Stealing/Bounty Interactions

[rydin]

Sorry to ask this, but does anyone know what part of the game engine (quest, script, marker, whatever) controls the interaction where the player steals an item for the first time in front of an NPC, and the NPC takes it back, and it adds the bounty (second time, NPC attacks you). I've found the dialogue which I can edit under DialogueGeneric and the MessageBox to change any text, but I just can't find what controls the NPC to take the item back. Has anyone stumbled on this? Needing it to try out making a mod.

 

(I'm gonna downloading Prison Overhaul again, as it might give me extra clues, but thought I'd ask).

 

Thanks!

Edited July 7, 2023 by rydin

[traison]

I know very little about this. Right now I would go by the assumption that this is at least partially hardcoded. However, did you find all this:

1. Several objects have crime factions assigned to them, such as: Locations and Actors. Hint of this being at least partially hardcoded.
2. Crime factions have gold bounties set. Defaults are defined somewhere. Hardcoded?
3. https://www.creationkit.com/index.php?title=Crime
4. https://www.creationkit.com/index.php?title=Creating_a_Custom_Crime_Faction

For instance, the last link has this:

Quote

This branch will account for those cases where the player stupidly talks to a guard while having a bounty above the petty crime gold threshold.

 

This could suggest that the interaction when the player gets caught is in a quest, as a dialogue entry of some sort, and that the branch that is selected could be based on the current crime faction bounty.

 

Looking at where CrimeFactionWhiterun is used does not reveal anything obvious. There's about 50 quests all well named in an intuitive manner, like: WE09, WE32 and TGRNT </sarcasm>. So what I'd do is write an xEdit script to find the dialogue string that NPCs say when you get caught. Work backwards from there to locate the quest.

 

Edit: and if you plan to have me write that xEdit script for you, get me the dialogue line you wish to find and make sure you copy it 1:1 - punctuation and capital letters, everything.

Edited July 7, 2023 by traison

[Guest]

SL Survival does some interesting stuff when the NPCs realise you've pickpocketed them. Instead of becoming hostile, they'll take back their stuff and potentially equip some DDs on you for good measure. Not exactly what you're looking for, but it might be worth seeing how it's done in the CK. Fair warning, though, SLS is a huge mod.

[rydin]

4 hours ago, ponzipyramid said:

SL Survival does some interesting stuff when the NPCs realise you've pickpocketed them. Instead of becoming hostile, they'll take back their stuff and potentially equip some DDs on you for good measure. Not exactly what you're looking for, but it might be worth seeing how it's done in the CK. Fair warning, though, SLS is a huge mod.

 

I don't mind tearing apart a mod—I might learn something else in the progress. Haven't tried SLS either so might be fun to look into. Thanks for the recommendation!

 

6 hours ago, traison said:

I know very little about this. Right now I would go by the assumption that this is at least partially hardcoded. However, did you find all this:

1. Several objects have crime factions assigned to them, such as: Locations and Actors. Hint of this being at least partially hardcoded.
2. Crime factions have gold bounties set. Defaults are defined somewhere. Hardcoded?
3. https://www.creationkit.com/index.php?title=Crime
4. https://www.creationkit.com/index.php?title=Creating_a_Custom_Crime_Faction

For instance, the last link has this:

 

This could suggest that the interaction when the player gets caught is in a quest, as a dialogue entry of some sort, and that the branch that is selected could be based on the current crime faction bounty.

 

Looking at where CrimeFactionWhiterun is used does not reveal anything obvious. There's about 50 quests all well named in an intuitive manner, like: WE09, WE32 and TGRNT </sarcasm>. So what I'd do is write an xEdit script to find the dialogue string that NPCs say when you get caught. Work backwards from there to locate the quest.

 

Edit: and if you plan to have me write that xEdit script for you, get me the dialogue line you wish to find and make sure you copy it 1:1 - punctuation and capital letters, everything.

 

Thanks for these. I had stumbled over them, and they are useful (I've seen the dialogue branches mentioned in the guide. I might look again incase I missed something obvious). I've checked the obvious dialogue entries, and I've also reverse searched with Use Info and not came across it yet. So the quest may be on of those random numbers ones and doesn't directly link apart from through a script perhaps. Or I've missed it. I've found the voice leans in the DialogueGeneric under Misc > (Steal) but they give me nothing, so not use the xEdit script would help there? Unless there's something that xEdit might pick up that Creation Kit won't? (Appreciate the offer though, just don't wanna waste your time there).

 

I might give @ponzipyramid's suggestion a try first and see if I can decipher it out. I'll install it, see if it triggers what I need, then look at the raw files and see what I can get from there first. WOuld be good to try on my own as I might learn something else too!

 

Thanks both!