Story places/protected area changes that makes more sense with the sandbox nature of the game

[Parco]

If there is one thing that has been quite off putting for me/immersion breaking it's that claimed areas is untouchable/unchangable, it just makes no sense for me in a sandbox game with this much freedom in all other areas. But I do have some ideas that still allow for the more linear solutions to story areas that the devs seem to want and still allow them to be modifiable/lootable by the player later on.

Traders and villagers:

• The current claim area system should be removed and instead be replaced by a new softer owner area for npcs
  • blocks are destructable and items can be looted
  • will aggro the npc if they notice(hear or see) any such acts
    • will need some sort of redemption arc to get goodwill back
    • maybe a prison area in the village where you will be put in if caught and defeated/surrendered
      • the guards are strong and well fed, they have afterall survived in the world far longer than the player 
    • many traders got access to strong weaponry already, making them potentially letal enemies
      • have to make them capable of climbing ladders and potentially placing ladders and such so they can reach tricky players
    • tobias will chase the player out with help of his creatures and his questline will be halted until player is redeemed

Story areas:

• tie the land claim area to a unique and advanced spacial interference item. (similar to valheims area claim system, the ward)
  • well hidden and strongly protected
  • destroying one destroys most, if not all of the parts its made of
    • expencive for player to make themselves, most parts from late game monster drops, but useful to grind for on servers with not so friendly players
      • fueled by temporal gear
      • once built the spacial interference item detects all non natural blocks and pieces within its area and the player has to instruct the device which blocks the device shall lock
        • maybe some lore could be it's suspected these items is part of the reason these protected structures also fell the way they did due to instability side effects 
          • potentially increase rifts and enemy underground spawns where land is claimed
            • potential for players to make their own adventure like dungeons
          • probably why tobias doesn't have one in his new hideout
  • allows player to fully loot the area afterwards which is mostly decorative items and blocks
    • still allows devs to have a linear route to solving/finishing the story area

[LadyWYT]

The whole reason that story locations are protected, is to prevent the player from outright ignoring the puzzles and challenges(like players can in the other block game), or otherwise exploiting NPCs/robbing them blind(like players can in various other games). There are also some location pieces that just aren't even feasible for the player to remove, given the sheer size of the blocks in question or the fact that removing certain parts would logically collapse the structure.

24 minutes ago, Parco said:

will aggro the npc if they notice(hear or see) any such acts

• will need some sort of redemption arc to get goodwill back
• maybe a prison area in the village where you will be put in if caught and defeated/surrendered
  • the guards are strong and well fed, they have afterall survived in the world far longer than the player 
• many traders got access to strong weaponry already, making them potentially letal enemies
  • have to make them capable of climbing ladders and potentially placing ladders and such so they can reach tricky players
• tobias will chase the player out with help of his creatures and his questline will be halted until player is redeemed

 

I wouldn't be surprised if there were some sort of reputation system implemented, however, such systems are often difficult to implement well, without resorting to NPC omniscience or stuff like "even the chickens can report crimes". Likewise, while jail would be a realistic option for punishing crime(death isn't a logical option given that the player is immortal), it's not actually fun to sit there and serve the time. If the player goes to jail, they're going to expect to be allowed to escape, or to otherwise just "sleep it off" before going back to bad behavior.

It's also worth noting that the player isn't just some random nobody either. While it's ultimately up to the player to determine how to play, Vintage Story isn't an RPG, and currently the story is set up with the premise that the player was an individual that generally had good intentions and played nicely with others. The exceptions might be the Malefactor and Blackguard classes, as it's clear both have done some horrific things, but it's also implied that Malefactors gave up crime and tried to redeem themselves, while Blackguards did what was necessary to keep peace in the ranks.

32 minutes ago, Parco said:

tie the land claim area to a unique and advanced spacial interference item. (similar to valheims area claim system, the ward)

• well hidden and strongly protected

 

To my knowledge, this is somewhat how land claiming already works in the game. Additionally, there are padlocks players can use to lock up storage, and there is an item that players can use to reinforce structures to prevent others from breaking in. I don't think any changes are necessary here.

