NPC Claim Planning: Othrensis

Developing the city of Almalexia. Currently on HIATUS.

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Yeti
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NPC Claim Planning: Othrensis

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Post by gro-Dhal »

The style mixing could come from the town suddenly growing at some point relatively recently, having previously been a sleepy village. Either new natural resources were found nearby, or perhaps a miracle occurred in the area (that would explain the attraction of religious people. Maybe the area has nothing to recommend it so only really devout types wanted to move in). The manifestation of a saint, or maybe the discovery of one of their burial sites?
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Post by Why »

My favorite kind of topic!

Architecture
The Velothi part of Othrensis is an acropolis. It's always been a somewhat irrelevant village in Indoril territory, but when Mehrunes Dagon sacked Almalexia, thousands of Indoril refugees fled to the safety of Othrensis. When Almalexia was rebuilt, some decided to stay, and the village expanded to where the refugee camps used to be, in the style of the new Indoril inhabitants.

I'm not really a fan of the saint burial place / miraculous events thing, not because it's a bad idea, but because we do that kind of stuff relatively often. It's not exactly breaking new ground. Then again, a good story is a good story, so I'm not vehemently against it or anything.

Ruins
I agree, we don't need them.

People
I could see some nice conflicts arising here, with the people in the Indoril part of town being their usual Indoril selves, adhering to strict Temple doctrine et cetera, and the inhabitants of the Velothi part of town being less dogmatic, normal folk, some of who still harbor old grudges towards the "refugees" below - after all, they provided them with shelter and hospitality, and it doesn't really look like they've benefited from the Indoril presence in town as much, with the Velothi part of town looking altogether poorer than the Indoril part.

Leader
Someone not too terribly important. Like I said, I like the premise of Aeven's (and now Yeti's) story. If we want to stress the duality of the town, I'm perfectly okay with having two people in charge - a lesser Indoril noble in the lower part of town, a village elder, council of elders, or priest in the upper, Velothi, part.

For the ranking Indoril, we should avoid hinging their character too much on one thing like this witch hunter business, but as long as it's just one of their traits it can still work. Maybe they're a retired high-ranking Ordinator of Inquisition. Another thing to consider is the proximity of Draler Ilvi in the West, and Almalexia and its nobles in the East. I'd expect a noble in Othrensis to be at least supportive of Ilvi's efforts at containing Hlaalu expansionism.

Misc quests
1: I like that.
2: How about we turn this one around? The player hears about an Imperial Cult missionary, and what the local boss thinks of them, through rumors. Now it's up to the player to defuse the situation, convince the local authorities that the Cultist is not to be harmed, or help him leave the town unharmed (or do nothing, stand back, and watch it escalate?).
3: I like this one a lot. A touch of personal drama mixed with established lore. Isn't there a madhouse or asylum in Almalexia somewhere?
4: If we go down the refugees route to explain the architecture, a bit of delving into the history of the town and the tensions between the two groups would be nice. Solve a murder that happened ages ago by talking to the descendants of the suspects and the family of the victim? Involve some ancestral magic to start it all off? People being haunted by an old ghost? I don't know, just throwing this out there.

Indoril story
There's a lot of practical details in your story that I, if I were to implement such a quest, would disagree with - the copious killing of militiamer, the priest being totally okay with just following you, etc, but I think it's best if we save such details for a later discussion.

Like I said, I like the premise of the story. I think all we need to decide now is if this is something we can work with as part of the Indoril story and if we do indeed want to have a clash between some Indoril noble and some religious-type maybe-dissident in the Velothi part of town. And, more importantly, if we decide that yes, this is cool, how should it influence the town now, before the quest starts?
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Post by Gnomey »

Not wanting to go too far into the questline side of things, I have two ideas relating to the questline: first of all, I think it would be interesting if Dralysa Therayn actually advocates purging the heresy. The Indoril in Almalexia are the ones in favour of a more measured approach, and the player is sent not to help her, but instead to restrain her.
Ideally, the player would be able to make the choice between taking Ernethas into custody or allowing the purge to happen. If the purge does happen, predictably, local unrest would become more pronounced. That being said, beyond dialogue and some other details, the locals would keep quiet after that.
In a similar vein, the player could kill Ernethas, or allow him to be killed, on the way back to Almalexia. Again, with their leader gone, the restless locals would keep a low profile, but, again, the actual unrest would increase.

