Devious Followers - Continued

[Herowynne]

1 hour ago, Lupine00 said:

even if it's just four or five - saying "please fix deal conflicts" and there is nobody at all saying "don't fix deal conflicts, write a new game where the follower does X" then I'm going to fix deal conflicts.

 

The Jarl event is awesome and the pony gear event is great, and yes it would be wonderful to have more such events.

 

But I feel that the deal structure is the most significant issue that DFC has right now, especially by comparison with SubLola.

 

Imagine if the SubLola events and activities were chained together into groups, and if the player character had to wade through dialogue to agree to all of them.

 

That process really drains away the surprise, immersion, and serendipity of the mod.

 

It would be so much better if the Devious Follower simply had a large configurable list of activities and events that they would do to, or with, the player character, similar to how SubLola works.

[ck2modfan]

1 hour ago, Lupine00 said:

That's fine.

 

Boredom is actually a simple and fairly limited mechanic:

• Boredom resets if you take a deal. (Follower likes this).
• Boredom is reset if you have more deals than expected deals. (Follower likes this).
• Boredom increases over time while you have less deals than expected deals.
• Also, it only increases (in most cases) if you have some amount of willpower left.
• Boredom means your daily rate is increased or your deal discount is offset (basically discount and boredom increase cost are combined and capped).
• The current caps are max discount 90% and max penalty 100%, so you won't be charged more than double due to boredom.

 

 

While there's a plan to make some games and other events trigger off boredom, there are currently only minor interactions between boredom and the follower's direct actions.

So, the daily cost penalty is boredom working as it should. As your cost-per-day increases due to levelling, you might find it gets to be more of a problem.

 

The main purpose of Boredom is to make it so that your costs increase (possibly by a lot) if you don't take any deals.

If you take even one deal, your boredom is reset to zero.

As long as you have enough deals, it won't go up.

 

In future, I may make it less generous and only remove some boredom when you do something amusing, or make the amount removed configurable.

 

 

The impact on your daily rate is configurable. If you don't think it's severe enough, you can increase it in the MCM.

 

Maybe that limit of 100% extra charge due to boredom is too low?

Maybe should be more like 500% or 1000%?

 

 

The mechanic that triggers a follower to take direct action is debt. Purely debt. Boredom merely accelerates accrual of that debt.

If you owe more than the debt limit, they will act to correct it.

If you get too many deals they will enslave instead of adding more.

 

If you owe more than half the debt limit, various games unlock.

If you stay under half-debt-limit, the follower will not do much to trouble you.

 

However, there is also a mechanic based on having a lot of deals.

Get too many deals and a timer starts for enslavement.

 

You can configure these behaviors in the Punishment page, or adjust the Enslavement amount in the main config page.

Thank you for that explanation! Very helpful. I think I should increase the extra charge so indirectly forces the PC to take on deals.

 

Thanks for this mod and continually adding new features!

[Lupine00]

11 minutes ago, Herowynne said:

Imagine if the SubLola events and activities were chained together into groups, and if the player character had to wade through dialogue to agree to all of them.

It wouldn't make much sense there, but DFC is not the same thing. It's primarily about avoiding total slavery, not being a slave. The negotiations are part of the experience, and there's always a window to escape through, which helps keep things interesting - you don't know how it's going to work out.

 

Changing the deal structure wouldn't remove any of the dialogue "wading", just how the rules are bound together.

Also, having a "mini-story" in a sequence of Lola events sounds great. I would like that!

 

I've added a POLL to the blog, so people can just vote for what they want!

[Anunya]

As a staunch believer in civic responsibility and engagement, I have voted!

[Lupine00]

15 minutes ago, Anunya said:

As a staunch believer in civic responsibility and engagement, I have voted!

?

 

The poll won't close until I start work on DFC again. I may do some minor bug fixes, but adding anything new won't start until June sometime.

[loniceraa]

4 hours ago, Lupine00 said:

Does addressing this area justify holding back genuine new content again? Is now the time to expunge the classic deals entirely, in favor of modular deals that are themed instead of completely random?

 

To be realistic, classic deals will have to go away eventually, but it might not be for a long time.

