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I guess most players don't know this, but making a good CRPG that feels like a quality game is extremely difficult. You can be a small indy studio and make very good roguelikes, tactic games, deck builders, platformers and so on - because with those games you need a good game mechanic and taht's basically it. Nice graphics, music, writing etc. will help, but they are not definig the game most of times. Look at Slay the Spire: its graphics are simple and not really breathtaking, the music is good but not jawdropping, there's nearly no writing. But it's a great, really great deckbuilder roguelike game. More than 1 million sold copies... Same with FTL (music top notch though in its own niche, pixel graphics good as well but nothing AAA-like), Among Us, Hotline Miami and whatnot. You need one or two really good aspects and that might be enough to land a hit. With CRPGs you need the whole package: good story/writing or else it feels like reading a cheap novella with Fabio on the cover. The branching dialogues are very complicated, you have to do quests with several outcomes, the world is supposed to "react" to what you do, companions should feel "alive", you need decent graphics that can be simple but don't look cheap, your game mechanics better be great, your char have to be customizable, you want lots of loot, interesting abilities, the balance shouldn't be off, the music can't be too awful. And then people also want VO because it helps their immersion. Imo CRPGs are the games which need the most comprehensive set of talent and experience to be done right. At the same time they are a niche product most of times so you won't sell millions of those. So who does these games must really be dedicated and passionate about it. If I were to make a game I certainly wouldn't start with an RPG, jesus no. The underlying systems alone... So I understand why there's not a ton of good new CRPGs out there.

yeah, raffensperger and sterling down in georgia is getting much credit for standing up to trump. deserved. much applause. however, is worth noting how raffensperger and sterling purged 200k individuals from voting rolls before the november election and such efforts appeared to be little more than the all-too-familiar southern voter suppression antics which in any other year would make raffensperger and sterling appear to be villains instead o' heroes for many progressives and liberals. at issue were change of address and use it or lose it rules which primarily affect lower income and young voters. numerous voting rights organizations provided compelling proof that a large % o' the 200k purged had not changed address but had failed to take notice o' the innocuous 3rd party mailer which required a mailed response to keep an individual registered. in spite o' trump ire directed at raffensperger, the ga secretary of state did more to help the republican election cause in 2020 than any other single individual, and sterling were his right-hand man as voter suppression efforts which woulda' made george wallace envious were implemented with little national recognition. black votes matter and other similar organizations took raffensperger to court regarding the +200k purge. predictable, and all too familiar, the plaintiffs case were dismissed 'cause o' standing. is perhaps ironic that the same case law which for decades has stymied voter rights advocates such as the aforementioned black votes matter case were what resulted in so many trump campaign auto-fails in court. while many cheered as trump failed time and again to get access to judicial relief, the thing is, in 2021 and beyond is once more gonna be poor, minority and young voter groups who is gonna get the whack-a-mole court treatment and is gonna happen quiet and with negligible media coverage. today's heroes... HA! Good Fun!

Depressed or not, there's a case to be made that nobody inside the US prison system is fine. You're such a fascist. Guilty until proven innocent?

Some of it* definitely looks like credibility shopping. Much of the rest is pretty lol. Some of it sounds like the sort of stuff that was cut from Witcher 3- Iorveth and the plague, Wild Hunt attacks Novigrad, Devil's Pit etc- most of which seems to have been cut for a sensible reason**. The trouble is that saying it was all cool 2 years ago isn't really credible from what we know of development, the logical answer is that it was just a buggy mess, but with a larger worldspace. The counter example for cut content is probably KOTOR2. Very short dev cycle, absolute masses of cut content/ retasked content. Remember its release state and imagine if they'd tried a release with the ~20% more content of the Droid Planet still in... *specifically "There will be major departures from the studio in the coming months". That's obvious, they happen after every single major release, successful or failed. Even the basic maths of it is pretty simple, if you had 300 employees and the average employment length was 5 years then you'd be losing an average 60 people per year even without contracts for specific projects running out. Wow, 60 people leaving in a year!!! Sounds major, but it's just attrition. Even if everyone stayed a ludicrous average of 10 years you'd still be losing 30 people to natural attrition. But, if you say departures will happen then when they inevitably do you look like a genius... **cutting stuff that simply wasn't working to make time for fixing stuff that mostly was. The only real loss from Witcher 3 was Iorveth, since that was almost certainly going to lead to a elf/ human Decision as in the prior two games. The two really stupid ancillary plot points in WItcher 3 both could be easily fixed if Iorveth was there- Iorveth was involved in the plague plot so Keira taking research to him would make sense, to Radovid... not so much; and Iorveth vs BROche with Geralt input makes infinitely more sense than Dijkstra deciding potential personal combat with a Witcher was a good idea.

