Persuasion skill?

[kdar1987]

I don't know if anyone made a topic about it, maybe someone did, but I will post it anyways.

I was playing one RPG, which I liked, called Goldenland (zlatagor'e) and I think it had nice use of persuasion skill, allowing your character to speak better, have more options during conversations with different NPCs, opened up to some new ways of finishing a quest (by having extra options in conversations).

I would love to see something like this in Eschalon as well.

Was there any plans for something like this?
What does everyone think?

[geishaboy]

Which of the stats would a persuasion skill be backed by? Intelligence maybe? Eschalon doesn't have a "Charisma" stat as such

Personally I don't think such a skill would really be necessary, but it's a cool idea none the less. I remember it was quite useful in the original Neverwinter Nights game

[kdar1987]

yes, maybe intelligence. or maybe just independent skill, like mercantile or cartography

[Evnissyen]

Yeah, some games have this, or some version of it.

Thing is, though... there're already so many useful skills to which you can decide whether or not to invest points in... so to add yet another that would have significant effect upon the game, at this point you'd probably have to remove one of equal significance, and I'm not so sure you really can.

I'd have to look and see.

In other words: game balancing would be a major issue with employing something like this, in terms of the attention a player ought to pay to such a skill, and just how significant or crucial or not-very-significant it is.

There're probably a few skills that haven't been given enough attention to make them borderline indispensable, but personally I'd rather they be worked on and made more valuable/significant. I don't really want to say "get rid of it" to any of these skills.

All that said: this thread should probably be moved to the Book II forum... .

[Randomizer]

Spiderweb Software's Geneforge games have a leadership skill where at certain levels you get extra dialog options to influence other people's actions without resorting to killing them.

[Evnissyen]

Yes, and the amount of a certain very potent power-giving yet addictive product that you might or might not choose to consume also determines how well you are able to keep your temper and not torch someone's head off at the slightest provocation... .

Just one of the cool aspects of the Geneforge series.

[MaximB]

Eschalon series is an old school, it doesn't have much choices and consequences - and the dialogs are very simple.
So speech skills won't "donate" a lot to this game , sadly.

BTW
Golden land looks very cool, does it happen to have a Linux client ?
Is it based on OpenGL ?

Can't find the game website.