Umberlin

I didn't really see anything in the second tier that I'd ask for. I'm not a fan of reusing the typical fantasy races, but they can be done well. Heck anything can be done well. Beast races, however, have never really sat well with me. Somehow the usual, 'slap together a Human and whatever animal is handy' approach comes off as lazy every time, no matter how well fleshed out they are from a story perspective.

Widespread use is relative to context, time frame and area of the world. Widespread use doesn't mean everywhere or throughout time. Again, untrue, many would have seen consistent use in their time frame. Just look at the cloak mentioned earlier, widespread enough that it's a consistent image in Sumerian carvings. Practical in the modern day or in later periods? No. Practical for them? Yes. Time is funny. Exactly where do you think weapons of war started? The cross over is obvious and it's not a question of the chicken or the egg. Hunting weapons and weapons used in battle, and war, were one in the same in many cases. Did that change eventually? Yes. This is another thing you have to consider time frame by time frame culture by culture context by context and location by location. You're really stuck in a modern mindset, and you're forgeting to look at different time periods, peoples, cultures and locations for what they are. Your 'fact' is a fact to a particular amount of peoples in a particular amount of time. You're not thinking about the very different views of different peoples and cultures in different times and locations. They aren't you. They weren't raised in the world as we know it now. At least when talking about the past. So on that note your: Isn't undeniable, because people throughout history have refused to change, and stuck to their traditions. For a great many people, in fact, throughout time tradition (as just one example) was more important than this adaptation you're talking about. To then death would have been preferable to changing. Even without looking into the past, we can look around the world right now and find multiple examples of people who live in a world full of technology, advanced and glorious and all that . . . but don't partake of it. You have peoples that choose to still live very different lives and very different ways. Some because they have to, others because they want to and some because it's tradition. There's that tradition thing again. Even right in places such as the United States you can view peoples that do this. And it doesn't just happen in one way. One place, again let's say the U.S., you can find a people who prefer a simple farming style of life in accordance with their beliefs and traditions. Across the globe you can find peoples who live out in the jungles, making their own clothing and hunting their own food. Another hop and you find people in dry savana who cake their hair in mud to help prevent head lice, living as they were. Do some people leave these examples, and join the more modern society? Yes. However, others don't. Others live those out of the way no tech or low tech lives. This applies to the clothing they use, the weapons they use, how they hunt and even, yes, how they fight or solve their issues. Yes, even in the modern world there are actually people that don't use guns. Somewhere out there someone is still hunting with a spear, a bow or any number of things that aren't a modern superior weapon and this applies to what they use when they fight. The world is not a straight line where you can say: Because no such fact exists, because if it were a fact then 'everyone would take it' as you put it, but not everyone does. It's easy to think of the entire modern world as cities, cars, skyscrapers, electricity and more . . . and even easier to forget that some people by choice, not even getting into the ones that don't have a choice at all, don't live anything resembling such lives. This is an example of technology, but you'd be amiss if you didn't think it applied to how they fought or what they used to fight with, when it came to it. This: Wasn't true in the past. And it isn't true now. It may be true of some people. It may be true of a culture from which you come in the here and now. Heck, it's probably true of a lot of cultures throughout time, and definitly many now. It is not, however, a fact of all people everywhere throughout time, because if it was you wouldn't have countless examples proving otherwise. Which is what I was saying. Facts are absolute. If what you're saying is not a broad, all encompassing absolute . . . then it's not a fact.

There were crazy people trought all ages. And crazy inventors. And failed experiments. We can find peices of experimental weaponry and armor - that doesn't change the fact that it failed and never saw wide use. It was a faliure. Like many things even in modern times, with far more scientific approach to weapon design. And yet others were not failures at all, well and oft used in their timeframes only inferior in any way when put up against later more refined weaponry and armor. Not every bit of weirdness was a failure for its time. Some wouldn't have even been failures later, they just fell to the wayside due to cultures dying out for wholly unrelated reasons. Sure there were things there were right off, or eventual, failures, but that's not everything. Some of what we can read about really was just plain odd, but worked in the timeframe well enough or excelled in it, and possibly beyond in some cases. It's not as simple as it's weird so it failed or it was old so it eventually was out performed. Some of the oldest ideas in the book we still use today. Different application or purpose, in some cases, sure, but there none the less. This is blatantly untrue, in fact you still see peoples that refuse to use better technologies, that includes weapons, even to this day - despite it being available. I think that's just fine personally.

