Immortalis

You could also read that as ~89% of participants aren't happy with only quest xp. Problem is that this poll isn't representative. Mind, this doesn't just mean number of participants, but also criteria for how they are selected(which for this poll, isn't happening at all). We sort of thought of the poll last minute.. although I think it does represent a problem with the current system.. the in's and out's of the poll are not exact. (To be honest any forum poll is questionable at best.. we don't know how many voters are actually legitamate people OR how many of those people even played the beta.) It was just a visual key to show if people were happy or not in broad strokes.. looking for anything deeper then that isn't gonna happen. Also a lot of votes are being skewed by bugs which is honeslty stupid.. I think a lot of people like a system and when it doesn't work out it was easy to blame bugs and still sit in that camp. On the other side maybe people thought the current system sucked because it wasn't working correctly also due to bugs... although this has largely been stated as not the case by Skeeter.

I guess I was misunderstanding his point..? I really zoned in on this quote "However, optional encounters should be implemented as minor quests. You shouldn't end up with no XP after a full-scale combat." Now that I am reading his post more closely I guess I misunderstood what he was saying.. EDIT: I ultimately don't want to be completely nonnegotiable.. I am hoping for a middle ground that makes most people happy.. although I would prefer the IE systems be implemented almost exact.. I understand this game isn't about just what I want

I understand what resource management means, thanks. (I'm an RPG player for chrissake.) Make up your mind. Did they deliberately make a subpar system just to save resources or not? Do they truly see no merit in the system for gameplay and RP? Why are we both liking the same post by RedSocialKnight? that would leave me to believe we agree on a common system? What are you against exactly from my previous post?

I can get behind this.. I don't actually care if we get kill -xp in quests or not.. as long as there is the payoff after an encounter or milestone. My issue with lack of kill -xp is for when your not on a quest.. or your getting to a quest and now suddenly your achievements don't mean ****.

Thats not what that means.. it means he doesn't want to give a direct answer because it's probably not his call and you could use the quote against him if it was later changed. All he said was what has already been said. When the game comes out you are free to mod it as you wish. He is basically saying, no you can't mod the game before it is released.. and I am ignoring the other part of your question about xp. That doesn't mean they are debating or even thinking of changing anything.. but your interpreting beyond what was said in that message. That sounds a bit more hopeful. I would be hard-pressed to interpret it as there's still hope for combat xp, lock xp, trap xp, and that kind of fine-grained xp system, but you could be right that they are certainly discussing ways to do objectives in much finer increments, for instance! Yea I didn't mean to give you hope that it's gonna change.. I just think it's dangerous to assume things or add meaning to things where there isn't any. Until Josh or Fergus comes into this thread and says "We Hear you and will be examining other options for our XP System" I wouldn't get too excited..

I have to say that games are generally held up to a much higher standard for what is considered "art" then movies are. I can't remember the last time I saw a movie I would consider art.. maybe Shawshenk Redemption? I dunno.. probably there were some I missed or forgot but most of the stuff out of hollywood these days is what we in the game industry call shovelware and they totally get away with it too. I think it's good that games are held to that standard but you guys are gonna be waiting a long time if you expect to see a classic appear in a video game on the same level as some of our most recognizable literature and symphonies. PrimeJunta you may be right about those dopamine pathways but it changes nothing.. I still want kill -xp (so does Helm ).. I want to be rewarded for overcoming challenging fights in a predictable (as you stated and I agree) manner. I don't think getting xp for combat is a "boring" xp reward.. I think it's an interesting xp reward.. unless you mean picking off villagers in Beregost.. but even that can be interesting when the Flaming Fists shows up. Thats not what that means.. it means he doesn't want to give a direct answer because it's probably not his call and you could use the quote against him if it was later changed. All he said was what has already been said. When the game comes out you are free to mod it as you wish. He is basically saying, no you can't mod the game before it is released.. and I am ignoring the other part of your question about xp. That doesn't mean they are debating or even thinking of changing anything.. but your interpreting beyond what was said in that message.