 

Personally, I would prefer if modular deals were removed entirely, rather than classic deals. But maybe it's the same thing: (re-?)unification of the deal system.

 

I think the classic deals are much more interesting than the modular deals, because they can rely on their earlier stages when building the later ones. The stage three Piercing Deal works well because of the existence of the first two stages: it tells a nice story. I think the deals could use more reliance on earlier stages to tell the story, not less! Why does there need to be more than one deal that makes use of nipple piercings? As evidenced by some of the new modular deals, and by some other suggestions in this thread, there's plenty of other ideas that can be used to make new non-conflicting classic deals out of.

 

A bit of flexibility in some deals is fine, e.g. I don't see why the Bondage Deal needs to force both gloves AND boots on the player: it could be either/or. But it seems like some people are trying to hack DFC into a custom slavery experience, which to me misses the point of the mod completely. Picking and choosing exactly which inconveniences you are to experience is at odds with the core DFC thesis that the follower is trying to push you into things you do not like! Of course you might want to get out of some of the deals: that's the whole point!

 

Ultimately, build it in line with your own vision, but I don't see why DFC needs to be remade in the image of Submissive Lola. They serve different purposes, and should remain distinct.

[CaptainJ03]

As we're just talking about Lola, I have some remarks in that direction.

I've been playing with SLtR and DFC with two Mistresses (the Tank, the Healer, and the Bondage Slut) I really would love, if this mod would be able to recognise and react to my other follower being my Lola Mistress. As I have to offer service regularly, the person I have the most frequent dialogue is Mistress. With the slut deal, my follower interrupts me - which is okay and expected - but Mistress reacts as if she were some generic NPC I've just talked to the first time. If I tell her that I'm a slut, it would be very nice if she reacts along the lines of "I know, that's why I keep you", or "I know, let's fuck" - not regarding my willpower towards the DFC-Mistress. (Maybe some better defined reaction depending on Submissiveness, but I fear that would require a patch, so that one mod knows about the innards of the other mod. And who else would be so silly to have two Mstresses at the same time?) Would also be nice if a sex action triggered by DFC would count for servicing SLtR, be it Pimp my Adventurer or just having to offer sex daily.

It would help massively with immersion, but I don't think the potential audience is big enough to even think of implementing this.

 

Small bug: When I buy out of deals, the counter isn't reset properly. There are always more deals counted than I actually have left.

[finalfrog]

It took an entire weekending of computing time but I finally have all the .wav files generated!

 

On 5/8/2021 at 6:19 PM, Lupine00 said:

I need to focus on SLAX though, so I better not do that now.

 

I should be able to finish this first voice pack manually, so yeah no worries. It's tedious but I'm the kind of person who finds tedious activities relaxing and I have plenty of downtime at the moment.

[Lupine00]

1 hour ago, CaptainJ03 said:

Small bug: When I buy out of deals, the counter isn't reset properly. There are always more deals counted than I actually have left.

Modular, classic, or both?

[CaptainJ03]

28 minutes ago, Lupine00 said:

1 hour ago, CaptainJ03 said:

Small bug: When I buy out of deals, the counter isn't reset properly. There are always more deals counted than I actually have left.

Modular, classic, or both?

Seem to be the modular deals. I just tested it by console-adding enough gold and buying out. Buying out of modular deals didn't count down, whereas removing a 2-level classic deal removed two deals from the count.

(DFC 2.14.2 not 'fixed' if that's of relevance)

[stas2503]

Ru PatchDevious Followers 2.14.2 Ru Patch.7z

[Lupine00]

3 hours ago, CaptainJ03 said:

Seem to be the modular deals. I just tested it by console-adding enough gold and buying out. Buying out of modular deals didn't count down, whereas removing a 2-level classic deal removed two deals from the count.

(DFC 2.14.2 not 'fixed' if that's of relevance)

Thanks. Very helpful.

[Seeker999]

I voted. I like both the classic and the modular deals. More games, more deals and rules - great! I also like the whole idea of personality driven/influenced deals.  If I had to choose between classic or modular ... I would probably choose modular once the personality system was in place. Seems to me that a given personality would prefer certain deals and willpower/debt/number of deals would create a certain 'natural' progression. Which, if I remember and understand correctly, is kind of where you're going.

