Adhin

As strange as this is of a connection as this is, and how oh-so-little this has to do with durability, what khango is saying with the RP or growing potential of weapons reminds me of what Bungie is doing with Destiny. All the weapons have there own sorta perk tree, on a individual basis. I'm sure common weapons all share a basic common thing, but the unique weapons all have a unique tree with interesting changes that can occure depending how much you invest directly into it and I personally think that's a freakin' awesome idea that more RPG's could take advantage of. It's also something thats often toyed with to some extend in DnD books with finding some magical sword of fire lets say and you have trouble just using it because it just rejects you as its owner initially. Coming to grips with that and winning the sword over, extended using making it stronger as its bond grows with you. It's the kind of thing that could make more unique weapons more interesting and allow for a level of progression with magical weapons letting you keep an initially weaker one earlier on that grows to later game. Totally in favor of that kinda thing 100%.

It is so far everything I believed I was getting, but I had no disillusions and took what they said at there word not interjecting something else. That said totally confused as to what the OP stuff... was... Also whoever was the angry part of that discussion must of not actually read anything Sawyer's said or not realize PE is using uses per rest systems. They're not turning it into a cooldown system or anything. It's a very involved and complex system which is fantastic. But yeah to the actual question posed by the title, so far, it's everything I've expected and am extremely happy with the updates and developer discussion in these forums thus far.

8 is a good number, more so if they're as complex and interactive as PST and BG2. BG1 list was silly, it was a collection of pre-sets with unique voice sets really. They kinda had some bonus quest stuff that added a little flavor but that was often how you got them into the party. I really, really liked how PST handled companions, BG2 had a ton of growth and development and all that but it was all timed and thrown at you. I loved the party banter, DAO also had a good bit of that which was easily one of the best parts of that game. Really, REALLY hope they do some party banter. Really makes them feel more alive. But back to what I was saying PST I think handled it a tad better, companions rarely forced a conversation on you but if they had something to say, something new, they'd often mention something (with out opening a chat window). Annah, for instance, her green circle would flash and she'd say 'I, I've got somethin' tah say' and you'd be all 'okey dokey' and click her for a conversation and poof, something new that wasn't there before. You could also talk directly to them at any time like any other NPC only they had a lot of stuff to say and go into, BG2 lacked a good bit of that sadly... but again they made it up with just a ton of conversational stuff popping up and how the characters developed over the course of the game. So yeah, 8 is a good number, hopefully means a lot of unique banter and lots of depth and detail and character progression. Also, BG2 was a HUGE freakin' game, biggest of all the IE games and I haven't played a RPG that's quite matched that since. You could say a TES game, I guess, but its not really the same. It's just a lot of space really with some fun linear choiceless stories to experience. -edit- Oh just remembered something. In BG2 I only ever had 3-4 others with me, the rest I just kinda swapped around for there personal quests then mostly ignored afterwards. Also to fill in any gaps (granted this isn't NEARLY as good as a complex party member) but we 'did' hit that one goal with the Merc Guild... thingy. So if there is only 2-3 companions you like of the 8 you can always fill the gaps with custom characters 'you' make from the merc guild or whatever the heck its called. Probably what I'll do, make like 1 other char with that, have 2-3 others and swap out the last slot to do quests or whatnot from the rest of the cast. Unless I just love all of them to the point I have trouble picking 5 anyway. 3 is a good number of NPC to have for banter and getting deep into there personal development in the story though. To me, anyway.

But those stone walls keep givin' me the stink eye! Totally agree with the enchantment healing thing. Could also have some kinda magic rune they transfer the enchantment to prior to melting the sword down before making another sword out of it and move the enchantment back over. Ultimately I just want it to be explained to some minor degree. Even if its just some off comment from a smith when you ask about repairs in some exploratory chat stuff. "you do repairs?" - "Yeah, we also got some guy who can transfer enchanted arms n armor to runes, its more expensive but we can transfer it to the new stuff". It's all in the details... the delicious details.

