Diagoras

Have you been watching the documentaries?

As I clarified in another thread - DoubleFine has not run out of money. They have revised their projections and decided that, on the current track, they risk running out of money on the tail end of the game. When deciding whether to cut scope or raise additional funds, they decided to try and raise more by selling the first half on Steam early access.

Clarification - DoubleFine has not run out of money. They have revised their projections and decided that, on the current track, they risk running out of money on the tail end of the game. When deciding whether to cut scope or raise additional funds, they decided to try and raise more by selling the first half on Steam early access.

Project Eternity, Wasteland 2, FTL, Maia, War for the Overworld, Castle Story, Dead State, Grim Dawn, and Guns of Icarus Online are all pretty well-managed, though with incredibly different attitudes towards feedback (ie. contrast Dead State's confident lack of communication with War for the Overworld's enthusiastic and weekly updates). Guns of Icarus is interesting, thanks to its successful second Kickstarter being similar to a second round of public financing and showing that crowdfunding can do what investment funding can and provide additional backing for a good vision. The exceptions are what I'm really interested in, and each of them is fascinating in its own way: I'm looking forward to seeing the outcome of the Double Fine Adventure's attempt to go for second-round financing/early sale with the first half of the game - as it will show the level of financial flexibility available in this model. Their decision to be almost totally honest with their problems is refreshing, and I hope they don't end up being punished for it. The head of Shadowrun Returns had to make some tough decisions but went ahead and made them, and it'll be interesting to see the backer response once the game releases - are they happy he did what he could to deliver, or upset that his early estimates were off? The Microsoft DRM issue sucks, and the dead hand of publishers reaching into crowdfunding leaves a bitter taste in many backer's mouths that has earned Harebrained Schemes some goodwill - as well as their clear love for their own game. The Banner Saga's issues with their free-to-play combat testing shows both the importance of communication as well as that the wisdom of crowds is opposed by the unique stupidity of crowds. People heard "free-to-play" and, because they have no actual idea what it means, panicked in a way that feels curiously like investor panic. This wasn't helped by generally ignorant backers who hadn't read any of the updates and weren't going to let that get in the way of their shouting. The issue was resolved by clarifications from the developers and other backers shouting down the ignorant, but it shows the dangers of these larger project's substantial number of unengaged backers who treat Kickstarter like a store. Hopefully, incidents like these will either teach them or shake them out of the ecosystem. The death of Haunts: The Manse Macabre was undignified, but the backers were extremely gracious. That bodes well for small Kickstarter projects, as they appear to be able to generate the intimacy and sense of community that crowdfunding excels at providing.

I really liked that interview. I got the sense that this guy had not only read other interviews and thus knew what not to ask, but also has been following Eternity and Torment. The questions about the mega dungeon and about Torment vs. Eternity were both really good I thought, and treaded new ground. Also his earlier questions to Chris, especially the one about whether he's afraid this will jeopardize their publisher relationships - Chris's answer was interesting...

Keep in mind that when dinosaurs roamed the Earth, the oxygen level was way higher which allowed all sorts of gigantism to show up - check out the size of the bugs, for example.

Citation for that being the case for 16th century black powder bombs. Again, any historical citations at all from the 16th century? Because from what you're saying, all the Italian Wars should have consisted of lines of half naked men hurling grenades at each other. Black powder explosives of that size were unreliable due to lack of an effective fuse system and weak due to the low power of black powder. The only use of black powder weapons in 16th century is for undermining, and that only works because you an put a whole lot powder in an enclosed space - and even then walls would often only partially collapse. I have absolutely no idea where you're getting the idea that grenade lobbing was a thing - it wasn't. Which would matter if Project Eternity were set in the modern era. It's not. It's set in the Italian Wars era Europe. You know, those wars where people used swords and shields.

