"Locking this thread before misinformation is spread further. I'm not sure where the OP got the idea that simply stealing a ring was enough to take someone's title, but that isn't the case."

"It would be a ridiculous mechanic if taking someone's title away - something they worked months or years for - was as simple as taking their ring in their sleep."

Quote above by Caspian. I think he was quite right to bring a close to it.

The problem with that thread is that the OP, was spreading false information, whether the following thread had any merit doesn't matter at that point.

Also, if the king is wearing the ring, the thief would have to be an assassin to take it, after a coup de grace.

Even after that point, you need the Casus Belli from a duke/king, and then if the king loses, he still has 28 real days to reclaim the throne.

As for a quest being created, it's likely just going to be a bounty token that the king turns over to a sheriff, and then it becomes a kingdom wide quest of sorts.

Edit: Oracular Guidance is also true, not a great idea to open a thread citing a troll thread as your reasoning.

Personally I'd cap the loss period. If a noble announces a loss of a ring, after a period of <X> a new one is comissioned, and the old one is no longer recognised, becoming an "old ring".

Either way though, a ring on it's own is little more than a ring..

Nobles don't face any likelihood of losing their domains just because some thief sneaked in and stole a ring. It requires a Cassus Beli, as well as a takeover, potentially by force in addition to being able to "hold" the region for at leat the 28 day period. If at any point in that period your challenge is defeated, your bid fails.

Anyone implying it's a simple matter is fooling themselves. In addition, there are risks. If you declare your intent and use a cassus beli, surely there's a risk that both you and your allies are presenting your own cassus belis to your target, and potentially their allies, a move that may backfire with those believing themselves to wield the most power suddenly gaining the largest volume of rivals.

Sorry Oracle but I disagree with you. I've not gone over the same ground as the OP but instead suggested a fix to that particular problem and expanded to discuss what the Souldborn Engine could be capable of.

Precisely why I've posted in this forum and not General Discussion.

Posted By ZeroCool at 12:11 PM - Fri May 12 2017

Sorry Oracle but I disagree with you. I've not gone over the same ground as the OP but instead suggested a fix to that particular problem and expanded to discuss what the Souldborn Engine could be capable of.

Precisely why I've posted in this forum and not General Discussion.

You've referenced a thread that was closed in your opening lines and stated that you think it was closed prematurely, potentially repointing people straight back at a misleading thread containing incorrect information.

Am I not entitled to that opinion? The thread is short and Caspian is clear at the bottom that it contains misleading information.

I'm reffering to DJ-18;

"So one possible scenario is the king is assassinated and the murderer takes his ring. This creates a power vacuum and one of the dukes uses that as an opportunity to coup, by gaining favor of 2/3rds of the other dukes. The assassin then returns to him the ring of the king. The king is dead, long live the king!"

That's all I'm saying, what if the assassin does not return the ring and provided one possible solution to the problem.

I've just read your solution and also feel that would remedy the situation.

But the main question I wanted to raise was what is the Soulborn Engine going to be capable of in a dynamic way, outside of it's main purpose of driving the overarching story\individual character destiny's?

You Lose, because you changed your argument in light of Facts. "So let's imagine a thief does steal the ring." and, for the record, NO, you are not entitled to post your opinion when the subject was CLOSED.

Now, as for you post Title, there will be "procedural" quests, this has already been stated. It's one of the reasons why this game will be different from others. All quests will be dynamic based on needs and probably fluctuate quite a bit...

The real series of queries I have about the contract system and quests fall into a matter of time frame;

How long will an NPC "wait" for you to return with whatever they want? If one NPC is more "impatient" than another NPC, will they "jump the gun" and offer it to someone else while you are out and about? The Big Five would dictate that some NPC's are deviant, but that isn't necessarily meaning that they break a contract. I can see the potential for it only being Players doing that. But it is a thought.

If there is a time frame and you are late, will they negate the contract entirely? Because they still have the need.

Would that mean someone else could legally get the new contract? I imagine hunting for something for a day or two, Finally getting whatever was needed, and returning late, to find someone else happened to have on hand what they wanted, now what do you do? ....

Ignoring the premise of the OPs discussion about procedural quests, I do appreciate the concept of robust quest creation that can address imbalances in the world.

The ring example is false, but the idea is good. I hope perhaps exploits can be remedied in universe in this manner.

I really don't want to enter into any kind of flame war here. I've not been here as long as most of you and this is the first conflict I've been involved with.

