Thorton_AP

Didn't see the GSG vs SWAT one. Or most of the other ones haha. I watched the first few episodes and it was neat, but got old.

So you're cool buying a used copy of the game for a different platform, then waiting to buy the game when the DRM is patched out? Or buying the game for retail for PC? Steam or bust, right nao, or else you go and give gamestop your money for a used version?

I didn't notice that Steam let you pre-load the game already. I have next to no experience pre-ordering stuff. Is there something I need to do for the preload to take effect?

Am I the only one that sees the solution to this being "buy the retail PC version?" Or, don't buy the game at all until the patch removes the Uniloc DRM?

He's probably referring to the ninja's glass filled egg (which had 0 kills and was decidedly under considered IMO)

Go Chicago

Errr, I could've sworn they gave points to the Spartan Shield.

I wouldn't worry about it until the game is actually released.

LOL no worries. I was just clarifying my point

I find this to be a double edged sword. A game like Arcanum forced you to specialize to an extent that I didn't like it. I think Jack of All Trades should be just as viable as full on specialization. This would mean that at the end game, there are still doors that do not require 100% lockpicking to be picked sort of stuff, and so on. To simplify the example: Make it so that you aren't penalized for not going full guns or full lockpicking, with half guns half lockpicking still being suitable. You can't do everything that a full one way can do, but you can do the other skill at a proficient enough level that it lends you certain advantages over a fully specialized character. I'm a bit worried that AP will also require too much specialization as well. The point is, in Fallout 3 EVERY character ended up a jack of all trades by the time you reached level 20. That's what I meant when I said that the system will push you into specializing : if you can either be GOOD at something or 'ok' at everything it's ok, if you end being GOOD at everything by the end, no matter how much you try to gimp your character.. that's the epitome of bad design for a character development system in an RPG imho. This is why I cited Arcanum, not Fallout 3. It has to be well designed to allow your character to enjoy success regardless of their build. The fact that I went jack of all trades in Arcanum eventually blocked the game for me as I couldn't proceed past some of the encounters. On a personal level, I do not think that it should be possible to ever "gimp" your character. I do agree with your notion that characters should not be experts at everything though. Never meant to give that impression.

Simply being a potential customer, does not make you the target market. Do you think that people pulling in minimum wage are the target market for Rolex watches or BMWs? Ferrari doesn't look at Thorton_AP and go "how can we bring this car to him, because he's +1 customer." They say "We want to make expensive, exotic cars that only rich people can afford. They are our target market. People that cannot afford our automobiles are not. Companies are rarely "fair." I don't know where people get this impression. Some companies don't offer their services to various regions. That's not "fair." Some companies require you to have a credit card (as that's the only method of payment). That's not "fair." Some companies require you to have a guarantor in order to do business. That's not "fair" either. Reality and life are not fair. So I feel no sympathy to those (not saying you) that claim "not fair" because they aren't able to play a video game due to a DRM policy that does not work for them.

Exactly! Ubisoft DID do their research, and their research concluded that it was WORTH the "unfair" perception that SOME people would have. They didn't just randomly make this decision, which is what I've been saying. Sure they may revise based upon feedback/backlash, but Ubisoft did not cluelessly decide to require internet connection without acknowledging that this will be a deal breaker for some people.

I was thinking Agility for melee weapons, and Perception for light ranged ones. By your logic, if you're totally clumsy with a blade you will damage it more than your enemy, and if you're greatly myopic you won't be able to aim with a gun. I think that stuff like that is suitably factored in with the weapon skill. And they do tend to factor into your starting abilities with those weapons. At the same time though, it'd be cool to see high agility open up different types of attacks with weapons (I believe Fallout 2 did do this with H2H combat) and stuff like that. I can still appreciate your perspective about the abilities.

