[Idea] Rape discouragement mod: Post-rape animations, psychological consequences

[R_dahri]

Maybe adding some blurr effect while being under risk of being raped again would be a good idea, and a accelerated breathing

[Ashra XIII]

The blur effect and heavy breathing seems like it'd be easy to do as well, because there are already other mods that do this for when, say, your character is low on health and/or stamina. I've seen it on Nexus.

 

It could also be used a bit for after the rape, as combined with a bit of a drunk stagger effect seems like it would portray the stress and trauma of the situation.

[Guest GuyWhoAbruptlyDisappeared]

Maybe adding some blurr effect while being under risk of being raped again would be a good idea, and a accelerated breathing

Love this idea. Will do everything in my power to make it happen.

[xboronx]

Finished Real Play now, it's quite disturbing. Even though it is only a game and fiction you are sorry for the poor girls.

If Skyrim would get more immersive as it already is in a similiar way would be great.

 

 

[Gᴀʟᴠᴀɴɪᴢᴇ]

Good luck in your modding endeavors! I really hope this actually becomes a finished project, and again, I wish you all the luck, I don't think I could ever figure out how to do all the scripting and animating!

 

(PS: Maybe you can change your name from "guywhoregisteredtodownload" to "guywhomakesamazingmods" after the project is done! haha.)

[Just Checking]

This mod would go a long way towards making things like Defeat and Submit feel more like negative consequences rather than just a potential way to cheat death.  As was mentioned by someone else here, previously the PC just sort of seems to shrug rape off, rather than feeling much more than, say, a hit to health regen for a few minutes.  This PTSD simulator in the making here sounds like a clever idea.

[Kawauso]

Having a long lasting debuff to health/magicka/stamina would be good too.

Configurable ones in time and strengh.

Being able to get back on your feet after a single nap nap when you've just been raped doesn't make sense.

 

Though I disagree with the title of the topic because who are we discouraging here anyway ? And you can't really discourage a victim from getting raped.

[Guest GuyWhoAbruptlyDisappeared]

Having a long lasting debuff to health/magicka/stamina would be good too.

Configurable ones in time and strengh.

Being able to get back on your feet after a single nap nap when you've just been raped doesn't make sense.

 

Though I disagree with the title of the topic because who are we discouraging here anyway ? And you can't really discourage a victim from getting raped.

 

We're discouraging victims from using rape as get-out-of-dying-free card, making it something to truly be avoided and feared rather than "lol getting raped again what can you do".

Also heavily discouraging aggression.

[magnusx]

I think that each time u get raped decrease the skills already obtained, like when u go jail, just saying, could be great

[Adorkable]

That is quite an interesting idea.

I would definitely use it for a more 'realistic' playthrough with a slave girl character.

 

I don't know how feasible it would be, but it might be an interesting feature to include a sort of 'getting used to it / resigned to it' mechanic. Let's say a female NPC gets raped repeatedly (either due to having insanely bad luck and a lot of assholes running around or the aforementioned slave girl scenario), and by repeatedly I mean A LOT, the reactions you described might stop occurring or lessen in their intensity. Obviously that does not at all mean that she likes it (god forbid), but is rather an indicator of a certain numbness to the whole situation setting in.

But I admit this is fueled mostly by a desire to perfect my slave girl playthrough, and I'm not sure whether other people would be interested in it at all.^^

[Guest GuyWhoAbruptlyDisappeared]

That is quite an interesting idea.

I would definitely use it for a more 'realistic' playthrough with a slave girl character.

 

I don't know how feasible it would be, but it might be an interesting feature to include a sort of 'getting used to it / resigned to it' mechanic. Let's say a female NPC gets raped repeatedly (either due to having insanely bad luck and a lot of assholes running around or the aforementioned slave girl scenario), and by repeatedly I mean A LOT, the reactions you described might stop occurring or lessen in their intensity. Obviously that does not at all mean that she likes it (god forbid), but is rather an indicator of a certain numbness to the whole situation setting in.

