up your Restoration skill.


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Karmic Returns and Good Deeds
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The powers Lay On Hands, Lay To Rest, and Redeem Vampire are considered good deeds. The more times they are performed, the more likely it is that you will receive benefits in return. A primary aspect of Paladin Mod is the mysterious nature of the Divine. The motivations of the Divines cannot be understood and therefore cannot be predicted or controlled. And so I don't want to spoil it by saying too much up front about such karmic returns in detail. I think it's much more fun to just play as a Paladin and enjoy the surprises that come with it.

But I will say that as your good deeds accumulate, you will gain http://i46.photobucket.com/albums/f101/iwatson/guiding_light.jpg befitting a Paladin. Undead and Daedric creatures (including Dremora) will have significant reason to fear you. Also, praying will bring additional and unpredictable benefits. And last but not least, it will also become more likely that, when things are most dire, you will receive assistance in the form of divine intervention. This is never guaranteed, is actually rare, and comes in different forms.

As you become a seasoned and powerful Hand of Arkay, it will become undeniable that you are favored and protected by a Divine.

Note: "Good deeds" only refers to the actions above that come with this mod, and have nothing to do with your Fame value. I made this decision because you can sometimes earn Fame points in vanilla Oblivion by doing horrible things to innocent people.


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Mod Progress
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• Paladin Mod should be done within a week or two.

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Requirements
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• http://obse.silverlock.org/ v0020 or later. Paladin Mod will not load without it. And please remember to launch Oblivion with the OBSE Launcher.
  
• http://www.7-zip.org/. You will need this to open the downloaded archive.

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Known Issues and Conflicts
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• None.

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Credits
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• Even lone modders like me don't really make a mod alone. These are the nice people who have helped me so far ...
  
• Creative Input and Technical Help: QQuix (big time), MatH, brucevayne, TheNiceOne, JRoush, saebel, Five Alpha Reductase, bg2408, Sozerius, DragoonWraith, tejon.
  
• Resources Generously Shared: The http://obse.silverlock.org/ for making OBSE, and http://www.tesnexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=26196 for the script functions making custom spell icons possible.
  
• Tools Used: http://www.tesnexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=8665 by TeamGecko, The Oblivion Construction Set, Notepad, and Adobe Photoshop Elements (with the DDS file plug-in).

Of course, my current character is being played as a Paladin by me and then you start making a Paladin Mod. :banghead:

Nah just kidding, that is a great idea Pimpskinny. Before i started playing with my current character i looked on TESNexus what was there for playing a Paladin, i could not find much but i did end up using a Birthsign mod that added a Paladin Birthsign with a few spells and such and one mod that placed the spell Turn Undead in the restoration school. I also found a mod on PES that looked awesome but in the end i decided not to use that one, although i would have liked to. Maybe these mods can give you some ideas for your Paladin mod.

http://www.tesnexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=22034

http://www.tesnexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=15874

And the one on PES.

http://planetelderscrolls.gamespy.com/View.php?view=OblivionMods.Detail&id=5067

Whoa! There's some overlap between mine and Judgement of the Nine. That mod actually includes spells to "redeem" undead, and an aura of sunlight to harm vampires. And I thought I was so clever in coming up with those ideas a couple weeks ago Although Paladin Mod will be a lot simpler. Instead of getting a lot of spells, the power mainly comes in the form of unpredictable divine intervention.

I definitely like that mod to change Turn Undead into a Restoration spell.

Yeah me to, though the author hat forgotten to change the spell magic effects(Or what ever you call what you see when casting a spell. ) from conjuration to Restoration but that is easily changed. And it makes it well...easier for playing a Paladin. In my own opinion conjuration has no place with a Paladin character. And that mod does seem complicated alright, i guess that was one of the main reasons for me not to use it.

Awesome stuff, just finished a playthrough with your druid mod!

Started a new playthrough as a Paladin earlier today Couldn't find a single decent paladin mod apart from armor.

Eagerly awaiting this, my last playthrough before i get Skyrim.


Edit: Any tips on a character build for this mod and other mods that might play nicely with this?
( Going to start over and complete the MQ while waiting for this mod)

Thanks! So cool you did a playthrough as a Druid. Yea, the reason I decided to make this one was because I couldn't find a Paladin mod either! I can't believe it. This will also be my last playthrough. There is that Judgement of the Nine mod I didn't know about before, but it seems a bit overpowered and flamboyant for my taste. Although it looks like the author and I had some very similar ideas.

Paladin Mod will not be nearly as deep as Druid Mod Remade. Not as many spells. Pally Mod grants you four immediately, three come later as surprise bonuses (along with various buffs), and there are seven different flavors of "divine intervention" that you have no control over, and also I think I've got a way that the Player can add a custom weapon enchantment to a weapon of their choice as the final reward. This way, it would cater to the weapon taste of anyone. There is also no proper quest, other than being occasionally surprised as you are granted new paladinny powers. I initially had optimistic ideas for a long quest involving a sleepy Nordic town and an ancient vampire, but honestly I'm too eager to start playing my mod

As it stands, all the spells are written except one. Just testing and tweaking the "special effects."

Paladin Mod will add a new class "Paladin" to the Character Generation screen. Although you don't have to select this class to play the mod. And also you can start this mod with an existing character. But the class skills are ...

Blade
Block
Heavy Armor
Athletics
Armorer
Restoration
Speechcraft

The only two Oblivion skills put to use by this mod are Restoration and Speechcraft, used to determine the effectiveness of a few custom Paladin powers. But all the others are just my personal preference for a Pally.

I honestly can't think of any other mods to compliment this one. That mod Illius mentioned that makes "Turn Undead" a Restoration spell is cool, but I think you've got that covered if you select The Ritual as your birth sign.

