Eiphel

Exactly this - It's my preference that there not be named 'kit' style sub-classes at all, either, and you can just sculpt one through your choices.

I really, really enjoy in-universe signposting and landmarks in games. I think it's important to make sure the player knows where they're meant to be going (unless of course it's actually a mystery in-universe), and they aren't neccesarily always going to suffice by themselves, but they certainly add a lot.

Personally, I've always wished for a more realistic or at least balanced and functional economy in RPGs, but basically as long as it's not broken mechanically, it's fine. Other than that I thought this was a good update and I'm in favour of your decisions.

But that was the whole point of the OP - That they wanted the 'evil' options to be morally complex options, not juvenile ones.

But... it literally is, on a fundamental level. That's pretty much Josh's point. If they make the game a shooter, you can't play it as a city-builder, obviously. When it gets much more subtle than that, though, everyone seems to act like it's something entirely different. If you're playing Tetris, and you can just press a button to alternate between block types, then that defeats the purpose of having to adapt to whatever block type you happen to be given. As Josh said, if they design the game to let you do that, then doing that isn't wrong. Their designing the game that way was wrong. The design is literally self-defeating, as the only obstacle between you and the solution to Tetris is the fact that you can't choose which block shape you get and when. The block shapes are already designed to fit together to form a solution, ultimately, so once you can choose your blocks, the entire game is broken. Tetris is, of course, a very simple game, which is why it makes a good example. It can be compared to a mere component within a larger game (like a cRPG). The point being that, the developer is in no way obligated to design a game that grants the player the ability to break the game's own design. This is sort of veering off topic here, but there's a very good book about games called The Grasshopper: Games, Life and Utopia, and it offers an interesting perspective on just these sorts of points.

Raziel always seemed to get by.

I definitely support this sentiment. My favourite crafting systems are ones where experimentation, deduction and discovery are rewarded.

All sounds pretty straightforward, but none the worse for it. I just want to raise one point: I've always found it really bizarre and silly in games that you can just wander up to some blacksmith's forge, elbow him out the way, and start working. I'd really appreciate it if you actually had to gain the right to use these locations from their owners (options could be owning one yourself in player housing, paying to rent the use, included with board at inns, or being allowed access from a friend, for a few examples). Oh and, mentioning no Skyrims - I mean names - can you please make sure crafted loot is balanced against the overall loot progression in the game. I'd like to be able to find loot in the field which can compete, rather than being able to simply craft items objectively better than anything anywhere else. Where's the point in recovering a legendary longsword if the one I made and enchanted is just better?

It's hard to evaluate this news without knowing more about resting and healing. The first thing I thought of was, if one of your party is on the brink of death, surely you'd need to stop anyway, regardless the higher health of other party members?

Yeah, I was talking about liking them more. So you played all the characters in BG in one play through? I never did that because I would only lose xp on them. I haven't actually played BG1. (Horror of horrors! I've got a copy to play after Arcanum though.) But no, not neccesarily all in a single playthrough, depending how many there are, how the game is set up, etc. If I do a second playthrough of a game though I will usually specifically focus on a whole new team.

I ran a pathfinder campaign quite easily with just the OGC, which is available for free online.

Else we wouldn't be getting Elves!

You're under a bit of a misapprehension - Stamina isn't a resource used for your moves. It's your health.

Torment, of course, had a quest that was in no way dependent on you being a heroic, moral, good guy type. The same for New Vegas. I prefer stories of that type, where your motivations are more personally drawn than some grand universal imperative.

So what you are saying, when playing a game you would pick companions you don't like if there betters ones for you to pick. I'm not totally sure what you're asking - Better how? Better as in I like them more? Or better in terms of mechanics? And the answer is I usually try and use every single companion in a game if I think they're all well developed. I'll have my favourites who are my 'go to' team, but I'll try and shuffle in other companions when it feels appropriate because I enjoy a well written character even if I don't like them. The difference is, even if I don't like them for their character (in universe), I can like them for their depth and quality of writing (out of universe).