You can't actually just fix a chip or a crack in a sword, repairing a 'broken sword' means replacing the part thats broken. Binding on the handle, new cross guard, pummel. If the blade its self is broken via any real method and there isn't much you can do but 'start over' again, which having the existing blade is helpful as it'll give you all the steel you need to work with (all be it a tiny smaller sword). Armor it depends but most 'breaks' are at joints, bindings, leather straps, individual rings on mail. Those you, again, 'replace'. If you have a dent in the armor you can bang it out, it wont be 'as' structurally sound as it was originally but for armor its good enough (and a hell of a lot cheaper then replacing that whole section). Ultimately it comes down to how the metals shaped, the kind of place and how its messed up. It maybe an odd thing to compare it to but think of a car. If you get a dent in the side sheeting you can just bang it out, paint will fix the rest visually but its not structurally gonna be 'as good' as it was, not that that matters much. Anything else though has to get replaced. Now as for the why? Metal has shape memory. In the process of making a sword you have to keep it at high temperatures to deform it, once it cools it basically locks in its shape memory. If it gets bent, and stays bent... well grats that it's new memory. You can heat it up and try to re-straighten but it wont be as good as it was before, it'll always have a penchant for wanting to re-bend that way and will be more likely to bend that direction and stay bent. Only way to truly fix that is melt the whole damn blade down again. Chips or cracks are worse, there structural issues, you can't just heat it up and 'fix' it. You can try to fix a piece of metal in there and kinda weld it in place but that will 'never' be as structurally sound as the blade was originally and wont really be combat ready. Metals not the only material that does this, almost all material has these same properties in different degrees. Go get a piece of paper, fold it, now try to get that crease out. you can re-work it till it doesn't try to stay folded but that crease will always be there. tare/cut a little bit out, you can fix it with tape (something you can't do with metal mind you) but your not going to really fill it. I mean other then clays which are constantly in malable states till you heat it or freeze it this is just how materials work. Chips a chip, tracks a track, bent blades kinda screwed. Your only viable option is turning it into a smaller blade (like a dagger) or reforging it, which is totally a thing but that literally means melting it down, and pounding out a new blade all together. Which is probably cheaper then a new sword as your giving the smith the material to make said sword over again. Part I have issue with in relation to reforging is magical weapons, how the hell is it keeping its enchantments once you melt it down (aka, destroy it) to reforge it, that parts just kinda weird. But hey magical smithing dust, problem solved. No need to reforge or anything just sprinkle it on, heat it up, presto. Magical Smithing Soul Powers at its finest. -edit- As a side note, when I mentioned ritual bending of a sword to berry along with its owner so no one could ever use it again (viking thing, amongst others im sure) they heated and looped it. It was literally not useable with out melting down and reforging. Small bends you can fix-ish but it still wont be as good as new, but good enough till it goes completely FUBAR on ya. Heat treating can help in that process and would be another reason going to a smith to 'repair' would make sense. Chips, cracks or otherwise snapped in 2 is a recyclin' job.

With RPG's it kind of depends how the difficulty is handled. In IE games I play on core rules becuase I like the core rules, difficulty is just an against the rules jack in numbers an an artifical push in the dice rolls and that always bugged the crap out of me. I'm hoping the higher difficulties are less 'monsters do double dmg lols' and more 'what' we fight in any given encounter. As an example say theres a boss that has a few lackies (lets say a Bugbear with a few goblins) early on, im hoping the higher difficulties will have a lot more goblins, and perhaps have them continuelly show up as you kill them off. That said I did prefer DA:O on the hardest difficulties, but would of prefered direct controle over how FF was handled. That's one thing im looking forward too, while I like core rules (which should be difficult on there own, and it should be encounters that make it harder) often a lot of more interesting mechanics get removed, and having those in toggle form allows me to have all those with out having to play on a fake-difficulty setting. I voted hardest diff with pick/chose my own toggles. And I'll adjust difficulty if its just a crappy number swap (or if it turns out normals specifically designed to be a snooze fest). DA:O was very much like Halo in that the base 'normal/medium' setting wasn't there actual intended balance, hardcore was and the next step up, legendary, was there real test where things got stupid crazy. If PE follows the same difficulty logic of some past games (including DAO) I may play one step under highest difficulty... I hope they make normal that though, always feels weird when normal isn't the actual intended.