Who is to say your character, by how you've grown them, isn't someone that knows 'what this is'? That's always been the point of the lore skill, to me, in part at least. That idea that you have to go to this person to find out about X makes a person wonder at some point, if they know, the knowledge exists, so why couldn't your character be the sort that researches such things, and thus have such knowledge themselves - provided you built them in such a way? Not to discount your point on going to the local shop for a scroll/identification, mind you, because that is a legitimate point. I don't find identifying it with a skill you've chosen to invest in is a bad thing at all, it's not boring, it's a way of defining your character. A lore skill check is used for far more than identifying an item besides. It's not very realistic that your character knows every legendary item ever created in the universe of PE with a maximum lore skill. Of course, this could be true for more ordniary magical item (like the mentioned longsword +1 or armor +5% fire protection) but in my opinon not for the real legendary items. It would be much more fascinating if you have to reveal the hidden information about them little by little (like a quest). I really don't like super-human characters who know everything in the universe. That's not what the lore skill means. The lore skill is a representation of what you know. Not a form of omniscience. You can fail a lore check and not know something.

I'd like to see Magic users that concentrate on the far less typically used areas of magic, the weird stuff, we've seen the Elemental magic user, the Fireball throwing guy countless times. For me the really interesting Wizards were always the Transmutation, Illusion and even Divination. Heck even Enchantment. Obviously I'm not talking about actual DnD and the actual schools but types of magic users concentrated around these sorts of things. I know Evocation and Conjuration, Adjuration and their ilk can be done well but how many times have you seen the pyromancer, the elementalist and their type over and over? They're the default. Even Necromancer we've seen done a hundred or more different ways. But Transmutation and Illusion? Especially Divination. Magic users fully concentrated on those types of magics? It's a rare thing to see these types of magic users as the base that you have to concentrate around. These are very powerful types of magic to pull inspiration from, and I always felt too many games have had it so success as a magic user in a game meant the Evocation/Conjuration types. It'd be really something to see a game where something like transmutation was really, really well supported for all aspects of the game, not even the combat, the combat too but take schools like Transmutation, Enchantment, Divination and Illusion and apply them to the non-combat. Think about it for a second and think of how much more interesting that is than . . . "I shoot it with fire." Conjuration I'm being a bit hard on, it actually has a lot of potential especially if made well and implemented well. Think of the character that needs information and actually putting your conjuration abilities to use to get that information. There's untapped potential there beyond, "I summon this think to kill my enemy" because there are a lot of contractual and dealing and talking aspects to conjuration that are so readily ignored. Again I'm not talking about reusing the DnD type schools as much as just the idea of that magic user that uses their magic to change themselves, others, objects and the world around them. Transmutation is always such a terribly under used school by first time players. They jump at the fireballs and fire storms and ignore the school that lets you reverse gravty, reincarnate, control weather, animate different objects or materials, levitate, fly (I can't tell you how useful that is), alter yourself, stop bloody time and so much more. There's so much potential there. And, yeah, it's all to easy to ignore or overlook in comparison to the usual 'oh look I can shoot fire!', but they also have access to horribly destructive magics. Disintegrate. Destruction. Yeah sure put in the usual evokation and elemental styled magic users, fine, but put in those weird magic users that weild the strange energies, warp the fabric of reality, fool their opponents and that sort. The less obvious. The less direct.

Keep in mind you're following a thread of conversation in this, er, thread, that spreads from before we knew the exact type of setting. Nevermind that medieval fantasy has been done to death, and that the original points I made back in the first pages were about inspiration they could pull from sources besives the typical medieval, roman and other oft used sources. Not to say there's anything wrong with them, it'd just be nice to see more variety, especially from less tapped sources. The Sumeriams are great example but any of the ancient South American, Middle Eastern and other cultures have lots of neat stuff to pull from. Sure, it's a moot point now, but oh well, life goes on. And Chariots, apparently being the first inventors of them, barring any future discoveries that prove otherwise. It's quite interesting, actually, because they had some interesting ideas toward early armor. There's question on what exactly some of it was made from because a lot of it is based on observation from carvings, rather than actual samples of the armor. The most striking thing was this though, being one of the few examples of 'more than just a carving': "The Sumerians invented a long leather cloak complete with metal studs interwoven to protect the wearer. It would be interesting to see if the cloak would afford decent protection but at least it would make quite the fashion statement. Another interesting piece of Sumerian armor was discovered in the tomb of a nobleman. It was a helmet made of electrum, an alloy of silver and gold, and was modeled with the ears, headband and even the hairs fashioned out of the metal. Electrum isn't a very tough metal so most likely the helmet was used for ceremonial purposes." Like I said. Some of the ancient cultures on this planet had some pretty weird ideas of what to wear. I've seen Sumerian carvings of warriors in chariots wearing such cloaks. My point, again, isn't what he fought in, because I'm not pushing that our characters fight naked, or even in loincloths, I'll just quote the whole thing and let you pick out the relevant bits. No sense in typing them again, might as well copy and paste:

