Licenses - Player Oppression

[Plaguetard2.0]

Mod works fantastic. Using it alongside the new Sexy Adventures for a unique way of playing through.

 

Possible request... is it possible to make the licenses no longer needed if Thane? I've always considered Thane as 'citizenship' sort of, so licenses could be for outsiders and once you live there you're good. Just a thought.

[Nuascura]

3 hours ago, Plaguetard2.0 said:

Mod works fantastic. Using it alongside the new Sexy Adventures for a unique way of playing through.

 

Possible request... is it possible to make the licenses no longer needed if Thane? I've always considered Thane as 'citizenship' sort of, so licenses could be for outsiders and once you live there you're good. Just a thought.

It is possible... It's not something I've looked into, however.

 

What I could do is create an MCM option "Allow Thane Exemption" on the General tab.

 

Pseudocode:

Function checkForViolation()
	if allowThaneExemption == true
		if WhiterunThaneQuest.IsCompleted() && player.isInLocation == Whiterun
			return ; exit function, no need to check
		elseIf
		[...]
		endIf
	endIf
EndFunction

 

But don't hold your breath aside from bug fixes for now as I'm anticipating a large workload in real life.

Edited October 1, 2023 by Gyra

[Corsec]

Thane quests are easy, so allowing a full Thane exemption would trivialize licences and misogyny. Also, Thaneships are only for a specific hold while I think licences are valid across the whole country. Perhaps a Thane exemption would be better if it was harder to become a Thane? Like, maybe you would have to pay a lifetime insurance licence cost (a huge bribe to the jarls) before you can become Thane and get that licence exemption. This would also be a way to improve on the SLS feature to buy lifetime licences.

 

If you give the option for Thane exemptions, than I'd suggest limiting it to only a few licence types; the clothing and collar exemption. That's the minimum that female nobles ingame seem to possess and they'd have to pay for the additional licences.

 

Comedy ideas that I don't expect to be implemented- when becoming Thane the housecarl becomes a forced follower when outside town and will actively enforce licence rules. After all, noble women need to be kept 'safe' above all from themselves. Also, noble women get forced chastity belts unless married.

 

The mod description says that the magic licence uses an inventory checker to look for scrolls/tomes. Is that still to be done or is it in the mod already?

Edited October 1, 2023 by Corsec

[Plaguetard2.0]

43 minutes ago, Corsec said:

Thane quests are easy, so allowing a full Thane exemption would trivialize licences and misogyny. Also, Thaneships are only for a specific hold while I think licences are valid across the whole country. Perhaps a Thane exemption would be better if it was harder to become a Thane? Like, maybe you would have to pay a lifetime insurance licence cost (a huge bribe to the jarls) before you can become Thane and get that licence exemption. This would also be a way to improve on the SLS feature to buy lifetime licences.

 

If you give the option for Thane exemptions, than I'd suggest limiting it to only a few licence types; the clothing and collar exemption. That's the minimum that female nobles ingame seem to possess and they'd have to pay for the additional licences.

 

Comedy ideas that I don't expect to be implemented- when becoming Thane the housecarl becomes a forced follower when outside town and will actively enforce licence rules. After all, noble women need to be kept 'safe' above all from themselves. Also, noble women get forced chastity belts unless married.

 

The mod description says that the magic licence uses an inventory checker to look for scrolls/tomes. Is that still to be done or is it in the mod already?

 

If you consider Thaneship easy, I don't think we have the same Mod setup. Nothing is easy in my playthrough. In addition to just overall difficulty, I also have "Thane me Slower" and the complimentary mods, making becoming Thane a rather longer process indeed. I think in my last several playthoughs (though most of the time I alter mods and have to start over around level 30ish at most) I only became a Thane once of one city. You'd probably have to put in about 40 hours of playthough to become a Thane of just one city on my setup though (though the remaining Thaneships would become slightly easier as you've progressed).

[Corsec]

12 minutes ago, Plaguetard2.0 said:

 

If you consider Thaneship easy, I don't think we have the same Mod setup. Nothing is easy in my playthrough. In addition to just overall difficulty, I also have "Thane me Slower" and the complimentary mods, making becoming Thane a rather longer process indeed. I think in my last several playthoughs (though most of the time I alter mods and have to start over around level 30ish at most) I only became a Thane once of one city. You'd probably have to put in about 40 hours of playthough to become a Thane of just one city on my setup though (though the remaining Thaneships would become slightly easier as you've progressed).

