Hi again!
We've been continuing our work on investigations and interrogation. The main task for this time around was to set up a framework for transient conversation states and conversation tone/tactics, so that interrogations aren't just a rote process of asking questions and gathering evidence. For example, if your character decides to approach an interrogation by intimidating the subject, you now select that skill to pair with your question. The subject can attempt to resist, based on how afraid they are of you, and how well they understand social interactions. If you succeed, the intimidation decreases the composure of the subject; failure to intimidate increases it. Regardless of success or failure, an intimidated subject will dislike talking to you and want to leave. But if their composure is broken, they'll answer your question. Other conversation tactics like persuasion work differently, and some tactics like 'pacify' can affect attitude without asking a question at all, if you find the interrogation slipping away from you. The questions and tactics also affect the long-term relationship variables mentioned last time, like trust, respect and fear, as well as your various reputation levels with the subject.
If you are a good judge of character, you'll get a more refined/correct preview of your chances to succeed with a given question+tone pairing, similar to how combat aiming works. In this way, player characters that swap in some social skills and attributes to balance or replace their fighting skills will have a significant advantage here. We might not clear the bar this time, but the aspiration is that these interactions will grow to be as interesting as regular combat. It's a tall order, but at least we have a richer set of player decisions to work with now, and something that's starting to feel like a contested investigation, which is the main goal for this stage of development.
Reminder: we're working on villains and investigations to finish off the material we were working on for the last DF Classic release before we transition fully over to work on Steam (the artists are already way ahead of me.) This is the third of four stages of that release. We completed villains in history generation, and moved those elements into the world during play. Now we're focusing on adventure mode before we tackle fortress mode in the final stage.
- Tarn