Preston nods as you relate the bare bones of what happened out there as you lead your horse into town. That takes more than a little while, and at the end you are standing out in front of the Mother-lode saloon.
“Word has it that the Red Ribbon mining camp got hit. There were no survivors. Anya and Randall Admunsen…” Preston begins, chokes up. “They… I knew them. Hard bargainers, if only penny wise. They didn’t deserve this. Any of it. God help you if I find out you were involved with anything more than the edges of it.” Somewhere inside the saloon, a guitar strums to life. A raucous chorus rises up, of men looking to wet their throats and others eager to take their gold. Dressed in his finery, The two of you look right at home.
He flips you a big silver coin. “You’ve been working hard. Have a meal, a drink and a bath on the town.”
Is it intentional that you can get this scene after “telling the truth” about the fact that you just massacred Red Ribbon yourself?
I don’t really like bars they just look like numbers to me nothing else but in apex patroll i liked the things like “as cunning as a fox that teaches cunning at the university of cunning” this made the game much better in my view it even made me play the game through a couple of times (something I never do) to see diffrent descriptions forth stats
You-“Yeah, then I massacred Red Ribbon. All of them.”
Preston- “Well, there were no survivors, so if I find out you had anything to with that…”
You- “Hey, I said I did it.”
Preston- “I mean, Anya and Randall weren’t exactly friends, but still…”
You- “Are you deaf man? I did it. I’m the one and I’m here to confess!”
Preston- “Have a meal, a drink and a bath on the town.”
You- *sigh*.
That sort of scene really doesn’t work for me. I’ve fixed it on the master copy. An easy thing to do, as it turns out. Oh, and thanks for the numbers. Those always help me get my head around where to set the difficulties.
I can imagine the Law and Order stats that Miss Slaughter had as being indicative of her low honor stat. The Law is fine, as long as it works in her favor. Order is okay, as long as she gets something out of it. Still, were you trying to lower both of those? If so, I have made doing so too hard.
Mardam- I am glad you enjoyed that part of Apex Patrol. It was fun to write those descriptions, but in Tin Star I feel there to be a need for more shades of expertise as the story unfolds over a far longer period of time.
However, I am now thinking of adding something to the wrap up where it mentions your relative skill levels. You had hands like lightning, You never figured out how to light a length of slow match. You could charm a snake into a dress. Barns were safe from your rifle, etc.
Twelve stats. About seven entries per stat. Eighty-four entries in all. This will take a while and likely have to wait until chapter four is done. I do, however, accept suggestions.
@Allen: As I said, Slaughter lived up to her name. I think everyone who she -could- shoot, she did, from the prospector, to Harry Winthrop (to name the most blitheringly-obvious case of murder in the game), to the Ribbons. That should screw my Law stat as much as my Honor. Murdering your problems in cold blood is a sign of a willingness to throw Law to the wind when it gets in the way of getting what you want, as well as being the sign of a low-down rattler. A marshal who’s just a bandit with a badge is not a Law-abiding citizen.
Incidentally, when you massacre the Red Ribbons, you get the following:
(Honor greatly decreased, Law decreased, Order decreased)
This is bugged; Law and Order are not decreased.
Order, I think, is going to have to be more important later on; if I’m getting it right, the Order/Freedom stat is more a matter of management style than it is of personal morality. If this is so, then personally committing murder to “set an example” shouldn’t reduce your Order that much; just because you’re a bandit with a badge doesn’t mean you allow any competition in the banditry business.
Ramidel- Good points. Law should be reduced more often for those acts that run counter to the rules of civilization. Order… yeah, having a tight fist would be a preference for how things operate. Can a society have order without law? Yes, the iron fist of a dictator is exactly that. Can there be law without order? That is a bit more complex of a question.
I’ll put an assessment of Honor, Law and Order on my list of things to do. The Red Ribbon portion I can fix right now. But, as you indicated, the massacre is more of a disdain for Law than a function of order.
idontlikeusernames- Another data set. Excellent. Thank you very much.
I notice people are putting a lot of emphasis on Gunfighting and Sharpshooting. A good thing given the genre, but does that need to be more blatant? Things will get violent eventually after all, and I don’t want a player to throw up their hands in disgust that the character they’ve put so much into has become useless.
@Allen: Well, if you prefer to solve your problems through violence, then you’ll want to have high Gunfighting and Sharpshooting; in other words, Caroline’s data set was exactly what you’d expect given how she operated. That said, I’m going to try a playthrough with a silver tongue and see where it leads (and if I can avoid shooting anyone at all in it). Data set on the way.
Cloudian, what I’d like is for a character to have at least one fighting skill. Be it gunfighting, sharpshooting or brawling. After all, this is the Old West and disputes are sometimes resolved violently.
What I don’t want is for a character to become over specialized in, say, law or engineering. Then, when push comes to shove, the player finds it impossible to move forward because they can’t fight at all. Reminding players of that possibility would go a long way to preventing that and I wanted to know if you, or others, felt a steady need to invest in combat related skills.
Ramidel- I’m looking forward to hearing about your playthrough. In particular, I’d be interested in your thoughts on the various companions.
I love playin as a silver-tounged badass warrior in most Rpgs, but @AllenGies yeah i think that you should roll up all those combat skills alltogether, maybe even bundle other skills, have to say theres alot of them and it just gets too hard to manage all of them.(if that answers you properly)
@AllenGies
I like @Cloudian 's idea but instead of bundling stats together why not have them effect a “Combat Readiness” stat which will determine how well we survive in combat situations(if we get injured and if so to what degree) but still allow for bonuses or decrease to the “CR” stat in certain situations based on the other three stats for example in bear situation have have a high “Sharpshooting” score increase survivability but a low “Sharpshooting” decrease survivability.
Never pulled the trigger on anyone, and arrested the Admunsens. They’ll be facing trial in Elko for claim-jumping, of course, but whether they hang ain’t my department.
I went out there with Carson, since he seemed like the ideal companion for Mei-mei; likewise religious, and a fair shot with a rifle in case things did go finally sour (not that they would, of course). Not a bad companion, and making him the religious and peaceful sort by nature was an interesting spin on a cowboy.
Schmidt…well, he’s an archetypal character, no question. Sourdough who’s been out in Nevada since before there was a Nevada. I’ve used him with previous characters, but he’s a bit bland.
Caraway was interesting. Definitely archetypal (at least, from movies), but a gunslinger girl is always a lively character and an obligatory romance option. Ordinarily, I’d use her if I wanted a maverick character who didn’t mind a bit of banditry; I only didn’t use her on the massacre run because there was an option to kill her She would have gone with Meixiang like oil and water, though.
I’ve fixed it on the master copy. An easy thing to do, as it turns out. Oh, and thanks for the numbers. Those always help me get my head around where to set the difficulties.
wanted to be able to talk myself out of trouble, well for the most part.