Adhin

The dual-wielding bit makes sense to me in a ranger but that has less to do with the idea of 2 swords and more the idea a Ranger, in many cases would be the survivalist in that they carry what they need to do stuff. So in general a bow, a sword and an axe. Axe are awesome tools and weapons and make 'great' off-hand to swords as it allows you to hook and pull things while also getting the benefits of a sword. Most folks I feel often overlook that when they make rangers and its usually just identical weapons or dual shorties for whatever reason. If you think about it like that, carrying what they need for any manner of situations both to help survive in wilderness enviroments and city (or whatever there 'range' is) things, at least to me, make a bit more sense with how there setup in 3E. The only part I think feels awkward is the forced focus. Lvl 2 in 3.5 your picking DW 'or' Archery. Which, granted, opens up general feats for archery or DW if you so choose but DW is so much more...exhausting on the feats side it was a bit lopsided. Anyway I'd love to see, or at least have the ability to setup a Ranger like that. As for a pet I liked the DnD split in that a druid, ultimately, had the better companion cause... I mean they're a druid. If they can't befriend an animal early on there kinda crapping on there entire role compared to a Ranger where protecting a range can benefit from a companion but it's not exactly a base part of that existence. Definitely hope they allow extensive speccing into any of that stuff, cause I'd love to make a Sword/Axe + Bow ranger with a wolf companion of some kind. I pray if they do companions (which no IE game has done worth **** so far) isn't some timed faky summon. Have it be an actual 'part' of the class, have it sit off to the left side of your character with in group formation or allow pet/summon circles when doing custom formations.

See now that's an awesome history lesson I didn't know about but I've never heard anyone use that term to mean that is my point. I think it comes with a hippy vibe which never made sense to me and I guess i know why It never made sense, cause it doesn't. And the willing to die to protect nature is a trait I view with druids too though less 'peace' and more dealing with how nature would deal with it... angry wrath. That is, in the same situation with in a fantasy setting version of druids would of probably ended up killing a good number of, and ran off the rest of the princes forces. But yeah, putting there life on the line to preserve natures and its balance.

I think PST and BG games did an amazing job, in general, at giving your character an actual tangible, in game background while still ultimately leaving you as a 'blank slate'. Ultimately I feel like you need a blank slate for these kinds of games that allow such diverse choice in race and the like but it can feel a bit empty when your characters always the odd one out of never having any real ties to anything. DAO did it with the origin stuff but I'm not sure how viable that would be for PE. Though picking a background that involves stuff and not getting that pre-knowledge of getting to interact with that also tends to deaden the impact of all of that. For instance if DAO didn't actually 'have' the intros but had you meet some of those characters later on anyway and they act like they know you? Where DA2 failed a good bit often, didn't let you get to know the characters that have known you for awhile before introducing them which causes stuff to feel stilted. Guess what it comes down to for me is there has to be some level of blank slate and if you can't do some kind of intro thing to get you familiar with people who would of known your character (such as family) prior to the bulk of the game... then your better off not going that route and just doing a blank slate. With that in mind going pure blank slate style I still think its a good idea to have some kind of thematic background stuff that isn't so much about your place of origin or people you knew but is more focused around the kind of person you where growing up. Simple things like brutish or charming or some basic bonus to combat or non-combat related things that can also be called upon in later conversations as something folks notice here and there. Though would be nice if they had later growth analogs for most of those.. example is charming or ladies man like stuff, no reason you should be stuck with that type of thing at lvl 1 and not being able to develop into it later so... meh. Things and stuff...

