ogrezilla

I think most people voting for it are thinking of aggro in a much broader way. Basically anything that controls who the enemy attacks beyond just targeting the closest character. That doesn't mean they want any skills that directly alter "threat." At least, that's what I hope.

does there?

that would be cool. An RPG where magic and monsters are very rare and most educated people might not even believe in them.

there really isn't much reason not to include a camera lock option honestly. The control changes I wouldn't expect to see

indeed.

Well certainly the kind of change that Bioware made was bad and yet they probably had the same motivation that Obsidian now has. To improve things. Dragon age was advertised as the spiritual successor to BG2. Perhaps they sincerely wanted to make something like that, but partly due to their mostly nextgen player base and partly due to simple errors in logic they ended up destroying everything about BG2 and even NWN that was of any value at all. Instead of making things better they made them much, much worse and at great expense. They could have just made BG3 using the old Infinity Engine and saved a whole lot of money and earned the respect and gratitude of everyone who enjoyed that wonderful game. Gaider could have done it. Instead they tried to improve things. I think the lesson that can be learned form Bioware and Dragon Age is not so much that change is bad, although many kinds of changes clearly are, but that change is dangerous. And the more perfect the system you try to improve upon the more dangerous it is to attempt it. Yes, yes. Your syllogism should be: Bioware changed their games (which used to be good). Those changed games were bad. Therefore changing their games was bad. But you changed the conclusion to "All change is bad" which clearly doesn't follow. Looks like Merin finally gets her beloved strawman served on a silver platter. Of course I'm only saying that because I haven't seen anyone argue that "All change is bad." Perhaps you can point to an example that I missed. It is important to learn from others' mistakes so that you do not repeat them. Bioware was in a similar situation to the one that Obsidian is in now. They chose to fill their BG2 sequel-in-spirit with NextGen mechanics which presumably all sounded great at the time. Ushering in the modern age. Progress! Hurrah! But that isn't what happened, is it? It's just a lesson. Nothing more. It certainly doesn't prove that Obsidian cannot somehow succeed where hundreds of other highly intelligent people have before always failed. Maybe they'll finally pull of a cooldown system that really works for once. It's highly unlikely, especially without an extremely insightful analysis of what went wrong with all of the other attempts, but it's not impossible. Nevetheless, by replacing sleep with a short, convenient timer or just an instant recharge button they would be fundamentally changing the dynamics of the entire game. If that isn't a risky thing to do then I do not know what is. fair enough. Those changes were bad. But that doesn't mean future changes will be bad. That was my point. Thank you for saying it more eloquently than I did.

Into what? There are really not many options. You either have something that you click to intentionally replenish spells (resting, touching glyphs, reading, meditating, drinking potions or however you want to call it) OR they replenish on their own without your input (so you either wait.. and wait... and maybe wait some more or it's DA style of combat-over-you-full-again). or some combination of the two. Resting is confirmed to still be in. Maybe resting isn't even being changed at all. Cooldowns could just be added to keep the mage from needing to rest quite so often. If my mage is getting low level spells back fairly regularly via cooldowns I wouldn't feel the need to rest nearly as often. High levels spells would basically go unchanged. A Frankensteinian mixture of both so you can wait or click the rest button when you're tired of waiting? Ingenious. Since we're philosophating about possibilities from what clearly appears to be a myriad of options and innovations... How about aliens that come and randomly give you spells? Or, you only get spells when a meteorite hits you in the head? Oh good, thank you for letting me know intelligent conversation isn't going to happen with you. Saves me some time. I was just brainstorming possibilities to mimic your extremely intelligent either-wait-or-if-you're-tired-of-waiting-click-a-button suggestion. I'm sorry if those 2 suggestions weren't idi.. ehm, intelligent enough to reach the brilliancy of the one you offered. Ok, so as simple as the rest button was, it was rarely so simple that you could do it anywhere at anytime without some consequence. You would need to backtrack to somewhere safe or risk getting attacked. Now if you introduced cooldowns so that you generally had enough low levels spells available in each fight to allow the mage to contribute, you might be less inclined to inconvenience yourself with finding a place to rest. You could just press on and have your mage cast a low level spell or two in most fights. Then when needed you would use the better spells. Its not perfect, but I think it would help by adding longevity to mages so you aren't resting purely for their sake so often.

I was talking about the cooldown system specifically. All you did was make up a scenario about arrows to support your point. You can simply stock up on arrows and bullets in most games so you don't run out. If you forget you have to walk back. Crafting arrows isn't a bad idea, but it's not really a strategic choice between buying arrows, pulling them off corpses, and crafting them. It has nothing to do with the cooldown system that's being suggested. you brought up arrows and bullets, not me. Again all you did was make up a scenario about arrows to support your point. You also said it adds strategic choice to choose between buying arrows, looting them from corpses or crafting them. It really doesn't. It also completely disregards my original point. I'm sorry then. Apparently I mixed up your point and your side example.

