BaronVonChateau

But doing what? Moving everywhere at walking speed? I'm playing on an old rig, and a good amount of my playtime is spent on loading screens and quicksaving. (Almost at 80 hours of play, and currently in Twin Elms, almost finished Caed Nua.)

Got a solution, better than nothing but still a little messy. The price to pay is the deactivation of further Steam Achievements for your savegame : activating the cheat modes does that. To get the quest working somehow, get back inside Lle a Rheman, activate your console (usually ~ , otherwise you can set up the console key in your game control configuration screen) and type iroll20s : this will activate the cheat commands. Then, type in : additem quest_item_bronze_weapons 1 This will add the items to your stash. When you get out, a delegation of Crucible Knight should greet you. It'll mean the quest is back on tracks. The actual journal will only get updated once you get back to The Dozens, though.

Got the same problem as everyone up there. Got locked out from Doemenel's and the Knights' path. Basically stuck. Have a workaround been found?

I'm quite overwhelmed, thus far. The game is a real joy to play. -Keeping in mind that this comes from a guy who didn't like D&D system that much, the combat and character customization are very satisfying. Allow to experiment without committing your characters to a single playstyle, in part thanks to the fact that Weapon Specialization include a wide range of weapons, instead of one type. As well as modal fighting style. -The non-binary "alignment system" goes well with the game mature treatment of a non-manichean storytelling. -Despite my initial reservations on what I heard during the Beta, Justin Bell's work on the soundtrack is outstanding. -As for the writing, in the sense of presentation, rythm, characterization and setting : Obsidian guys know their trade. Strong moments and underlying themes, convincing and intriguing characters. A bit overwhelmed by the exposition, though, since I didn't do my homework and have some troubles keeping up with the lore. The Game manual could've been a little more fleshed out, in that regard. -Haven't seen much yet in the multiple quest resolutions departement, by didn't bother to explore it. Still early in the game, also. -Where the fruck is the accuracy bonus for Dexterity ? -Scouting and finding hidden loot. <3 In short, what I've seen thus far makes me wish Obsidian would only work on in-house projects. This thing feels like it was made with inspiration and dedication. 5/5 would back again.

Just as I hoped, with its implications of collective un/consciousness, the chanter concept is Jungian as heck. I am joy.

Anything that pops during play because you've awesomely slain whatthousandth enemy, or because you have simply reached a milestone during your play is absolutely horrible. I'm not that much an immersion fan, but this kind of pop-up makes me feel insulted. It's just as if I was reading a book in the subway, reading a particularly well-done characterization or development, only to get interrupted by a random stranger giving me a lollipop because I just finished the 100th page. Even a non-invasive page at the end of the book which'd describe all my achievements while reading (REACHED 50th PAGE ! READ 30 PAGES IN A SINGLE SITTING !) makes me feel infantilized. No thanks, playing a good game is its own rewards. This said, there are games who does this Achievement thing very well (like Amorphous+ : a free flash game where achievements are used as a kind of currency to buy upgrades). Achievements doesn't just not work well games with a story, or ambiance. If they aren't a piece of the gameplay, they are useless.

Sounds like a canine variant of a leucrotta from AD&D. As a DM, that was always a fun one to use on the players. Shiii... It *is* close to a Leucrotta. I started with the idea of a hyena which - instead of laughing disturbingly - would cry and whine to lure preys into thinking there's a human suffering out there. I crossed it with a mynah and worked from there. Shiii...² : it is actually an even older myth : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leucrotta So much for the collective unconscious.

Myhenah : Solitary lupine predator of considerable weight, the Myhenah often hunts near small human settlements where it waits for solitary preys. It has the unique ability to mimicry human speech up to the tone, words and voice. Because it learned to use this unique ability to lure out humans, it usually prefers children or teenagers as its first victim. Once it finds a reckless prey straying too far from the settlement, it usually disables him before torturing him long enough to enrich its vocabulary and vocal knowledge. After this, it usually prowls around the village for two or three days more, luring other people out - usually family and relatives looking for the lost individual - by crying for help with the child's voice. Whether it leaves because it has eaten enough or because it perceives the village's agitation is up to interpretation. Since those hunts often precedes winters, some thinks the Myhenah is preparing itself for hibernation. Once identified, the creature has been naturally subject to the most vehement abhorrence. Entire campaigns have been conducted to exterminate it. It has now become very uncommon and mostly forgotten, to the point that the most distant communities are now - again - very vulnerable to this scourge. Some observers have reported that their mating process includes reciting their entire litany of moans. Some have theorized that a long litany is the indication of a skilled hunter, hence, a suitable mate. The whole process have been described as extremely nerve-wrecking and said observers have been notoriously known for dramatically increasing their daily alcohol consumption.

