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Adhin
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Posts posted by Adhin
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Yeah already said it in another thread but I think Vancian system makes 0 sense no matter how you try to apply it to a world. It's as gamy of a game system as you can get. Never feels organic or believable. As basic no-regen mana sytem would, ultimately, serve the same basic purpose with out all the awkwardness and forced 'I only memorized 3 fireballs'. I mean, really? the **** do you only memorize 3 versions of the same thing? Sorcerers make infinitely more sense in DnD, wizards are being controlled by some unseen cosmic hand.
Also I don't like cooldowns. The second you introduce them the second you get skill rotations as the means to combat. Which is far less 'tactical' and far more button mashy. There should be a resource that's required, that resource should be limited. And rest should be required to get it all back. Someone made a suggestion in the other thread about another game that did a stamina thing where max stamina depleted slowly with use, but you had a quick regen on the bar it self.. so extended outtings resulted in less and less effectiveness but ultimately didn't stiffle your ability to do stuff (unlike DnD where your bad-memoried wizard only had 3 fireballs).
So I voted for other, I want a limited resource and spells from different levels (or in general) costing more of that resource. Either it doesn't regenerate or it does but the max value slowly depletes with more use making 'resting' a requirement down the road in either case. Personally I like the 2nd option more with max resource being slowly reduced and requiring sleep to restore. Seems more interesting to me that way, would require less sleeping but still apply that heavy tactical thought to conserving your resources in any given situations since you don't know whats around the next corner.
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Also keep in mind from what we know so far of the story, or at least there overall concept of it.. its less chosen one save the world and more personal story. Now, it may still involve you saving the world but if its anything like PST or BG1-2.. that ergency is entirely molded around you wanting to solve the myster of what the ****s happening to you. At which point, you being side tracked by some other stuff is entirely reasonable.
In those games, any super urgent stuff was... literally int he side quests. Run into some event and oh crap somethings happening! someone needs help, this small village is under attack! or.. what have you. And in those instances your just jumping at the situation,d ealing with it and... that's a side thing. Your overall story, whats 'driving' your character as a whole is less rushed, but still 'feels' urgent as it's a personal thing.
Frankly that's what I want them to do, and if they do end up going with a 'dooms day' thing, that shouldn't become apparent till the end (like with BG1-2). The War stuff didn't really kick up till you where really locked into the end part of the game. Though the whole kidnapped imoen thing kind of was an odd-ball in that as it felt urgent but you had to go make a ton of money just to get to her. Which was there handwaved reason for saying 'go do all the side stuff now'. So in that, BG and PST are better examples... less kidnapping super-early on as part of the main story, more mystery in 'wtf is going on, and why is some of it directed at me'.
Now, time passing, which is completely unrelated to what I just said (but you mentioned it as part of yours).. I would, honestly, prefer time to pass at a 3:1 ratio. Not counting actual in game time-passing events. Such as 'waiting' or resting that pass hours by. To many games, in my opinion, work off the 1 hour = 2 minutes and entire days skip by in 48 minutes. It's just insane how fast **** goes, you can have a single conversation and half the 'day' is gone, or the sun went down and came back up already. With the 3:1 ratio you get much nicer, smoother transition. Was used mor recently on a PW I played in for years in NWN. They used to work off of a 4 minute to 1 hour ratio and that was extremely fast. The 1 hour = 3 in game hours switch changed everything, and it changed it for the better.
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Oh and, 99% of the time, time limited stuff sucks.
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The 'Vancian' as i guess its been called all this time that I've never heard of now, ehh, it never made sense to me. It sounds more like some kinda wand-charge that is, for whatever reason, applied to organic beings. It, ultimately, sounds far more like some kind of bizar, cosmic law forced on existence. That being, it feels to 'gamy' and unless you have a lot of pre-knowledge of the upcoming situation it's, I don't think anyway, to tactical.
Also, they don't have arcane/divine stuff. It's already been stated, and is a HUGE theme of the game is peoples Souls. And, ultimately, that's where magic is coming from - your soul. Your using yoru soul to fuel magic. One could go to say any class they have will ultimately be magical in some way even if a fighter or warrior type is entirely due to passives or some such.
Either case I can understand a basic 'number of uses' prior to sleeping, but that's basically a non-regenerating mana system. Turning the sorcerer into a single mana pooling and giving each spell tier specific costs (like t1 cost 1, t9 cost 9), then adding all slot in a tier as that number of mana in total... you basically get the same thing but a bit more free-flowing. In the end, I think your souls energy your using to fuel your spells (or abilities) should function the same as health, to some extent. Minus the part where you can bandage it after using it.