That said I do feel I should defend myself somewhat. How have I changed my argument? Are you referring to me first referencing a locked thread and then later using a dev journal? The base point in them is one and the same; a ring on it's own is little more than a ring; no it's not the ring is special and we've been told it enforces an implicit contract. Hence why I thought it deserved more discussion.

I know they've mentioned procedural quests, not only that but event driven quests, like if the population of wild beasts spirals out of control might cause the local NPC mayor to issue bounty contracts. I was simply trying to open a discussion on what other types of events could trigger the Soulborn Engine to do something, The Kings Ring being just an example; but how that player driven event then drives multiple NPC given quests given out to multiple players.

But once I read Oracle's idea of simply commissioning a new ring that has struck me as a much simpler way of addressing that problem. But I don't think that should put an end to the discussion I was trying to start; how can the SBE bring balance to the force?

EDIT: I can see another place you may feel I back peddled, my second post was in reply to Oracle's first. I left the new post editing for too long as I should really be working and so didn't see the suggestion of commissioning a new ring straight away.

A lot of this may come down to how much they wish to place on the shoulders of NPCs vs human players.

If human players work up to most positions of power, the pressure on the engine reduces. Humans will actively spot problems and raise bounties themselves. NPCs with the right skills or characters may then fulfill those bounties, as may players.

This is something I've been wondering for a while. In terms of "rope bridge" designs, you would expect that behavioural design may start off relatively simple. You effectively build a set of measures and methods that are available.

If the "world preview" includes something akin to a prologue with stationary or minimal functionality NPCs, they could potentially employ an unwitting userbase who are developing their OPC scripts to effectively develop NPC scripts and generic community scripts, optimising development resource usage.

Following on from that, the higher you move up the "chain" in regards to aristocracy, nobility and royalty, the more specialist your duties potentially become. There functionality becomes increasingly dependant on more input, assuming it's going to function well. They have said however that players will outstrip NPCs on those fronts, so perhaps that's less of a worry.

If KoE sees a decent spread of players in roles, and remaining NPC roles are all but mopped up by it's conclusion, the duties of the engine and NPCs could safely be restricted to "individual function" rather than group and town management in all but the most simple cases etc.

Will human players raise bounties and generate quest content through their actions? Undoubtedly. Will NPCs? Individual content will no doubt raise bounties. Trade, theft, death, all examples of things that may trigger reaction.

Wider scale or more damaging events could be reacted to on a higher level, potentially tweaked by staff. We know there is a talent engine that might be utilised to redress balance between regions and create diversity.

Where intervention is required, they may simply decide to code in reactive rules there and then for future automation. That way, the engine is a growing constantly evolving system.

It probably goes without saying but a large part for the success of this game relies on us and what we do whilst our characters live thier Elyrian lives.

I was close to requesting a lock myself! Thanks for turning it around Oracle :)

Simple answer.

NPCs have needs and they have skills. The quests NPCs will generate is based on one of those two items.

I do not see a lot of general quests being made by the system. That's not typically how a sandbox game works, and if you read some of the earlier journals NPCs are literally just place holders till a PC comes in and takes over.

If you as a player lose something or get killed by someone the onus is on you to figure out what to do and whom to send out for retribution.

Honestly I'm a bit hesitant of saying something contrary now >.<

I thought CoE was meant to be the best of both themepark MMO and sandbox MMO. I think a bunch of quests offered by NPC, randomly generated of course for diversity, will give more depth.

I'm sure (I hope?) there will be a bunch of missions\quests\events that are not directly tied to the main story. Your family for one will be asking you to do this or that, initially to teach you the game mechanics but why stop there?

But lets take the big 5 example. You've got an NPC who rates highly on the neuroticism scale and he's hungry. He smells your rabbit cooking by the campire. Now that's not a quests per se but it sure is an event.

Posted By ZeroCool at 08:48 AM - Fri May 12 2017

Honestly I'm a bit hesitant of saying something contrary now >.<

I thought CoE was meant to be the best of both themepark MMO and sandbox MMO. I think a bunch of quests offered by NPC, randomly generated of course for diversity, will give more depth.

I'm sure (I hope?) there will be a bunch of missions\quests\events that are not directly tied to the main story. Your family for one will be asking you to do this or that, initially to teach you the game mechanics but why stop there?

Never seen SBS ever state CoE was supposed to be a theme park MMO. Quite the opposite actually.

Edit: There will be some quests generated by the engine to drive the ten year story but these will likely (speculation incoming) be one hit wonders. You get lucky enough to get / find the quest it's up to you to finish. There won't be 1000's of other players who level up and that quest chain suddenly opens for them as well like a theme park mmo.

I think it was one of the slides on the PAX video. Maybe I misinterpreted.