Jarmo

I know I went through it smoothly, though I didn't take the Doomguides help, didn't kill the necromancer either, just flooded the village with undead. Mission complete, rewards given.

As for that, I can testify it's not buggy at all now. All patched up goodness. Ship shape and Bristol fashion. Building characters was sort of fun.. but then you were given only 4 characters to do in the beginning. Which pretty much limits where you can go in a D&D setting. Ended yup making a pretty devastating Rogue/Fighter/Weapon Master for my own character, she really kicked ass. But then the support trio.. well you pretty much need a wizard (thought about sorceror, but you do need some specific spells for crafting), and a cleric so I got those. Since I combined fighter and rogue in the first one, that gave only one to experiment with. Picked a Warlock, which turned out a good choice. Pretty bad attacks, but he could haste everybody all day long, so it worked out.

Summons you don't get back if they die would make it exactly one of those assets you never ever use because you might need it later for the even bigger fight. And then you just keep storing that tactical kobold past any usefulness. Still carry it around to the final battle where summoning it would take too much time and it'd die in a second anyway. Just about every NWN module where you were given a summon something 3 uses item, you never use them. Or maybe you do, on a second or third playthrough where you know you can just use it on miniboss 3.

Just finished replaying NWN2 expansion Storm of Zehir (played it through before right when it came out) and thought to share some thoughts, especially as SoZ contains many of the features one might hope to see in PE and being Obsidian work is obviously something they would draw from. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neverwinter_Nights_2:_Storm_of_Zehir ** Will contain some minor spoilers. ** First to get it out of the way, the interface and camera were horrible. After a couple of years pause it took until halfway through the game before I didn't have to continually struggle with the camera. No obvious way to use feats or abilities, constantly forgot how to get the cartable spells or choosing what to memorize if I accidentally closed the window. Traveling in the overland map. Overall, it was good fun. Great to see possible encounters pop up and detour to avoid or take them. Made the exploring seem worthwhile and for once there was some use from ranger skills. Seems impossible for anyone to actually live in a territory though, either jungle or sword coast, with monstrous bands and undead and whatever rushing you every 5 seconds or so. Way, way too much pointless combat. I was overjoyed when finally got the teleportation system fixed, only to be disappointed in how the trips were one way only, giving not half the hoped relief. Locations and encounters. Most of the areas were tiny in RPG terms, dungeons or temples or whatever having usually only a few rooms and most every occupant rushing you from wherever they were as soon as the fighting started. I really, really liked this if only as a change of pace. No clearing mobs one room at a time but one big prolonged fight. Combat. Well this I disliked then. I do use the NWN2 AI on and let most of the party do whatever they want, which is part of the problem. The AI behavior settings were very welcome, though even set in the lowest the spell casters were pretty loose with magic. The visuals of mid high level D&D were the main problem for me, the combat was one big field of fiery explosions from spells and weapon effects, then the losers drop dead. Never in control of anything, just one big mess where you can't tell who's actually accomplishing stuff. Companions, adventurers guild. So you make the base party and later pick up one or two reinforcements. And many of the reinforcements come up hopelessly late in game which is something I'm happy to hear PE is going to avoid. The adventurers guild, which you get into maybe halfway through the game was a unhappy affair all in all. Hearing at that point, there'd be some minor bonuses if I have an all Elven party, or if all the members in the party are well accomplished in ranger skills or other stuff like that, was just disappointing, as almost certainly almost every party was not able to get anything out of there. Something for the replayers maybe. Enchanting and creating items. I remembered this was in and picked a good load of crafting skills which were of no use. Might have crafted one sword or a piece of armor. Generally though, you get your hands on usable ore so late in game, you're almost sure to have already found or bought better stuff already. Enchanting was easy enough, fun and useful. Adding bonuses and damage effects to weapons and armor. Creating wondrous items not so much, needing hard to come by ingredients, the most stupid example being some magic boots which I never got to make. I had the gems and the skins of rare animals, but never found a pair of ordinary hide boots to use as a base! Trade and upgrading your stronghold Added a fine layer into the game, the desire to get enough trade bars to meet the next something was a working way to ensure the willingness to explore and build up the trade network. Building church and orphanage and upgrading the stuff the patrols had was a fine thing, though completely pointless actually. From rags to riches came a bit too abruptly though. Once you have a couple of trade routes established, the income totally dwarfs every other money source in the game. I don't mind that actually and it *was* fun to reach the "money is no object" state, for once. It just came all too quickly once the cash floodgates were opened.

