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Thanks to everyone who participated. Below you will find the Top Three Dev Questions, community member contributor, and a Dev's subsequent reply. Happy 20th Obsidian! Q: I've seen that there is someone who's head of XBox research for Obsidian. How do the developers work with that person and their team? What are the kind of things that Obsidian can ask them/they bring to Obsidian? (Question submitted by Sannom) Q: Are we ever likely to see a similar complexity of choice and consequences as done in Alpha Protocol in any future games? Or was the combined reactivity of conversations, character attitudes, the timing of when and where you met characters and mission choices too stressful, frustrating, and convoluted for testing and story writing to revisit that approach? (Question submitted by Raithe) Q: You guys obviously do a lot of research on your games, given how detailed and plausible your worlds are so that even little things stick in memory, like rings considered to be tacky to use as jewelry in Tyranny or yacht's name in Alpha Protocol being a reference to cult soviet cartoon, and it's clearly more than "lets google this sh†t", so here's my question - how do you do your research? (Question submitted by bugarup)

Your prune tip has benefited most everyone I've ever made any kind of roast for. I made a Mi'sippi pot roast last week with prunes and my family that was in town thought it was just about the best thing they'd ever had. I made Bolognese

For me it's like.....imagine a heist film where the crew was 100% successful instead of one where an alarm gets tripped or there is an investigator on their tail. Wouldn't that be a lot less interesting? Larian has done well is make it so a failure at a check doesn't necessarily doom the party and require a rreload. You'll probably miss out on something....but I thought that's what people wanted. 5e in general is lousy tbh. Yeah, there's very little benefit to having multiple odd numbers. Two 16s vs 17 and 15 for your main stats just means that in the secondary one (like Con for Karlach) is going to be 1 less for the first three levels, which can be some of the harder levels to survive in. To boot, the feats are often less desirable than a pure stat boost (which they compete with for resources) so the appeal of an odd stat to pick up with a feat just can't compete. The exception of course is Fighter, who gets more attribute increases than other classes and can swing a few more feats, so half loading dex or something with the intention to grab a feat that makes you proficient in those saves is an option.

I finished the game, the final battle was over before I even finished looking over Areelu's stats sheet. She teleported in the midst of my party, took a beating and then died from attacks of opportunity when she tried casting a spell.

Pretty much any recipe you find on the interwebs will do Like this. The basic ingredients are just meat, Ranch dressing seasoning, butter, pepperoncini, and au jus/onion soup/gravy mix then just throw in a handful of prunes. Not all recipes call for it but I strongly suggest you sear the meat before cooking. Then you can either pick the prunes out or leave them in and shred them with the meat, which is what I do.

The "system" involved here being the dialogue system.

Obligatory Ting Tings Happy Birthday!!

I read this and thought it was actually a puppy. Then I read the other comments and was like ... wut? ... oh! ... Congrats. Also, cute footprint blankie and headscarf.

Hey all, I just wanted to say that my run was officially verified today! \o/ It seems like a lifetime ago, but I am really looking forward to receiving that badge - probably another couple of months down the road haha. Hope you're all doing well and enjoying the summer!

I feel having content you don't want to engage with is or at least can be a positive, not a negative. I do not want a sixty hour long game full of repetitive and homogeneous content that everyone who plays will rotely go through because making anything but the obviously correct choices is just plain stupid (if there even are any real 'choices' to be had in the first place, seeing as games almost never have any real choices beyond some mild window dressing before the game railroads you right back down the same path everyone else has to go). That kind of thinking flies pretty hard in the face of the literal meaning and spirit of "role playing game", and I'd rather have a 30 hour game full of variability and interesting content and options that makes second playthroughs actually worth bothering with in the event of not wanting to make the same exact choices that you did during the previous playthrough. Heck, look at what KP is saying regarding failing his rolls and just rolling with them: failures in a game system like D&D can and should be used as an opportunity in of themselves to create interesting and different content/situations. This complaint is also kind of hilarious given that BG3 is pretty darned inclusive in terms of making sure that certain character types and builds do not ever miss out on much content - so long as you explore, talk, and engage with the game enough to find alternatives. Like, there were literally just multiple posts complaining about how way too much is available to everyone! Then again, I prefer my games to be on the short and sweet side, and I don't mind making hard choices so long as I feel like I understand those choices. The latter can be frustrating when not handled properly/clearly, I will grant, but otherwise... (Also, see Undertale for a great game with radically different situations, content, and writing depending on how you play it, and which I would contend did the most interesting thing that I've ever in any game ever in terms of handling this idea with its alternative route - even if there was relatively limited variability within each of the two main routes due to the indie scope of the game.) Everyone's stats having odd numbers when odd numbers contribute absolutely nothing to their effectiveness is basically hard encouraging you to respec everyone, which I think is kind of stupid. But the way stat distribution in 5E is handled appears to be rather lousy in general, so I guess it's whatever.

on the downside, am no longer able to identify our lonesome as the only person we know who adds prunes when braising meat. HA! Good Fun!

