Rostere

This.

Northern coniferous forests:

Well, just like a regular workforce then? Except that a mage would be that much more powerful. What we're looking for is an explanation in the game's lore which prevents magic from being used to power large-scale industries, and something which limits the world from overflowing with magical items. An appropriate definition of this "fuel" would do.

Well, obviously there's a need to find a spot on several scales which is not already occupied by an existing class. Do they fight physically or magically? Ranged or close combat? Do they have any auxiliary skills, like Chemistry/ Alchemy which someone mentioned? (Maybe a monk is functionally just a close- combat mage? Maybe they boost their physical abilities with alchemy, becoming like The Hulk, or perhaps Jekyll/Hyde?) Obviously, if monks fight with physical attacks and with physical weapons it will be very hard to find them an unique role compared to fighters, paladins and rangers.

I'd rather they steer clear of any copy/pasted Chinese or Japanese cultures. Why not use for inspiration any of the multitudes of other less known foreign (for a westerner) cultures like Scythian, Sumerian/Akkadian, Minoan (please!), Maori, Tibetan, Persian/Iranian among others? Maori- inspired warrior monk who comes from a distant ocean- faring civilization who don't have any access to iron for making weapons. Yes please! But all that is presupposing warrior monks are from a culture foreign to where the game takes place. The ideal solution would be that monks are part of any of the main cultures we will get to see in the game. I'm open to monks being a "different" part of that culture though, perhaps like Sikhs are is in todays India, or like Jews are in Europe.

That is a great idea. (and, it has historical support for its credibility )

The real question to me is still why monks do not use any weapons. What is it with their fighting technique which disallows the use of weapons? Obviously it must have something to do with them imbuing their bodies with some kind of magic. There should be a solid reason why it isn't possible to enchant weapons in the same fashion, and why ordinary fighters do not also learn monastic fighting for defensive purposes. Maybe it takes a lot of time to learn to fight like a monk, or maybe you need to be gifted in some way. If Obsidian can explain how and why people are fighting half- naked with their bare fists against knights in plate armour I think that the exact cultural background for monks will be easy. The only reason people think it is a problem is that they themselves associate monks with East Asia while they believe PE will mirror European cultures.

So, I take it you've been to P. Schuyler & Co. in Tarant?

Well, of course magic must be logically integrated into the economy - but like you, I would prefer that magic did not have a very profound effect on it. So then it is important that we get a lore explanation to why mages do not power windmills, make an industry out of crafting magic items, et.c. There are a number of very important questions to answer here: How rare are magic items, and why are they not more common? How are magic items created - are they even created by mages in the first place? To which degree is spellcasting something you're born with or a skill? How does it relate to the "soul" concept? Do spells have some sort of exhaustible ingredients ("fuel") which limits the use of some or all spells? Which categories of spells need ingredients? How are new spells researched, and why do we see spells such as "magic missile" and "cloudkill" but not "irrigate farmland" or "find rare metals"? Are the spells we can find in the game a complete list of different distinct possible spells, or just a small subset? Are spells discrete rituals, or more like continuous alteration of reality by a trained mind? Or perhaps possibly both? Are there several different distinct types of magic (like divine magic and arcane magic (with different schools), for example?) Once again I would like to say that Dark Sun had a very clever approach to most of these questions by making the use of magic erode the soil and draw life energy from the surrounding area. That would explain completely why magic could never be used on a grand scale to benefit society. I would very much prefer a similar explanation in PE, with the small change that the "life energy" drained would only be temporary. That would completely explain why magic could never be used to create or improve foods, et.c. Concerning magic items, I would like there to be several obstacles to making enchanted industrial or agricultural equipment. There are lots of possible ways to explain the absence of these: Magic items are all artifacts and nobody knows how to create them in the first place Magic items require fuel, commonly in the form of bloodshed to function (this would allow for magic combat equipment without problems, but enchanted forges or mills would require human sacrifice - which would create other interesting lore possibilities) Creating magic items permanently drains magic power from the creator Magic items are connected to souls somehow - perhaps they must be imbued with souls or degrades souls when they are created? We know that there will be separate Wizard and Cleric classes, we know that there will be a crafting system (which almost surely includes magic), and we know that magic is most probably somehow tied to the souls of beings. The rest is up for us to discuss here, let's hope the devs read our discussion

This.

I was originally dismayed at the inclusion of Monks, but I hope Obsidian will give them good a lore explanation to why they are there and how their powers work with the setting.

These are very interesting thoughts. I've actually pondered the subject myself, but not enough to collect it into one long post. There must definitely be magic- based communities in PE, although I'd prefer if most communities were not magic- based (for some good lore reason). As I remember Dark Sun had a very good take on this subject.