But I admit this is fueled mostly by a desire to perfect my slave girl playthrough, and I'm not sure whether other people would be interested in it at all.^^

 

The PTSD effect I'm attempting to work on now (doing the scripting side of things before the animation because I am still figuring out how to get my animations working) will stack up to a maximum. This makes sense, even for your slave girl character, because people who undergo repeated trauma do not become numb - they become increasingly paranoid and reactive to the trauma. This makes sense, as people on battlefields grow an aversion to loud noises, rather than getting used to them.

 

I think the same thing would apply for your slave girl. With every rape, she becomes more stressed, not less, hence why PTSD progresses. However, the effects of PTSD (called Shellshock in the game) will be mediated as your player levels up and gains more confidence.

 

I have begun to move forward on this mod. In a week or a few, if everything goes reasonably well figuring out animation and scripting, I will move this mod to a WIP stage. I will do it in two separate parts, since they do not depend on each other:

Animation part: Extra animations for the framework for post-trauma.

Scripting part: Guts of the mod. Scripting, shellshock, insomnia, etc.

 

I am working on the scripting first simply because I want to know what I'm doing with the scripting so I know what to expect when I work on the animations. First thing on my list is shellshock / PTSD.

 

I'm planning to use this formula (wlil probably modify it later for balance) determine what stage of shellshock you are in:

Trauma integer =  90*[Number of times raped in past month] + 10*[Number of times raped total]

Confidence integer = [People killed in last month] + 2*[Dragons killed in last month] + [50 if Alduin is dead] + [50 if Miraak is dead]

Sadness integer = 25*[Number of deceased vanilla followers]

SS points = Trauma Integer + Sadness Integer - Confidence Integer - Player Level

 

Stage 1 of shellshock at 100 points, stage 2 at 250, stage 3 at 400, stage 4 at 1000. That way, if you've killed Alduin and Miraak, and you just downed an entire bandit camp, you're probably not going to get shellshock from one rape. 

Haven't decided what to do with the stage as far as blurring goes. Obviously I can do basic magic effects like magicka regen and such but that's not important to discuss. 

 

What about this for starters: (I am completely open to changing these, so long as you tell me before I figure out the scripting)

If possible (I am trying to figure out how to pull this off as we speak), have a list of potential rapist factions, and any faction of your rapist that is on that list will be added to the shellshock blacklist. I plan to make symptoms individually, then throw them together in each stage. Here are the symptoms I have written down so far (working on panic attacks as we speak): Some of these may not be doable with my lack of experience, if at all in the engine. But most of them should be doable.

Panic Attacks: Simple screen blur when getting close to people in a blacklisted faction.

Social Anxiety: Panic attack effect at random when alone in an interior cell with an NPC regardless of faction.

Shock: Double vision, decreased attack and movement speed, random dropping of offhand weapon or shield, when getting very close to people in a blacklisted faction.

Insomnia: Random waking with panic attacks when attempting to sleep.

Delusions: Delusional events, such as followers briefly turning ghastly, falmer/daedra inexplicably appearing and then disappearing when the player is alone in an interior cell, hearing voices in an empty house, trap doors appearing out in the open that lead to nowhere, whatever other creative delusions I can make in the creation kit.

Black-outs: When in city limits, the player will randomly black out and wake up in a nearby cell.

Insanity: The worst and last symptom of shellshock - the player will occasionally get a random insanity event such as: Waking up in a city, 12 hours passed, over a dead body that resembles a bandit, incurring a bounty. Looking in the inventory to find a random valueless item the player does not recall picking up. Followers may disappear, appearing back at home as if the player had dismissed them, even though the player did not. The player may gain spells or shouts with nonsense names that do nothing. 

 

Then:

Stage 1 gives panic attacks, insomnia.

Stage 2 gives panic attacks, social anxiety, insomnia, shock.