It's a resource, you use it, when its emtpy you get fatigued/tired. Resting refill it (or whatever system they ahve to mimic the whole 8-hour sleep non-sense). But the forced '3 fireballs' BS is... well its BS. We're not living wands.
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@Trashman: See to me, I would 'love' that kind of system used. Stamina that max-value depletes with continual use. Food/resting (standing around) rengerates it quickly but only rest till restore your maximum cap is great. Put's strain on extended stuff with out heavily impacting direct confrontations. So yeah if any devs are reading this (which, you knw, they are as evidence above) - I'd vote for that system, or something similiar.
Dragon's Dogma actually used something smiliar to that for health bars, really loved that but they put WAY to much emphasis on potions over magical healing for my taste. Granted, magical healing was crucial still, only way to rapidly heal up mass amounts of HP in and after a fight with out eating into your resources. Still, lotta potion chugging.
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Yeah, as far as I'm concerned DnD invented it, and then broke it with 3E. 3E is a very, very good platform to looking at how to do things. Think one of many games have a habit of ignoring that... frankly seeing a mildly more (then heavily more) Diablo item system in DAO/DA2 was... saddening to me. Either case I fully agree though I still want classes to exist. But I kinda went into that heavily in another thread about sub-classes. They should exist, but they should be mallable.
If warrior is there 'tank' class, it should be the best at it, but by a small-sih margin and others should be pliable into that role. Hell you can make tank-mages in 3E. Granted that usually involves 'some' fighter or something close. Clerics can pull off that front-line fighter extremely well as previously stated by OP. Then you got skills being more universal. Yeah rogues where best at picking locks and disarming traps, but for 90% of the stuff, any class could handle it if they went that route.
Personally I love the ephasis 3E brought to your character in relation to other versions, and other RPG's for that matter. The feats you picked and your class combination (if any) ultimately had a giant impact on who you where. As much as I love 2ne edition, it lacks that in extreme quantities.
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Ahh, as per an 'aggro' system its a cRPG thing since a DM or, well, a human isn't behind the enemies. Also position can mean less, even if your physically able to block the monsters. You often lack stuff like grapples handled properltyy or the ability to keep a monster or person at bay with a shield or weapon. Hell even ToEE didn't do that in full and it had a ton of those rules in place. When you lack that level of controle and detail PnP provides in controlling stuff, you ultimately need another system to manage it.
That's where the whole 'hate management' stuff came into the picture. Most Infinity engine games just used basic AI that had them attack the nearest enemy. Everyonce in awhile you'd get certain opponents that had more directed stuff like 'attack ranged' or mages, or would go after priest classes. But... most of the time it was just the nearest dude, and if you had your formation right, that was your front-lines.
It works out to near the same, and ultiamtely if somethings on your mage you run it by your Front-lines so they go after that once you go past them. Having a 'taunt' or 'aggro' based off armor class or class type is just a bit more automated of a system that's WAY more apparent to 'everyone'. Not really sure which one I like better to be honest.
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The store should just be setup like FO3/NV is. It makes it simple. Instead of having seperate menus for buying and selling or having to do them seperate, you get a single window. The window lets you put up what you want for sale, what you want to buy, put up an 'offer' (raise or lower the base price it gives you), have part of that based off a barter or some social skill... presto. You have an actual, realistic, barter system that's existed for thousands of years.
I know folks think of barter as '3 sheep for blah blah' but, ultimately, majority of civilizations 'had' a currency and did bartering around that or in combination. That, and bartering is just discussing and coming to terms on a payment, that can be a currency or some other object. Lotta smaller business (like custom buildin' or pawn shops) still often do that kind of 'trading'.
So I voted for both as well, should be a single menu like FO3, allow us to adjust the bid and see if they'll take it. That can also factor into any kinda disposition they have with NPC liking you or not. Or a town liking you or not, or whatever. Could earn a reputation as being a crude business man for always getting the most out of a deal or otherway around and folks just like ya for constantly selling stuff for cheap. Either way making it a tag stuff to sell, and buy and having that be a +/- thing for what you get out, weather your paying some extra or they are. It's a good system, and hopefully is kept for PE.