Naturally the player would have to try and justify himself to the questgiver, but I think including the above scenarios would allow for a certain amount of roleplaying, in which the player can set himself up as a future firebrand Indoril councilor rather than always being a moderate.

Secondly, I think this questline would be very interesting if some lines were to be included to reflect the player being Nerevarine, should that be the case. The conversations with Ernethas could get really interesting in that scenario, especially if the Tribunal are already dead.
Ernethas would probably still end up dead, much like Eno Romari and his End of Times cult, but the player would ideally feel like a brazen hypocrite for killing him.

On a more general NPC side of things, I think "the enemy" is a very important factor to consider when looking at Indoril locals. As a strongly indoctrinated society whose internal structure is crumbling, establishing a strong external threat is a basic and very important measure.
East of Mournhold, I doubt anybody at a local level would see the Hlaalu as a threat. Outlanders could be the threat, but outlanders form such a small minority there that I'm not sure whether they would be too effective in that role. The Telvanni could serve as a suitable threat in border towns, but probably not very far into the Indoril heartland.
Dralysa Therayn is not only so fanatical about chasing heretics because she's stuck in a rut, she is also getting desperate about maintaining (local) Indoril unity, and has attempted, with mixed success, to establish heretics and cultists as the threat. Ironically, among an increasing part of the populace, her actions have allowed House Indoril to be established as the threat by Ernethas, which is a large part of the reason for his (initial) success.
As long as there is no clearly defined threat that faces the region, the local populace will remain unruly. Whether the player will be able to resolve the issue or whether it will continue throughout the game is another question.
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Post by Yeti »

Thank you for the responses, everyone.
Why wrote:Architecture
The Velothi part of Othrensis is an acropolis. It's always been a somewhat irrelevant village in Indoril territory, but when Mehrunes Dagon sacked Almalexia, thousands of Indoril refugees fled to the safety of Othrensis. When Almalexia was rebuilt, some decided to stay, and the village expanded to where the refugee camps used to be, in the style of the new Indoril inhabitants.
I'm in favor of this idea. Refugees often bring drastic changes to the lands they flee to (see the conflict in Syria as a recent example). My only concern is that the destruction of Mournhold is a little too far in the past for there to be any lingering animosity about the Indoril moving in. Perhaps the destruction of the Indoril version of Ebonheart by Tiber Septim before the signing of the Armistice would work better?
Why wrote: Leader
Someone not too terribly important. Like I said, I like the premise of Aeven's (and now Yeti's) story. If we want to stress the duality of the town, I'm perfectly okay with having two people in charge - a lesser Indoril noble in the lower part of town, a village elder, council of elders, or priest in the upper, Velothi, part.

For the ranking Indoril, we should avoid hinging their character too much on one thing like this witch hunter business, but as long as it's just one of their traits it can still work. Maybe they're a retired high-ranking Ordinator of Inquisition. Another thing to consider is the proximity of Draler Ilvi in the West, and Almalexia and its nobles in the East. I'd expect a noble in Othrensis to be at least supportive of Ilvi's efforts at containing Hlaalu expansionism.
I agree the witch hunting angle shouldn't be overdone. Retired Ordinators are becoming kind of a cliche, in my opinion, but allying Othrensis's noble with Draler Ilvi is a good idea. I also agree that the Velothi part of town should have a hetman-type character.
Why wrote: 2: How about we turn this one around? The player hears about an Imperial Cult missionary, and what the local boss thinks of them, through rumors. Now it's up to the player to defuse the situation, convince the local authorities that the Cultist is not to be harmed, or help him leave the town unharmed (or do nothing, stand back, and watch it escalate?).
Why wrote: Indoril story
There's a lot of practical details in your story that I, if I were to implement such a quest, would disagree with - the copious killing of militiamer, the priest being totally okay with just following you, etc, but I think it's best if we save such details for a later discussion.
There are indeed a lot of problems with my plan, and I mostly agree with you on where these issues lie. For now, we should come to an agreement on the basic ingredients for the story, which I see as threefold:

1. What is Ernethas's "heretical" beliefs?
2. Who will oppose and support him in Othrensis?
3. Why will he be able to gain followers in Othrensis? What conditions make a religious revolt in the city possible?
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Post by Aeven »

Nice to see my story wasn't forgotten!