 

If it's that hard to become Thane, how much of that difficulty comes from non-fetish mods? How much easier would it be without the fetish stuff?

 

My point is that it's one thing to make the gameplay difficult generally, but it's something completely different to make the game difficult for the purposes of roleplaying fetishes. Just raising the number of vanilla fetch quests you have to do isn't really the kind of difficulty that is 'good enough' for fetish roleplay. The point is struggling against the difficulties that arise from constant and brutal sexual oppression, rather than from raising arbitrary numbers.

 

LOL noone gets off on the thinking that, "Oh god, it's going to take me *ten* times as long to complete all these vanilla fetch quests" lmao.

[Plaguetard2.0]

27 minutes ago, Corsec said:

 

If it's that hard to become Thane, how much of that difficulty comes from non-fetish mods? How much easier would it be without the fetish stuff?

 

My point is that it's one thing to make the gameplay difficult generally, but it's something completely different to make the game difficult for the purposes of roleplaying fetishes. Just raising the number of vanilla fetch quests you have to do isn't really the kind of difficulty that is 'good enough' for fetish roleplay. The point is struggling against the difficulties that arise from constant and brutal sexual oppression, rather than from raising arbitrary numbers.

 

LOL noone gets off on the thinking that, "Oh god, it's going to take me *ten* times as long to complete all these vanilla fetch quests" lmao.

 

While I understand everyone has their own playstyle, that is actually not where my difficulty comes from. At 800 mods (though that includes texture mods), only about 30-40 of those are SL mods. I'm a huge supporter that everyone should try to find a way to play their game that is enjoyable for themselves. If using lots of fetish mods if your thing, no judgement and so be it, however that is not mine. I want an overall and total harsh yet immersive world. Considering there are no naked citizens running around in my cities, and everyone else seems able to do certain things (wear clothes/armor/have a weapon equipped), my balance to using licenses and having immersion would be to justify why only my PC is naked (while I could add a few naked ones, I don't have any mods that do so). So to me, once the PC becomes a Thane through hard work and fighting through a lot of mysgomy, at least for THAT hold specifically, I'd like to try and be allowed to be able to walk around like the other citizens in the town.

 

Maybe 15% of the increased difficulty is from SL type difficulties added to the game. Alternative death mods alone make getting out of the lower levels extremely difficult (I use Shadow of Skyrim, which adds in another whole level of difficulty from the debuffs that occur early on). While I have SL mods, I don't spend hours just playing with SL mods, but I have no qualms with anyone who does. My Fallout 4 is setup equally as difficult, as was my Oblivion and Fallout 3 before that. I like extreme difficulty. Also, with several of the thane quest mods, you can make none of the thane quests the misc quests, just FYI. While some of the townsfolk quests are still 'fetch' quests, they at least have a semi questline and you get to know the citizens better that way than just grabbing things off the bounty board.

[Corsec]

58 minutes ago, Plaguetard2.0 said:

 

While I understand everyone has their own playstyle, that is actually not where my difficulty comes from.

 

Yes, everyone has their own preferences and I wouldn't criticise that. I don't expect anyone to have the same as mine, and that's fine.

 

If becoming Thane is very hard in your game, then it couldn't be an easy way of getting a permanent licence exemption. But it would still be easy for other people, because the vanilla quests aren't designed to be difficult. What works as intended in your game wouldn't be the same in other people's games.

 

58 minutes ago, Plaguetard2.0 said:

 (while I could add a few naked ones, I don't have any mods that do so).

 

If you use my non-DD patches and/or Slaverun Enforcer Standalone then you can put female NPCs into DDs, lingerie or bikini armors, so this could help your immersion perhaps? I agree that it's really unimmersive when the PC is the only one naked and bound. These mods will make it appear as if everyone has to live in and experience the same misogynistic world that the PC does.

[Plaguetard2.0]

2 hours ago, Corsec said:

 

Yes, everyone has their own preferences and I wouldn't criticise that. I don't expect anyone to have the same as mine, and that's fine.