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As a side note, the only example you have that you can really argue against 'not' using the countries 'currency' would be tribes. And Tribes living that close to mass civilization would probably take coins in trade but not at the values you would expect. Ultimately while they wouldn't be as useful to there sociaty, it would make it easier for them 'to' trade with the larger civilization around them. And, ultimately, they could just work in a trade thing just for tribes at that point.
In either case a rogue clan/faction or tribes are smaller more situational things. No major civilization has been run with out some kind of currency, and a lot of tribes where known to have rather simple makeshift ones (like beads or certain pebbles).
Seriouslly though 'clans' and factions? Ehh yes, they'd use the countries currency. Clan is just a large family, faction is a damn faction living with in that country, they're part of the overall political stuff... the idea they would, somehow, not use that just seems mildly absurd. Unless, of course, they're some crazed rogue faction out somewhere acting like some cult. In which case they may have there own, internal currency, but would still need that countries currency for outside resource gathering (unless they're the 'pillage 100% of the time' kind).
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Argueing name of a skill or talent or trait, perk, whatever is just semantics. They get named whatever they get named on a game by game basis. And, ultimately, General feats in DnD are actually setup like a skill tree they just simply aren't represented like one. Though you could easily map them out that way if you so choose to. Granted 'Skill Tree' makes it seem like it'll have a start point and all branch out into a single direction but again that's simply graphical semantics. DA2 had 'skill webs' since they tended to be relteively cirular but that's still a skill tree. Any system that has skills, or talents, or feats orwhatever the hell you feel the need to classify them as, once those have requirements involving others of there like you can put it to a tree or web or whatever.
Pretty much every DnD based RPG thus far hasn't though, they just list them out in just that, a list. It's easier given the sheer volume of it all. And as far as infinity games only one to allow any real character customization outside of attributes was IWD2 which used 3.5 rules. DId a pretty damn good job of it to with in an infinity engine.
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a super restrictive skill tree always kinda bugs me I just use skill tree as a means to say a tab or skills or group of stuff. Doesn't have to be linked up, simple level requirement for them would be more then enough.
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Yeah it's not about being channelled, I don't like 2nd edition style of classes. And while I like that you can pick and choose whatever at any point in 3E I'd still prefer a more free-form version of it. A 100% completely classless system always seems to result in to much sameyness for my taste, and often times lack some kind of thing to name your character whihc just always feels off to me. Skyrim, for instance, no title, no class name, even fi they had the system as is and let me pick a class name I'd be happer with it. Its stupid, it really is, but its details and flavor like that, that ultimately make things more enjoyable.
Kingdoms of Amalur (yeah I know i keep bringing it up, most of that games kinda boring) did a good job of having the same be a 'blank slate' and let you customize past that to make each character a bit more unique... no one could do everything but they didn't use a skill system like TES does either. I think a far more expansive system like that, with a full on attribute system like in FO or whatnot wouild do a good job of allowing that level of complexity but I 'still' want a title that I pick, for my character, that isn't tied purely to story progression of some type.
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Yeah, I get that, but I still it should be split up. Ultimately in an adventurer type role they'd call them selves what they feel like, why I'd like some kind of affinity class title we select outside of what we're picking to define are selves skill wise. Then also get titles from organizations you join. Basically, if the only way I can be called a Warlock is if I join a specific faction that I don't actually have any desire to join imma be a tad irritated and disapointed. If that was, however, a class title or, vocation or whatever you want to call it name I got to pick from a list of stuff had specific requirements to say, unlock that class title... I'd much prefer that.
I think ultimately we're just going on with semantics on what to call it at this point though. I'd like getting some kind of title from joining an organization, and I'd like to have my own title that follow normal RPG class naming that's seperate from that. Hell if I know what you'd call either of those, not sure you really have to name them but just giving the player that freedom to pick what they want to call them selves (but actually have some kind of benefit to that) would be my ideal I guess.
Hell maybe not really limiting them to much past some basic stuff like having warrior abilities unlocks all the (or most of) the warrior-esk titles to choose from. Though I could see some being available to specific skill sets such as taking rage like skill unlocking 'Berserker' as a self-descriptive title (with some maybe HP bonus). That's the kinda thing im hoping for anyway.
With all that in mind, I'd say a 'class' is the combination of your self-picked title and your organization given title. Ultimately I feel having it 100% tied to organization is to limiting and doesn't mimic RL as much as allowing the normal RPG-style self-defined class naming would allow for. There 2 seperate extremes, rather meet in the middle.