 

34 minutes ago, Parco said:

expencive for player to make themselves, most parts from late game monster drops, but useful to grind for on servers with not so friendly players

Honestly, if a player really doesn't want their stuff messed with, maybe don't play on servers that allow players to mess with each other like that. Otherwise, if the player is okay with the risk, there are already ways of fortifying bases in the game, such as padlocks and block-reinforcement(I think it's the plumb and square required for this?).

 

36 minutes ago, Parco said:

once built the spacial interference item detects all non natural blocks and pieces within its area and the player has to instruct the device which blocks the device shall lock

Way too complicated, and it's easily exploited by just hitting blocks with the hammer and chisel to turn them from natural blocks to chiseled blocks.

 

38 minutes ago, Parco said:

maybe some lore could be it's suspected these items is part of the reason these protected structures also fell the way they did due to instability side effects 

Depending on the structure in question, many have fallen into disrepair simply due to being abandoned for decades, if not hundreds of years. The temporal forces and whatever else was involved in tearing apart the Old World is also to blame for the anomalies found at certain locations.

 

39 minutes ago, Parco said:

potentially increase rifts and enemy underground spawns where land is claimed

Rift spawns and monsters spawns aren't related to land claiming, outside of monster spawns being fixed in most story locations for storytelling purposes. Land claiming is simply a tool to help manage players in multiplayer, as well as a tool used to keep players from tampering with story locations and either stripping them bare or bypassing the challenges within. Lorewise, chunk instability, rifts, and monsters are all results of past catastrophic events.

 

42 minutes ago, Parco said:

potential for players to make their own adventure like dungeons

This is best accomplished via creative mode, which has several different "command blocks" and other tools to help players build their own stuff.

 

44 minutes ago, Parco said:

allows player to fully loot the area afterwards which is mostly decorative items and blocks

As noted before, one reason the story locations are under such protection, is that the player isn't meant to strip them bare. Logically, stripping out certain blocks would cause structural collapse, or otherwise not be feasible due to the size of the items in question. In certain cases, there are also anomalies present that seem to freeze things in time, so to speak.

[Teh Pizza Lady]

I really fail to see what, if any, problems this suggestion solves. Especially since it hinges on the traders and other NPCs keeping their items in a physical location.

The suggest fails on a false premise. It relies on there actually being something to break and loot. There isn't.

Play the story @Parco, there are plenty of things to loot without destroying everything. More than you can carry from the 1st story location, for sure. It took me... 3 trips with a fully loaded elk and help from my blackguard friend and we finally got it all. and I'm sure I still missed something. As @LadyWYT said, the claims are there to preserve the puzzles required to complete the story locations and to prevent people from ransacking and destroying trader outposts for no reason. You're the good guy in this story and you're going to need their help. Best not to make enemies.

[Parco]

3 minutes ago, LadyWYT said:

The whole reason that story locations are protected, is to prevent the player from outright ignoring the puzzles and challenges(like players can in the other block game), or otherwise exploiting NPCs/robbing them blind(like players can in various other games). There are also some location pieces that just aren't even feasible for the player to remove, given the sheer size of the blocks in question or the fact that removing certain parts would logically collapse the structure.

 

 

39 minutes ago, LadyWYT said:

As noted before, one reason the story locations are under such protection, is that the player isn't meant to strip them bare. Logically, stripping out certain blocks would cause structural collapse, or otherwise not be feasible due to the size of the items in question. In certain cases, there are also anomalies present that seem to freeze things in time, so to speak.

