random n00b
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I liked BG(2) portraits. Must be nostalgia...
Anyway, for NPC mods, get the Edwin Romance, and unleash the erotic fury. You know you want to.
It's such a shame the BG1NPC mod doesn't continue into BG2. I haven't quite recovered from Shar-Teel's romance ending in BG1.
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Yep. I don't understand why it was decided that petrification/imprisonment meant final death for the PC. And ONLY for the PC, since Imoen can die in any number of ways, and so long as she isn't chunked/disintegrated, she can be raised and it's all fine and dandy.
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Cool. Since you chose to disregard nine out of ten parts of what I said, and went for an attention deflect, I'm not even going to bother addressing your points. I do find this mildly amusing, though:
Yeah. Because you were not trolling when you posted this:Your personal insults are tedious and boring, and add absolutely nothing to this discussion.Whatever though, you go man. Fight the good fight.
Get over yourself already.Seriously, what is wrong with half the people in this thread!?!It really isn't a particularly difficult concept to grasp.
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You CANNOT then just come along and apply your own interpretation of what you think a 10/10 should mean to their scores; your interpretation is simply irrelevant. Well, I guess you can, since half of you have been doing so for the last 6 (!) pages, but it just makes you look like an ass. Considering that Hurlshot, Spider et al. have drawn your attention to this already (on page 1, no less!) makes it doubly so.
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I honestly believed that humans have the capacity to learn, but you guys make a good case for why they might not. Mega-fail.
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Right. You would ignore a game reviews site giving a 10 to a game just because it "has b00bies", but you just can't bear people here discussing how they feel about how those ratings are assigned?No, I would ignore it, because whether or not a game has b00bies is not relevant to my finding enjoyment in a game (which may or may not be a complete lie ). However, what I would NOT do is go around claiming the reviewer said it's the perfect game, when all he's saying is that the game has b00bies.You go man. Fight the good fight.
So, now you are the authority on what can and cannot be discussed in these boards?I'm not convinced that everyone truly has understood, to be honest. I mean, why have this discussion again when it should have been done and dusted in the Oblivion thread that mentioned the Eurogamer review, for example? At least the discussion does seem to have moved on somewhat, as you said, but I think I'll reserve judgment once I've seen more of it down the line. For my part, I think the criteria are perfectly valid/reliable/logical, as anything else would just make a complete mockery of having a 10-point scale in the first place.I guess it's one of those cyclical things, here. You might want to go throw another rant in the "Top 10 Games" thread, as well, since the current iteration is by no means the first. And while you're at it, have a go at the politics threads as well.
As for the last part in the quote, that sure looks like your opinion on IGN's rating system. But I thought you had said everything you had to say on the subject in the Oblivion thread? What's the point of repeating yourself?
So, let's sum this up so a misunderstanding cannot be blamed on the derailment anymore. Not saying they CAN'T give GTAIV a 10,. Just that I disagree with some of the rationale behind it. Surely I am welcome to my opinion?
That's precisely the problem. When you are used to others doing your thinking for you, simple stuff like understanding basic sentences becomes an uphill battle...That doesn't even make sense. -
Sorry. But I think I am entitled to my own criterion regarding their rating system. If instead of 10 being "best around" or something equally vague, it was assigned to games that "have b00bies", wouldn't you object?You CANNOT then just come along and apply your own interpretation of what you think a 10/10 should mean to their scores; your interpretation is simply irrelevant. Well, I guess you can, since half of you have been doing so for the last 6 (!) pages, but it just makes you look like an ass. Considering that Hurlshot, Spider et al. have drawn your attention to this already (on page 1, no less!) makes it doubly so.I don't think folks have failed to understand that IGN has first defined their rating criteria, and then are applying it. I thought the discussion has evolved to how valid/reliable/logical those criteria are.
Hey, don't let me stop you from letting others do your thinking for you!You guys were pulling the same stunt when Eurogamer gave Oblivion a 10/10. You were wrong then, you are wrong now. I honestly believed that humans have the capacity to learn, but you guys make a good case for why they might not. Mega-fail.
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-"There are two kinds of people in the world, my friend. Those who have a loaded gun and those who dig. You dig."
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Lol.Sarcasm wasn't too appreciated aboard my ship. -
No. An olympic athlete that getting a 10 means that from the judge's perspective, technique and execution were both flawless. That's why there isn't a single judge, because it theoretically reduces the appreciative error inherent to the human condition. The next guy to get a 10 does not render the previous 10 a 9.9, because one is not evaluated compared to the other, but separately. If you rate a merely "outstanding" performance a 10, what rate do you reserve for the truly flawless?(in my mind) 10 out of 10 doesn't translate to "flawless" it translates to "outstanding"Exactly. When an olympic diver gets a perfect 10 nobody suggests that they shut down the sport (even though in that case 10 might very well mean "flawless"). Likewise, the next person to get 10 doesn't render the previous 10 a 9.9 or whatever.