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As per the knight example (or templar) I think that should be an organization title. Anything that has more of a conitation to being in a group such as that should definitely be apart of a more organized guild/clan thing for sure. I'm talking about more general descriptor stuff like Adventurer or Mage.
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I went and voted yes, I'd go further and say 2 things, 1 regardless of settings it would be nice to have an hour or 2 of 'well fed' after eating 'depending' on what it is, and where you are. Example, if you goto an inn and nab some food auto-well fed cause, its food from an inn, good stuff. If your not in town, out in a dungoen somewhere then survival skill of some kind kicks in and not sucking with that will result in well fed, otherwise you just aren't starving (wood/water meters like FO:NV).
And, of course, 2, it being tied fo that hardcore setting cause, srsly, some folks don't wanna deal with that **** like I do. And hey, sometimes even I don't want to and I love that kinda crap.The well fed thing keeps inn feeding useful at any difficulty, as does using food with a good survival skill in non-hardcore mode outside of a town. As a side note on that inn keeper, as per someones suggestion... I don't thinkt he inn keeper should be automated, least not entirely. I don't wanna talk to him and have it auto spend money. Maybe im saving money and ill feed my self from crap I got off a kill/food I already have. Should be a dialog option with Inn keeper/waiters in taverns and.. yeah you pay 2c and that's the auto-part, fills your meters and your well fed.
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Yeah, ultimately it seems more like, for this typeo f game anyway, animation flare/visual thing over something we'd have any direct control over. That said for melee at least (and perhaps variations to archer/ranged, and mages) doing 'stances' as a general thing I could see being an interesting switch. Both tactically and visually. But that's something that's been in PnP stuff that doesn't really make its way into a lot of cRPG's. ToEE did a looot of the rules for that which I adored. But basically giving a more defensive stance vs balanced vs balls out crazy man stance (rage, rawr) would be nice. Also adjusting how that effects each given style fo combat would be nice, such as 2H vs shield/1h vs dual wielding... speaking of which I really hope they have dual wielding in heh.
Then also keep in mind it'll probably involve monsters often enough, and other general beasts where animations vs humans like that just wouldn't make any sense either. I'd kinda prefer a more generic swing animation like they usually use, and just add in stance animation shifts (with blended swings for that) and animations for dodges and stuff like you had in NWN. In fact the basic animation variation you had with NWN, but in group combat scale would be pretty nice. They had block anims, dodge, all that good stuff. Wasn't exactly the best but throw that into isometric infinity style stuff and I think that would work out real nice like.
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Yeah though I don't think a group or faction should have to big of an impact on my choices in character development. I mean, ultimately, that's more of a title and would be nice to get an ability or 2 (with a passive or 2) for that but I wouldn't want it being part of the actual character progression. To me factions are story related character growth. I've always viewed combat/social skill stuff of my character to be more of a manifestion of the type of person they are, generally irregardless of whatever faction or group hes associated with. Though in some PW in NWN RP stuff groups one is associated with always ends up being what you use to say what you are, or what people often refer to you as.
As an example my favorite character I had up till I just stopped was Kurn, was a Barbarian/Psion/Fighter. He didn't call him self a barbarian, or a fighter, I refered to that part as a 'fury warrior' but the psion part is a little more apt name and he'd use that as a descriptor when folks asked. Ended up joining a Psionic order and becoming a Master in that group so he was a Master Psion (egoist oriented as some may guess). Very oriented around blood/physical stuff.
I think, group or otherwise, it would just be nice to be able to pick say... a personal affinity that happens to have class names to describe them, Warrior, Warlock, or whatnot and the ones available are based off your current character development at the time. That's, as I mentioned before, like Kingdoms of Amalur but less... bulk, more specific. I mean if all your doing is going heavy melee, not really varying from that path, calling your self a Warrior or Berserker if you got some rage stuff would fit, regardless of your faction. Faction could add a title infront or, or after that stuff. As an example the military again, Rank vs Job role. They refer to you as your rank, but your experience and knowledge determines what jobs you do for your squad more often then not and will often get added onto the end of the rank.
Hope that rambling made sense heh.
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Yeah I agree there, RPG's also use it as a base determining of some other stuff like proficiency with certain things, health progressiona nd the like. Personally I don't think RPG's need health progresion but a boost for being a warrior type makes sense. You know, gaining a class title based off role in an organization or whatnot would make sense, just keep it 'adventurer' or something at lvl 1. That said still doesn't fix the whole role focus you get outside of that, so I still feel like there should be some kinda early choice focus to help... paint your character towards one side or the other to keep that 'im a copy of that other guy' that TES games always give me.