Into what? There are really not many options. You either have something that you click to intentionally replenish spells (resting, touching glyphs, reading, meditating, drinking potions or however you want to call it) OR they replenish on their own without your input (so you either wait.. and wait... and maybe wait some more or it's DA style of combat-over-you-full-again). or some combination of the two. Resting is confirmed to still be in. Maybe resting isn't even being changed at all. Cooldowns could just be added to keep the mage from needing to rest quite so often. If my mage is getting low level spells back fairly regularly via cooldowns I wouldn't feel the need to rest nearly as often. High levels spells would basically go unchanged. A Frankensteinian mixture of both so you can wait or click the rest button when you're tired of waiting? Ingenious. Since we're philosophating about possibilities from what clearly appears to be a myriad of options and innovations... How about aliens that come and randomly give you spells? Or, you only get spells when a meteorite hits you in the head? Oh good, thank you for letting me know intelligent conversation isn't going to happen with you. Saves me some time.

Are you wishing to imply the problem with DA2 is a lack of tedium? I believe so. The lack of a particular kind of tedium that cannot be removed without also removing most of the fun of the game. Dragon Age specializes in a kind of pointless tedium and it probably came about due to precisely the kind of logic that Josh has been using. Everything has a price and the price of attempting to remove the tedium from every single aspect of the game, no matter how crucial to the operation of the mechanics, leads to not 1% of the game being tedious, but all of the game being tedious. I think 1% is better than 100%. So it's not so much the 1% tedium that I like. It's the fact that that 1% is protecting me from the 99% if I tried to eliminate it. lack of tedium is not the problem then. The problem is the lack of the other mechanics that were removed or changed in an attempt to remove tedium.

Into what? There are really not many options. You either have something that you click to intentionally replenish spells (resting, touching glyphs, reading, meditating, drinking potions or however you want to call it) OR they replenish on their own without your input (so you either wait.. and wait... and maybe wait some more or it's DA style of combat-over-you-full-again). or some combination of the two. Resting is confirmed to still be in. Maybe resting isn't even being changed at all. Cooldowns could just be added to keep the mage from needing to rest quite so often. If my mage is getting low level spells back fairly regularly via cooldowns I wouldn't feel the need to rest nearly as often. High levels spells would basically go unchanged. Then again, if I was describing that system my main descriptor would not be cooldowns.

I didn't read all of this, but was shield and spear that good in a small scale fight? It seems to me it would be great in an organized formation but fairly unwieldy in a free-form fight. Its hard to do much more than stab with a spear in one hand. With a formation, the enemy would always be in front of you and if they sidestep your spear the guy beside you can stab him so it works. When the enemy can step around you I would think it would lose a lot of effectiveness.

I was talking about the cooldown system specifically. All you did was make up a scenario about arrows to support your point. You can simply stock up on arrows and bullets in most games so you don't run out. If you forget you have to walk back. Crafting arrows isn't a bad idea, but it's not really a strategic choice between buying arrows, pulling them off corpses, and crafting them. It has nothing to do with the cooldown system that's being suggested. you brought up arrows and bullets, not me.

we were talking about removing tedium from the game without removing game elements. You brought up a few posts ago the notion of someone wanting unlimited ammunition because its tedious to go get more. So I gave you an example of removing the tedium of buying ammunition without removing the element of ammunition management.

Not at all. Many alternatives have been suggested here like various fatigue systems. I have a problem with cooldowns in specific because they have never worked in the past imo and so far I haven't heard of anything special that would make them better in this game. ya, its not everybody. The thing that makes me more hopeful about this cooldown system is that the goal is to use it to replace resting more than to replace the casting system. You'll still choose spells and you still won't be casting magic missile every 3 seconds as it comes off cooldown. The intention is for the casting to feel almost exactly like the Vancian system within any given fight. its just how the spells will be recovered between fights that they want to change.

Are you wishing to imply the problem with DA2 is a lack of tedium? that does pretty much seem to be the logic there.

Agreed but that would certainly be kind of dull since you need that extremly powerful spell once in a while too just to create the dynamic. I wouldn't want that system in this type of game. I'm just pointing out the flaws in her logic. Arrows are now expensive and money is limited. I literally cannot afford to use a bow and arrow against every enemy in the game. Oh what's that? I can learn to craft my own arrows though? And even to salvage some of the arrows that are sticking out of all of my enemies? And I just replaced the tedium of walking back and forth to get arrows all the time with legitimate strategic choices and potential challenge. For spells, I'm not sure. I'm not a game designer. Limiting where I can rest would be a start.

There seems to be a lot of thinking along the lines of Bioware changed their games and those games were bad, therefor change is bad.

I disagree. Games shouldn't sit there and immerse you with combat 24/7. It just shifts to being more of an action RPG. I think it's ok to have some downtime. Yeah walking is tedious. But there hasn't really been a good idea yet except a vague notion of cooldowns. Cooldowns, I don't believe, have ever been done well. I'm pretty sure all the old great RPGs had tedium of some sort. Games like DA2 don't have this stuff and look how it turned out. I'm saying a game should have it's ups and downs and most players don't realize this is good. It should punish the player for making mistakes, and that encourages the player to learn and adapt. It gives a sense of accomplishment. Judging by your post, you'd rather not have arrows or bullets because you could run out and then have to return to town to restock and that would be tedious. Players (and I think devs) just think well here's some tedium. It's bad how do we get rid of it. You get rid of it be removing and simplifying the game and making it so there is no downtime and just combat all the time. Which means a shallow cooldown system to prevent the player from having to rest or return to town. removing tedium doesn't have to mean removing elements of the game. It could mean changing what was a tedious activity to an actual rewarding and valuable part of the game.