@Gfted: That's for non-combat movement for towns and dungeon crawling so 1 of your members isn't always flailing about ahead of everyone like a crazed, sugar fueled toddler. Hitting a map edge brings up the map and lets you fast travel to anywhere you've been, it's how it was in BG1-2 and just about every other IE game to date. It 'is' fast travel but it requires you physically exit the map its self first. @Lephys: I agree again but allow my to flail my arms at you in irritation as to fixing chips, cracks and bent stuff (on a sword, not armor)... thats all horribly irreversible damage to turn a blade back into combat ready... so.. *flails* aaaahh! They would bend blades in old times before berrying them with there original owners to make them forever unusable. Fixing that means melting it down and making a new thing out of it. blarge, blar, blarble! (this is all in jest) Think in some cultures they'd make smaller weapons out of a blade that was chipped or broken, depending on the thing. Course magical fantasy smithing dust and all my points become moot. But still... >.> -edit- Oh hey Obsidian, if you do end up going back with a durability/repair thing, definitely come up with some kind of silly magical smithing dust, not joking on this. Make it regulated or something and be created via soul magic to allow them to repair literally broken weapons and armor so you have an actual reason to take it to the smith only to fully fix stuff. It's silly, and dumb, but it's the kinda thing that stops a foolish nitpicker like me from being all uppity about something so minor and easily looked over.

I kind of like the idea of a weapon being able to break, but when you start getting into fantasy metals that don't lose there edge by normal means and adamantite can't break on anything other then something much harder then it (which in fantasy settings is practically impossible to find unless its rock-based adamantite pulled out of a gods ass) for the vast majority of situations it would... only really effect the starter base items. That or require some kinda story related stuff... Not saying that's a bad thing though mind you. If I was going to put in some kind of durability/breaking system into a game like this and 'only' have it in for a hardcore 'me want realsies' mode that changes things. As your design choices change quit a bit, its less about whats fun and putting in stupid things to make it more interesting (which is fun to a lot of us weirdos). So with that in mind I'd say a basic system like TrashMan mentioned except theres no way to actually 'repair' it at a smith or whatever. When you rest you do general 'upkeep' which restores some, but not all, of the durability (the cap could easily just get lower or it could be represented as a percentage). Once its below 30% its in critical condition, does less dmg (by a small bit, nothing drastic) and each durability loss (%based) has a secondary chance to just straight up break the weapon. This would make starter items be more of a long-term consumeable, you wouldn't need 3 swords with you cause omg one might break, you'd just need one, and when it gets crappy you trade it in. Now this is just for starter stuff or base material things. Mid/Late game your getting better material weapons which no longer have this break point such ad mithril or adamantite equivelents. High enough enchantments could make it so basic maintenance always returns the blade to its perfect form blah blah blah. Actually... I could see that just being part of the basic progression of items with breakage vs non-breaking stuff later game. You go through the junk early game (not to quickly like BG1, that was crazy). But late game, when your actually finding or getting the good stuff made its fantasy metal/magic and the worries of normal men and there foolish toy weapons are no longer a concern. That being a mid/end game scenario would make it so the mechanic doesn't draw its self out to long. I think that's a bit much for just a toggle mode though personally, there old durability idea minus the craft skill just being an on/off switch would be far more realistic. Though I think a system like that, that slowly fades out as the game progresses might make more sense as a base feature that's not just a toggle. **** you could also just explain away item repair with magic smithing dust, damn fantasy worlds.

@TrashMan: I like the semi-repair at campfire thing on resting. Would help alleviate a lot of peoples issues with durability ware that I've seen over my years of gaming.. generally being folks suck at paying attention to it unless its constantly slapped in there face. Look at Dark Souls as a good example, most people it's not that big of an issue, you buy the repair kit, you repair everything (gods I wish they had a repair all button) every few bonfire visits it becomes a non-issue but its just another source of removing a few souls from your total. And then you got people who constantly forget and find there **** breaking mid fights, which I personally find hilarious. Anyway I think that would help the useability of the whole system for some of the more forgetful of players. 1 hit = 1 durability lost with out a skill to kill the % I can tell you right now would require hundreds of thousands of durability points to make any real sense just strickly from a playability standpoint. D2 tends to have durability around 80-100 base (not counting higher end weapons) and they work off a very small % chance, and your hitting a looot of stuff. Wont hit nearly as much in an IE game but 100 durability being 100 hits and your weapons crappy (not broken) would still happen quite a lot, the partial repair at resting would help a lot there, % chance to remove a durability or not). Ultimately 'needing' to take it to a blacksmith is the extremely minor immersion breaker for me. You 'can' repair a chipped blade, you can re-heat and put a broken blade back together. These are possible things but the weapon in question is no longer suitable for battle in either situation. A simple quick-fix like that simply wont make the blade effective again and it'll just be that much more likely to break on you. More so with the types of forging available back in those days. Like I've said before, for believability sake, the weapon breaking and you trading in the broken steel to buy a new one makes far more sense. Course, that's coming from a mind of are newer age, the idea of discarding the broken thing for a new thing makes more sense to me. In a lot of places in old times the weapons where a tad more treasured then that and would often get berried with people, broken or otherwise (and often would be broken if it wasn't already to be berried with). I don't care either way, there original system would need some tweaking on %, your idea for an always minor repair on resting to a limit would be kind of nice to help extend equipments life. But none of it really makes any sense and its just a game-mechanic to be a game-mechanic in the end. So.. I dun cur one way or another. (as a side note, apparently i've been typing sync not sink this whole time or partially and I kinda feel like an idiot, oops heh) -edit- As a side note on the repairing chipped/broken blades, back in the day forges couldn't actually get hot enough to make most the metals not suck. Damascus steel, and some high end viking broadswords (of which I forget the name to, sadly) got 'close' to creating the kind of heat required to remove a lot of the impurities. But keep in mind the kind of temperatures required to fuse 2 pieces of metal together literally require the metal be practically melting which isn't exactly a great way to keep the blade in its current form. What I've been trying to get across for awhile now, a smith 'repairing' your weapons is a crazy idea. repairing literally is 'replacing'.

