Tonight I finished up the glamor code so that it takes into account various attributes of the player and the victim. Its quite a bit of math to finally come up with an equation that reflects many skills, abilities and stats. Finally there is a reason to increase speechcraft and personality, but you can probably get by with just raising them to 50 or so. Essentially any skill/stat below 50 is going to take away from your score and above 50 adds to you chance to glamor.

Currently glamoring can convince people to follow you around for a kiss feed and you can convince a merchant to reopen his store at night for you. I will probably add more stuff, like convince a guard not to arrest you. Open for more ideas about possible glamor powers.

I also fixed a bug with holy damage burning the player and turning them into a vampire before they even have the disease.

http://downloads.4drulers.com/Oblivion_Mods/unholydarkness/Unholy%20Darkness%20glamouring.wmv

EDIT: You know the cool ideas seem to never stop sometimes. I was thinking when I fed on that mage in the video, how easy it would be to boost the players magicka after feeding on a mage or necromancer. That could be a useful thing in combat and give something to mage vampires.

Seems like a cool idea, could give you a reason to take the chance at force feeding in combat on a mage if your out of magicka.

Awesomes video, its all looking great :goodjob: there are alot effects influencing seducing, its making it mabye to easy? Mabye add that if someone sees you kissing a person and that person faints mabye they report it something. I dunno, but i found it somewhat funny how that mage guy just passed out and the other dude just standed there.

Does feeding via a kiss give as much blood as normal feeding?

I loved the video MM.

Would be neat if they turned paleish when fed on , but thats alright.

One glamor power i can think of is from Vampire the Masquarade...basicly you can put mental powers such as making them go insane...

Rendering them hepless, or making them die from panic, OR making them hallusinate and attack random folks ...though this would make you
more of sheogorath and anything when comparing lore in TES.

This is looking better all the time MM, please keep at it compadre ! I'm completely drooling, over the prospect of re-installing Oblivion and playing once again. Not that I can't do so now of course, I'm just waiting for this to be released first. That way I won't start up once again, without having this to install and go at it completely fresh Once again, I'll stop back by in a few weeks to see how everything is coming along MM

Fal

Isn't that exactly, what you implemented as you did the blood quality thing? You mentioned a framework, which enables to get special effects from different victims

edit: oh i see.. youve already had it in the video

It's not too easy. I had to actually take my level 25 character to the levelers shack and raise her speechcraft to get it to work. It was only 25 and that was bringing my glamor score down too low for success.

I don't think its such a big deal to see someone fall down at the bar, it happens quite often I'm not really sure how to go about it. I mean AI can be simple or as complex as you want. The guy lost his footing. He had too much to drink. Not all NPC's pass out when you feed on them, but low level weaker ones will, so it would be tough to try and code in AI to react to this situation. Its either a crime or it isn't in Oblivion. There is no way to do it without scanning the area for nearby references and slowing your cpu down. If its too easy to feed this way then I can make it a crime. I'll have to play test it a bit and see.

Kissing is the same as any method of feeding. I'd call it "necking" lol. Maybe I'll change the text so you don't bite their tongue.

I could make victims pale VERY easily. But the problem with the way I'd do it is that it washes out the texture definition of the original character. I mean, the blood on the neck is a shader overlay, I could add some white to it, but it would cover up the finer details in the characters skin. It might look ok. I thought about doing it a few times.

I'm not sure making someone go insane would play well. It sounds like a gimmick that would be fun the first time but would lack any long term usefulness.


Awesome. Thanks for the continued support.


Yes, I have done all the hard work already, which is what I was saying I could buff the player's magicka very easily when feeding on a mage type, and maybe add other benefits which would make feeding more interesting. I already make your blood cravings slow when feeding on quality blood, but why not a little magicka buff when feeding on a magic user? Maybe a fatigue restore when feeding on a warrior? Just something useful in combat mostly.

I have an idea. Well, I'm not really good at keeping them to myself so I'll let everyone have a peek at my genius.

