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Post by naramoore on May 13, 2017 23:19:18 GMT
Right, steampunk not cyber. I knew I was missing something.
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Post by sleepygirl on May 13, 2017 23:22:13 GMT
This would be a nice subtitle for the mod: Refugees from Red Mountain. BTW Yagrum Bagarn makes an airtight case for a part living part machine entity. Additionally, lore and divine intervention is already documented in canon. Could be a nice little irony. The dwemer sought to create life and succeeded. Then poof, they vanished and a few centuries later out pops Dee and Co. And no Prozvec, Sorted Silt or LLamasexia around to help make sense of things. Wonderful! - I love it, - the perfect title for the mod.
I can see that I'm going to have to brush up on my Dwemer lore though as it's been some years since I last played Morrowind.
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Post by jgf on May 13, 2017 23:45:35 GMT
Perhaps the Dwemer were not trying to create life but extend their own, hence they experimented on captives of other races; they were eradicated in battle before perfecting the process, but those Dwemer hybrids ("Mechmer"?) survived. Prejudice and persecution from the Dunmer caused most to migrate to Cyrodiil.
Clothing would be superfluous for their mechanical side but may still be comfortable for their biological side; since I see them as not particularly happy with water, a raincoat (robe and hood) may be a favorite item. (Nudity doesn't seem an issue in Cyrodiil, other than Vilja no one ever complains if my characters run around naked ...I always forget to get dressed after the Nightmare quest).
How much could they repair themselves? (Obviously cannot reach everything.) How much could the PC repair them (when used as companion)? Maybe full maintenance would require a trip to Rohssan (with a large shop in the largest city, I assume her to be the best armorer in the land); or fall back on the fantasy story stereotype of an ancient, reclusive (and usually irascible and cantankerous) sorcerer who is familiar with Dwemer constructs and is the only one who can fully repair the hybrid mechanics. There is a mod (COBL?) which adds some Morrowind ingredients, including Dwemer scrap metal, to Oblivion; I can see this, with repair hammers, being required for maintenance/repair; possibly even a new "potion" - Dwemer oil - would be needed occasionally (lol, a new sound effect - creaking joints - would indicate a need; though a companion would just ask). The oil would have limited availability so you better keep a couple of flasks handy. Thus there would be several unique items and activities involved with playing as a hybrid or having one as a companion.
Looking forward to seeing how this project progresses.
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Post by Sniffles on May 14, 2017 0:01:22 GMT
In complexity, detail, lore, plots, quests, sub quests and subplots, character and theme development, and richness of the overall game and grid itself, Morrowind leaves Oblivion and Skyrim combined but pale shadows with Oblivion a Shrek 3 riding the coat tails of it's predecessor's popularity and Skyrim all about new graphics, hack and slash and game crashes. Thus for theme, detail and canon, Morrowind is the place to start.
The lore of Morrowind, which alone in the wiki is larger than all of Skyrim, is a vast source of info that lends itself easily to this mod. Replicants, twisted and distorted by Sotha Sil's envisioned ideals, already exist in Tribunal. The existing lore could easily be appended that Sotha Sil at the least suspected Replicants existed, could be made with Kagrenac's tools and the Heart of Lorkhan, and being as mentally a nutcase as his compatriots in his own way, chose that as his route to deification. Repopulating the world in his envisioned image.
Thus the appearance of these replicants, possibly made by Kagrenak himself, fits in perfectly with the underlying theme of the entire Elder Scrolls saga.
I would refer you to Qaarl's mods of Morrowind and Tribunal for inspiration on the graphics aspects of these beings. He cranked out a LLamasexia that was somewhat believable, unlike what looks like something a cat barfed up that Bethseda gave us.
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Post by Sniffles on May 14, 2017 0:13:37 GMT
PS If you choose to use the Morrowind theme and lore as in my above post, it should be kept in mind the mechanical aspect of these people is incidental, not intrinsic. How they worked, how they survived, their strengths are weaknesses are not limited or bound to basic laws of physics. They are first and foremost magical beings, forged from the heart of a god through magical means by the greatest sorcerer the world has ever known.
This need not equate to them being all powerful demigods. Throughout the lore of Morrowind there are loads of hints, clues and references to a vast number of weaknesses, screw ups and deviations that got written in to Kagrenac's efforts, his tools, and the subsequent use of his tools by the trinity of turkeybutts that wanted to emulate gods.
Thus these replicants could possess some of 'All hail these mighty beings' and some interesting sauce more in line of something Cheech and Chong would cough up: "OOOP. Aww man! Uhhh, maybe it wasn't such a bright idea to use wheat paste there." IE, never got as far as the Beta version. Still a few bugs in the works. Or maybe, works in the bugs.
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Post by Sniffles on May 14, 2017 0:40:10 GMT
PPS If you follow the general Morrowind-Lorkhan-Kagrenak theme, what ultimately came down when Kagrenak's tools were used to create-modify life displays a few serious foops. * Vivec: floating serenely in mid air in his very private chamber, contemplating his navel and humming complex one note tunes to himself * Almalexia evolved an ego the size of Vaardenfel with a cat permanently in heat mentality to finally lapse into homo-genocidal delusions of ultimate granduer * Sotha Sil, who some viewed as the grand master of things magical to ultimately digress into a hermit who got his rocks off socializing with androids and becoming wackier than a wooden watch that ended up inspiring American McGee's Mad Hatter in the game Alice.
