You have obviously never been robbed at gun point before.
No, I have not, and I'm going to refrain from making any assumptions about whether you have.
On the other hand, I assume that in your average robbery, there's reason to believe that the robber in question only wants your stuff, and has no interest in killing you unless you give him a reason. If a notorious necromancer known for slaughtering guards and killing people for no reason at all comes into my shop, that doesn't exactly apply. If a known serial murderer walked into your store, would you really stick around to see if he's feeling nice today?
So it is a fantasy realm. And a place where "Law" doesn't exist as it does in our world today. The 'flaming Fists' are mercenaries and little more than that. And regardless of your reputation level, by the end of the game, your PC has killed probably hundreds of intelligent beings including a fair number of Humans/elves/dwarves. etc... So if someone with a reputation as being 'Despised', who has already taken several lives walks into my shop, I am not going to automatically 'Assume' that they are just wanting a nice chat. And if they catch me off guard such that I can't run out the back and call for the guards, they are going to get whatever discount rate is going to save my neck. I certainly am not going to try and bilk them for more cash.
All in fun.
and yes, I used to work as a teller at a bank. Got robbed twice at gun point. Wouldn't want that to happen again.
Fair enough. It's just that when you say "armed robbery," I imagine a scenario in which a relatively anonymous person walks in and suddenly pulls a gun on me. When you say "band of heavily armed and armored psychotic killers," I'm imagining that The Joker and his Clown Gang just walked through the front door.
The main problem is that BG isn't equipped to let you rob stores at sword-point (or staff-end, or mace-head). So if your rep is in the 6-8 range, you come off as unsavory but not willing to have the guards on you, and if your rep is 5 or less the game is forced to assume that you are attempting to politely haggle over a wand while trying to scrape the gore off your boots.
Really, for the low low rep types, it should be a coin flip between "shopkeeper rolls over and gives you what you want at the slightest hint of violence," and "the shopkeeper saw you coming and decided he'd rather be anywhere else but in the same room as you." The idea that the shopkeeper is doing mental calculus based on the number of horrific stories about you to determine that a 50% discount is what will convince you to leave him alone is just silly.
I agree, a store owner who tries to stay alive would not overcharge known criminals. That would only give them more reason to kill him or at least steal. Unless it's a complete psychopath who already shows up swinging a bloody axe, these villains enter the shop as customers willing to pay. The best way to make them go away as soon as possible and stay as unharmed as possible is to give them what they want and not give them a reason to get angry. Naming an astronomical price is a good way to make ANY customer angry. If those villains walk up to your counter, slam a bunch of weapons on it and ask "how much?", you know they are willing to pay - and you aren't in a robbery/direct danger - so you give them the best possible price and hope they leave.
More or less my point. As before, if Mr Necromancer walks in the store with his psychotic dwarf and hobbit in toe, I wouldn't be doing mental calculus either. I would do one equation. Divide by 100%. Why take a risk. It is only stuff.
However, there it breaks down. The original intent was to make it so you got rewarded for your good behavior. That wouldn't work out if you could reduce your reputation to 5 and get everything in the game for free. So the whole system is borked. But, hey. If that is the only problem with the game, I can deal with that.
That noble pissed me off by insulting my clothes, I killed him, 4 rep down. I took in the drow as a party member, 2 rep down. I let the slaves drown in the mine, 2 rep down.
It's very easy to play evil without being total jackass.... just a bit maybe.
This is off-topic, but I've often wondered whether we're supposed to imagine the shops in fantasy games like D&D being like modern supermarkets (browse the shelves, pick out what you want, bring it to the counter and pay for it), or like earlier general stores (look at samples or a list of goods, tell the clerk what you want, stockboy brings something out from the back, and then you start haggling over the price).
this is all speculation on my part, but I kind of see it like the old west. Pretty much whatever is on sale is on display. Precious items like jewelry might be locked up, but i wouldn't imagine that there would be a huge storehouse locked up somewhere. And I definitely don't see people reading a list of description for the primary reason that not a lot of people could read.
I'd say it's the latter. You only get to see the goods after talking to someone. Most stores also have surprisingly few shelves, so there is no room for more than samples and the real stock is... in the basement most stores don't seem to have. Under the perfectly hidden magical trap door in the floor, made from shapeshifter bones that make the door blend into the floor.
That's a possibility too, and more in line with the way the store is handled. But..... You can still 'Pick Pocket' at some stores. Which makes me think that at least some stuff has to merely be on display. But then it is just a game, so....
Also if you go all the way down shops will no longer sell to you.