Right, I meant its development in the West. If I'd meant worldwide, my statement would have made no sense, as the development of gunpowder in China would have had no effect on Western heavy cavalry and thus wouldn't make any sense as a rebuttal. Gunpowder weapons are used in Europe from the late 13th/early 14th centuries onwards, but don't even appear in field battles in a real way until the mid 15th century - and it's not until the deployment of the matchlock arquebus in the 16th century Italian Wars that we see gunpowder weapons forcing serious changes to the prevailing tactics. Their contribution to sieges was more immediate, but still quite limited initially. It takes at least a century to see any real effect, and new defensive countermeasures quickly restore the balance between offense and defense in sieges to its previous state. The historiography of this issue has been pretty solidly settled on continuation and evolution for at least 30 years, AFAIK. Gunpowder weapons were an evolution of the existing system of Medieval warfare, and were not a radical break from the past. So, that's not how the historical method works, for a variety of reasons. Primary and secondary sources are preferred over the insistence that you know how to drill a 16th century shot formation in an hour. From David Eltis' The Military Revolution in Sixteenth Century Europe: "In fact, sixteenth-century arquebusiers, musketmen, and pikemen required considerable training to operate with effect, as did pistol-armed cavalrymen. Even those contemporaries who were sceptical of the superiority of firearms over the bow believed that firearms needed experience owners if they were to be used to advantage. None of them argued that the new weapons economised on training. The advocates of firearms promoted training in their usage with great zeal. Humphrey Barwick, who had been trained in musketry in French service in the 1550s, wished to see the English militia instructed in the new weapons forty-five days a year. It was firearms that needed most attention: 'the armed pikes and halberds and lances and speares are to be better to be made perfect in six daies then the fiery weapons are in 60 daies'." So, the military instructors of the era seemed to take quite a different view. Possible reasons include that drilling a unit is a much more complex affair than drilling an individual, that teaching someone how to aim and fire under regular conditions is very different to having them do it while their comrades vomit their intestines up next to them and pikemen charge screaming across the trench, and that anecdotal evidence based on reenactments isn't very accurate. In fact, if you have used a matchlock with the correct 16th century drill, you should know how incredibly delicate and dangerous an operation it really is. Incorrect procedure could result in everything from burned hands to blindness to shooting your scouring stick at the enemy. Also, feel free to peruse the records of any battle of the 16th century in an attempt to find any peasant levies with gunpowder weapons. You'll quickly notice that it's professional mercenaries and soldiers alone which are using gunpowder weapons, due to their complexity and need for constant drill making it impossible for peasant levies to develop the needed skills. Generalizations like this don't provide much if they're not quantified, but yes there existed units capable of hitting man-sized targets at those ranges (the Ottoman Janissaries sword by 65 yards with smoothbores alone). However, most shot fired in volleys at other units, so man sized targets aren't really a key measure. I'm also not sure what this has to do with the issue at hand. Muskets? Not arquebus but actual musket? What kind of simple people with no training would be using those dedicated anti-armor weapons? Even if you mean arquebus, this entire issue hangs on the definition of "could". Of course any given outlandish scenario could possibly occur, but I'd be very interested in seeing any citations for this assertion. It would seriously call into question why pikes were so often deployed in the period if cavalry were this impotent, as well as how the astounding cavalry victories of the Italian Wars occurred. Okay, could you please explain how gunpowder is like magic that any child could use? With any assertions cited? Professor Michael Robert's lecture that first set out the Military Revolution theory in 1956. While sweeping in its scope and laying the groundwork for Geoffrey Parker's revision, it propagated many of the fallacies that were rebutted first by Parker, then Hall, and finally the new wave of historians in the post 1990 period. These (most notably) included the idea of firearms representing a decline in firepower, the weakening of calvary, and firearms as a driver for larger armies through increased ease of use - all of which were outside of the historiographic consensus as early as the 1970s.

Sure, it just seemed as if you were talking about a historical context. If you weren't then I don't really get what your original post was saying.

Use of "Byzantine" is an Imperial offense, citizen. The Roman Empire transcends the Queen of Cities, and encompasses all of Christendom - even those that have fallen into the so-called Catholic heresy. As the Vailian Republic has an Iberian vibe, this is my take on their soldiers - pikes and arquebusiers are included, but the emphasis is on the adventurous rodeleros who fight with sword and shield.