Agreed. Cooldowns lead to a waiting system were you come fully refreshed to every combat. That way the combats quickly become linear and boring. This doesn't necessarily solve the problem with combat linearity. Switching between 3-4 top tier spells isn't what I would call enjoyable tactics. Being economical by casting lower tiered spells and saving the higher ones for later combats creates a much richer dynamic for variance in combat. like I said, you'd need a spell system that didn't have "best" spells.

Exactly my point! The problem wasn't that you could rest. It was that Amie lacked longevity. Then I think we are in agreement. The real key is that the different game design elements all work well together. We shouldn't have to decide which parts are good and which parts are bad and then create our own rules to make the game play how it was intended to be played.

unless the battles are designed so that you need different tactics for different encounters. The keys then are to design spells so there aren't "best" spells and to design encounters so they aren't all the same. I'm not saying I want that design, but it can theoretically be done without removing tactics or challenge. Even with explicitly designed encounters, to cover up such a horrible bland system, it would be boring. Period. Seriously think about it. Imagine in BG you have access to EVERY SPELL (appropriate to your level) at EVERY encounter. There is no meaningful tactics. There is no Challenge. Is boring. And there is NO sense of tension. It's just YAWN, next battle. In BG it would be boring because the game isn't designed around you having every spell. It removes the strategy of preparing the right spells, but it doesn't remove the tactics of using them properly. The game would just need to be designed differently to maintain tactics, challenge and tension. Again, I like the strategy part of planning ahead. I don't want that system for this game.

If folks are pulling two mobs and resting, perhaps the problem lies not in the ability to rest but a more basic imbalance in the game? Poor companion AI? Certain classes lacking sufficient power or longevity (either at certain levels or throughout the game)? And yuck to solutions that require a trip back to town every time the group needs rest. people resting every two encounters doesn't mean they needed to; just that they can. It can mean either. In my game wizard companion Amie unloaded her entire arsenal of spells before leaving the Farlong home when the village is attacked at the beginning of NWN2. She was not yet equipped with a weapon. I didn't have the party rest, but I can see why another player might feel they needed to. Constant resting is boring. Why would players resort to it if they felt confident they had the resources to continue? so Amie could unload her entire arsenal of spells again. If you've never played the game before (I haven't), you probably have no idea what the next encounter might include. Maybe you'll need Amie ready to cast her spells. If you don't know what is coming next, I don't know how confident you can ever feel. If the game is giving me a convenient option to be fully prepared, I would feel like the game designers probably intend for me to be fully prepared.

unless the battles are designed so that you need different tactics for different encounters. The keys then are to design spells so there aren't "best" spells and to design encounters so they aren't all the same. I'm not saying I want that design, but it can theoretically be done without removing tactics or challenge.

or just walk back to town and get more arrows. I personally don't do it, but it's up to each player to do as he/she likes. so do they balance encounters for people who do or don't keep themselves fully supplied? They should balnace encounters for people who can use tactics. If your ranger runs out of arrows, I bet there's something you can he can do. I've played lots of games where I run out of arrows, but I don't exit the dungeon each and every time to buy new ones. I ALWAYS keep a melee weapon in reserve for my archer, just in case. He'll probably not be very useful for some time, but can still help out in battle. you didn't answer my question. Should the game be balanced around my party always being fully prepared or should it be balanced around someone who allows their party to go into fights in sub-optimal conditions. If the game mechanics don't discourage me from always being fully prepared, I would say that's what the game is designed for and thus how it should be balanced. You have the option of adding extra challenge, but the people who use the mechanics how they are designed should be the ones who are seeing the challenge as it was designed. Otherwise, its bad game design. I would personally prefer the game to be designed for what you are describing. But assuming the player will add his or her own limitations to get the intended results is bad design. That's pretty much the definition. If your design doesn't give the intended results, something is wrong with the design. edit: this has strayed off topic. I want arrows to either be limited for real (I can't go get more at any moment so it actually adds strategy or challenge to the game) or just unlimited. The walk back to town to get more is boring tedium that adds nothing to the game. Well, I want the game to assume that I will always have arrows (be fully prepared). It is then up to me to make sure I have arrows or have another backup plan if I don't. Let's say I use a ranger that is great with a bow. I would still assume that he would survive in battle, but not be nearly as effective. In NWN2, I ran out of arrows on many occasions, and the game seemed to be designed around players being fully prepared. I had to come up with other plans. In this case, my rogue was the archer. So I had to use traps, wich was a way to help the rest of the party, despite not having any ammo. Ok, I agree. I felt like the older games were designed for you to be much more careful than you actually needed to be. Thus if you just kept yourself fully supplied they ended up being easier than they were meant to be.