So far the updates have pretty much shown exactly the kind of game I was expecting, yes. Only in small, minor areas of individual mechanics or such have I raised an eyebrow. Overall this was exactly what I expected. If Obsidian hadn't incorporated the impact of a decade's further evolution of the genre into the fundamental heart of the old IE genre, then that would have been what threw me. I feel like there is a lot of very, very hardcore nostalgia on here, and a lot of heavily entrenched resistance to any deviation from an old formula - a formula that was far from perfect. Project: Eternity is, I am sure, going to feel vastly more in the spirit of the IE games than anything else since them. But it's not just going to BE an IE game, exactly as it had been developed ten years ago. And the reason is, that would simply not be the best such a game could be. Things have moved on, and mostly, for the better. Obsidian never said they were going to make a direct facsimile of the old IE games. What they said is they were going to capture the spirit, the feel, and the intent of those games. They're making the game now that they would have made back then, if they had today's experience. That's the point. If the IE games were being developed today, this is how they would be being made.

Connotations are exactly what we want in a name, at least connotations of things that hold for all characters. This is what I was going for with "Godscarred": The Goldikes are the result of a god tampering with a soul for whatever reason, and their physical differences are a manifestation of this tampering. I imagine that most godlikes, one way or another, struggle to deal with the consequences of this. Some can handle their scars and come out stronger for them, others can't and are destroyed by them. 'Avoid any specific connotations which might not be true for the character.' 'Connotations are exactly what we want in a name, at least connotations of things that hold for all character.' You manage to make agreeing with me sound remarkably like disagreeing.

Personally even characters I don't 'like' in the typical sense, I still fully appreciate if they are well developed. I'd actually consider if a disappointment if none of the companions didn't evoke some reactions other than liking from me. I feel like a really good array of companions will include enough diversity that you should always like a good number, but meet one or two who don't quite click for you - as long as they're not clicking due to who they are, as opposed to how they've been developed.

Something simple and functional like 'changed' might ultimately flow better when used in dialogue and such. For a more jazzy name, I think it's still important to avoid any specific connotations which might not be true for the character. (I mean, I am assuming from a game balance perspective godlikes are not just better than normal races.)

'Godlike' also has the connotation of superiority. Even something like 'godtouched' might be preferable. Godlike being an actual word meaning 'on the level of a god' it doesn't really feel appropriate. Hopefully it'll be tweaked along the way.

Not at all - You could have another melee DPS in the party and move them up to the frontline, retiring the fighter to a support position to be healed by a cleric or paladin maybe. You're prolonging the fight and lowering your certainty of winning, but that's not the same as 'die'. It's 'go for the win right now' versus 'prolong the battle'. And having more stamina handy can encourage the former.

We don't know the system they're going with, but speaking proportionally, I always find it pretty preposterous when in the average course of adventuring you can DOUBLE your stats or similar. Given you're only focussing upon people who are at least able-bodied enough to be adventuring in the first place, the range of human(oid) ability is not that wide. Unless of course the fluff for one of the races is that there actually is a tremendous diversity in their capability, which might be interesting. My preference would be that the 'best' adventurer not really be more than say 33% better than an 'average' adventurer.

I would be curious to hear you expand on this point. IMO, its nothing more than a case of diminishing returns. We know that 95% of attacks against the player will cause damage and that all damage is dealt across both Stamina and Health at some ratio. We also know that the one and only way to replenish Health is to rest, which can only be done at specific locations. With that in mind, it seems obvious to me that regardless of Stamina regeneration or abilities, your Health can only go down. So it doesn't matter at all if you are at full Stamina if you are one Health hit away from dropping dead. Imagine a tough encounter though - Your health and stamina have both got beaten down a fair way, you need to retreat from the front line to recover. But if your stamina regenerates, maybe your health is still low but you have a decent stock of stamina. This fight has been really tough and you reckon if you just keep up the DPS a few more moments you might triumph. With your decent stamina, you reckon you can survive, just, so you go for it. There is definitely a bit of an incentive to go for longer which might tell upon your HP.

Now I'm imagining 'A last breath' as a spell component. That'd be so flavourful.

I'll be particularly interested to see how a godlike wild Orlan gets treated by various different groups. That's gotta be an interesting one to play.