Delterius

'Vitality' is represented by your 'Constitution' stat, which merely affects hitpoints. Losing one hitpoint out of 75 means you were barely hit, not that you can take 75 more stabs through the chest. An axe to the face would mean 50 out of 75 or 1 out of 3, etcetera. Simply put, this interpretation means that 'Armor Class' (and such) isn't the only statistic that represents your martial prowess, hence why martial classes gain more hitpoints even though they may have as much 'Constitution' points, and may go through the same physical exercises as a non-martial class.

If I remember right, Arcanum's dialogue system had a 'reaction modifier' - a predisposition that NPCs had towards helping your character based on their appearance. Fine clothes improved that modifier. And that's fine with me, personally literally playing dressup is kind of pointless in this kind of game. Just look at PC sprites from Arcanum and Baldur's Gate - character customization (appearance) was reserved for custom portraits.

Oh gosh, yes. I thought this went without saying, but it doesn't hurt to say. A lot of things should go without saying, but then the last half decade happened.

But they did age (its not Super Noah's Ark 3D), but ToEE looks better. And that's what Eternity seems to be aiming for

I was physically unable to scroll up in those games. Combat log is of vital importance, but I'd see it segregated from dialogue. 2 tabs, one for dialogue and another for rolls and all would be great.

I suppose the OP believe that if its evident wether someone likes you more or less, that should be communicated in other ways than influence points. He's asking to hide a statistic, not to cut it. I can agree with that.

It may not be a threat mechanic, but my issues with it still stand. For one, a taunt was never, ever needed in any IE game. You're supposed to prevent that ogre from attacking your mage. Squishy characters shouldn't be in the thick of battle for one, and they should have resources to be less squishy (even if temporary). These were both true for the IE games. If anything, I 'tanked' with my single classed mages a couple of times in BG2. Furthermore, the taunt mechanic still doesn't make sense. So people insult you during a battle and flail their arms around? I suppose that happens rather often and it may be distracting, but to change targets altogether? Maybe if you're fighting a bear, but still not guaranteed.

That's freudian in so many levels.

@Hoverdog I always thought the IE games were designed with limited resting in mind. As if their ambushes were problematic. That's how I played the games at least, and it improved the whole experience. I'm thinking along those lines too. Limited spell casting with powerful magic, a 'memorization' system that merely enables reliability as opposed to completely gutting versatility. But I propose that a chance of mayhem for casting un-prepared spells should be contained to combat (stress on concentration and limited time).

So I kinda was the pot calling kettle black. Heh.

To hell with the triple A hype-inflated sales (Jay Wilson would have phrased it better), but if the quality of the projects is good then they'll leave their mark. If that debunks the 'larger audience' compulsion, great, but that's a bonus. If the kickstarter projects can satisfy their backers, then its good enough for me. There's no dilemma here. And I read that the cost of triple a games is actually much higher than a few tens of millions. Don't quote me on that, though.

Skill usage is what won my vote on the SoZ system, but aside from that it seems like a more aesthetic choice than anything. One thing I'd like to discuss is how open exploration itself is, like the differences between Baldur's Gate and Shadows of Amn. I personally lean towards the first game.

The bolded part is the sort of utility that I'm interested in. But 'taunt' as in 'threat mechanic'? No thanks, I'd rather the fighters soak up damage as the player make use of party positioning (casters way in the back); exploit the terrain (bottlenecks) and make use of aforementioned crowd control abilities to keep enemies from charging into the mage. Quick movement also worries me. It can be too quick and break the dynamics of party positioning. I did mean taunt as a "forcing an enemy to attack someone else for a pre-determined amount of time" type mechanic, but I don't think the ability wouldn't take away from strategic combat a whole lot if the ability has limited uses per combat/day, and/or a long cooldown between uses. No thank you, threat mechanics never made sense and always simplified party dynamics. And if its not even present in most encounters would mean that encounters wouldn't be designed around it.

Ah, no, the comment on 4e was a seperate one for completeness' sake. In D&D4e physical skills and magical spells are functionally identical powers on about a half-way point between the two former(ly) distinct categories. Lore-breaking cheap balancing at its "finest". I googled some things and yeah, that's World of Warcraft kind of crazy.