I really do like the idea they had for there durability system, I think a single craft skills kinda dumb. For me, at least, the only thing they'd have to do to put me fully in camp for it in game is add a permanent upgrade item we could buy that let us do maintenance at rest spots. There system actually reminded me a lot of Dark Souls, though in DS you could buy a kit to let you do it at any bonfire instead of requiring a blacksmith. Still costed 'souls'... which makes a hell of a lot more sense in DS then it does in PE, throwing gold at a campfire wouldn't make much sense. But yeah a system that doesn't remove the use of the item, just make it more inferior when its at 0 dur is always my preferred method of durability. Once it kills the weapon or makes it completely unusable till its repaired is where I start shakin' my head. That said I think the singular craft skill was a bit of a bum idea. I liked that a skill or something would effect durability degradation but having that tied to some kinda proficiency talent may make more sense. That and just a single skill for crafting is awkward, its not arts n crafts, cutting out paper isn't some universal skill that lets you also bang out a sword proper. So 'that' being out im definitely happy with, more so when you consider other skills will be used in conjuncture with crafts and stuff.

I agree Lephys, I like to think that wasn't there only reason... pretty sure it had to do with a combination of folks vocally not wanting it and not needing a gold sync that bad.

Ahh I think your misunderstanding me a tad bit. I'm definitely not belittling it by saying they're gold syncs. That is what they are, it is why they exist and I absolutely hold gold syncs as good features. They're important to keeping a constant-gold-flow economy from imploding on them selves. ME1 didn't have a single one, it was all items found (for the most apart) with a mass overflow of credits till you maxed out before the midway point of the damn game... it was horrible, that game needed less credit flow and waay more gold syncs. I think a durability system is a good idea, I'm just saying its not believable, its abstract, just like are inventory systems. All I was trying to get across is saying it adds depth and immersion is silly as its unrealistic. Frankly what they had 'was' the middle ground and I would of been happy with it. I'd of also liked a maintenance kit to let us repair at camps instead of having to go to a black smith but that would remove the whole gold sync reasoning for it being there in the first place. I like durability systems, I like gold syncs, but I think in this case they where unnecessary.

Yeah that was kinda my point rjshae. It exists as a gold sync, trying to make it make more sense ultimately kills the gold sync factor. What they had literally was just an abstract sharpening system that worked for armor and any kind of weapon. I don't think it was a bad thing to have in, ultimately, but I think folks keep taking it like it was some kinda crazy realistic system that was taken out for no good reason when ultimately it existed for the games economy sake, not the players. I've said it before in here plenty of times, gold syncs are a good thing, and durability repair is a very common and effective way to do that. But I also don't think an IE style game really needs one, just avoid ME1 style credit flow and give us more interesting stuff to buy both with equipment and the stronghold and it'll all work out.

