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J.E. Sawyer

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Everything posted by J.E. Sawyer

  1. J.E. Sawyer
    I'm not sure what you mean by point and attack system, but we will likely be using a reputation system similar to F:NV in Project Eternity (also, we aren't using "alignment", "karma" or other morality meters). In general, the way we will be approaching the world design and faction development will likely be similar to F:NV. We want the characters to feel like they have believable motivations, reasons for doing what they do.
  2. J.E. Sawyer
    Yes. Say "swift-footed Achilles" to the spirit world three times and everyone is hasted. Not literally, but that's kind of the idea.
  3. J.E. Sawyer
    Yes, that is essentially what we mean.
  4. J.E. Sawyer
    I always loved Mordenkainen's Force Missiles and Smashing Wave.
  5. J.E. Sawyer
    PE is not another BG, another IWD, or another PS:T. We want to take the best elements from each game to make something new. From BG, the exploration and companion interaction, from IWD, the environments and tactical combat, and from PS:T, the highly-reactive narrative and exploration of mature themes.
  6. J.E. Sawyer
    It was relatively complex, but not tremendously more complex than the reputation system in Fallout: New Vegas. When designers starting using the F:NV reputation system, it was initially confusing (mostly because it has positive and negative scales), but they adapted to it quickly.
  7. J.E. Sawyer
    One of the reasons we wanted to add the Adventurer's Hall was to allow people to experience all of the various class mechanics if they want to without requiring a companion per class. We put a lot of time into developing our companions and we would rather not link their number directly to the number of classes.
  8. J.E. Sawyer
    That's the idea. And as I wrote in my Formspring post, your lower level spells aren't unlimited. You will still temporarily lock out all spells of that level once you've cast enough of them.
  9. J.E. Sawyer
    I'm speaking generally, but I'd say 3E/3.5E influence with some 2nd Ed. and 4E bits here and there.
  10. J.E. Sawyer
    We also want to have a deep class system with a lot of options.
  11. J.E. Sawyer
    Close to BG2/IWD.
  12. J.E. Sawyer
    Who doesn't?
  13. J.E. Sawyer
    I have to go to my tutoring session now and then I need to write my update for tomorrow, so unfortunately this is all I can contribute to the thread for today/tonight.
  14. J.E. Sawyer
    I think attrition can be valuable for pacing, but I think it's more interesting to think about party attrition rather than the attrition of a single character's class-based resources.
  15. J.E. Sawyer
    We do not have a spellcasting system designed. This is not something we have to "change" because the majority of what we have developed for things as complex as the spellcasting system are ideas. It's three weeks into a fundraising campaign to make this project. I cannot tell you what final form the spellcasting system will take, what elements it absolutely will or won't have. All I can tell you is the sort of goals we have and general ideas of things I'd like to see and avoid. I'm trying to create the feeling of strategic spell selection and tactical spell use in D&D while avoiding the constant rest spamming that was so prevalent in the games I made. There are probably a number of ways to solve this problem. I have some ideas on this, but we haven't settled on them. I want to tell people about general ideas and opinions I have, but I don't think spending a day trying to design the system in the forum is going to produce good results.
  16. J.E. Sawyer
    Why would you be able to instawin by spamming? A theoretical 12th level wizard in PE will probably have about the same number of 5th level spell slots as an equivalent wizard in D&D. Let's say that's 2 or 3. In IWD, you could cast Hold Monster your two or three times in a row and then you'd be done casting 5th level spells for the fight. It would work the same way in PE. The main mechanical difference that I'm considering is when/how you regain your 5th level spells following the fight.
  17. J.E. Sawyer
    I was describing circumstances that occur constantly in IE games. Dark Souls is an excellent game, but it also solves the problem in the opposite direction. It respawns creatures after rest, not on your way back to the campfire. This is also acceptable within the fiction of Dark Souls because it is quite close to being a world full of monsters and undead. This is not always the kind of area population that the BG/IWD games had.
  18. J.E. Sawyer
    Practically speaking, that's how a lot of players handled enemies like the black dragon in Chult in IWD2 (well, with reloading). A high-level sorcerer in IWD2 (or tabletop) could chain cast a fair number of Acid Fogs or Hold Monsters, but they'd have to be pretty high level, and I think that while those spells are really powerful, they don't compare to the save-or-die family spells.
  19. J.E. Sawyer
    There is a spectrum between these two extremes.
  20. J.E. Sawyer
    Not particularly. What I've been consistently saying is that in the IE games, most players did regenerate their spells (through rest) after the end of combat, if not after the end of one combat, usually after two or three. We have some players in this thread insisting that they never do that. I'm not doing to dispute them, but I certainly know what I've watched players actually do (rest constantly and backtrack to rest constantly). I don't know why you would assume that. There are hundreds of spells in A/D&D that run the gamut of power between Sleep and Wail of the Banshee, even at high levels.
  21. J.E. Sawyer
    Isn't the incentive that the fight goes much easier when you scout and select your spells prior to engaging the enemy? Whether you're going to get AS back immediately after the fight or as soon as you can/choose to rest, the enjoyment comes from having AS before you start the fight and using it in a tactically excellent way. Scouting is what gives you the buffer of safety to make those preparations.
  22. J.E. Sawyer
    Well, that is a good question: should spells of that power (mass save or die, enormous damage sink summons) be in the spellcaster's arsenal, period? I know some players do want "omnipotent" (to use one poster's words) wizards.
  23. J.E. Sawyer
    Not in the way you're thinking of it.
  24. J.E. Sawyer
    I don't believe you are sincere. The amount of time that a spell level lockout should last isn't something for which I have a solid answer. It could work in a manner similar to 4E where the end of an "encounter" resets the lockout on the majority of abilities, but "combat" states in engines is something that, in my experience, is often triggered on/off in weird ways. If a lockout lasts for something like 30 seconds or 45 seconds, that lockout will likely last longer than the remainder of the combat, but not so long that the player would have a compelling incentive to "spam stand", which I agree is bad. Whether the answer is a timed lockout or a combat state-released lockout, I'm not sure. I think health and hit points can be handled differently because the player always has a high incentive to avoid as much damage as possible for all of their characters. I.e. conserving health is (almost) always in the player's best interest, but conserving spells may not be.
  25. J.E. Sawyer
    Locking out access to an entire level of spells once you have exhausted the castings you have available to you at a given level (as a 3E sorcerer would) means that you have to use spells from your other spell levels. This creates a tactical challenge during combat, especially for spells at levels where you do not have many castings available (i.e. typically your highest). Allowing them to regenerate literally instantly means that there is not a tactical consideration; you should just use the most powerful spell for the situation over and over again for the duration of combat. The feeling of challenge is a balance between enjoyment and frustration. It is not the same for every player, but it is almost always at some midpoint between those two emotions. My goal is to use a variety of mechanics to find balance points that appeal to this specific audience, varied as it is. I think that instant health regeneration errs too much on the side of ease for this audience.
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