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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)

As it should be. What's the genius behind this idea, Norwegian? Well if he's so generous, he can always offer Svalbard to russia instead.

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've been so trained by most other poorly designed games to think that failing something, even something completely out of my control such as a literal dice roll, always makes me feel like I need to go back and fix it. It's difficult to break out of that programming, but you're absolutely correct: succeeding at everything all the time because you made all the correct decisions is just...kind of boring and dissatisfying. If we lived in an ideal world, we'd have more video games that do a better job with this sort of thing, but we don't. I think this is some part of why my interest in a lot of 'traditional' video game gameplay has really waned over the years: I'm tired of learning systems that ultimately just come down to making 'correct' decisions, finding out what works isn't fun and what's fun doesn't work, and endless min-maxing to make the gameplay as painless as possible - while most everything else is background noise at best. It's old, it's stale, I don't care or want to engage with it anymore. Just want games that attempt novel experiences, games with compelling worlds, stories, and characters, and maybe possibly even be able to make choices without nearly so much objective value tied to each choice making me feel like the vast majority of possible choices are stupid/wrong... BG3 is by no means perfect for any of that, not even close, and I think it's pretty wild that it's currently sitting at #1 all time for PC games on Metacritic, but I can say that it seems like it at least tried, and that it does actually feel like a proper attempt at a game instead of some kind of money-making lab rat simulator, and that's better than what I can say for almost every other AAA game I see these days. Hell, the game was even released on GOG right off the bat...

From what I've played of the game so far, it's pretty much fine. Which is infinitely better than I expected, and way more than I get out of almost anything AAA-released these days. If I get farther into the game and my mind changes, I'll let you all know. I mean, I always do, don't I?

I feel like I'm playing a different game than most of the others on here. I like it okay, but looking forward to going back to Pathfinder.

I backtracked to Mountian Pass area and enjoyed it quite a bit. Managed to recruit the first non origin companion, but I have some questions about whoever designed stat destributions:

trump is not being charged with inciting the january 6 attack on the Capitol, so... a good reason key shouldn't respond to individual counts is 'cause is clear he don't know what is being charged. in any event, key posts read like an alt-right mad lib: "political witch hunt," "establishment democrats," "Obama," "banana republic," "Hillary" none o' that stuff has anything to do with the validity o' the various indictments, but you will always hear in a defense o' trump from alt-right sources. we didn't bother responding initial 'cause we saw key's response as eye-roll worthy at best. aside, am gonna repeat how tiresome is the hillary comparisons. serious, people need to quit it with hillary emails. hillary were mindboggling reckless to maintain a private server and fbi director comey tried to make that point brutal clear, but charging her for crimes woulda' been unique in the entirety o' the history o' relevant statutes. the biden and pence document situations is similar non analogous. the only reason the doj learned pence and biden had documents is 'cause pence and biden folks informed the doj o' the presence o' documents, after which pence and biden fully cooperated with the nara/doj efforts to retrieve docs. no obstruction. no effort to withhold documents. no attempts to destroy evidence. honest, if you see as mar-a-lago analogous, am not sure where you is getting your news. keep in mind it were only after trump spent the better part o' a year jerking the feds around as he failed to relinquish docs as is his duty according to the Presidential Records Act that any kinda criminal investigation were initiated. even after the feds realized trump had highly sensitive defense secrets in his possession at a florida resort, the doj wasted three months to final get to the point where they sought a subpoena for doc returns and according to the indictment trump then resorted to attempts to hide documents from the feds and his own lawyers in addition to his efforts to destroy evidence o' his obstruction. the most obvious criticism, and one we would hear from republicans and alt-right loons if we were talking 'bout a democrat ex-President, is why it took so long for the doj to do anything about trump and his mar-a-lago docs. senate republicans on the intelligence committee would be going ape-****e if ex-Prez obama were discovered to have been waving around pentagon attack plans for iran at a martha's vineyard resort and in response the doj did functional nothing but ask politely for doc returns. were only after the obdurate trump team's three stooges efforts to withhold state secrets and cover-up trump malfeasance were a special counsel appointed, a counsel who would choose independent to charge for the fraud and fake elector scheme as well as the mar-a-lago docs issue. only in alt-right fantasy land is trump some kinda victim save o' self harm. lord knows is not worth addressing how multiple indictments and possible convictions will improve trump electability compared to 2020, but at least that aspect is opinions as 'posed to key's clear factual fubar o' his doj weaponization narrative. oh, and we got no idea where key's suggested obama quote regarding banana republics and political adversaries originates, so am unable to discern validity or context. well, last time key learned 'bout eisenhower's military industrial complex speech thanks to Gromnir, so maybe we can learn him something new this time too, eh? baby steps. HA! Good Fun!

