Play your backstory before the Main Quest

Talk about the mods you'd like to see in Daggerfall Unity. Give mod creators some ideas!
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Ralzar
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Play your backstory before the Main Quest

Post by Ralzar »

I've recently been thinking quite a bit about the Main Quest and how it's pretty good but could do with a bit of restructuring and rebalancing. A few triggers and level reqs tweaked etc.

But, one major thing I started thinking about was altering the start of the game. To give you room to grow as a character before the events of the normal Main Quest starts. Imagine something like this:


1: The first intro movie starts with the book and the backstory. However, the movie with the Emperor giving you a mission does NOT play.

2: Your "History" gets the last part removed. There is no longer any story of how you became friends with the Emperor.

3: You start the game some time (a year? Half a year?) before the normal game start. King Lysandus has just started haunting the streets of Daggerfall, but the news has not yet reached the Emperor.

4: You start in a town in a region based on your race or based on a choice presented to you.

5: You get no Main Quest at start. You're free to do whatever you want.

6: All guilds have a high-rank quest wich is the entrance to the Main Quest. So, once you reach one of the highest ranks in a guild, you get a specific quest which ends up with you doing something that makes you popular with the Emperor (saving a family member for example). The quest ends with you being invited to meet the Emperor. When you agree to that, you get exposition text about how the Emperor decides to trust you.

7: THIS is when the Emperor movie plays. "Sleep well this night. For tomorrow, you sail for the kingdom of Daggerfall!"

8: Ship crash. Privateers Hold etc. Now the Main Quest starts as normal.


What this does, is have you start with a character capabable of just picking up the Main Quest right away. You don't have to put off the Main Quest because you need to level up first. You are a mid-to-high level character with at least one high rank guild membership. You are a person it makes sense to give this sort of mission to.

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NikitaTheTanner
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Re: Play your backstory before the Main Quest

Post by NikitaTheTanner »

The idea is definitely interesting, though I am not sure how much it's necessary to cling to the video and the original start, despite it being very iconic. Players who want to experience game as it was released can just play without the mod, and I just like the idea of giving a more random/unique game start to the player, as opposed to always starting in Privateer's Hold as Emperor's friend. It's cool, but gets repetitive very fast.

Maybe, you don't need to be Emperor's friend to start the Main Quest, but can get enough of reputation for yourself, that you'll be contacted by the Blades, who are Emperor's agents in provinces. You do enough quests for them, and you'll get the Main Quest assigned to you, as the most promising agent. Maybe the Emperor could even consider you a friend, without the need to go to the Imperial city and such. Of course, it should still be possible to incorporate the original video, if need be, but it's not necessary IMO.

And even without the Main Quest, being a part of the Blades as the Emperor's spies might be an interesting guild to roleplay and it doesn't need any buildings to be altered, since it's a secret organization. Cool quests are possible with spying on nobles, scheming, hiding your identity, rescuing other spies when their identity is compromised, etc. This could be an interesting venue for sneaky characters who do not necessarily want to join Thieves Guild or the Dark Brotherhood. Also, finally the etiquette might become a somewhat useful skill :P

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Ralzar
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Joined: Mon Oct 07, 2019 4:11 pm
Location: Norway

Re: Play your backstory before the Main Quest

Post by Ralzar »

True. You could actually have a high-level quest in each guild where Lady Brisienna has asked that guild for help with something. This puts you in contact with her which then leads to a couple more missions. Then Lady Brisienna is the one who has the two missions from the emperor, but she has to go into hiding, passing the job on to you.

imsobadatnicknames
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Location: Colombia

Re: Play your backstory before the Main Quest

Post by imsobadatnicknames »

I'd definitely be down to help write the additional quests and rewrite parts of the original main quest as needed to make this a reality, it's such a good idea.
I agree with the idea that the original intro video is not needed, it'd be better if your activities eventually attracted the attention of Lady Brissiena, the emperor, or the Blades and that's when you're contacted.

My guess is that the level condition for quests like Princess Morgiah's quest and Prince Lhotun's quest would have to be removed from the main quest backbone and replaced with timers instead, since otherwise you'd get all the letters at the same time as soon as you meet the conditions to start the main quest.
Released mods: https://www.nexusmods.com/users/5141135 ... files&BH=0
Daggerfall isn't the only ridiculously intrincate fantasy world simulator with the initials DF that I make mods for: http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=177071.0

imsobadatnicknames
Posts: 371
Joined: Sun Jun 02, 2019 4:28 pm
Location: Colombia

Re: Play your backstory before the Main Quest

Post by imsobadatnicknames »

Maybe we could use the Great Knight as an entry point for the main quest? According to the uesp wiki he exists as a political faction but he doesn't actually get used for anything in the game. He's supposed to be Lady Brissiena's brother and the leader of the Blades. Maybe as you climb through the ranks of any of the game's guilds or as you gain reputation with the nobility of the three main regions you eventually catch his eye and he contacts you and offers you to join the blades, and once you do a few Blades quests for him Lady Brissiena contacts you and gets you up to speed with the King Lysandus situation.
Released mods: https://www.nexusmods.com/users/5141135 ... files&BH=0
Daggerfall isn't the only ridiculously intrincate fantasy world simulator with the initials DF that I make mods for: http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=177071.0

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