Metabot

So update today then?

I"m not old! Well not that old.

I think we can all agree that buffs on a per-situation basis is more interesting than using the same ones over and over, right? Although I think the idea of common sense ones is fine like fire resistance if you're in an area known for having enemies that deal fire damage and the like.

All of this talk has made me realize even more how much I can't wait to play this game.

I agree preparation is something that should be expected to some degree.

I guess with the way combat in bg and iwd were structured it made it nearly impossible to buff party members during combat, not impossible though, maybe if buffing during combat were more viable people would be happy with that. Dark souls is a game where you'll probably retry most bosses multiple times. It is possible to beat every boss the first time but that requires perhaps nearly infinite skill, for argument's sake. The problem that josh is pointing out is that it didn't require skill to make it through encounters just luck.

Pre-buffing kind of assumes you know the nature of the encounter to come. That means you've probably reloaded. I guess that is bad design if you have to know the encounter beforehand in order to have any hope of overcoming it. It kind of negates tactics entirely.

It's still a game and still requires you to learn how to play regardless of if you just want to play for the story. If you want a passive role in storytelling watch a movie or something.

Well I don't think skyrim's character system is really robust enough. Fallout new vegas maybe but there's always more reactivity that can be added.

I think implementing the total freedom of pnp would be impossible, but trying to get as close as possible would be incredible.

Well wouldn't it be nice if it were true for computer games? And I know you're going to say well Josh is trying to address that, but what I mean is wouldn't it be nice if computer games strived more towards emulating the tabletop experience in terms of creativity.

Uh... dialog? Take Firkraag, for example. What if there was a level check on the quest, and if your level < design level, and you had accepted the quest, someone approached you as you were exiting the inn. Dialog: "Psst... I noticed you talking to that guy earlier. Want a piece of intel? Cost you 10 GP but might save your life." "[Give 10 GP] Done. What you got?" "The Baron is a bastard. He's done this before. No-one who took that job ever came back. If you do head that way, you better be prepared for the fight of your life." Oh yea I totally agree with this.

I can say that Final Fantasy tactics has some really bad design once you get to that battle with weigraf where you're by yourself. There is literally only one way to beat that. You have to have a very specific set of skills, start the battle with a speed of 10 I think, maybe 9 and run around for 60 turns using an ability that increases your speed and increases your attack. Otherwise you have to overlevel the encounter by a huge amount and I don't know if that is possible. That was just poor design in the encounter though rather than with the job system per se.

This is something I'm having a hard time with too. In order to make sure bad builds can't be made wouldn't you have to severely curtail freedom in character creation and thus eliminate the possibility for creative builds?

Dear god, I hope not. Leave the handholding to MMOs. Borderlands had a fantastic way of telling you the quests difficulty that worked in the context of the game.

Exactly, I'm not sure what other indication there could be other than MMO style color coding and then of course we'll exclamation points and question marks over npc's heads.

Hmmm not really. Science fiction started out as all b movies focused on weird aliens and the like. Stargate didn't start that. Stargate is much more detailed and vast than farscape. I mean don't get me wrong farscape is cool, but there's plenty of action, explosions and cheesy crap in it as stargate. I loved Universe personally, although they did really screw up by making almost every off ship episode not really advance the plot much at all.

Did you just imply Stargate is better than Farscape? I want to hear this justification. They're both campy as all hell. I just like stargate more. Although haven't finished farscape, almost though.

How should the difficulty of quests be indicated though? Borderlands style or what?

I'm not a mind reader, but If I had to guess at what J.E. Sawyer is referring to, I'd say: 1) Enemy cheese: Stuff like getting finger-of-deathed by a mages when you're only 11th level, or getting imprisoned (looking at you, BG2) 2) Sitting around watching your 1st and 2nd level characters miss, and miss, and miss (hello BG1) 3) Getting your rest interrupted 5 times in a row (Icewind Dale 1 & 2) 4) Inventory management mini-game extraordinaire (BG1, especially with TotSC) Personally, none of these things seem all that oppressive or frustrating for me, but then, I've played the IE games so many dozens of times each that I've instinctively learned to deal with all of the above and now I love them for the raw, old-school goodness they've come to represent. But for a new player, yes, I imagine these things would be seen as.... frustrating or whatever. Oh ok, that doesn't bother me that much I think. I don't mind having separate inventories for each character personally, but combining them on one screen isn't a bad idea.

In what ways, specifically, were the IE games frustrating or oppressive? I know you might cause some controversy if you answer this question

One thing that is pretty annoying in BG2 is level drain. Although, a better way to remedy that would've helped.

Apparently star citizen was announced at GDC with the kickstarter beginning a few days after. I could only dream of bethesda allowing obsidian to develop Fallout 4 while they worked on Elder Scrolls VI. Even better both of them working on both titles with obsidian handling more of the writing for elder scrolls in black marsh

It's a little late for that. I doubt obsidian is even working on this game anymore and probably hasn't for quite some time. Also, I don't see why it would sell any worse on the wii u, nintendo fans love some turn based games, see pokemon.

Right but what is the website for?