But then I think the whole Warrior/Rogue/Mage thing still works for that, granted could use different names like Bruser, well rogue sitll works, mage could be more soul-theme named due to the nature of magic in this world. AHh i dunno... I still want that, and I don't think Attributes do a good enough job of doing what I want in that light you know? I mean a Barbarian and a Wizard can have the same con scores in 3E but that Barb will have more HP still. He'll just be better at hitting things at a base, fundamental level.
In my current iteration of the mod I work on I actually use 'only buy 1 of 5' Archetype pasives to paint your character in 1 way or another. No hp/mp progression, everyones 150 base. Going Warrior Archetype shifts you to 200/100 (hp/mp) and Mage does the opposite, rest are all inbetween one way or another. I think same type of thing but doing a 'background' that matchs 5 or so archetypes like that would probably fit that role pretty well. You'd still want some way to decide the pool of skils you have though to pick from... second you open it all up 100% to every base character is when you run into the TES issue I have. Or making it so jack of all trades are just not reven remotely viable as your stuck with crap low end stuff across the board (unlike TES where jack of all trades are actually 'master of all trades' heh).
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Actually, going off that, growing ability scores I think are kinda silly. I prefer picking them but I kinda like the FO style of them mostly staying 'as is' and maybe having some story stuff to advance em. One point I was trying to come up with some kinda system that involved temporary shifts in stats to show life-style routines or personal focuses on what your character really prefers (such as hand eye cordination or just brute force) to give a bit of an edge that way.
Be kinda nifty if they do body types and stuff but I know a lot of people like to play freakishly skinny people that have giant strength scores cause... why not? heh so, tying that together could just ultimately diminish folks choices.
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I chose PST since that's the one they actually made. BG2 was 99% a BioWare game (of which a good chunk are at OverHaul not Obsidian...to my knowledge anyway).
But ultimately just to see a fan-funded, no major overhead but there own 2D+3D merger game with an infinity influenced combat/camera party style combat... hopefully with a more PST/BG2 like companion interaction and story complexity? Yeah... ultimately seeing Obsidian throw up something no kickstarter had me more interested then any past games. Though, looking at 'just' the Obsidian title games (aka, not PST/IWD since they where under Black Isle at the time)... I'm interested to see the no-publisher thing kick in. Often times they're schedule for what they where doing always seemed to heavily stifle things.
I mean look at KotOR 2. I Loved that game, really did but the ending just... cut off and went all story board on us. It's like it got forcibly booted out the door at the end and seeing thats just sad. I got high hopes for this... cautiously optimistic hopefuly, but still very hopeful either way. Really just want to play more RPG's in that vein.
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I think that's what you consider a bitter sweet type ending? Bad things happened, ****s horrible, but its overs, the worlds in a better place now in general... but all the bad crap that happened still ultimately leaves things feeling rather tragic. Often times a lot of good comes out of horrible acts... no idea if thats what he meant though heh.
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This thread, oddly enough, thinks gotten me to thinka bout BG and PST story lines more then I have in recent times. I know I liked em but they where really good damnit heh.
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I think BG and PST both did a good job of making the story a personal one with out you being the 'chosen one fo save all of existence'. Yeah in BG1 you kinda averted a war but that was almost entirely by circumstance then you being the hero that has to totally stop the giant war that will destroy mankind! I mean it was even a pretty small scale war as far as that stuffs concerned. Ultimately, BG1-2 and PST where well writen, engaging, 'personal' stories that had some level of mistery as to what the **** was going on. You where always working towards discovering a few things, and when you got close new crap always popped up to muddle up the view more.
That said what RiceMunk said, rather simplistically, Tragic and Happy (and whatever inbetween) can be dramatic, and they can often times not be dramatic. Kinda depends how its writen. But damn if I didn't love the planescape story and just all the stuff in that game... also, said it before in these forums but <3 Annah. Fiesty, red headed, Scottish accented tieflin' girl.... so much awesome.
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Actually, BG2 storyline is something I think is kinda... funny how they handled it. You adverted a war as well, or stopped it from getting out of hand, and that war was the main bad-dudes goal from the outset. But, story wise, it was a backdrop late into it and had 'nothing' to do with you. Nothing at all. The only reason your character was involved was due to your soul being partially mixed with Bhaal's essense as a bhaalspawn. So you kinda had 2, overall stories, the villians and yours, and he just happened to involve you in an attempt to fix his situation so he could get his revenge on somethign else completely different.
