^Rayne^

When I think of a Role Playing Experience I want the experience to be an immersive one where characters in the games especially those that join with your PC have meaningful dialog and dynamic relationships that have small or large impacts on the fantasy world. I’ve seen threads that ask the questions about the quality of these companion relationships vs. quantity and the quality is generally favored by more players based on the feedback. With that in mind, I want the developers to feel that whatever stories and ideas motivate and excite them when it comes to designing companions, please go for it. You will always write best when your heart is in it. Personally I hope this includes unexpected relationships between the companions and between the PC and the companions. I would love to see a friendship develop between a PC and a companion that is carefully written and prepared and is as genuine and meaningful as what I saw form between Andy Dufresne and Red in The Shawshank Redemption. The game I want to play would run full the gambit emotions between jealousy, betrayal, humor, anger, joy, shock, love, loyalty, fear, lust, humility, and sorrow. I want to be surprised and inspired by what Obsidian’s designers and writers come up with and I hope they have fun getting to that place. I want the designers to feel they have freedom to make a quality game they believe in and this Kickstarter publishing drive really does give them an exciting opportunity to do just that. I’ve supported it from day one with my $65 (I wish it could have been more) and I will not take pull that money if Obsidian decides they don’t want to add something to the game I feel passionately about. I do appreciate that they’re listening and I hope they’re happy with the direction us players are encouraging in our feedback. I do want to address one more aspect of role playing that for whatever reason a very vocal minority are single-mindedly against. There are more than a few locked threads on whether romance should be in the game or not and I’ve seen poles on this board which clearly shows that more players want them than don’t by almost a 3:1 margin (with 530 votes 73% were in favor of some sort of Romance option compared to 27% that wanted nothing). I know the designers are listening, but I hope they’re paying attention to what the majority are asking for and not becoming focused on who is yelling the loudest. That said, if the designers don’t think they can do justice to a romance option or they don’t really enjoy writing them I hope they choose the route that fits best for them. More than anything I want to play a quality game. Quality in my opinion isn’t sacrificed by more opportunities with companion dialog and companion quests it is enhanced. I feel a lot of false choices are being thrown around and it is disheartening. I love all aspects of an RPG and so often they are only hack and slash adventures. My only concern is there is a concerted effort being made to limit the choices a player can make in a role-playing game.

The point of this thread is to discuss Romance options if they're in the game. For those who want to discuss why they shouldn't be in the game at all, go start your own thread. It gets a little old how some individuals hijack a thread and tell us all why there shouldn't be any romances when that isn't even the point of the discussion.

My all time favorite introduction to a game was the beginning of Icewind Dale. Most of it was a series of images to tell as story, and superb narration, coupled with great music. To this day it was the most memorable cutscene or movie in a game for me and I have seen a lot of these in-game cut scenes. I would really rather see a series of beautiful still drawings and/or paintings coupled with superb narration to fill in these gaps. It's an artistic choice that I really appreciate and relies more on the player's imagination to fill in the gaps. I think that is one of the reasons I still remember it so well and like it so much.

I'm putting in my vote for Jeremy Soule all the way. By far the best soundtrack for a game ever. The score for this is as good as the best work done for films. It gave such a magic feel to Icewind Dale. Between the art on that music the game will always be one of my favorites.

While that would be super cool, my bet is for something between 2-3 million (closer to 3 than 2). Still I would love to see 10+. That would be totally awesome, but I'm not holding my breath.

Thumbs up on hitting stretch goal number 2! I'm hoping you will hit #'s 3, 4, and 5 before the time is over. I agree with the second poster, that we probably won't see goal 3 hit until Monday or Tuesday next week. Things are definitely slowing down now. Still I'm just thrilled the main target was met and now the first two stretch goals to boot.

That would be so cool if some of the companions had journals and the player accidently finds it at camp and discovers the companion whose been rejecting you is actually interested in you and the reason why is detailed there. That could lead to an interesting way of returning the journal without them knowing you read it or dealing with the consequences if you give it back and they know you've seen it. In any case, this would be a lot of fun. I would love to see something like this. As for the main point of this thread, I'm all for it. I think it would be great to take notes in character and read them later when elements of the story unfolds to see what I thought earlier in the story.