Yep, I think this is correct!

The Matildas have lost to the English, and my interest in soccer has never been lower.

It's blatantly obvious that Trump did that ****, that it's a surprise he's being prosecuted says more about the benefits of being a rich guy and powerful politician than anything else. His supporters don't care, for them "Law and Order" is about ensuring that there are those the law protects but does not bind and those the law binds but does not protect, and Trump has given them a supreme court packed with Federalist Society ghouls to boot. This legal trouble will damage him amongst the "normies", so to speak, but he's already done that with the whole election denial thing and the Poster's Putsch. If Trump is the Republican nominee he's absolutely going to lose the majority vote and will probably lose the electoral college unless some ****ery is going on.

Thanks! This is why I previously said I want to see what people in this forum eventually provide as feedback on the game, because unlike the Larian forum this forum has many people who I respect as intelligent and thoughtful people who can be counted on to provide honest and objective feedback.

From my experience, playing a "good" character usually leads to various levels of slaughter, which is more noticeable when a random goblin has a name and can be interacted with prior to that. On the other hand, I've got (Act 2 ending spoilers) Also, the tiefling refugees throughout the game. While I haven't played the Dark Urge Origin specifically, I suspect that most of the unavoidable evil-aligned choices are bound to it. I might try to see whether anything changes from using the tadpoles at the end. Edit. Agreed, though they are somehow avoidable and it could be worse - there could be survival elements or equipment durability.

I'd also point out that when I said things I don't like/I'm not interested in engaging with, I included systems and not just content. For me, all of the following in BG3 are either awful or a waste of resources that could've been spent on things I consider to be central to a good cRPG: all of the cinematics; full voice acting; the origin PC system; the Dark Urge PC system; all of the romances; the entire combat system; the entire tadpole system (not an exhaustive list; I may have missed a few more things). All of that taken together surely makes up a HUGE part of the game.

For me failing in games is interesting when you fail forward (but even there it's hard to let go), but I don't think BG3 is one of those games. To me it doesn't feel good to miss content because of a failed check.

There are 2 more narrative pushes - (a significant) one at the end of Act 2/beginning of Act 3 (you get your objective for the rest of the game), another The companions have some development in Act 2-3, though I liked my party in Solasta more. I cannot find explicit faults with Larian's D&D game's narrative structure (the PC is interested in the main plot, the plot goes from personal to spoiler, there are twists, the side quests are related to the main objective, etc.) but it was as engaging as Solasta. I suppose, my specific play style (stealth, persuasion) does not align well with what the developer was going for, but I do appreciate that they at least tried to support it. There is no XP for picking locks or completely avoiding encounters or finding side paths, though all of them are present. There is reactivity in the immersive sim-like design approach, but to some extent it could have been done as dialogue options in choose-your-own-adventure games (it also falls apart in Act 3 with the boss you threw off the arena, climbing back up for the post-battle cut-scene*). Additionally, I agree that classes should have been more distinct with more unique interactions (e.g. some investment in Sleight of Hand was required to pick locks). I suppose, though there is no day/night cycle (NPC schedules) or more destructible environment. On the other hand, I like that it is possible to ignore quite a lot of content. Agreed, my RP is defined by the choices I make as much as the options I skip, which I cannot do if there are no such options. Regarding the stat distribution, I had thought that I would be able to fix them by level 3-4. I was mistaken and the lack of the level progression screen was most unpleasant at that point. I generally don't like to fail because of RNG instead of my (poor or not) choices and I would strongly prefer static skill checks or the Take20 option. There is a difference between failing because of conscious roleplay decisions (none of the party members can do X) and rolling a 1. The former is an interesting story point, the latter is reloading. For me, watching a reliable and well-researched plan with transparent logic and its implementation is more interesting than dumb luck. ---- Finished the game. In the final parts, combat becomes more integral for the good-aligned characters, which was a problem (solved by dropping the difficulty). Also, the game failed to recognise several "creative" solutions to boss battles. Though, it was most satisfying to skip the boss' monologue (with its fancy mo-capped cut-scenes and VA) and just throw the b... oss of the platform with telekinesis (I tried the explosives first, but the corpse-to-become had Uncanny Dodge). Also, getting a closed helmet or a masked hood resolved the weird facial expressions in the "field" cut-scenes (the ones in the camp still had it). Overall, the game often felt like fighting questionable design decisions, despite the generally high reactivity, interactivity, and being able to ignore a lot of the content. It was nowhere close to Pillars of Eternity or Tyranny and somehow worse than Pathfinder: Wrath of the Righteous (despite the long and slow dungeon crawls; on a positive note Larian's D&D game was shorter, ~40 hours vs ~120**) or Encased. I will try to replay it at some point, but probably just to check how far I will be able to get with some specific builds. Also, one screenshot for the final cut-scene (an HDD-related bug, no spoilers): *I would post screenshots, but not sure that I should, considering the spoilers. Though, the foe in question was shown in several trailers. **On the other hand, I never wanted to complete all quests and was trying to stick to the critical path and RP, while in PF I wanted to see and do everything (and the RP supported it).

