Durandal.IV

Question: Is there anyone that's good with photoshop who might be willing to assist me? I'm not looking for help with the watercolour, since there's a fantastic tutorial. What I am looking for is someone who can help me recolour a portrait I found. I love playing pale elf, but the lack of selection for portraits in a style that is visually similar (both in the game and among custom portraits) is incredibly frustrating. More annoying is the fact that every single one has white hair! Don't get me wrong. It's a good look. Really drives home the whole "we're winter incarnate" thing. But I would love a bit of variety. It'd be nice to play a blue skinned elf with bright orange hair. Adds a bit of colour. So, if anyone is willing to edit the portrait I've attached, I'd appreciate it. If you want the original source (which is 1500x2567), let me know. I know it'd be easier to just edit a portrait with white hair only, but I just really love this portrait because of how close to the style of the game it is.

It was NOT definitive. It was open-ended and vague. Why would you spend money then? You knew it was not definitive. You knew it was open-ended and vague. So you knew there was no certainty in that regard. You knew there was no guarantee. So you knew there was a risk. And based on that knowledge you decided to spend money on it. And now you are blaming Obsidian for that. You took a gamble. You lost. But you don't want to take any responsibility for taking that gamble in the first place. You're comparing the ending of the final product to the marketing of said product. Nice try, but I'm not buying. ...Although I technically did. My problem in this current debate is, that Obsidian is being accused of INTENTIONALLY misleading people into giving them money. In some countries that is a serious accusation and a crime actually. Obsidian is being accused of having committed a crime. In some countries that accusation is so serious in fact, that someone who makes it could be sued for defamation if it cannot be proven. If we could take a step down in this debate and say we were disappointed. Okay. Or that we would have wished for more information during the campaign. Okay. But to accuse Obsidian to deliberately mislead their own backers. That's huge in my eyes. I actually wonder if such an accusation is in accordance with the Site Rules here. And if you are truly so upset and feel so betrayed then I wonder: What is left for you to do? What are you doing here? What will you be doing? You feel betrayed. How are you going to react? If you feel cheated for your money, should you not ask for refunds? If you feel Obsidian committed a crime, should you not consider legal actions? You are on Obsidian's own forum. You are a guest here on these boards. And that is how you treat your host? Could you at least consider to drop the "intentional"? Could you at least maybe admit that you are at least partially responsible for how you spend your money? Fair enough. These forums may belong to Obsidian, but they are here for the purpose of communicating with the fans. Are you saying I shouldn't let them know how I'm feeling? That it's better for them to continue in ignorance of something they likely did by accident, than let them know that their conduct in this matter did cause some friction between me and them? I have said nothing offensive, or untrue. I haven't accused them of anything, I have simply said how this whole thing has made me feel. Do I think it was done intentionally? Quite possibly. But I don't think it was malicious. If anything, I think they said what they did because the product was still evolving at the time. It could be that all the companions were meant to have a romance route at some point, but they found it didn't work for whatever reason. The updates have always served two purposes: 1) To assure backers that funds aren't going to waste. 2) To market the game to those who are thinking of backing. The reason to keep the discussion of the relationship system vague is to draw in people who had hoped to see that system in place. It's not mean spirited to market your product, or to refrain from making commitments to the final product (Peter Molyneux is a good example of why that's a bad idea). What I felt was wrong was the fact that they allowed certain presumptions to continue well after the final decision had been made. As others have mentioned, they could have easily mentioned that two of the three most desired characters would not have romance routes, but they did not. I don't think that was intentional, but it does not change the fact it was misleading. You are assuming this is some personal vendetta against Obsidian. It's not. I love their games. Pillars of Eternity was fantastic, and Deadfire is looking to be equally as good, if not better. Alpha protocol is one of my favourite games! Just because I love their games does not mean I can't be critical of some of their actions however. As a backer, I would argue it's my duty (think of me as Obsidian's gadfly). Blind faith is just as dangerous to a game development company as blind hatred. Look at Bioware. Mass Effect Andromeda was a mess because they completely misread their audience. They assumed all their fans were radically liberal, and it completely backfired. Beamdog and Seige of Dragonspear had the exact same issue. All I'm saying is that Obsidian needs to be more careful about how they word things. The wrong type of wording can cause all sorts of problems, which is why they need to be sure to be clear. Edit: And yes, I saw your previous post, but I already had this started one and would rather beat my head against my keyboard than rewrite it. Just to clarify, this isn't me being angry or betrayed. This is me debating with you, and I have thoroughly enjoyed it.

Don't look at me. I was just arguing about the role of trust in a kickstarter campaign. Completely different subject... In that it was sparked by discussion of possible romance options... Maybe a quick glance, or out of the corner of your eye?