At any rate, I'd personally like to see actual physical change in Othrensis during this quest, with scripted activators pulling a switcheroo when a different faction (Indoril/Ernethas) control the city. Maybe also a murder of outlanders, burning them in the streets? Morrowind often lacks a real physical indicator of dynamic changes, and I believe this is by far the best place to show we can do this.
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Post by Yeti »

Aeven wrote:Nice to see my story wasn't forgotten!

Morrowind often lacks a real physical indicator of dynamic changes,
which is why I, at least at the moment, think the kind of visual changes you are suggesting could look out-of-place, and -for lack of a better word- "moddy". I understand where you are coming from, though, and I would hope any questline we develop for Othrensis will involved noticeable consequences.

I hope you don't mind me posting my own (admittedly flawed) version of your story, Aeven. :)
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Post by Aeven »

Of course I don't! I just think it'd be a great place to start off from with regards to visually noticeable quests.
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Post by Haplo »

I agree ruins or subterranean structures are unnecessary. I also really like the notion of assigning "sub groups" of factions to various cities for the purpose of introducing the player to the faction as a whole (old conservative Indoril in Othrensis, more industrial/aggressive Indoril in Akamora, passive but temperamental in Roa Dyr, for example). I think we should do this more often for more Great Houses.
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Post by Yeti »

How is this for a general overview?

Location & History

Othrensis is split between a Velothi acropolis built atop a low plateau and a clustering of Mournhold-style buildings along the river. For most of its history it was a sleepy village of little interest to the outside world. This changed when Morrowind’s annexation led to a gradual Hlaalu and Imperial takeover of House Indoril’s holdings west of the Thirr River. A number of Indoril families from these territories eventually resettled in Othrensis, beneath the gaze of the old Velothi village.

Leadership

Dralya Therayn is the ranking Indoril noble in Othrensis. She is a member of the House’s conservative old guard, a religious firebrand who upholds strict adherence to Tribunal doctrine. Having dedicated her life to weeding out heresy, she personifies the Indorils’ dependency on external threats to maintain unity and rationalize their decline. She isn’t terribly important and is allied with Draler Ilvi, the Councilor of the Thirr River Valley to the west. As part of House Indoril’s militant wing, she supports containing Hlaalu expansionism. Although the people of Othrensis genuinely appreciate her efforts to keep them safe from witches and heresy, her strictness has begun to alienate some of the working-class folk. These people prefer the leadership of the town hetman, who resides in the Velothi enclave.

People & Economy

Local shopkeepers and craftsmer form the bulwark of Othrensis’s economy, and provide services to travelers heading to and from the capital. Most inhabitants (at least 90%) are Dunmer. Although many of them are not as dogmatic as the town’s Indoril leadership, the majority are still very religous. Xenophobic attitudes are also common, and local traders and merchants only grudgingly do business with the outlanders who pass through town.

In general, the working-class folk of the Velothi part of town resent the local Indoril aristocrats and their retainers, who are not only visibly far wealthier, but also increasingly overbearing when preaching religious dogma. That Dralya Therayn is often more focused on stamping out heresy than seeing to the needs of the poor like a good Indorilcrat also isn’t helping things.

Miscellaneous Quest Ideas

1. A local witch hunter is facing a morality crisis after killing the mother of young child in a raid on a Daedric cult. Feeling dispirited and confused, he will ask the player to deliver a letter to his old mentor, Galoro Selvor living in Dondril, asking for guidance.

2. An Imperial Cult missionary is staying at an inn in Othrensis. Although he’s only passing through on his way to Almalexia, he’s managed to piss off the townspeople by proselytizing his faith in the Nine. The player will be able to defuse the situation by convincing the Cultist to leave voluntarily.

3. A Dunmer man living in the Indoril part of town keeps his elderly mother locked in his basement. Her odd behavior (the result of her advanced age) has led him to believe that she is suffering from Soul Sickness, which he is intent on hiding from the town’s morally uptight and superstitious citizenry. He basically doesn’t want his mother’s state of mind to reflect badly on their families’ image.

His mother’s nephew, however, has recently arrived in Othrensis to visit her, and incorrectly believes the son is keeping his mother confined for malicious reasons. After being asked by the nephew to investigate, it will be up to the player to mediate this dispute.

Indoril Questline Details

A militant Dissident Priest named Ernethas and a group of his followers are in Othrensis to secretly preach against Indoril orthodoxy, Temple corruption and Imperial hegemony. This is contributing to dissatisfaction with Indoril rule among the people of the Velothi enclave. At the moment the influence of this "heresy" is simmering beneath the surface, and should only be subtly referred to in current dialogue.