Well my idea would still protect the story elements from tampering until player has solved the story puzzle, just have the item placed somewhere its only accessible after story area is solved. And those structures that would be illogical for the player to harvest is simple to deal with, make it so that when its broken then its turned to scrap parts or simply get fully broken. and that it risk collapsing the structure if the player isnt careful isnt a problem, its a solid solution to punish impatient and carefree looters

20 minutes ago, LadyWYT said:

Likewise, while jail would be a realistic option for punishing crime(death isn't a logical option given that the player is immortal), it's not actually fun to sit there and serve the time. If the player goes to jail, they're going to expect to be allowed to escape, or to otherwise just "sleep it off" before going back to bad behavior

 

simple solution to this, the prison time would be fast for the player, but maybe still would fast forward some ingame days(depending on severity) and loss of items when released to pay for the damages. youre right its not an rpg, but it doesnt need to be an rpg to have punishing systems for bad behaviours

22 minutes ago, LadyWYT said:

To my knowledge, this is somewhat how land claiming already works in the game. Additionally, there are padlocks players can use to lock up storage, and there is an item that players can use to reinforce structures to prevent others from breaking in. I don't think any changes are necessary here.

i dont intend for that system to be changed, just added ontop of that existing system, a sort of spacial interefence item would be an expansion of that current 

24 minutes ago, LadyWYT said:

Way too complicated, and it's easily exploited by just hitting blocks with the hammer and chisel to turn them from natural blocks to chiseled blocks.

simple solution is to make chiseled blocks from natural blocks still keep its natural role

25 minutes ago, LadyWYT said:

Depending on the structure in question, many have fallen into disrepair simply due to being abandoned for decades, if not hundreds of years. The temporal forces and whatever else was involved in tearing apart the Old World is also to blame for the anomalies found at certain locations.

26 minutes ago, LadyWYT said:

Rift spawns and monsters spawns aren't related to land claiming, outside of monster spawns being fixed in most story locations for storytelling purposes. Land claiming is simply a tool to help manage players in multiplayer, as well as a tool used to keep players from tampering with story locations and either stripping them bare or bypassing the challenges within. Lorewise, chunk instability, rifts, and monsters are all results of past catastrophic events.

my idea for lore involving the item is that it simply aided in the downfall of these areas by adding to the instability, it would most likely still have happened, just potentially faster. Maybe at first it was intended to help keep structural integrity during the experient and fight against the rot, but that backfired. and my idea for the extra instability as a drawback to using this sort of powerful landclaiming, to make it somewhat more balanced. 

36 minutes ago, LadyWYT said:

This is best accomplished via creative mode, which has several different "command blocks" and other tools to help players build their own stuff.

true but this would add the posibility of it without using admin commands/creative mode. of course would be best if possible to disable it in server settings if a server host dont want this sort of thing on their server

[LadyWYT]

12 minutes ago, Parco said:

Well my idea would still protect the story elements from tampering until player has solved the story puzzle, just have the item placed somewhere its only accessible after story area is solved.

Right, but the world isn't at the mercy of the player, but rather the player is at the mercy of the world. The game has a clear story to tell, and while the player has a lot of freedom to do whatever, there are still some definite limits in place. Not to mention that if the player can just tear apart the story location after it stops being relevant, then it's really hard to take the world seriously at all, instead of treating it like a theme park.

 

15 minutes ago, Parco said:

And those structures that would be illogical for the player to harvest is simple to deal with, make it so that when its broken then its turned to scrap parts or simply get fully broken. and that it risk collapsing the structure if the player isnt careful isnt a problem, its a solid solution to punish impatient and carefree looters

Which would also require a monumental amount of physics coding to implement properly, as well as generate a plethora of player complaints when they die to the inevitable structural failure. Or players on servers complaining about story locations getting thoroughly gutted, or fighting over who gets to live in the Resonance Archive, etc. Not to mention that some places are literally frozen time anomalies...

 

17 minutes ago, Parco said:

simple solution to this, the prison time would be fast for the player, but maybe still would fast forward some ingame days(depending on severity) and loss of items when released to pay for the damages. youre right its not an rpg, but it doesnt need to be an rpg to have punishing systems for bad behaviours

Yeah, but I will point out that the player character is supposed to be one of the good guys. That is, there's already an established history of the player playing nicely with certain other important characters. At best, to stay within a realistic style of the punishment, the player should get an instant "game over, man" when they steal, murder, or otherwise prove they have ill intent. Obviously, that's not going to be fun, but if the NPCs act like nothing happened and the plot continues as normal after the player does the time/pays a fine, then it's obvious the world doesn't actually react to player actions and continues on for the sake of "plot".