The biggest issue I have with 'tree hugging druids' is that 'all animals love each other' approach you get with hippies flies in the very face of nature its self. It just doesn't... make any sense. Most of the other tropes do though to some extent. I mean you look at most DnD druids, outside of some bad writing and cRPG's and they're not tree huggers in the are days hippie sense. So for the most part I agree with what the OP's saying I dislike the hippie druid because it's just not very druidy. It literally is disrespecting nature, its got nothing to 'do' with nature, its just loving peace which is great and all but nature doesn't give 2 ****s about peace. Seriously, all this animals love each other is such a load of bullcrap majority of the time (always exceptions, duck and cat best buddies thing). Also the whole animals only kill to eat? Buuulllcraaap. Bears will kill **** that's in there territory, play with its corpse, tare up and leave its carcas. Most 'prey' will kill stuff, violently, and leave it there. Nature is a crazy, violent, but wonderful and beautiful place. Tree Huggers ignore the crap outa most of nature for the sake of love man, peace and love man. That bears doesn't give a crap about there love, hes gonna maul there face off and go eat there garbage. Anyway I love druids, so... curious where they go with em. -edit- Also while I use the term tree hugger I find it amusing, cause the term its self is an unbalanced view on nature almost entirely but... every druid would technically love trees as its a part of nature. Guess that was my only point really. Embrace nature for everything it is, not just its beauty and some made up ideal about bunnys spooning a tiger.

That was actually my biggest disappointment with the dragon age series as far as mechanics go. They took a very mildly Diablo-esk approach to the 'base' items in DAO, and went balls out for DA2 with insane base item progression to the point items 2-3 lvls 'lower' then your lvl where crap. That's just bad, bad design if you ask me. I mean they where talking about learning stuff from all there time with DnD and they kinda failed to notice long swords always do 1-8 dmg? I mean Long sword +5 gets you an extra 5 but that's magic... that's not the base items, that's like the best you get. Character progression should mean more then the items, and if you have to go at it with a base item for whatever reason it should be viable. Yeah +5 or there analog to that 'should' be better then a +3 or a base item but it should still be viable to just pick up whatever and go at it. Considering there focus on IE games I have faith they'll take that bit to heart but with how cRPG's have been going that aren't DnD based... im still a little scared it'll get over looked for 'numbers lol'. Dunno what it is about it being on a computer but it tends to tard up the base items for no apparent reason with developers.

I think 'rewards' and xp should be separate and that's ultimately the only part of the equation I feel should be equal for everything, the actual XP delivered out. But I also don't think XP should only show up at the end of a quest, sure might as well be at that point to but should be for progressing in any manner of things. Made it to the second level of a dungeon, xp. Defeated a random encounter, either via talking your way out, sneaking past, intimidate half of em to run or just murdered all of em? Same Xp for 'dealing with the encounter'. Rewards though is another matter and are a tad more... well a bit less important, and, if you have multiple sides to a quest with multiple outcomes it makes sense to give different though generally comparable loot rewards. Maybe ones just money, maybe ones bonus money for being a horrible person. That I get, but when you end up the game 3-5 lvls lower because you didn't pick the optimal path while still doing all the quest, it feels a little more cheated. Anything I've said in posts about XP dishing out thats ultimately all I've been talking about, evening out xp growth irregardless of the outcomes...cause really why should intimidating give less or more experience then killing all or sneaking around? XP is just character progression, which is ultimately meant to match story progression. Being less or higher level at the end of the game should be a representation of how much extra sutff you did in general, not that you picked some bizar optimal path with in those extra things.

Conversation would have to pause combat one way or another, it'll be a different mode. It'll involve picking options. The only way to do it otherwise is via a turn based system or to handle combat in conversation. And to all of that I say no. Combat and Conversation are separate systems and should be handled separately. Outside of a purely turn based game, or doing everything via voice command (which also sucks balls) there's no real fun way to do that. In either case your newer example instead of good/bad wouldn't require to tie in the 2 systems outside of a basic scripted event. And there is a good chance they would rather use the scripted event in a more universal method otherwise that whole wood elf thing would end up being a giant chunk of content majority of people wouldn't see and would only later learn about this hidden content that requires a lot of drastic measures to get into. I guess my point of all this is, they don't need to be the same system to do some of the major points your saying. And there is little reason to allow 'starting' up of a conversation mid fight. In the end all the instances where it would be applicable would require specific scripting in either way, and it'll all end up being specific story points. So just... let them do it how they're going to do it instead of trying to merge two systems to get the same thing done, more work for no greater pay offs pointless.