Yes, he does. It's pretty short though. Most of them are just a line or two, and relatively vague and open ended. Xoti's are the most detailed. I like vague and open-ended better than super detailed anyways. Gives you more room to imagine what happens. I just hope there's a version of the ending that allows him and the watcher to stick together after the story. There is, I saw someone post his other ending on a different forum. But now I'm also wondering about the other companions. I don't think all of them did. Some were parting of ways, others were just "Til we meet again" . Maia and Xoti were the latter, for example. I just realized that sentence has two different meanings, and they both work.

It was NOT definitive. It was open-ended and vague. Why would you spend money then? You knew it was not definitive. You knew it was open-ended and vague. So you knew there was no certainty in that regard. You knew there was no guarantee. So you knew there was a risk. And based on that knowledge you decided to spend money on it. And now you are blaming Obsidian for that. You took a gamble. You lost. But you don't want to take any responsibility for taking that gamble in the first place. You're comparing the ending of the final product to the marketing of said product. Nice try, but I'm not buying. ...Although I technically did.

Yes, he does. It's pretty short though. Most of them are just a line or two, and relatively vague and open ended. Xoti's are the most detailed. I like vague and open-ended better than super detailed anyways. Gives you more room to imagine what happens. I just hope there's a version of the ending that allows him and the watcher to stick together after the story.

True, but that was part of the problem. It may not have said they were all romanceable, but it certainly didn't say that some of them weren't. It was not definitive. It was open-ended and vague. And I remember that video because I was surprised how well he was rocking that blush. The part that needed clarity is the term relationship. It's such a broad and general word that it is open to misinterpretation. This is where clarification would have been needed. Is a relationship a romance? Not necessarily, but do you ever hear people talk about their romances? Nope. You hear them talking about their relationships. With this in mind, it's actually quite obvious where the confusion is. That's probably part of why the term was selected instead of romances.

People get what you are saying. They disagree that Obsidian was misleading. (Also tangential, but "trust" is absolutely needed with stocks inasmuch as you trust that given company 1) is putting out accurate information about their earnings and such and 2) that they are managed well enough to be competent. There's a reason people prefer investing in Google over, say, junk bonds from Venezuela and trust has everything to do with it). Honestly, I'm just being contrary right now. Concerning your first point, there are laws in place to force them to do that. I would argue fear of the law is a bigger motivator than trust of the investor. Nortel comes to mind. I actually feel that point two is also motivated by law. They need to be competent so they don't get fined or jail time. Also, Google is a bad example as it is currently a well established international company. If you are referring to early Google however, I will partially agree. Early Google wasn't initially funded by crowds or the public, but by a handful of private investors who were familiar with the field. They were all individuals who were trained in computer science, which means that they would have been knowledgeable of what Google was offering. The only trust required would have been concerning whether or not they could implement the system. They didn't need to worry about how the system was accomplished.

Yes, he does. It's pretty short though. Most of them are just a line or two, and relatively vague and open ended. Xoti's are the most detailed.

Investments do not have a good faith component. Investments are about risks and gains. You don't need to trust a company to invest in it. It's a game of probabilities. Crowd funding is not. Is there risk? Certainly. They can abscond with your money and run off. Hence why trust is needed. The issue is not that something was not provided, but that there was no clarity. This isn't about having all the facts. I don't want all the facts. I'd have no motivation to play the game if I had all the facts. I do want an indication of what I am funding. You can't have crowd funding without the crowd, and you can't have crowds without individuals who comprise them. And those individuals need to be able to trust that the product they are funding is the product they agreed to fund, which requires a certain level of transparency and explanation. We have really deviated here. I was never arguing that we shouldn't fund the game. I quite enjoy it. I have no regrets. What I was arguing about was the nature in which they advertised the relationship system! I will repeat my initial argument again, because I feel like I'm going to forget it: The issue is not that there are no romances, or that they weren't implemented in the way I wanted. The issue is that the relationship system was teased in a way that mislead a large number of people. These points may seem similar, but they are not.

As I just stated, crowd funding is about good faith. You are trusting them to deliver a product with your money. To sit there and say that people have no right to feel slighted because they were mislead is even harder to fathom than my thought process. The issue is not that they failed to deliver. The issue is that there was no explanation given for why. Crowd funding cannot work if there is no trust between the funder and the funded. How can companies expect to get funding without making people feel as if they can be trusted with their money? But people already explained in this thread. The devs were very careful to speak of relationships only NOT of romances. Also they said characters whose authors would not feel it, would not get a romance. They also stressed that not everyone would be satisfied/pleased with the choices of the romances. And based on those statements people got their hopes up that Edér must be romanceable. Otherwise Obsidian would intentionally be misleading people. Yes, that is really not easy for me to understand. In any case, I find it very unlikely that we reach a common ground. I think the only thing we could maybe agree on is that in future you should not join a crowd funding by Obsidian anymore if you feel they are misleading people intentionally? Stressing that characters might not get a romance is not the same as saying they will not. One is a possibility, the other is definitive. What you are essentially saying is that I should not crowd fund unless I have blind faith in the company. If I can't trust them, then I am definitely not going to fund them. THIS IS MY POINT. Crowd funding requires trust. How is this a difficult concept? Anyone is going to tell you that trust is essential in a crowd funding project! What do you think the point of the updates is?! To reassure backers that their trust is well placed. Devs aren't doing this because they have nothing better to do. If anything, it's a waste of resources. They do it because it's essential to not only ensuring that backers don't ask for a refund, but to draw other backers in by demonstrating that they can be trusted.