With some of the other options in your poll, I don't see a need to rush into deleting the classic deals altogether. I know that's your plan, but I prefer new content and some of your options will still affect deals.

BTW, I don't know if I told you before, but I really appreciate the option to save and load my settings. I don't remember if it saves which modular deals are disabled (which is or would be great ) but I find it saves me a lot of time when loading a new game.

I also like your help page.

A suggestion: I do think that one simple thing you could do that might be helpful is a basic guide stating exactly which modular deals block each stage of each classic deal (or vice versa for less clear situations). Some are obvious, but I don't know, for instance, if the petsuit blocks any stage(s) of a classic deal.

[Lupine00]

29 minutes ago, Seeker999 said:

A suggestion: I do think that one simple thing you could do that might be helpful is a basic guide stating exactly which modular deals block each stage of each classic deal (or vice versa for less clear situations). Some are obvious, but I don't know, for instance, if the petsuit blocks any stage(s) of a classic deal.

I should have made such a grid before writing the code when I think about it.

 

The modular deal enable/disables should all be saved. It seems to work for me.

 

It's interesting to see how the results are changing as more people vote.

I wonder how it will look in a week?

 

 

[ghurdhyll]

i seems to have a problem with the mod, The problem is not game breaking or anything , but it does impede with the mods fonctionnalities.

Ihave a custom follower (gunrose, a lykaios) and i run with EEF.

The problem is that when i pay back deals, everything about the deal itself work as intented, but my current deal count as well as my discount does not reduce.

If you have any idea of what could cause this, i'm all ears.

[Anunya]

Thanks for adding the debug option for ending the devious relationship.

 

I managed to pay off all my debts, wait for a good time to get out of gold control, and then say "it's time for us to part ways." But my follower still stuck around. With the debug option, I can continue playing as intended. 

[jammingserver1]

If you hate reading wall-spanning posts, please skip ahead. It's long.

 

I posted on the recent poll on lupine's blog about having some more early-stage content in the one-way power-exchange/power-distribution trip between player and follower, to balance out the content-heavy lower half of the downwards spiral where the player is already below eyelevel with the follower. This serves as a sketch of ideas thrown together to aid a flaw that might only exist in my imagination - take it with a grain of salt.

 

 

While some settings start right away from 'the player is a failure', DFC doesn't need to limit itself to these lower segments of the spiral of power exchange - it can play its already existing strengths by showing its ability to make smooth transitions all the way down from the very top of 'I am an aspiring adventurer, and I just hired you mere mercenary', and most of the pieces are already in place, just not shown enough. Filling this upper half of the spiral could also mitigate some players from 'just skipping hard over the boring start until in deep debt' - those that exclusively want the humiliating extremes will still do this, straight skipping the 'boring first half', then ramp down the debt amounts to manageable extents in the settings, but probably there's also a lot of people loving DFC for what I see as its core strength - the intricate journey downwards. And those could enjoy some extra chapters of the story where there isn't that much content yet: The start, from 'hero that hired follower' to 'your demands get more bothersome every day! But I'm screwed without you so I have to keep you at least somewhat happy.'

Some ideas on how that could happen (just to get some rough ideas across): more low-impact micro-events and flavored follower-introduction-miniquests. Also, some low-impact 'beginner-stage' deals easing a player into harmless gambles, but there's already plenty ideas for those, I feel.

#######

microevents:

Spoiler

 

specific to a generic location, isolated and harmless on their own, but just enough to make the player feel as if they're lost without the follower, can go a long way in this first half. Pattern: Player's incompetence is 'to blame' for problem that appeared. Follower luckily can fix problem, tells player to be more careful. Player might go from 'You work for me' to 'oh without their benevolence to fix things I might actually be screwed, I have to keep them happy at least a little bit'. Small, static event that works regardless of any willpower, mostly just dialog. Again, the important thing is not so much a gameplay-affecting change, but introducing, and reinforcing, the mindset of dependance. These can just as much happen later on; but the follower doesn't need to make themselves seem so rescuing then anymore, and the important part is that they fit in a relationship where the player has still everything to decide. Also, some similar events are probably already in place in DFC anyways; I might not have found them all yet. So take these suggestions with a grain of salt.