Thanks. We make the "regular" Mississippi pot roast but I wasnt sure it the prunes were an addition, or replacement, for something.

You should avoid Pathfinder: Wrath of the Righteous like a plague then, because the Lich, Demon, Devil, and Swarm are evil enough to make the worst Dark Urge look like Mr. Rogers. Not to mention Camellia. I've been rolling (hon hon hon) with the dice failures and it's been pretty fun. I tried to cow an Owlbear by roaring at it and instead it just attacked me. Anyways I did part of Karlach's quest and paid an undead guy 600 to repsec the companions to a stat array of 16,16,14,10,10,8, which has been a good move. Also woke up bloody and saw someone had been brutally murdered, which I assume my character did while under the influence of I decided to come clean about it. The companions were freaked out, but they think it's just the parasite.

I know that its full of HE cord, but it was the incredibly lucky shot by the Ukraine drone operator that surprised me. A tank hatch is slightly larger in diameter than an adult body so getting a homebrew 40mm grenade bomb to drop right in the pickle barrel is nuts! Considering the wind and the 3 axis sway of the drone, they could have taken that shot another 100 times and never hit the hole again.

What's with Larian and squirrels? DOS2 had a delusional squirrel (riding a cat of all things) that not even death could rid you of. Judging by its ~wacky antics~ I think I was supposed to find it endearing, whereas all I wanted is an option to say "Hey cat, want me to kill your parasite?"

I watched the new Indina Jones movie, and to my big surprise, it did not suck completely. It was too long for its own good and conveniently dropped a plot point near the end to get it over with, but otherwise I was never bored enough to pick the film apart. Which is as good as it gets in this day and age. Guess following Crystal Skull helped. That turd would make rotten bread look good next to it.

It is needed to be taken with grain of salt, but Prigozhin himself has stated few weeks before his mutiny, that more casualties for wagner has been on the side of his “elite” soldiers compared to convicts. and here is the summary by UK defense. Every 48cm of landgrab by wagner cost them 1 casualty (KIA or WIA)

@Gromnir You are right, I meant midcore. Idk why I wrote softcore. With all the "romance" scenes you could forgive me for the Freudian slip.

So... R rated instead of XXX rated?

I'd just read American Prometheus

fixed sven said their audience were midcore rpg players, purposeful avoiding softcore. not hard. not soft. mid. am honest not sure what midcore is s'posed to mean. the term is possible misleading 'cause the manner in which sven uses makes it less 'bout perceived depth or difficulty as 'posed to a recognition o' broad appeal. as such one assumes larian embraces targeting an expansive goldilocks zone. 'course am thinking hardcore is kinda a weird label which is attached to games which is having little in common save for their niche appeal. am personal not a fan o' aiming for broad appeal. is how we got minivans in the 1990s and new michael bay movie every couple o' years. that said, is tough to argue with success. whether or not you thinks sven is right or wrong 'bout the midcore label, larian has managed to significant expand their audience with each new release. credit where credit is due. admission: the vehicle we got the most use outta for many years were a 1997 chrysler t&c lxi minivan. with all seats removed save driver, it were an ideal dog hauling vehicle. taupe. ugly vehicle made uglier by uglier being brown/bronze. the minivan worked for us precise 'cause it were a fugly, generalist, multitasker. no amount o' dog drool, vomit or mud were gonna make the minivan worse. am s'posing if we had to move a sofa, were a soccer mom with multiple kids, or had an airport shuttle business, the minvan woulda' worked equal well. even so, is difficult to imagine anybody genuine loving their minivan. based on what we saw in bg3 early access, am equal surprised so many people love bg3. looked like a taupe minivan from what we played. 5e weren't our personal issue with bg3. at the same time am recognizing the enduring appeal o' d20 d&d. heck, the reason paizo's pathfinder became so popular is 'cause wotc abandoned d20 and paizo continued to make games gamers recognized as feeling like the d&d they knew and liked... for all its flaws. d20 and old skool d&d love is a big enough niche that it continues to sell pnp and crpg games. regardless, midcore, not soft. HA! Good Fun!

Your problem is you just played Jagged Alliance 3. I knew this was going to happen. We are ruined for games because nothing can match JA3.

Since we were recently talking about mine clearing vehicles, heres a UR-77 getting obliterated by a golden BB: Russian Mine Clearing Vehicle Detonates In Massive Fireball From Drone Bomblet (thedrive.com)

These days all the "AI" would do is **** up the fingers in portraits.

I'm really torn between doing things how I normally do and being an utterly psychotic murderer. I snapped a totally helpless woman's neck for no reason and the rest of my party silently looked at me in horror with "what in the absolute hell is the matter with you...and are we also in danger?" expressions and it was kind of amazing, but like, it's really hard for me to stick with such egregiously insane choices.