You can pan a 2D perspective camera for isometric games np. http://www.rpgcodex.net/forums/index.php?threads/just-what-is-isometric.69829/ Haha.. try rotating your camera.. see what happens.. I think you will go cross eyed trying to figure out wtf is happening. Fast Forward to 1:40

One day before it ended.. through a reddit discussion.. common. That is pretty much the opposite of fair. Josh Sawyer is a great designer.. im sure people would trust him and back it anyways but it was a bait and switch to say IE**. ** As Josh Sawyer interprets it.

... Are you trolling now? To be more clear.. your saying because they backed an IE game instead of saying I backed a kill -xp game.. it doesn't matter? Nobody would assume that the experience system is being changed until the check was cashed.. Don't be ridiculous. EDIT: "If the new system is fixed then they probably won't mind it?" Are you speaking on behalf of the entire player base now? I think this is my last reply to you.. what fantasy world are you living in? They do mind it.. read the quotes...

You would be wrong.. two examples below of gold backers who showed up in this thread right after beta.. I am sure there are more that I missed. Hiccups should be done with their money.. not the backers money who wanted something else.. We didn't pay them to experiment with trying to make a new kind of game.. they were paid to make an IE successor. Do your research Broken before you tell me I'm wrong And that's really all that needs to be said about this. You get better at something by doing it, so doing something should provide XP. Doesn't matter if it's combat, picking a lock, sneaking, crafting, whatever.

I think playing hot potato or the shell game between character screens for inventory was one of the worst things about IE.. However this thread is more about encumbrance and the magical stash of unlimited item holding. Nothing wrong with making a good UI for inventory management.. but I disagree with having this stash so you can pick up every stupid item without consequence.. Making choices about what items you take was a big deal in IE.. because you didn't wanna walk back out into the middle of nowhere for a bunch of stupid long swords.

Ah then I already addressed that in the previous post. I doubt they make an algorithm for such a thing. As I said in the previous post, make the main quest line + the unavoidable encounters on that line give just enough xp that the game can be beat and then add the rest of the xp to the side quests. All my likes go to this Sarex.. This means your drive to do side quests is to make you more powerful.. Like maybe you can beat the game doing critical path.. but to beat the mega dungeon you need to do a lot of side quests or be really good at the game to finish the dungeon..

So we have a system works.. then we break it and try something different with other peoples money.. while telling them before they give us their money that we were gonna do the system that works. Do you see an issue here? I feel bad for the gold backers on this forum who wanted kill -xp (who wanted an IE game) and are in this thread confused after beta wtf happened.. Don't you have to give like 500ish for gold backing?

Orphan your post makes a lot of sense.. Again I pull my one trick pony though.. This was kickstarted as an IE successor.. If it wasn't broke.. don't fix it. XP functioned fine in IWD and BG.. Not so much in planescape.. If this was the InXile kickstart of planescape I wouldn't be in this thread arguing with people about the current system.. it works perfectly Fact is.. BG and IWD are combat centric games with tons of mobs and it works.. it just plain works. If it didn't they wouldn't have gotten 4 million dollars. We loved those games but now we all wanna play designer and make up our own systems for this and that. Why? The IE games were great.. I still play them today way more then I play Mass Effect or Alpha Protocol. I prefer BG1 over BG2 purely for the pacing and atmosphere.. Mechanically BG2 is the better game although I hate that they removed Dimensional Door way.. Anyways.. I totally disagree FINDING the village should have awarded XP and then all the little ****s would give nothing.. That would encourage people to show up at the village.. say "okay im good now" and leave. Your encouraging people to not engage in combat.. unless they wanna load up their inventory with daggers and broken arrows.