Likewise, I will note that if the player is allowed to steal or get away with murder, then they're going to expect those to be viable gameplay options and complain if that ends up not the case. Additionally, it's a whole lot easier to just stop the player from tampering with things they shouldn't to begin with, than it is to try to program NPC line-of-sight, or track who owns what in the event the player accidentally sets an item down. Finally, if the player is allowed to steal, then multiplayer is going to have to deal with certain NPC locations getting picked clean by greedy players who were somehow able to game the system.

The short of it is, if the player isn't intended to do certain things, maybe they shouldn't have the option of doing those things to begin with.

27 minutes ago, Parco said:

my idea for lore involving the item is that it simply aided in the downfall of these areas by adding to the instability, it would most likely still have happened, just potentially faster. Maybe at first it was intended to help keep structural integrity during the experient and fight against the rot, but that backfired. and my idea for the extra instability as a drawback to using this sort of powerful landclaiming, to make it somewhat more balanced. 

Except land claiming is a game mechanic put in place to stop unintended player behavior in those locations. The actual reason those locations fell apart, is due to certain catastrophic events that happened in the world's past. The instability that exists there now is a lingering result of said catastrophic events.

 

33 minutes ago, Parco said:

true but this would add the posibility of it without using admin commands/creative mode. of course would be best if possible to disable it in server settings if a server host dont want this sort of thing on their server

Honestly, the suggestion just comes across as asking for a Minecraft-style sandbox rules, but with Vintage Story's aesthetics. And that's not at all what Vintage Story is.

That being said, for players that really want to tamper with the story locations outside of needing to use creative mode, that should already be possible via mods. All that would really have to be done, is just removing the protections entirely from story locations. It seems there's at least one mod that does just that, although it was made for an older game version so it may or may not work anymore: https://mods.vintagestory.at/show/mod/23236

[Parco]

21 minutes ago, LadyWYT said:

then it's really hard to take the world seriously at all, instead of treating it like a theme park.

imo its the opposite, atm the story location are like themeparks, unchangable but you go there for the selective intended fun, while outside(rest of the game) is a sandbox. you say the player is at the mercy of the world, but thats only up until a certain point as eventually most things are more easily overcome and player is no longer as threathened by enemies and can even terraform entire regions if one wants to with next to no fear of dying to the elements and you have more food than youll ever need. 

26 minutes ago, LadyWYT said:

eah, but I will point out that the player character is supposed to be one of the good guys. That is, there's already an established history of the player playing nicely with certain other important characters. At best, to stay within a realistic style of the punishment, the player should get an instant "game over, man" when they steal, murder, or otherwise prove they have ill intent. Obviously, that's not going to be fun, but if the NPCs act like nothing happened and the plot continues as normal after the player does the time/pays a fine, then it's obvious the world doesn't actually react to player actions and continues on for the sake of "plot"

at the moment you can murder npcs with little to no reprocussion, you cant however loot the corpse or do anything with its claimed area afterwards(or trade with that npc again). if the game was only meant for the player to be good then friendly damage would logically be disabled. and npc's interaction and reaction to player is something that can be expanded on in the future, and i did suggest a redemption arc so it wouldnt be like nothing ever happened, it can be more than just jail/fine as the relations to specific npcs and potentially nearby npcs is poorer and you need to regain trust if there are story elements with them or want to trade etc.

41 minutes ago, LadyWYT said:

Which would also require a monumental amount of physics coding to implement properly, as well as generate a plethora of player complaints when they die to the inevitable structural failure. Or players on servers complaining about story locations getting thoroughly gutted, or fighting over who gets to live in the Resonance Archive, etc. Not to mention that some places are literally frozen time anomalies...

why, its already a thing in the game that roofs and certain soft blocks can structurally collapse. and with caveins already a thing is there that many complaints about people dying in it? this is already a harsh games where you can have sudden unforseen deaths if not careful, players who keep playing this game already accepts this. Well if people play on servers and the server hoster dont want tampering with story location then let there be served sided options for keeping those places in stasis. The argument that the places are frozen time anomalies kinda ruins its own logic with that some items within the anomaly are interactable/collectable, hence why something similar to what i suggested would make more logical sense as to why some things are interactable. that things stay unchangable in the timeskip scene at the tower for example is perfectly fine.