That sounds like a system that could get in the way and would ultimately only be useful against humanoid enemies. It's kind of interesting but I imagine most of the social skills that can double as means to avoid some fights will be fights that only start 'with' conversations (or have scripted mid-combat talking prompts). That and random encounter stuff where you get a choice what to do depending on if you get ambushed or not. In either situation i can see reputation + skill being taken into account for what your doing. In either case its not the kind of thing I would want attached to 'every' possible fight with a person, and, ultimately feels like it would be best served with what I said above instead of part of the every day combat. Also this whole bad guy good guy thing screams of black and white morality systems. Also there is no reason a 'bad guy' and another 'bad guy' would turn into a buddy cop movie. If they're really that revolting of a person they'd more then likely just try to kill whoever it is regardless of that persons moral outlook. if they want to throw into some story point the 'bad guy' asking you to join them and that is literally an option it should be just that, a player choice option.

Just to throw this out there but the IE games where your second option, not third. You could not, and did not always loot 'everything'. It was based off the creature/person involved. So it was, ultimately, restricted. Just when it really mattered you have full reign over the targets full equipped equipment. Good example of rogues, often you'd just get a short sword or 2 from them instead of their leathers and any potions... some other stuff was randomized like gold. Either way I like IE style, it made sense but was sometimes limited depending on the kind of enemy you where facing. Mooks rarely dropped all there stuff, for example, where as a pack of adventurers you'd get the full inventory. Also like Skyrims to an extent so... I just picked 3, since IE is kinda close to how Skyrim handles it but ultimately is actually the 2nd option. -edit- Biggest issue I have with skyrim is close to what someone said in here but for a different version... stealing there 'candlestick'. Some NPC carried some super bizar **** on them for no apparent reason, and that ultimately came down to a randomized misc inventory placed on a lot of NPC (especially vendors) that I feel had no real business being there as loot options.

Yes and no OldRPG, the kind there talking about is the rare subset of phobia victims that literally can't play the game once a spider hits there screen. Jump up away from the computer, turn it off instantly, can't watch all that stuff. Spider phobias one of the most common considering being waring 'of' spiders is imprinted in are brains as is (they're all poisonous after all). Most phobia just would rather remove it from the game (and I don't think they should be pandered too for the sake of it) and others literally just can't play. One's that can't play are rarer though, and unlike colorblind people can still ultimately learn to deal with it. That's really the only folks I think should get some kind of special catering, the colorblind. Cause ultimately they can't 'get over it' to put it in the most irritating and assholery way I can. Takes a long time to actually deal with a phobia, it's not some movie over night BS. But you can deal with it, and running away from it in a video game sure aint gonna help. I'd rather spider replacement, if they feel they want or need spiders in PE, to be a thing for mods. Also, why the **** would you want to replace giant spiders with kittens? Spiders bad, murdering kittens good? That ****s backwards man lol. I mean ok, I get it, cats and subsequently kittens are vile evil creatures bent on are destruction, but there 'adorable' (though extremely evil) things. Also they can't really hurt us so it just makes all there evil plotting more cute.