I was thinking about the relations between humanity and vampirism (yeah, instead of finishing my reports for tomorrow's deadline...) and the thought just hit me - shouldn't growing in, nomen omen, inhuman power erode one's 'humanness'? I've been contemplating your system for some time and came to the conclusion that elder vampires are getting too awesome without really paying any cost for their power. Yes, of course, age should make you better, but having more and more benefits without any drawbacks to complement them quickly gets... boring - the curse of vampirism just stops feeling like a, well... curse. I'm massively stealing ideas from WoD now, but I think that the older you get the more powerful effect your vampiric nature should have on you as well. In WoD, vampires with a higher Blood Potency have more problems with waking up from torpor (and later staying awake at all), appearing in mirrors and photographs, and even feeding (while neonates can feed on animals, humans and vampires, the older they get the more 'picky' their Beast becomes and the narrower their menu is). I don't suggest implementing any of this, since it's rather hard to do in Oblibian and doesn't sit well with your concept, but I have other ideas.
As I remember, your vampires can have a "sunblock" after feeding, right? And the older they become the longer they can withstand the sun? Well, what about reversing it? And even increasing the elders' vulnerability to sun and fire. I see it as inability of elder vampires to maintain their connection with the sunny, mortal world - they may be powerful otherwise, yes, great, but that power is not exactly theirs and growing in vampiric strength comes with growing in its weakness as well.
Also, the ability to connect with humans - living as a bloodsvcking beast which, by the natural order of things, should have died centuries ago distances you from your human nature. Elder vampires typically appear as degenerated, apathetic and disturbing, subtly or openly inhuman, regardless of how many layers of make-up they wear, how expensive their clothes are and how eruditely they speak. Perhaps that could be reflected by a small penalty to disposition when dealing with mortals when not depending on supernatural aids? Come to think of it, if I was a vampire I'd rather mind-control people around than needlessly socialise with my food - would spare me a lot of time and words. Yes, I'm sick and proud of it.
Lastly, increased drawbacks of hunger and lack of sleep? Maybe older vampires can go on without blood or coffin for longer than fledglings, but when the hunger finally kicks in, it really kicks in.

Et cetera, et cetera, I can really go on without end, but unfortunately my senseless, bureaucratic duty calls.

This is definitely a good point. Even with parasiteX's vampire mod, my favorite of them all before I started this, once I had acquired all the powers and was uber powerful.. I lost interest. And any good game mechanic should introduce new challenges to deal with these new weapons. Even doom gave you a BFG, but then you had to deal with cyberdemons.

I don't like the idea of crippling an elder without feeding. It only makes sense that they hardly need blood as they mature. In fact, I plan on the whole incubation stuff where you can sort of dry up like in underworld to a corpse pretty much, but once given blood you can rise again. You just go into hybernation. But I do like the idea of perhaps messing with disposition. My own character is hated so much, it is alien when I fire up a new character. People actually say nice things to them, lol. But guards rude comments don't bother me, I know I can destroy the whole town if I wanted. Earlier I did a few times, but my own character sort of progressed. Just because she has the power doesn't mean she will always use it. This was a fun role playing progression. It used to be rude comments meant instant death and a fight would ensue.

The trick is to come up with something which causes the player some sort of thinking to overcome the new disabilities, yet not make it annoying or crippling.

I could magnify vampire rumors and bounty based on your age. This would make it so its easier to screw up and get vampire hunters after you. But that doesn't make a lot of sense either as an elder vampire would probably rarely get caught, unless they wanted to. Lets brainstorm.

I'm a pretty big fan of VtM myself, and vampirism is really a curse in that setting. It just doesn't feel like it would do any good in Oblivion. I mean, one of the biggest gripes of vampire players in vanilla Oblivion is that feeding is actually a bad thing, taking away your vampiric powers and stuff.

But yeah, WoD is an awesome setting and there may be some ideas worth getting in there. IMO, weakening older vampires just doesn't feel as right in a video game as it does in a tabletop game.

*attempting to resist the irresistible compulsion to start another off-topic discussion about WoD... - resistance successful, but hardly*

Yes, it is. Because that's just bloody imbecilic beyond comprehension. But is anyone complaining about sunlight damage or weakness to fire? No, because these are at least sensible.

What I mean is that power always comes with a cost - if you just increase the bonuses and reduce the penalties, vampirism effectively makes you a god - it's "goddism" not "vampirism". You could just as well raise all your attributes to 255 with 'modpca' command, wouldn't be very different.
But if benefits are properly balanced by drawbacks then you get a challenge that deserves you to face it. Currently I'm playing with The Vampire Experience by CDM where I've set the fire weakness to 300% and sun damage to 20 - sounds hardcoe? Well, I love it. Being at the level 7 of vampirism I can pretty much challenge the entire garrison in the IC with FCOM and win without extraordinary effort, but when mages come to help and start hurling fireballs at me? Well... evacuation or ash within 5 seconds. If my killing spree continues until morning? Well... ash within 30. It's not actually weakening you all the time, but makes you avoid certain situations, and that's what makes it so fun.
I suggested weakening the sunblock, because daywalking for an entire day just seems like cheating ("so don't do it", someone could say, yet, I would anyhow, because I just could) You're a sodding creature of the night, so keep to that - if you want an hour of daywalking, okay, here you go, but when midday comes, even though you're the oldest and most powerful vampire in existence, you should crumble to ash within seconds - that's how I see it. It's their greatest weakness, maybe they can stave it off for a short while, but should never feel as if they've defeated it, even for a short while.