Sounds awesome, can't wait!!!

Was gonna have this as my build but can't make my mind up lol
Blade
Armorer
Alteration
Destruction (for a "smite evil" type spell"
Heavy Armor
Restoration
Speechcraft

Edit: Oh and i'm using Supreme magicka so heal spells does damage on undeads

LoL with exception of speechcraft those are the same skills i picked for my current Paladin character. In stead of Speechcraft i picked Mercantile.

It's about time someone is working on a detailed paladin mod. I must thank you for that. Hopefully by the time your mod is ready my character is strong enough to finish the order of virtuous blood and the main quests. BTW would it be compatible with any mods that expand upon the Virtuous Blood quest such as the one here? http://www.tesnexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=30568 :turned: :thumbsup:

Forgot to mention... would it be too complicated to make the mod compatible with Oblivion XP?

Should be. Paladin Mod will do a simple check to see if the right stage of Virtuous Blood is complete so it knows when to initiate itself.



As I understand Oblivion XP, you get experience when you kill something. Because of some of the scripts in Paladin Mod, XP might not give you "credit" for things you kill when using certain powers. I have no idea how I could fix that. However, the great majority of kills you make will be normal type kills that XP will recognize.

This is a part of Oblivion XP decription from Nexus for your reference: Aside from XP from kills, the player can gather XP through the following actions:

* By gaining Renown (fame/infamy). The XP earned for each is point of Renown is 150.

* By exploring new areas. The XP earned for finding a new area depends on the remoteness of the area, which is determined by your distance to the nearest city. A very easy location yields 30 XP, an easy location 60 XP, an average location 90 XP, a hard location 120 XP and a very hard location 150 XP.

* By gathering Artifacts. The XP earned for finding an Artifact is 300.

* By gathering Nirnroots. The XP earned for finding a Nirnroot is 50.

* By stealing items. The XP earned for stealing an item is 1.

* By pick-pocketing items. The XP earned for pick-pocketing an item is 4.

* By picking locks. The XP earned for picking a lock depends on the difficulty of the lock ? a very easy lock yields 15 XP, an easy lock 30 XP, an average lock 45 XP, a hard lock 60 XP and a very hard lock 75 XP. You will only get XP for picking the lock if you do so without breaking too many lockpicks. The amount of lockpicks you're allowed to break while still getting XP is determined by the lockpicksBrokenMax setting in the ini.

* By making potions. The XP earned for making a potion is 25. Only making a new potion yields XP, where a stronger version of an old potion made before counts as a new potion.

* By eating ingredients. The XP earned for eating an ingredient is 1.

* By reading books. The XP earned for reading a book is 25. Reading a book only yields XP once. If the book is a scroll, it will yield 1/3rd of the normal XP gained for reading a book.

* By investing in stores. The XP earned for investing in a store is 150.

* By feeding on someone as a vampire. The XP earned for each vampire bite is 50.

* By closing Oblivion Gates. The XP earned for closing an Oblivion Gate is 200.

* By successfully trapping a soul. The XP earned for trapping a soul is 20.

* By buying a Horse. The XP earned for buying a horse is 65.

* By buying a House. The XP earned for buying a house is 180.

See if you can make your mod work with XP. If you have issues that's fine too. Thank you for modding in either case. :clap:

I agree totally. A Pally should not have the power to summon undead and daedra, even if they chose not to use it. In fact, at the moment right now I'm considering adding a measure of protection to the Paladin from summoned creatures. OBSE has an "IsSummonable" condition check for Actors that could be very useful. I'm always worried about doing something overpowered, but I think that Necromancers and other Conjurers should have definite reason to fear a Paladin.



The more I think about it, the more I'm sure that the Pally Mod kills that would go unrecognized by XP would be so rare that it would be insignificant.

I'm glad to hear that or rather read? I'll be looking forward to trying your mod when the time comes. :clap: :celebration:

The mod is coming together very nicely.

All the spells are done. Need to write the quest script, which should be a simple matter, and make a little interior space and we should be good to go. I'm sick of modding and wanna start playing Maybe another week and it'll be done so I can clean it up and test it and make sure there are no extra-stupid mistakes/bugs.

With OBSE you can do some really awesome stuff. Woe to those who attack the Hand of Arkay. They will likely see no consequences, but then again they might find themselves struck to the ground with a lightning strike from above, or find that the Paladin has burst into white flames, infused with strength so great that everyone they strike flies through the air. And the undead will fear them. With a touch, the tired bodies of the undead may be exorcised. Daedra may be banished from the world, and vampires could be surprised with a burst of sunlight that burns their flesh, even in the darkest and deepest of places. And after a time, when the Paladin becomes truly favored in the eyes of Arkay, they will be the arch-nemesis of necromancers and conjurers of daedra, as Arkay protects his chosen from summoned beasts.

Divine vengeance hey, nice.

I noticed that the random divine blessings occasionally work on Daedra, but none of the base powers do. Is this intentional?

If by "base powers" you mean the abilities you get initially, then yes. But a couple daedra/dremora-related goodies come later. As you perform the tasks given to you by Arkay (Lay On Hands, Lay to Rest, Redeem Vampire), you will unlock seven new abilities that culminate into significant advantages over undead, vampires and daedra, and especially necromancers.

Ahhhh, okay. I totally missed that there was a separate category of stuff besides "initial bonuses" and "random blessings." :sweat:

Sounds really neat! Definitely looking forward to this one.

I think this could be really cool. I already have a Khajiit character whom I play as a Paladin of the Nine, so this will be great for him.

http://www.tesnexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=41095!

I'll make a release thread tomorrow. Too tired at the moment.

grats on the release.