Ernethas is secretly a firm critic of the Tribunal’s claim to divinity, but so far hasn’t dared make this widely known to his followers. At some point in the Indoril questline, Ernethas will instigate some kind of religious revolt in Othrensis, and the player will be involved in bringing him to trial in Almalexia.
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Post by Haplo »

I like all of this. Is there a reason you don't call the guy in misc. quest #3 the cousin of the son, specifically? :-P It just sounds odd to read "the nephew of the man's mother" rather than "the man's cousin".
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Post by Yeti »

Haplo wrote:I like all of this. Is there a reason you don't call the guy in misc. quest #3 the cousin of the son, specifically? :-P It just sounds odd to read "the nephew of the man's mother" rather than "the man's cousin".
I can never keep family tree relationships straight in my head. The fact that the mother's nephew is also the son's cousin never even occurred to me until now. :P

This reminds me that we still need to chat on irc about my GM powers, Haplo. For some reason, whenever I log into #tamriel, no one ever seems to ever be around. :?
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Post by Haplo »

Ah... well, feel free to send me a /query or find me in another channel!
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Post by 6plus »

Indoril Questline
Gnomey wrote:As a strongly indoctrinated society whose internal structure is crumbling, establishing a strong external threat is a basic and very important measure.
I feel that for the Indoril it'd be more fitting if the enemy came from the inside: like Ernethas not being a dissident priest, but a simple servant/servicemer of the Temple (or the town hetman). After witnessing the failures of the Tribunal, being ruled by the empire and the rising threat of Dagoth Ur (and perhaps the return of the Nerevarine), Ernethas comes to the conclusion that his gods wouldn't allow this to happen; therefore they can't be gods.

As charismatic leader he convinces the other servants/servicemer and other commoners that the Temple and/or House Indoril have failed and are now governed by heretics trying to secure their power with iron fist (Therayn) or weaklings (the hetman). He and his followers basically take the hetman as hostage and slowly take over the executive of the Velothi part of town.

And then some small dispute or incident lead to his uprising.


Side note: IMO scripted changes should be kept as subtle as possible, like moving around NPCs. The more is changed, the more moddy it looks.
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Post by Gnomey »

6plus wrote:I feel that for the Indoril it'd be more fitting if the enemy came from the inside: [...]
I was talking about Indoril propaganda geared towards maintaining House unity. The actual threats to Indoril come in both external and internal varieties, but when trying to get a bunch of people to work together it's generally better to point out a common enemy than to say "you can't trust each other".
Of course, another possibility is to turn a member of the group into an example for the others. ("This is what happens if you abandon the ways of our House"). Doing so basically acknowledges the internal instability of House Indoril, though.
6plus wrote:Side note: IMO scripted changes should be kept as subtle as possible, like moving around NPCs. The more is changed, the more moddy it looks.
Subtle, yes, but Morrowind is by no means without scripted events. You have the dreamers popping up during the Mainquest, the fabricant attack in Plaza Brindisi Dorom as well as the ash storms in Mournhold, off the top of my head. There's also the werewolf attack on Fort Frostmoth.
Such events appear to be more common in the expansions, but I believe more scripted events were planned for Morrowind when it was still in production.

I'd argue that it's more a question of execution. As the world of Morrowind is generally very static beyond the involvement of the player, having things suddenly happen outside of the player's control can be jarring. If the quest plot does a good job of preparing the player for the changes, though, and dialogue throughout the course of events properly acknowledges the changes as they happen, and the world in general appears to acknowledge the changes occurring, I think we could make it work without it coming off as moddy.
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Post by 6plus »

Gnomey wrote:Subtle, yes, but Morrowind is by no means without scripted events. You have the dreamers popping up during the Mainquest, the fabricant attack in Plaza Brindisi Dorom as well as the ash storms in Mournhold, off the top of my head. There's also the werewolf attack on Fort Frostmoth.
To be fair most of the scripted events consist of enemies popping up in some place. The most dynamic events (IMO) were the battle between the fabricants and the dwemer constructs, and the ashstorms you mentioned (plus the decaying trees) from the Tribunal expansion.