PS:T, Shin Megami Tensei III : Nocturne, Shadow of the Colossus, Star Control 2, amongst others. There are other games I'm hesitating to put there, like Alpha Centauri, Dragon Quarter, FFVII, Dark Souls, Battle Isle 2, Kotor 2, 9 hours, 9 doors, 9 persons. When I look this list, the only line I can draw between them is how memorable they are for me (memory being heavily influenced by emotions.) All those game are doing something special, and they aren't doing it in a superficial way. Whether it's gameplay, story, presentation, there is something the designers did and didn't stop at the first layer : they dug deeper, and they make sure all the games components were working with each other. It's that special fusion that makes games special, at least for me. Drawing as many lines between as many aspects of the game.

People joining the PC must have a pretty solid reason for doing so. The reason should rarely be dependent on the PC's personality or identity, because it would cheapen both the NPC's motivation and ability to make choice for him/herself. On some touchy and critical matters, it's important that they voice their disapproval, but it would be even more relevant if instead from speaking, they acted. There's this "Pulp Fantasy" RPG trope that the player is some kind of God descending on earth, and that every companion is a good or bad-willing witness of everything the player does, seldom doing anything against the PC. "I must judge of your behaviour by myself, so I'll join and see if you are worthy" ; "I kinda like you, so I tag along" ; "You're a natural leader, I'm putting my life in your hands" ; "I owe you my life, I'll do everything you say" ; "You're BROFIST THUNDERFAP's cousin ? I guess I'm going to help you then, since we're related" ; "You're going to NEVERDAFFODIL CITY ? I'll tag along !" All of those are pretty weak characterizations, because it means that the reason the NPC joined you is something contrived, and often vulnerable to every bit of emotional reaction. Of course, for someone who joined with such an unsteady motivation, if the PC is not exactly their wet dream of a leader, they're prompt to leave in disgust. Those are not even motivations, they are pretext. So, what's the deal with it ? DRAMA is the deal. You have to manage the companions precious feelings, have all kinds of philosophical agreements with some of them so they don't squeal every time you violently finish off one of McVILEVILLAIN's begging-for-his-life-minion by popping his head with your special WHACKAMOLE HAMMER. Enmity can be a perfectly viable relation in a group, and if the NPcharacters have a sound logic, motivation, philosophy and reason for joining, they can stomach most of what happens and deal with it how they choose to. For example, a lawful character could step in and impose a duel with the player to decide the outcome of a choice sensible to them, in the same manner a more chaotic character could propose a head-or-tails, just as another would ambush the PC to have a "little chat" with him after the deed. Thing is, the player has been the one making all matter of life-or-death decisions in RPG for a good amount of time now, for the sake of dear "GRAY MORAL AREA AWESOME CHOICE". Let him sometimes be the one who have to accommodate or back down sometimes, accept the fact that being the leader in a group is not being some kind of (benevolent or not) tyrant who have to arbitrate every goddamn event that happens in his farting perimeter. Last thing : when the group you're in have to face regular dangers along the road, I suspect its members would value each other's skills far more than their philosophical views.

My voice also goes for a limited number of slot for maintaining buff spells. As for the Stamina cost, I'd favor a temporary penalty to Max Stamina, depending on the quality of the buff spell. Since the goal is to stop bothering casting buff spells again and again, let the mage cast it once and decide when to scrap it in favor of something else, or generally improve its durability by limiting the amount of spells he's maintaining.

The patrol and migration ideas are very good. Overall, the possibility that some patrols or reinforcements can sneak up on you while you're already fighting another enemy group is interesting and gives more weight to scouting, sneaking and preventive trap laying.

Finishing moves are pure fluff and doesn't add anything to the game except for some "WOWTHAT'SOBEAUTIFULLYBRUTALI'MCRYING" effect. Even if I liked very much the special death animations of Fallout 1&2, I could go without. From my point of view, good sound design can easily provide the satisfying feeling of brutality that goes with a critical hit/kill.

Jasede mentioned Krondor's riddle chests where you have to scrolls a limited amount of letters to answer of the riddle. If I'm correct, the amount of possible letter for each slot was limited to 4, which solves or at least reduce the mistakes one could do by typing the answer. On top of that, they were purely optional but provided a nice distraction to the game itself, while still being consistent with the setting and gameplay. Also, I think that language is a non-issue. Even when I was a young Internetless unhappy non-english speaker, I would pick up a dictionary and translate the words while playing TES : ARENA and World of Xeen.

I prefer the fourth option. It is a good balance between replayability, non-Diabloesque dependancy to random drops and a good challenge to the player's adaptability. I'd like to avoid replaying the game with a determined mindset, preconstructing the party's evolution by jumping to powerful items milestones. A touch of randomization may lead to rethinking the strategy you were using and vary the game experience.