You where a means to an end for him, nothing more. And in the end, you stopping the war was just a byproduct of getting your soul back (and, prior to that, saving Imoen). That game had some interesting story intertwining and managed to, at least to me, keep the bigger picture stuff a side track to what was ultimately your characters main goal - dealing with a crazed elf who done you some wrong.
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@Fromage: I agree with that, and actually a bit less crazy and maybe a bit less 'samey' then the type of systemed used for naming in Kingdoms of Amalur used. Idea there was your 'class' name ended up being a 'card' you picked which opened up based off your overall skill point progression. These had passive bonuses and whatnot, my biggest issue with it was you'd find a name you really wanted, say, Warlock... but it was tier 3 of the rogue/mage combination. And if thats where your going you'd ultimately be better off using a higher lvl 'class card' for it.
I guess with in that line something close to that would be a nice way to make your class name shift as you play but not to the same extent as having 7 versions of the same damn thing. Basic example, say you start off as a Warrior, end up taking Necromancy at lvl 10 (in my earlier examples) instead of being a Warrior/Necromancer you get a choice of those 2 or 'Death Knight' and each one comes with a little... minor passive bonus. Then again I don't have much trouble with DnD system of being called a FIghter/Cleric.
Also, the President is always a president.. yeah we can switch jobs, but that experience is always there, and a lot of my examples are the kinda thing people tend to always 'be'. May switch your rank or whatnot as a police officier but a lot of them are addicted to the job. And as for the army I was thinking more in line with are current ones, where knowledge determines what you are more then what someone gives you. You actually have heavy weapons, demolishen. You can't just throw heavy explosives at your random grunt and decide to call em a bomb expert basically is what I mean.
Yeah you can throw heavy armor at light infrantry, but if they've had no training with it they may not you know, really be that. But that's still straight up true, throwing heavy armor on a light makes em a heavy.... just doesn't nessesarily make them an effective heavy.
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Yeah, I can get PST to semi-run on Win7 but it kinda craps on me, constantly so It's... just not where I'd want it to really get into it and just play for hours like I do. I really hope the guys over at overhaul get the go-ahead and do a PST Enhanced Edition as well as that'd just be awesome to see that updated. Though that had a much more custom infinity engine compared to IWD series. Had a rather fundamental GUI shift, all the art assets are a tad larger actually though so I feel like it would, ultimately, hold up better to a larger screen res then BG1 does. I'd love to play that in a 720 16:9 man... would be so good.
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It's also not supported and can have a ton of issues. I know a good amount of folks who can't even get it to run. Trents team over at overhaul has been working on BGEE for a damn long time now just to fix bugs and get it to run properly on Win7+ along with all the GUI and other BG2 enhancements plus further tweaks. If it works flawlessly for you, you should count your self lucky. Though even then its stuck toa 4:3 res.. just one of the many reason I am excitedl awaiting BGEE release.
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Yeah, on top of that I believe they've stated they plan to go with a 2D background but use 3D models for characters, monsters, that kinda thing. Should end up, hopefully, being a nicer variant on Temple of Elemental Evil did where it used 3D PC/Monsters on top of pre-rendered backgrounds. Personally I think its the absolute best of both worlds for this style of game and for resource management as far as how the game ultimately looks and plays on a wide range of systems.
Outa the infinity engine stuff, Black Isle, more often then not, had the better art direction and some of those spell effects where a delight to see comparitively. But yeah that kinda 2D and 3D mix should be useable on a super wide range of PC systems currently. I'm hoping, honestly, more flexible then D3 currently is. Kind curious what they'll do for lighting... but really I just wanna see game stuff, to early for that. Ah well, year from now hopefully.
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I selected all because... ALL. I played all, often multiple times. I liked IWD more then IWD2, though I really loved the 3E stuff in IWD2 and would of loved to see it being used for the new BGEE stuff but I'll be happy with the BG2, ADnD stuff. Ultimately, as fun as IWD was, having no companions (and as such, having to make up my own party in its entirety) kind of killed 2 birds for me so to speak. One, less attachment to a character since I was 4-6 people at once, kinda awkward. And 2 just.. no personality though out the game, nothing to bounce off of. Party companions just kinda helps ground things when they comment on stuff and can.. you know... talk, have personality and all that good stuff.