I don't think its about limiting abuse or trying to 'stop' abuse but making it so that abuse doesn't give any giant gaps in advancement or advantages on the abusers part... outside of just straight up cheating of course. I think the issue comes in when the temptation 'to' abuse something is so heavily in the abusing favor it almost feels like the only way to play. Saving any time is something I agree with and can't stand save points. But both BG game, and DAO for that matter, where built with encounters in mind to literally kill you first show around. A lot of those games where built on the premise you'll die via ganking, gain pre-knowledge of the encounter via reloading and out-gank said encounter. That's just kinda bad implementation that's requiring a constant reload or constant rest mentality. I guess kinda what TrashMan has been saying but for semantics sake I'd re-word it to, a well designed game shouldn't matter much if its abused. Mostly because once you get into the idea of it being 'hard' to abuse... well, that's where RDM comes from to try and make crap 'hard to pirate' and it just ****s on everyone else instead of folks going out of there way to abuse stuff. Two different things, I know, but it's a distinction I think that's important. -edit- Ahh just to re-iterate on this it has NOTHING to do with 'other' players habits, or that someone 'else' is going to abuse or cheat via a console/trainer or whatever (though this is about abuse not cheating). It's specifically about the pushing desire some design causes to try and force you to do that when you'd rather not. Some folks don't have issue with that, others do, I usually have less issue with it after I've played the game a few times, though considering how many games I've played now its generally not much of an issue. Either way it's not about it being 'balanced for everyone' in away that means I care what others do, I don't. It's about trying to promote even play style with out making it seem like you 'have' to rest constantly or 'have' to reload every 5 minutes. Ultimately that comes down to difficult and challenging gameplay that's fair. Opening a door with 3 fireballs from mages you can't see 'at' the entrance that auto-kills you is... just bad encounter design (that's DAO mind you). Forces you to reload and fireball **** you can't see... just bad.

Yeah jiv, that's actually the reasoning behind XP via progression/quests not kills. To open up play styles so folks don't feel the need to murder everything in sight for the sake of maximizing level growth. Which has nothing to do with limiting powergaming, just evening the playing field. Power Gamers will still do every quest to maximize there XP in take, I know I will.

I like my giant spiders to be of the more magic variaty, like Phase Spiders. Though often times normal spiders as monsters tend to be kinda weak and exist as fodder. Think the only time a spider as a monster was a 'serious threat' was.. well BG. Skyrim to some extremely lesser extent depending on difficulty, player level and where they encountered said over-sized spider. Either way I don't care to much one way or another but I don't think a phobia should be as big of a consideration. I get that it's (quite literally) an irrational fear of something (even something you have every right to be scared of a little, like some spiders). But I'd rather spiders be in as canon fodder then not be in due to a sub-set of a sub-set being incapable of handling game spiders in an isometric-ish game. But that has more to do with me not wanting **** censored in any manner which, generally, can be fixed by 'not writing it that way'. So yeah I guess just put em in if it makes sense, or don't. Meh...

Unique twists are great but I want SHIFTING. Gimmeh Meh shiftehs! I mean, Shifter PrC is a great example of something that would really fit with this soul idea they got going. By the time your level 10 in that PrC your character is literally a walking (or floating) soul that changes there vessel into whatever is required. I mean that's kind of there identity at that point, there soul, not there physical being as that's so fluidly malleable. Not saying let us turn into every monster we run into but I'd love to see animal shifting or maybe some more monster-like beast shifting thrown in as options for Druids. Druid/Shifters are some of my favorite classes in RPG's and I always get mildly disapointed when a druid lacks any interesting shapeshifting options. Often times its just wolf a bear and some kinda pig to have something 'different', but they're rarely as useful as just using a spell. So if they have it I pray it's implemented well and is a viable thing as a main stay for that specific character combat arsenal. ...yay druids.

