Jarmo

The error you're making is assuming your minority opinion is the correct one, or majority one. Since the Ironman style is not what IE games were about, nor the way most players want to play, you're basically arguing the IronMan mode should not have been made or should be dropped. ...and then you could choose to not play or get a mod. Luckily enough, the developers seem to have a broader vision.

Sitting in front of your computer for many hours causes health problems, back and otherwise. Using a standing desk is much better for your health. PE should only be played while standing, make it so. The choice shouldn't be left to individuals, I know everybody is as lazy as me and will drift to a more comfortable position given a chance. Most importantly, I'll feel stupid standing up if everybody else gets their gaming kicks in a more relaxed way. Gaming shouldn't be fun or relaxing, it should be constant tedious effort to embetter yourself. No pain - no gain.

Sex worked pretty great with 1 inch pixel characters in Fallout 2 and made for some of the most memorable scenes in the game. (admittedly a pretty juvenile bruahahaa sort of fun, but still) Anyhoo, I hope the adult rating means there wont be silly houses of night like in NWN2 where men go have some tea with scantily clad ladies. Rather, if there are brothels, make them the whorehouses they are. Or don't have them at all. Platemail nippleguards are probably out anyway, no worries there. Though if there are brothels, then maybe there are chain bikinis as well. Mostly though, I hope adult means other things beside sex & violence, for once.

.... just wow. Decided to wait for a sale for this one, but now.. -25% isn't going to cut it.

Some percentage (depending on the armor weight ) for spell casting failure sounds more promising than a total blockade. Also ability to use weapons, but with penalties, seems more accurate. See, this is why this whole multiclass thingy is overrated. I doubt the limits on fighter/mages wearing armor would or should be higher than plain mages wearing armor. Though obviously, if one has to put talents into weapon skills, one wouldn't be putting them into casting, and if being an efficient armored caster requires "armored arcana" or whatever talents, that'd leave even less talents to spread around.

Plate skirt, one of the things that's hard to imagine being good for anything. One would immediately think a skirt made of mail would be much less restrictive and infinitely more practical. ... but yea, mail would weigh the same while constantly restricting feet movement. Would be more practical on a horse though.

Forgot to add in my long blahblahblah that the PE option of giving more leeway inside the classes is something I quite look forward to seeing, and not necessarily easily compatible with multiclassing. That's something I enjoyed in D&D 3.x, being able to give a fighter some level of expertise into picklocking or sneaking or whatever, quite a step up from D&D 1st E, where every 5th level rogue is exactly as good at hiding as another, even with different int or dex scores. Now if PE goes even further into this direction, that's definitely something I want to see. One more thing, maintaining balance between classes and multi-classes is not something I'm very keen on. It's fine if things are balanced, but if, say, mages or priests are way more powerful than anything else, that's fine by me as well. (Though not if the in game lore maintains eg. that mages rule because their awesome power, while the game experience shows they're useless tools). Finding the perfect class-ability-combo to make übercharacter to rule all, is a metagame I quite enjoy in D&D games. Kind of takes the point of character building if the game is so well balanced your choices won't make the character better or worse.

Which would be a real good example actually. Anyway, yes, I'm a fan of classless systems actually, but it's like.. dunno.. In purely single-class system you pick a class and go with it, maybe and probably make some adjustments inside the class. In a classless system you have the most control over your character build (assuming the system *let's* you have control)*** In a multi-class system, you build your character from big blocks like you'd do with Lego. I think there's room for all, no matter which one you prefer. Now PE, it's the first and maybe the only "PE system" game there is and is going to be. It's not like D&D where you're assumed to play about 78 campaigns with the same ruleset and you're assumed to roll yourself 78 different characters. There's simply no need for endless variety at this point. Actually I'd have preferred there were just the 4 main classes (and maybe cipher or chanter) to choose from, and no multi-classing either. better to keep things simple in the beginning, make sure the basic stuff works and then go about adding more and more. *** The problem in classless systems is they often give you something like 1) magic attack, 2) magic healing, 3) martial attack Then you pick and choose, but you'll actually need to take a bit of everything in order to make viable character, so every character ends up looking pretty much the same, with minor variations.

