I just think leaving out body language is going to be really difficult when you are trying to get a message across, especially when it's meant to be so intricately detailed and having real conversations can really add that connected depth you're looking for. Truth is body language is never so specific, and having it the way I proposed gives conversations a level of personal interpretation that you can't get with speech verbatim, while only having the vague abstracted conversations removes you almost entirely from the situation.
I agree with the people who said that complete abstraction will get repetitive REAL fast, and that's because there is no conversation there, I think the people who want that are probably the same people who skip most of the dialogue in Bioware games, most of it CAN be abstracted and you can still get the message, but that's because there is almost zero body language in that stuff, and they're too afraid to try and put nuance and interpretation into the dialogue.
It sucks that right now all you have to do to start is:
[enter]
find closest house with a person
[k]
SERVICE
[enter]
[enter]
[enter]
GOODBYE
[T]
I want to have interesting, weird conversations and the truth is, I'm a cashier, and I will tell you, real life greetings get repetitive, just like video games do. Don't pretend like every conversation needs to be meaningful, but at the same time, not every hello is the same either, which is why an abstracted version of body language in the game can not only add depth, but multiply it for much more FUN (with various misinterpretations as well as weird characters who simply are odd in their body language, making it more difficult to discern people who are weird from your own characters ineptitude in the social field). Obviously you wouldn't just randomly generate any body language with whatever dialogue is being said, it needs to fit on some level, but it can totally change the feel and tone of a conversation to make it much more meaningful, and much more varied.
I think Toady will find an adequate way of tackling the dialogue issue whether he uses my idea or not to be honest, I'm more concerned with the content of the quests and things like that than I am with how I get them, and whether or not I enjoyed the conversation with the person I got them from.