This thread reminds me of my favorite item in any isometric game and that was the Elven armor that mages could cast spells in that was found as an occasional drop in Seldarine's Hand called Elven Chainmail of the Hand +3. It looked functional and realistic but it didn't look overtly magical even though it was. This is one of those items I was extremely happy to find and I really enjoyed the way it looked. Actually Icewind Dale items especially those for IWD2 were very nice and functional in appearance. I hope that is the model for the look of things. I agree with the main poster of this thread, I hate these anime swords that are the size of the person swinging them. The only time this ever works is when it was done by The Witch King in LotR's when he pulled out the epic sized flail on the battlefield. No one in the party should be able to tow one of these around and I wouldn't want to see items like that.

Your approach is more in line with what I was thinking. A lot of the problems with the sleep method had to do with the lack of controls on this choice. For example if you had to complete the quest in a day to accomplish the main task (save the child or get to the evil boss in time) then sleeping isn't an option because time is critical. If you go into a dungeon and a solid rock wall falls down behind you trapping the party and you can't rest until you figure out how to open the door or find an alternate way to rest safely then there is another way to take away the abuse of rest. More xp and better rewards should be a part of this approach to remove the abuse of sleeping to restore spells. That said, I never enjoyed the situation where you memorized spells and could only use a certain number of slots. I would prefer a system that works more like psyonics where you have a pool of points to leverage for casting spells and it replenishes after rest. In this system the lowest level powers could eventually be cast for free because are so simple for the PC to cast. That way even when the magic user runs out of big spells they can still rely on some of their early bread and butter spells to be of value.

What about the billions who think it's simply waste of time and money with a project this small? Actually the polls here are shaping up to show that more folks want romance options. I would rather have the option for romance and have some players not engage in it than to deprive the majority that does want it in the game.

I actually saw a little of this in KOTOR 2 when you're working with the T3-M4 to restore his memory. I found this very cool as I liked that little droid. I definitely like these RP rewards and I find these moments far more memorable than the hundreds of battles that were fought. I would also like to see choices in the dialogue tree actually go into unique directions and not just have 4 of the six options lead to the same dialog tree.

I agree with most of what you're saying as long as it doesn't lead to durability penalties to weapons. I hate that about Fallout and Skyrim. I really don't like seeing artifact weapons or armor take damage simply for being used and especially for being knocked out. If they want to add in durability they should at least give us spells and/or skills that allow us to repair the damage to our stuff with the right equipment.

I would love to see this. If they made it simple to add in custom portraits, character models, maps additions, item additions, etc. it would make a lot of fans very happy including me. Tools that simplify setting up trigger points and dialog trees would be very nice. Plus if they make these tools internally for their designers and make them to be very easy to learn and use it would be good for them and the mod community.

While I agree with you there, I would like to have some warning that is what he's planning on doing, ie. see him doing the same thing to other fallen NPC's so you know that if one of your companions goes down you better push this guy back and try to keep your companions from getting attacked while they're down. That would make the strategic part of combat that much more interesting and increase the value of something like a "knockback" ability.

I think it would be really cool if the house or whatever form it takes is actually magical in origin and can be taken with the PC's and behaves like the tent in Harry Potter where it's small on the outside but much bigger on the inside. Something the PC's could invest to improve over time that also allows them to craft and rest safely and also has a few unexpected surprises.

This is an interesting discussion, and I see both sides point of view here. However, there are some interesting directions never taken in any of these Computer RPG's that perhaps should be considered. What if in battle those fighting your PC's rarely killed because it was better to knock folks unconscious and then sell the PC's into slavery? Then you find your possessions are taken and you're working in a mine or fighting in a gladiatorial arena and have to escape and recover your lost belongings and save your companions. This is just one example of how to change the dynamic a bit. If at least one or two members of the party survive a big fight they can heal their friends and get them back up. If there was a difference between knocking a PC out and killing them with some safe zone between the two it would allow for less reloading. I imagine a little reloading is going to happen regardless, but if the system allows a bit more creativity it could be fun. For example what if you were fighting in a dungeon that trapped the souls of those knocked unconscious (either through sleep or fighting) and the party had to break their companions souls out of the device holding them to get their friends back? It may add urgency if the party is declining in numbers but it would also be a reason not to just up and reload because the challenge is part of the journey. If more locations didn't allow one to save unless they did so from a secure location that too could create interesting challenges. I would love the idea of actually having to find good defensible locations to secure for rest in order to recover and use as a save point. I also have to say that PT handled death in an interesting way. What if the main character was semi-immortal but whose sould still had to wrestle some maze or series of obstacles in order to return to his/her body. The Player Character might even gain some sort of inner knowledge each time he returns, maybe he hears and sees things in these moments from the souls that are dead that helps him/her learn more about some hidden elements in the plot? I think this game will give the designers and opportunity to try something a little different perhaps very exciting. Still I won't complain if I see a basic rehash of the BG and IWD system.

