TrashMan

That's more of a player problem. And there is always a limit anyway. The main problem is if it Is abusably grindable. Take for example JA2 - all skills increased only by use. PROPER use.

And may I ask why? You expect every places in the world to have the exact same culture? No, but I don't expect them to mix to that extent either. A Madieval world is far more compartmentalized than the modern one. There was no huge migrations and mixing of ideas and communications. Especially since half the cultures and creatures in FR are taken from myths/cultures that didn't even exist at the same time. And even moreso because it just feel wrong and stupid - enough to completely ruin the setting for me.

How rare you want them to be? Personally, I liked the feel of Baldurs Gate 1 the most. Magic items were rare and special. By the time I reached the game end, I didn't have a magic item in every slot for everyone. It just seemed too silly for me. Almsot like every magic item worth something is gravitating towards you. You come into town loaded with magic gear, carrying several bag of magical extras. Magic kinda loses it's impact..it's not that magical anymore when you can't take tow step without stubbing your toe on a magic item. When you read fanatasy novels, the characters there usually don't have that many magic items either. Usually one or two signature ones. A good, well-crafted steel sword shoudl serve one well the entire game. 2-3 (no more, it starts getting silly. DA sucked in this regard. In what sensible world would you see bronze, iron, steel and titanium weapons be used at the same time??) different sword materials and qualtiy can give variety (altough the differences would be small) without needing to be magical.

Yes. A thousand times yes.

I play Pathfinder and find that what you say is very difficult. You practicly have to build select feats and focus everything to get a diplomatic fighter. Which is not good. Since it takes you 2 point to raise diplomacy by 1 level compared to a bard, you spend a whole lot of points for little effect. Now I know what you'll say - just get a skill focus feat. No. Why should I? It is stupid that I get a penatly to skills and I have to waste a feat jsut to get rid of it. Why should diplomacy be a penalty? Why should ANY calss have a penalty to ANY skill? Being diplomatic has nothing to do with your class. It's a social skill. And how much your character socializez depends on your background. 1 point in skill = 1 point in skill for every class and every skill. It's simple. It keep the playing field leveled and allows for much more freedom in character creation. Now you might be wondering - what about skill-based classes like rouges? What about them? They are already a DPS monster because of stupid backstabbing. What more do they need? If you want, you could give them extra starting skill point in specific skills, so they get a head start in some skills. But that's all they should have. I'll give you an example of problematic builds. In a recent Pathfinder session I wanted to create a specific character - an orphan who fell int othe wrong crowd early on. Componded with the poverty that struck his village he started to ssteal. One very unfortunate incident led to the death of his friend and him being accused of it, promting him to flee the village. He survived by latching onto a group of forest bandits, basicly being their little servant and even engaging in robberies with them. Untill the entire band was destroyed ina raid, with only him fleeing and resuming banditry alone. Up untill he tried to rob the wrong person, a renowned swordsman who beat the living snot out of him, but didnt' kill him. Insted he showed mercy and brought him to the paladin order, where he was trained and set forth into a new light. Now you see the problem - the character neded to have some basic bluffing, survival and street skills - all of which are not class skills for paladins. Even with inital trais carefully selected, I'd have to waste enourmeus amount of feats just to make this character work. Made even worse by a paladins low number of skill points. I hate the way classes are so rigid. People want ot enforce that false "uniqueness" at the expense of character freedom. There was never a good explanation as to why X class is so penalized for skill Y. People end up playing classes, not chanracter. Because any character that diverges fro mthe stupid class stereotype ends up being unplayable. I like the sound of that.

No. XP for solving problems, not straight up killing.

NO. Makign a mish-mash of every culture, mythology, style and everytihng is bad, BAD idea. It's one of the reasons I started to hate Forgotten Realms. Throwing everything in a blender ins NEVER a good idea. NEVER.

Oh gawd....feminists... There goes the neighborhood..... And people actually funded that project? "pay me to play videogames nad make vidos like the ones you cna already find on YouTube anyway".. What sheep. What mindless sheep.

... thatis pretty much what evil is.

Wh? I don't remeeber any such character in WNW2...

There is a problem with this kind of evil. It is a compelx and multi-staged process. Actions taken with a specific purpose that the developers can't possibly know. Actually creating and implementing long-term plans in the game is...difficult to say the least. It's not impossible to make a intelligent evil playtrough, but it would probably follow the developers plan to build a slaver empire, not your characters.

Turned 31 today. I guess I'm now official an old geezer. FAvorite RPG? Oh...a difficult one. BG1&2, Drakensang :River of Time, ToEE, Fallout.