I have a somewhat different perspective. When I participate in crowdfunding a game-- and I've done so over a dozen times-- I'm paying the developers to make the kind of game that couldn't or wouldn't be made using "traditional" funding sources. I want the developers to stay true to their artistic vision, not (say) add multiplayer because it helps sell DLC. Because I trust that people with decades of game-making experience can make better games when they don't have to go through design by committee. I certainly hope the developers listen to crowdfunder feedback, and incorporate good ideas where appropriate. That's one of of the benefits of crowdfunding! But I reject the notion that developers have to or should add some feature merely because the crowdfunders want it. That's design by committee, that's how "big studio" games are made, and that's *not* what I'm paying for as a crowdfunder. [Aside: I don't mean to suggest big studio games are awful, and I love my big budget RPGs as much as the next gamer. Just noting that the whole point of crowdfunding is to free the developers from having to incorporate things that funders demand.] You just reiterated my point. I'm not saying they should or have to, but I am saying they should be clear and, keyword here, transparent. If you join a crowd funding campaign that features a single-player campaign with multiplayer, and you are supporting it for the campaign, only to discover that they decided to scrap it for full multiplayer campaign at launch day, you are going to be angry. Why? Because they didn't explain that they had scrapped the campaign. Will it matter if they used the words "campaign with multiplayer" instead of "single-player campaign with multiplayer"? Absolutely. It will make you feel mislead. Potentially betrayed. Yet, they were technically truthful in that they provided a "campaign with multiplayer". Does that explain where some of the frustration may be coming from? If they were to explain why that single-player campaign was scrapped for a multi-player campaign, you might not be as angry.

My recollection is that Obsidian was very careful to say "relationships" and not "romances," and that they clarified that not everyone would be romanceable. I remember that because I was excited about relationships that weren't romances. My Watcher wants to be bash brothers with Eder and shield sisters with Pallegina, not get into their pants. There in lies the issue. The wording is very precise and very misleading. It's rhetoric 101. Regardless, this is a kickstarter project. It's fundamentally built on the principle of good faith. People should not have to pay attention to wording as if they were reading a legal contract. If they were aware some people had misread, the onus was on them to clarify. As I just stated, crowd funding is about good faith. You are trusting them to deliver a product with your money. To sit there and say that people have no right to feel slighted because they were mislead is even harder to fathom than my thought process. The issue is not that they failed to deliver. The issue is that there was no explanation given for why. Crowd funding cannot work if there is no trust between the funder and the funded. How can companies expect to get funding without making people feel as if they can be trusted with their money?

I think you are massively misunderstanding the issue: transparency. Considering the number of people who backed this game and were looking forward to romances, myself among them, the manner in which they portrayed the "relationships" in the game during development comes across as a bit underhanded. I mean, considering that it appears that Eder and Pallegina can't be romanced, with Eder probably being the most sought after romance, it seems slightly mean-spirited/spiteful to say "We've added relationships!" only to reveal that it's not with the characters everyone wanted. If they had been transparent about it, there probably wouldn't have been as much of an issue. If they felt that adding a relationship would be detrimental to the character, or simply did not fit the character's personality, or did not feel confident in their ability to write a decent romance, I'd have no problem, so long as they explained that. However, the fact that they didn't seems like they intentionally mislead people. Honestly, I'm tempted to say that they didn't mention this specifically to appease the backers who wanted the romances. "Hey, we gave you what you wanted, just not how you wanted it, which essentially means we didn't give you what you want, but thought we were clever about it... Wait, you're mad?" A little honesty goes a long way, and this does not feel honest. Perhaps I'm being a bit harsh, and they intend to do something in one of the DLCs, but if they don't, I feel like there's been a bit of a breach in trust.

This is actually kind of disappointing. Concerning character creation, it looks like the same distribution concerning races and classes. Culture makes sense, but I am disappointed that the Snow elves have been shafted again. You'd think with how rare they're supposed to be that people would gawk more. It also surprises me how many references Orlans get, considering how few portraits they have.