In 1914, Germany declared war against France and in 1934, Adolf Hitler became the Fuhrer of Germany. Oh, and in 2005 Mahmoud Ahmadinejad became the president of Iran. Nothing interesting on my own year of birth though...

So I take it you've never played Penumbra: Black Plague?

I loved Arcanum too, enough to replay the whole thing again. I do believe that some of his criticism is valid. There isn't enough depth to companions, the world can sometimes seem too daunting, magic can seem overpowered (although I've always played as a technologist). It's a great game and I really think it's one of those games that gets better the more you replay it, especially for the cRPG connoisseur. Edit: Wanted to use the word connoisseur. I think there is enough depth (but not for all companions - the companions in Arcanum range between full-fledged companions and mere "henchmen"), but not enough conversation. I don't think magic is that OP (with exception of Harm) compared to any other sensible build. Even then, you're basically as powerful in combat with Molotovs, pistol, bow, just charisma to get henchmen, or other stuff. Some individual spells/ technological recipes are pretty useless but I think that's a lesser problem... No one ever bashed D&D because they thought, I don't know... "Skull Trap" was a useless spell.

They did, and all for the better.

I would even go so far as to saying that Torment is an intentionally surrealistic game. But I don't think that's what the devs are trying to accomplish with PE. No one used that word until Sawyer said it, and now people are throwing it around like they actually speak that way. Actually, I distinctly remember first reading it when discussing F3 on the Bethesda forums back in those days - 2007 I think.

I was thinking "I hate fan art..." when I opened this thread, but damn, that is pretty good.

All the people who played Arcanum seem to have had the same issue - "lol I used build X which is totally OP". Now, aside from the Harm spell which actually is pretty OP in the original game, there are lots of different builds in Arcanum which are very viable. Since it's a Troika game, it has also grown a lot with the unofficial fan patches. It's really a great game, you just need to replay it with different characters to realize that - in my opinion, it's more replayable than Fallout.

I bought a XBox 360 to play Deadly Premonition. Consoles don't have a lot of interesting titles, really, but it's worth having one for the few there are. (Yes, I'm the guy who played RE4, Psychonauts and SH2 on my PC, with keyboard controls) Also, the notion that there are games of every genre for the consoles is simply not true. I will change that opinion the day they release EVE Online or the next EU game for consoles.

I think people are confusing "a believable villain" with "a morally grey villain". Just because he/she has motivations does not mean that you are supposed to believe he might be right. Take for example a game where you fight Nazis - it would be that much more interesting if you get to know the entire backstory, and people's individual motivations. Rommel, Goebbels and Göring all wore Nazi uniforms but their individual stories were entirely different. A story where you are just presented with "Evil guy X is rampaging through the land, stop him" tends to feel so bland compared with a game where you get to see the entire story. In short, I think the devs should always ask questions. WHY does Villain X want to do evil? WHY do people follow Villain X?

I want to see: Animated dead with no will of their own (this does not exclude the existence of sentient undead) Evil magic- users making unsavoury pacts with otherwordly powers to increase their knowledge and abilities (really, I never tire of this cliché) A prophecy whose interpretation creates a plot twist (an established cliché since ancient Greece) Platforms floating in space (The Astral Plane where you encounter Myrkul in MotB, the Arcane Sancuary in Diablo 2, the dream scenes in BG2, la Calle Perdida in Lionheart, and so on...) Also, I really like all the clichés of H.P. Lovecraft's fiction. These could hardly be called clichés in a general sense, but I wouldn't mind if parts of the game were heavily Lovecraft- inspired.

I think the point of the OP is that it should be possible to roleplay a character who is very strict about associating with lawless or immoral elements of society. I don't think anyone would like the game to forcibly team up the PC with characters he/she would have fought to the death. Regarding paladins in PE we already know that there will be no alignment meter, so we will definitely see paladins of different types, some more moral than others. I don't want non- PC paladins in PE to all be exactly the same and I don't think any of you guys do either. I just hope that it will be possible to roleplay as either a strict inquisitor- type of paladin or a more merciful, pragmatic, "chivalric" type (this does of course extend to every character class).

There should always be an option for the PC to be very strict about who you associate with in the game. I hate it when games force you to cooperate with lawless/lawful organizations (depending on my character). BG2 is in my opinion a huge mess in that department, considering for example a certain choice between Bodhi and the Shadow Thieves (what is a lawful character supposed to do?). I think Arcanum managed that one pretty well though - main storyline characters such as Bates are possible to ignore altogether .

I'm still waiting for Moustache Protocol...