Technical Info concerning Interiors

[sandor]

General Remarks

Tenth topic.

How to make the interior interesting for the PC.


About expensive and rare property.

Originally posted by Razorwing
The important things to consider when it comes to property is 1) that it isn't "?ber" and 2) that it isn't obviously culturally wrong and 3) that the items aren't illegal (unless the owner is intentionally created to have illegal items in his possession). Everything else is usually fine.

"?ber" items are items that are either more powerful than Bethesda's finest counterpart, or items that are extraordinarily valuable, or items that are just too valuable compared to how hard they are for the player to acquire. Sometimes ?ber power items can be okay, but they have to be as reward for a truly massive quest or adventure. On par with the Pale Pass quest for instance, in terms of playable content. The other two kinds of ?ber items aren't okay, like for instance leaving precious gems lying around a home or making a sword worth 8000 gold and just dropping it into a home, or giving an everyday commoner daedric armor. So, moderation is often the best way to go - but we *do* need to have cool and amazing stuff in the mod as well, to keep player's interest piqued.

Culturally wrong items were a much greater risk of being used in TES3 mods than it is in TES4, because TES4 is much more culturally homogenous. There won't be Telvanni robes put on Hlaalu businessmen or Redoran banners placed in Telvanni homes or Imperial furniture placed in Redoran homes, et cetera. So, hmm... but you get my drift. Some items are only supposed to be used in certain settings.

Illegal items in TES4 are pretty much confined to Skooma. I don't think it's de facto illegal to have it, but it's supposed to be illegal. In TES3, moon sugar (base ingredient for skooma) and Dwemer artifacts - such as limeware - were illegal to trade with, and hopefully those items will be in our mod some day.

Mithril is okay for anyone to have I think, since it's not especially valuable. Should be in a locked container though. But watch out with levelled items because some of them do go up into the glass/daedric range and could prove too easy for the player to acquire.

General remarks.

No bleeding and floating.

Check the pathgrid thoroughly.
If you see NPC's walking against the wall etc., it's no good.

Make sure the NPC who lives in the interior has interesting packages. For example eating (two / three times a day), sleeping, wandering etc.

Add dialogue. At least one greeting, a Reich Parkeep (Steadhelm etc.) topic and one other, of your own choice.

Make sure the interior is interesting enough.
Add locked chests with keys. So the PC has to pickpocket the NPC. Add a lot of detailing. Add interesting objects.

Make sure the lighting is ok.

Check the interior settings. Make it for example off limits.

Think about a storyline, it makes it more easy to create dialogue and to decorate the interior.