Well, I've always just hated him as a presenter, but it's nice to hear why I can be a hater for better reasons than that.

@xzar_monty IIRC, you have been wondering about number of fires in Russia before and after the start of the SMO. Today I have read in local media, that before 02/22 the average was 20 fires at industrial sites per year. In 2022, the number of reported fires at industrial sites is more than 90.

We should rename this thread to "Random tech njuus" or something. Steve put out a piece on LMG's quality standards and business ethics: LMG's channels are the only ones I have blocked on YouTube. I didn't even block Sargon of Akkad or The Critical Drinker, which both are Grade A All-Around Idiots...

I finally ventured outside Early Access are, met one of the legacy characters. Nothing to blow my socks off. I feel like Larian is struggling to write compelling characters, who aren't over the top like Astarion. Karlach, who seems to be the only semi normal in the party, is also a total bore. It's probably due to characters being as deep as a puddle. They still didn't evolve beyond a one minute intro that game gives you during the character creation. So far, even Minsc in BG2 had more going for him than any of this lot (not in terms of content, but in terms of narrative potential). I have been cooling off on the game. In my time with early access I generally enjoyed opening=>grove=>goblin camp, and after that my attention have been waning. Same is happening in this playthrough - I hoped things will picks up once I reach act2 but it still hasn't happened yet. I think lack of narrative drive is to blame. I am pursuing the same objective for about 20h. Narratively, nothing of note has happened in quite a while. I was wondering if writing got better in BG3 or I got desensitized to it- I think a little bit of both. I was getting along with act1 just fine, but act2 really feels off to me so far - like as if Larian have done act1 for Early Access, and now they are just making stuff up as they go along. It feels like the game is not going anywhere - just another chunk of content to go through. I am running into more and more issues with reactivity. Mostly small stuff, but some really odd ones, considering I feel like I am good boy and following paths set out by devs. The most recent example, is Gale crit. NPCs (oh gosh, Gales story somehow became even more idiotic) whom we met on a road, and sent him out to camp to chat with him later. Instead of being there, he appeared a new after I woke up, and the encounter played out as if we never met before, covering the same lines as before. Just... very weird, as in the first conversation "go to the camp and we will chat there" is an option, that the game gives you. People harp on how much choice the game gives you - and I am just not feeling it. I can't recall when was the last choice I made - outside the big good/bad path. Sure, I get a choice to murder everyone I meet, but that's not a real choice, is it. I also don't like that the game lacks guts to restrict content. I already traded off "speaking with animals" from my PC. It's a worthless skill to own, considering how easily it is acquired from other sources. It' a real shame, speak with dead/animals etc. could provide nice spins to individual playthroughts, but the game is incapable of rewarding those choices - instead it's choose to make everything available to everyone, making everything feel rather bland.

Spoiler-free screenshots: I actually would not have noticed otherwise. Edit. Also, the mask resolves the issue with weird facial expressions almost perfectly ("almost" - can't wear it during rest). Sent the hand to pickpocket and explore. Discovered 2 things - the hand cannot pickpocket, but can initiate a dialogue. Couldn't jump there myself, so decided not to spend a spell slot. Spoilers for a companion quest:

You import choices, your character starts at level 1 and the cap is 20.

Irony is that Linus obviously didn't actually watch the video before responding (or didn't pay attention) since it was specifically mentioned that they auctioned it. So it wasn't a valid correction in even the most trivial sense.

we read the georgia election interference indictment charging trump and coconspirators. were 2:00 am when we did a first read and we were keeping track o' every time an "unindicted coconspirator" were mentioned 'cause is one o' those important facts which sometimes is overlooked in media. caution: not every mention o' an unindicted coconspirator signals a cooperating witness (rat), but such is the obvious conclusion in the absence o' an alternative explanation. is difficult to identify at this stage who exact is the "rat," as such media outlets should be cautious when 'bout speculating on rat identities. is potential defamatory to make guesses w/o evidence. not every mention o' an unindicted coconspirator signals a cooperating witness, but such is the obvious conclusion in the absence o' an alternative explanation. ... we mentioned we were keeping track o' possible rat sightings in the georgia indictment, but we gave up after we hit sixty. serious. is a talky indictment, so is more detail than is ordinary, but even so there musta been at least eighty mentions o' unindicted co conspirators and given the context o' the reveals we ain't talking 'bout just one rat. half dozen? more? dunno. the georgia case is gonna be televised, so that will be must see tv... unless you suffer from musophobia. HA!

Not really. Imagine this in Alushinyrra: Not sure about combat, but dialogue will be something else.

I'm also playing as a , I mean, Dark Urge. I'm curious and often do pick the psycho option then reload and pick the good guy option. All the rolls are getting annoying to the point where I feel like I'm just playing the dice. Meh, f5 and f8 to victory.

If it's the squirrel I'm thinking of, that mother****er bites you first.

Kicked a squirrel to death for no reason. Game was worth the price of admission just for that.

Corrupted Ravager: