RiceMunk

I like what I'm reading there. Especially this bit: As for boobplate, kinda meh but won't make me scream bloody murder. And it's not even horribly ridiculously pronounced (compared to how boobplate usually ends up) so not too bad. Like the character's looks otherwise.

Guys. GUYS. Mushroom people.

It'd be awesome if I could openly disagree with the views of one of my companions while still gaining influence with them by debating said views in a thought-provoking/persuasive manner. I agree with the rest here that if I want to gain influence with my companions, I end up feeling like a slimy politician whop just says whatever he needs to in order to suck up to his "demographic" and then do whatever he wants to when words have to turn to actions. Though the actions themselves may every now and then cause a slight drop in influence, the influence system is often balanced in such a way that I actually still gain net influence through lip service alone. This was even worse in, say, DA:O where I could buy all sorts of baubles in order to gain influence with my companions and then just bribe my way to their good side even if I was talking and acting completely contrary to their beliefs otherwise. I say, as far as dialogue goes, always have an option of going "I disagree with you, and here are my reasons why." when debating stuff with a companion and still gain influence by it. However, not all companions are necessarily impressed by your arguments either because your argumentation is piss-poor or because they're so deeply entrenched in their beliefs that they simply refuse to consider anyone with opposing views as a good person. In these cases making the amicable disagreement dialogue options some sort of a persuasion/diplomacy/charisma/intelligence/knowledge(puppy-kicking)/whateverseemsrelevant-check sounds like a good option. Make the difficulty depend on how deeply entrenched the opposing companion is with the particular issue that's being debated.

I'm a great fan of pacifist runs so if it can be implemented in a feasible and interesting way, I'm all for subdual/non-lethal damage. If I remember right, the way D&D effectively did it that if you attack with a weapon that would normally deal lethal damage (as in, most of them) you can opt to lower your attack bonus (chance to hit) to deal the damage you'd normally deal as non-lethal damage instead. And non-lethal damage leads to unconsciousness instead of death. Also heals faster and a lot of creatures are immune to non-lethal damage and so on. I'm not sure how non-lethal damage could be implemented in an interesting way. Just having a toggle that goes "You hit less often but people don't die now" is a bit bland, no? Non-lethal damage does, however, become more interesting when combined with stealth and all that. Then you smack a person with a blackjack instead of driving a dagger through their back. Would be nice having an option for something like that.

Having a fishguy as a party member would be pretty rad. However, we need to go more outlandish. Gimme a high-fantasy noncorporeal energy being! :D And no, ghosts don't count. They're undead people.

I have given concrete examples of what I can see being the most interesting things, from a perspective of tactical considerations, that would happen in a game with durability mechanics. In this thread I have seen from proponents of durability mechanics a lot of handwavey simulationist arguments on why durability mechanics should matter but no clear, concrete examples. Let me break this down a bit further for you: Imagine a game with mechanics akin to D&D 3.5. Fighter-Joe is a sword-wielding fighter who has specialized in sword-wielding. His attack bonus is +5 and his damage per hit is 1d8+4 Then his sword breaks. Oh no! However, following scenario 1 I outlined in my larger post, he soon finds himself an axe without really any trouble at all. He's not specialized in axes so he's not quite as effective with them. His attack bonus is +4 and his damage per hit is 1d8+3 Would that affect your tactics? It would not affect my tactics. It would be a minor hindrance, not a tactical issue. A tactical issue would be if Fighter-Joe was actually specialized in crossbows and the party ran out of bolts, unable to find any more. This would force Fighter-Joe to find that axe and go hit things instead of shooting at them. This would cause me to rethink my tactics for the upcoming battles. It also has nothing to durability mechanics. It also is analogous to a situation where I run out of other consumables, such as healing potions. Consumables create a tactical consideration because, if you're used to fighting with them and then run out of them, you have to adjust your tactics to cope without them. If Joe is incapable of finding any weapon at all, it would create a tactical issue because generally unarmed combat (except for monks) kind of sucks a lot compared to armed combat. Then we would fall back on the scenarios starting with 2. And I've already listed why I consider them to be more annoying than tactically interesting. Do you consider them tactically interesting? If you do, why? Do you think I missed a likely scenario? Then please enlighten me. That is what I have been trying to discuss. Ramblings about metal fatigue have no relevance in discussions about computer game mechanics because simulating it realistically would take more computational power than the rest of the game combined. Give concrete examples that can be applied in a computer game setting instead.