Guns 'eventually' eliminated plate armor. The kind there talking about did not and it took quite awhile for all plate armor to just stop being used. I mean we're talking into the 1700 is about when it really started declining, and the Wheellock was 1500. By the time armor stopped being used widely, Wheellock wasn't being used much. Add to all that people being capable of magic, creating explosions with 'out' the aid of science, large monsters, and... frankly guns being developed into are era and we'd still be using plate armor and swords. They'd just be a **** load more advanced since it's not just the basic of what works best vs people. Ultimately your best bet for taking out a mage is stabbing him. But that's not what PE is on about, and I think the inclusion of Wheellocks kinda nifty. I'd imagine they'll have weapon set stuff like IE had but, hopefully, a little better implemented. And as has been mentioned I kinda hope you can fire the wheellock then use it as a club till it gets reloaded. Would be an interesting 'once per battle' scenario per wheellock (keep having to not type rifle heh) then it turns into a melee club of a sort. Would be pretty awesome, make a lot of sense for priests as they've mentioned. Also, printing press.... yeah crazy stuff, talk about prioritizing things weirdly... but I just think that makes the world more interesting in the end.

It's not about eliminating power gaming, they can't do that. That's just doing stuff as efficiently as possibly while building your character as powerfully/efficiently as possible. That'll always be there. To remove that you have to remove all the RPG mechanics entirely. at which point you still have speed runs. None of that is bad, none of that is what they're trying to remove. The stuff they've talked about is the feeling thats often there that, maximizing everything feels like the only way to go about things. If we're talking about the whole XP not via kills to stop the 'feeling' that doing things one way then doubling back to murder everything to maximize XP then still not seeing it. That wont stop power gaming, it'll just even the playing field a bit more for folks who don't like feeling that need to kill **** they'd rather not.

What Blondy said, also Forsworn? The dudes where half naked as well. I also think Dragno's Dogma did a good job at that, they let you just kinda go at it however ya wanted, plenty of incredibly covered fully armored women... to running around naked with a g-string on. Though some of the lady cloths a dude couldn't ware (like that g-string) but good bit of it they could do the point of creepily nekked. Ultimately I don't think it'll be an issue for PE.

No idea, any success ultimately would be a benefit either way on either side though. And they'll keep doing games for publishers as they've said, companys to big to only do these smaller funded games (which can still be huge games). Personally I hope if does really well and they get more 'time' on other backed products. Some of there past games just didn't get the time needed for polish and the ends usually suffer for it. -edit- Best example I got is KotOR2. Was great up till the end then it felt like an animated story board.

From what little I know im gonna go with the archery short girl. Cause... um... yay short girls? I dunno I know absolutely nothing about them except the Cipher, and he sounds kinda interesting but... yeah.

I'd wait and see. Expansion will be done if if they make enough off the main game its self and use that money for it. So a second game entirely... definitely, for me at least, would depend on how that came about and who's publishing. Ultimately the companys I tend to be wary of as publishers (not 'to' many) only tend to 'really' screw with games if its one of there big projects they're using to compete with something else like that. A second game could also be worked on first and seeked publishing backing second, its happened before, granted more in the 90s then today due to the way the market is. There are plenty of publishers out there who wont screw with the thing much at all, more so if the products is mostly done anyway. Granted, that's not really funding the project at that point but if they could do the first one with about 4m, a fund throwing in lets say 10m is small potatos comparatively and I just... I don't see it being that big of a deal in the end.

Yeah I think a good example are the transformer movies, that's considered a 'tripple-a' movie, a blockbuster, its BIG. They're also kinda poop. Some of the best games, and movies, don't have a giant amount of funding and huge funding doesn't mean it'll be a great game. It just means it has a lot of money behind it. In fact, while having at on of money can be a great thing, it can also be a detriment to the games ehh, I dunno lets call it soul. You get people who don't know much about games looking at charts trying to push things in away that ultimately dilute what could of otherwise been a great game, or cut a project's development time a bit short when it needed an extra 3 months. I think for what they're doing, it'll definitely go a long way for making a modern IE-style game. A damn long way.

I haven't actually seen any detailed information on 'all the races' but barbarian will probably be my first. If i get the ability to mix classes it'll be Barbarian/Cipher. Beyond that I'll make a druid, try to make a necromancer. That's... basically the 3 main things I enjoy right there. If I can make the mage, priest or cipher into a demonic oriented like warlock that will also happen at some point.

