Infinitron

Mirror Image in AD&D wasn't a hard counter. It's a pretty iconic example of a soft counter, actually.

"Best parts" being the key phrase

I've seen a preview of Sensuki and Matt's attribute design. I'm not sure it's the type of thing that'll make anybody here very happy. They're very faithful to the principles of Sawyerism.

Lots of grognardism ITT (especially from Arsene Lupin who really needs to read up on what the health/stamina system is trying to accomplish) The combat is basically fine. It's just more difficult across the board then the type of stuff you encounter at the beginning of the IE games. Which makes sense considering the beta isn't an area from the beginning of the game.

Shadenaut: One thing that needs to be considered is that Pillars of Eternity seeks to address two famous imbalances of D&D. The first of them - high level wizards being overpowered - has been discussed extensively, here and elsewhere, during the game's development. The second of them - low level fighters being overpowered - hasn't been discussed so much, and that's what we're encountering now. Even if fighters are made more flexible somehow, they'll probably never be the beasts they were at low levels in the IE games.

Josh has more to say over at Something Awful: http://forums.somethingawful.com/showthread.php?threadid=3593502&pagenumber=253#post434739652

I would argue that pausing is in fact a convenience tool. But even without RTwP, the player's own personal sense of efficiency is still an important factor in this game's difficulty. Some players will have no problem running back to town to rest after each fight for maximum combat performance, while others (most) won't find that to be an efficient use of their time, and will avoid it. This isn't really something that can be avoided without turning the game into some sort of high stakes time-limited iron man survival game. But that's not what the Infinity Engine RPG experience is.

There is a difference between "restricting yourself" and doing what it takes to win at a reasonable, acceptable level of efficiency, and no further. Few computer games demand 100% efficiency from players, turn-based or real-time. By your logic, not programming and running an exhaustive brute force prediction algorithm after every turn in a turn-based game to determine the optimal move is "restricting yourself in an arbitrary way" and "playing a self-made game".

I don't think that has anything to do with it. Again, fighters in AD&D got more health than most other classes as well, and barring ranged weapon cheese in BG1, that was because they needed it.

Yeah, but this is a symptom, not the cause. Giving fighters more health relative to other classes is simply an acknowledgement that they will always be taking more damage than other classes, due to their "lack of flexibility" (usually on the front line, not as good at ranged, etc) Remember, D&D did do the same thing (even if not for paladins), and it wasn't a problem for you there. If even the "flexible" AD&D fighter got more health than other classes, then the PoE fighter definitely needs that too!

When I first heard about this, I was a little apprehensive. Now thinking about it a little more, the idea is growing on me. Still not quite sure - but I've an open mind and I'm looking forward to seeing if it works. It does sound a bit risky. Classes with an inherent health advantage seem like they could easily become "must have" for most players, since the game is strongly pushing you to survive as long as possible and minimize resting, with its resting mechanic and lack of healing. I thought that the trade-off of having to choose between a party with a long adventuring day (lots of high health "front-line class" characters) and a party with a short adventuring day (few or no high health "front-line class" characters) wasn't something this game wanted to have. That's why priests aren't health healers, right? On the other hand, if we accept that those front-line classes really are rigidly "front-line" in their usage in a way that the other classes aren't, then maybe it all balances out. (Of course, the people who wanted more flexibility for Fighters won't like that...)

Hey now, that wasn't my intention. It's a beta - I would expect it to have things that aren't enabled yet to due to them being buggy and not working yet, and I wouldn't consider that to be a sign of incompetence. Nevertheless, when something that players would expect as a standard feature isn't enabled/working yet and the project lead says it leads to a "huge number of bugs", that isn't exactly a good thing, right? It certainly doesn't sound good. It doesn't mean you're incompetent and that you'll fail to implement it if you try, but it does smell like trouble. Anyway, glad to hear you're working on it.

Ai, so the fact that stealth applies to the whole party at once is because you couldn't get per-character stealth to work properly? No, it isn't. Selective invisibility of characters as a general rule leads to more bugs with selection, perception, and GUI feedback. Yeah, okay, but this is a pretty basic thing. It's how the IE games worked. In most cases where the behavior of Pillars is divergent from the Infinity Engine games, you've explained what, how and why well in advance. But this whole stealth-on-the-whole-party thing has kind of gone under the radar, so I'm asking.

Ai, so the fact that stealth applies to the whole party at once is because you couldn't get per-character stealth to work properly? That's not good.

I know there's loot down there in that corner, in a wall of some ruins iirc. Can't remember what the loot was though. A pointless encounter in the corner of the map was enough for me to never go back down there again. The IE games were filled with pointless encounters, especially BG1. And those wolves are around my favorite spot to rest on the map, so I always dispatch them. I guess that wolves in Dyrford Crossing are where they are because area is from time of the vertical slice, meaning that is from the time when you needed to use dedicate resting places to rest and I think that tower ruin where wolves are is that dedicate resting place for Dyrford Crossing and wolves were meant be just small easy encounter to take over that resting place. And as now you can rest in anywhere that encounter has lost its original meaning and works only to bring some flavor for the map. IMO there should be limited camping supplies AND resting only at dedicated rest spots.

My experience as a staff member on RPG Codex tells me that: 1) Hardcore RPG players hate when game designers talk about balance, and speak effusively about how imbalance makes a game fun. 2) When hardcore RPG players actually play RPGs and write reviews of them, they always complain about the lack of balance. Draw your own conclusions.

Well, I guess we disagree on the purpose of those descriptions, then.

O_o I don't see what's so unclear about Arsene's post, wanderon. In Baldur's Gate, any character in your party could initiate dialogue and have conversations, but the dialogue was written with the assumption that the main character, the Bhaalspawn, was doing all the talking. Somewhere on the Internet there's a post by David Gaider who is shocked to learn that Imoen, Minsc and the rest could initiate conversations. Apparently he had no idea.

No comment.

Yeah, I know, but I'm asking whether they actually do "weak damage". As opposed to "strong but not as strong as they could be" damage.

Do spells actually do "weak damage" with low Might?

Let's discuss this...outside the Backer Beta discussion forum. :deadhorse.jpg:

Matt516, next time you want to have a useful conversation, don't put the "D word" in the thread title.

That's because it's pretty obviously intentional. They want you test all those levels. is it? Do you have a quote? https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/obsidian/project-eternity/posts/957143

The interview with Feargus took place in late July.