(Recalling Squishy when the PC managed to jump through 172 hoops of fire and gain an audience with the guy: "That's Vivec? If I was the PC he'd be in for one good hard kick in the privates."
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Post by sleepygirl on May 14, 2017 13:01:25 GMT
A WIP Fabricant head. Progress not helped any by making lots of mistakes and then not saving what I'd done
I'll sleep on the many good suggestions you've made Sniffles and write a reply when I'm a bit more clear headed.
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Post by sleepygirl on May 14, 2017 21:19:34 GMT
There certainly is a lot to absorb and think about Sniffles. It was the deep levels of lore, history and culture that made me fall in love with Morrowind in the first place. All of which is making me think about dusting off my old player character, finding my Morrowind CDs and exploring the game world again.
Possibly a mistake, but I'm considering creating a mod that has two or three different replicants/fabricants/chimera type folk. Imperfectly adapting the Fabricant head texture last night is pointing me in a new direction that's much influenced by the Clockwork City. In fact the whole concept of the Clockwork City is one I could easily lose myself in for months. For a start I'll just create the head and body textures and then I can make an attempt at building up a lore based scenario/history for them.
My original Mer-mech chimera folk are still something I want to work into the threads of lore and history. The direction of them being an imperfect 'science experiment' made using Kagrenac's tools is one I do like. Jdf's suggestion that attempts were being made by Dwemer mages to find a way to extend their natural life span into near immortality by experimenting on captives is very much a workable scenario to my mind. Re-reading what I hope are the relevant parts of the Elder Scrolls Wiki reminded me that Dwemer Animunculi are powered by a type of soul gem and your own comments about magic more than physics being the stronger part of their physicality are doing their best to inform my brain as to the best way to proceed.
My present thinking is that the Mer-mech chimera folk may not be powered by one of the god sourced soul gems, but by a more mundane variety of soul gem instead which would fit nicely with your 'Cheech and Chong wheat paste' suggestion of there being a built-in beta version weakness with these Mer-mech folk. The potential for being machine gods is there, but never quite realised which I feel would give them a little more of a Human or Mer frailty.
My thought is the Fabricants wouldn't be like that, - they would be people sized bi-pedal machine demi-gods and much less nice to know.
As always comments and critique are welcome
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Post by dogonporch on May 14, 2017 22:38:36 GMT
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Post by sleepygirl on May 14, 2017 22:47:27 GMT
Looks scary. Not quite the direction I want to go in with my mod though.
Thanks for the thought, but not really what I'm trying to do.
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Post by jgf on May 14, 2017 23:26:47 GMT
"...a mod that has two or three different replicants/fabricants/chimera type folk"
It's probable these experiments took place over a span of hundreds of years (outside of Nords and Imperials the inhabitants of Morrowind were quite long lived), so it's likely you would encounter mech-mer with different degrees of hybridization. Some may be only ten percent mechanical, others only ten percent biological, and anything in between; I would think those less mechanical would retain more memory of their previous lives thus be more bitter, resentful, and dangerous; while those with little of their biological side remaining may remember nothing beyond their current existence; there might even be animosities and prejudices among them, depending on degree of hybridization. Possibly the Dwemer even experimented with various specialties of mechanical enhancement, optimizing some as warriors, some as workers, etc.
What happens when a mech-mer dies? You may find remains in dungeons - a skeleton with the mechanical components intact. What would you get from looting one? Perhaps, though heavy, you could take the entire machine portion, it would certainly have value ...especially to a wealthy mech-mer, who would value it as "spare parts". Extrapolating from this, there could be a black market in such items, even bounty hunters who sought these folk for their enhancements. Would the PC engage in this (it would certainly be lucrative)? or try to help these people? So many possibilities for plotlines/quests, whether playing as a mech-mer, having one as companion, or just having them living in Cyrodiil.
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Post by sleepygirl on May 15, 2017 22:11:31 GMT
I was having a dig about in the wonderful mw.mod history website and I discovered that a chap by the name of Alan Q Smithee had worked on a Biomechanoid race for Morrowind. Biomechanoid Race and an updated version Biomechanoid race: Now with male version and armor
I'm revisiting Morrowind at the moment so I'll have to have a closer look at this mod. From the screen shots there seems to be an H. R. Giger influence to this mod, - which isn't at all a bad thing, but different to my steampunk interpretation.
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Post by Sniffles on May 16, 2017 1:21:00 GMT
Something my other pointed out. Ignore the sexual anatomy completely. Only the latest generation of bio-mechanicals would be given a slight nod to this as it is entirely a superfluous cosmetic feature.
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Post by jgf on May 16, 2017 1:45:38 GMT
FWIW, "Alan Smithee" is a generic pseudonym used by movie directors, producers, screenwriters, etc., when they do not want their real name attached to a project; much as "John Winter" was often used in the auto racing community.
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