I find this to be a double edged sword. A game like Arcanum forced you to specialize to an extent that I didn't like it. I think Jack of All Trades should be just as viable as full on specialization. This would mean that at the end game, there are still doors that do not require 100% lockpicking to be picked sort of stuff, and so on. To simplify the example: Make it so that you aren't penalized for not going full guns or full lockpicking, with half guns half lockpicking still being suitable. You can't do everything that a full one way can do, but you can do the other skill at a proficient enough level that it lends you certain advantages over a fully specialized character. I'm a bit worried that AP will also require too much specialization as well.

Are agility and perception really requirements for a gun though? I figure they'd just be factors in accenting your skill. I can understand strength. If you have the steadiest hand in the world (maybe this is agility?), but the gun is physically exhausting just to hold, you're going to struggle with the gun. Some of the energy weapons could be melee weapons to start.

He rescinded that.

Actually, given how easy it is to raise stats is probably why they didn't have considerably more impact on the gameplay. No, I think Slowtrain had it right. The reason that the effect of skill levels tends to get stripped out of ARPGs is that players generally dislike playing shootery combat that features their onscreen avatar missing what the player aims at. Short of taking the ME2 route and removing combat skills entirely, there are a couple of ways to mitigate this effect. Two of the more dubious ways of doing so are to make the difference in skill level minuscule, and to throw enough skillpoints at the player that he never gets to experience much of the low-skill state of affairs. Bethesda took the worst of both worlds and implemented both of these lousy approaches-- having already swamped the character in skillpoints, the drawback of making them matter a lot in the feel of the shooting goes away to a great degree. (Other, better ways to address this are to make the skill affect things other than accuracy or damage-- rate of fire, reload time, chance of a jam, rate of decay-- or to make leveling up a skill more about acquiring special moves than about marginal improvements in overall effectiveness.) I think there was a misunderstanding. Looking at Slowtrain's commentary: (paraphrased) "Because Skill points are so plentiful, they should be more significant." My impression: Skill points can be so plentiful because they are not particularly significant. It is easier to hand them out in large quantities, because it does not significantly change the game.

Actually, given how easy it is to raise stats is probably why they didn't have considerably more impact on the gameplay.

To be clear, when I (and presumably others) say that AP "looks better" than FO3, I'm not meaning graphically. It looks like a better game IMO.

Sawyer was the one that wanted to merge throwing and melee too right?

Have you been to school recently? Place it in a sociohistorical context for the region, and the exact same lessons will achieve very different results. Then you get into the ideas of what it means to be "properly educated." I doubt you'll find much consensus for what that term means. I was a pretty smart student, and like to think that I did a pretty good job of understanding circumstances of things such as Dresden. But looking around the room, there are a lot of not-so-smart students in the room that totally miss the point. And even then, when I was young and things like affirmative action concepts were taught to me, all I saw was the perspective of "rewarding someone based upon physical traits, not merit" in spite of my teacher trying to illustrate the concepts of systemic and institutional discrimination as barriers of entry to various aspects of society. The fact that I grew up in a conservative, almost "redneck" environment helped cement those thoughts, and definitely the thoughts of my peers. Many of them still feel that way today unfortunately, and when perceived that way it just fuels racists vitriol IMO.

Where do you draw the line? Dresden as a logical payback for the 9/11 every week for a year? How about the "Bombing of London as a good thing." Racial genocide as a good thing. Auchwitz as a good thing. After all, you want to teach our kids the alternate points of view, might as well share the pros and cons of setting up death camps, right? I know that I'm just using a slippery slope, but it really sounds like that is what you want. I think teaching our kids that something like Dresden (vindictive revenge that your own side regrets doing as a good thing has a greater chance of educating young, still very much developing children that this type of behaviour is okay. At least under certain circumstances. I disagree in many ways. There are aspects of history that can definitely be shown from alternate viewpoints without negative effect, but teaching 14 year olds a perspective that the philosophy of the White Man's Burden is a good thing is not the way to do it.

Agree with Gromnir. I think I was sort of thinking the same thing, but couldn't really put it into words. If you want to play "hardcore" to make the game more difficult, then it should be more difficult.

I actually don't really care for stuff like that to be honest. Then it's no longer about options, but players having to make an actual choice of significant merit. When it comes to stuff like this, I think options are good as opposed to choices.