Odarbi
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Planescape Torment also tended not to tell you that your quest needed to be done yesterday or the village would be destroyed. It did actually. The narrative clearly projected the "Time is of essense" theme in Carceri, in many of it's "bring order" quests. In one of them, You literally walked up to a situation where someone was on the block about to be executed. Yet nothing stopped you from walking away, taking care of some other quests, sleeping for 10 days in the potion shop, then coming back and successfully preventing that execution. You're also not told if the execution actually occured, if you decide to skip it and go face the Diva. Instead, the choice you got was a moral one, involving whether to let the execution happen, or prevent it. Which is then a flaw within Planescape: Torment's writing, because it's telling you one thing and not backing it up.
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I have been arguing that timed quests would add to the game this whole time, and given examples of how it could be done so. I've never once strayed from that point. I never once said they were necessary to make the game fun.
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1: We've made plenty of arguments of why this is a worthwhile addition to the game. Addition of time will make quests more dynamic, adding more options to the game than dialogue itself can, and adding a possibility of failure for things outside of combat and dialogue. That you dismiss them because you don't like them does not make them invalid. All of the counter arguments are simply "I find it inconvenient", which is hardly an argument against something and more a statement of preference. 2: We don't need to prove they were inferior at all, as we're talking about an addition to a game. Adding to something does not in any way mean the predecessors were flawed... although they did have their flaws. Lack of time affecting the game world being one of them.
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You mean delve into the moral choice-consequence such as "Do I stop my current quest to go save this elf princess, or leave her and risk her being sold off to slavers"? Yeah, I can see your point where time doesn't have a moral choice oh wait that's a moral choice right there. Try again. No, that's a time management choice. Maybe its your turn to stop splitting hairs. PS: No, I mean getting sidetracked and missing the deadline by 30 seconds. Timers are timers, and that is their nature. If a human is added to allow for "close enough", then you can no longer call it a timed event. Time management and moral choices can go hand in hand, they aren't mutually exclusive. Also, if you get sidetracked and missed the deadline, you made the choice to get side tracked that ended in your failure. You've still made no successful arguments against timed quests.
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I disagree, I find timed quests totally fun for the player.
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Dragging your feet/apathy failure? You mean like.... waiting around too long so you end up failing the quest because of time?
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The risk of failure if you waste too much time instead of dealing with it when you hear about it. As opposed to the risk of failure if you do the quest wrong, or aren't careful during a violent rescue attempt. Yeah, not a very notable difference in the grand scheme of things. I'll take the latter, as it can at least delve into moral choice-consequence, which I rank a little bit higher than simplistic time management issues. You mean delve into the moral choice-consequence such as "Do I stop my current quest to go save this elf princess, or leave her and risk her being sold off to slavers"? Yeah, I can see your point where time doesn't have a moral choice oh wait that's a moral choice right there. Try again.
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The risk of failure if you waste too much time instead of dealing with it when you hear about it.
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Why in the world would I waste my time explaining how a feature I dislike can work? The point is that you can't descibe a time based success/failure purely through the narrative style without using a concept such as time. Your argument that such things can be done purely without timers falls flat because of this.
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It's also not hard for writers to project a sense of danger, and yet swords still do damage. And they're only unimaginative if the result of the timer going over is "YOU LOSE THE QUEST". Surely having something different happen if you wait several months to rescue the maiden is more imaginative than having the same set of events always happen? Which brings us right back to what we just got done discussing: the redundancy of the timer. Having something different happen if you don't rescue the princess".... can be done without one. So basically the only benefit of a timer is the sense of "urgency" or the illusion that the world moves on without your input, even though that elf maiden actually didn't get kiddnapped in the first place unless you actually spoke to the king. Try and explain how a TIME BASED SUCCESS/FAILURE might work purely through a NARRATIVE style.
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You're grasping at strings. Also: Time, controversial? Hahaha. Everyone has a concept of time, it's not like it's some new horrid thing.
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And What problem is that? I cited the possibility of failure at every step of the questline, including the very first step, which involves caving to greed, instead of "oops! I overslept and missed my appointment!" The problem is that, firstly, "caving to greed" isn't failure unless you're in the habit of basing your dialog options on a coin flip, and secondly, It is literally quest failure, since your mission was to rescue the princess, not strike a deal with bandits and let them kill her. To your second point, you assume of course, that joining a thieves guild is mutually exclusive to rescuing the princess, when the writers could easily make it NOT mutually exclusive at all, you could join the guild then recieve your very first quest: "Favors to get the king in our pocket ", which sees you....rescuing the princess.... Edit: my spelling skills are worsening by the second. However, his point still stands because you're now trying to change the quest example to depend on being in that guild. The simple fact that you still seem unable to grasp is that the quest should not wait around for you to do whatever you want without consequence.
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And What problem is that? I cited the possibility of failure at every step of the questline, including the very first step, which involves caving to greed, instead of "oops! I overslept and missed my appointment!" The problem is that the whole point of this thread is ABOUT things in the world happening without the player input. That you risk failure of a quest for not dealing with it.
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Failure can easily be incorporated during the battle itself. One of the bandits, could, if you're not alert during combat, start taking shots at the elven maiden...killing her. Or, you could side with the Bandits, and then they can outsmart you in dialogue, then double cross you, and kill the elf maiden. Or you can kill the bandits, rescue the princess, but then refuse to escort her home when she asks, thus she dies from a goblin attack on the way home. Or, you could rescue the princess, decide to escort her home, but on the way, one of your companions decides to engage her in an argument, which you fail to defuse, which turns into a fight , and she gets killed. Still no timer needed. You're still not facing the possibility of "failure" because you took too long screwing around, and that's still not an argument for why timed quests shouldn't exist. Try again.