Would you agree the following logic holds? If a component has no siblings below it, its operator can be ignored. (I mean, this is sort of what Noqn said, but I don't know how large a scale it was supposed to apply to...) The JSON pasted means, according to Apotheosis: IF (the player is an Island Aumaua AND has Deadfire Archipelago as their culture) OR (Tekehu is in the party). One and, one or, but the JSON has six operators in it. 06_cv_biha, node 44. First operator (line 2): On the whole conditional, but this will never have a sibling. Ignore. Second operator (line 6): Preceding the race/culture check, does have a sibling (the Tekehu check). Do not ignore. This is the OR. Third operator (line 22): This is the race check. Has a sibling, the culture check. Do not ignore. This is the AND. Fourth operator (line 38): This is the culture check. It has no siblings below it. Ignore. Fifth operator (line 44): Preceding the Tekehu check. It has no siblings below it. Ignore. Sixth operator (line 59): This is the Tekehu check. It has no siblings below it. Ignore. I was doing a little test to see if the initial operator (the one on line 2) is always 0, and it turned out there are twenty-or-so cases of it being 1 (which means that 0 is by far the most common). I don't know if this is relevant, necessary or helpful... I figured perhaps it was just a hint that the first child would be an OR-clause, but re_si_crew_event_shore_leave node 24 for example has a 1 operator for its conditionals, but no components. "Conditionals": { "Operator": 1, "Components": [ { "$type": "OEIFormats.FlowCharts.ConditionalExpression, OEIFormats", "Operator": 1, "Components": [ { "$type": "OEIFormats.FlowCharts.ConditionalCall, OEIFormats", "Data": { "FullName": "Boolean IsSubrace(Guid, Subrace)", "Parameters": [ "b1a8e901-0000-0000-0000-000000000000", "Island_Aumaua" ], "Flags": "", "UnrealCall": "", "FunctionHash": -1558632484, "ParameterHash": 1209903115 }, "Not": false, "Operator": 0 }, { "$type": "OEIFormats.FlowCharts.ConditionalCall, OEIFormats", "Data": { "FullName": "Boolean IsCulture(Guid, Guid)", "Parameters": [ "b1a8e901-0000-0000-0000-000000000000", "7093880b-7527-4087-a764-d6613701a025" ], "Flags": "", "UnrealCall": "", "FunctionHash": -714406469, "ParameterHash": 957745537 }, "Not": false, "Operator": 0 } ] }, { "$type": "OEIFormats.FlowCharts.ConditionalExpression, OEIFormats", "Operator": 0, "Components": [ { "$type": "OEIFormats.FlowCharts.ConditionalCall, OEIFormats", "Data": { "FullName": "Boolean IsCompanionActiveInParty(Guid)", "Parameters": [ "b1a7e805-0000-0000-0000-000000000000" ], "Flags": "", "UnrealCall": "", "FunctionHash": 1667060059, "ParameterHash": 1635363358 }, "Not": false, "Operator": 0 } ] } ] }

In the court of public opinion perception is reality. Assuming he's not convicted of a felony, Trump can and ABSOLUTELY WILL use this to his advantage once the primaries are done and it's down to him vs Biden, or whoever comes out of the democratic primary.