 

If becoming Thane is very hard in your game, then it couldn't be an easy way of getting a permanent licence exemption. But it would still be easy for other people, because the vanilla quests aren't designed to be difficult. What works as intended in your game wouldn't be the same in other people's games.

 

 

If you use my non-DD patches and/or Slaverun Enforcer Standalone then you can put female NPCs into DDs, lingerie or bikini armors, so this could help your immersion perhaps? I agree that it's really unimmersive when the PC is the only one naked and bound. These mods will make it appear as if everyone has to live in and experience the same misogynistic world that the PC does.

 

Yeah, I get that. I wouldn't want it standard that being Thane makes exempt, just looking for the potential for an added option, hence the request.

 

I checked out your mod, I definitely like how it adds NPCs that would help the PC blend in. I will likely download it and look around on CK and see if I can't alter it from equipping DD to just being nude. While I have DD, because certain mods require them, I'm not a fan. It is very popular and the mod author and subsequent authors that added it all are amazingly talented, I just find many of the items unimmersive for myself (I don't mind a few, just the vast majority). Additionally, having used some heavy DD mods before, now THAT is a set of mods that can have you playing for hours, and hours, and hours just with the fetish of the mod, haha. I think I once had to hobble for an hour just trying to get to a city to unlock some items. I do really like how you altered the world though to set a better all around mood that Skyrim is this harsh and misogynistic world.

[Nuascura]

7 hours ago, Corsec said:

Is that still to be done or is it in the mod already?

 

Done

Ammo, scrolls, and tomes can only be enforced when inventory checker is enabled.

 

Ideally, I could track equipped ammo so that it can cause a violation. However, my findings align with SLS's implementation which uses that slow-ass inventory checker for checking ammo. It's unfortunate, but ammo doesn't occupy an equipment slot.

[Corsec]

1 hour ago, Plaguetard2.0 said:

Yeah, I get that. I wouldn't want it standard that being Thane makes exempt, just looking for the potential for an added option, hence the request.

 

It's dangerous to mod while horny! lol

 

I mean that, in my experience, if you throw together both gameplay and fetish mods they often don't mix well together as well as you'd expect. Features will conflict or overshadow each other. It's probably better to select particular mods that are primarily for either fetish or hardcore difficulty, but not equally for both. Then to add only other mods that are complementary to your vision for the modlist.

 

If you're looking for hardcore combat difficulty, then you might get bored during the long streches of time when you functionally can't fight because of all the bondage and debuffs. Or clearing difficult dungeons might start to seem like a chore between the lewd quests you want to complete. If you really want a goldsink mod then there are other mods that can do that without adding extra fetish content and forcing you into bondage.

 

I spent a lot of time in the past trying to achieve 'balance' between hardcore gameplay (with Requiem mostly) and fetishes but to be honest it just resulted in a lot of abandoned saves and wasted time. Often some element would be not working as intended and then I would have to redo the whole modlist and then start a new game, but I eventually burnt out from that.

 

1 hour ago, Plaguetard2.0 said:

I checked out your mod, I definitely like how it adds NPCs that would help the PC blend in. I will likely download it and look around on CK and see if I can't alter it from equipping DD to just being nude. While I have DD, because certain mods require them, I'm not a fan. It is very popular and the mod author and subsequent authors that added it all are amazingly talented, I just find many of the items unimmersive for myself (I don't mind a few, just the vast majority). Additionally, having used some heavy DD mods before, now THAT is a set of mods that can have you playing for hours, and hours, and hours just with the fetish of the mod, haha. I think I once had to hobble for an hour just trying to get to a city to unlock some items. I do really like how you altered the world though to set a better all around mood that Skyrim is this harsh and misogynistic world.

 

Yeah, the original intent was for the patches to be complemetary to both Slaverun and Sexlab Survival, and now both BM Licences and Slaverun Enforcer Standalone. There's a set of mods that work really well together for misogyny and player slavery.

 

If you want nudity rather than bondage for NPCs then you can edit the outfits and/or levelled lists with xEdit and then remove all worn items. I think there was a modified version of my patches for someone, maybe Gyra, to assign only collars and nothing else. Maybe @Gyra can share it with you, if he has it, please?

