Give NPCs more personality + idea for discounts: (Also an idea to slow down botting)

I presented an idea ways back about giving Henchmen more lore and personality, since we know so little about them.

Well our henchmen talk now. Its kinda funny and silly. So what next?

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A little story: I play Animal Crossing. In Animal Crossing theres the Able Sisters. They sell clothes and umbrellas. Now...when you start the game, the older sister doesnt talk to you. However the more you talk to her, the better her responses get and she eventually tells you little stories about her, her childhood, etc and considers you her friend.
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Anyway. I thought merchants and xunlai deserve some personality.

I mean...they are important to the game! Go to ANY collector in Cantha and they have WAY more interesting conversation than any merchant or xunlai.

I think the few merchants in the game (LA and Druid's Overlook) who actually give you quests are very very interesting.

so enough of an intro. whats the damn idea >.<

Idea: NPC Personalities:

Every merchant and Xunlai agent gets a personality. They have proper names, moods, motivations and ways of talking. If you befriend them, you get a small discount/upcharge when you buy/sell.

How does it work?

Merchant dialogue Tree:

Gives you these choices
Talk ----> Hello. --------> Starts conversation tree
Weather's nice.-------> Starts conversation tree
To business. --------> Goes straight to buying/selling/Storage

Now. Heres the thing.

Your choices for conversation starters changes everytime you talk to the NPC as well as the order of the choices. This makes the "To Business" option move around from choice 1, 2, 3 (later on when you befriend the NPC, you get more choices to talk to them).

But theres always 1 choice to do business right away, and 2 conversation starters.

Possible conversation starters: (some i stole from Animal Crossing!!)

Talk to me.
Got any news?
How's your family?
Did you ever taste (some fictional GW dish)?
I think i got bit by a mosquito.
Did you see that (insert random profession) just walk by?

Possible choices for going straight to trade mode: (Note some choices will bring you straight to the selling tab or buying tab)

Whats on sale today?
I'm here to fill my pack.
I'm here to empty my pack.
Got a good haul today.
Whats this worth to you?

Once you've built up a kind of relationship with the NPC, you gain more choices, or the NPC starts a conversation without you choosing. Theres even a chance that the NPC will give you a present or sell you a cool weapon, for being their friend (Ok i stole that from Animal Crossing too)

Hey you're a (insert profession), look at what someone sold me today....

Some NPCs respond better to some of the choices. If you learn the personality of a NPC, you can gain a chance to get a small discount on buying, and a small upcharge when selling. Also, if you piss off the NPC, they can refuse service till you apologize.

What does it do?

Well for one thing, it makes the NPCs way more interesting. Plus since the choices change and move around everytime and are random, this will make selling to the merchant difficult to automate for a bot farmer. I assume some players would get annoyed at this, but they can easily bypass it just by going straight to business.

^^ ok, hope you like my ideas.

Animal crossing is either one of those games you hate or love, I liked it though.

I do like the idea of adding depth to the npcs, but theres so many other things that need improving first. I went mad with all the pop up boxes flooding the screen when the npcs were talking.

I would like to see some more back story or quests that relate to the hencman though especially aidan, their really wasnt much interaction between the npcs besides the main missions.
Example: Aidan says he worries about ascalon, It would be nice to go back there sometime and complete some quest there with him.

Dont have much input for time being, tired to.

So I dont know, pop up idea is a good idea though.

Actually a really good way to implement merchant trade would be to develop a relationship with just one trader. Traders who sell more expensive items (mainly chest keys) would be harder to make a relationship with, as they would be more stingy as to what they are selling. As you develop a relationship with that trader, he could give you a one-time discount, and that discount would come more frequently the more you talk to that person, but it wouldnt be anything permanent, and it would only happen after you have made the purchace.

So say you have a really good relationship with a trader, and you go to buy something, and then you select 'buy'. Once done, the trader will instantaneously go "oh, lemme give you a discount for that" and you will end up paying less than what you have already paid for. And this could be done automatically, so you dont have a choice to say "I dont want a discount"

There is another thread somewhere asking for general merchant quests (repeatable) where you can deliver goods to another trader, but you would have to walk the way there, instead of mapping to the place immediately. That similar idea consisted of checkpoints to ensure that you walk the whole way.

anyway

/signed

I'm all for NPC personality, but I think quests (like the one in Lion's Arch, where you deliver some supplies) are plenty good enough to fill the need. There's no reason a merchant can't give you a quest; it just doesn't need to happen too often, or it isn't special anymore.

Merchants aren't usually there to talk to you, just to sell you stuff and let you go on your way. If you've ever had a pizza guy who wouldn't stop talking you know what I mean; just shut up and let me go enjoy my pizza.