I have to agree.. Kill -xp needs to be balanced correctly or nobody is gonna enjoy this game.. If they didn't design this game at all with kill -xp or even just encounter based xp in mind and try to hack it in a week before launch.. it's gonna set the expectation they gave a s**** when they didn't.. it's gonna be awful and hurt the rest of the game

Sorry who said it was essentially useless? Can you get 1 or 2 levels out of.. 12 through kill -xp? Yes. Can you offset quest XP and get that level sooner in a system where you gain no power until the DING of a level up. Yes. Kill -xp is not the driving force of that xp.. but it can tip the scale a bit sooner in your favor.. which is a fair reward for exploring for a few hours and not finding anything but a few bear assses and goblin ears. Only replying to your post because you said "serious question".. Was gonna write this off as troll response because you obviously went to the extreme.. again.. in reading my post. And I thank you for the reply. I was indeed serious. Something interesting has come up in this reply ... the assumption that exploration deserves a reward. Hear me out. As another poster on the Codex observed, the major difference in POV here is that one side basically wants to be rewarded for doing whatever they feel like (such as wandering around killing stuff for no reason). The other side wants to be rewarded for doing things that are useful and relevant. This is actually a pretty major difference. To me, 'exploration' is kind of lame if I can expect to find a cookie behind every tree ... in fact, at that point it becomes something I'm "supposed" to do. I can't tell you in how many games I've searched every corner of every building and cut down every shrub, for fear of missing something that would power me up. Not necessarily because I like exploring, but because I feel that if I don't collect all the cookies, I'm doing it wrong. I'm definitely doing it wrong if explorer players are level 5 by Act II and my guys are only level 3½. Finally, we have an RPG where you can explore if you actually care about what's there, but you don't lose cookies if you choose to be more direct in your problem solving. Something interesting has come in this reply as well. While your opinion is very logical and I understand it (Minus the blatant over exaggerations).. This is not what the IE games were and this is not what was kick started. If Josh wants to beef up the new engine to overcome IE limitations.. we all agree that is the right course of action. Now you are obviously being extremist again saying that EVERY tree or EVERY building will have goodies and xp.. which is obviously not what anyone wants so again your over exaggerating to make my position look broken and less appealing. However, if we can land this bad boy back into reality for a second, exploration should be rewarded with progression. If you hate being rewarded for exploration, why did you kickstart a spiritual successor to baldurs gate and IWD? Making a different game however should have been stated in the kickstarter. Josh should have told us that they are making a game like the IE games except that hes gonna change everything as he see's fit and ignore half the customer base on his forum when people don't like it. So we all knew going in that we were getting Baldurs Gate: Throne of Sawyer. I mentioned this exact problem and people told me to shut up. I said that even if kill-xp was removed combat will still be enticing to power gamers because the reward scale is still not equal. AKA the original problem is still not solved so why even bother doing it this way. If it's just an xp problem there were 100 other ways to solve it. I know you don't agree with me PrimeJunta but I still might make this quote my signature.

So kill XP is essentially worthless? Why waste time arguing for its inclusion then? Serious question. And I'm not interested in psychologically profiling every individual player in the world. Don't be ridiculous. However, I am quite comfortable stating categorically that incentives influence behavior. Sorry who said it was essentially useless? Can you get 1 or 2 levels out of.. 12 through kill -xp? Yes. Can you offset quest XP and get that level sooner in a system where you gain no power until the DING of a level up. Yes. Kill -xp is not the driving force of that xp.. but it can tip the scale a bit sooner in your favor.. which is a fair reward for exploring for a few hours and not finding anything but a few bear assses and goblin ears. Only replying to your post because you said "serious question".. Was gonna write this off as troll response because you obviously went to the extreme.. again.. in reading my post.

I don't think so.. I just think that there is a bit of arrogancy going on in the design team.. aka our opinions are dumb and their opinions are right. When the kickstart began they sold the dream about how they love working with their fans and talking to us directly instead of going through a publisher.. they then proceed to ignore us when we don't like something. Which again bugs me when they do interviews.. they keep saying they love having open dialogue with their fans on the forum.. but the only communication I see is Josh stroking himself when someone likes a feature.. or the QA saying "thanks keep it coming" when we are reporting bugs.. If however people are complaining or upset about something.. it's dead silence.. except to call us irrational morons.