Honestly, if the designers make the portraits first they should make the mini-avatars custom to match the portrait. That would be ideal because then you would see the mini-character really nicely resembles the beautifully rendered painted image of the character.

I think this one has a clear winner. I remember back in the day the talk of removing them because they were a bit old fashioned when there was 3D characters on the screen. However to this day those 3d characters never properly show the status of the character. Plus there is something cool about the idealized portrait of each PC being shown rather than a 3D rendering of them. I hope they do go back to the portrait views. The real goal should be to make the 3D character in the game actually resemble the portrait to a large degree. I would love to see these little marching characters actually look something like their portraits even if they're miniature in a top down fixed view.

Some people are taking the No Romance option only because it was done poorly in some other games they played. Let's assume for a second that a group of professionals who are interested in making a superb game are also focused on making some adult level romance options too. I think the designers are up for the challenge and this is funded by players so they don't have to cater to teen ratings when it comes to dealing with adult subject matter. For those who don't want to engage fine, don't bother with it when the option presents itself, but it is clear there is a larger half that wants something smart in the game and for that crowd I don't see how it can hurt to have some smart options available here. (By the way when I say adult and mature I'm not talking about X-rated, I'm talking about complex and realistic relationships that are not designed to be the next sequel in the Twilight series). Who knows if Romance options are in the game and handled well maybe it will convert some of you on the "nay" side of the fence. I trust the designers they have on this project to do great work here.

I've always wanted my very own mage tower in a game. With at least 5 levels and a few sub levels too.

I never got the chance to play the expansion to Fallout 3, so I may be restating things that happened with that house, but I will state my hopes for the house just in case they're not similar. One thing I've experienced in a game where the player could get a house was that they got it in a state of disrepair and over time through the completion of quests they were able to improve the house and see its transformation. I also recall enjoying surprises like a secret door into a hidden complex below the house that wasn't found until later in the game. I like having reasons to revisit these homes over and over again in the game and I hope some of these ideas will be present in this home if the stretch goal is achieved. By the way, I really hope we at least see a doubling of the 1.1 million. I put in my money, and I hope a lot of other people do too.

I definitely want to see Romance options available in the game. The lack of romances and companion interactions in Icewind Dale 1 & 2 were really my only gripes with those games. However, I prefer companions that are extremely deep and well written and complex compared to what I've seen in games lately. I would love to see a relationship handled as brilliantly as the one in Patrick Rothfuss' The Kingkiller Chronicle series between Kvothe and Denna. I want to be surprised by the events that unfold and I want these relationships to be integral to the story arc. The romances that I'm finding in most games are fairly shallow and are basically only playing lip-service to what is really possible. It would be interesting if in the same ways you can toggle on certain feats or combat modes a player could turn on certain behavior modifiers like Flirtatious and then select who you as a player wanted to direct it to in the party. Then the designers could pick different places and moments in the game where this behavior might trigger conversations or actions that are connected uniquely with what a place and a time. If a player later developed a strong affinity to a particular companion these toggles might also allow for special actions in the game like trying to protect the companion from harm or giving the player the option to select emotional responses if their romantic attachment was suddenly flirting with another NPC. My longwinded point is that I would prefer a few well thought out romances over the option to romance everyone and have fairly pointless sexual encounters be the high point of the whole romance. I have a feeling the design crew on this project is up for the task though. Honestly I can't wait to see what they cook up.

A friend told me the day this appeared on KickStarter and I donated immediately. I wanted to donate more than $65, but my wife wasn't down with more than that. Icewind Dale 1 and 2 and the Baldur's Gate Series are still my all time favorite games. Hearing about this return to the old school systems of yore made me very happy. Josh, thanks to you and the team. I used to post all the time back when you and the team were working on Icewind Dale 2, but it's been about a decade I got excited enough about a game to jump back on the forums. Good luck with the game, I plan on hanging out on the forums until the game is released.