This needs to be quantified and qualified. A pistolier, a mercenary arquebusier, and a Janissary sharpshooter are all going to be very different in this regard. Except few civilizations used the English longbow other than the English, who were still a bunch of island-bound savages to a good Continental. And rate of fire is of little benefit if you can't penetrate armor consistently. I have no idea where you're getting this stuff from, but this isn't remotely true.

No, no they couldn't. That's why heavily armored knights dominated the battlefield for 300-400 years after the invention of gunpowder. No it isn't. That sounds like historiography that's at least 60 years out of date. Is this coming straight from Robert's initial Military Revolution lecture? Yeah, better drop those OP pikes as well. Damn Swiss with their pike rushes.

OP - read almost any of the other threads on this topic before continuing. For example, this section: Is so disconnected from everything that it makes it clear you haven't read up on this at all.

Is Stun seriously trying to claim that the core of IE games are instant death spells and fetch quests?

Who in this thread has said that?

A solution to this, that I've noted before, is to make magic actually magical. What's being described here is differently flavored technology (systematic manipulation of reality through mastery of the laws of physics) as opposed to any sort of historical conception of magic (inconsistent interaction with an arcane and supernatural power). Magic isn't technology that's invoked by waving your hands, but voodoo and witchcraft - neither of which lends themselves to reproducibility or economies of scale.

It's important to also keep narrative sensibilities in mind - the standard D&D power curve results in insane rules that don't mesh with the P:E setting at all. I'd think something more like Epic 6 would be a better model: increase in power for a short time, but mainly leveling providing a increase in capabilities. A pistol shot to the head at close range will kill you like anyone else, but you have new capabilities that other people lack.

The Talisman of Bladder Bursting, The Arquebusier's Aid, Amulet of Piss-and-Shot This savage fetish is nothing more than a preserved and inflated pig's bladder tied round a simple cord, with morbid strips of disintegrating colored cloth, some with faint heraldry still visible, strung along the length of the cord. Most likely produced originally by a Glanfathan shaman as a practical joke, this artifact (and its many inferior reproductions) has found its way into various arquebusier units over the years, with a solemn tradition of adding the unit's colors to the cord giving it its grim reputation for bearing the regimental colors of long annihilated units. When tapped three times, the talisman instantly fills the wearer's bladder with urine. This would be good for nothing other than obscene party tricks, but to an arquebusier this is a valuable item. When a gunpowder weapon is fired repeatedly, the barrel fouls with soot and grows too hot to touch. The traditional way to deal with this is to urinate into the barrel, swirl it around, and then pour it out to clean out the grime and cool the metal. However, this trick only works once - unless you can refill your bladder on command. Then a gunner can fire his weapon more often and more reliably than other soldiers, but only if he can withstand the smell.

I'm going to restate the OP's actual point, as the vast majority of this thread seems to be people arguing over an entirely unrelated series of questions: What reason is there for the Steam DRM not to be switched off/reduced as much as possible, which the publishers of games on Steam are allowed to do? What does the DRM integration do for the game?

Well, now I know I'm building a gunslinging Paladin and teaching the party Chanter to sing Western ballads. "With a big iron on his hip..."

That's all amazing, Karranthain. I'm playing a Stainless Steel Medieval 2 Total War game as Venice, but that just makes me want to restart as Early Era Byzantines.

I'm really digging all the lamellar and banded armor.

>Most people for example picture "plate" armour as being just all the same silver colouring and clean/plain, but there were many great designed suits of armour and it could often be decorated with everything from paintings (you can paint on armour, look at the "Black Sallets" as they are known) and even some had ways to attach cloth to them for decoration purposes. Absolutely true. I know 17th century Winged Hussars were considered impressive on the battlefield in part because they actually polished their armor to a silver gleam, when most cavalry burnished it or coated it with linseed oil to ward off rust and stains.

For those concerned about realism: as the setting seems to be early 16th/late 15th century in nature, the existence of investments and banks is perfectly historically acceptable. And that's assuming a slavish devotion to European social structures of the time.