Does this make sense to anyone? I mean, if a band of heavily armed and armored psychotic killers walked into my store, i would hardly be trying to gouge them for every cent. In fact, they would instantly get the highest discount i thought I could live with (meaning the discount that would keep me alive).
"Yes, sir Mr Necromancer. As luck would have it, you came during our 'Everything is free' sale, so long as you don't turn the sales staff into anything Unnatural."
Every time this subject comes up I cannot resist the urge to post this scene from No Country For Old Men:
That's a possibility too, and more in line with the way the store is handled. But..... You can still 'Pick Pocket' at some stores. Which makes me think that at least some stuff has to merely be on display. But then it is just a game, so....
You can steal the samples... each and every one of the few dozens of samples...
Hmmm... well I think I have the broad ideas for my reputation system overhaul worked out. Probably post about it later, although in no way a programmer so would have no chance of pulling it off myself.
For me, a decent reputation system would have three factors.
Like: How nice a person you are. How helpful you are to people. How likely you are to be decent and honorable you can be. A Lawful good Paladin might be extremely rigid in his or her outlook on things and so therefore might not be very well liked.
Respect: How competent you are power wise. How well you keep your word. How much you keep your word. Or on the flip side, how thorough you are in following through with your threats. A Chaotic Evil Necromancer might be highly respected for his power and capabilities with raising an undead army.
Fear: Generally how good you are in combat. How terrible is your Wrath. How committed you are to some specific ideology, particularly if it is opposite to the person evaluating that factor.
At the end of the day, a Paladin might be highly respected, but feared and not very well liked due to his fanaticism. A Thief might be highly liked as a generally genial guy and very much respected for his adherence to the thieves code and only a little feared because he keeps quiet the bad things he has done. A good and kindly, if a bit absent minded cleric might be very much liked, but not respected because of his ineptness. and certainly not feared as he wouldn't hurt a fly.
These three factors could very effectively give a temperature for any encounter. And depending on who you are dealing with and how the three factors intersect, could make for some really interesting reactions. But, I wouldn't know how to implement it in this game.
I would also comment that factions are an absolute necessary part of the above scenario. All IMHO.
For me, a decent reputation system would have three factors.
Like: How nice a person you are. How helpful you are to people. How likely you are to be decent and honorable you can be. A Lawful good Paladin might be extremely rigid in his or her outlook on things and so therefore might not be very well liked.
Respect: How competent you are power wise. How well you keep your word. How much you keep your word. Or on the flip side, how thorough you are in following through with your threats. A Chaotic Evil Necromancer might be highly respected for his power and capabilities with raising an undead army.
Fear: Generally how good you are in combat. How terrible is your Wrath. How committed you are to some specific ideology, particularly if it is opposite to the person evaluating that factor.
At the end of the day, a Paladin might be highly respected, but feared and not very well liked due to his fanaticism. A Thief might be highly liked as a generally genial guy and very much respected for his adherence to the thieves code and only a little feared because he keeps quiet the bad things he has done. A good and kindly, if a bit absent minded cleric might be very much liked, but not respected because of his ineptness. and certainly not feared as he wouldn't hurt a fly.
These three factors could very effectively give a temperature for any encounter. And depending on who you are dealing with and how the three factors intersect, could make for some really interesting reactions. But, I wouldn't know how to implement it in this game.
I would also comment that factions are an absolute necessary part of the above scenario. All IMHO.
Would you see "like" and "fear" as being opposite factors within the same faction, then? Would it be possible to be both liked and feared by the same group of people? A side effect of this in your average RPG would be that the PCs would almost necessarily rack up a high Fear score (which is itself an interesting commentary on the genre).
It makes me think of the more recent Doctor Who episodes with the Eleventh Doctor, and how they drove home the idea that the Doctor is a nice and likable guy, but is also very scary to anyone who's been on his bad side.
Would you see "like" and "fear" as being opposite factors within the same faction, then? Would it be possible to be both liked and feared by the same group of people? A side effect of this in your average RPG would be that the PCs would almost necessarily rack up a high Fear score (which is itself an interesting commentary on the genre).
It makes me think of the more recent Doctor Who episodes with the Eleventh Doctor, and how they drove home the idea that the Doctor is a nice and likable guy, but is also very scary to anyone who's been on his bad side.
I would not see Like and fear as opposites. I can like someone because he is cool to hang out with, but fear him because he is such a bad-@$$. And yes, I think that the fear aspect would have to ratchet up quite rapidly with all of the killing that is done. maybe there would be negatives to that category as well based on actions?
