V.O.I.L.A
(Voices Of Imperial Legion Amalgamated)

Version : 0.7
By Section 31
============================
"Tremble now, criminals of Cyrodiil!"

• Have you ever wondered why the Imperial Legion soldiers you met on the roads, taverns, and wilderness consisted of endless wave of Cyrodiils?
  
• Are you amused by the fact that you can still talk casually to Captain Burd while the whole Burma guards are going after you?
  
• Or perhaps why those burly Nord captains never apprehend you for committing crime right under their noses?
  
• Have you ever noticed the heavy-handed Breton Cheydinhal captain would not arrest you for pickpocketing his money right in front of him?
  
• Are you bothered by the fact that non-Imperial guards added to the game would rush to you after you stole something, only to ask "How can I help you?" ?

Regardless of your answer, VOILA aimed to give solutions to the aforementioned problems. No longer will Captain Burd or those Altmer members of Imperial Legion added by some-other-modification let criminals get away with bounty on their head. Tremble now, criminals of Cyrodiil!

What is it all about?

The main purpose of this plugin is simple, it enables non-Imperial and non-beast races guards -particularly the Legion members- to truly behave like their Cyrodiilic counterparts.

Imperial Legion soldiers are the main emphasis, but ordinary town guards are not set aside. Breton, Elf, Nord, and Redguard have their own unique responses. In addition, they have new greetings, rumors (after the Oblivion crisis ended), and guard-to-guard conversations. On top of those, the new dialogues have voices. The voices came from the original game and have been modified and amalgamated to create "natural speeches", these are possible thanks to a wonderful tool called ODDC. The result is conversations that blend seamlessly into the game.

Since version 0.7, VOILA is featuring a brand new squad system. No longer the Imperial Legion mounted (riders) and foot-soldiers patrol the roads of Imperial Province alone and endlessly at short distances. They will now patrol the roads in http://www.invision.tesalliance.org/forums/uploads/1263243224/gallery_456_25_33344.jpg, and will http://www.invision.tesalliance.org/forums/uploads/1263243224/gallery_456_25_36370.jpg. Some squads have battlemage with ability to heal injured squad members.

Where can I download it?

http://www.invision.tesalliance.org/forums/index.php?app=downloads&showfile=53
http://planetelderscrolls.gamespy.com/View.php?view=OblivionMods.Detail&id=5771
http://www.moddb.com/mods/voila-voices-of-imperial-legion-amalgamated

VOILA was created particularly as a complement to http://www.gamesas.com/bgsforums/index.php?showtopic=1015102 which I created, which includes border guards. At first, I considered making III with its own additional voices and guard behaviours. But then I decided it would be best to separate these for compatibility reason.

For more variety of Imperial Legion soldiers, you might also want to try "ImpeREAL Empire - Unique Forts" plugin by SilentResident.

Change log

Version 0.7 :

• Over a dozen new Imperial Legion soldiers of various races patrolling the streets of Cyrodiil province
  
• Several new Imperial Legion foresters with dogs
  
• Squad (company) system for both existing and new Imperial Legion soldiers
  
• Revamped A.I routines for all original Imperial Legion riders
  
• Viera Lerus (Bravil Guard Captain) now becomes a proper guard

Version 0.5.7 :

• Guards react properly if you are caught without enough money to pay the fine
  
• New method to modify three original guard captains for better compatibility
  
• Nord legionnaire's fixed original power attack and new guard-to-guard conversations
  
• Seven new non-Cyrodiil legionnaires; three patrolling near the Jerall Mountains and four close to Fort Sutch.

Version 0.5.1 :

• A new Orc legionnaire and Orc's response for resisting arrest
  
• New AI packages for each non-Cyrodiilic legionnaire, they patrol the roads and stop at various inns throughout the province at specific day.

Version 0.5 :

• Initial release

Special thanks section

• Fawzib Rojas - creator of Oblivion Dynamic Dialog Creation.
  
• HawkFest - creator of CS-OBSE Syntax Highlighter plugin for Notepad++
  
• Creator(s) of Contruction Set dialog creation movie.
  
• Notepad++ creators and contributors.
  
• Audacity creators and contributors.