They add nothing to you. You really think every single thing in rolepalying game should be only super-fun? Roleplaying games exists to roleplay. That means, to give you character a space in which to express himself. Not ot jsut swing sword. You know what I don't find fun? Dying. Thereofre, dying is pointless since it's no fun and adds nothing. Let's remove it. How is sword repair lees "pointless" than healing? But they do have meaningfull strategic value. You just refuse to accept it. You can't seriously tell me that WHEN you arrive somewhere and with WHAT equipment has no strategic and tacticla implications? You can't serisouyl tell me that choosing between risk A and risk B is not a meaningfull choice? If you consdier armor repair a chore, but heling you're OK with, maybe you need to find some other games. Hey, your lack of imagination is not my problem. I have already expressed reasons on why I do not consider durability mechanics to add anything interesting, least of all meaningful tactical elements, to a cRPG yet you keep making vague statements about how they do and invent new ways to sidetrack the discussion. Please either reply to my points directly or ask me to clarify myself. If you have no interest in that, I consider this discussion closed on my part.

It's a matter of balance between realism and fun. If you think implementing a pack-mule-annoyedness-meter would somehow make the game more interesting, please tell me so. Arguing who carries the hypothetical spare swords is pointless anyhow, because my point is that durability mechanics add nothing to an cRPG but pointless busywork. Why is that problem? Of coruse, assuming you find a spare you are proficient with. Or that the spare would be as good as your prefered sword. Why couldn't you kill it without your sword? Both of these replies miss my point. You argue that durability mechanics add interesting strategic elements to RPGs. I argue that at most durability mechanics add minor annoyances and busywork to them. Neither have any meaningful strategic value. I can say that for half the stuff in RPGs in general.... Getting back to town is a chore? And killing the spider queen ISN'T a chore? Both involve going to a location and doing stuff. If you play RPGs where half the stuff you do are chores, you need to find some better RPGs. Also, do you truly equate killing spider queens with sword-repairing trips? I know I would most definitely play the spider-killing game over the sword-repairing game. Unless it's a really nifty sword-repairing game. Having a hard time imagining how that would be so, though.