Otherwise, why not just make them sparkle?

Trust me lots of people have complained about sun damage and weakness to fire. Long before this conversation, I have considered increasing weakness to fire as you age. It is typically compensated by increasing levels and gaining hit points, but still it keeps the game a challenge when fire comes out. If you have watched my videos where I fight the imperial legion vampire hunter.. the weakest of them all, he really hurts my elder level 25 vampire. However I can stand in a sh!tstorm of guards attacking me and barely notice it. So what you speak of is in there to some degree, but I could worsen it.

I also thought of making it so if you feed on a holy person it might not do much to a young vampire, but could cause a lot of damage to an elder vampire perhaps.

There are ways to keep it interesting as you age. I will definitely work on that, as I agree that there has to be some sort of drawback to all the powers you get.

My mod has drains during the day so even if you do daywalk, you are not nearly as strong as you are at night.

Well, that debuff certainly discourages taking a sunbath, but I prefer when it's actually deadly, not just annoying.

Heh... But that's okay, I do realise my standards of 'fun' may seem a bit radical to normal players. Well, I guess I shouldn't care much - when I don't like something I just open CS and change it.

Personally I prefer to start with hefty sun and fire weaknesses and see them dimnish gradually as I age.

I prefer an old vampire to consider fire merely an extra annoyance rather to see that weakness scale up, but I suppose its a minor issue. Ill try it out either way.

Though it does make things easier in the long run, thats the point of leveling up or aging. Its just like a maxed-out vanilla character is incredibly more powerful than one just out of the sewers. The pursuit of that power is the attraction of the game - its only "goddism" if that power is handed to you on a platter right away.

I agree with Valamyr, the entire point of progressing is to become stronger. If for every skill increase, there was an offset, then increasing your level would be a very bad idea. I think there needs to be some offset, but an ancient vampire has to be much more powerful than a starting one, even considering all of their weaknesses.

I'm with you on a lot of points, but I think there is also considerable value to overcoming weaknesses too. At first you get zero daywalking. If you go outside from the mages guild in skingrad and want to go anywhere, you can sprint to gunders across the path... and be almost dead. It is intense. Even with the daywalking as you age and are freshly fed, you have to remember that my powers when active add to your blood usage... so when I said that you can go all day outside, well thats if your not using vampire speed to travel, not using mortis shield, nor life detect or a host of other blood reserve draining powers. once you hit a craving stage, the daywalking is over. It can just pop up on you in the middle of nowhere, and suddenly you need to take cover, and that is where the fun is for me. Some control freaks might not like that, therre is no meter... but the challenge in escaping that sun damage is fun too.

Anyhow, before I make any more changes you should probably just play it and see what I have in there. I can always add some ancient disabilities down the road as an option. I have a few "non threatening" ideas down below which could make you happy, yet not upset the masses.

True, what is the point in leveling up if all the badguys level with you? That is why I use OOO because vanilla does that to some degree. I want to be uber powerful at some point, but I also like being pathetic in the beginning.


They are much much more powerful than a beginning one. I can toy around with some ideas that are non threatening to what the majority of people want. Like making your blood type a little pickier with age is a decent idea. I don't like to drink cheap coffee like I used to, and I make a special trip and
drive 40 miles to get the right kind of creamer. 20 years ago black cheap coffee with a little creamer was like awesome.

A few ideas about making older vamps a little more challenging:
*I could make it so you can only get blood points from a single npc ONCE. This would force you to travel far and wide to search for new blood to further increase your powers.

*I could make some elite powers only function when you have fed on the right blood type.

*I could make it so there is a notoriety score which is like fame/infamy. Once you get it high enough, you will be like the gray fox, guards would attack on site, regardless if you are showing fangs or not. Fighting guards constantly naturally increases your infamy which in turn makes everyone hate you, and does make the game a little harder.

*Vampires naturally follow their makers and are obedient to them. The only way to move up in a coven is to destroy those above you. So I could have some no named random members like the murderers in the dark brotherhood try to kill you once in a while.

There's a million things we could try.. but I want to get the base mod done first and if people feel it is over powering... we can try a few things. Some of these would be easy to put in.

Right, some of this, like only being able to feed from someone once seems a bit excessive, but maybe once we tried it, if we feel the mod is too generous, you can react to feedback then Maybe then you might want to add a few customizable options to satisfy different tastes, I dunno. I definitely agree with starting weak and growing stronger, though. "Our Blood is a curse of degrees, made bearable as it thickens".

This reminds me, regarding the existing plan you had to ensure that NPCs that were fed on regularly would eventually seek healing or die; I assumed that is associated with some kind of timer? Im guessing feeding on an NPC monthly would not harm it at all?