As far as the Dr Who episode/reference, yes. I totally get that and liked what they did there. They did an Audio CD as well with 8th Doctor where he was the Boogey Man to a group of monsters who needed watch-dogging or they might go astray. There is an element of fear that comes with that much power, no matter how nice a person you are.
See, I've always seen it as the other way around: at rep 1, the storekeepers are selling you the item at actual cost; at rep 10, they're giving you a slight discount to encourage return business; at rep 20, they're actively slashing their prices to help you.
OK.. seriously? This is just so much F***ing BS it's ridicules.
OK I've hit 1 rep, but am strong enough to fend of the Flaming Fist... but now stuff cost ONE HUNDRED TIMES normal value. Yes, ONE F***ING HUNDRED TIMES!!! at 19 charisma trying to buy The Army Scythe would cost me in the order of 117000 GP. Shadow Armor something like 134000 GP.
Are you F***ING SERIOUS?!
Honestly just F*** playing evil in the BG saga, I don't even know why the F*** they even bother giving you the alignment or NPC or F***ing evil options. At every single turn you just get bent over with no F***ing lube... Just F***ing stupidity.
(Not reputation related, but an element of this rp angle: Xzar will find a skull in High Hedge and become friends with it. I treat the skull like Boo, voluntarily blocking a quickuse slot.)
@The_New_Romance: I wish someone would add that to an NPC mod. Complete with a popup if you try to remove the skull, like Edwin and Minsc have if you try to remove the amulet or Boo. It would say "Xzar looks at you, apparently confused and frightened, while cradling the skull. 'BUT HE'S MY FRIEND!' he shrieks, before attempting to hit you with the skull." As a mod, it would also prevent this skull from being recognized for the Mellicamp quest, so there's really no way to remove it. The first skull you pick up on the map would automatically move to Xzar's quickuse slot and drop whatever he had there to his inventory.
For an evil character I generally play as a ruthless mercenary type. I'll only do things for a reward, but as long as I get paid I'll do whatever the job requires. And if someone has something I want then I won't hesitate to kill them for it.
Sometimes this means I end up doing quests for good guys and gaining rep, but that's fine too. So in BG2 for example I will kill Firkraag for his treasure and to pay him back for the trouble he has put me through. I get rep, but I didn't care for the slightest about the former landlord or his daughter.
LOL. Found a way to bork my rep without having to randomly kill some commoner. I was exploring around Nashkal and came across this nymph. She wanted me to stop these treasure hunters from digging up her stash. She tried to give me some feeble excuse that she didn't have any gold to pay me to protect her and then she flat out lied about having WMD hidden in some bunker. So I sided with the treasure hunters and ended up ganking her. Still didn't find the WMD, but I am sure they are there somewhere. And treasure. Plus, now my party loves me again.
The following table (valid for BGEE v2012) may be helpful in managing reputation:
REPUTATION
KILL INNOCENT
KILL GUARD
TEMPLE DONATION
1
0
0
500
2
-1
-1
400
3
-1
-1
300
4
-1
-2
200
5
-2
-2
200
6
-2
-3
200
7
-2
-4
100
8
-2
-5
100
9
-3
-5
100
10
-4
-6
100
11
-4
-6
100
12
-5
-7
200
13
-5
-7
200
14
-5
-8
300
15
-6
-8
300
16
-7
-9
400
17
-8
-9
500
18
-9
-9
0
19
-10
-10
0
20
-10
-10
0
The first column is the current reputation, the second the loss for killing an innocent, the third the loss for killing a guard and the last column is how much you have to donate in temples to increase by 1 the reputation.
LOL. Thanks. I am not looking for a chart to Meta-game my reputation. I was looking for anecdotal stories on how players are role playing their Evil characters and what, if anything works.
Ohwait, I usually kill the guys first, take my reward, then kill the dryad. Can you still kill the guys for the gloves, or would they be commoners and give more rep drop?
When I get around to doing my Evil play through, I'm just going with all the "jerk" chat selections, and forget the consequences of missing quests and the like. Still going to try and avoid the murderhobo aspect.
@Erg - I like your chart, could you add the Flaming Fist Spawn % to it as well? I've started an Evil play through, which I've never really done before. However I'd like to avoid being hunted by the FF too early. Also I didn't realize before that being a cop killer was worse than killing innocent children in BG!
@Lemernis - Thank you for this idea. I tried it as well, but for me Minsc chunked Oublek and the guard causing a rep loss (acceptable though, since I could bribe the Priest and still come out ahead), then attacked us and we put hi down. Also the guard was red, so if he had killed Minsc we would have had to deal with him or run away and avoid him in the future. No other guards went red though, so overall it worked out great. I may have to find a reason to do this every time hahaha
So one example that I can recall, is that he completed Prism's quest, but...