A valid point but implementing something like that without it becoming more of a hassle and less of an interesting strategic choice is quite difficult. So let's imagine a game where swords break. Fine, what do I do? Well, if I know that my swords can break in this game, I turn my strongest party member into a pack mule (Hello, Minsc) who lugs around, depending on how frequently swords tend to break, half a dozen or so spare swords for my party. Not very interesting at all. Just means I have one dude who carries around a backpack full of sharp implements in case on the implements being wielded breaks. Fine, you say, swords have a high volume and therefore we shall also implement (in addition to the more common weight limits) a limit based on the volume on the item, whether through a grid-based inventory or something more abstract like, say, in Ultima 7. Have you ever played Ultima 7? Hassling around with both item weight *and* item volume is not fun at all, if you ask me. It just adds a layer of micromanagement with dubious benefits in game enjoyment. Anyhow, let's assume that we have found an inventory system that effectively limits my party from carrying around enough deadly spare cutlery to last them through the apocalypse if I so choose because I would have to balance between picking enough food or whatever, as well. Well, then my sword breaks and I find myself without a spare. Faced with one of these strategic decisions, I see the following options: 1) Continue onwards, hoping I find a spare Thinking back on all the RPGs I've previously played, I find it extremely difficult to think of an example where I couldn't find at least one chest or dead kobold from whom I could loot a spare weapon from inside of one or two simple encounters. To be prevented from doing this, I'd have to be in some sort of a... spider cave? With nothing but spiders? Not even a dead adventurer or two. In other words, in most cases I would find a spare. I would mutter in an annoyed fashion, equip the axe from that dead kobold that my friends will kill in ten seconds or backtrack to the site of our rather recent battle with the kobolds and loot one of the axes, because I hadn't already looted them due to inventory limitations or whatever. I make a mental note to visit the blacksmith when I get out of here, even though I would really just prefer to get on with the plot. 2) Backtrack to a place where I can repair my broken sword This really depends on what happens as a result of my backtracking. So I'll split this down further. 2a) Nothing happens. The dungeon will be just as half-empty as I left it when I come back with my repaired sword I sigh, trek through the now half-cleared dungeon and travel to the nearest village and get my sword fixed. Then I go back to the dungeon and get on with my dungeoneering right from where I left it. 2b) Monsters respawn or whatever while I'm out getting my sword fixed I grumble. If option 1 is unfeasible due to inconvenient spider-cave or whatever, respawns means I would have to hack and slash my way through the same spider-cave again. I don't want to kill these spiders again. I've been killing enough spiders today, thank you very much. I just want to find the spider queen and get out of here. However, I know I can't kill the spider queen without my sword so I guess I have to kill some more damn spiders. Yay. 2c) Plot-related time limits mean Bad Things™ would happen if I go fix my sword This means that I would have to make a choice of dealing with the Bad Things™ or trying to do without my sword whatever I came to do in the spider-cave. This would, however, assume that not only did my sword break in the spider cave but that somehow no spare swords would be readily available and I just happen to be on a quest with a time limit on it. Seriously, how likely is that if it's not something that's been pre-scripted to happen? Not very likely. Unlikely random events do not make for any more interesting strategic choices than having my entire party roll nothing but misses three times in a row, if you ask me. 2d) Getting the sword fixed would mean I have to deal with random encounters on the way back to the fixing-place This is something of a mix between cases 2b and 2c. If your slightly underpowered party runs into a random encounter on the way back to the fixing place, what do you do? You deal with the random encounter as well as you can. Considering the usual threat level of random encounters, this likely means that you'll do just fine without one sword. If not, you reload and try again. In any case, nothing particularly interesting happens aside from you getting sidetracked from the main quest by doing some extra chores as a result of your sword breaking. So I guess my point here is that, unless swords breaking are pre-scripted to happen during that one critical moment where it actually matters, dealing with durability mechanics tend to involve nothing but some combination of micromanagement and chore-like encounters. There's no interesting strategy to be found there, only boredom. The only times when I can imagine item durability mechanics posing an interesting challenge in an RPG is when said RPG is of the pen n' paper variety and is being run by a GM both sadistic and creative enough to make the choice of continuing on or running back to town to get swords fixed actually meaningful and not just a chore. The best implementation of durability mechanics that I can think of come from S.T.A.L.K.E.R with its rather strict weight limits combined with heavy weapons and ammo, with the aforementioned weapons also having a durability meter. The strategy here came from not using the really good weapons unless you thought you really needed to because, due to the setting, the weapons couldn't actually be repaired. The rest of the strategy could be summarized as "Oh for f's sake, I have to run back to town to buy more ammo again?"

I liked the way BG2 did it. Failing that, do it the way KOTOR2 did it.

I think we need Logan Cunningham (Bastion narrator dude) to be the voice of the PC's love interest. Which one of them, you ask? All of them. Even the women.

Realism be damned. Running back and forth between a blacksmith or whatever, getting your stuff repaired between adventuring is a pointless hassle. Unless repairing an item has some plotline significance, don't bother with this stuff. You can assume that your characters do their equipment maintenance in the same nebulous period of time which includes activities such as going potty but which is never shown because, quite frankly, it's not interesting at all from a gameplay perspective.

Bumping this because I'm also curious about whether PE will be kicking it forward.

If it has relevance to the plot and/or makes sense in the context, sure why not? Doesn't matter what kind it is then, as long as those requirements are met. If not, don't bother.