Nonek

I'm probably far too passionate about this, it's becoming my hobby horse. However i've no wish to spoil the game for anyone so i'll take a little time off from the thread, Tyranny is hardly the worst culprit.

I agree that there should have been some improvement in the fifteen years since BG, not to mention all of the features which were dumbed down and missing from the IE games themselves from the previous generation. Blanket removal of a system rather than making it work is not an improvement however, and should be highlighted as regressive. There's been decades of this streamlining, excused and championed, while the press harps on about innovation, time that there was an attempt to actually innovate and improve rather than accept more of the same degeneration. Edit: As far as making the game more difficult, well i'd like to see it but I don't hold out any hope, I expect i'll kill hundreds if not thousands without even taking a single scar or suffering any form of attrition. RPG or homicidal Superhero simulator as per usual.

I agree the IE games and most others have implemented this middling to poorly, however the response to utterly remove a feature that's difficult to implement is tiresome and wrongheaded, implement it better, improve it. We have had twenty plus years of games streamlining, stripping features and content, and this is just another step on that road, with the usual cheering on of this dumbing down. Eventually games will simply play themselves like the Dungeon Siege if we continue removing features. Asking for more and better should be an intuitive reaction of any consumer, whereas this dumbing down and simply not bothering should be reviled. Edit: Hopefully there will be magical resistance, as that can serve as an interesting feature. Though personally as a GM i'd rule evoking a Fireball, which explodes producing heat and combustion, to be a purely physical/elemental force and not subject to magical resistance. I'd use that against Magic Missiles, Walls of Force etcetera.

Ha, regression rules eh? Personally i'd prefer that physical forces like fire, lightning and such still hurt anyone caught in them (as physics seems to work exactly the same in every other respect) rather than companions being special, though i'll be keen to read the reasoning behind this dumbing down. Placement being a core element of tactics I don't think that AI will improve because of removing friendly fire, that's counter intuitive nonsense. Edit: It would be nice to see advanced AI in action, feints, fallbacks to fortified emplacements, leading into ambushes, using environmental hazards (where physics is still working of course,) etcetera. However if it's just the same old run towards melee, or use long range attacks then i'll be calling shennannigans on this particular claim of more efficient AI.

I want far more attrition and strategy in gaming, not less. I also want the enormous out of combat and gameworld/play altering spells that were implemented in AD&D to be brought to gaming, to restrict spellcraft to combat is ridiculous, backwards looking and regressive. The resting system felt half baked and poorly implemented, it did not solve the problem it set out to combat nor provide any new opportunities as any feature should. There is much talk of combat balance, but what of balance outside combat and why are there so few features other than melee now? As a GM if I presented my players with a scenario where they had nothing to do but fight and loot then I would feel ashamed of myself, time for balance across the board, in and out of combat.

I'd imagine that unleashing physical forces through sheer willpower would be hard enough, but also modifying whom they affect in the midst of combat would be spectacularly difficult, and certainly not something available at every level of proficiency. I'd prefer progression and the satisfaction of achievement rather than being catered to and having everything handed to me at the beginning, though I realise that's an unpopular view in this age of walking simulator non games and "storybook" modes.

Early 2017 apparently.

Expeditions: Vikings is quietly shaping up to be my most anticipated game, it's looking very nice and the feature set sounds ambitious and far more RPG heavy than most RPGs. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7ufvaqAobRE

That it is always present in the game for the spells that are described as affecting everything, such as Fireball, rather than being toggle-able or removed entirely. This seems obvious.

Hear, hear. Games are already sadly lacking in any kind of punishment or long term strategic thinking for the player, this removal of a tactical element is just another step in that direction.

I don't know the implementation difficulty, in my opinion friendly fire should be mandatory however instead of just removing it like Tyranny has done. I sometimes wonder who exactly is giving the feedback that mandates such things should be removed? Are they using inept or utterly inexperienced QA testers?

Yes modern game design, fairly sickening isn't it? Edit: Hiding ones helmet meant something very different in my day!

I quite liked that we didn't have the almost obligatory Joss Whedon squeeing lowest common denominator humour in Poe, that was one of its highlights. I far prefer either a Wilde like use of actual wit or vulgar commentary such as say Mercutio provides in Romeo & Juliet, or any number of characters who serve as comic relief in Chaucer's Canterbury Tales, the Witcher also provides a wealth of such bawdy foils as well as Morte in Planescape: Torment. Personally i'd add several complaints to the one Mr Sawyer raises: The first being that the attributes are unintuitiive and nonsensical, Tyranny solves this easily enough so why was it a problem in Poe? Second, the infinite stash, or let's encourage boring trash collection to pad gameplay and not even bother explaining it. Thirdly, the reliance on WOW class archetypes and 4e mechanics, I realise it's almost obligatory now to copy design off these dull grinding simulators but for once somebody please break the mold. If they wish to better pace lore then there is one title that they can look at which performed this feat masterfully, and with an extremely strange gameworld, concept and very little handholding, this is of course Planescape: Torment. There were numerous sources for organic exposition, companions who could add to that, and it never felt like one was being inundated with information for no reason. Look at Creeden selling his "ratsies" in the Hive, providing exposition and a friendly face because it helped him sell more of his product. The Frightened Hive Dweller, cowering before a scarred wreck and answering out of fright but still looking to earn a bit of jink and unwilling to answer some "dim" questions etcetera. Nice to see Mr Sawyer's analysis however. Edit: Oh forgot to add a personal gripe, motivation, I had very little and for it to end in a boss fight as usual, utterly disappointing and (considering the antagonists background) extremely unlikely. That said I must praise several aspects, the IE feel, the expansions, the art design, the soundtrack, an interesting gameworld (that needed exploring in this first game rather than changing,) and last but not least producing a large, successful Kickstarter and showing that the right people can make this crowdfunding work very well.