58 minutes ago, LadyWYT said:

Honestly, the suggestion just comes across as asking for a Minecraft-style sandbox rules, but with Vintage Story's aesthetics. And that's not at all what Vintage Story is.

well it is a more survival and story focused sandbox than minecraft is, i dont think finding ways to allow some more sanboxy freedom regarding some/most of the story areas(after those chapters are closed) is making the game less vintage story, as you'd still have to follow the questline as intended

well either way, i just wanted to offer an alternative to current system so its less immersion breaking, gonna be up to the devs anyway regardless of our arguing/debating haha

[Bruno Willis]

I was also quite frustrated when I first entered the R.A. and realized my stack of rope ladders and my explosives were useless. Then I got to enjoying the location design and I didn't mind so much, but it still bothers me. 

For the most part, especially when it comes to player behavior towards NPCs, I agree with LadyWYT. The current land claim system enforces the tone of the game and moral character of the seraphs, and it does it well and fairly subtlety. The story of the game suggests that we are interested in communities recovering, have good intentions towards other people, and are unwilling to desecrate significant sites. 

But we are also survivors and adventurers. The current land claim system limits the sort of tools the game considers 'adventurer's equipment' to a very small pool, with torches being the only placeable tools of the lot. It does this because if we adventured in story locations like we do in caves and ruins, we'd ruin special places as well as our own gameplay experience. 

If land claims were to change, it would have to be in a way which preserves the tone and moral character of the game, and doesn't undercut the current story location design. 

It might be worth changing claims because claimed areas feel a bit artificial, and also stop player using tactics they've learned elsewhere when they encounter story locations. 

We discussed this a bit in the "Combat is too shallow for it to be so integral to the game." thread, so I'll just summarize a few of the ideas for changes we had, and their issues as I see them now:

1. Placement and removal of a limited selection of items within claimed areas - rope ladders, beds, cookfires and pots, maybe explosives. Issues: allows construction of artificial barriers to cheese combat in a way which doesn't support mood. Might create three separate systems, free gameplay, partially claimed, and fully claimed (for npcs), instead of two. 
2. Having those items disappear in some way - either they time out, and slowly flicker out of existence like temporal storm rust-foe do. Issue: still allows barrier building, but keeps the story locations pristine.
3. Rust foes break or pick up those items when they would interact with them. Issues: rust foe aren't that smart and don't exhibit the ability to break stuff out of claimed areas. Still, this would keep story locations mostly pristine and not allow barrier building. 
4. Making a noise or alteration sensing system, like a sleepy monster, which gradually wakes as things are placed or broken. It would punish placing items or breaking items in claimed zones by becoming a terrible threat, lowering stability massively, etc. Issues: very story location specific, also allows locations to be damaged and altered, and areas to be cheesed and mined, for possibly very unrewarding gameplay (run away, come back when its calm, mine another couple of pretty lights, then run away again...). 
5. Rework items to work in claimed areas within existing conditions, i.e. make the scrap bomb throwable. Issues: maybe bad people kill lots of NPCs :-(
6. Class of portable items, as with #1, with bags/back packs, a portable stove, sleeping bag, bombs & traps? Smoke screens, noise makers, flares, caltrops? which can be placed in claimed areas, automatically broken if placed in a crucial location. Issues: as with #1, could be used to block foes from getting through corridors. Griefing with bombs and traps in player claimed areas. 
7. Automatically collect 'portable items' back into inventory when the owner walks too far way. Issues: it might have to happen as a seraph walks out of arm's reach of an item, otherwise it might feel odd, but a seraph's arm's reach is massive so... This seems like a very good solution to a lot of these issues.