Who is to say your character, by how you've grown them, isn't someone that knows 'what this is'? That's always been the point of the lore skill, to me, in part at least. That idea that you have to go to this person to find out about X makes a person wonder at some point, if they know, the knowledge exists, so why couldn't your character be the sort that researches such things, and thus have such knowledge themselves - provided you built them in such a way? Not to discount your point on going to the local shop for a scroll/identification, mind you, because that is a legitimate point. I don't find identifying it with a skill you've chosen to invest in is a bad thing at all, it's not boring, it's a way of defining your character. A lore skill check is used for far more than identifying an item besides.

Would these herbs/bandages as you mention them require a skill to use them, that you need to improve over time, that perhaps somehow alters their effectiveness? Obviously still keeping with the, 'it takes time to use them' and, since you mention out of combat, I assume 'gets interrupted by anything making combat actions.'

I think you need to clarify what you think is simple or believable because some of the actual armor people in history, especially the truly ancient cultures, have worn, outside of the usual medieval, roman and germanic bents fantasy games tend to pull from, could be exceedingly odd by those standards. Even considered overblown, so far as to say non-functional . . . but they were. As for the Celts and going naked, they actually did have armor, those that went naked were not the standard at least during the conflicts with Rome. However, much older cultures or just different cultures? Yeah. Naked or in little more than loincloths (loincloths being relative, not necessarily exactly that for every culture in question). Maybe some clay beads, decorations like paint or mud and some neatly aranged leather cords and bones if they were lucky. And you know what? For those areas, those times and those cultures? With the weapons they were using? It worked. We may think, 'not practical and not believable and not functional' but . . . you know what? We aren't them. As for Conan, there were times he wore armor. There were also times he wore very little in battle, and one chapter in particular I remember where he fought completely nude. Then again, let's consider that nudity for anyone in some of those books was pretty common. And no, that wasn't the comics. Nudity wasn't rare in those books, and while I can only remember one instance of Conan fighting nude, the lightly clad look was not a rarity in battle. Heck The Black Stranger opens with him naked, except for, and I quote from the book as I type: "except for a rag twisted about his loins, and his limbs were criss-crossed with scratches from briars, and caked with dried mud." He fights in this state. More than one opponent, they being in, and I quote again, "they wore beaded buckskin loicloths, and an eagle's feather was thrust into each black mane. They were painted in hideous designs, and heavily armed." Again he fights in that state, and fights with people in such garb. That's just one example but lightly armored fights were not a rarity in those books. And while I can only remember one instance of a nude fight, trust me, people wore nothing often enough in Howard's books that I sincerely doubt the one that I can remember was the only instance. As I said earlier I'm not trying to push nude fights by bringing this up, rather an idea of practicality and functionality that can be hard to grasp. I used the example of a fictional character but people in reality, in history, have used and worn weapons and armor strange enough that their idea of practical and functional for the time just . . . may seem anything but to us. I'm not pushing big huge swords either. I'm just saying . . . 'careful' when insisting on simple, more believable alternatives. Simple happens, but so do other things, and that's in reality, and trust me, some of the weird barely functional stuff in fantasy? It doesn't hold a flame to some of the weirder stuff people have come up with in reality over the thousands and thousands of years of goofy Humans and their crazy ideas.

I'm for having to identify something mysterious, old or just plain completely unknown but I agree that the typical +1 sword of whatever that you find countless of . . . shouldn't need identified. Then again I tended to have a higher skill so I didn't tend to bother with spells and such for identification. I like it when my character knows things. Always seems more interesting than a character that doesn't know much at all.

