Fast Travelling should cost money

[Pandamatak]

Lots of it, too. Not only that, but depending on the location, the time should also change a considerable amount.

Now suppose fast travel took lots of money - say, 1,000 to 10,000 coins depending on the location (more for places that have dangerous paths). This way, players at a lower level will be forced to explore Skyrim until they have enough money or are a high enough level. By that time, they will have already explored Skyrim enough so that fast travel makes sense - going to the same locations over and over just becomes tedious work.

Now, something more. What if every time you visited an area without fast travel, the price of fast travelling to that location decreased? This would create a natural way of balancing the costs of different locations' fast travel prices.

If it costed money, not only would players think twice before fast travelling, but would also plan our their journey even more, and multi-task. If I needed to buy something from location A and use it in Location B and return to Location C - which happens to be close to location A - to sell some other goods, I would fast travel to location A, travel to location C, then fast travel to location B. A very bad example, but you know what I mean.

[Vendetta]

.................. That's it... I have just lost all hope for the skyrim forum.

[Pandamatak]

.................. That's it... I have just lost all hope for the skyrim forum.

Why?

[POMC S117]

Look at my sig. If you don't want to fast travel then don't do it. Don't penalise people who want to.

[AKB]

.................. That's it... I have just lost all hope for the skyrim forum.

I never had faith in this forum to begin with... It never gave me a reason to believe that it would go anywhere worthwhile what with every other discussion seemingly being about how awesome child killing would be or how much the game is going to suck. The rest of the threads? They are simply suggestions that don't need their own thread due to the wish list and similar threads intended to capture all these topics.

On to this topic, I sincerely dislike that idea. You shouldn't penalize your player for not wanting to do a lot of otherwise pointless busy work by forcing them to walk everywhere. Sure it can be fun exploring the wilds, but once you penalize people for going off the path by making them have to pay to get back home (Or otherwise spend a while wandering about to find the road) you simply seriously hurt the chances that players explore your game world. I never went off the path in Morrowind if it wasn't absolutely necessary because I knew that there wasn't an easy way to get back to civilization without a teleportation spell. The same would be true if the dev team went with this suggestion.

[Pandamatak]

Look at my sig. If you don't want to fast travel then don't do it. Don't penalise people who want to.

I see what you mean. I could drop 1,000 coins every time I wanted to fast travel.

But if you look at it that way, anything could be fixed in a unnatural way. If I felt that sneak attacks should do more damage, I could just drop the difficulty slider right before the first strike, but all of these things ruin immersion.

Also, I'm not asking for the complete removal of fast-travel, merely that such a convenience shouldn't come without a fee, so that planning is encouraged instead of just doing the task at hand.

[AKB]

... merely that such a convenience shouldn't come without a fee...

I could make a convenience fee joke right here but I'll allow you to fill in your own. It isn't convenient if we have to bring a large amount of money with us just to be able to get back home in a timely fashion. There is a reason that the eagles saved the hobbits at the end of the Lord of the Rings, or that the ending was skimmed over in The Hobbit, the story was over, no one wanted to read a story that went on for another thousand pages about them returning home. Quite simply, the adventures climax is ruined without fast travel. Of course this is all in a scenario where you don't have the money, but that is what makes this even worse. This suggestion only serves to penalize novice characters and aggravate more aged characters who just want to get home. Essentially what this suggestion would do is force Skyrim's adventures to become a lot more like real life what with the annoying commute home.

[Haravikk]

If it costed money, not only would players think twice before fast travelling, but…

…they would think twice about playing the game!

Fast Travel is completely optional, so it's entirely up to you if you want to travel with all the risks that entails, or just skip to a quest location so that you're actually able to sit down and finish a quest in an evening.

The last thing anyone wants is to have to spend 1,000 gold just to nip back to their home to pick up an item that they forgot. Sure some people may be fast-travel addicts, but that's their choice

[Arch-Mage Matt]

Seriously... it's optional...

