Improving Utility of Inns

[Heretic]

I’ve noticed the Inns in BGTSCC have little utility beyond a space for RP, which they're infrequently used for. Frankly there’s no value in paying for a room to rest my character in when I can just rest my character anywhere in the town housing the inn, at no cost.

On the NWN1 server I used to play on the inns had utility it that a player could use them to rest their character without having to wait for their rest cycle to expire. Players were not allowed to rest their characters within the confines of a town unless they were inside the room of a local inn.

IMO it would be great if such a utility were implemented here. At the very least it would ensure the Inns that are sprawled throughout the game world are more frequented and utilized. Also the cost of renting a room would have some return on investment especially if the inns allowed players to rest their characters without having to wait for the expiration of the rest cycle.

[Steve]

RP XP is supposedly increased inside Inns!! So that's some utility, yes?

[KOPOJIbPAKOB]

Maybe my opinion is unpopular, but I'd delete some of the campfires & benches we have and ESPECIALLY farmlands campfire. I know it's convenient to gather in six steps from the default spawn point, but that's not even funny having empty city vs 15 people by the campfire infront of it most of the time. Perhaps without the campfire people would actually start gathering inside Baldur's Gate as it's supposed to be according to common sense. After all, who would even create a campfire in 20 meters from the city entrance, what for?

upd: By the way, the default spawn point in the Underdark is Gloura's, why don't we move the default spawn point from the Farmlands to Elfsong or Blade and Stars, for example?

[wurdpass]

More gambling tables please Real adventurers love to gamble their illbegotten gains away

[Steve]

Surface spawn points used to be Elfsong and FAI. But people complained about having to be "stuck" inside the Gate...as well as possibly IC banned from the Gate...which poses some issues.

[Hoihe]

It once used to be a thing, before the Amn-Gate War.

You could buy a key from the owner of one of the Beregost inns (the dude you had to do the merchant dues quest with), and the key allowed you to force rest within the area.

I still don't know why it was removed. I distinctly remember Xvart farmers visiting said inn to get faster rest between spells and ending up actually RPing!

Maybe my opinion is unpopular, but I'd delete some of the campfires & benches we have and ESPECIALLY farmlands campfire. I know it's convenient to gather in six steps from the default spawn point, but that's not even funny having empty city vs 15 people by the campfire infront of it most of the time. Perhaps without the campfire people would actually start gathering inside Baldur's Gate as it's supposed to be according to common sense. After all, who would even create a campfire in 20 meters from the city entrance, what for?

upd: By the way, the default spawn point in the Underdark is Gloura's, why don't we move the default spawn point from the Farmlands to Elfsong or Blade and Stars, for example?

Way too many characters (that I personally find interesting to interact with) tend to dislike cities because nature, but are OK with farmlands because chauntea. Removing that fire would reduce interactions even more.

[Heretic]

RP XP is supposedly increased inside Inns!! So that's some utility, yes?

True, but as KOPOJIbPAKOB pointed out there isn't overwhelming incentive to enter the inns and RP when the campfires are right there next to a spawn point. Perhaps re-instituting the spawn location inside the inn with the option of spawning someplace outside a city if a RP ban is in effect.

Though I'm primarily concerned that the inns outside the Gate and FAI are highly under utilized. Take for example places like Greenset, Beregost, Nashkel, and that Svirfneblin village in the Upperdark (the name escapes me at the moment) - what's the point of using the inns if you can just rest outside the Inn? Were I an area developer I'd be disappointed if something I spent time creating went underused.

[Tsidkenu]

How about random encounters (via dynamic spawns) triggering upon rest in certain areas? Resting in a gutter in town? City watch spawn on you and demand you move your vagrant hiney onwards. Rest in the forest? Random creatures from that area can have a chance to spawn on you and disturb it. Rest in the open in soubar/roaringshore? Dynamic spawn of some cutthroats trying to kill you and take your stuff. Any rest thus disrupted should not reset the rest timers! Players should learn to rest in appropriate areas, yes!