While I'm mildly opposed to PE having multi-classing, I'm in favor of the concept otherwise. And also coming from roleplaying side of things. Warrior mages first. In 1st edition D&D all elves were fighter/mage hybrids, heavy armor, weapon skills, spellcasting. All from level 1. So it seems natural and right to me, to have such characters. But from my viewpoint, combining classes is better than having a set hybrid. Because it just makes sense there'd be ranger-mages as well, or from priestly class.. ranger-priests. Or fighter-priests, or pure mages. And maybe it shouldn't be 50-50 all the time. Maybe scholars don't spend as much time in the field, so while they were 50-50 fighter-mages to begin with, they then just continue being mage. Or maybe this culture makes a point of making everybody take military training. So everybody gets 1 level of fighting class and then can go on doing whatever they want. Or maybe it's a remnant split off an ancient magical culture. A culture in which everybody has magical potential and everybody studies magic in grammar school. So you can become a fighter, but you need to have at least a level of a casting class. It's easier to do these things by combining classes than by making a hundred custom classes. It shouldn't be like... hmmm.. guess I'll take a level of bard next, to get the xxx feat and perform ability.. Rogue-Cleric. This just seems odd because when thinking of a Priest, one tends to think of a christian priest. Or one from which ever main religions of the world. Becomes a lot more plausible if you're thinking of a god of mischief, Loki or whatever. God of hunting, God of murder and death, God of twilight shadows. Again, it shouldn't just be.. hmm.. a couple of levels of priest would give me nice buffs and healing spells, might come in handy. Like before, of course you could do a prestige class for priest of Loki, but again, it's so much tidier and simpler if priests of Loki just take a couple of rogue levels instead.

Indeed, pollaxes really were quite versatile (not to mention fearsome), as were the halberds - so much in fact, that it's diffcult to pinpoint their significant weaknesses. I'd hazard a guess the weakness comes in form of added weight and cumbersomeness. Compared to say.. a spear with no extra blades, or a sword. A slightly slower attack speed might be the best way to handle the issue. Or more fatigue from each swing. But is fatigue even in, don't think so. Wonder if requirement for free space around you could be factored in? Less than sufficient space means negatives to attack.

Hmm.. there was some mention/question/racognition of the problem of multi-function weapons, will you stab or slash or crush with these. Can you choose between piercing and slashing damage with a sword? With 3 options to choose from, these would need a solution just for them, which might or might not seem like the thing to do. Good point. But I seem to remember that it's been mentioned that some weapons have multiple damage types and basically apply the most optimal one on a target basis (i.e. if you're attacking someone highly resistant to slashing attacks, your weapon will deal piercing damage instead - if it has that capability, of course). If that's the case, automatic selection of optimal damage, then one of those with hammerhead, axeblade and a spear point would seem like a really, really versatile pick. Be it a longer polearm or a shorter one, good meaty pollaxes for everybody. D&D actually treats polearms just fine, if anything, they're overpowered. It has rules about reach, and having an extra hex of reach makes for a massive advantage to attacks of opportunity and such. The trouble is that in order to apply these rules you need to play with miniatures and a grid, and in cRPG's it won't work in a RTwP system. Temple of Elemental Evil implements the rules really well. A fighter with Great Cleave and specialization in a polearm is scarily effective. Zap him with an Enlarge and he'll clear out an entire largish room without having to take a step. (Overpowered? Yeah. With the extra reach, polearms dominate; there's no point for a fighter to use anything else. If there were penalties to attack the closest hex, it would balance things out.) .. I stand corrected actually. I was thinking of D&D CRPG's, not the tabletop (of which I've only played 1st edition, red box), and even then forgot ToEE. I did like the reach weapons a lot in ToEE, but... that's the only one isn't it? in all others they were just 2-handed weapons with less damage than the good 2-handers. And yeah, some downside to having a huge weapon with big reach would also be welcome.

Hmm.. there was some mention/question/racognition of the problem of multi-function weapons, will you stab or slash or crush with these. Can you choose between piercing and slashing damage with a sword? With 3 options to choose from, these would need a solution just for them, which might or might not seem like the thing to do. If polearms are in, I hope they will be dealt better than in D&D, as a bunch of identical 1d10 weapons to avoid.

Yea, I don't think they are at all trying to go with Vaillan = Africa thing. The culture is totally separated from skin color here, cultures are what they are and people from hot climate have dark skins. Having said that, very nice example pictures. Style from Kush and other "black kingdoms" has definitely not been overused in games or... anything. Berbers and ... heck, I don't even know what the similar blacks were/are called as a group, have been seen but not too much at all. Southern African style, Zulus and the like, have been seen but can't be used anymore because that'd be seen as racism. Which is a shame.

