Larian Studios Forums Divinity - Original Sin Divinity - Original Sin - General Question about indirect thievery detection

Hi, I've just seen video about scripting and I think it's great. But from 'Bert the guru' said, it looks like NPC's will react to thievery only when they see it. I'd like to know whether they change their behaviour or at least their mood when find their own property missing.

There is an example: in Obilvion during the night I took every single item from jewelry shop. On the next morning I visited the same (now empty) shop and asked the shop assistant how it is going... and he replyed something like: Everything is perfect, thanks for asking!

asm

Can we add custom stats to NPC's trough scripting? In that case we could adjust the script to add a "suspicion" stat that increments every time you steal something (and increments to the max if the owner actually sees it).
So that, the more stuff magically disappears while you are around, the more suspicious the npc will be so his dialog will change accordingly. You could even make it so the more suspicous he is, the more he will follow you around, up to the point where he denies you access to the store.

It's a pretty awesome idea actually. I think/hope we will see some really nice behavior modifying projects in the future

Yeah, thats pretty stupid indeed.

Asm, good point indeed. It wouldn't hurt with some kind of suspicion factor check based on time from when the theft was committed and a check if the player character has been in the vicinity recently and then seen by key NPCs. And if the suspicion flag gets raised, the theft-victim NPC can react accordingly. It must be a clever system, as simple and neat as possible.

I suppose items should get some sort of "property off NPC-X/Player" marking, with some kind of timer. And you shouldn't be able to sell stolen stuff in a X radius (town/region) from where is was stolen (depending on it's uniqueness/value). But I suppose that would only work for fixed placement items, and not randomized stuff.

Some good ideas here. It does seem weird that NPCs don't seem to notice half their stuff going missing if they don't directly see the player take it.

Hmm I see, there are at least 2 different cases:

1. player steals something and NPCs are around but nobody has seen him stealing something. There should be an addition to some 'suspect' value just for player. If that value is too high, player is accused of thievery (and searched by guards).

2. player steals something and nobody is around (in the night) he should not be suspicious of thievery, it just upset touched NPCs (they may also call guards for more realistic feeling).

So the question is: will something of that be in the game?

@asm heh good point on the Oblivion thing.. I experienced the same type of thing.

@Dexyd that would be great and I doubt it would be hard to incorporate.. as another example from Oblivion.. stolen items were red and you could only sell them to a fence but here instead of a fence have like stolen from A town, can only sell in B-F towns.

Asm: Well, you bringing it up, and us coming up with suggestions and potential improvements, is a good start. Larian are known for picking up on great ideas coming from fans and others.

I agree but there is one major catch.
Suspicion should not be abused. ie. if your player stat is high enough in stealth mode, it would be like literally no one see you steal in public space( as it limited the detection range from NPC.)
This is subject to balance of course, but just putting a value with area scan for player is not good enough, owner should suspect all player and/or NPC in that proximity. Since owner didn't catch it when it happens.

Also, if a NPC thieve can steal from player would be quite hilarious.

And, if you sweep clean a shop, you should see the owner respond to the devastating event, and maybe see him close shop and sleep on the street later on. Which also mean you had one less shop to do shopping, and deal with the consequence.