 

micro-event examples:
#0 Follower finds some lost, dropped ring of loot. Gives it to the player. Mentions that the player should be more careful, or they'll miss out all the important things deciding between death and life.
#1 Player is falsely suspected of being a sought criminal, follower clears that they look different/follower has proof of being legit citizen, making it unlikely.
#2 Player stumbles when entering town tombs, or in wilderness when no enemy is nearby, gets some minor cut. Follower does some basic first aid, minor cut stops bleeding, they put some minor salve on it so it doesn't get infected. It might need them to take a look at again, some hours later.
#3 Innkeeper tries to tell player they're 'fully booked' and wants five time the normal pay. Follower points out empty beds, intimidates innkeeper, gets normal price.
#4 trader doesn't want to trade with filthy adventurer after some rumours went around. Follower shows their proof of citizenship/honourable intentions and vouch for the player, or simply threaten to use said rumours against the trader by bragging about making shady deals with them in the inn. Trade happens normally.
#5 (could conflict with carriage mods) carriage-drivers try to scam player, ask five times the price due to 'most horses being sick of some illness from cyrodil, we need to rent ones of the yarl'. Follower points out that skyrim's horses are immune to said sickness, and that the driver just wants to empty that bottle next to them. Carriage driver then asks normal price.
#6 courier runs up to player in town, after leaving some house-cell. Accuses them of stealing ancient nord treasures due to being an adventurer, having to pay an 'adventurer crimes tax' of 500 gold. Follower asks the courier why they have a faked yarl's sigil on the letter. Fake courier runs away.
#7 - follower warns player in the wilderness. Yells at them to watch their feet, and not run over old graves. And indeed, soon some summoned wolf appears out of nothing. Follower then brags about their survival instincts, and says that that wolf would have straight come at the player's neck from behind.

 

 

#######
flavored follower-introduction-miniquests:

Spoiler

 

depending on follower-type (mercenary, spouse, thane, guild-member), the quest is varying in its flavour of justification for an early hook into a first deal-like quest, or some early-stage games that build a richer narrative bridge from 'it's just a small money problem' to 'how do I get out of this affair'. This quest might even come at start of the recruitment, or soon afterwards when in a generic place, and sets the theme according to the type of follower soon after recruiting them. Especially in the first stages where the player can still say 'that's nonsense', the follower's manipulative character must be more creative in the use of justifications and not-entirely-dismissable telltale stories.

This is also the stage where the follower personality can be defined the easiest by exchanging their 'justification' lines; after all, the further down the power exchange the player gets, the less the follower has to justify- well, anything in their relation. Basic pattern: harmless quest accepted, something goes wrong 'accidentally', player is blamed, follower 'generously' helps them out in the end, tells the player they don't seem good at being careful and responsible, and would be lost without follower. The entire purpose of the quest is to serve as a foundation for the followers' later telltales, absurd demands and weird games to find some odd 'proof' affirming their claims, keeping the door open for more outlandish justifications and guilt-tripping later on which then happen to put the player in a situation they are blamed for again.

 

Example introduction quest: #1 (minimal description)
Player is being 'captured' while sleeping in an inn or owned bed in town, and brought to an empty hut (like in astrid's dark brotherhood quest) where they have to wait until the buyer comes. Luckily, in the meantime, the follower has tracked the slavers to the hut and frees the player of their prison and their binds. Follower chastizes player for 'leaving door to their bed open, not being careful in town, and putting weapons far from the bed'. They even brought some food to bring the player's energy back! No, it's not poisoned. Just making a point.

 

Example introduction quest: #2 (radiant, can be auto-taken again by follower later at low willpower.)
Harmless 'fetch quest' in town where player needs to wear an item from a new shipment for a trader and just carry it, while equipped, to the next trader in the same town. Hard to refuse the follower from taking this quest because it's such easy gold for a glorified fetch quest in-town, and they are disgruntled if you refuse, and use it as a reason for some later gaslighting/blackmail attempts in another flavoured mini-quest. For some reason, player stumbles/ragdolls upon changing cell out of shop (only questgivers inside their own cell in town are possible), and it appears the locks on the gear broke and are jammed, and the player gets blamed for it. Follower takes the lead, argues for at least half pay, and that it's just this silly adventurer, and takes the knife the trader gives them to cut the player off. Now the player has had some excuse noone believed, and the follower got a taste (if they hadn't already.)  Follower comments the player seems equally skilled to wear items, as they are in getting into trouble.