What I see as the best case scenario for changing claimed areas is making a class of portable items which explicitly say "can be used in claimed areas" on their handbook entry, which would do double duty by informing players that other items can't be used there. Making items which Devs want to be used in adventures usable without placement where possible (scrap bombs). Adding interesting extra items into the portable items category: portable stoves, smoke screens, caltrops etc. and having them automatically collect back into inventory if you go too far away, and also become temporally unstable and disappear if a rust-foe tries to get past them for long enough (Maybe a short delay of  2 seconds before they phase out). 

I'd love this change but I don't think it's the biggest priority. I do think it would give the devs a few more fun options for story location design, and would make claimed areas feel less jarringly different to the rest of gameplay. 

[Teh Pizza Lady]

Why are we all trying to desecrate the monuments that the devs spent a LONG time hand-crafting and creating for us to enjoy the story experience?

[Bruno Willis]

6 minutes ago, Teh Pizza Lady said:

Why are we all trying to desecrate the monuments that the devs spent a LONG time hand-crafting and creating for us to enjoy the story experience?

Fair.

Okay, for me it's more about wanting to take multiple paths and avoid combat where possible. I'm not so keen on the idea that you can only do story locations in plate armor. I love how many different ways you can play outside of story locations, and I would like to see some of that diversity supported in story locations. Not all play styles, not mining: I think the restrictions are there for a reason, but I think they're a bit tighter than they need to be. 

To reiterate:

12 minutes ago, Bruno Willis said:

What I see as the best case scenario for changing claimed areas is making a class of portable items which explicitly say "can be used in claimed areas" on their handbook entry, which would do double duty by informing players that other items can't be used there. Making items which Devs want to be used in adventures usable without placement where possible (scrap bombs). Adding interesting extra items into the portable items category: portable stoves, smoke screens, caltrops etc. and having them automatically collect back into inventory if you go too far away, and also become temporally unstable and disappear if a rust-foe tries to get past them for long enough (Maybe a short delay of  2 seconds before they phase out). 

All of that is about keeping the current, lovely story locations, and just adding a few more options for how you might interact with them. 

[Parco]

17 minutes ago, Teh Pizza Lady said:

Why are we all trying to desecrate the monuments that the devs spent a LONG time hand-crafting and creating for us to enjoy the story experience?

well, people are already playing through it and enjoying it(and i have too). but i dont see why it would be bad to allow the "desecration" of it afterwards, there are always new playthrough and then its restored to its former glory. and its not like looting a few unique furniture is an act of evil(if something is not meant to be used in survival make it destructable if attemped removal). I do get that they are pationate about the story experience, but i hope they realize the contradiciton (especially new) players might feel when they get to the story elements, where so far its been a sandbox experience to sudden linear very controlled progression. Its kinda similar to the reason why i ended up disliking the dying light game, you spend hours gaining better weapons, skill etc and when you get to a story boss suddenly youre tossed in with a scrap weapon and a linear way of defeating them with the final boss just being cutscenes with quicktime events(it just went against what the whole game been up until those points). now ofc vintage story is nowhere that bad with it as you can at least still use what you have gathered up until that point(gear and consumables) and get to fight freely, just cant interact with the enviorment, i just thought my idea would be a good compromise to keep up the "sandbox spirit of the game".

[Teh Pizza Lady]

7 minutes ago, Parco said:

its not like looting a few unique furniture is an act of evil(if something is not meant to be used in survival make it destructable if attemped removal).

It literally belongs to someone else, even if they're dead.

8 minutes ago, Parco said:

its been a sandbox experience

It's a survival game with sandbox elements, so not quite.

So your idea would be okay if it were a sandbox game, but it's not. It has lore, it has a story, it has progression, it has puzzles and unique elements that few games try to replicate.

[Parco]

9 minutes ago, Teh Pizza Lady said:

It literally belongs to someone else, even if they're dead.

can't own something when you're dead (well so far in this game that seems to be the case even if theyre dead haha, those pesky traders just wont forgo their loot)

9 minutes ago, Teh Pizza Lady said:

It's a survival game with sandbox elements, so not quite.

