Morrowind Mod talk:AddTopic

general or targeted?

From reading this page, am I understanding correctly that no target needs to be specified? Up until now I've been selecting the NPC that I wish to have the desired topic added to their dialogue options. If I add a somewhat unique topic (such as one related to a quest stage) without selecting a target NPC, does it attempt to add the topic only for the NPCs who are associated with that particular topic? If I add a general topic like "my trade" that doesn't always show up for certain characters, will this command bypass that? Chill fridge (talk) 05:03, 1 June 2023 (UTC)

AddTopic does exactly what it says on the page: it adds the topic to the player's (i.e. your character's) known list of topics. It does not need to be "targeted" in any way. Once your character "knows" a topic, any NPC who has a valid line(s) of dialogue for that topic will display the topic in their conversation list. If an NPC does not display a "known" topic, then either: (a) the NPC has nothing to say about the topic at all (i.e. no dialogue relevant to the topic has been assigned to the NPC in the game data), or (b) the NPC has something to say about the topic, but the conditions necessary in order to say it have not been met. The latter case is often true during quests, when dialogue requires a certain stage of the quest to be reached before the NPC will say it. If your character has not reached that stage, the topic will not appear in the NPC's conversation list; once that stage is reached, the topic will be displayed. The topic may also disappear from the list again later if the dialogue has conditions to only appear while the quest is active; in this way topics are removed from an NPC's list to avoid cluttering the list with topics that have outlived their usefulness and/or relevance.

All dialogue in the game is pre-defined in the game data. AddTopic can not be used to "bypass" NPCs not having anything to say about a topic. All AddTopic does is "unlock" the topic to be available from NPCs if they have dialogue assigned for that topic and if the necessary conditions for saying it have been met. Hopefully this clears things up. :) — Wolfborn^(Howl) 08:59, 1 June 2023 (UTC)

Thank you, that clarifies things perfectly. Thank you for taking the time to explain that. Chill fridge (talk) 04:12, 2 June 2023 (UTC)