[AKB]

Can we create a sticky fast traveling thread with every thread on the subject locked on site? Every time I venture into this forum I see this subject causing arguments.

[Lindai]

To whom does the money go to? All that Fast Travelling does is speed up the journey you would take anyways. Gets rid of time usually wasted. Much like Waiting and Sleeping. It speeds up time you would spend waiting around doing nothing. Tax that as well?

[Haravikk]

It might make more sense if fast-travelling only worked to certain locations (rather than absolutely anywhere), at which point mage guilds or other locations could offer teleportation services, free to use once you're high up in the mages guild or gain special permission somehow, meanwhile these might not go to all the same places as some coaches as well.

But I think that fast-travel anywhere you want, with optional proper travel methods to discover new locations is the way to go so that people who just want to sit down in the evening and complete a few quests can just go ahead and do-so.

[soda popinski]

There are already going to be fast travel modes that cost money. Not more than the average skyrimian would make in their entire lifetime, mind you, but a reasonable amount.

This to me is like the people that are begging for "hardcore mode," which forces you to eat and sleep. Why waste development resources to force someone to do what they could already do if they so choose?

[Pandamatak]

To whom does the money go to? All that Fast Travelling does is speed up the journey you would take anyways. Gets rid of time usually wasted. Much like Waiting and Sleeping. It speeds up time you would spend waiting around doing nothing. Tax that as well?

Agreed. You have convinced me.

I still like the idea of the guy who posted below you, though.

[lostlast]

Wow. Note to self don't start topic on 'Fast Travel'
Haha, when first reading this I was thinking, yeah I guess that could work. But then reading the replies. Hmmm..
I used fast travel all the time in Oblivion. I never role played not too. But there is so much to gain from getting out there and actually exploring. Then again, having fast travel didn't prevent me from doing that, made it easier.
If it cost money to fast travel, I'd pay it. I don't care. What else do you do with your millions by the end of the game. I kinda like games where it's takes ages to build up money to buy the good things. Having to pay for fast travel would put a dint in the budget. Take even longer to buy that special item.

[Spiney]

.................. That's it... I have just lost all hope for the skyrim forum.

Oh shut up you. The kid had an idea and you can voice your opinion without being such a bloody ass.

As for the OP, they said there was going to be a travel network that would cost money, but not in the thousands.

[OblivionDuruza]

Can we create a sticky fast traveling thread with every thread on the subject locked on site? Every time I venture into this forum I see this subject causing arguments.

I agree, there is a list of dupe threads that I posted in the UESP Site Forum, but nobody's gotten back to me.

The Skyrim Forum needs some attention, as far as I'm concerned.

But onto the OP, there will be methods of fast travel which cost money a la Morrowind (carriages and what not), but what many people seem to miss is that fast travel is merely like fast forwarding walking. Therefore, time passes and it's completely optional.

If you don't like it because it breaks immersion, simply use the carriage system, which will cost money.

[MARS]

I stronlgy disagree with the OP. Up to 50 Drakes would be acceptable. But the sum you proposed is just ridiculous.

[Mattbott]

TES is all about choice, fast travel has always been optional.

Also it has to be affordable at low level otherwise you are forcing people to play the game a certain way (ie walking and wandering monster bashing). I see no reason why a 1st level character might be played as a lazy git or a high born lord, both of whom might wish to fast travel/hire carriages for the entire game to simulate this aspect of their character

but also fast travel also is about the devs saying that they understand safe and uneventful journeys are made from A to B every day and for the flow of the game to be maintained sometimes it's good to just get there without a load of walking and wandering monsters - so it's a plot device/convenience rather than a 'realistic' part of the game.

IMO walking for half an hour to the next bit of a fast paced quest can sometimes break immersion more than the meta gaming aspect of just appearing at the next destination

[Ratwar]

Considering the posts in this thread, I'm going to lock it.

And some of you will be getting PMs that have 'gifts' attached.

Isn't that grand?