But appreciated nonetheless.

She loves my beef wellington, euphemism not intended. I'm not a fan but I make it to make her happy. Such a hassle to make for an inferior use of the meat.

It is. You can reduce the waste by simply using pork instead. Still a tad on the wastey side, just not as much. Doesn't taste like beef either then, but hey... at least you're not commiting a criminal offense against beef.

welsh rarebit for all intents and purposes, were nothing more than a grilled cheese sandwich but with welsh rarebit am able to extra load the cheese. am gonna embrace any excuse for more cheese in a recipe. we oven toasted thick cut sourdough making sure both sides were toasted. ordinarily we use rye bread, but we did not have rye bread and we were not gonna make rye bread. is not traditional, but we were throwing on a slice o' tomato for each piece o' bread. 'cause. too bad we do not drink, 'cause this woulda' been perfect with guinness as were a fair amount o' guinness in the cheese sauce. HA! Good Fun!

Heh, I think I am with Shady. I've basically become a terrorist in a desperate attempt to win Keanu's approval.

https://themindcircle.com/french-spent-20-years-building-new-medieval-castle-looks-great/

Sometimes, I am a moving T-pose.

Tanya Roberts still alive. What the hell?

As always:

It is a pretty big game but I also think it's fairly easy to see how it could have/was supposed to be bigger and more. Don't get me wrong, I'm loving this game but I'd be lying if I said that it was as interactive and branching as it was talked up to be. It's pretty linear with almost nothing really mattering. Still easily my game of the year though PS I wanted Silverhand to be more Bowie but I can't really complain because I'm such a Keanu fanboy.

Why do you support governments killing whistleblowers? He was honored by numerous awards for his work exposing illegal and horrendous practices by governments around the world. He should be protected.

The Ice King This was a build I put together for fun and it ended up working out very well with support. The main synergy targeted is witch debuffs + icefall’s dispersed suffering to keep everything near you debuffed practically infinitely. Game version 5.0 Difficulty: PotD Solo: Untested Race: Any (Coastal Aumaua was what I used for testing) Class: Witch (Barbarian: No-sub /Cipher: Beguiler) Home: Your choice (White that wends is min/max combat choice, Deadfire gives extra conversation options) Background: Your choice (Deadfire + aristocrat provides extra conversation options.) Stats (w/ BB) Mig: 18 (20) Con: 8 (10) Dex: 8 (10) Per: 18 (20) Int: 18 (20) Res: 8 (10) Skills Active: Athletics 5 Arcana 15 Skills Passive: Your choice (I went high intimidate) Weapon Proficiencies: Mace Hatchet Your choice on rest Abilities: Frenzy, Eye strike Lingering Echoes Iron Will Thick skin, Biting whip Barbaric blow Two weapon style One stands alone, hammering thoughts Bloodlust Bloody Slaughter Spirit Frenzy, Body attunement Greater focus Savage defiance Interrupting Blows, Borrowed instinct Barbaric smash Leap Brute Force, Mind plague The Empty Soul Improved Critical Spirit Tornado, Ancestor’s memory Bloodthirst Equipment Weapon set 1: Frostfall (Dispersed suffering & shattering head) Acolyte’s frostbite (Vengeful Cold & Freezing Gust) Weapon set 2: Frostfall (Dispersed suffering & shattering head) Barditto’s luxury -or- magistrates cudgel -or- Grave calling Helm of the White Void Strand of favor Guardian’s plate Kuaru’s Prize Footsteps of the beast (not essential but leaving ice on the ground while you move is very thematic) Shroud of the phantasm (unlimited resources is nice) Whispers of Neriscyrlas The Left hand of the obscured Ring of prosperity’s Fortune The undying burden (sub in upright captains belt if you will be using pull spells) Pet: Pes Gameplay: Open up with borrowed instinct then leap in and tornado and start laying waste. Get plague and body attunement out between kills as soon as you can and just try to make some killing blows w/ barbaric smash. You will see lots of cold cones from the hatchet and shatters from the mace while adding duration to all the afflictions near you. Notes: 1. This will NOT work with berserker. You will die horribly, but fast, to yourself normally. Spreading afflictions then stacking duration on your self gets bad quickly. Being hobbled 24/7 while wearing the boots doesn’t help either. I tested as a berserker because I wanted to use the armor’s “while afflicted” abilities w/ frenzy but it really made me WAY too squishy; the second tornado will terrify yourself then if you keep auto attacking and each time you kill something that terrified will get extended. 2. This build works exceedingly well with a small party including the will-breaker. If you also use Eder’s pet unlock BB you can put Nalvi on him and get better action speed. Grave calling is really good for the stacking freeze damage and is superior to the hatchet for single target fights (or vessels since the chill fog proc that Frostfall will extend the blind for). 3. The armor is more for looks than the abilities on it and could be swapped out for Casità Samelia Legacy or DoC (although I had DoC on Will-breaker so it was unavailable for this guy).