 

Reason for stumble after leaving cell depend on the quest-giver type:
generic trader - wear some random device. follower says 'someone ran off out of the shop', pushing player down.
blacksmith - wear some cuffs 'new type of lock'. some spark flew in the players eyes, making them stumble.
alchemist - wear some random device, 'see how this potion affects moving in it' (potion used). player stumbles because they're drunk.
mage - chastity belt + soulgem plug. player stumbles because plug goes haywire, or because some random spell aftermath caught them from behind.
innkeeper - gag - 'someone gave this to me for the bard, let's see if this thing works'. Player stumbles because 'some drunk guy' threw a bottle, hitting the player's head, then went back in.

 

Reason the followers present to accept introquest in first place:
HiredMercenary: 'it's easy gold without danger, for an extra meal.' if refused: 'You don't seem to be able to judge the dangers outside.'
Spouse: 'I had heard of these shipments. I want to try these out, see if rumours are true!' If refused: 'I am disappointed. There's no reason to not do it!'
Thane: 'It's our duty to help citizens when feasible, and this seems very feasible.' If refused: 'It seems you need to work on handling responsibilities.'
Guildmember/Ally: 'We can always need gold for better equipment, yes? It won't take long.' If refused: 'Throwing gold away! What a careless attitude.'

 

The quest can also have a chance of being randomly extended, when reaching the assumed reward-giver. Potential excuses made by them:

normal response: 'You got it all dirty! That's coming straight out of your reward. Now hand it over.'
next-day-response: 'The keys... right. I think I forgot where I put those keys. Come back in 8 hours or tomorrow, I'll have to look for them.'
go-somewhere-else-response: 'Actually, I accidentally put the package of the reward, the explanation letter and the keys into some bigger package with some other things. But if you ask them, they'll probably give it to you! They're reliable people, like you and me.' -> new random goal location. Might be nearby, might be on the other side of skyrim.

 

 

#######

Like I said, these are just some raw sketches that came to mind. There's practically unlimited potential in the complexity of relationship transitions from 'party leader to party equal', to 'subordinate/follower', to 'hired assistant to veteran mercenary', to 'lowly subordinate/adventuring pupil to experienced teacher', to 'owned employee/packmule', to 'owned plaything/companion kept for amusement' to 'owned slave'. All of those nuances and their mental shifts in the 'victim', as gaslighting, as conditioning and as framing their nature to outside viewers, are all caused by the manipulative eventual-owner, and there's already plenty of blogposts, stories and fapfiction fleshing these concepts out on this site. But making mini-quests around more of these topics would make the mod explode even more in complexity and branching dialogues than it already has up to now (and lupine is amazing to keep the lid on the thing, preventing it from falling to a thousand pieces and still have a quite flexible range of tone.)

 

Of course, all of this might seem completely useless to all the players who just want some good oldfashioned, simple, brutally hopeless humiliation extreme. But then, I feel those already have a delicious meal in many mods on this site, including the DFC of the present.

 

 

EDITED to make it a bit more friendly to the eyes, adding spoilers.

[finalfrog]

Ran into some complications generating lips automatically for some of the voices. I think CK may actually have been crashing in this case because it leaves a much larger number of dialogue responses without .lip files. I started to try and do it manually and got a pretty quick way to do it, but the CK kept crashing and I did eventually get bored.

 

So I took a closer look at Silent Voice Generator and decided to copy their cheaty method of "generating" lip files using the pregenerated .lip files with integer durations from 1 to 30.. Now I'm running a script to copy a lip file with a length rounded up to the next second (1.01 second long wav file has a 2.0 second .lip file) if there's a missing .lip file.

 

Since I switched part way through, some dialogue lines may have more accurate lip sync than others. Sorry about that.