Also while IWD2 added more RP options (yay) it ehh, still lacked the ability for you to choose who was going to be talking at any given moment AND cut skill point allocation IN HALF per character. I mean, here you have a game, based off a rule system designed for groups... and they cut up the non-combat skills in half for reason i can't quite figure out. Can't because you where making more then 1 character... just seemed silly. Also luck of the draw on who talks with no selection of which NPC does gets kinda aggrivating after awhile.
My favorites where PST and BG2. Loved BG1 more open setup, but BG2 was still a much, much bigger game even with the more jump-point oriented setup they had going. And then PST man... Oh man. I love that game so much. Has a bit more openyness like BG1 had going for it but just... well, it has Annah. <3 Annah.
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Ahh BG2 being 'bigger' isn't why I like it more.. the character development really. They talked more, they chimed in constantly. They stopped you mid strole just to start up a conversation. They argued with eachother (Jahiera, Aerie and Viconia in same party anyone? Oh the delicious bickering). PST also had that to a good extent. That's what really made those 2 the best of the crop in my book. IWD ultimately lacked that, but it was designed as just a more combat heavy dungeon crawler style.
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I'd love a general customization in my look outside of stats but, either via a crafting/smithing npc who can change it to how I want it for a price or just the basics of what the OP said. That all aside, item wise, i pray they learn from DnD in how to handle base items. BioWare said they did and then implemented a crappy Diablo style 'that lvl 10 white shortsword has 5 times the dmg of that lvl 1 shortsword I used to have that looks the exact same'.
Seriously.. the ****? That kinda crap always causes a lot of awkward equipment swaps that just kinda kill my enjoyment. I think it's kinda born outa some made up idea that items don't matter in RPG's and the only way to make them matter is to add a buncha awkward curvy scale to base values. Just a lotta BS if you ask me. DnD man, longswords 1-8 dmg, that never changes! Sure it may get +5 enhancement dmg +1-4 fire or something but that's cause its magic.. the longsword parts still 1-8. Please keep that Obsidian! Don't be crazy, make the sense making!
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As for the first selection of which type, i choose other. I want PnP style death systems. BG has part of it but lacks the part that stops it from being a crap-fest of irritation. KotOR simplifed that part to the point of lacking in any real consequence for a fail state other then them all being wiped. DAO kind of added a penalty which was nice (but overly easy to remove in mass abundance).
So.. here's basically what I want. I don't want instant death. Outside of being stabbed in the heart, brain or generally being decapicated, most folks don't instantly die in battle and it's been that way since people started stabbing eachother. It's how wars are now, it's how they where in Medieval times. I mean once you add actual full on armor, battles where long, drawn out fights where fetigue often set in and you usally died cause you where on the ground and a dude finished you off. Which is close to the kinda scenarios DnD and PE take place in (everyone having access to Plate Armor).
So, a bleed out, or fetigue where you go unconcious. I don't care if you bleed out, or if you don't or if its basedo ff the kind of damage you took when you passed out from HP hitting 0. but DnD you got a bleed out, each round you take 1 dmg once you hit 0 and have a chance of stabilizing, few feats based around alwways stabilizing as long as you have a companion alive or thea bility to remain concious and butt-slide your way out of danger or whatever. So I'd like to see an analog to that, which is what KotOR's was, ultimately (minus the bleed out). I think faster regening health outside of combat is a good one for non-hard modes but the hardcore more realistic stuff should cut that (except of course regen item/talents). Anyone who was downed to unconcious and gets back up should have some kind of disability.. limit that to some extent in easier modes but crank it up for harder difficulties settings.
Ideally the idea is instead of straight up dying (since that, in most cases, makes less sense) you go unconsious and a healer type could stabilitize and maybe get you back up into walking condition in the next 5 seconds. Fights over, the unconcious get up after a bit and in either case once you've been knocked into that state you have some kind of heavily disability.. preferably based off the kind of dmg you took. I think this kind of system can allow for a no-resurrection system style game. Though having that as a NON-PLAYER ability and allowing downed enemies to be finished off entirely making it so you have to either A, leave em, or B to pay to get the process to get them revived would be nice.
In fact, I think resurrection based stuff should be an ordeal (but should also be hard in general to have happen to you). It's either costly in coin or in resources of some other kind and requires more then 1 person knowledgable in said ritual to the point of the player not being able to do it them selves. Some kind of Priest organization, for instance, being able to 'return the soul' to the body but it requires a small group of the priests and some special item or focus or something (along with a fea for the service).