I'm all for exotic swords and armor. Japanese, Chinese, and Middle Eastern swords come to mind. And a barbarian might as well rush into combat with a couple of animal hides stitched together, foregoing protection in favor of mobility. But Conan is a little much. As much as I've loved the movies when I was a kid, I don't think it prudent to go into a swordfight in your underwear. I could go with a class or kit that is specially trained to fight very effectively with no armor, but would still suffer heavy penalties. Well then you certainly should check out some older cultures like German tribes, Gauls, even Celts... Some of them were running into battle naked... I am not saying that majority was doing that, but some were. The idea of an almost naked barbarian is not that far fetched as you may think. There are accounts of celts going into battle naked around 4th-5th century bc , so as not to hamper their mobility, and to intimidate their opponents. Conan really was a rather conservative barbarian in this regard. Heh. People have done some funny things throughout history. I guess, in the end, what I was trying to get across though wasn't that we should be running into battle naked, just that the functionality of armor . . . when looking back at some of the armor various older to ancient cultures came up with . . . might have been right 'for them' but paired against a more advanced, later, culture may not have been very practical or functional for fighting them. What I mean is function is a matter of context, what you're up against, so to speak. Some older, and especially ancient, cultures did some great things I'd love to see as a source of inspiration for a game. It'd just be a shame to dismiss some of it when due to the matter of functionality against later forms of armor and weaponry. There's just a lot of neat stuff here, and what we've seen of the map, if it's accurate, could lend itself to 'some' variety . . . however . . . when I wrote that we didn't have: Which spells out a more specific idea of what to expect and probably hints at the forms of cultural and historical inspiration they've chosen to pull from making a lot of what I said a waste in the here and now. Ah well. I do notice something neat though, note the whip. It's in the same hand as the shield. Not many games implement flexible weapon types like the whip. I'm hoping that's a hint at a flexible weapon class in the game. The last RPGs I remember playing that had whips, and other flexible weapons, in them were Dark Age of Camelot and . . . I believe one of the expansions to NWN implemented a whip. HotU if I remember right. That's a neat thing, just because of how rarely we get to play with flexible weapon types such as whips, chains and their ilk. Well the naked ones were berserk religious fanatics. That wasn't exactly standard. Gallic metal working was extremely advanced and their nobles were often armored like tanks compared to their Roman opponents. It was a very long and nasty series of conflicts ultimately won by Roman organization and efficiency more than raw technological superiority or individual martial prowess. It's also of note that . . . while they may have done it in that time, the fact that they were doing it then likely hinted to a cultural/religious heritage that went back further. Meaning within the pre-Roman conflicts, especially a lot of the unrecorded, or I should say badly recorded . . . (or just plain destroyed) bleh . . . era . . . we have no idea what sort of success rate they may have had. Mind you pre-Roman doesn't just me Rome specifically, but advanced military presences in general. That sort of combat wouldn't have just been a religious thing, but something spawning from a time when I'd bet you most of the fights were between rival clans on a much smaller scale, and of similar levels of progression (lacking the organization and efficiency and all that of the Romans for one thing, amongst others, being that it would have been a far earlier period than the issues with Rome).

