Elerond

We have a bunch of people saying "yeah, AoE increase doesn't really seem that valuable", mostly because the marginal increase can be a liability. Allowing you to scale it down solves the liability problem, but also means that in those circumstances, you get literally no benefit from it at all. I still really don't get why this is such a spot of resistance when making the margins safe doesn't remove friendly fire, it makes INT valuable all the time instead of sometimes being a liability, and it doesn't require adding a UI layer on top of the system just to regulate AoE sizes. This is also my take, even as scalable AoE sound cool idea, they actually only work to make area increase less meaningful buff. Which is why I supported friendly fire free zones when this topic previously come up in these forums.

It could seen that you character has better understanding how to position themselves better so that it is harder to enemy to hit them and they have better ability to choose right counter move against enemy etc.. I would say that deflection in intellect as fine as it would work in dexterity and even better than in prospection in my opinion.

That's not a 4e things, my 3.0E DnD Master Manual also suggest 4 encounters per adventuring days (aka each normal difficulty encounter should take about 25% of the party resources). yes. But 3.5 didn't have encounter powers or short resting between encounters. You could make single encounters that used up most party resources. My point is that DnD recommendation of 4 encounters make an adventure day has nothing to do with 4e existing. In fact, they probably balanced the mechanics in the 4e based on that many years old recommendation. Blog post that ponders quite deeply D&D's four encounters per day philosophy. http://harbinger-of-doom.blogspot.fi/2012/01/encounters-per-day-design.html

Game's need for CPU and GPU time don't seem to be very high, but it seems to hog RAM quite briskly.

But wouldn't that result in Resolve not being useful to certain characters/classes/builds for the same reason it isn't right now? They all hinge on the character being frequently hit. Only characters that get hit a lot need more healing, only characters that get hit a lot need more Stamina, and, as before, only characters that get hit a lot need better defense against interrupts. You have two or three weak reasons for the stat instead of one, but they're still weak. I see that is possibility, although AI that also targets back line characters especially when they are armed with ranged attack and AoE will probably rise need to put points in Resolve even for back line characters especially it they don't wield armor. So I would like to see how new AI works and couple additional encounters that have several ranged enemies in them before drawing any defined conclusions.

As Expanded Universe content that is published before Disney's acquisition of Star Wars license, are now rebranded under Star Wars Legends, and all new Expanded Universe content will follow much stricter guidance to prevent different works to be in contradictory with each other as they now have done sometimes, I would say it is highly unlikely that there will ever be KOTOR 3 that will continue story from current KOTOR and KOTOR 2, instead I would say it is more likely that we will see relaunch of Old Republic games that probably will re-tell Revan's and Exile's stories in player controlled way or indirect way via lore tidbits. Also Disney's more direct handed approach to keep lore and content in Star Wars universe consistent probably also means that products that they approve are such that they don't need to seek funding via crowdsourcing, especially in gaming side where EA has control over licensing.

Right now, Health:Stamina is 1:1. For every Health, you have one point of Stamina. The loss ratio is 1:4, so that every every 4 points of Stamina damage, you lose 1 health. That's ideally how the system should function. You get knocked out more easily than you are killed. The change sounds like a semantic difference. Both are Health and Stamina/Endurance are lost at the same rate, but your Health will be multiplied by a class Hit-Die; logically making your health value greater than your stamina. That must be how its going to work. If they move the ratio to 1:1 without increasing health & stamina/endurance values four-fold or greater, characters will both get knocked-out less and die more quickly. That can't be right. I imagine that this change will be semantic only then. That's my point. It largely is a semantic difference. One of their goals is to make the system more clear, though personally it has been pretty to me from the beginning. That's what the change from 1:4 to 1:1 with a multiplier addresses. The second part is to give classes more staying power. They could have just as easily stayed with the existing system and changed the ratio for fighters and paladins to 1:6, priests and druids 1:5, etc. I would say that is what they plan to do. So if character has now 100 health and stamina points, they will have in new system 100 endurance points, but number of their health points rises to at least 400 but probably higher especially if they belong one of the front line classes. Also damage changes from current system where 100 stamina damage does 25 health damage, to system where 100 endurance damage does 100 health damage.