BTW I've always disliked class names that are a profession, like Knight, Priest or Gladiator. A knight is someone who's been knighted, made nobility. No reason why a knight couldn't be a rogue or ranger who's been knighted. By some tellings, Robin Hood was a knight, then turned to live as a rogue. (Side note, did he multiclass into a rogue or ranger?) A priest is employed by the church, a priest character shouldn't be completely free to do and go as he wills. A gladiator likewise, how could you possibly call yourself a gladiator if you never fought or trained as one. These can be dealt with by a good DM, but if used simply as class names without any extra baggage, I'd prefer more general namings.

I dragged a bard through Icewind Dale and the follow-up, he worked out just fine. Basically a walking buff mule, but made the whole party that much more effective. Were the songs IWD only or did BG as well?

A cape, or a cloak? Because cloaks are so much more practical/awesome. Just sayin', u_u... I never realized there's a difference before now. Anyway, what the heck is wrong with the fashion industry for not bringing the cloaks back already!?

I'll definitely go with the flow and pick whoever happens to come by, when I have to choose, I'll choose based on personality. But if I'd build my own team: Base four Fighter Priest Mage Rogue Bonus characters Paladin Chanter The first four are self explanatory, the bonus characters give bonus effects. ---- Oh, silly me. Didn't even think about the races. All human.

Co8 modpacks added content comes with velkwood bog, a pretty decent short baddie hunt involving a bunch of kobolds and goblins to whack. Intended to be done instead of the fetch&carry stuff from the village. That and all other added content comes from talking to the village smith.

Much depends on what the finalised classes are going to be in the end. What talents are available to what classes. If rogue is as accurate in hitting with sword as a fighter, but simply does more damage (even excluding backstabs) then blademaster sounds appropriate. But if a fighter parries with the same blade like a pro, while a rogue sucks at it no matter what, then "blademaster" starts to sound a lot less descriptive. Everybody can sneak, yea. Can everybody pick locks or pickpocket? Is rogue the only class that can take "improved hidy-hoo" talent? How about the "masterful pocket grabber" talent? Those don't sound at all like something a "weaponmaster" should have an exclusive access to.

I've made a few notes of my playthroughs on gog.com forums, but yeah, you pretty much nailed it. Especially how darn pretty the game is. The difficulty kind of spikes all over the place, but the first levels are the most painful ones. A couple of horribly impossible battles later on.. and ones that might turn out real hard without area effect spells... Overall though, the game tends to get easier as you progress. Bad on one hand, but on the other hand, I can't think of any other game that gives you the same kind of feeling of having gained power and skills. After the hard time with the first ogre you meet, it's rewarding to meet 4 of them at once and simply annihilate them in a few strikes.

... so can we have that cipher-monk love-hate-abuse-romance of needs to spank and be spanked already? They complete each others and hate the other and themselves for it. Because that'd totally be everybodys cup of tea.

There's also the level of importance of the events. Starting from little more than party banter, like the party barbarian suddenly taking a few sidesteps to go tip a sleeping cow, or someone suddenly collapsing for reasons unknown. These could be done in whatever way: painting, in game scene or a cinematic. I'd prefer to experience small stuff through in-game happenings, those break the scene the least. Leave cinematics or cutscenes or voice-overed stuff to when something significant happens, preferably when entering a new area or location or unlocking something important.

My favorite option would be a class-free system, pick up whatever skills you want from whatever skill tree. Fallout-Arcanum-Elderscrolls The second favorite would be strict classes with their limitations, multiclass to build your own variety. Fighter/thief/mage/priest, so.. if you want a paladin, pick a few priest levels and then some fighter and so on.. PE already has a lot of classes, some of them a kind of hybrids already, add in multiclassing and you've a potential for disaster. I'd like to see it pulled off, but kind of hope they won't even try.

Even in D&D3 rogue had the highest DPS.. provided the hits connected and he was flanking. 2E rogues only had the... was it backstab, that worked only for one hit. Which is something I'd prefer, but I'm old so there. I'm expecting PE rogues to be as accurate as fighters, do as much damage, but have talents to help with flanking and to do more damage when flanking. Not ideal but tolerable. If rogues simply have higher base damage, that's something I'd have an issue with. Ranger simply doing more damage.. are they going to? Or is it ranger + animal companion that together do as much more damage as is the companions share? If it's the ranger doing more damage and the companion does plenty on top of that, then.. it's going to be plenty of damage.

Oh yea, the way cutscenes are usually (as in bioware usually) used, is as a silly plot-hole-plugging-device. The enemy boss, having just lost the midway-semi-important fight, suddenly stops fighting, proclaims the inevitable doom for the party and runs away unopposed, the party – being suspended in cutscene – is unable to give chase and has to watch helplessly.