 

There is one remaining thing which concerns me, one of the .wav files, FemaleCondescending _DFlowBore__DFlowBoredomSp_0027AEB6_2 (which as far as I can tell is entirely ordinary and uses the same format as all the others), caused the CK to crash every time I tried to generate .lip files for it. It plays fine in every media player I've tried and ffprobe doesn't cry about anything, so I'll include it with one of the pregenerated lip files. However, if you use a follower with the FemaleCondescending voice and run into a crash during a dialogue with the voice packs that I'll up uploading let me know.

[Lupine00]

9 hours ago, ghurdhyll said:

The problem is that when i pay back deals, everything about the deal itself work as intented, but my current deal count as well as my discount does not reduce.

If you have any idea of what could cause this, i'm all ears.

Read up the page (where you originally posted) about three posts up  

I haven't fixed it yet, but it should be trivial.

[Lupine00]

5 hours ago, Anunya said:

But my follower still stuck around.

Which follower framework was this?

[Anunya]

24 minutes ago, Lupine00 said:

Which follower framework was this?

 

Nether's framework, on SSE.

 

I paid down my debt to zero, got the "are you thinking about leaving me" comment.

 

Then I went to do the standard "it's time for us to part ways" dialogue (which is the same for non-devious followers). The follower said something that I don't remember, but it sounded like generic "ok see you around" type dialogue. At this point, they were still following me around and when I talked to them I still had the option to say "it's time for us to part ways."

 

For non-devious followers when I say "it's time for us to part ways" they accept and walk away, so the basic functionality works there.

[Lupine00]

30 minutes ago, Anunya said:

Nether's framework, on SSE.

It's possible that the SSE version has some difference.

 

Either that, or you simply don't have DFC overwriting NFF script files.

Or another mod has patched those files.

Can you check your DFC install and see if any of its files are being overwritten?

 

Once again, the nightmare of all those follower frameworks... three was bad enough, but with SE that sort of makes it SIX variants I have to consider.

It's getting unsustainable, though perhaps there is only this to fix...?

 

 

[Lupine00]

@jammingserver1, thanks for an interesting post.

Yes, it's rather long. Are we secretly related perhaps?

 

There are elements of your ideas that could be developed relatively easily, and other aspects that are probably more trouble than you expect.

 

One thing to think about is that the license mechanics now do provide a place where the follower is adding value, and creating a legitimate "lock in" for the PC. Being able to push license expenses off into follower debt can be hugely advantageous for a low-level character, but you can't do that without the follower's help.

 

There's potential for the follower to revoke some, or all, licenses if you upset them, though there's no mechanic for that as yet.

 

The license dialogs aren't very flavorful, but step one is to make them function. Variations can come later.

 

 

To address an example suggestion: the device delivery quest.

 

It's an entire new quest.

After taking the quest, the stumble event has to be triggered by ... something ... and that requires synching up a push with the follower dialog.

Or it could just use a message box DSHV style.

 

It's a fair amount of effort, a full multi-stage quest, with objectives, AI packages, force greets, DD-version binding (because it tinkers with device scripts) or a custom device, and so on.

It's only usable once pre playthrough.

 

 

One-off unique content does have value, but could this (kind of) scenario be altered to be more reusable?

 

 

Is SLTR, you have the ale fetch quest. It's generic, and fires in several spots, but assuming SLTR has decided to allow a minor task (beyond that, as far as I understand it) its simply bound to a bunch of trigger boxes - or at least appears to always happen in consistent spots. It's framed as a not-so-special request. The down side is it feels generic. It is generic. It trains you to make sure you always have ale for the SLTR master, so you can short-cut time-wasting trips that always occur when you're trying to leave town to do something else. Compare that with a one-off event.

 

 

If shop-keepers had some bogus rationale, such as, "You must be wearing the special harness to transport this, or it will explode!"

Any vendor could give the quest, and they could give it repeatedly. The trip event might only occur sometimes.

 

Is that better, or worse?

What is certain, is that it provides more content, but does it provide a more impactful experience?

 

 

When something only happens once, it almost always feels subjectively better than something that happens repeatedly.

But things that happen repeatedly create more of a game experience (vs a story experience) and game experiences have continuing value.