The idea, ultimately, is to make it a bit more fair like PnP is. cRPG have a tendency to be to binary in that, sadly, and just kinda go all or nothing. Which, harsh or not, make a hell of a lot less sense then the PnP variant.
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ADnD was kinda an odd one too when ya look at it. Looks like 3rd edition and 1st edition both used the 0 to -10 as a bleed out unconcious state, ADnD base was 0 = death straight (makes no sense comparitively) and just had a note to the 1st edition death rules as a 'or use this instead'. Either way 0 equalling straight death makes little sense to me. Then again using health as purely an avoidance measure (which its described, again, in dnd as not avoidance) I just think is bizar. People don't instantly die from a cut, you can get slashed across the chest and survive for extremely long times, your blood will often clot well before you bleed out and if you DO die from it, it'll be from infection as a secondary effect.
That's the kinda stuff I'd like to see but... yeah. Granted a critical hit that downs you should be auto-death. I few that as something a bit more devastating then you just taking one to many cuts and passing out from blood loss or general fatigue. I mean the guy cut an artery, stabbed your kidney, punctured a lung, did something your dead quickly from kinda ordeal.
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Fun article on death rules for DnD from 1st edition up to 4th - http://www.wizards.com/dnd/article.aspx?x=dnd/4ll/20110510
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Dislaimer - I have not read anyones reply as of writing this... not that it would chang my opinion.
So I think it shouldn't, realistic or not you would have a lot of other means outside of what a cRPG would allow to move gold. In PnP that kind of stuff is handwaved, you used a cart to get it places (maybe including an ambush on the way to a town or hideout or whatever). A lot of that can just be skipped over in the understanding 'real-like-stuff happened to make this happen'. In a cRPG you just don't have that luxury, though you could ultimately get some kind of 'ferry it all to the bank' button like you have a 'rest' button in some RPGs.
Generally speaking I tend to view my characters gold count a metaphorical bank, that being, I figure majority of that is 'in' a bank or holding spot somewhere and if i buy something extremely expensive '**** happened' to get them all that crazy coinage. I think it's also nice when they simply don't just use gold. Ultimately Gold, Silver, Copper is the same general number resource as pure gold but it adds a bit of immersion when its split up into 3-4 things like that (4th being platinum coins).
Now, if your looking for a more immersive way to handle all that excess of gold here's an idea I literally just had writing this. Instead of having a bank you put money into, have a bank you 'invest' in and say, pay to increase general 'size'. Kind like increasing gem wallet size in say a Zelda game. But they could tie this into other things such as the player housing. a Vault as an addition (or any perm-storage device) could increase some arbitary max-limit on coins carried at any given time. They could also just make you put gold into all these sources and just have it all 'counted' when you hit up a shop as well.
ultimately though I think that kind of limiting thing should be kept to one of there more hardcore mode type toggles (like eating/drinking in FO:NV). But yeah, weights a bad idea, both from a gameplay perspective and from a general believability POV. Second you add weight is the second you scream 'im carrying thousands of coins on me'. Keep in mind, on top of that, currency doesn't come in 1 size. One of those gold coins could be a 1k print, worth 1000 coins. One reason gold/silver/copper is nice for the sake of flavor and immersion.
[merged] Vancian Magic System and cooldowns
in Pillars of Eternity: General Discussion (NO SPOILERS)
Posted · Edited by Adhin
@Trashman: DnD system isn't even explained, its a ruleset applied to the worlds. None of the worlds explain why they can only memorize a certain number of things. It doesn't make sense in DnD, at all. I've been i RP situations where folks have tried to explain it, and they can't. All they can do is explain how it works, not why its that way. To me, that's a very, very big difference in making something believeable. The second your explaination as to try something is the way it is, comes down to anime shoulder shrugging of '... and thats the way it is' and everyone just kinda nods like 'makes sense, I geuss its just that way because yeah'. Even though they kinda don't explain it and... yeah.
I still think its bad, I can understand from a 'gameplay' perspective how it can be a very tactical thing when in a PnP setting and they're is just more information to go around on that kind of stuff. But it generally falls flat for me in cRPG's and, from that, I start to look at why its even there and there is no reason beyond it being a game rule. Feel free to find a DnD description of why the magic works like that in any of the worlds. Frankly I'd love to read an actual reasoning of it from a non-game rule perspective for once.