[Corsec]

25 minutes ago, Gyra said:

 

Done

Ammo, scrolls, and tomes can only be enforced when inventory checker is enabled.

 

Ideally, I could track equipped ammo so that it can cause a violation. However, my findings align with SLS's implementation which uses that slow-ass inventory checker for checking ammo. It's unfortunate, but ammo doesn't occupy an equipment slot.

 

That's great (for the magic arts in Skyrim lol)!

 

How would the ammo checker interact with mods that hide ammo when not in combat, or that automatically equip/unequip ammo when equipping bows? In the past I had some problems with those mods when Sexlab was stripping for scenes.

[Nuascura]

@Corsec @Plaguetard2.0 Collar-only patch is here.

 

1 hour ago, Corsec said:

How would the ammo checker interact with mods that hide ammo when not in combat, or that automatically equip/unequip ammo when equipping bows? In the past I had some problems with those mods when Sexlab was stripping for scenes.

 

Nah, like I implied in my post, BMLE has no capability of checking (or, more specifically, differentiating) between equipped and unequipped ammo. There is only one time when ammo is checked: when inventory checker is run after being confronted by a guard. And ammo is thereafter removed from your inventory should you lack a weapon license. Hence, BMLE's inventory confiscation feature should have no apparent incompatibilities with the ammo-related mods you're referring to.

[Black714]

It’s work with oldrim, Anyway?

[Someone92]

Dunno if this counts as feature creep, but

- Option that Thanes get their items only unequipped, not confiscated

- Option for each license to automatically be valid if Thane (e.g. a Thane is always allowed to be armed)

( - Option that Thane always has insurance )

[Plaguetard2.0]

14 hours ago, Corsec said:

 

It's dangerous to mod while horny! lol

 

I mean that, in my experience, if you throw together both gameplay and fetish mods they often don't mix well together as well as you'd expect. Features will conflict or overshadow each other. It's probably better to select particular mods that are primarily for either fetish or hardcore difficulty, but not equally for both. Then to add only other mods that are complementary to your vision for the modlist.

 

If you're looking for hardcore combat difficulty, then you might get bored during the long streches of time when you functionally can't fight because of all the bondage and debuffs. Or clearing difficult dungeons might start to seem like a chore between the lewd quests you want to complete. If you really want a goldsink mod then there are other mods that can do that without adding extra fetish content and forcing you into bondage.

 

I spent a lot of time in the past trying to achieve 'balance' between hardcore gameplay (with Requiem mostly) and fetishes but to be honest it just resulted in a lot of abandoned saves and wasted time. Often some element would be not working as intended and then I would have to redo the whole modlist and then start a new game, but I eventually burnt out from that.

 

 

Yeah, the original intent was for the patches to be complemetary to both Slaverun and Sexlab Survival, and now both BM Licences and Slaverun Enforcer Standalone. There's a set of mods that work really well together for misogyny and player slavery.

 

If you want nudity rather than bondage for NPCs then you can edit the outfits and/or levelled lists with xEdit and then remove all worn items. I think there was a modified version of my patches for someone, maybe Gyra, to assign only collars and nothing else. Maybe @Gyra can share it with you, if he has it, please?

 

Yeah, that is where I think we differ. I don't do a lot of the bondage stuff for two reasons.

 

1. It definitely is just an entirely different playthrough. You'll never get anywhere in the actual game story, I whole heartedly agree.

2. I find, personally, a lot of the bondage outfits a bit far-fetched. Could some wealthy noble have a handful of those devices? Sure... but a common bandit isn't going to have a high quality armbinder.

 

It was hard for me, long ago, to switch away from SL Submit for this reason. I found that the most 'reasonable' outcome. Be defeated, be assaulted, be tied up and have to wiggle and get free while if noticed be assaulted. Naked Defeat has this to an extent, though I'm not a fan of the electrocution/urination that comes upon failing to loosen the bindings. SL Submit is just immensely outdated. Currently, using Shadow of Skyrim in conjunction with SL Defeat has worked pretty well. I used to enjoy the DAYMOYL connection between that and Defeat, but as of a few months ago, I cannot for the life of me get any of the blackout functions to work for DAYMOYL.