Hm..never heard of that True d20 system. Have to look it up. Thanks for brining it up. I always had a big interest in modding and game systems, so this will be an interesting read for me. That said, I dislike collosal HP accumulation mainly because it's unnecessary, doesn't make sense and creates other balancing problems. Also, it's far less immersive. I see where you're coming from, but I dont' see why classes have to be so restrictive. It leads to palyers roleplaying a class and not a character. Which, for a ROLEPLAYING game, is very bad. And partially because many restrictions dont' make sense. Why SHOULD a thief/rogue get double skill point bonus for social skills compared to a fighter? By what logic?

I prefer the "camp" idea of Dragon Age.It kinda feels closest. Has that tight "family" feeling and makes sense...but it makes sense for Dragon Age. The BG2-like option is also good. Give the party NPC some life. They have places to be and things to do. But to have a singular meeting place (like the inn) is a great idea. Even moreso if one can give that inn some of that "home" atmhosphere. By having the party NPC's interact there a lot. Just a in-game cutscene showing them all sitting at the table having smalltalk adds a lot to the atmosphere.

I remeebr them all. All of them.

I prefer the vanacian systme honestly. Not only is it more tacticla and rewards preparedness more, but it also given the gmae gravitas. Having to rest, but the area being dangerous - a tactical decision. With no mana and HP that replenishes after each battle you have ot make some tough choices. And clearing that dungon when wounded and low on resources and thus making every resource count even more importnat - you just can't get that feeling anymore. Furthermore, given that in modern games you enter every battle at full strength, then changes the battle dynamic. Because of this the enemies/monsters ususally suffer from HP or number inflation. With the old system, even weak enemeis cna be a threat if tehy attack you when your'e wounded and tired.

I don't want any scaling. I don't want weapon scaling, level scaling, hp scaling ,enemy scaling... nuttin.

OP I support you 10000000000%. Form follows function. I want swrods and weapons that feel like they were made to be used in actual combat. Funcitonal armors. Well-balanced swrods. Greatswords that aren't giant slabs of metal (tehy are actualyl quite nimble). Two-handed axes and hammers that arne't oversized and that don't use the same animation as a greatsword. THIS: Is a two-handed sword. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iOutRhR10pQ Not the crap in many other games

Enemies should drop whatever they had on them. Pack rats might have a problem with that, as there would be too many items for them to take, but that is their problem. If the enemy wore armor and you killed him, then chances are that armor is not in a good shape anymore. Furthermore, I'd probably add armor size - an armor made for na elf won't fit on a human without re-fitting. Heck, even an armor made for a human might be very uncomfortable on another human. Hence why I would have such armor have a penalty to their effectiveness, untill you go to a blacksmith and have it re-fitted for you.

I think the question refers to the PC and his romances, not the general romances of everyone else. Of course the characters populating the world should have their own quirks and emotions - but the quesiton is - does the PC have to specificly be romance bait? I mean, what are the odds that if you travel with 5 people for a month, half of them will fall madly in love with you? It would be interesting to have a flirting option, only to have the party NPC turn you down, hard.

Since when do you need all that? I don't ever recall "aligment" immunites or neededing to have a weapon of specific aligment. Slashing/piercing/blunt are VERY rarely immunites and more often damage reduction effect. Elemental immunites are rare and when they do happen they do make sense. A fire elemental? Other than that I see no problem really. A smart character will always carry a spare (and if he's smart of a different damage type), so there really shouln't be a problem.

Erm..what makes you think levels and classes are opposed to what I said? You cna have levels wihtou having HP inflation. Also ,yo ucna have classes wihout those classes being straight jackets. for example - I wanna make a smooth-talkign fighter. In normal D&D you cannot do that since fighters class skill is only intimidate. but that is only because class skilsl work by not giving oyu a penalt,y while everything else does. Now immagine if class skills dont' work like that, but insted a "class skill" simply means you get a starting bonus to those skills? So as a fighter you get a +1 (or +2) INITIAL skill bonus on intimidate (non stackable. You don't get it for every level. Just first), but all skills cost the same to increase - 1 point. Same for all other classes. A thief may have a headstart and he may have more skill points, but you aren't penalized for taking any skill. Now suddenly you can have a smoothtalking fighter. Far more flexibility when creating characters. EDIT: Oh. Almost forgot - a RETREAT OPTION.

Why not? There's a time and place for everything. Who sez that the PC has to boink someone in the time span of the game? Who sez he has to make a move? Some people flirt for years before making a first move. If you like a character, you can always imagien an organic foever after the game.

Mot modern games nad MMO's suffer from big ego-boosts and pwoer creeps. I wouldnt' cal lBioWare games juvenile...well, their last one are. But the first Dragon age? It has probably one of the best setting I've ever seen. It feels so real because people act like you'd expect normal people would. Especially the mage dillema. I totally see people locking uip mages if they were real.

Agreed. I belive a lot of those problems cna simply be solves by toning hte scale down a bit...and normalizing enemies. Heck, normalizing level/item/power scaling would be a great step i ntaht direction, since "normal" opponents even in small number would always be a fair challenge trought the game - thus not requireing demigods to fight the overpowered PC and his party.