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TheMufflon

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About TheMufflon

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  1. That reasoning requires the imposition of a non-diegetic object (i.e. the "quest") on the story, and therefore not be rationalised a priori. Only after the quest has been constructed and imposed on the story (as opposed to the quest resulting from the story) does your reasoning make sense. Hence it is a post hoc rationalisation. That this is what I meant is quite clear from my original statement, and if you had taken the time to understand my argument then (instead of assuming that I picked my words "randomly") you could have saved us all some time. And if toggling XP had anything to do with what I wrote about, that would could have been relevant. You propose to find every instance of possible redundancy and add a (from a diegetic POV) contrived reason for why it won't work? That sounds like putting in a lot of effort just to annoy the players. Belligerent moralising? Oh, please. Video games are entertainment. People play them to have fun. Two of the things that are fun in RPGs are (a) advancing through the story and (b) mechanically developing your character. One thing that isn't fun in RPGs is (x) doing the same thing over and over (a.k.a. grinding). If we give rewards for using tools, then it holds that doing (x) (e.g., solving the same quest in all different ways or killing everything) leads to (b). This puts the player in a bad position: either do (x) (which isn't fun) to get (b), or don't do (x) and get less (b) (which isn't fun either). This isn't very fun for the player. That's why instead of rewarding using tools, we reward achieving goals (i.e. (a)). In this scenario the player isn't conflicted, because all the fun things lie in the same direction. Whereas your solution is apparently to scream "It's not a bad game, you are just playing it wrong!" at the players. And now for the fun part: responding to all the petty insults! If your posts contained anything but straw I'd grasp at that, but it seems we are both sh*t out of luck in that regard. ​Indeed, you seem a credible connoisseur of pig-swill. Oh, I understand just fine; and I agree: you would make a awful game designer!
  2. But the "quest-giver" (and I hope my inverted commas convey all the loathing I feel for that term and the mechanised gameplay that comes with it) isn't the one bestowing the XP reward, so there is no reason that lying, cheating, and betraying the "quest-giver" can't also be a quest. Generally I hope P:E stays away from the usual trite quest formula of "person A asks you to go to location B and kill/retrieve/talk to someone/something and when you come back he gives you some cash". Quests shouldn't be an end unto themselves, but rather be an abstract framework for the story.
  3. But you had to resort to post-hoc contrivances to make them exclusive: an "Everyone Dies" deus ex machina* and non-diegetic effects of a switch between the arbitrary states "hostile" and "friendly". Implementing it for just this quest is clunky, implementing it for every quest is impracticable. The fact remains that as long as you reward XP for killing, the optimal SOP will always end with "... and then kill everyone". Yes, but with the introduction of XP using tools, what the quest is about and what the player wants is no longer the same thing. The player wants to use as many tools as possible to complete the quest, this leads to redundancy. The fact that you don't have to kill everyone to complete the quest doesn't matter, because killing everyone is a now a goal unto itself. The same goes for stealth and diplomacy. *Which could easily be avoided by simply leaving the Eye/putting the Eye back again the first time, since you will get it when you trick them anyway.
  4. Simple. The optimal path is a combination of the Combat Path, the Stealth Path, and the Diplomatic path. E.g., first you sneak in and rob the secret room, then you sneak back out and approach them diplomatically, and once you've taken over the cult you kill everyone. This yields the following rewards: 30,000 quest completion XP, 15,000 XP for killing the cult leader, 12,500 XP for finding the treasure room, 10,000 XP for tricking the cult, all the loot in the entire complex, all the cult leaders items, and your choice of quest reward item. It is by far the most profitable solution. This is why rewarding XP based on using tools, rather than achieving goals, is a bad idea: it encourages the player to use more tools than is necessary to complete a task, resulting in redundancy.
  5. I like having separate boxes for first and last names, that way the game can differentiate between them and NPC can refer to my character by either or both as appropriate. Having a set surname doesn't really make sense in a game where only a few lines will have VO.
  6. I've always considered things like doing your tax returns and going to bed early because you need to get to work in the morning to be mature themes. I wonder if PE will explore either of those.
  7. TheMufflon

    Music

    I'm post-rocking out to the new Godspeed You! Black Emperor album: 'Allelujah! Don't Bend! Ascend! Those of you who enjoy 20-minute instrumentals full of slightly-out-of-tune violins should definitely check it out.
  8. Since that poster was anonymous, I can't say with complete certainty that it wasn't her. But is seems very unlikely. I doubt that, too. But there are more than two sides to this issue. What I disagree with are specific claims about what all women want (and don't want) from gaming, and I take issue with generalisations about half the world's population in general.
  9. Please don't make assumptions about me or my friends. My friend does not "attribute extremist views to women", she just happens to have a gaming preferences that differ from what you claim women prefer. That is because on the topic of attributes of female video game protagonists, we pretty much agree.
  10. I prefer to organise my posts systematically. I find that posting each response directly after the statement I am responding to avoids misunderstandings. While flow is important, I find that erring on the side of clarity is better for the discussion.
  11. No, my argument is based on the fact that people who don't know what all women want shouldn't make claims about what all women want. That is very much an intrinsic feature of logic. ... without statistical evidence." Though in this case it wouldn't be necessary for all people of those groups to agree, since it being objectionable to a subset could be enough. Which is why referendums were held. And (as opposed to what you posted) the in first referendums (in the US) more women voted against suffrage. What does that even mean? The truth of both these statements seems to be obvious: just as you are in no position to say what all women want you are in no position to tell me what to do. I fail to see how what ever these nebulous persons you chose to clump together into "people" say has anything to do with me. For an accurate definition of ad hominem, see my previous post. Pointing out that an argument constitutes an ad hominem is clearly an attack on the content of that argument. I do not see any of my posts containing arguments against the character or motivations of any other poster, so please point out the relevant lines in the relevant posts as I have done for you.
  12. Saying that someone has made a hypocritical statement is not an ad hominem, it is an attack against the hypocritical statement. An ad hominem is an attack against the character or motivation of the person making the argument. You are correct in that asking for a respectful tone is not an ad hominem. These, however, are:
  13. I typically don't bother replying to ad hominems, but I suppose I can make an exception. I will go so far as to say that Moonlight Butterfly made some disingenuous assertions about some dear friends of mine. And I really dislike of hypocrisy. Speaking of which... A good rule of thumb when maintaining a respectful tone: if all you are going to post is an ad hominem, don't post at all.
  14. Not at all. In fact I can (and do) think that there are many things that are wrong with what you have posted, such as: (1): The implication that there are only two possible positions in an argument. (2): What might in grandiloquent words be termed the tyranny of the masses, i.e. that the opinion of the majority counts for everyone. (3): That speculation about what the majority wants should ever be done from a position based solely on anecdotal evidence. (i.e. you don't know what the majority of women want, and neither do I. Thus; speak only for yourself and let statistics speak for others.) (4): Hypocrisy. (5): How readily you reach for the same tired ad hominems. (I should note that none of my previous posts have covered this particular disagreement.) None of which are the opposite of what you think women want concerning video game protagonists.
  15. Absolutely. They are insular because they are a self-selected sample of the population. By which I mean (for those who don't like statistics lingo) that people tend to avoid communities they disagree with. But for a lot of people it is the only game they like. Some women want that. Some men want that, too. If that was my thesis, that is what I would have said. Your statements about what women want went quite a bit further than that.
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