Translating that to our current plan I'd say we should simply:
-move civilians from the streets into their respective homes
-make some militia people pop up in the streets
-enable some kind of bonfire in a central spot (plus some militia guys nearby ready to burn some books)
and afterwards all of this is reverted of course.
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Post by Aeven »

Maybe a switch in some sort of banner activators?
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Post by Why »

I very much think we should just try and see what looks good and not overly moddy once we get to the implementation stages of that questline.
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Post by Yeti »

What Why said. Personally, I think switching banners around would be too obvious and superficial to work as a meaningful representation of dynamic change in the game world. It reminds me of multiplayer games like Star Wars Battlefront where a team captures a section of the map and a flag goes up to show what territory they now control. It feels like a very video game-y thing to do. But now isn't really the time to be worrying about such things.

I will try to get this claim up by tomorrow for anyone interested in claiming it.

I'm a little late on this, but thank you for your comments 6plus. Your suggestions for how to portray Ernethas's character are better grounded and less overly dramatized than mine. I will be taking them into account when ironing out the finalized claim description.
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Post by immortal_pigs »

Yeti wrote:I will try to get this claim up by tomorrow for anyone interested in claiming it.
(Hint)
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Post by arvisrend »

Yeti: the NPCing claim? Is Othrensis ripe for this? IMHO splitting M3A6 into two now would deprive us of the possibility to fix some terrain between Othrensis and Alma any time soon (without extra troubles), so maybe it wouldn't hurt to get this through Nemon first.
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Post by Yeti »

Detailing the Infirmary in IP's last claim took more time than I thought it would. I haven't gotten around to preparing a file for NPCing. If Nemon or someone else has time fix the landscape between Othrensis and Alma (I wasn't aware any further work was needed) they're welcome to do it. I'd like to get some new NPC claims up in the near future, however, and Othrensis seems to be one of the few major areas ripe for it.
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Post by arvisrend »

Yeti: can you please tell me the coordinate along which you are planning to split the file before you actually split it, so that I can do some detailing on the border?
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Post by Aeven »

By the way, A3 and A6W need matching. Not sure what a good time for this would be, but it needs doing nonetheless.
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Post by Yeti »

Splitting Othrensis off for NPCing is now on hold until the exterior issues mentioned above are dealt with. I'll have to look and see if there are any other areas that could be turned into NPC claims instead.
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Post by Yeti »

Moved to new section.
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Post by rot »

What's a city to do in the shadow of Almalexia...

The Indoril questline situation would be a major defining point for Othrensis, which is why I think this is worth discussing here: how about having it be a shared event in both the Temple and Indoril factions? (initial setup hinting at it, then can be triggered from either faction, resolving it giving credit for both)
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Post by Why »

That could be fun. I'm not opposed to that idea.
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Post by Yeti »

I had something similar in mind as possibility as well.
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Post by rot »

Let's look at Indoril settlements to try and figure where Othrensis fits in all this, (thanking [url=http://tamriel-rebuilt.org/old_forum/viewtopic.php?t=24283]IP's thread[/url], reminder it shouldn't be forgotten. You have [url=http://s1273.photobucket.com/user/rats_tr/media/mapp_zps48036027.png.html]Rats' addition for visual aid[/url])

Almalexia.
Large towns - Akamora, Othrensis, Roa Dyr
Small towns - Meralag, Sailen, Bosmora, Gorne, Enamor Dayn
Shacks, velothi,... on Indoril territory - Darnim, Hlersis, Seitur, Tahvel, Evos, player's Seyda Vano


Akamora is the Indoril node up north, let's say Roa Dyr is there to interact with Almas Thirr. The Hlaalu conflict likely happens mostly at Almas Thirr, along the thirr, and if it extended further at all at Roa Dyr. So what's the purpose of Othrensis?

Balancing Indoril wrt Hla/Telv/Red as it's not present on Vvardenfel, and yet, especially supposed to be the 'largest' House? having the town in this rather tight territory in a row inbetween Alma/Roa Dyr/Almas Thirr sort of defeats that imo, really this isn't an area where a major services node is a gameplay need

No, I think Othrensis' raison d'être really has to be the Indoril quest (tho that doesn't justify the location... yet...?). So it should be a big deal. Not just to the town but as a part of the questline. Have the local lady Indoril be a major questgiver, earlier in the questline; this way you even get to really build up the thing (let's say NPCs switch robes - the player won't notice that unless they had a reason to consistently go to and do stuff in the town before, no?)
This also allows foreshadowing, changes,... to be progressive and more subtle.
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