NPC Contracts and You...........

ArchivedUser

I have a few ideas on the types I would love to see, and some that I would like to see, and others that look to be in the game. This is just a guess, but here goes.

NPC Contracts could be for the following. Be you Online or Offline, they will be there to help.

1. Vendor - Buying and selling for the players.

2. Mine Worker - When you have a big operation.

3. Inn Keeper - They handle your place while your away

4. Barmaids - They server your drinks and food

5. Guards - Used in the Freeholds and Caravans

6. Mercenary - A little help when you have no one else.

7. Solders - Siege war only

8. Farm hand - They help with your crops, and pick them when ready, if you don't.

9. Hunting Aid - This might be a choice between a Dog or a Tracker, if you don't have that skill as a hunter.

10. Town Crier - Used to advertise for you in the towns or along the road, with limits of course.

Did I miss any? Anyway, I think the contract idea is the way to go within AoC, it works in other games that use it, and I don't see why AoC can't use it to an expanded role. Contracts in general are temporary, so once they are up the NPC will go away. The exception should be Shops and Inns, they should extend the deal a little longer. So as long as the money is there, you can keep the deal going. Again, the others should end when the contract is up. IMO

What do you Guys and Gals think?

ArchivedUser

I actually don't know much about how these systems will work but I do hope they're very limited in what they can do. I dislike the idea of NPCs gathering for you like in BDO.

ArchivedUser

Elder said:

I actually don't know much about how these systems will work but I do hope they're very limited in what they can do. I dislike the idea of NPCs gathering for you like in BDO.

This is mainly coming from my days in SWG, there we had machines that would work the areas to get what was needed. main examples was with mining, you would setup your miner in a sweet spot, and leave it for the week, and return to get all the resources.

Now in a game like AoC, true we should do most of the work on our own, but mainly I was thinking why now has the NPC work as an aid to what we are doing. If we are on or offline, they can still do the work. There is a very small example of this in SWToR, where you send your NPC people of to do odds and end type jobs, and they only do 1 thing at a time. I am not saying let them do all the work, just they should have expanded roles to help with your work.

ArchivedUser

They have said that there will be a harvester mechanic similar to SWG. No specific examples or details beyond a casual mention in an early livestream. Did say that they would be expensive to craft and maintain, may be a guild activity versus a solo effort. We also know that you will be able to hire different npcs to do different functions on your freehold. Hireable companions for use in the open world has not been touched upon. Caravan guards will be part of the level of the caravan, the higher the level (worth) of the caravan, the more guards you will be able to hire. Town npc and guards will be attackable only during a siege, and once again, while we have no specifics, you can bet their numbers will be a function of the city hall in preparing defenses for a siege. You can expect their effectiveness to be tweaked over the course of testing. Would be kind of useless if you have 10 caravan guards, but the only criteria for winning a caravan was crippling the wagons, leading to zerg mechanics ignoring guards and blasting objective only. Same goes for node sieges, we know that part of having a successful siege will be the taking of certain districts of a city, with the final being capping the flag at the city center. After looking at Shadow of War and other mechanics from games where I was just able to blast right by the "planned" siege route and skip to the end capping a flag while taking out the "trigger" npc, we can hope they make the mechanic truly challenging.

ArchivedUser

Yep read all of that, and it's why I wanted to break it down, if for nothing else in my mind, and I posted it here. Maybe we are missing a few, and we can flesh it out more.