He turned in the emeralds. Got paid 300 gold. But then he charmed Oublek. And then he made Oublek attack Minsc. Who killed him. The Nashkel guards then killed Minsc.
And my Ceric/Mage who was watching the whole thing while invisible gathered up the emeralds plus the purse of 2700 gold Oublek carries, and off he went with a spring in his step and a whistle.
Comments
On the other hand, I assume that in your average robbery, there's reason to believe that the robber in question only wants your stuff, and has no interest in killing you unless you give him a reason. If a notorious necromancer known for slaughtering guards and killing people for no reason at all comes into my shop, that doesn't exactly apply. If a known serial murderer walked into your store, would you really stick around to see if he's feeling nice today?
All in fun.
and yes, I used to work as a teller at a bank. Got robbed twice at gun point. Wouldn't want that to happen again.
The main problem is that BG isn't equipped to let you rob stores at sword-point (or staff-end, or mace-head). So if your rep is in the 6-8 range, you come off as unsavory but not willing to have the guards on you, and if your rep is 5 or less the game is forced to assume that you are attempting to politely haggle over a wand while trying to scrape the gore off your boots.
Really, for the low low rep types, it should be a coin flip between "shopkeeper rolls over and gives you what you want at the slightest hint of violence," and "the shopkeeper saw you coming and decided he'd rather be anywhere else but in the same room as you." The idea that the shopkeeper is doing mental calculus based on the number of horrific stories about you to determine that a 50% discount is what will convince you to leave him alone is just silly.
However, there it breaks down. The original intent was to make it so you got rewarded for your good behavior. That wouldn't work out if you could reduce your reputation to 5 and get everything in the game for free. So the whole system is borked. But, hey. If that is the only problem with the game, I can deal with that.
It's very easy to play evil without being total jackass.... just a bit maybe.
Like: How nice a person you are. How helpful you are to people. How likely you are to be decent and honorable you can be. A Lawful good Paladin might be extremely rigid in his or her outlook on things and so therefore might not be very well liked.
Respect: How competent you are power wise. How well you keep your word. How much you keep your word. Or on the flip side, how thorough you are in following through with your threats. A Chaotic Evil Necromancer might be highly respected for his power and capabilities with raising an undead army.
Fear: Generally how good you are in combat. How terrible is your Wrath. How committed you are to some specific ideology, particularly if it is opposite to the person evaluating that factor.
At the end of the day, a Paladin might be highly respected, but feared and not very well liked due to his fanaticism. A Thief might be highly liked as a generally genial guy and very much respected for his adherence to the thieves code and only a little feared because he keeps quiet the bad things he has done. A good and kindly, if a bit absent minded cleric might be very much liked, but not respected because of his ineptness. and certainly not feared as he wouldn't hurt a fly.
These three factors could very effectively give a temperature for any encounter. And depending on who you are dealing with and how the three factors intersect, could make for some really interesting reactions. But, I wouldn't know how to implement it in this game.
I would also comment that factions are an absolute necessary part of the above scenario. All IMHO.
It makes me think of the more recent Doctor Who episodes with the Eleventh Doctor, and how they drove home the idea that the Doctor is a nice and likable guy, but is also very scary to anyone who's been on his bad side.
As far as the Dr Who episode/reference, yes. I totally get that and liked what they did there. They did an Audio CD as well with 8th Doctor where he was the Boogey Man to a group of monsters who needed watch-dogging or they might go astray. There is an element of fear that comes with that much power, no matter how nice a person you are.
OK I've hit 1 rep, but am strong enough to fend of the Flaming Fist... but now stuff cost ONE HUNDRED TIMES normal value. Yes, ONE F***ING HUNDRED TIMES!!! at 19 charisma trying to buy The Army Scythe would cost me in the order of 117000 GP. Shadow Armor something like 134000 GP.
Are you F***ING SERIOUS?!
Honestly just F*** playing evil in the BG saga, I don't even know why the F*** they even bother giving you the alignment or NPC or F***ing evil options. At every single turn you just get bent over with no F***ing lube... Just F***ing stupidity.
Sometimes this means I end up doing quests for good guys and gaining rep, but that's fine too. So in BG2 for example I will kill Firkraag for his treasure and to pay him back for the trouble he has put me through. I get rep, but I didn't care for the slightest about the former landlord or his daughter.
The first column is the current reputation, the second the loss for killing an innocent, the third the loss for killing a guard and the last column is how much you have to donate in temples to increase by 1 the reputation.
But thanks for the chart.