Also, regarding the idea of gaining a restore magika when feeding on a mage, I must say I liked that bit alot. Might I also suggest eventually adding an alchool haze when feeding on the Skooma addicts or other inhebriated NPCs?

Finally, regarding hunters, are you planning of making them limitless, or would it be possible to kill so many that they leave you alone for awhile?

I was curious by what you mean by only getting bloodpoints once from a person when you feed on them. If that means they only contribute to increasing your level once, but you can still feed on them for blood to sate your hunger then thats ok. I think only being able to feed for blood a single time from each npc would remove alot of roleplaying. When I play a vampire I tend to have favorite npcs that I like to visit. Losing that connection would be disapointing.

I meant IF I did it, it would make it so you can only gain experience points (blood points) from them the first time, after that they could satisfy your hunger but not advance you as a vampire. This would make it a little more difficult to advance as an elder vampire without making the game play mechanics any more challenging.

I wasn't even reading MM's post that way, but THIS sounds like a good idea. Only once do you gain their "knowledge" and gain vampire experience, but you can still feed off them and gain blood points. Perhaps even make it so you gain less blood each time (or just less than the initial bite everytime after).

I believe they come after you until your vampire bounty dies down. If you kill enough of them, I think they won't bother you for a bit....but they'll be back if your bounty is still high though.

I should clarify that blood points are "experience" and that if I did do this feature you would only get experience once, but you could always feed off them to reduce your cravings.

Getting "experience" blood points only once per NPC sounds like a very good idea. But only if one can still drink blood from that NPC to calm the hunger (as you mentioned). That sounds like a pretty good incentive to travel. The idea about having a vampire of your covent trying to kill you to move up in rank sounds good too

Regarding the "strengthening / weakening" question, I think the perfect balance would be changes that make you fell less like a human and more like a vampire as you age, but without hindering the gameplay. Some things to keep in mind in your travels, but not something that actually detracts from the gameplay and makes players think "If I had known it would be like that, I wouldn't have advanced in vampire level".

I have been away for a bit but oh wow is there ever alot of catching up to do! I can tell allready that I wont be getting any sleep tonight.

Along the same lines as younger vamp after your place in the pecking order. you could have younger vamps drawing hunter attention to the area. creating problems for you no matter how careful ya are, ect. to the mortal populus a vamp would be a vamp.. maybe the player would hear a rumor thet sets him on the trail of the hack vamp.. to keep the hunters at bay..

just a thought.. looking forward to a release when ever that may be..

I'm a bit too lazy to go back and find your post about coffee madmole, but it got me thinking (2 days after I read it?).

I was wondering if maybe the blood quality would only affect an older vampire. That way, as a fledgling you can feed off anybody, including the homeless bums without any penalty. Later in life (or rather vampire age) you become tired of "sour" blood and can't stand it anymore so it makes you sick. Fits what you said about your coffee drinking habits.

Sorry if you've already thought of this idea and even mentioned it...this topic has been going really fast lately it seems. It's nearly at 200 posts yet again. I wonder if they'll close the topic at 200 though.

Dante: All blood quality does starting out is either last a bit longer than crappy blood. I haven't decided to do much else with it. I'm reluctant to since new features seem to introduce loads of bugs and I'm on the home stretch to finish this thing if I don't get too many more crazy ideas.

Tonight I fixed the thralls. They are by no means done... but I feel like I made some ground on them from where they were months ago when I first got them in. There were some things I didn't like about them, primarily appearance. I was able to hack the vampire code some and change how NPC vampires look to some degree.

Essentially I came up with a hack that will look better when I am done. It will appear as if they are using their vampire speed power and they will flash over to a victim, feed and then come back to you for further instructions. I have it roughly working but it needs much polish. I can make them fade in and out smoothly... so you'll have to bear in mind this is a WIP video here.

The big accomplishment, is that I was able to give them buffy morphs and look like vampires with nice fangs, but also I made it so they get younger when you turn into a vampire instead of older, plus I managed to make them look almost human again AFTER they feed, similar to how the player is when they are starving, but not quite as elegant.

I'm pretty happy with this. NPC vamps just looked plain bad before, but I could almost live with them now. As I said I have more plans to improve all of this.. but at least I got something working.

http://downloads.4drulers.com/Oblivion_Mods/unholydarkness/Unholy%20Darkness%20Turning%20an%20NPC%20into%20a%20vampire.wmv

Its kind of funny, she took off in a panic after she drank my blood and her body was in the dying process then she wiped out on the floor. I'd never seen one do that before, lol. But its pretty cool how she looks BETTER after turning into a vampire, lost 20 years off her age Like I said its a WIP video. Oh yeah I got the new voices in too, but they need some work too. FRAPS makes things sound way worse than they do though.