I'm of the opinion that the combat system loses its point if a AI can do the job for me. And if it can't, then I don't use it. The only thing I ever left for the AI in BG or IWD was auto-attack with a ranged weapon and even that kinda sucked when the Ranged AI insisted in repositioning itself without need. Well, I agree to disagree. My turn-based cravings will be hopefully be satisfied with the upcoming Wasteland 2, Divinity: Original Sin and Chaos Chronicles; I'd rather Etenity's RTwP is done right. Possible better than anything that came before. And I also fear you're being idealistic yourself, but I do understand that the idea of mixed combat systems is a interesting concept. Not one I'd have the guts to design, though.

From the way I see it, Obsidian thankfully ditched consoles from a design (keyboard has more buttens), not artistic, standpoint. Graphic whoring is something else entirely, and its ultimately another problem that the console generations brought to RPGs: a creative stiffening cinematic focus which Obsidian also seems to disagree with, given their opposition of full voice acting (not that they had any choice in the matter, haven't seen a 'wall of text kickstarter' with full VO yet).

I don't get it. So the vancian interpretation I cited was actually for 4e and its somehow ridiculous but sensical? And I confess, I don't know much about D&D, but how does that apply to non-magic users? Problem is, if anything Wizards in IE games are best for their utility in combat than their dps power. Especially IWD 2, I think (since it doesn't use 2e). I was thinking. Magic should be very limited, because otherwise you may find yourself casting 10 lightning bolts a battle and (due to gameplay reasons) it will take you 5 of those lightning bolts to kill a human being. Therefore, to keep magic from being nerfed for the greater good of Balance, overall spellcasting should be limited no matter if the system is Vancian or otherwise. But to keep the tactical and strategic depht of Vancian, I believe that memorization should still play a part in combat, by making spells actually practical. If a un-memorized 'magic missile' has a unreasonble cast time, then you should memorize it if you think it will be useful in the coming adventure.

The bolded part is the sort of utility that I'm interested in. But 'taunt' as in 'threat mechanic'? No thanks, I'd rather the fighters soak up damage as the player make use of party positioning (casters way in the back); exploit the terrain (bottlenecks) and make use of aforementioned crowd control abilities to keep enemies from charging into the mage. Quick movement also worries me. It can be too quick and break the dynamics of party positioning.

This comes up a lot. I agree with what you said before this (and even with that statement when it comes to Arcanum itself), and I can make do without TB despite my preferences; but is Arcanum really the pinnacle of what could be done with this context? Not but that's not the point. The point is that Arcanum, and Troika itself, are a Greek Tragedy about trying to make a RPG larger than you can - developer idealism if you will.

That idea crippled at least one good game that I know of, Arcanum, and its cited as a inspiration. So far, I've yet to see a RTwP implementation that tests either decision making or coordination in a way that is comparable to either of the specialized systems (turn based and action based, respectively) - but its important to note that RTwP requires both but without a focus on the player's dexterity (like a pure RTS). If your complaint is that too much happens at the same time its because you're comparing it to a TB game, where much of party coordination happens in a abstract way that requires only decision-based thinking of the player: you should rather complain that its often hard to discern what exactly is happening in RTwP games, especially NwN2 (IMO). However, one very, very, very important thing that a lot of people should have noticed by now is that the kind of combat is only a part of the formula, and its not a chief part of it. Its more important to have good, say, encounter design than your preferred kind of combat (provided you can stand whatever isn't your ideal choice). ToEE had amazing rules and implementation, but terrible encounter design and, as such, shouldn't be cited as a good example of all things turn based ever.

So, basically WoW? That assumption would require major ignorance between the game mechanics of a action game and a strategy/action hybrid like the IE games. I'm surprised it took this long to note the existance of something other than 2nd ed.

Wasn't it in 3rd edition that they stopped using the word memorization in favour of preparation? In the sense that most of the spells are cast as the Wizard studies his spellbook and what you actually see him doing is merely triggering the magic?

Best Stretch Goals: mechanical features they were planning for already, since the best thing they can do is more of a quality game (which would be hard to translate into set goals).

That book might be the pinnacle of High Art

How else are you going to get the golem armor in the third game? That's not just underwear. That's Legendary.