Of Carts and Foxes and Treasures and Bees
August 19, 2021 7:07 AM Subscribe
On Tuesday, Nate Purkeypile (@NPurkeypile) shared a fun story about the development process of the now-famous Skyrim Intro. Inspired by this, yesterday, Joel Burgess (@JoelBurgess) shared another Skyrim development story, about foxes leading players to treasure. Both stories are treats.
Immoveable bees brings to mind the old legend of the killer carp in dwarf fortress.
posted by kaibutsu at 7:55 AM on August 19, 2021 [2 favorites]
posted by kaibutsu at 7:55 AM on August 19, 2021 [2 favorites]
Oblivion has a few fun emergent behavior during development stories as well. My favorite is that as they were first developing what would later be labeled by Bethesda's marketing wonks as "Radiant AI".
They found that when town guards who were patrolling the areas immediately outside of town would get hungry, sometimes they'd choose to hunt down local wildlife, like say deer. Except that they had set killing deer as a crime. When the player commits a crime and gets caught, they have options: pay fine (for small crimes), go to jail, or try to resist arrest which usually means a fight to the death with all the guards in the immediate area. NPCs who commit crimes don't get a choice, they're forced into that last option.
So hungry guard kills a deer to try to get some venison. This triggers the next nearest guard's nigh-omniscient crime-sense, so he then tries to arrest the Hungry Guard. Hungry Guard resists, but the fight that ensues between the two results in the both of them getting flagged for the more serious crime of attacking a guard. This ends up catching the attention of even more guards, until the entire town watch is killing itself trying to arrest each other.
If I remember right, the solution involved a combination of toning down the hunger mechanic in the Radiant AI, tweaking the NPC factions system so that guards ignored their own crimes, and making sure that containers in cities were stocked with a few items of respawning un-owned food, so that other NPCs wouldn't have to get flagged for crimes while trying to eat.
posted by radwolf76 at 8:03 AM on August 19, 2021 [11 favorites]
They found that when town guards who were patrolling the areas immediately outside of town would get hungry, sometimes they'd choose to hunt down local wildlife, like say deer. Except that they had set killing deer as a crime. When the player commits a crime and gets caught, they have options: pay fine (for small crimes), go to jail, or try to resist arrest which usually means a fight to the death with all the guards in the immediate area. NPCs who commit crimes don't get a choice, they're forced into that last option.
So hungry guard kills a deer to try to get some venison. This triggers the next nearest guard's nigh-omniscient crime-sense, so he then tries to arrest the Hungry Guard. Hungry Guard resists, but the fight that ensues between the two results in the both of them getting flagged for the more serious crime of attacking a guard. This ends up catching the attention of even more guards, until the entire town watch is killing itself trying to arrest each other.
If I remember right, the solution involved a combination of toning down the hunger mechanic in the Radiant AI, tweaking the NPC factions system so that guards ignored their own crimes, and making sure that containers in cities were stocked with a few items of respawning un-owned food, so that other NPCs wouldn't have to get flagged for crimes while trying to eat.
posted by radwolf76 at 8:03 AM on August 19, 2021 [11 favorites]
"It's not a crime if the guards do it" might be the most depressingly realistic bug fix of all time.
posted by dng at 8:10 AM on August 19, 2021 [39 favorites]
posted by dng at 8:10 AM on August 19, 2021 [39 favorites]
Even moreso in that they didn't make the action not a crime, but just made the other guards not care.
posted by Navelgazer at 8:18 AM on August 19, 2021 [11 favorites]
posted by Navelgazer at 8:18 AM on August 19, 2021 [11 favorites]
The stocking cities with unowned food so the people had something to eat though, that part is not depressing. (Couldn’t they have just paid the guards some food every so often?)
posted by nat at 8:43 AM on August 19, 2021 [2 favorites]
posted by nat at 8:43 AM on August 19, 2021 [2 favorites]
Immoveable bees brings to mind the old legend of the killer carp in dwarf fortress.
Or how giant sponges used to be effectively immortal. No blood, organs, or any body parts meant that they couldn't be killed through normal means.
posted by nathan_teske at 8:53 AM on August 19, 2021 [3 favorites]
Or how giant sponges used to be effectively immortal. No blood, organs, or any body parts meant that they couldn't be killed through normal means.
posted by nathan_teske at 8:53 AM on August 19, 2021 [3 favorites]
The stocking cities with unowned food so the people had something to eat though, that part is not depressing. (Couldn’t they have just paid the guards some food every so often?)
This reminds me that all of the cities in Oblivion also had at least one or two homeless beggars living within their walls. I can't recall whether they were ever seen being arrested for stealing food, but you interact with them enough that the can't have been spending all of their time in the jail cells. Maybe they were eating the public food as well?
posted by Navelgazer at 9:43 AM on August 19, 2021
This reminds me that all of the cities in Oblivion also had at least one or two homeless beggars living within their walls. I can't recall whether they were ever seen being arrested for stealing food, but you interact with them enough that the can't have been spending all of their time in the jail cells. Maybe they were eating the public food as well?
posted by Navelgazer at 9:43 AM on August 19, 2021
Following a fox up a mountain to a secluded shrine to an unknown god was really kind of a magical moment in Skyrim, and one of the few things I really remember from playing it. I'm glad for that accidental behavior.
posted by egypturnash at 4:27 PM on August 19, 2021
posted by egypturnash at 4:27 PM on August 19, 2021
I can't read anything in Twitter without having to log in with an account I don't/won't have so here's a Threadreader about foxes.
posted by fiercekitten at 6:40 PM on August 19, 2021 [1 favorite]
posted by fiercekitten at 6:40 PM on August 19, 2021 [1 favorite]
That cart ride was weird for me because it wasn't bumpy. It looked like a smoother ride than my car on the road by my house. A cart like that on a road like that should have been super bouncy.
(Maybe they needed more triangles for that)
posted by MtDewd at 7:35 PM on August 19, 2021
(Maybe they needed more triangles for that)
posted by MtDewd at 7:35 PM on August 19, 2021
Related: this list of AI fachidiotische schlimmverbesserungen. tinyurl.com/ynmcuk5k
posted by Sterros at 11:35 AM on August 20, 2021 [1 favorite]
posted by Sterros at 11:35 AM on August 20, 2021 [1 favorite]
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posted by firechicago at 7:16 AM on August 19, 2021 [7 favorites]