-All team selected, one or two distant mob, one pressed key, one click. Archers and Crossbowmen pepper the mongrel while melee fighters stay in one place, waiting until the creatures come in close range. OH THE JOY I'M WEEPING. -One key, two of my casters cast a separate spell in coordination on the target : the "Lower Fire Resistance" spell takes 2 seconds of casting, while the "Fire Dart" takes 1,5. The "Lower Fire Resistance" mage begins chanting immediately while The "Fire Dart" caster automatically wait 0,6 second before beginning his own incantation. :ThisIsBeautifulCat.Gif: Or something like that.

Since we don't have a solid grasp of the story, its stakes and setting, Obsidian's lead designers are the best suited to judge which composer is the most fit for the job. Fan feedback is useful for some matters, but I'm convinced its field of possible influence stops where the "author's vision" kicks in. So yeah, I love Mark Morgan's work, but there's no way I feel I could have an enlightened opinion on who should do "Project Eternity"'s music.

Either one is good, as long as there is the possibility of stumbling on an undiscovered place, either because you just happened to pass by or because you deducted from some fragment of information that something *might* be there. Star Control 2 style. It allows for intelligent exploring. So I'd prefer something open-ended, like Fallout or Arcanum's World Map - with the added possibility of getting lost into content-packed wilderness. BG 1 did it in a restrictive manner, thought. It pushed the player into a systematical "let's click this location and sweep this map" mindframe, where discoveries and exploration are not decided by deduction or adventurous/dangerous wanderings, but systematical combing.

There is a dangerous and sometimes empty trend which consists of systematically including matures theme in a RPG. As if blood, sex, moral grey areas, political intrigues and various depictions of social anguish were sufficient to bring a game into the realm of TRUE COMPELLING AND GRITTY STORIES. Nowadays, these are regularly vaunted in interviews, sold as features as if their inclusion alone was sufficient to tell a good story. Maturity is more a matter of writing quality than topic selection.

I'm not really gung-ho about houses in RPGs, especially in the "I'll put the head of that DRAGONBEAR I killed above that AWESOME MAHOGANY nightstand I crafted by CLOGGING ten pieces of wood with PURE SKILLS" sense. Whether a house is easy to use for the player and his/her party would imply that they are not in direct danger, it somehow defeats any feeling of quest urgency or danger. Also, a quest implies the idea of a journey : there is a strong narrative regression if the player periodically "feels at home." At least I do. But I could deal with something special like the Planar Sphere, or Chrono Trigger's "End of Time". If that was up to me, I would design an event where burglars come into the player's home while no one is there, rob the PHAT LOOT the player LOVINGLY stashed into ONE chest before doing unspeakable THINGS to the furnitures. Following quest would includes the party having to deal with INNOCENT young adventurers who bought part of said loot, yet refuse to give it back. This said, I admit that a home is a formidable convenience in many games.

PS:T, KOTOR II and Fallouts for the writing. NWN 2 and Arcanum for the character building. Fallouts and Arcanum for the setting.

I somewhat mod, so I would be awesomed by the addition of modding tools to the game. Depending if the players "feel good" in the game world (like they notably do in Morrowind, or other TES) it can help insuring the long-term popularity of the game.

Great post OP. You summed it up very nicely. From my point of view, one the numerous things that made PS:T so great was the use of its game world to tell and reinforce its story. Many side-quest were parables which resonated with TNO's journey, giving it flesh, illustrating its stakes on a smaller scale while giving insight about how Planescape's world is working. There is a reason why PS:T's sidequests are interesting : they are not a diversion from its main content : they directly flow from and back to it, bringing something along the way - either because you discover something TNO did in his past lives, either because you're learning some surreal bit information which - you're not sure how yet - will connect with something else later. For that reason, I'm very glad I played it when I was a teenager. There is a very strong "you don't now jack about the outside world" message in it. While it is very true that the main quest is about the inner self, how it grows with experience and with being confronted with uncanny sights and unconventional views, there is also a strong focus on the outside world, which acts like a (distorting) mirror to the player's choices and TNO's actions. It may be far-fetched to add this, but it's not by accident that PS:T is a RPG and not an adventure game (even if it's RPG aspects weren't all that predominant) : it's a story about growing (up). In the same manner as TNO sometimes learns BIGASS experience just by saying "WOKAY, I HEARD DAT", the player may learn something about himself and how he relates to the world. Because the game is unconventional, I still feel it addresses something within us (even if we are bitter old salarymen and women) : the small chunk of cerebral stuff that gets all jumpy and excited when we learn something new. So yeah, to connect this to Project Eternity : I'm kind of expecting Obsidian to bring us into a fantasy world, where they will waste our preconceptions in the most ruthless way.