TCJ

Drakensang 2 did something like this. Your "home base" was a boat and every now and then you'd keep a trophy from a battle and it's appear on the boat for the rest of the game. It didn't actually add anything to the game, but I thought it was an interesting touch. Sort of a "This is what I accomplished" reminder, if nothing else.

How about complete anarchy? Or if not, can we at least have the option for the PC to cause it? It's just so stereotypical that the PC is there to prevent some major catastrophe, to stop a war, to save lives, to build houses for the homeless. Why not START a war and then watch it unfold with gleeful satisfaction? That said, I'm fine with whatever government systems they have for the game as long as it's not ridiculous.

Mentor: Every game always has one of these types anyway. Cynic: What fun is it if everyone agrees with you? You need the person to be cynical about your decisions and also to be there to say "I told you so" after you did something stupid. Trickster: I think of a trickster as not someone who plays useless pranks all the time (though pranks could be included) but also someone who uses his imagination to pull of unusual tactics against his enemies. Someone who doesn't think sword and magic all the time.

A nice touch is that enemies might use anything they have on their person, including health items. So managing to kill them quickly would result in the reward of some nice potions, but if you take awhile to bring them down, you'll find they use that time to drink the potions and make your fight harder and the rewards less.

I don't really care one way or the other on multiplayer. I tried it with the BG games, but it didn't work out so well for me, though it was nice for a create-your-own party, but I imagine that something like that could be put in without the multiplayer. However, if they choose to put it in, I wouldn't complain. Modding tools? Definitely! To me, it makes the game worth more and extends the life quite a bit, plus it helps keep a community of fans going... fans that will be ready to support the next endeavor of this type. Multiple language support: I don't speak a bunch of language so English only is fine for ME, but I can see it being a nice feature for those who do not have English as a main language. I'd think that they should get enough extra business from adding in extra languages to justify the time/cost of adding it in. So... why not?

Speaking of carting around, has anyone else around here used the human chain method in BG1/2 to move around large amounts of loot? I used to form a chain across the map and pass the loot from one character to another until I finally got the stuff to the edge of the map, then I'd do world travel to the nearest place with a store. Yes... all that for some gold that I really didn't need.

Just stay away from half dragons, eh?

Me too, but it never stopped me from taking the gold. Never look a gift wolf in the mouth, I say!

Sure, put the riddles in. I found the ones in BG2 to be very easy, but that's also because you only had about eight options to answer. Most of them didn't make any sense whatsoever, so then you just had to pick out of a couple that did make sense. For me, it was more about the flavor than the difficulty.

If a player gets a house, I'd like to see it used for a side quest or something rather than just storage and a meeting point for NPCs. How about getting robbed while being away or something like that? I just think that if there's effort going into a house, there should be some content besides simple inventory/party management.

Maybe Robin Hood could have a cameo in which he finds out that robbing from the rich isn't always so easy... at least not when they are PCs.

Getting him would certainly bring back even more memories of BG2. "Every Hamster has his day!"

I would vote for some of the bandits having names like Freia Expee and Mora Lutte. In all seriousness, moving away from stereotypes is something I have no problem with. I always did wonder why bandits would appear and attack someone who has more gear on than the entire army combined. Maybe once you get to a certain level, if bandits appeared, they'd drop their jaws once they got up close, then run away for fear of their lives. Or perhaps have a dialogue option so you can intimidate them or something. Just don't make them throw themselves upon the PC's sword because it's just what bandits do in fantasy games.

You got a home in NWN2. It just didn't last long!

They should drop their equipment for sure. After that, they should drop items that they'd likely be carrying. Humanoid? Gold, gems, odds and ends. Animals? Pelts. The great thing about the BG series was that you could always grab the armor from enemies that you killed so you could sell it (assuming you could carry it). I've seen other games that don't provide that option, or eliminate it on certain enemies so you can't get the nice stuff. If an enemy has a nice stuff that they use AGAINST you, then they should drop it if they are defeated. If not, at least make a plausable reason for why it can't be looted.

Sure. I found having to change tactics in BG2 because some monsters had immunities to be a nice alternative to using the same strategies over and over. Sometimes I'd find my non-fighters being the ones trying to deal out the damage while the usual tanks would have to satisfy themselves with taking the hits but not doing any damage. There were some flaws (which I found quite a bit) in that there wasn't a warning on a lot of the monsters on what could or could not damage them, and not being a lore geek, I didn't know all that stuff beforehand. But, as someone mentioned, having in-game hints to at least give some idea wouldn't be a bad thing to implement. Considering the lore will be entirely new and not based on some pre-existing setting, I think that would be somewhat necessary anyway. I usually had one main weapon for each character and one backup weapon, or two main if they did dual wielding. Of course, I usually had a few dozen weapons stored in a bag of holding just in case I needed them (rarely did!), but that was mainly because I'm a pack rat in games. It wasn't nearly fifteen weapons per person, but it was plenty to get me through the game without using cheats.

I'm not too much into time limits, but done properly they can be alright. For instance, Fallout 1 seemed to work out okay with the original time limit, but perhaps that's because the time limit was really much, much more than was needed to complete the quest, so in reality, you could still take time to explore. There were a couple of time related things in BG1, too... for instance, Minsc's actions if you didn't do his quest soon enough. I'm against them when the time limits are unknown (Commandos 3, ugh!) or too short, or just don't make sense. Use them sparingly and in good taste and they can add something to the game.

I like the isometric 2D painted backgrounds. The art in the BG games (I don't have IWD) was superb and made the game that much more fun. In comparison, I never had as much fun looking at a 3D map (CoD, NWN2, MoH to name a few) as I have with exploring the BG maps. The latter tends to lose its appeal quickly (in my case) while the former retains its appeal for years and years. I do like that screenshot from the Witcher, but it still doesn't have the same appeal!

If they were done as they were in BG2, then fine, have them. However, considering the way romances seem to have gone in recent games, I feel it would be better to leave them out entirely.

In BG2, you could just start a multiplayer game and create as many party members as you wanted, should you desire to have a PC-created party, or at least partially-created. Why not re-use that system? Since it's put under multiplayer, it won't be the default, so players will actually be encouraged to play with a single PC and all the original companions.

I'm sure there will be limits on what the people can do. Names (without being ridiculous), looks, personality, class, some direction on what they say or talk about (to be edited by Obsidian)... I can see that being what the person gets to design.

I would really like to see some modding tools made available, with functional tools that allow more options being preferred. Considering that isometric view is how the game will be made, I don't see certain types of modding (like areas) as being quite as feasible as they were in games like NWN2, so for this, I'd be happy with a scripting mod and a dialogue tree mod -- at least for starters! We've already seen a lot done with BG modding, which had no tools (to my knowledge) except those which fans made and they've done quite a bit with that, but having the tools already in hand and not having to do workarounds would make modding that much easier.

I think that only Obsidian staff should be permitted to reply to this poll.

And have a chance to end up like this? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bangt7d9vGA Hence the reason for the crazy face. I wasn't being serious.

Maybe you can add a new $10,000 tier which allows the person to voice-act for an NPC. ...Now that's a bizarre idea! I do like the way BG2 did it for a lot of NPCs.... voice the first line and let the rest be text. Once you've heard the voice you can imagine the rest of it in the same voice easily enough. It's nice to have main NPCs voiced fully, but for lesser ones, the one line might be nice.