So, it's less intense, but it scales.

 

The DFC approach has always tended towards repeatable (the weird potion is a bit of an outlier on this). Is that something that should be consciously abandoned? Should something like the "Jarl Game" be a one-time-only experience?

 

 

Should DFC be tracking all those one-time-only experiences and creating lasting and cumulative consequences for them?

 

 

What I'm seeing, is ideas that get closer and closer to "Devious Deidre" the mod I was going to make back before I fell down the SLD rabbit-hole: a gradual follower enslavement built around specific story events and repeated tasks that gradually tips you over thresholds into new levels of submission.

I did do some work on this. Deidre and her follow/unfollow mechanics were in place. She had some basic dialogs and the stage one quest.

 

The design had ten defined steps (not counting the initial state), with each step enabling a new set of follower behaviors, starting at 'not being dominated at all' and ending in 'total submission'. I was looking at it in OneNote only yesterday  

 

Here are some notes on it ... from ... 2018 or so...

Spoiler

0 - no domination/submission

 

1 - talks suggestively, always removes devices, sometimes romantic

2 - simple sex situations, but hints at more, always removes devices

3 - sex sometimes with devices, either character may wear them, mostly removes devices, but sometimes triggers a game. Always responds to pleading.

4 - sex mostly with devices, follower rarely wears them, 50/50 remove devices, otherwise trigger a game, rarely add more. Mostly responds to pleading. If you give keys, you won't always get them back.

• Locked on Nipple piercings
• Bound sex. More devices.

 

5 - sex only with devices, follower never wears them, 25% remove devices, either triggers a game, adds more, or occasionally a more elaborate scenario. Doesn't respond to pleading, sometimes punishes. If you give money you won't always get it back. Very rarely punishes with violence.

• Locked on Vaginal piercings
• Adds collar, but will remove it
• Bound sex.
• Punishment. Not whipping or beating, so how? (Noted as "very rarely" above, so unsure).
• Punish with piercing shocks?
• Punish with drugs?
• Punish with devices?

 

6 - adds collar, PC always in some devices, sex entirely at followers discretion, may choose to use frustration tactics. Only removes devices in dungeons. Pushes PC over in safe places. Nearly always punishes for pleading. If you give items, gold or keys, you won't get them back, but may earn rewards. May force some gear item to be worn, but only one item at a time. May be bound in towns. Sometimes made to sleep on floor. Guards treat as "legal slave" but player houses ignored. PC must ask follower permission to leave town or after entering dungeons. Sometimes punishes with violence.

• Locked on Collar
• Collar shocks.
• PC being pushed and falling.
• Bound sex with Deirdre.
• Punishment via whipping or beating.
• Floor sleeping

 

7 - collared and submissive. PC always in some devices. Always in chastity unless whoring or being used by follower. Only removes devices in dungeons. Pushes PC over in safe places. Punishments for pleading increased, but chances it works increased too. Actively takes items and gold from PC. Decides what gear you are allowed to wear. Must be naked in towns, frequently bound in towns. Sometimes gagged in towns. Mostly made to sleep on floor. Talking to blacksmiths may be punished. Guards may rape. Follower takes all player house keys. PC put in pet suit in house, sleeps in bedroll at foot of bed. PC must beg follower permission to leave town, after entering dungeons, and after changing hold. Often punishes with violence.

• Locked on plugs (removed for sex)
• Plug shocks.
• PC pushed and falling.
• Bound sex.
• Guard rapes.
• Begging (kneeling?)
• Punishment via whipping or beating.
• Locational pet suit.
• Floor sleeping formalized.
• Locational gags occasionally.

 

8 - as 7, but gagged almost all the time, including dungeons. Can only get food and drink by begging from follower or DD dialogs etc. Put in pet-suit in inns and player house. Talking to blacksmiths always punished, talking to inn-keepers mostly punished. Guards mainly rape if talked to. Follower locks player houses, empties player house containers. Cage added to all player houses, PC must sleep in it.

Follower will decide to stay in a house for days at a time, with PC locked in cage, let out only for sex or beatings. PC now has to beg for beatings before other favors granted. PC has to beg to get follower to leave house and go adventuring. Dialogs with shopkeepers mostly result in mockery or rapes, trading largely impossible.

