he term “NPC” (Non-Player Character) is, perhaps, used a bit too broadly. When used in the context of Blades, NPC can either refer to
(A) any character in the story other than the party,
(B) any friendly character in the story other than the party, or
(C) friendly characters in the story that join and assist the party.
This article, as you may have guessed, is only concerned with final of the three categories.
NPCs joining the party was first done in Amazonian Saga, but it wasn’t until Doom Moon II was released that the Blades community realized the true potential NPCs could have towards improving a scenario.
NPCs provide designers with many powerful tools previously lacked, and enable enhancement of several standard design modes. Most notably:
- NPCs allow the designer to speak in 1st person.
NPCs, once they’ve joined a party, allow the scenario programmer to provide the player with information in means other than the traditional, “As you enter the deserted city, you sense something is wrong..” format. Although Blades is a powerful tool, its design limitations often handicap scenario creators from effectively conveying moods, atmospheres, settings to the player. A message which says, “You sure feel creepy walking into this deserted mansion..” is regrettable, but often unavoidable. A message, in which a member of the party says, “I get a bad feeling about this place, keep your eyes open and your blades drawn...” Isn’t perfect, to be sure, but it’s a heck of a lot better. Additionally, through the use of such messages, you can not only convey information to the player, but also build the NPCs personality.
- NPCs provide an excellent “side-quest” incentive.
Let’s face it — veteran BOE players have parties who have every spell, parties with nearly limitless gold, parties who’ve got great weapons and armor. If you want to induce players to embark upon side quests in your scenario, you need to do something new. NPCs can be a great answer to this dilemma, provided you make them worthwhile (see below).
- NPCs are a great source of “necessary but cumbersome” information.
Often, as a designer, you will need the party to acquire/realize some crucial piece of information, but will have to railroad in an awkward mechanism for acquiring it. The poison cure conveniently located in the assassin’s bookshelf. The secret password to the underground lair, which for some unknown reason, the bandits told the local innkeeper. The key piece of history on the ancient and forgotten evil arch-Lich, that luckily, for some reason, a local mage knows all about. And so on... Although often necessary, this means of transferring information can often seriously damage the quality of the scenario. NPCs, by contrast and if designed well, can be an alternate source of this information. Of course, no optional NPC should ever have mandatory knowledge.
Now, it’s easy to represent an NPC in a party with a special item, and call an “If then..” or two to spice things up at certain locals. But as Doom Moon II proved, NPCs can be a far greater force, arriving to fight not only the final end boss, but also any significant counters in between. The mechanisms for accomplishing such are as follows:
Let’s say you want to have a friendly bard named Iolo join the party if and only if the party has slain Puff the Magic Dragon. To accomplish this, you’d want to have Iolo waiting in a nearby town somewhere, maybe at the local pub. When the party comes up to interact with Iolo, and asks him to join, call the following chain:
- If SDF (Killed Puff?) is 1 go to 3, otherwise go to 2.
- Display Message, “I am sorry, but I will not join your party until Puff is dead.”
- If Have Special Item (Iolo) go to 4, otherwise go to 5.
- Display Message, “I have already agreed to join your party, let us depart!”
- Destroy Monster (Iolo).
- Set Flag (Iolo’s Life Flag) to = 1 (This will prevent Iolo from reappearing in the town after the town resests.)
- Give Special Item (Iolo)
- Display Message, “I would be honored to join the famous warrior who slew Puff the Magic Dragon.”
Representing the NPC as a special item serves several purposes. First, it represents to the player that Iolo is in the party. Secondly, it provides convenience of access for the designer later on, as checking if a party has a special item is much easier than any of the alternatives. Finally, and probably most importantly, it allows you as the designer to build in a fail-safe for the NPC, allowing the party to recall the character.
This is easily done. In the special item box, check the “Special Item Can Be Used” box, and call a special node that destroys the NPC monster type. You may wish to include a message such as, “Iolo has rejoined your party”. It’s important to include such a fail-safe, for without it, if the NPC ever turns hostile, say because your Firestorm spell was just a bit off target, there will be no way for the party to reverse the process, short of fleeing the town, and waiting for it to reset.
So now the NPC’s in the party, and you’re probably asking, “What’s the best way to make him/her/it appear for battle?” Good question. Here’s the method I use, stripped down:
- If have special item (Iolo), then go to 2, otherwise end.
- Call One Time Place Town Encounter #5, (Which in the town has been preset to Iolo).
Simple, right? And if you’re only using one NPC for one battle, that’s all you’ll need to do. But what if you’re using multiple NPCs, for multiple battles, any one of which might or might not be included? Here’s the technique I used for Falling Stars:
Designate an encounter class, from 1 to 9, for each NPC. Let’s say Iolo has encounter class #5, and let’s bring along another NPC, Gwenno, who we’ll give encounter class #6.
Every time you have a major battle (in a town), call the same scenario special from the town, via “Call Global Special” for the General Node category. The Scenario Special chain should look like this:
- Have special item (Iolo)? If yes, go to 2, otherwise go to 3.
- One Time Place Town Encounter #5, go to 3.
- Have special item (Gwenno)? If yes, go to 4, otherwise end.
- One Time Place Town Encounter #6, end.
Now, in each town that has a major battle, you present Iolo and Gwenno where you want them when the major battle begins, and set Iolo to encounter class #5 and Gwenno to #6. Voila!
Obviously, with two NPCs, the chain isn’t very complicated. But it’s not too hard to see why this method, if you’re using five or six or ten different NPCs throughout the scenario, can save you a lot of time and effort.
The only thing left to do now is to plan for NPC death, which isn’t difficult. Edit the monster type that is the NPC, and check the “Call Scenario Special When Killed” Box. That Scenario Special should call a node that takes the special item NPC from the party.
Finally, although I feel this NPC method can add a great deal to a scenario, I would be remiss if I did not mention its limitations and drawbacks:
If you use a lot of NPCs, you seriously limit the number of one-time placed encounters you can have in a town. Blades contains a very low limit per town of these, and you might run into design limitations as the number of potential NPCs grows. If anyone wonders why in Falling Stars no NPCs showed up in Simon’s Estate, this is the reason. With the animation and node limitations involved, it was simply impossible to get the gang into the estate. However, as Stareye pointed out, there is a way around this.
NPCs can’t show up in outdoor encounters, or at least, they can’t show up without a lot of work. In Doom Moon II, the original NPC could appear only because (A) she started with the party and could never leave and (B) if she ever died, the party died, and the scenario ended. Absent such restricted circumstances, it can’t be done.
NPCs aren’t good for “town-wide” battles. The Blades AI is awful, friendly and powerful NPCs are great for hacking to bits monsters they can see. Monsters around the corner? Don’t count on it, the NPCs will just mill about.
Be careful with friendly spellcasters. The Blades AI shows no problems frying friendly monsters with firestorms, provided enemy monsters are hit as well. This can be especially insulting when the enemy is magic immune/absorbent, as the NPC spellcasters won’t even scratch their foes (and may actually aid them!) as their pummeling you to death.
|