Remember, just because nobody has ever seen a perfect 10, doesn't mean it can't exist.
Also, I like pixies' rating system. I deem this post a september.
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The Longer Road is one of those mods I have perma-installed. Not only the writing is pretty good, with Irenicus having effectively more interaction with the rest of the party and the PC than say, romantic Jaheira, but he also makes a great addition to the party (regardless of party alignment, a la Sarevok!), without being overpowering. After all, they did take his cheat scripts away. He is just a level 30 wizard, and he has no HLAs. The only fault I can find with the mod are the VOs (which are pretty scarce, and none for Irenicus himself, fortunately), and the item icons. The rest meshes with the game pretty seamlessly.It does suck when the mod doesn't fit well with the game. Spell/item icons that are clearly out of place; abilities that are clearly overpowered; so on and so forth. However, over the years, I feel that the BG2 modders have become so good at what they do there are quite a few mods out there which really fit in quite seamlessly; for example, the one which lets you have Irenicus in your party in TOB, and even have him contemplate redemption, as Sarevok does. He is a little too powerful, but they did a good job by not going overboard with the redemption thing (he has doubts, he doesn't just go OMG ILL BE GOOD NOW), the dialogue fits quite wonderfully, etc.
The problem I found with Tactics is that some bosses were unreasonably beefed up, and given stupid immunities/cheats. I hate when that is done. And some of the other fights (Random City Encounters) become a chore after fighting the same group for the Nth time.Tactics is very good if you leave out some fights you personally fiind silly. You don't need to cheese through most of tactics battles to win it, and I'm not a particularly good D&D player or a careful character builder (i mean, Jan+Edwin+Mage PC+Jaheira? Not effecitve, at all), but I don't need to cheese on most of the battles. Even soloing Very Hard vanilla isn't very hard after a while, because the challenges are very 'stock' - it just gets annoying because of the ridiculous difference in pure damage and HP. It's not fun to fight, say, 50,000 soldiers with 2,000; it's fun to fight 3,000 vs. 2,000 where those 3,000 have special bonuses like immunities or unnerfed abilities, and that's what tactics does.Take Improved Faldorn, for instance. She is given an undispellable Ironskin, begins the fight already polymorphed, summons 3/4 allies instantly at the beginning, and despite using her wild shape's claws to attack, keeps applying the stun effect from the Staff of Thunder and Lightning. You, on the other hand, begin naked. That's not fun, that's sadism. She IS a chapter 3 boss that can only be challenged by DRUIDS. A mage can mop the floor with her, but that option simply doesn't exist.
The same with Improved Bodhi. What's the rationale for making her harder than the endgame boss (Improved version)? That is, assuming you don't cheese, and give everyone scrolls of protection from undead/magic.
It's entirely possible that I plain old suck, btw. But beating those fights using metagame/cheese is just not rewarding for me.
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Seriously, who cares?
Chances are they shelled out the big bucks to get a nice score. People daft enough to swallow arbitrary scores from people they don't know anything about deserve to be lied to.
That made me laugh.Yay, another game which glorifies crime and which will become readily available to ten year olds. -
I tried Tactics, and have come to hate most of it. I don't like cheesing my way through the game, so I get assraped with most of the improved fights. At that point I either get bored and unleash the exploits, or unsheath the killsticks and proceed to make chunks out of everyone. It's cheese or die.
Components like Improved Druid Grove, Improved Ilyich, and Smarter Mages and Liches are not only unreasonably difficult, but also heavily dependant on cheats (multiple insta-protection casting scripts, undispellable stone/ironskins), which is something I totally loathe. But I understand how players that max everything out and find exploiting design flaws perfectly acceptable would welcome the increase in difficulty. It is simply not enjoyable for me.
Other components are pretty good though. Improved Kangaxx and Improved Twisted Rune bring the difficulty of those encounters to what should be expected from them, for instance.
I guess it's one of those hate-it-or-love-it mods.
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Cool, didn't know that.
Wait, what?Why would I reroll my character?My stats don't change, my level doesn't change, I get to re-distribute my weapon profs, and I can choose the Blade kit when I import.
Plus, those extra 8 stats points from BG1 tomes are nice, especially when they cause 19 Int and 19 Str. 