I picked no cap but I have no idea what your example is, kinda confused by that. I don't want unlimited XP, but I don't want there to be a hard cap (least not one anyone could ever hit). So, kind of like DAO, For the most part games designed around the idea of you hitting 20, but you could potentially just hit 23. It allows for room to grow when you go all out and do everything in sight. It's also nice to have progression capable of continuing, even if it gets cut or winds down once you hit the pseudo-cap, the 'target' general level you'll probably be at the end. So yeah no idea what your no-cap example is but not 'unlimited XP'. No cap on levels, but a general limit on actual xp gain. If they do that it also works well with expansions as its already setup to allow for further progression, they can add more skills in or ones for late game only but it would be pre-setup to allow that.

Not really, getting XP for completing a quest doesn't make it more fun and my point still stands. The only reason I would say XP via progression (quests or areas or whatever) vs per kill is they're more universal to the different experiences. I've seen people grind quests they hate, just cause it gives XP. They'd never do them unless it involved XP. The only reason they 'do it' and kind of enjoy it was because of the XP. If you enjoy combat, if you enjoy the story, the quests, the exploration, the XP becomes a bonus at that point. And ultimately XP exists as a means to progress through character levels. Sorry but what I said, I still hold by, to me at least its completely true. I'll do story and quests even if I don't get XP, I'll kill even if i don't get XP. I do it because I want to, because it's something my character would do, and it's because I want to experience the story. XP is just progression, better it be spread equally for all play styles and paths through the game. Putting it per kill is counter productive to that. This is not a new idea, this is ultimately how its been handled before computer games started trying to do it... and they've found that way causes a lot of bizar play habits that're counter to the roleplaying.

Said it before but XP from killing stuff doesn't make killing stuff more enjoyable unless you already don't like it. At which point your wanting something extra for doing something you don't like doing. Ultimately there is no reason to give XP per kill other then to allow kill farming. XP can be rewarded by progress, not just quest completion. Weathers thats in a dungeon, finding an interesting place, completing a level... figuring out how to get past some magical door. There are plenty of places to pepper experience that gives you the progress mid dungeon or mid quest that doesn't start to value things as being better then other things. And ultimately that's what they're talking about specifically. Not that XP per kill is a bad thing, but what it tends to cause and is associated with often, doesn't force, but entices people to play in away that makes little sense in the context of whats happening. On top of all that most peoples example are the idea of a random encounter. At which point I think rewardless of how that situation plays out, get the same XP. You don't need XP per kill, you just need XP for 'defeating' the encounters. Weather thats because you killed everyone, scared some off and killed the remainder or snuck around... same XP for all. And as for reasons to kill that aren't XP related (or story), well, coin and items. Beyond that they're looking into crafting at which point random animals and other such things become reasons to tangle with some over-sized spider. I think when they say you'll want to invest in the social skills they're talking in a much broader term then in relation to avioding combat. Ultimately they exist for other reasons then combat, and they just get applied to some situations that 'involve' combat (such as avoiding it via some means). But in the end being charming doesn't exist to get you out of combat, it exists for generally other non-combat roles and just can help you avoid it, as an aside bonus. As you may guess im in favor of XP being dished out more evenly, irregardless of how you play and not via direct kill values. Perhaps having it tagged to a random encounter or quest related, or just exploring an area that happens to have enemies you can engage in. Ultimately there are more rewards then just XP, and they often help define your character more then metaphorical number of your characters combat career. Though I get the desire, at least, to what some kind of 'bonus' for fighting (outside of items and whatnot) but it's not needed, I've played plenty of games where I don't get XP per kill (that in fact have a leveling system) and frankly, they can be great. ME2 failed, mildly, not because they used a system like that but because it was all at the end of missions instead of via progress in missions. That 1 change fixes all manner of stuff, and that basic lesson can easily be applied to a more complex game like PE (and has, well before ME1 was ever released).