That's a good point actually. So.. let's tie it to character generation phase instead? If you pick weapon proficiencies in when creating your character, it's assumed you trained with the gear of your culture and will then get the minor extra bonuses when using equipment from your own culture. And I'm thinking minor stuff. Like, you're skilled with a longsword. You can also fight with a saber, but not quite as well. But if you happen to get your hands on a damascus steel saber, it's time to toss that old longsword.

The ones you made yourself? Or the few available hirelings that'd take a huge cut of the loot and had almost zero dialogue. Elmo, because of his drunken battle cry?

I basically agree with this and the original post, would love to see something like Vailian getting something like a +1 to hit when using vailian equipment, and maybe some minor bonus when using something like 3 or more vailian armor pieces. But about the knight... if you've trained enough with a longsword, I'd imagine you to make instinctive moves and every now and then try to slash with the reverse side even when you'd suddenly be using a saber or a katana. Or do a lunge without remembering your current hacking instrument doesn't actually have a sharp tip... Wouldn't mean it'd be like RuneQuest, where despite superior saber skills, you're a complete nobody with a rapier, as likely to pierce yourself as the opponent.

Always hoarding them, practically using none but health and mana potions, the others being too specific. One NWN module actually sold health potions in 6-packs, which was neat but i digress. Actually I have nothing to add on subject, but I thought to mention I hate how potions so often come in pint size. I'd rather smaller light vials or bigger multi-use bottles, doesn't even make sense to gulp down a gallon of tiger-juice and expect to be so very agile after that.

Let's assume it's the same actor who'd do the partials.

Samples? And what style? A bit of electropop tossed in might clash with the atmosphere they're going for... But if it's nice and free for real, I'm sure they could use some stuff.

Also, while I agree partly spoken is probably the best of both worlds... Can anyone tell if the actual amount of lines has actually gone down with full voice acting as one might expect? Or did the costs just go up? Because I'd say DA:O has a lot more lines from the companions than BG2 or Torment. Obviously, doing changes and adding stuff in the last minute is more difficult and costly and can hurt the game. But would anyone realistically suggest the game is actually worse, if the dialogue is all fully spoken, than in a game with the exact same amount either partially spoken or not spoken at all.

One thing always bothering me, is how a game makes a big deal about the race and racism, Viconia, Neeshka, Sten. All were pretty much under a death threat wherever they'd go. A drow! Let's kill it! Fetch the pitchforks! ... and then the game kind of forgets the whole thing! After the rough start, there's no problem getting into a town or an eyebrow raced when you appear with a a drow in your party, or an abyssal demon or whatever. That part of the game is done.

One reason why camp scenes were played up so much in many games like FF, NWN2, Mass Effect or DA:O, is you had a big party but only had a couple of them around at any time. Without camp or base system, you might never get around to talk with that totally unlikeable dweeb the game railroaded into your party. PE is going to be different there, all the party at hand at all times, so the importance of camp setting is lesser. Said that, I do like many of the suggestions here and camping and roleplaying the game in general. Party splitting up when in friendly zone sounds great, companions doing their thing alone, maybe something happening? One NWN module (forgot which) had one of your party members hit the bar and disappear mysteriously, which was great. Situations like... yeah, we need to talk about this, but not now with the others listening, later when we have the time.. are always great.

I'm not at all sure which AOE method I like the best. On one hand, I enjoy spamming fire in NWN or DA with friendly fire turned off (and the way everybody bolts around like crazy, it's better be off). ToEE's precise damage radius was also excellent and had a load of fun with that as well. But then.. if you compare AOE effect with something like real world hand grenade... is it reasonable to know you need to be exactly 2,5 meters away to be completely safe? Could some AOE effects have some randomness to their radius? Or shape even? So you don't know precisely how far you need to be to be safe?

As untraditional as it is, I find the color coding to be the most effective and obvious way to do it. Italics instead of color, or bolded for action would also serve.

None of the first two smell to me. I'm thinking of stuff like: - soften the enemy up a bit, retreat to the next room for a quick nap and then return to finish the fight. - cast some area effect long duration spell (stinking cloud or something) to a location you know (because you reloaded) the enemy will appear, - reload every turn unless you hit - fight ranged from a location you know the ai cant plot route to.