I would say that crowdfunding pool is more heavily focused on early adopter and limited supply markets, than your general markets, which usually means that number of possible customers(backers) is smaller, probably in significant degree (from which D:OS works as example, it had about 25k backers and about similar amount people that bought it from steam's early access, and after it come to general market number of copies that is sold has grown to ~500k copies), but other hand early adopters and people that markets offer only limited supply are usually willing to much more money in the product and they usually are willing to suffer more problems and delays with products that they have invested in.

4chan.org's current site visitor demographics don't necessary correspond what is their long time visitor demographics. Given that we even trust in first place alexa's robots. And I am also interest to know what is their "internet average" in actual numbers instead of vague term that could be anything. http://www.alexa.com/siteinfo/4chan.org This I did for just for fun of it http://www.alexa.com/siteinfo/forums.obsidian.net http://www.alexa.com/siteinfo/forum.bioware.com

This is hilarious as he just posted on his blog this: Quote is from same blog post

"Listen to your community, but be aggressive in your triage and remember that game development requires enlightened despotism, not democracy. Communities are diverse and as such you’ll get conflicting opinions. You need a strong core vision to guide you through their feedback, and you need to stick to that vision, no matter how vocal they become. But you do need to listen and recognize the underlying causes of problems being reported. Often communities will complain about the symptoms of something that’s wrong and it’s not always easy to discover what the root cause is. Also remember that the vocal minority does not represent the majority, no matter how hard their claims. The majority doesn’t have time to write thousands of posts. And if you encounter some uncivilized people on a forum, ignore them. They’re not worth the emotional stress they may cause. You wouldn’t deal with them in real life either." - Wise words from Swen Vincke @ Larian Studios, which I feel are quite appropriate for this and some other topics here.

Relocating "My documents" directory to some other drive than C is also good way to save space in C drive, because many games and programs but their files user specific files there (save files, dlcs in some cases, e-books, audiobooks, etc.).

I am sorry but the underlined part is not entirely true. Whether there is pause or not also depends on type of turn-based system. Take Magic the Gathering: Duels of the Planeswalkers for example. There are turns there but also there is pause for enemy to use instant spells. Turn-based is a very loose and arguable term. It doesn't have fixed definition really. It can only be described in general sense. Might and Magic: Heroes VI for example also has turn based combat but based on units and not players. Xcom has turn based combat based on player and AI going one after another. Wasteland 2 has turn based system based on initiative and sequence. There are turns but units with higher initiative act not only sooner but also more often. I am seeing you guys arguing over semantics. What I am getting on with this is that there isn't any point in doing so due to loose nature of the term. There is nothing loose nature in definition of turn-based games. As it only means that there is turns to tell who's turn it to do something at the moment. Fact that fps, third person shooters, adventure games, reflex/reaction games, rts, lot of other games use different implementation of real time system don't mean that definition of real time system is obscure. There is also hybrid systems that combine multiple ways to control game flow. Magic the Gathering: Duels of the Planeswalkers don't actually use real time mechanic, but instead of one player can interrupt another player's turn to cast instant spells by taking interrupt turn, which is limited by clock (like all turn in the game), because it has heavy multiplayer focus and developers use timed turns to prevent another player to use tire tactics to make another player to quit the game. Here are some more specific definitions for the terms at question: Real time: In real-time games, game time progresses continuously according to the game clock. Players perform actions simultaneously as opposed to in sequential units or turns. Turn based: In turn-based games, game flow is partitioned into well-defined and visible parts, called turns. A player of a turn-based game is allowed a period of analysis (sometimes bounded [meaning for example timed turns like in MtG: DotP], sometimes unbounded) before committing to a game action, ensuring a separation between the game flow and the thinking process. Real time with pause / Pausable real-time: In real-time games with an active pause system players are able to pause the game and issue orders such that once a game is un-paused, orders are automatically put into effect. There are more specific definitions for system depending on what sub system they use. This definitions help to differentiate two games that use same overall system, but such specifications aren't usually needed when we speak about real-time vs. turn-based.