• Locked on gag (ball or panel in dungeons, ring elsewhere, removed at home - for access)
• As above, plus… Cage occupation.
• Beg for beatings.
• Shopkeeper mockery and rapes.
• Locational gags.
• Inn keeper punishments and humiliations.

 

9 - from here on, a process of collecting bondage-combat-gear proceeds, so PC is in bondage in dungeons, yet can still fight. Corset, boots, cuffs, collar, gloves, hood, belt, bra - or harness.

• TBD: jewellery
• Port home if deviced in dungeon, but at a cost.
• Punishment for follower knock downs.
• Forced skill advancement - must level alchemy, blacksmithing, enchanting, to please follower.

 

10 - total submission, there is no way to reverse out of this final state, all other states are reversable.

 

Most mechanics, follower checks occasionally and if infraction found, punishment follows. Talking "traps" done via blocking dialog.

 

In late stages, follower is taking all loot, and "handing out" gear to be worn according to level and skills. Follower sets loot quotas. PC is allowed to handle potions, but only allowed to sell them to alchemist.

 

Dialog and decisions determined by stage.

 

PC cannot simply buy out of "legal slave" once they hit it at level 6. The only way out is to do an "escape quest".

 

Stage advancement requires multiple components:

Level

Must pick dialog options that gate to it voluntarily (though follower will pester)

Number of "events", such as sex, punishment, device removal/add, etc.

 

Exception. Entry via SS, leads straight to stage 8, plus, any gear the PC had on entering is put in a locked chest in the slave auction house - key only available on completion of escape quest.

 

Note, that in stage 8, if you enter via SS, you may simply be sold into SS again if the follower doesn’t like your performance.

 

Each stage has its own aliases and own quest, with no sharing of dialogue between them.

This wasn't going to be a generic follower mod, but specifically tailored for one follower, Deidre, who is part of the mod.

While you could swap it to another follower, it would not be intended to work like that.

The follower would come with a single personality and some base custom dialogs that fit well with the rest of the experience, no matter the level you're at.

 

Deidre's personality was intended to be more playful than harshly domineering, somewhat inspired by the Echidna character from Queen's Blade.

 

The bondage in Devious Deidre is/was simply determined by the stage; Deidre charges no fees; she makes no deals; she's just your "friend", and then ... something more. When she takes your stuff, it's not for profit, it's because she wants to control you - and at each stage, she only does as much as you will accept, which is what defines the stage, effectively. The PC has to actively do something to move to the next stage; it can't just happen.

 

 

 

To be clear, I don't see DFC heading down a path of adding this kind of logic - even if people thought that would be fun - it wouldn't work with the existing systems.

 

 

In DFC, I can imagine certain games or one-off quests potentially resulting in the PC gaining "perks", with each one reducing max willpower by one. Other one-off quests would allow you to get rid of them.

 

e.g.

If you answer appropriately at the end of the Jarl Game, you'd gain a Submission perk, but you could answer differently and refuse to submit.

But some quests could always give a perk, because taking and completing the quest would always be optional.

 

 

[loniceraa]

1 hour ago, Lupine00 said:

One thing to think about is that the license mechanics now do provide a place where the follower is adding value, and creating a legitimate "lock in" for the PC. Being able to push license expenses off into follower debt can be hugely advantageous for a low-level character, but you can't do that without the follower's help.

 

I allow the devious follower to add value by using him or her as the prerequisite for enabling a death respawn mod. So, as long as I have a devious follower hired, I assume they are careful/experienced enough to save my character from her own mistakes and bring her back to somewhere to recover. In the absence of such a follower... well, presumably my character would just die, and that would be that.

[Herowynne]

1 hour ago, Lupine00 said:

Should something like the "Jarl Game" be a one-time-only experience?

 

No, that would be a shame if it only occurred once per game. It's a key highlight of the mod.

 

1 hour ago, Lupine00 said:

What I'm seeing, is ideas that get closer and closer to "Devious Deidre" the mod I was going to make

 

This Devious Deidre mod sounds like a wonderful idea!