Cool idea, I'll check this out asap. :goodjob:

Hm, how's this fare with OOO's guards?
This looks like a great mod

Updated to version 0.5.1 :

• A new Orc legionnaire and Orc's response for resisting arrest
  
• New AI packages for each non-Cyrodiilic legionnaire, they patrol the roads and stop at various inns throughout the province at specific day.

It should be compatible. VOILA added new dialogues for non-Imperial legion members and did not modify legionnaires stats per se.

Yes, this has always annoyed me, so it's great to see a mod fixing it.

What about Reneer's Guard Overhaul? Is it compatible?

It should be completely compatible.

Updated to version 0.5.7 :

• Guards react properly if you are caught without enough money to pay the fine
  
• New method to modify three original guard captains for better compatibility
  
• Nord legionnaire's fixed original power attack and new guard-to-guard conversations
  
• Seven new non-Cyrodiil legionnaires; three patrolling near the Jerall Mountains and four close to Fort Sutch.

http://planetelderscrolls.gamespy.com/fms/Image.php?id=87362

This sounds really cool. So, as this is compatible with Reneer's Guard Overhaul, I suppose it would fix the problem of guards chasing you after you commit a crime then say, "How can I help you?" which many people have problems with in Reneer's mod? I haven't seen this problem occur outside of Reneer's Guard Overhaul.

This mod would likely not 'fix' RGO - the problem is currently that, for whatever reason, the game does not properly add the crime-gold, so the guards don't know about it, so they greet the player normally. 1.95 should reduce the number of times this bug occurs, if you haven't tried that out yet. Though this mod (should) be compatible with RGO in all respects.

I have plans and questions for the next releases:

- Modify all the existing legions (original Imperial and VOILA non-Imperial) outside the city to stop at inn or tavern at least once a day, it seems to me the original legionnaires are superhuman whose job is to move back and forth between two points. It is therefore possible that you will not encounter any Imperial Legion soldiers at all when traveling the road, or meet them at one of the inns or taverns.
- Add the ability to bribe and unique responses based on the legionnaire's specialty (ordinary soldier, battlemage, archer)
- Should I add more (static) non-Imperial legionnaires? Or should I add a spawn point on which random legionnaires might appear (like bandit and marauder spawn points) but with their own predetermined activity?
- Should I make all the Imperial Legion soldiers travel in a group of two or three? I believe during the Roman and Medieval era, most soldiers who patrolled the road did it in a group.
- What do you think is the 'limit' on the number of Imperial Legion soldiers outside the major cities? Having too many might be disproportional with the numbers of actual civilians in the Imperial province. Furthermore, Chancellor Ocato mentioned on the main quest that all the Imperial Legion garrisons in Cyrodiil are on the other provinces.

What do you think about these?

Sounds good. I'll DL and give my 2 cents when I've seen it in action

sounds great! i love it


very cool


i think i'd go with the latter

yes please! it never made much sense to me how the legion would patrol 1 man at a time, i mean, 1 guy would hardly scare off a group of bandits...


hmmm, not sure. But since i've never encountered to patrols at the same time i don't think it would ever appear disproportional.

perhaps you could also make it compatible with fort akatosh redux, as onra pointed out they are incompatible and both are too good to pass up

Guards acting more realistically is fine, however I'd keep it compatible with Reneer's mod. I.E. leave bribing and such to his mod.

A few groups might be cool, have maybe a group of three patrol all the way along the main roads?

Oh, and an almagated mod would be convenient for a lot of people. Combine Reneer's mod, this, and the Imperial Faction mod into one for convenience. At least have all the downloads available on one forum page or something.

It could depend on which location outside the major cities you mean. I would expect to see less Imperial Guards along the roads in Blackwood, for example, than nearer to a major city.

Yes, that sounds like a great idea. It would make sense for them to stop just sometimes for a meal and a drink, and other times for a sleep to rest. But I've never done any scripting, so I've got no idea if it would be possible to do that.

Maybe you could have a couple of guards be alcoholics...boozing and sittting around instead of doing their job...