Stage 3 gives panic attacks, social anxiety, insomnia, delusions, shock, black-outs. 

Stage 4 gives all of the above symptoms, plus the possible insanity events.

Shellshock can be treated with confidence. Leveling up, becoming better and more confident in combat, etc. will all help the player be less scared. 

[Just Checking]

Looking over all these plans, it almost looks like you're working on a completely new psychological horror game.  This looks like an impressive project.

 

If you're counting things like Alduin and Miraak being dead, will you also be considering other big, confidence building in-game events occurring?  Things like resolving the civil war or becoming head of a guild?  And then there's Harkon for Dawnguard users.  Or would too many factors just freak the whole script out?

 

Have you considered memory repression as a symptom?  It might be a little over the top (and cumbersome to put in), but at high trauma PCs might lose spells or something like that.  I'm just sort of throwing this out there as a surrogate for actual memory loss, since it's not like the player character has some kind of memory bank anywhere.  Unless you want to count perks, but that might be even more extreme than forgetting spells.  Another person suggested hits to skills like when you go to prison.  I feel like if this is a consequence you implement they would need to be upper-end trauma stuff, with equally upper-end penalties.

[Mufasalikemods]

you mentioned crying textures, think someone has worked on that so not sure if you would be able to use it/if it would be what you had in mind. Not tried this, just seen it. Its called skintextures in adult mods, models and textures, sorry for some reason I can't paste the link. Sounds like a good idea for a mod, I could see this being built into something big

 

[WaxenFigure]

If you get raped too many times in dungeons I can see the mod giving you a panic attack when you enter a new dungeon populated with more of whatever you got raped by before.  A fade to black and the next thing you know you are back in the nearest town well away from that dungeon.  You may have to try to enter it several times before it will let you.

 

 

[Guest GuyWhoAbruptlyDisappeared]

If you get raped too many times in dungeons I can see the mod giving you a panic attack when you enter a new dungeon populated with more of whatever you got raped by before.  A fade to black and the next thing you know you are back in the nearest town well away from that dungeon.  You may have to try to enter it several times before it will let you.

 

I don't like the idea of preventing people from entering dungeons, finishing quests, etc. I want the mod to change gameplay, but I don't want it to get in the way of gameplay. 

 

I also am not sure about making area-based panic attacks. I can't think of a way to do it efficiently and without excessive tedium.

[Kawauso]

 

We're discouraging victims from using rape as get-out-of-dying-free card, making it something to truly be avoided and feared rather than "lol getting raped again what can you do".

Also heavily discouraging aggression.

 

I see  your point but the mod should be about making it more immersive, more realistic; discouraging rape should be a wanted side effect and the users should be the ones to decide how harshly rape should be punished,

 

 

The PTSD effect I'm attempting to work on now (doing the scripting side of things before the animation because I am still figuring out how to get my animations working) will stack up to a maximum. This makes sense, even for your slave girl character, because people who undergo repeated trauma do not become numb - they become increasingly paranoid and reactive to the trauma. This makes sense, as people on battlefields grow an aversion to loud noises, rather than getting used to them.

 

I think the same thing would apply for your slave girl. With every rape, she becomes more stressed, not less, hence why PTSD progresses. However, the effects of PTSD (called Shellshock in the game) will be mediated as your player levels up and gains more confidence.

 

 

I speak of experience when I say that repeated traumas can lead to derealization, in that case you would most likely react with acceptance to your fate, losing your will to fight, become depressed, etc. This is a thing that happens too often. It's one of the sad parts of repeated (sexual) abuse.

[Guest GuyWhoAbruptlyDisappeared]

 

 

We're discouraging victims from using rape as get-out-of-dying-free card, making it something to truly be avoided and feared rather than "lol getting raped again what can you do".

Also heavily discouraging aggression.