The thing with this is, if you really truly aren't ANY better than the dudes giving you the quests, WHY aren't they DOING THE QUEST THEMSELVES. They lazy? The whole world is nothing but lazy arseholes? THAT would make for a great game. Your mission, if you choose to accept it . . . get these lazy arseholes to get off their bums and GO DO SOMETHING. Actually, that would make a great quest option--have a quest or two you can complete (and get the xp for!) by convincing the person to go do it themselves. :D Why would that question exist? Plenty of people share similar skill sets in reality, each one doesn't automatically cover every possible application of said skills. They each have different lives, different jobs and responsibilities. Why doesn't the regular guard go off and do X? Because he's in the middle of Y. It's the same reason the cop in New York doesn't run down to Atlanta and do the job of another cop down in Atlanta. It's the same reason a person with all the training, possibly more, due to a past job, of said cop doesn't go and do the cop's job and instead works at home as a mechanic, because those days are behind him and he may really not want to get involved with that anymore. If the game was especially good, and he really did want to go and do what you were set out to do, you know what would happen? He'd be a companion. Which you have in games of this style. That's what a companion is. He's that guard that didn't just want to stay at his post anymore and came with you. That happens in these games. Heck look at Thunderscape: World of Aden, right off the boat you're confronted with a character who wants to come with you, even though he has other responsibilities. In fact once you achieve the specific objective he signed up to achieve, he'll go back to his responsibilities. Still if you can convince a person to go out and do their own dirty work . . . I'm all for that. In some situations. I've known enough people that wouldn't lift a hand to deal with their own problems in reality that I have no problem believing in the existence of people that would rather you go do their work for them. Even if they're fully capable themselves. Strength. Power. I used these words for a reason. Most games that make you the chosen one give you some brand of 'X' that just makes you better than everyone else. That's what I meant. Better strategy doesn't make you better than anyone else in the ways I was talking about, not at a base. Your strategies that you apply to your character are things you have to come up with, through prior planning or through on your toes thinking. These things aren't on hand and always available, they aren't a set in stone ability or passive that's always there for you to fall back on. Your ability to plan for a situation can be faulty. You can walk into a situation and be wrong and lose. If the stats are the same, you are interchangeable. It's simple a matter of you have the potential to reload your game when you mess up. - Actually Thunderscape is a great example of 'not the chosen one' you create a party of characters to reactivate the shield. The call went out to any and everyone. Many went. You run into some. Some dead. Some that might come with you. Some unrelated but still willing. And so on. Your characters aren't special. They're just willing to face the horrors ahead. Yours weren't the only ones. I always thought the intro to Thunderscape was one of the better tension builders I ever came across. It's not calling for the chosen one. It's a desperate cry for someone, anyone, because things are just that bad. You aren't the best of the best. The best of the best aren't there, can't get there. Things are just that bad and those that show up aren't prepared for what they'll face.

You should have a variety of choices, open to you basedon what you've chosen/done and statistical factors. There shouldn't be a strict good evil divide with a good evil point counter. Your choices should have more variety and complexity than that. I want to get lost in the fog.

I'm imagining we'll see a mixture, and to be honest I'm not entirely sure what I'm imagining is too far off. We'll see I suppose.

I think the 'chosen' thing is never played up for how ridiculous it must seem to someone you come across. I'd be interested to see a setting where being chosen meant that many think you to be outright delusional, crazy and others even heretical and dangerous. A sort of thing where even your friends/family are planning an intervention. Still, I've seen too much of the chosen one. I'd really prefer to just see a regular character with regular abilities who . . . struggles just as much as that veyr mundane city guard that needs their help. Struggles in that they're just as bad off, they aren't better or more skilled. The challenges they overcome they overcome through wit and tactics not by being stronger or more powerful, at a base, than anyone else.

Agreed. What I want is for (1) the world to make sense and for me (2) to be given the chance to cause changes in it. Also, there should be conflict in that world and allow the player to take sides or impose his own. This is not a my little pony world. (1) - if women are warriors, let them be wear light plate armor like Joan of Arc - if they are harlots in a tavern, let them show cleavage - if they are clerics of a church, let them be humble and in appropriate robes - if they are witches or priestesses of an evil cult, and if the occasion fits, let them be virtually naked and act like sex succubus to charm/seduce the PC or some of his companions (Ulysses and sirens anyone?) when outside of battle (non-combat skills). And if the player is smart, let him dispel her illusion spell and see her true form. (2) - if I want to play as a paladin preaching gender equality, human/elf/dwarf rights, and race equality, then let me do so - if I want to play to play as a misogynist slaver, then give me that possibility (and before someone comes preaching "that is wrong mkay", let me say that I'd also love to have a drow alike race where females are in charge, due to cultural reasons, strength or plain intelligence) This is not a "let me shove my morals upon you and teach you about democracy with the use of lethal force" THIS IS SPARTA a cRPG! I have a question about your (1) list, what about just female Wizard or Sorceress style character that isn't in an evil cult? Since the female 'wizard/sorceress' styled companion tends to pop up a lot in fantasy games. I'm not trying to poke holes I'm honestly curious since you were so thorough.