Currently only game that is coming for new consoles but not PC and interest me is Quantum Break (which probably will get PC version in couple years after console version with upgrades, like Alan Wake), but even that is because it's made by Remedy and not by published material about or information from its developer interviews. Although I had similar feeling about Alan Wake and at end it was interesting and good game. So I don't think that I will buy any of new consoles at any time soon, if ever.

You can kill anybody in Dryford village and only ones that may care are those that you attacked. Although when you think it, only armed parties in village are bandits, aristocrat elf and his guards, cultist (which live under the village) and your party. So there isn't anybody that would have great motivation to challenge party of armed thugs that have just killed another party of armed thugs.

PoE uses universal game engine called Unity, as does Torment Tides of Numenera, but TToN also will use tools and modifications/addons that Obsidian has done to engine, like how they use 2D planes and dynamic lightning/dynamic water/path-finding/etc. solutions that they have gone up during development of PoE. But inXile creates their own rule system for the game as they adapt Numenera's rule system and they already have turn-based system for their Wasteland 2 (which also uses Unity), where they probably will borrow code for TToN's combat system.

On the other hand IE games didn't have mechanic that would allow all enemies to detect invisible characters if they are too close.

It is because of animancy lab in cave under the town of course

Beetles need also unburrow animation and there should be also some delay in both burrow and unburrow animations which gives you change to interrupt beetle and/or react in it some other way. Current instant teleportation feel too much AI cheating and it looks bit clumsy.

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.

What is that fun that balance in system destroys? Players ability get through challenges in game without getting challenged? Removing players ability to choose class that is better than other classes? Removing players ability to find which ability is better than other abilities in same level? Removing players ability to do perfect build that is better than any other build that they could do? Do you feel that classes in PoE play same regardless of which you choose?

That's actually not the attribute of a turn based system that I'm referring to, ironically enough. Turn based systems are by their nature, methodical and ponderous. Combat in PoE is methodical and ponderous. There's your linkage. Turn based systems are system where game flow is partitioned with well-defined and visible parts called turns, nothing more nothing less. Although turn-based systems can be more complex than real-time systems without causing severe issues in game flow as by nature they have more disjointed game flow. You're missing a detail here. Turn based RPGs pause the game while the player considers and enacts his turn for each party member they control. This is the methodical and ponderous part that I referred to. I've played plenty of turn based video games in my day, that pausing component is a fundamental part of the experience. I liken that experience to the longer pause times that I experience also in PoE. No in turn based game there is turns where player can do their actions and then there is turns for other parties usually AI or game master. Turns can consist very simple things like move one game piece to another square. Turn-baseness don't bring anything methodical or ponderous in the game, but turn-based systems allow more complex rules without making game unplayable in extent that most players can't play it. Because of turns there is no pausing in turn based games as time is controlled by turns not by clock.

One of their goals was to make combat feel as intense as it is in IWDs. Most of tediousness in combat comes from fact that it is often hard to tell what happens in it and that controls don't work as well as one would want. And I also think that weapons and abilities don't currently have right balance which causes combat become maybe bit too hard if one is using less optimal combinations in combat. IMO

That's actually not the attribute of a turn based system that I'm referring to, ironically enough. Turn based systems are by their nature, methodical and ponderous. Combat in PoE is methodical and ponderous. There's your linkage. Turn based systems are system where game flow is partitioned with well-defined and visible parts called turns, nothing more nothing less. Although turn-based systems can be more complex than real-time systems without causing severe issues in game flow as by nature they have more disjointed game flow. PoE having or not having complex, demanding, what ever system has nothing to do with turn-baseness. RTwP is system that is invented to allow more complex systems in real-time games by giving player option to pause game to control and command their characters/or what ever they need to do.

PoE's combat has nothing to do with turn based systems, as it don't even have anything that one could call representing turn let alone having actual turns.