 

I see  your point but the mod should be about making it more immersive, more realistic; discouraging rape should be a wanted side effect and the users should be the ones to decide how harshly rape should be punished,

 

 

The PTSD effect I'm attempting to work on now (doing the scripting side of things before the animation because I am still figuring out how to get my animations working) will stack up to a maximum. This makes sense, even for your slave girl character, because people who undergo repeated trauma do not become numb - they become increasingly paranoid and reactive to the trauma. This makes sense, as people on battlefields grow an aversion to loud noises, rather than getting used to them.

 

I think the same thing would apply for your slave girl. With every rape, she becomes more stressed, not less, hence why PTSD progresses. However, the effects of PTSD (called Shellshock in the game) will be mediated as your player levels up and gains more confidence.

 

 

I speak of experience when I say that repeated traumas can lead to derealization, in that case you would most likely react with acceptance to your fate, losing your will to fight, become depressed, etc. This is a thing that happens too often. It's one of the sad parts of repeated (sexual) abuse.

 

 

The idea of the mod is not to have discouraging rape be a side effect - the idea is to make the game more immersive using heavy consequences to rape. 

 

I want to keep it relatively stupid and simple as my first mod. If I ever actually manage to finish the mod, by all means, mod it to your liking. 

[Just Checking]

I suppose you could use an MCM menu to just check a box for how the PC reacts to repeated trauma.  Does it derealise it to you, or do you become hyper aware of anything that reminds you of it?  The example the author used was when soldiers suffer PTSD they become more aware of loud noises and such and they become more and more stressed and scarred over time by it, but as Kawuaso and other previous people have mentioned, it becoming an "accepted fate" is another possible outcome.  This kind of stuff is something nature never really prepared our minds for, so is it just a matter of our brains desperately trying to develope a "survival mechanism" for the trauma one way or the other?  Either by reacting extremely to whatever takes us back there so we try to avoid it, or by finding a way to dull the pain so we can survive what we feel we can't escape?  Having said that, I'm by no means a psychologist or anything, this is just mean thinking out loud about what makes sense to me.  Anyone with actual knowledge on this, feel free to correct me.

 

Sorry about that, a little rant there.  I sometimes prattle on when I start wondering about things like the human mind.

 

But yeah, a checkbox in a menu to decide how a character reacts to repeated trauma might solve the problem, if it's not too annoying to implement.  If not a checkbox, maybe a random roll when the mod is activated could decide how your character reacts.  I'd actually prefer the random chance, so that way each character could be different and you wouldn't know how they react until it actually happens to them.  Has an almost realism ring to it.  Almost.  Again, I have no idea how difficult it would be to implement this, and if nothing else it would mean having to write a whole new slew of script to cover the flipside of what's already in the works, but if the mod author doesn't want to go this way maybe someone else can fix up an addon to this later.

[Guest GuyWhoAbruptlyDisappeared]

According to what I've read on psychology, the main medium for desensitization is under capture - that is, if a traumatic event is absolutely unavoidable, the victim will be temporarily desensitized to it until they escape. The extreme case of desensitization is Stockholm's' Syndrome.

 

I thought about this last night and realized it would be very easy to add desensitization in a very simple way that obeys the K-I-S-S rule. Just modify the formula.

 

I already have a form of desensitization in the works - there is a grace period between rapes of about 3 hours so that getting raped 8 times in 3 hours is only somewhat worse than getting raped once in the same three hours. 

 

Using this, I can add a desensitization factor configurable via MCM - Instead of increasing the traumatic effects linearly, increase it exponentially, so that the formula looks more like:

 

Shellshock Points = {90*[Times raped in the past month] + 10*[Total times raped minus the recent ones]}^(DSN) - ...

DSN = 1/(Desensitization factor)

Then, with a factor of 1, it is as I intended - each consecutive rape is just as bad as the last.

With a factor of more than one, rapes are desensitized - the difference between being raped once and twice is greater than the difference between being raped ninety nine times and a hundred times.

With a factor of less than one, rapes are exponential - each rape is worse than the last. 

