Help with Foundry - Protect Person X

mleger

Was doing some playing around, and i can't seem to find a way to do this.

i'd like to have a quest where you have to protect a NPC, and the quest actually fails out if that NPC dies.

Any suggestions on how to pull this off?

Appreciate any feedback on this; Thanks

eldarth

NPC has the only "key" to a door/vault/chest/magic doodad
On Encounter Complete (i.e. NPC dies) Appear When an Invisible wall, or non-interactable door/vault/chest overlapping/in-front-of the interactable item.

Or... on Encounter Complete Disappear When an object (NPCs chest, Bookshelf, table, bag, book, etc) containing an item (Dropped Item) required later

Lots of different ways. Figure out how to block access to, or disappear an object (not in the story objectives) when Encounter Complete on the NPC follower.

..and if you're next question is how to get an NPC to follow you...
- Use an Encounter mob -- Adventurer (Friendly) if you want them pretty tough or Guard (friendly) for less tough.
Set them to Follow (expand properties) and set "Follow When" to Immediately (or at least not "Never" the default).

antonkyle

mleger wrote: »

Was doing some playing around, and i can't seem to find a way to do this.

i'd like to have a quest where you have to protect a NPC, and the quest actually fails out if that NPC dies.

Any suggestions on how to pull this off?

Appreciate any feedback on this; Thanks

This will be hard. NPC's tend to be really dumb and die very easy. I have always had to have re-spawn points countless times. I would suggest check points. Also you will need to find a way to stop people just going ahead and clearing the path as npc's move very slowly.

Edit: If you set them to follow, rather than one way patrol I don't see how you can keep them alive to be honest. unless the mobs are really easy. Maybe a mixture of follow and one way patrol.

It's a good idea though so good luck and if you pull it off be sure to send the quest my way. I'd be very interested to see how you have pulled it off.

kithlis

This idea was actually going to be something I tackle in a new foundry I have rolling around in my head.
Be sure to test it out with varying character levels. Friendly encounters tend to be tougher (more HP) at higher levels... but enemy encounters tend to be stronger as well.

mleger

Thanks for the suggestions.

What if i set it so the NPC is set to not fight to the death. Then force the player into interacting with them to 'save' them.

It pretty much rig's it so they really never lose, but i'd imagine failing out of a quest would upset a few players.

angrysprite

IF NPC is set to follow:

Use place markers, invisibles and portals (not the teleport portals, but meaning doorways and such).

Set NPC to follow. Set distance to follow to be ten feet or so (though this seems to work on and off - needs to be thoroughly tested on LIVE server). Put place markers where encounter will occur. Put invisible walls over the portal opening to prevent the NPC from going though.

So if you have a tunnel and the NPC is to follow you - put a place marker just on the other side of the first doorway (does't matter if it has a door or not) - when PC hits the marker, then APPEAR the invisible wall to prevent the NPC from following you into the encounter. Invisible wall DISAPPEARS WHEN component complete (mod is killed-off).

I know what you're thinking: this isn't really the PC 'protecting' the NPC - it is forced-protection for the NPC. So to have a bit of a challenge, have an easy mod APPEAR when component complete (first encounter complete that makes the invisible wall disappear) - that new easy mob appears *behind* the NPC - they attack him, PC must now fight-off the mob going after the NPC.

It would take a lot of play-testing and tweaking encounter power levels and which work best (mixed, melee, ranged, etc.) and so on.

I would create the quest to work slick as snot as possible on a level 30 character. Will be drop-dead easy for low-level 10s and a era serious challenge for the 60s crowd.

Just theories, of course. But this is how I'd approach starting out, then adapt, change, rejigger as necessary until it either works or I give-up trying.

EDIT TO ADD:

I'd also use stagecraft "smoke and mirrors" techniques (audience attention redirection): as a few twists, like the NPC becomes lost (separated from you the player) - you have to go find him or her, etc. This allows you the author to derez an existing NPC and rerez later in a different area,say, already being attacked and the player has to leap in there to draw aggro and defeat the mob. This way there is a REAL chance the player could fail.

Of course, you'll need to build-in "error-trapping" so that if the player fails there is a way to still complete the quest. I'd do it this way: use pathing near the end: if the NPC is still alive, the player must go left - contacts and story go on with success; if NPC is dead then player must go right, story is told from a failure standpoint. Once past that, back to the typical end-quest and super chest reward.

Again, just thoughts on how I'd approach it.

mleger

@angrysprite thanks for the great ideas.

My adventure isn't that big though, basically its a Pub owner who won't pay the nashers extortion money, and asked you to protect him while the nashers break in over night. etc. So the map is fairly small.

angrysprite

mleger wrote: »

@angrysprite thanks for the great ideas.

My adventure isn't that big though, basically its a Pub owner who won't pay the nashers extortion money, and asked you to protect him while the nashers break in over night. etc. So the map is fairly small.

Hahah!

Habit. I produce real stage plays all the time and so my mind is always thinking is grandiose ways. -winks-

orangefiree

I don't think anyone has mentioned this yet, but don't have enemies like ogres with slow attacks that need to be dodged, NPCs will not dodge the attacks and will die in a few hits. Pretty much, don't use solo difficulty for the protect part at all and try not to use anything else with red circles or other tough charged attacks.