So your idea would be okay if it were a sandbox game, but it's not. It has lore, it has a story, it has progression, it has puzzles and unique elements that few games try to replicate.

yea, a survival sandbox with lore and story. but what i proposed wouldnt take away/interupt the progression, puzzles nor the story

Edited November 15, 2025 by Parco

[Teh Pizza Lady]

7 minutes ago, Parco said:

can't own something when you're dead

And yet it's still considered stealing if you ransack a dead person's house.

You're supposed to be the good guy in this story. Stop trying to rationalize bad guy stuff. lol

[Parco]

15 minutes ago, Teh Pizza Lady said:

You're supposed to be the good guy in this story.

tell that to all the dead traders in my wake

Imo if player is meant to be a purely good character then friendly damage should be turned off for npcs or do something similar to many shooter games where you just cant attack if someone friendly is in harms way

[Teh Pizza Lady]

omg dude, why are you killing the traders??!?? They don't even have drops!

[LadyWYT]

4 minutes ago, Parco said:

tell that to all the dead traders in my wake

Imo if player is meant to be a purely good character then friendly damage should be turned off for npcs or do something similar to many shooter games where you just cant attack if someone friendly is in harms way

In that case, if you're really wanting to just murder all the NPCs so you can take their stuff without repercussion, then realistically, the story ought to get the Morrowind treatment. The NPCs don't respawn, and the player gets notified that the world is now doomed, since the story can't be completed due to missing characters, and now needs to start over. Of course, if the NPC was a seraph, then they should respawn, and hold an eternal grudge, which once again prevents the player from completing the main story.

[Parco]

2 minutes ago, Teh Pizza Lady said:

omg dude, why are you killing the traders??!?? They don't even have drops!

it was for science haha. ran around to test if there was any drops, if other npcs reacted badly if others were killed and to check if the ownership protection went away. Ofcourse had to do a few repeats to confirm previous test results

[Bruno Willis]

2 minutes ago, Parco said:

it was for science haha. ran around to test if there was any drops, if other npcs reacted badly if others were killed and to check if the ownership protection went away. Ofcourse had to do a few repeats to confirm previous test results

Grim. But it is fair to say that if a player does this sort of thing, there really should be repercussions. Word should get out and traders should refuse to trade, maybe send you on "quests" which are deathtraps, perhaps certain story locations might become closed to you, causing the whole storyline to be incompletable. I think that is a worthwhile addition, but hopefully not a particularly pressing one since people usually don't kill the NPCS. 

7 minutes ago, LadyWYT said:

In that case, if you're really wanting to just murder all the NPCs so you can take their stuff without repercussion, then realistically, the story ought to get the Morrowind treatment. The NPCs don't respawn, and the player gets notified that the world is now doomed, since the story can't be completed due to missing characters, and now needs to start over. Of course, if the NPC was a seraph, then they should respawn, and hold an eternal grudge, which once again prevents the player from completing the main story.

It's probably worth adding a bit of a Morrowind treatment as is, just to say "yes we saw that." Probably not worth producing much hidden content for though. 

[Parco]

1 minute ago, LadyWYT said:

In that case, if you're really wanting to just murder all the NPCs so you can take their stuff without repercussion, then realistically, the story ought to get the Morrowind treatment. The NPCs don't respawn, and the player gets notified that the world is now doomed, since the story can't be completed due to missing characters, and now needs to start over. Of course, if the NPC was a seraph, then they should respawn, and hold an eternal grudge, which once again prevents the player from completing the main story.

you know, that could be an actually fun alternative gamemode. Joining the dark side turning to a corrupt version of yourself and in a eternal war with other seraph npcs that keeps raiding you if you dont find and raid them first.

its actually a shame tes games didnt follow up on the permanent consequences after morrowind. i personally dont mind things getting messed up because of ones own actions, if you kill tobias then dont expect any more story progression, it just makes sense

[Teh Pizza Lady]

7 minutes ago, Parco said:

if you kill tobias then dont expect any more story progression, it just makes sense

If you kill tobias, the game should delete itself.

[Bruno Willis]

6 minutes ago, Parco said:

you know, that could be an actually fun alternative gamemode. Joining the dark side turning to a corrupt version of yourself and in a eternal war with other seraph npcs that keeps raiding you if you dont find and raid them first.

