Idea Bucket

[xanderdunn]

Where to Get Ideas

• Look through UESP Featured Images
• Look through Wheeze's Steam screenshots
• Watch the How to Train your Dragon movies
• Look through Skyim Shots

Lore

• Alphabet translates directly to English: Daedra language
• Well understood: Dragon language, Ayleid language
• Very few translated words: Dwemer language, Falmer language
• Languages not understood: Elder language, Magic Language
• Letters that appear only on a certain time or a certain place. Such as when moonlight is present or on a certain day of the month or in the presence of a certain statue.
• Have the player solve a riddle. Perhaps by using information in a book elsewhere in the game.
• What about using the circular stone that was used in Oblivion to old open the Oblivion Gates to hold up the structure of the house chamber objects. Perhaps the player simply has to find all the items in the cave that need to be in the house chamber and then activates it using the stone? The scholar who was locked inside explains it. If this is the story, then feature the Daedric shrines as ways to expand the cave. This could also be used as a method of leveling. Many of the Daedric shrines can be entered only at high levels.
• A negative result because the player recedes from the world into dark greed? Like the wood elves of Hobbit 2. He becomes isolationist and it has very negative effects for the rest of the world.

Weapons

• A weapon that gives off light.
• Weapon that has a certain percent chance to make the player go into a berserk mode with highly increased damage that lasts for a certain amount of time.
• Make a weapon better the more it's used. See here.
• Flash of light when the player hits an enemy with a weapon
• Shehai: Form a sword from the player's spirit as the legendary Redguard did

Quests

• Betrayal. Death. Anything can happen. The quest seems to be going in one direction and then BOOM it takes an unexpected turn. It could start as a small, unimportant quest and then BAM bandits attack and kill the person who gave you that quest so you can't complete it. The quest becomes something involving the new people who appeared.
• The player must have something in his inventory for something to happen.

Layout, Clutter, and Atmosphere

• Is there a fountain I can put in my house?
• Randomized layout? Can you have a bunch of objects that are randomly turned on or off? For example, Luftahraan's arena has a randomized arena layout.
• Can I have an ambient sound space that speaks ominous words over and over? Like "welcome, welcome wel welcommmmeee..."? And perhaps ghosts or some creatures that must be cleared to proceed?
• A door that is activated by capturing the souls of ghosts and putting the filled soul gems into the door?
• Activators that cause damage to the player. And an inability to heal? Must activate certain ones to get the door to open.
• Creatures turned to stone? Items with incorrect textures on them?
• Can I script the position of an object? Can I make an object move? For example, have a Sigil Stone floating through the air or circling around something.
• Block a pathway in the dungeon with a Dwemer pipe. The player can see through it but not walk through it. Maybe bust the pipe elsewhere in the cave by turning on stuff!?
• Be weird. Go all out. Do whatever the fuck you want. Make everything purple! Dream worlds.
• Water flowing underground? Hobbit 1: 43.14.
• Have cliffs that go down really far at the bottom of the cavern, like the Dwarven mining. Put a bunch of gold and other minable things in them, just not reachable by the player. Hobit 1: ???
• Mist. Giant whisps of mist.
• For the Dwemer part, create a massive layering of bridges in mid-air like Hobbit 1: 2.15.35
• A very steep canyon with a slit that the player walks through. Hobbit 1: 1.22.21
• Make battlefields more interesting with environmental changes rather than harder enemies. Visuals. Mist. Lights. Movement. Height differences.
• Can I make giant bumble bees?
• Have a pitcher with a waterfall coming out of it. Could this be the source of the waterfalls in my home?
• Lots of multi-colored trees? A large butterfly array?
• Can you mix architecture with nature? Hobbit 2: 34.42 and 35.02
• Underground waterfalls over rocks? Are there any roots? Hobbit 2:40.39
• Maybe the indication of the player's favor is in the color of the light that comes in through the ceiling?
• Makes your lights contingent on the time of day? House lights at night and streaming light from the hole in the top during day.
• A sheer cliff wall with rocks as steps going off the side. Hobbit 2: 55.19.
• How many gold coins can you get into a single room? Can the player stand on top of them?
• Player gets a disease just from entering a dungeon. The door locks behind the player.
• Add a homage to Wheeze. Use the song Guild Wars 2 Ruins of an Empire starting at 0:50.
• Play with colors, shaders, lights, and textures. Can you make something dream-like, gost-like, crazy, painted world-like? Perhaps make an entire area of the dungeon like this. Perhaps make a place the player gets sucked into.
• Have a Dwemer city turned on it's side.
• Have dead bodies reanimate and fight the player. You could even have a bunch of them that come alive and die and come alive and die.
• Can you have piles of skulls and bones the player walks on? How much does it affect performance? Could you make it a very narrow hallway with nothing else visible?

Encounters

• Ambushes. Make enemies wait for a player to reach a certain location and then jump on him.
• Enemies come out of the architecture. Integrate enemies into the architecture as if they actually live there. For example, have an ice wraith that comes out of a Dwemer pipe.
• Make the player lose dragon souls as a penalty rather than killing him.
• An all white dragon that illuminates light? Have its light activated in a dark room when the player gets near.

House Features

• Custom lighting. Allow the player to custom light his home. For example, I want to be able to have a rainbow assortment.
• The player can endow his workbench with special properties so that it gives a certain buff all the time or under certain conditions. Do this for all of them: smithing, enchanting, and alchemy. Perhaps the player must put a certain item on the workbench in question for it to receive the bonus.
• A dragon skull arrangement on the wall that forms into the shape of a dragon head. The player can collect items, such as dragon skulls, and place them into appropriate chests to have them appear throughout the house.
• A full skeleton dragon?

Music

• Tome of Rubicon (Dwarf Theme) from Guild Wars
• Consider using Ludovico Einaudi music in a special location
• Home in Florence by Jesper Kyd

Other

• Track player kills. How many of each type of character has the player killed. What could you use this data for?
• "Sheets of Silver Glass"
• Move objects toward the player?
• A man whose soul is trapped in a stone and the player releases him?
• Memory stone: Record someone's thoughts
• Should I have auto item sorting into containers and display positions?
  • I don't think items should be auto sorted into display positions because displays are not going to change often and I want to decide where which item is displayed.

Staff of Chaos was put under security in White Gold Tower?

Flask of Lillandril = absorbs all magic = in Sheogorath's possession

Can you put a special star in the sky?

Can you apply effects to the player's vision? Can you give the player an annoying confused/surreal vision while in a certain area?

Make a certain constellation prominent in the night sky so it's power becomes greater.

Include inconsistencies that are likely to occur in a real medieval society. For example, one book's date for an event is different from another source's.

Change the climate of an area as Tiber Septim changed the climate of Cyrodiil from jungle to temperate.

Old Progression Ideas

• Giant chamber with a very narrow bridge where the player must fight a dragon. Lava below it.
• A long aisle of soul gem traps and slicer traps. Use slow Thu'um to get through it.
• Completely black rooms with traps that require the player to use a light source
• Doors lock behind the player
• Make offerings
• Dig deeper into the dungeon
• Gather lyrim?
• Decipher dragon texts
• Amazing things should be guarded by amazing things. What is amazing about each location you are making?
• A player should be able to begin the quest around the time of being able to buy the house in Whiterun. Use dragon shouts and high level abilities to control when the player can unlock portions of the cave.
• A door that will open only when the player can cause a certain amount of damage to it?
• Things that react to certain elements. The player burns, freezes, or electrocutes things to activate or power them.

Inspirational Images