[Unity]

Maybe my opinion is unpopular, but I'd delete some of the campfires & benches we have and ESPECIALLY farmlands campfire. I know it's convenient to gather in six steps from the default spawn point, but that's not even funny having empty city vs 15 people by the campfire infront of it most of the time. Perhaps without the campfire people would actually start gathering inside Baldur's Gate as it's supposed to be according to common sense. After all, who would even create a campfire in 20 meters from the city entrance, what for?

upd: By the way, the default spawn point in the Underdark is Gloura's, why don't we move the default spawn point from the Farmlands to Elfsong or Blade and Stars, for example?

I fully support this and entirely agree. It always bothered me that the many inns inside the city proper are devoid of life while that one dank fire and a two log benches always seem to hold anything from master-bard performances to political discussions and general adventuring meetings.

Building on the idea of improving inns also: Add editable notice boards in front of major inns where players could write messages, same as the few existing quest boards, so if an open meeting is in progress or if a bard is playing, they can now advertise to passing players. I would also have those messages persist only until server reset so it doesn't end up cluttering the board and it'd only keep relevant events on there.

[Mance]

Why people gather at campfires?
1) sitting at campfire gives that magical feeling. Fire burning in the dark, open sky and stars. In short - it adds immersion to fantasy world. At P&P D&D my characters spent a lot more time at campfires than at inns. Inns mostly used as "Time-Skippers".

2)Convenience. And i'm not talking bout proximity of spawn points. Characters in open area. If you need to talk in private - just move a bit from campfire. Also every passing character can join. If you remove campfires - there will be a lot less RP.

3)Not all races\classes allowed in cities. And for them - campfire is only one opportunity for Free-For-All types of RP.


P\S Another campfire spot - At Friendly Arms Inn. People also more often gather outside than inside of Inn. So... Dont destroy campfires. please

[artemitavik]

As someone who ICly runs an inn as part of his guild (the Last Anchor) and would love to see more people inside the inn to RP I would say this:

1) don't remove the campfires. A plethora of reasons from people not having RP reasons to enter the city because their wild folk, to being generally unwelcome, to simple ambiance of adventurers meeting adventurers in an adventurer-y way.

2) give all inn a token that can be bought, only one carried per person, that allows a forced rest outside the timer that doesn't bother with the cooldown. That way, if someone wants to rest before the timer is up, they can do that. I say token, not a key, because some inns/taverns don't have rooms commonly available so much, because it doesn't have them or they're rented out ICly on the long term, such as the Belching Dragon in Nashkel or the Last Anchor respectively. But that could be a reason for people to go inside an inn or tavern.

3) give the Tavern/inn RP XP bonus back, that way people will go, in theory, to RP there more often because... hey, more xp right? Especially at higher levels where grinding is massively tedious and RP XP is just a good way to get there. A higher point award inside places like the Candlekeep in, FAI, Last Anchor, Muse, Twilight Rose, etc... you know, places where people should be congregating, would draw those folk in more and possibly even make RCR a little less painful.

[DiceyCZ]

I know people will hate this idea but...here goes.

On my old nwn1 server we had a pretty simple sleep/hunger/thirst system. Nothing overly distractive just meant that during your gaming session once or twice you had to sleep and eat and carry arround a canteen. It made people meet a lot more in Inns and once there...might as well RP

[Steve]

If Inns receive back the XP Bonus—why was it remove anyway?!?—can Temples ALSO be tagged for improved RP XP?

Be fair to the God Fearing!!

[Unity]

I know people will hate this idea but...here goes.

On my old nwn1 server we had a pretty simple sleep/hunger/thirst system. Nothing overly distractive just meant that during your gaming session once or twice you had to sleep and eat and carry arround a canteen. It made people meet a lot more in Inns and once there...might as well RP

I'm not against that. I think it could be fun, as long as it's not becoming an issue on events or dungeon runs. Not everyone has the strength to carry rations and bags of holding aren't a thing here.

[artemitavik]

Without the addition of bags and such, I don't think the carrying of rations and such would be practical. It's not a bad idea, but we would need some serious inventory management at that point.