@Lucidbro: I have, maybe not in that exact post but in the one prior (and in other threads). That's what the save throw is for, for stuff like rustmonsters and the like. Ultimately my point stands that the idea of a durability system is flawed outside of a money sync. If said thing trashes your shield it becomes crappy, 'if' you can still use it you will cause its maybe still better then no shield. No one is going to literally carry around 5 shields with them (per individual) just incase one brakes on them, it makes less sense then the crazy abstract inventory systems we use in RPG's. And just because we use crazy abstract inventories doesn't make it make sense to carry around a 'whole' other set of armor incase crazy demon guy punchs you in the chest. The only thing I can think of that makes any real sense would be a sharpening system for edged weapons, at which point it would only effect edged weapons and would leave blunts and ranged stuff out of the system making it a bit lopsided. But ultimately some kinda sharpening system where you 'sharpen' the blade and that degrades over time till its blunt doing less damage. But like I said that would be edge weapons only. I mean polishing up your mace doesn't make it any more heavy or effective at bashing skulls... still good idea to keep it from rusting but that's about it really. Durability systems don't make sense, they're not anymore realistic or believable. To do that would be kinda crazy which is why DnD has it, but makes it all fringe cases for why it would happen. DM has to be a **** to throw rustmonsters at you, or has something specific in mind to that where it wont cause to many problems for whats to come (though they're probably just being a ****). For gameplay reasons its just less of a pain for everyone if there isn't a durability system at all as far as im concerned. Less work for them, less work for us for something that is a made up thing to help with gold issues in vidjagames.

@jethro: Yeah makes some sense. In the end, money sync or not, they need enough money through out (if you do all side content) to allow you to buy everything on the stronghold side while allowing enough wealth to buy bunch of equipment and general in game stuff. The only way they could truly limit that would be to make the game extremely linear and limit whats available at any given time but then your getting a basic straight adventure game instead of an RPG. Way I see it option 1 and 2 are up to the player. So I guess 3... I don't care if I have a lot of money or almost no money by the end of the game as long as it didn't stop me from buying the stuff I wanted to buy leading up to the end. Same time ending up in the Mass Effect 1 boat kinda ruins the fun of it. You could max out credits in that game literally before the middle point and just always be extremely rich forever after even spending it on all the super expensive stuff. THAT is an extremely silly economy. ME2 handled it a lot better except that you had nothing to really spend the money on except in a few minor 'upgrades' (of which you researched the rest of). Far as im concerned, BG2 and PST had perfectly fine economies for the kinda game they where, worked out rather well. But I'd like more stuff to buy that matchs some legendary found lewts... though the found stuff should have more unique properties and that's really for another thread.

I'm happy to see it gone but it 'can' add to gameplay. To me, though, I haven't seen a durability system that makes any sense and ultimately DnD doesn't have one. It has an HP system for weapons that only degrades if the weapons directly attacked via some method in which case the attacker has to overcome the weapons DR to cause any damage or theres save rolls involved to see if the weapon avoids being broken. And when its broken its broke, you get a new one... except im sure in some DM oriented situation where it was an epic blade and you go on an adventure to have it magically lego'ed back together. And no, outside of rustmonsters it doesn't make much sense to roll into a dungeon with 3 swords cause one might break. That made sense in BG1 because all the ore making all the weapons where so heavily tainted they where ****ty and brittle and would break for no good reason. A sword or any other weapon should last you through maaaany battles. If it breaks in a battle its because of many, many years or some specific circumstance happened that snapped the blade, not because you forgot to smithy up it s'more everytime you hit town. Maintenance of a sword and most other weapons is literally wipe it down, make sure its not rusting and sharpen it...presto your done. It's not throwing it back at a forge. The idea of hitting up a blacksmith to repair your sword cause you did some combat is a silly concept found in video games because they need a constant money sync. It's why it was in originally in PE, they took it out because folks here didn't really want it (its not in IE games, or DnD as a whole) and Sawyer just came to terms with either finding a new money sync or not worrying to much about the overall economy end game. It's not some giant mark against creativity to remove an extremely common money sync but it could be used in some interesting ways to add more depth to a game (a very small amount of depth)... but outside of making you throw the weapon away or have it melted down and completely reforged the idea of its kinda silly. That or a rag n wetstone should be all you need to 'fix' weapons out in the field. But that ruins the idea of it being a money sync and then completely ruins the reason the mechanic has ever existed in the first place.