If you personally feel the need to kill things just for xp.. that is your thing. I find more enjoyment looking for items and side quests and want to be rewarded for my time when I don't find those things after slaying 100 beetles to explore the corner of a map. I also feel choices made during an objective should impact the reward. It should be MOSTLY the same and unbiased.. I think the xp pools should be the same but wouldn't mind different item rewards for solving things a different way. (I wouldn't want a difference in xp for combat solution or stealth solution.. but if I am in a forest killing bears and lions.. I want to be rewarded with progression for doing that) If you killed squirrels in baldurs gate for 2xp.. when you know you will hit level cap long before the final encounter.. well I dunno man.. I sure as hell didn't. I think you are being pedantic about this kill-xp = kill everything rule. Most people supporting kill -xp don't do this.. and even if we did.. so what? How does that ruin your experience? EDIT: I actually think it is funny that all the people saying "I need to kill every last bear for every last drop of xp" are the supporters of removal of kill-xp.. It's almost like these people have some kind of fixation on squeezing xp out of every last thing and need the developers to cut them off. They aren't strong enough on their own to stop slaughtering towns folk and squirrels.. the developers need to take all meaning away from those actions so our no-kill xp crowd can sleep at night without setting fire to Beregost. There is a level cap and most veteran players and munchkins alike understand this. Killing creatures is generally your slowest means of leveling unless your fighting liches and dragons.. it's not worth it.. Its a cup of water in the bucket at best. Stop over exaggerating how much kill -xp ruins the pacing and thought process behind a game.. you can speak for yourselves but not for the psychology of every player in the world.

All these options have been captured in our poll.. cast your vote bro!

You can choose to reject reality and replace it with your own all you want. Doesn't change reality. It IS reality that granting XP for kills will not automatically cause players to suddenly kill everything in order to win. You're doing nothing here but insulting the genre itself by claiming otherwise. PS:T has Kill XP. But I never kill TTO when I play Planescape: Torment, for example. Because engaging him in combat leads to the most unsatisfying ending of the game. I also never kill Trias unless I'm playing Evil, even though he's worth a crap ton of XP if you kill him, and nothing if you don't. This is the guy who said baldurs gate is a JRPG.. don't feed the trolls..

I always know when Lephys posts an essay.. He A) didn't read my post and B) won't actually be talking about the same thing as me.. Thanks Sarex

There is no way to say definitively "This thing is degenerate gamplay" You can't prove that.. Degenerate to who? by what standard? Cause Josh Sawyer says so? In fact.. ever since Josh used the term Degenerate Gameplay in some interview.. I have seen so many fan boys throw it around without even understanding what it is. It has become a buzz word on the codex and obs forums. To answer the second part of your statement. You are essentially stating that killing everything in the game because it gives xp ruins the Roleplay potential of a character. I agree.. and if that is important to you.. don't do it? You don't need to kill everything in an IE game to complete the game.. not even close.. so it's a extreme over exaggeration to make your bogus point.

What's degenerate play is to need so desperately to be able to kill things and get XP for them that you can't enjoy the game without getting XP for every single thing you slay, because it bugs you so badly. That in no way supports the roleplaying of a character in an actual world (at least to some degree), which is what separates this kind of RPG from, say, Diablo. You forgot to say "In my opinion".. I know 7 people on this forum who will disagree and according to our poll many more.

http://forums.obsidian.net/topic/67500-more-obvious-xp-notice/?p=1486643 Alright folks, well, this certainly answers that: The quest-only xp system is intended this way (perhaps with some long quest being divided into one or two xp chunks before the final xp lump)! So, no mistake, this is what they meant by objective/challenge xp, it seems. I'll be darned. How disappointing.. so it's not a bug or a reduced vertical slice of the game..