So, when importing from a BG1 save (or CHR file), you get to choose kits if the character belongs to a class that previously didn't have access to them
Yep. If I import a Bard I get to choose if I am a Bard, Blade, Skald or whatever the other kit is. If I import a fighter, I can choose Kensai.
and also redistribute his stat points?No, just proficiency points. Stat points remain the same, but BG2 doesn't make any changes to stat point distribution anyway. BG2 does not, however, have any Tomes of Knowledge, unlike BG1
That would be 8 +2 (cold dmg) +14 (STR bonus), for a less than impressive 24 dmg. Oh, and they do crushing dmg despite being claws. Crazy.So that's only dmg of 8 + 2 + STR during Offensive Spin (about 25 dmg or so)? That's not horrible, but it's not as good as I expected.The HLA druid form is 2D12 (hence my suggestion of Kensai/Druid). Oh well, hopefully the better Slayer forms Ascension grants do more max damage.
Ascension adds the possibility to change into The Ravager, which improves the claws to 1d10+2, with an apparent chance for an extra 1d8. You are better off wielding a katana and Crom Faeyr...
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Wait, what?Why would I reroll my character?My stats don't change, my level doesn't change, I get to re-distribute my weapon profs, and I can choose the Blade kit when I import.
Plus, those extra 8 stats points from BG1 tomes are nice, especially when they cause 19 Int and 19 Str. So, when importing from a BG1 save (or CHR file), you get to choose kits if the character belongs to a class that previously didn't have access to them, and also redistribute his stat points?
It's still just 1d8 (+STR bonus dmg)...Edit: Oh, and I'm looking forward to using Offensive Spin in BG2 while in Slayer form. Max damage @ 25 STR FTW! -
Good. For a moment there, I thought you were supporting a baseless stance over another equally baseless stance.I know.
What were the selling points of PST and Fallout back in the day? Well-written plots exclusively?I'm also basing it on the high rankings games such as PS:T and Fallout tend to get on "classic PC games" lists and things like that, and that they're highly regarded games for their plot, whether as the plot isn't the source of Mass Effects' acclaimed status, rather it's the flashy, fun, action packed interactive sci-fi movie zest to it that makes it awesome, which is what you'll find most people who've played the game and liked it compliment it on.You surely understand how there's little else for "classic" games to be remembered by, if not their story, and maybe atmosphere. You are making an unfair comparison between reviews that are written from a nostalgia-biased perspective, with the advantage of hindsight, and reviews of contemporary products that not only are expected to feature a decent narrative, but also to be up to the standards of today's technology (when not having an edge there).
The thing is, narrative was invented and perfected thousands of years ago. The rest of the elements in a game are still fairly virgin grounds and take more development time, while at the same time, get more attention because they are novelty. Until both games have become hopelessly outdated, reviews of genre "classics" will always make past times look better.
No, no. I deliberately used "up" and "black", because you can make formal descriptions of both. "Better" is largely dependant (at best) on circumstances, when not on personal preference. Therefore, any definition you can give is only valid for yourself, at the time you gave it.But when what is better is defined, is it still a completely objective concept? It's one thing to look for different things in the quality of a story, it's another to look for the same things in the quality of a story, but then be in favour of something that contradicts your views over something that doesn't.And Bos has stated the qualities he looks for in a story, by pointing out the crap he doesn't want in a story that he thought wasn't in Mass Effect, and given that it's Xard, I know he'd look for the same qualities in a plot that Bos does, so what makes you think better hasn't been defined yet, since we know what qualities to compare in this instance, such as the character depth of the villains, the little back story details of the "setting", the character development quality and the pacing of the story?
A conversation in which the same words have arbitrary meanings for the each participant is an absurd.
And, as is to be expected, the less definition the concept in question has, the more self-appointed "experts" on the field you can find. Cool beans.I'm using the term art game in a sort of abstract way. It lacks deffinition, but I think the easiest way to define it is a game that is a) not created for the purpose of making money and b) a game that's main focus isn't entertainment, but to achieve some sort of greater undefinable artistic value. -
Suit yourself. If it's not a problem for you to reroll your character for BG2, who am I to say anything?I'm still checking out TuTu. I've downloaded it and haven't gotten far in BG1.Thing is, I like BG1. I don't really see a need to change or improve it. I'll be playing BG2 soon enough anyway, y'know?
The problem I see with Cernd as an un-rebalanced shapeshifter is that as a caster, clerics are generally more useful, with a wider variety of spells. And he can't cast while in his (severely gimped) werewolf form, so once his ironskins wear out, he's in trouble.Cernd isn't the same as Jaheira in a fight, but he's anything but useless. His werewolf forms are half-decent when he gets corned and once he gets a shapeshift HLA he's a force to be reckoned with. But he's a caster in general. As a caster he trumps Jaheira, as he progresses faster and has higher wisdom. *shrug* I may still take Jaheira though. I haven't played her in quite a while.And, save for the Summon Elemental Prince HLA, most high-end stuff for druids is crap.