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Oh, I dunno, maybe an old enemy of the king who wants to see him suffer by assassinating his daughter? Regardless, you've still made no valid arguments against why timed quests should exist. That quests can be handled purely by a narrative method does not mean all have to be, or that all should be.
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Yeah but why should the game reward people who like that sort of gameplay and punish those who like to explore. You're not going to be punished by the game, because you will be the one making the choice to explore or do the quest. You are ultimately the one who makes the call, the game isn't going to force you.
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You're still "getting there just in the nick of time", regardless of how long you take to get there. Try again.
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A real time count down would definitely be dumb. I've always had the thought in mind of using days or weeks of game time for a completion.
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Oh, Is the assassination supposed to fail because the player said "Yes, I'll prevent it" and get there, only to find out they arrived too late anyway? Yawn. Maybe he just happens to die during the combat? Acceptable. Or is it just going to happen because you said no? If the weakest faction ends up being the one that had their leader assassinated, why would they bother hiring you to investigate the assassination when you just wouldn't help them at all in the first place? You're still missing the point, but I'm really not surprised anymore. As I said before, having time adds another facet to the game in regards to character decision and story telling. Your arguments of "Timers are dumb and I don't like them" are not a counter, nor are your arguments of "This can be done without using time". You've failed to prove with either why the addition of time to a story based roleplaying game is a bad idea, and are simply arguing because you don't want to be "inconvenienced", despite still having full control of your choices, while playing the game.
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Maybe you should read the entire thread, and the other one too. I've stated MANY times that "Complete or fail" is but ONE way timed quests can play out. Yeah,. and I cited it. point? In the meantime, we're no longer talking about urgency. instead, we've dishonestly changed the subject, preferring to put forth some fantastic, quest branching choice-consequence scenarios and then attempt to tie them to Urgency so as to make "timed quests" appear to be a no-brainer Must have. What you're describing can and does happen even in NON timed, NON-urgent quests. So you're not making a point. There's no "dishonestly changing the subject" involved since the urgency was in preventing the assassination. That something different happens as a follow up to your failure is not a lie, nor is it in anyway an attempt to tie them into urgency. Quit grasping at straws.
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Maybe you should read the entire thread, and the other one too. I've stated MANY times that "Complete or fail" is but ONE way timed quests can play out. There are plenty of other ways too. Failing to prevent an assassination on a faction leader might lead to a power struggle, with the weakest faction hiring the player to investigate the assassination. The information gathered could then be used to cause a massive loss of prestige on the instigating faction, blah blah blah. Stopping the assassination might simply preserve the status quo, and nothing else happens as a result. Failing a quest due to time does not mean "complete or fail". Failing a quest could lead to the beginning of new quest chains and story lines. Either way, a player does not need a 100% quest completion rate. Failure should be reflected just as much as success.
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Why does there have to be a 'consequence' of my preferred style of play but you get to have it how you like it? There should be a consequence to rushing through the game urgently too. If anything you see the ability to take your time and explore as something you dislike so you don't want it there. Yet you are putting me down and calling me casual for wanting to explore the game fully and do the content rather than rush straight to the end and finish it in 15 hours? No, you're confusing the issue. We don't want to be unable to take time and explore at all. We just want the urgency implied in dialogue and story to actually enforce it's urgency, and for the story to reflect if we've failed because we took too long.
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Why must you assume that your debate opponent is a nutter who's only desire is to sit around forever, doing nothing? Many of us are Role players, and will easily impose our own urgency to deal with an eminent threat. we don't need the game to forceably impose it. As it stands, in my first playthrough of MoTB, I *didn't* "wait forever". The moment I had that conversation with Gann (where he's wincing about the spirits tearing up the land), I made my way to the front gate. Because that's all it took. So...why do I prefer *that* type of urgency over the one you keep preaching for? Because in the type I described the decision felt like it was mine to make. it didn't, for example, feel like the devs were forcing me to be their storyline puppet. I assume that you're a nutter because I keep seeing you argue that "Time is bad because I don't have time to explore" or "I want to feel like it's my decision, I don't wanna be penalized for choosing wrong". You'll have all the time in the world to explore if that's what you really want. You're not being forced or corralled into the story by the timer. You're just going to miss out on a few things here and there because you chose to ignore their urgency. That is not a penalty, it's roleplaying. You should not be able to do everything in one play through of an RPG. Time is just adding another facet to the game when it comes to the idea of quests changing based off character decision. That's all there is to it. The world should change based off of your actions AND inactions, it shouldn't simply wait around for you to take action.
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Exactly. Urgency can be achieved through narrative. No timers needed. That ends up being entirely false urgency. Okku will wait for spirit eater? Okay, the spirit eater just never goes to the gate and nothing ever happens. The story never progresses. The impending threat never actually does anything. That's not good writing at all. If there was some form of contingency plan for when the spirit eater doesn't show up? Sure. The game should not wait around for you when it's implying urgency. It's immersion breaking and bad writing.
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Level scaling
Odarbi replied to buggeer's topic in Pillars of Eternity: General Discussion (NO SPOILERS)
Voted for the first option. I don't mind weaker enemies being scaled up a bit, in a "Oh, these kobolds were better prepared than those other kobolds" type way... but even only to a certain extent with the weaker enemies. They probably shouldn't still be relevant later in the game. Definitely no scaling down enemies to match my level. That crazy red dragon? Should not be able to kill him early on, and he should still be an powerful enemy later on. I'm not a huge fan of feeling like I'm crazy super awesome powerful and able to destroy anything with a single swing by the end of the game, but I should definitely feel like I've gained some power from those days of "Oh god, these wolves are eating my face for the 3rd time today."