HA! Good Fun!

Why is it unrealistic/unsustainable? Weve never tried it so maybe it would work? We can borrow ideas from the Scandinavians; Step 1: tax the rich (natch)...Step 2: make those corporate fatcats pay...Step 3: create a whopper of a VAT system...Step 4: ???...Step 5: Profit!

Unlike many people, I can live with a split Congress. At least they can't screw things up too badly. Given the way the Republicans have been behaving with this election though, they deserve a solid kick in the brovaries.

The end of getting 5-10 circulars a day and 2-5 cold calls a day from groups affiliated with both parties reminding me to vote. And 2-3 polling groups calling to ask my opinion on who I'm going to vote for. And the hand written letters about why its important to vote for a candidate sent from out of state. And 99% of all ads on all media being attack ads for the candidates, oftentimes leading to 5-6 political ads per commercial break or period. Although it is a bit funny with the attack ads when one of the candidates has an "I'm X and I approve this message" at the beginning of their ad, but their ad precedes a PAC attack ad against them that caries no disclaimer, so it makes it sound like the candidate approved the ad attacking them for a few seconds. Its just not enough to want it to continue.

LA County Paramedics Told Not To Transport Some Patients With Low Chance Of Survival Looks like they are going to rely on paramedics to do an early triage to take the load off the Doctors. Man that job is going to suck.

^Hopefully many programs that results in socialistic-ish policies that removes the burdens of healthcare, education and living expenses. I recently came to the insight that I am tore up with 3 "mental health issues" that would be completely solved with the mere wave of a pen. What are we waiting for?

I am looking forward to Black Geyser, which should be coming out fairly soon. It looks modest but I'm going to buy it anyway to support the developer (unless the initial reception it absolutely awful).

we just assumed ridley scott were a big fan of fight club and took the chemical burn scene a bit too serious. HA! Good Fun!

I had Michael Savage in mind, but yeah they've all been going down the rabbit hole for quite a while. You can definitely trace parts of it back to the Southern Strategy as well, which predates most (if not all) of the big organs of right-wing media. Yeah, it's the result of decades of dog whistles to drum up votes only to be surprised that the dogs* are in charge. Republicans have long benefitted from such rhetoric/policy/entertainment pushing votes to them, if not outright running them due to the incestuous nature of media hacks and political players, and didn't try to divorce themselves too much so they could keep a reliable group of voters. It's hard to take cries of some Republicans and republican-adjacent folks seriously about the ascendancy of alt-right ideology in the Republican party when they were comfortable enough to incubate it because it benefitted them. *Apologies to dogs by comparing them to the new/alt-right

There is too much nonsense in Prometheus. The honest trailer and the everything wrong with it videos make a good summary of the problems, but the film is beautiful. The Red Letter Media videos are gold. Now I'll have to rewatch them. Edit: the Engineers hated and wanted to wipe out mankind 2000 years ago, so some people think it was because Jesus was one of them and he was killed.