I have a feeling the devs, and most of the player base, wouldn't be interested in seeing what that story was like. Because vintage story is realistic and uncompromising, I'd imagine there'd be a few moments of bloodlust, and a long long time of sandbox play in a lonely world with no NPCs to talk to. 

I certainly wouldn't want the devs to spend any real time worrying about that playstyle. 

[Parco]

Just now, Teh Pizza Lady said:

If you kill tobias, the game should delete itself.

i dont actually disagree, but make it more dramatic. did you play halo reach? at the end of that game you basically are locked in an endless fight until you eventually defeated, could add something similar, where the world eventually, maybe after a ingame year, falls into chaos where the rot returns and infect the player which disables respawning and temporal storms become more and more often until its constant and eventually player dies of rot or from drifters.

[Parco]

6 minutes ago, Bruno Willis said:

I have a feeling the devs, and most of the player base, wouldn't be interested in seeing what that story was like. Because vintage story is realistic and uncompromising, I'd imagine there'd be a few moments of bloodlust, and a long long time of sandbox play in a lonely world with no NPCs to talk to. 

I certainly wouldn't want the devs to spend any real time worrying about that playstyle. 

yea such a thing could be a mod if someone wants to make it

[LadyWYT]

Just now, Bruno Willis said:

I have a feeling the devs, and most of the player base, wouldn't be interested in seeing what that story was like. Because vintage story is realistic and uncompromising, I'd imagine there'd be a few moments of bloodlust, and a long long time of sandbox play in a lonely world with no NPCs to talk to. 

I certainly wouldn't want the devs to spend any real time worrying about that playstyle. 

THIS. Plus I think that realistically, if the player had the option to be evil, then logically they should only get the worst ending possible, and have a horrible time getting there(in which case, they're probably also going to complain about getting such a bad ending, despite the fact that they did so much evil). Even with just committing petty crimes regularly, the only ending that should be possible there is a mediocre one--not bad, but nothing satisfying either(which again, will probably generate several complaints when players inevitably play a tamer murderhobo, and don't receive a hero's reward). In order to actually get a good ending befitting a heroic character, one needs to actually act like one. And as I mentioned before, the player isn't exactly a nobody in the story...spoilers:

Spoiler

The player was a close friend of both Tobias and Jonas. How close seems to depend somewhat on class, but given that both characters have good morals, I really doubt they would be close friends with someone of poor character. Rather, evil individuals probably got visited by the Blackguard, if not exiled to the surface and left to the mercy of the Rot.

Overall, the devs have a specific story to tell, and it doesn't seem to be one that encourages, or otherwise supports, evil actions on the player's part. The NPCs will respawn if killed, partly to avoid the player breaking things(because it's inevitable that most players will try killing an NPC at least once, to see what happens), and also likely to avoid the player being unable to complete the story in the event an NPC dies accidentally(like falling from the sky...and yes that's actually been an issue).

 

9 minutes ago, Parco said:

i dont actually disagree, but make it more dramatic. did you play halo reach? at the end of that game you basically are locked in an endless fight until you eventually defeated, could add something similar, where the world eventually, maybe after a ingame year, falls into chaos where the rot returns and infect the player which disables respawning and temporal storms become more and more often until its constant and eventually player dies of rot or from drifters.

Not to be rude, but I do have to ask now...did you actually play through the story of Vintage Story and read the associated dialogue and lore text? Because there's a lot of this that just does not fit at all with what's laid out in the lore.

[Parco]

26 minutes ago, LadyWYT said:

Not to be rude, but I do have to ask now...did you actually play through the story of Vintage Story and read the associated dialogue and lore text? Because there's a lot of this that just does not fit at all with what's laid out in the lore.

I have played through it yea, but not read every associated bits of lore, so not fully updated on it, so yea it probably didnt fit with the lore, but you get what i mean by adding something more dramatic way of ending the world if those player actions were to be taken, either way its not really a fully serious suggestion more a quick response to potentially build on to what pizza lady said as a player consequence.