They already do that. They have guards patrolling the roads 24/7, and guards sitting in the inns 24/7 drinking, so it looks like they actually go and rest in inns. I was under the delusion that guards might visit cities too at the end of their patrol, and I thought it might be interesting to follow one of them on their journey. Sadly, I soon discovered that that was not the case.

Thanks for the feedback, everyone!


My thought precisely, a lonely legion soldier is also very vulnerable to ranged attack and only a little nuisance for outlaws and beasts.


I'll see what I can do. Although, given the size, I'm unsure where to begin looking.


Hmm...I don't know if RGO only specifically handles vanilla guards or not. But if RGO caters non-Imperial guards as well, I might leave overlapping features to Reneer.

I plan to create "group patrols" with each consisting of at least two, although I might increase the numbers to three since it seems to make more sense and make the group patrols have greater chance survival against big adversaries. I might try to create variety as well within each groups, for example a group consisting of two sword-wielding soldiers and a battle mage (who can use spells and heal).

Did you mean to put the links to each modifications on one post?

I'm not sure, but my guess would be that "troubled area" have more soldiers patrol than peaceful regions, for example on the Blackwood there might be more soldiers due to Argonian resistance movements, Renrijra Krin smuggling, illegal slave trades, etc, compared to the relatively peaceful West Colovia or Colovian Highlands. But then again, despite the "heavier" legion presences, they will be limited due to the Oblivion Crisis all over Tamriel.

It is possible actually, but can be tedious at times. A good work when you awake at 2 AM on the morning and can't sleep...



Yes, although as Riveon has stated there are already some "drunkards" soldiers. I might tweak their behaviors and lower their dispositions to simulate their unruly attitudes.

umm, the tesnexus link is blocked...........r u updating???

i cant download it from pes either..........

yay, got it through tes alliance

re: fort akatosh redux: I guess asking onra about it would be the best start

I would simply recommend to load Fort Akatosh after V.O.I.L.A. This way FAR will overide the crime quest topics from VOILA. So you will have as well the beast races and females functionable as guards (which is not covered by V.O.I.L.A)....but you also have all the new guard topics and greeting that come with VOILA.

cheers

that's nice to know, thanx for the info onra. I'll post that in the BOSS thread

The days of lonely soldier wandering the road or countryside aimlessly are coming to an end. Below are some brief descriptions about the upcoming version with screenshots.

http://www.invision.tesalliance.org/forums/uploads/1263243224/gallery_456_25_33344.jpg patrolling the road. The battlemage is an adept magician and has order to heal wounded members of the squad. Later, http://www.invision.tesalliance.org/forums/uploads/1263243224/gallery_456_25_64838.jpg who were soon overpowered. It's a pity the horse couldn't make it. Somewhere else, http://www.invision.tesalliance.org/forums/uploads/1263243224/gallery_456_25_20447.jpg

Aside from fighting bandits and keeping the roads safe, the legions need to rest. http://www.invision.tesalliance.org/forums/uploads/1263243224/gallery_456_25_6541.jpg showed that the place is crawling with Imperial Legion soldiers http://www.invision.tesalliance.org/forums/uploads/1263243224/gallery_456_25_36370.jpg. All seats are full, http://www.invision.tesalliance.org/forums/uploads/1263243224/gallery_456_25_84585.jpg It is not strange however, because there is at least two legion squads inside the place.


Lastly, I'd like to share a little story about a group of Imperial Legion Foresters.

Somewhere on the western part of Imperial province, a group of Imperial Legion Foresters http://www.invision.tesalliance.org/forums/uploads/1263243224/gallery_456_25_77880.jpg. The Bosmer on the front was going to take a meat from a deer recently struck by an arrow, while his Imperial counterpart behind was collecting flowers. The Bosmer was also accompanied by a dog and another Bosmer. Not too long after, http://www.invision.tesalliance.org/forums/uploads/1263243224/gallery_456_25_14197.jpg in the vicinity...it's a Spriggan! And the cursed beast was summoning a bear! Immediately, without any hesitation they engaged the hostile creatures. Imagine the Bosmer shout http://www.invision.tesalliance.org/forums/uploads/1263243224/gallery_456_25_134853.jpg

looking great, Oblivion should feel a lot more "alive" , at least as far as guards go, when you get around to releasing this. nice to see progress is coming along