You are just bitter because he prefers trees to girls.Cernd bites the big one. His personality sucks and he's a useless druid. If I wanted a druid I would go for Jaheira. -
Just for the record, I was referring to his worth (or lack thereof) in a fight, mainly. From a narrative standpoint he's ok - I liked his personal quest more than most of the other NPCs'.
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You aren't getting TuTu or BGT, then?Haha true that.I've decided to play as a Blade, guys. I love druids but have played them too many times already. Still, it's going to be awesome fun playing a Blade in BG2. They rock. I guess this means my BG2 party will be:
Me - Blade
Imoen
Viconia
Jaheira or Cernd
Janny Jan Jan
Empty -> Sarevok
Sound good?
Well, off to play BG1 with some combo of:
Me - Bard (Blade in BG2)
Viconia
Jaheira
Imoen
Branwen
Minsc
Xan
Dynaheir
And, I guess it's a matter of tastes, but Jaheira is vastly superior to Cernd overall, unless you install the Shapeshifter rebalance component of the BG2 Tweak Pack. She can be more annoying too, to compensate...
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Indeed. However, when you counter an argument in that shape with "my opinion is fact because, unlike you, I have taste and perspective", you are just taking the silliness one step further.I agree with Xard. The "it's an opinion not a fact" is an annoying argument/defense.
And the posters in this board as a whole are a representative sample because...?Now I've never played Planescape Torment, Fallout or any of the games Xard mentioned before, although just from this forum alone, I've gathered that most people who have played those games who've also played Mass Effect agree that PS:T and such has the better plot. Now you have to ask yourself - why is that? It must be doing something right to gain such a more potent recognition in that regard than ME.See Bandwagon Effect and selection bias.
The problem is that people here are arguing on what's "better". Better has not been defined thus far, because it's not an objective concept like, for instance, "up" and "black".Now sure, Bos hybrid gave reasons why he liked ME more plot wise and that's fair enough, but give me one good reason why someone couldn't come out and argue why he/she thinks PS:T is better than ME in such a way that would make it ridiculous to argue against?For example instead of just saying "The characters in ME had more depth than in PS:T" you would say "The characters had more depth in ME because they had this and that and blah blah etc as opposed to PS:T which was lacking..." See what I mean? The more details that are applied to an argument, the more clear it becomes what is better.
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People generally rather play bland games that don't engage them in any way beyond the most basic emotions.
It's the same thing as with books, film, and music, of course.
Ah, yes. The hard life of the intellectual elite.I think the major trouble is with FPS taking the lead in the market, and people expecting that.The "most anticipated" games are the ones with the most beautiful graphics, but no depht at all (Crysis, Halo etc.), and for some reasons everywhere you go in other genres idiots expect these kind of graphics there aswell.
And since the idiots make the majority, and pay up the producers are going to make stuff for them primarily.
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24. And I'd rather not count how many of those have actually been productive.
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Yeah, same thing happens to me. I have BG2 perma-installed, and go back to other old games regularly.
Nostalgia, I'd say... you can find folks crying about how no game has ever been able to capture the sense of freedom of Elite, as well.
Maybe in fifteen years time, people will be like that with ME, for instance.
edit: foiled again!
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Actually her being "zeltron" or whatever isn't what I liked most about her, albeit her empathic abilities could have added some spice to her character, had she actually been a joinable NPC. More like, the backstabbing, manipulating, ruthless attitude. She *is* an Exchange thug, and she's obviously very good at it. A twist on the usual out-of-the-mill gamorrean or trando muscle. I liked her VO too.
Her outfit kinda threw me off too... I'm not impressed how most alien females are dressed in some variation of a bathing suit, while males of the species wear perfectly normal clothes. But that seems to be a common trend in fantasy, what with all the "bikini" chain mails and stuff...
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Krav Maga. That's the stuff I'd expect a secret agent type to be trained in.
Premises:
- "You're not going to care how much damage you're going to cause."
- "Cause as much damage as possible and run."
Gotta love it.
- "You're not going to care how much damage you're going to cause."
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Navy, specifically... hence kirottu's comment.Visceris was in the army?
Plus, those extra 8 stats points from BG1 tomes are nice, especially when they cause 19 Int and 19 Str. 
BREAKING NEWS: CRYSIS DEVS BAIL OUT! CONSOLES ARE THE FUTURE!
in Computer and Console
Posted
Why stop at going console exclusive?
Shoot them I say.
After stabbing them.