What I like to see in a Villain? Well, more than one. As much as it may seem prudent to have the 'ancient evil' threatening the land or 'the dark overlord' they never really should be the only focus. I'm more a fan of an organization, in a way. As far as villains go I prefer those with variety amongst themselves, but with the overall motif that . . . they might just be right. What if the choices you thought were right all along . . . turned out to far more questionable? What if the motivations of the villain either were better than your own or could legitimately be argued to be better than your own? What if the plot was so well conceived that every step of the way, there was a path that looked like the right one, the obvious just and honorable path, and, if you took it, could lead you to the revelation that you really were wrong all this time? That you weren't working for the greater good at all. It shouldn't be the only path in the game, but I do feel a villain needs motivations that not only make sense, but are potential for the better good whether you'd like to admit it or not, whether you like their means or not. Sure mixed in you could have lesser villains that were more typical, 'crazy whacky villain' or 'destroy everything' villain and so on, but you end game competition shouldn't just be about a physical confrontation. It should be the point at which you not only have to confront the villain, but possibly question yourself. Maybe they're right. Maybe you shouldn't be fighting them. Maybe you should be helping them. Maybe some of their other servants along the way were just like you at one point, realized the same things and joined up.

I always liked the Wizardry games, they had their own charm. Just keep in mind the Wizardry games were the sort of fantasy where you could come across a biker girl riding around on a far future hover vehicle, and use that as basis for why a large mish mash of cultures and elements might work better in that brand of a setting.

People regardless of gender come in all flavors, with all manner of imperfections if not outright flaws regardless of said flavor. From my point of view going out of your way to portray either gender a certain way that's poliically correct and 'acceptable' is actually just as insulting as if you'd written every last one as a mindless subserviant prostitute. People come in all flavors. Not one respectful and acceptable flavor. While I do think every character should be written intelligently, with care and respect for the idea that they're trying to craft a convincing sentient being . . . the reality is that sentient beings can be pretty darn unacceptable. I'm all for respect, just with the caution that if you narrow your vision for fear of what people will think . . . sometimes all you end up with is too acceptable. The strong independant woman is fine, I just have the experience in my life that the person proclaiming that they're a strong independant woman that don't need no man is . . . anything but strong or indepedant. The strong women I've met in my life tended to think of themselves as anything but strong. Something to think about, if nothing else . . . because I don't really disagree with the sentiment of the thread, I just caution fanning the flames too far in one direction.

If I don't have to delve my nose into at least eight oversized, dusty tomes in order to glean the most basic principals of an acceptable complex Role-Playing Game then I'm not having fun.

I always found the weak Wizard or the dumb as a brick Fighter came from the people making those characters not putting anything into said statistics, not via the system forcing you into such things. In PnP you can actually find DMs that will see people specialize like that, everything into the 'usual' Fighter stats, for instance, and then punish them for it by throwing things at them outside of that scope. Sort of a way of saying, "Stop that, you're not role-playing you're min-maxing" something CRPGs have never really done well.

I love them both.

I get the impression that people sit there and think we, the pro timed quest camp, mean "Oh, you've only got 20 minutes of real time to do this quest!", when we in fact are talking like... days or weeks of in game time, or whatever would make sense depending on how urgent the quest is. If I remember the plot of Quest for Glory II took place over the course of a month, and you still spent something like three days in Rasier quickly running out of things to do with the entire possibility that the last day or two you were just wishing it would go faster and the guards would just come arrest you. I really do think that was the only time in the entire game that I felt the time limit, and not because it was approaching too fast, no, I wanted it to go faster. I used to turn the game time speed up to its fastest at that point.

Sometimes I wonder if the idea of the timer is the issue in the first place. If I can use some events in QfG III, or the main story of QfG II, is that while there were limiters you always had enough time to wander about and explore. The urgency in QfG II was separated by spans of days when the city wasn't actually in danger, and you didn't have more clues to go on, so you had time to do other things like work on your skills, explore the city, meet new people, buy cool stuff, join guilds related to your class and so on. When the fire elemental first pops you've had several days to explore and get your feet wet in other pursuits. The Earth, Air and Water elementals that follow do not all cascade into one another, but have spans of time between them to goof about and enjoy the game. Sure, when the fire elemental was burning down the city, you had a time limit, but it was a large city, it wasn't going to do it in a single day, so you had a few days to figure out how to stop it. Yeah, if you failed and it went on for too long you'd get a scene of the elemental growing too large to contain and laying waste to all you tried to protect, but you had enough time that if you couldn't manage to contain it . . . it didn't feel like, "stupid time limit" it felt like, "I messed up, this is something I logically could have prevented in the time allotted." The time allotted being little enough to make things urgent, but enough in mass to work with.

Let's put it this way: If the DLC were as big as I expect an expansion to be, by measure of the old school expansions we used to get to games, I wouldn't have a problem with DLC at all.