 

 

[Mud]

Sounds like you've thought this through quite well.

 

It kind of feels to me like the confidence value could use some buffing and adjustment for long-term effects, though. First, feels like player level could use a somewhat stronger reduction than just simply subtracting its value from your trauma points - given that the mightiest warrior in the land, the Ebony Warrior, is level 80, and being that strong doesn't even account for the trauma of one recent rape. Also, the way you gain confidence for recent kills makes it seem as though all the bloodshed you've already carried out somehow doesn't matter anymore after a month has passed - perhaps a better implementation would be your total number of kills divided by some number? In effect reducing the confidence you get for each individual kill, but making every kill build up your overall personality. Perhaps dragon kills could simply be converted to a permanent 2-point boost with no division as well - they ARE mythical death-lizards capable of immense destruction after all. If you're not seeking them out on purpose they don't appear too often to make the reduction effect too strong, and if you are then being a roaming dragonslayer exterminating them wherever they hide must surely be a significant boost to the psyche.

 

The end result being that you're slow to gain confidence early on since all you have is a low level and bandits to kill, but later on, when you're powerful enough to annihilate cities' entire guard regiments single-handedly and have hundreds of heads under your belt, you'll have the confidence boost that befits such a power level.

[Guest GuyWhoAbruptlyDisappeared]

Sounds like you've thought this through quite well.

 

It kind of feels to me like the confidence value could use some buffing and adjustment for long-term effects, though. First, feels like player level could use a somewhat stronger reduction than just simply subtracting its value from your trauma points - given that the mightiest warrior in the land, the Ebony Warrior, is level 80, and being that strong doesn't even account for the trauma of one recent rape. Also, the way you gain confidence for recent kills makes it seem as though all the bloodshed you've already carried out somehow doesn't matter anymore after a month has passed - perhaps a better implementation would be your total number of kills divided by some number? In effect reducing the confidence you get for each individual kill, but making every kill build up your overall personality. Perhaps dragon kills could simply be converted to a permanent 2-point boost with no division as well - they ARE mythical death-lizards capable of immense destruction after all. If you're not seeking them out on purpose they don't appear too often to make the reduction effect too strong, and if you are then being a roaming dragonslayer exterminating them wherever they hide must surely be a significant boost to the psyche.

 

The end result being that you're slow to gain confidence early on since all you have is a low level and bandits to kill, but later on, when you're powerful enough to annihilate cities' entire guard regiments single-handedly and have hundreds of heads under your belt, you'll have the confidence boost that befits such a power level.

 

Very good points there. I will adjust the formula based on what you said.

[Just Checking]

I just want to say that looking over this thread, this is probably the most psychologically thought out mod I've ever seen.  just watching it develop is pretty interesting.  Kudos to OP and everyone pooling these ideas.  At the rate this is going, it'll end up a must have for using things like Defeat and Submit.

[00ptic]

Having your previous exploits and achievements count towards your confidence does make sense, but I also feel that having defeated countless dragons, giants, Alduin and becoming the leader of every major guild in Skyrim, the thane of every hold in Skyrim, the champion of every Daedric Prince etc. and then somehow managing to get raped (especially for the first time) might actually make it worse on you.

[Guest GuyWhoAbruptlyDisappeared]

Having your previous exploits and achievements count towards your confidence does make sense, but I also feel that having defeated countless dragons, giants, Alduin and becoming the leader of every major guild in Skyrim, the thane of every hold in Skyrim, the champion of every Daedric Prince etc. and then somehow managing to get raped (especially for the first time) might actually make it worse on you.

 

I wouldn't argue that it's worse, but it's of the same caliber. That's why I want to set variables within the formulas adjustable via MCM, so everyone can pick what they feel is the most realistic.

[Kawauso]

I was thinking I'd rather have rape decrease the friendship rather than making people instantly and permanently hostile, with still the possibility of the NPCs to become hostile of course.