by Haba » Wed Apr 14, 2010 5:00 pm This would be one way to incorporate some low-magic flavour into the game.
Summary:
The basic gist is that the game would keep track of players individual achievements, items and certain events involving villages. Certain types of players could then use this information to create custom tales that detail those events. These tales could be then retold within village, carved into runestones or sung within the heat of combat for some sort of a boon.
Prerequisites:
My idea is that the tale crafting would work like in Dwarf Fortress. A lot more statistics would be kept about players and their activities. The game would keep track of player kills, animal kills, tiles the character has travelled by foot or by boat, items they've crafted etc.
In more advanced form, the game would create an "event" on certain triggers, to capture the events during raids etc.
Some of the data would be publicly visible, other would be hidden (total combined worth of the village?)
Creating a story:
How would the stories be created? Lets say we have a character who has been crafting a lot of metal items, the village smith of sorts. He has crafted hundreds of swords, has very high smithing skill and strength of 300.
The game would next compare those statistics on global level to see if they are relevant, to determine if this character is major or minor player, compared to the global averages.
With this information, the game would then simply create a small story of the character.
"The sage tells you the tale of Seppo Ilmarinen, the forger of thousands of swords. He works his fiery forge tirelessly night and day, wielding a hammer so big that it takes two grown men to lift it."
Simple as that. The more data the game keeps track of, the more fluff can be incorporated into the story. The story itself would be created automatically, or with very little influence.
Sages 'n seers
My main idea would be that players who opt to become sages are not just buying a simple skill, but rather opting for a distinct playing style. Sages would be the characters who are able to collect stories, exchange them between other seers and retell them. Ideally I'd see sages being a "class" that can travel more freely in the world, as their stories would be valuable and as powerful players naturally would want their story to be told in all the corners of the world.
Loremasters
Beyond nomadic seers, the addition of a new village role would be in order. A seer could be appointed as the village lore master. Loremaster would be able to combine individual stories and create larger sagas of the deeds and qualities of the entire village. Those stories could then be used to grant relatively stronger boons for the village.
One could even bring the village lore master to combat, to sing stories to bolster the village's warriors and to demoralize their foes. And maybe even to sing the opposing lore master to swamp, Kalevala style.
Tales, stones and songs
The stories could be used in three distinct ways:
- Telling a tale: gives all the listeners a short term buff related to the story, and some LP to those who hear it for the first time.
Carving the story in stone: The story could be chiseled into a runestone at great cost. Anyone reading the story would gain LP and potentially improve his or her skills a little. This could be a meaningful way for new players to gain their initial LP/skills.
Singing a song: Songs would work as an active party buff, both in combat as well as common work (working on the fields, hunting, lumberjacking etc.)
a very nice idéa
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