Or more to your point. Choose between 5 gallons of water or a sweet bottle of your favourite malt whiskey, which you like a lot but drinking of which will dehydrate you even further and hurt your travel speed. I'm actually strongly in favor of unbalanced companions and making choices. Like... will you dump your childhood friend the crappy fighter bob, in favor of frank the half demon spellsword who is twice as effective total champ, but a total arsemaster as a person. Like... I did pick Sarevok the first time i played BG2 and was SO disappointed he was a total wimp when in my party. (compared to what he was when I was fighting against him)

On the downside, what they came up with looks completely generic. Not bad necessarily, but not memorable either. Also.. did they think they were designing a female character? The trademark opening to see lower belly is there, but now stuffed with armor. And... is that a corset? And... so much mascara? But... after being a jerk about it.. yeah. That's a good rogue set, one of the best ones I've seen. (also a set that screams "I'm a thief" so not ideal for day to day use in urban areas)

.... umm.. yeah. I'd almost write a slightly pointy reply, but the appearance is important. In NWN2 I'd probably have found good use for a competent cleric... but the lady space-frog was such a.... non-babe. Not the key thing in making of a great companion maybe, but... ahh crap it is a key thing. Any links to pre-game Leliana material? Never seen myself.

The cultists are doing something important that must not be disturbed. There's been explosions and loud noises, the patrol sent to investigate has not returned. Something is coming, something dangerous. The bosses position between the device and the door. They are pretty sure of themselves and their abilities, but if there's a battle the experiment might be disturbed. Best just wait, ready to buff up at moments notice. They'll try to parlay once the door opens, if the situation can be defused, all the better, if not, a few extra minutes might be enough to complete the experiment. Yup, I like it. Not one bit too bright either. Too bad we're (most likely) not going to see this in the finished game. As for the shadows, might be best to avoid strong lighting in the backgrounds as far as possible. But looks fine enough to me anyway. The axe of the main boss... yea, that's one pretty huge axe, no slight exaggeration there. But if it's meant to be one big axe wielded by a superhumanly strong bossman, then hey, what's not to like...

Yea, I'd take ME or DA companions over IE era companions any time. But in this forum, arguably amongst PE backers in general, that's a minority opinion.

Well I doubted this, but turns out the best companions poll supports the claim. http://forums.obsidian.net/topic/64210-which-games-have-the-best-companions-what-makes-them-good/ It's not quite "loved to death by 90%", rather more to the tune of "liked by 75%". Still by far the most loved by the forum dwellers. Which is a surprise enough. I'd have expected a more even split by Torment and BG2.

Also to consider. Adding a companion that has stuff to say and can comment on locations or something, takes an amount of work. But adding a companion that can also has stuff to say to other companions, depending on location or incident, adds an exponential amount of work. Lets say you have a companion A. She has 100 things to say to you and 10 things to say to companion B. 110 lines total. Companion B is the same. Now you add Companion C, Not only do you need 100 lines for the player, but also 10 lines to companion A and 10 lines to B. Not only that either, both companions A and B also need 10 new things to say as well. All are at 120 lines. When you come to 10th companion, adding that one extra guy means 190 lines for her and 90 lines for everybody else. And that's assuming no third character butts in to conversations, because that'd complicate stuff further.

The first sentence is correct. If you have fiction where orcs are generally dumb and strong, then they will on average be dumber and stonger than people. If it's -2 and +2, then you can have an orc with INT of 16 which is pretty darn good, but he'd still not cut it as the smartest person in the world contest. But it doesn't pose a problem at all. If orcs in the game and the game world have weaker intelligence, it does cast them in the light of having weaker intelligence, which is correct. Ignoring the stat difference would indeed would indeed lead to an unresolvable schism between the mechanics and fiction... which is why I find it so hard to understand why you would want that, people treating and considering orcs as stupid brutes, but not having that reflected in stats. As for human centric.. we are in fact humans, so using humans as baseline seems more productive approach than using Amaua as the norm. Of course you could use any race, like Elf rolls 3d6 for everything, humans get +2 STR and -2 to INT and DEX, for example. But would that resolve anything?

I can't see the link between a games economical success and sales and the modding community. The likes of BG Tutu probably have some impact on how much BG 1 is played, but even then it's mostly purchased in a bundle with BG2. The number of players purchasing a game to experience something like sword coast stratagems can't amount to more than a rounding error of a percentage point. Some exceptions to the rule obviously, like that zombie mod for Arma 2. Longevity, meaning how long a player keeps on playing the game, is another matter entirely. Theres a new final version of Killaps Fallout 2 restoration project and I'm itching to try it out. Kotor2 restored content likewise. And I wouldn't have kept on playing NWN1 for years and years if there weren't the humongous pile of modules there is. NWN might be another exception, might be even several percent of purchasers buying the game just to play the community modules or experience the persistent multiplayer worlds. Can't believe the boost to be in double digits even there though. The success or failure of PE will be entirely down to how the game is received in its unmodded state. Mag reviews, metascore, general hype, steam visibility. Lives or dies by those. And then there'll be mods to give it longevity.