Ironically this burned me in the latest title, because it is now optimal to promote ASAP.

They keep indicting Trump and it's having **** all effect on his popularity, which is predictable. A lot of people see this as a political witch hunt, and rightly so because that's exactly what it is. I suppose that if they manage to make a felony stick then it's mission accomplished since that would disqualify Trump from running for PotUS, so if that happens then establishment democrats can celebrate by drinking infant blood or whatever it is that they do in their gilded towers. Otherwise, this is only going to further help Trump, not that he really needs the help at the moment. It's funny, not that long ago a president, I want to say Obama, but I'm not sure on that, was asked why they didn't seek charges against one of their opponents during the campaign. Their answer was that they don't do that because that's the kind of thing that happens in a banana republic. How times have changed. On the other hand, Trump sort of started this with his put Hillary in jail talk during the 2016 election. Granted, he never actually had his cronies indict her, he just talked a big game. Still, I guess it could be argued that it opens him up to the ol' turn about is fair play.

That bug of enemies nocliping to you through the walls is much less amusing when Playful Darkness does that. Looking at his sheet got me thinking again that it's either a backer character or one of the devs let their anime loving nine year old to design a character as a birthday present.

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 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.

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.

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!

It's part of a serial killer origin story, so something you picked at character creation

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?"

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)

a lot of jrpg are pretty softcore usually didn't have english translation though

So... R rated instead of XXX rated?

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

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.

It was very easy to disarm Deskari, turning the fight into a joke. CMD in the 80s. Trip otoh would be a lot harder.

I know from programming both rules based and neural network based AI's in the dark and grim past, that the latter in particular is very resource demanding. Which is why I suspect it's not widely used to create "better AI's" in games. Rules based depends entirely on the rules as defined by the designer of course. No fun having an opponent that can out think and out smart you, if it also brings your PC to a grinding halt (despite outrageous hardware requirements)

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.

I have not seen Barbie yet, but the way some men have not shut up about the movie I have to wonder if Margot Robbie executed their favorite toys on screen.

I think BG3 is a fine game but the 5e ruleset leaves much to be desired. Other than picking subclass (and spells if applicable) or multiclass shenanigans, it feels like your character is on autopilot for the most part. Between an attribute increase and a feat the increase is going to win out 9/10 times. With reactions being done the way they are, I don't think we'll be likely to see a real time in a 5e or a PF2e game. Personally I haven't had too many issues with combat yet, hardest battles so far have been the party in the Dank Crypt (My guys were blocked in a room and pelted with ranged attacks) and the Harpies (who exploited the high ground and kept murdering a child).

Dungeon Meshi - Delicious in Dungeon manga is ending with the next chapter, so I assume the anime will not have issues with catching up with the manga. I think most people here will like it.

So,.. Basically, My suggestion. The Creature card has a total of how many times YOU, THE PLAYER has killed said creature. Suggestion. Adding a total of how many times THE CREATURE has killed YOU, The player.

Okay Grounded. Love the game, but for us loners, I wouldn't mind an update, where in a new game, the whole four characters are there. So 3 are NPCs. Obviously, two players, two NPCs. We all run off out. The other 3 disappear until you build a bed and a chair for each one. You'll find them relaxing in their chairs at random. They'll have random conversations with you, and they can be seen relaxing in your spa. Now once you have brought them back with their own beds and chairs, you can set gathering missions for them each day. What they gather each day or each time period is limited by the weapon and armour you gift them. i.e. no armour, they can only gather pebbles or plant fibre. Increase their armour and weapons, opens up to greater variety of items they can gather. Make the game so you don't feel alone. The last mission defending the three mixr cylinders. Make it harder, but the NPCs help. When growing big. They will gather around.

You know where their spells/abilities are, the bar that shows up if you select an individual character? Select the one you want to talk to, and there's a conversation bubble icon on that bar, to the right.