 

My games tend to be more heavily on the misogynistic side with sexual assault/robbery/nudity, not a lot of Slavery and Bondage (again, to each their own). I'd agree it can be a delicate balance to not overload on LL mods that turn your playthrough from a game to a live action porn, haha. Certainly, over the 18 years I've been modding Bethesda games I've gone overboard and you're 100% correct, you'll never end up playing the actual game. Heck a run where you end up enslaved in SD+ can take hours to try and get free of if you don't get attacked just to be enslaved again. Also, I found that many times people end up adding in many of the same mods to do the same thing and they start to overlap anyways. In order to make the game, well... still a game, I find that you have to really stick away from slavery/bondage mods in general.

Edited October 2, 2023 by Plaguetard2.0

[Plaguetard2.0]

13 hours ago, Corsec said:

 

That's great (for the magic arts in Skyrim lol)!

 

How would the ammo checker interact with mods that hide ammo when not in combat, or that automatically equip/unequip ammo when equipping bows? In the past I had some problems with those mods when Sexlab was stripping for scenes.

Thanks for that!

[Nuascura]

13 hours ago, Someone92 said:

( - Option that Thane always has insurance )

It’s important to balance complexity with usability. Too many options can overwhelm a player just as much as if there are too many overlapping features which impede usability. And features in excess also impedes my ability to debug, especially if they aren’t modular. It’s becoming more likely that Insurance will become a catch-all feature and that Thaneship will automatically bequeath Insurance’s benefits. In such a case, it shouldn’t be too much to expect players to adjust license cost values more so based on whether an adjacent feature is enabled.

[cerebus300]

Just trying out the mod and disabled the licenses from Sexlab Survival to see the difference. I love the more extreme nature that is allowed here. One thing that I was surprised by was that I was able to sell items to vendors even though I don't have licenses. I was kind of happy, because I was in a pickle trying to figure out how I was going to get licenses and couldn't sell anything, but turns out that I could. This might be a good change to incorporate.

 

My real problem at the moment is that I have no idea where to go to buy licenses. I've run around Riften and talked to everyone, it seems, but can't find any information on how to purchase licenses to begin with.

[Lucky Sparrow]

1 hour ago, cerebus300 said:

Just trying out the mod and disabled the licenses from Sexlab Survival to see the difference. I love the more extreme nature that is allowed here. One thing that I was surprised by was that I was able to sell items to vendors even though I don't have licenses. I was kind of happy, because I was in a pickle trying to figure out how I was going to get licenses and couldn't sell anything, but turns out that I could. This might be a good change to incorporate.

 

My real problem at the moment is that I have no idea where to go to buy licenses. I've run around Riften and talked to everyone, it seems, but can't find any information on how to purchase licenses to begin with.

There's a setting in the MCM to buy from either guards or the steward.  I recommend the steward to avoid guard/bounty issues

[cerebus300]

22 minutes ago, Lucky Sparrow said:

There's a setting in the MCM to buy from either guards or the steward.  I recommend the steward to avoid guard/bounty issues

Thanks. I'll check it out after I fix the problem that just popped up with the MCM. It suddenly won't show anything when I open it. No menu items at all. I'm trying to uninstall it, resave, clean save, then reinstall it again to hopefully fix it.

[Nuascura]

37 minutes ago, cerebus300 said:

Thanks. I'll check it out after I fix the problem that just popped up with the MCM. It suddenly won't show anything when I open it. No menu items at all. I'm trying to uninstall it, resave, clean save, then reinstall it again to hopefully fix it.

This is a known issue with SkyUI. It occurs when your mod data doesn’t match cached data OR when this mod or another mod you’ve installed is causing a perpetual “refresh.” An example for the former is if I added a new mod tab to BMLE’s MCM. If I asked you to install this new version over an existing save, you won’t be able to see anything in the MCM.

 

In your case, since I haven’t changed the MCM in that specific way, your best bet is to either:

1. Revert to a save before the issue occurred 

2. do what you’re doing and make sure BMLE is installed on a save entirely clean of BMLE

 

Note that if the cause is another mod, option 2 won’t do anything. Obviously.

[Corsec]

So SLS will block merchant inventory from selling contraband to the player. It seems like it'd be much simpler to implement a generalised Trading Licence instead. Since traders all use a dialogue line to open the barter screen, would it be possible to add a scripted condition to those dialogue lines to check if the player has a Trading Licence?