Sure. Let me put it this way: I think the only reason we'll (probably) have a peaceful transfer of power right now is that the conditions are not that bad. I mean they suck, sure, but they don't worldwide-depression, end of a world war, runaway inflation, nations collapsing suck.

I fully agree with what you say. I appreciate the difficulty of making games like this. But it's still sad that there aren't more of them. I'm not complaining, and I certainly don't feel entitled to games like this, as they're extremely difficult to make well, but heck, I am sad that there aren't more of them around. Given the right circumstances, I would be very keen to provide writing content for a title of this sort, as I think I'm pretty good at it, but I could certainly not help in any of the programming areas. Pathfinder: Kingmaker was a game where I often thought, "Dang, it wouldn't even be hard to write stuff that's an awful lot better than this".

maybe make her beef wellington as an apology? to our mind, every beef wellington recipe is requiring the waste o' a perfect good tenderloin, but some folks like it. am gonna admit our rate o' pie crust fail is a smidge worse than 20%. might be the reason we prefer cottage, sheperd or even tamale pie as 'posed to something like chicken pot pie. in fact, whenever we get a hankering for chicken pot pie we just end up making chicken and dumplings. HA! Good Fun!

We should be able to add flower petal curtains or something like that to the windowed stem walls. Please consider this idea, I think a lot of people would love this idea!

And also, the sequel:

Fair enough - there's an argument to be made that if you enjoy something, maybe not look at the underpinnings too closely.

to set the record straight, the word is hebrew not latin.

That's 'cause it only makes sense if you're living in a fumigation tent.

Hey i know it isn't about an Obsidian game, but this is the only forum i could think of that i already had an account on, and which was populated by nerds like me. So i was playing Icewind Dale Enhanced Edition on Core Rules difficulty, for the first time ever. I faced the first serious boss in the game, the goddess Yxounomil (or something like that). She was very tough, and i couldn't beat her. I didn't want to lower difficulty, because i swore to myself at the beginning of my plathrough i wouldn't. Eventually, through a right combination of spells, good timing, and favourable RNG, i managed to slay her, but she and her yuan-ti mages absolutely slaughtered my party. Only Gloin, my dwarven fighter/thief, managed to live. I led him back to Kuldahar (cause her mages were still alive), had him revive all my party members, so i could go back to Dragon's Eye and retrieve the items that my party members had dropped. I didn't grind through so many hours only to lose all my items just when the story was picking up. So i went to the place where the boss fight had taken place and... All my items were gone. All, except for the heartstone, some keys, and a shield related to some quest i did a while back. Naturally, i was furious. I was so happy to have managed that boss fight and then boom, i am set back many hours. After a while, i decided to just reload a save and kill both the boss and her mages on story mode. I decided that even if i had promised to myself i would never lower difficulty, that promise became irrelevant when the game made a mistake itself. I had every right to expect my items to be still lying on the ground, but they weren't, cause the old game had despawned them. So in that case, i have the right to cheat my lowering the difficulty. If the game isn't playing fair with me, i should be allowed not to be fair towards it, either, right? Sorry for the rant And i know it's just a video game so it might be silly to be wondering about stuff like that, but i am just a little bit frustrated. If you were me, would you have a) done as i did b) kept retrying the boss fight until all your party members were able to survive c) continued the game even despite the loss of items? Sorry for the bad English

the heretofore unphotographed fermi oven: chicago pile-due (doo-eh) HA! Good Fun!

I doubt it would be any of nations linked to Deadfire, like you said too repetitive. Personally I'd want to see the next game in The Living Lands.