So the last character is called Eb then, a nod to Dungeon Siege perhaps?

My brother in law used to work as a doorman in various nightclubs back in the nineties, he took great pleasure in spraying any flat surface he could find in the clubs toilets with WD40, and watching the furious customers who'd intended to snort a little Charlie storm out when their powder turned into a brown gooey mess. Apparently its all snorted off of phones nowadays however, which no doubt would irritate the sadistic old beggar no end if he were still working security.

So Kills in Shadows (Cowardly Lion) is the Beast companion then?

Nice Torment reference. The thing is that the world, the galaxy and the universe are very big places, how many lives and experiences can one live through just on Earth alone? Not to mention when mankind expands beyond our Solar System and spreads to the stars. If I were the classical interpretation of an immortal then this would be what I would do, roam this world and others, experiencing all that the infinite varieties of life offer, meeting great minds and personalities, and learn all that I could to pass on, store and maintain as much knowledge that would be lost otherwise. No doubt one of the most important questions would be why exactly I was granted immortality, and what/who granted it. Of course maintaining my avatar I really should state that there is a time to die, and possibly play that Queen song from Highlander.

I've always thought immortality would come with a massive amount of responsibility if one were unique in possessing it, all that we lose, all that we forget, and all the unfinished works of humanity: It would require me as a constant to try and combat the remorseless toll of mortality. A sort of Astinus of Palanthas character though probably more proactive.

One thing I always wonder about these games set in faux medieval/ancient times is what exactly the common man thinks of the events transpiring: Given that the majority of people will be lower classed, probably indentured agrarian workers, what will they think of the evil overlord Kyros and his rise to power? What were their former masters like, and how were they treated under them? What are the tax structures, and how harshly were they applied? What of law and order, was it applied universally or at the whim of their former masters, could Kyros' rule be a significant improvement for them in this respect bringing stability, justice for all, new markets and peace? How would life change under Kyros' rule for the average working man, is he and his just another set of masters to pull the forelock at and carry on regardless? Will the Fatebinder deal with such low concerns or are his responsibilities more focused on the middle to higher classes which he is raised from? Will their be any representative or representation of the average working man, rathe than soldiery, rulers and outsiders such as the Scarlet Chorus? How did the previous rulers rule their lands, were they as ruthless or more so than Kyros? Is there any institution in the world which could be clarified as good when compared to Kyros' empire, that is propogating some manner of morale society, or is Kyros simply a more successful version of the rulers who proliferate at this time, a man made for his age and its morality? I'd really like to see a game explore these issues, rather than having a middle to higher class character serving the usual functions of RPGs. Then again I suppose at least in Arcanum one could explore what it was like to sit on the bottom rung of the societal ladder if one wished, by playing as a Half Orc or Ogre.

Didn't really care for the Longest Journey, not particularly original, well written or interesting in terms of gameplay if you ask me. I played Torment immediately before so that may have coloured my perspective, but I was really not impressed.

Yes but how does one get rid of that console smell that will inevitably taint our playthroughs? On a more serious note, i'm obviously not bothered about the console port. If I were a console player I might be due to the late announcement and the usual issues with ports going either way, however i'm not so I don't care. What might (emphasise the might) be a problem is what feedback is accrued from the console port, and whether that will be used to affect the next iteration of PC games. Take other series that have ported to console and significantly deteriorated in some aspects in the next iteration, for instance the Witcher 2 which was so very obviously designed with gamepad and console in mind, even though it ported later, and abandoned a lot of basic functionality and elegant design that elevated the first game. It did not make Assassins of Kings a bad game, however it spoiled my enjoyment somewhat, and made playthrough sometimes a chore rather than a pleasure. I personally think this is a legitimate worry for any consumer, as we have probably all been burned by poor ports and ill implemented design at some time, and Kickstarter was supposed to empower the making of games for those of us who are a little sick of that particular publisher foible. Indeed some Kickstarter pitches promised a focus only on producing what the backers had asked for, though of course as we all know the best plan only remains relevant until it meets reality.

Well some of the inspiration is quite promising I must say, Elric Kinslayer, Myth (and therefore the early Black Company novels) and Soylent Green especially. I'm not sure they can quite get away with the level of sadism that the Melniboneans were depicted as possessing, after all they had thousands of years and the assistance of Arioch in their depravities, but it's nice to see them reaching for and referencing that decadent, lazily malicious sickness. The Fallen Lords being akin to the Archons really hadn't struck me 'til now, this definitely places the game on a more interesting plateau for me.

The irony of Mr Sterling squealling that anything is an amorphous blob is quite delicious. @LittleRose: Have you played Outcast by any chance, sounds like what you're looking for, though different in detail from the scenario you posit.

Feeding a goon headfirst into a Piranha tank at the local zoo, the Punisher is a teeny bit violent.

I suggest you have no music on the day you die and wait for the funeral.