 

You're doing really well in improving on the SLS licence system, there aren't many features it has left that you haven't improved upon.

[Nuascura]

3 hours ago, Corsec said:

So SLS will block merchant inventory from selling contraband to the player. It seems like it'd be much simpler to implement a generalised Trading Licence instead. Since traders all use a dialogue line to open the barter screen, would it be possible to add a scripted condition to those dialogue lines to check if the player has a Trading Licence?

That seems to be the idea. But after some time going through the conditions, it seems more complicated than I'd initially thought just because of the conditions I have to filter through to exclude street sellers that don't sell any items BMLE would consider for violations. That is, it's complicated unless Trading License is a blanket ban applied to all NPCs of the Merchant Faction. 

 

I'll probs take a further look later on!

Edited October 5, 2023 by Gyra

[Corsec]

One more bad idea lol. Females need a Bondage Licence to be allowed to own keys for devious devices. Since bondage is designed to control women, they shouldn't be able to unlock those items unless they have bought legal permission to do so. Or maybe you would think it better for the Insurance/Clothing Licence to cover this without adding an additional type of licence.

 

I forget under what exact conditions you are running the inventory checker so I don't know if it'd be worth implementing.

 

4 hours ago, Gyra said:

That is, it's complicated unless Trading License is a blanket ban applied to all NPCs of the Merchant Faction.

 

Yeah, a blanket ban is exactly was what I was thinking. It would mean that there would never be a need to run a Licence check for each item that is bought and sold. I presume it would be a lot simpler not to try to block items and instead to edit dialogue lines to block access to the barter screen. Maybe you can also run a script on the dialogue lines? I dunno how the licences work, but if possessing a valid licence is associated with a global variable then you can use that global as part of a dialogue condition. Or can you only run the licence check with a script?

 

So you'd need a Trading Licence to trade regardless of what items you are trading. In conditions for dialogue lines, you could check what kind of keywords they have to help decide whether to block. I think all merchants have a merchant keyword in the NPC record? We can also manually add keywords to merchants with SPID. Keyword checks are easy for dialogue conditions.

 

I think we can rationalize this. Legally, the merchants aren't at fault for buying/selling restricted items because they're either male or have the relevant licences. So only the female PC is legally liable for trade crimes.  Therefore, merchants have no reason to withhold trade in contraband. Merchants just make a profit and the female takes any blame. It also suits the fact that BM Licences is designed to be faster and more lightweight than SLS. So let the female PC buy/sell whatever and just take the simpler option of blocking the whole trade screen.

 

It would be better if there was also an additional locational check so that merchants outside of settlements wouldn't require a Trading Licence. I'm sure that location checks are possible as dialogue conditions, but you might have to manually add each settlement location as a seperate condition. Or check the keywords associated with the location?

 

If you really still want to require a specific licence to buy/sell particular items then I'd suggest that it would still be easier to block access to the trade screen. Do it by checking what type of trader you are talking to, rather than what type of item you are buying/selling. Meaning, if you don't have a magic licence then you can't open the barter screen with any magic merchant. I think maybe you could use merchant keywords to do this, and we could use SPID to assign relevant keywords to merchants (if they don't already have relevant keywords).

 

You can edit the services faction to control what items an NPC can buy/sell. Maybe this would be a simpler way to implement licence-based trade restrictions? SPID can add/remove factions from NPCs too. So create custom services factions, assign them with SPID. However there is a perk to sell any type of item to any merchant, that might be a problem.

Edited October 5, 2023 by Corsec

[Corsec]

I should clarify that when I say blocking the barter screen, I wasn't thinking of blocking by script. I don't know if that's possible or how to do it. It may require editing the vanilla script.

 

What I meant instead was to edit the dialogue line so that it would result in branching off to a custom dialogue line where they simply refuse to serve the player without a Trading Licence. Hopefully this could be done in a way that is much simpler than the way SLS does it, because SLS force-closes the barter screen.

 

Of course, all this would require editing vanilla dialogue and could conflict with other mods.

 

Or would it be best done by blocking NPCs based on their membership of a merchant faction?

Edited October 5, 2023 by Corsec