Yeah I can see them teaching stuff to you if they keep with there current craft system but I still don't think the player should be crafting anything legendary them selves. Least not equipment wise. As long as there isn't specific armor/weapon smithing skills (which there aren't, currently I don't think) then at least nothing the player spends points on will be wasted either way. Just a minor peeve of mine when the player can make stuff the games NPC smiths can't manage. I mean its there lifes work, but its your players hobby... doesn't make much sense. That said it wont stop me from loving the crap out of the game. I tend to think crafting in every game in existence is garbage and has no business existing anyway so my opinions are kinda **** on the subject really heh.

With out DnD handles (and most RPG worlds handle) magic weapons I agree with your random blacksmith having 'magic' items just a tad bizar. Though it sounds like some of the 'magic' items involve items prior to the actual forging and it gets literally worked into the blade, instead of enchanted after the fact. Depending on how that is, if thats common or maybe just the lower end stuff I could see at least some lower end stuff at some of the more common smithy though still I'd think that to be rather minimal still outside of some special order or whatever. You know, +1 stuff to throw out another DnD term. I'd like it if you managed to attract a high end blacksmith capable of some amazing feats for your keep or stronghold or whatever it is we get. Would make sense to have it centered there, and have it tied around to that story progress opposed to just being some dwarf in one of the cities. But I'd love for some of the heavier stuff being tied to that. As a side note I both liked and hated how BG2 did the legendary stuff. I liked you went to a legendary smith for forging of some of the higher end unique items but I disliked how they already existed and you just kinda lego-ed that **** together via a quest. Just bizar. Would prefer if that was literally just high end NPC related crafting of some kind, maybe requiring special ingredients but definitely not just finding different weapon pieces... no lego nonsense hopefully.

So... I'd vote in this poll but its extremely limited and none of them apply. So, basically I always want there to be a use for my money but I don't think it needs to be extremely scarce. So ehh, yup. I wanna collect a good bit of coin and... spend it on ****. I don't care to much if I end up with a good bit of coin left over at the end of the game but I don't want it to be so damn scarce I can't do everything I want to do. And, ultimately, I do care about the general economy of the game and hope it strikes a good balance. So the 4th option that doesn't exist on that poll, I want a good balance.

I kind of selected both and what they have as being fine but that's mostly cause I have no idea what options to pick. Ultimately I think smaller end stuff like herbalism related things make sense for the player to make (and make just about anywhere). Anything else beyond that requires, to me, to much work and practice for it to make sense for the player to really do it in any meaningful way. I think NPC should be the ones doing the 'crafting' which, ultimately as a system goes, doesn't really change anything it's just a matter of how its presented (also gold added to the making cost as its an NPC). That's the jist of it on my end anyway. Player shouldn't be crafting some legendary weapon or armor or experimenting and refining special potions, doing so, to me, makes lite of what that actually takes. They take a lot of experience and skill to do anything really meaningful with. Knowing what plants are useful for certain situations is a good survival skill and useful for making quick use kits or whatnot which is why I think, for the most part, herbalism is what makes the most sense (not necessarily a 'skill' for herbalism, survival skill fits that too) for in the field 'crafting'. Anything else major that makes equipment or complex potions should be a place you goto and do a special order for something. Would also give far more use to a smith you end up getting to move into your keep and setup shop. Being able to head to your homebase, hit up your smith and instead of dealing with there basic inventory or some random preset unique items you can say I want to make a Longsword of fire or something would be nice. LIke I said it's mostly presentation, but that's a detail... and details make all the difference in how a game feels when ya play it.

I highly doubt it would of been that complicated, was probably just 100 units or something with higher durability for higher grade/magical items. I just meant once a weapon gets that worn down (or chipped or whatever) 'repairing' it usually isn't much of a repair. You try to repair a chip in a sword and its still weak at that point, you just got a cutting edge back is all and it wont be long till its gone. I mean look at Skyrim, they removed weapon repair and a buncha folks got all up in arms about it... being all pissed it was gone and that you couldn't repair in the field anymore. It was just a buncha crazy talk, who the **** is carrying a forge with them in a dungeon? How do you plan to 'fix' your completely trashed sword? With some magically consumable smithy hammer that lets you repair mid dungeon? It's a gold sync, plane and simple, they're not meant to make any sense really. Which isn't a bad thing, really, gold syncs are the only real way to keep a constant-gold spawning economy in check. Hopefully they come up with some good lite gold syncs for us, maybe revolving around are keep with some kinda monthly upkeep cost or... something. Could do it via consumables that let you heal up the actual health pool not the stamina pool (currently resting does that) by a tiny bit. I dunno really... As for backgrounds I agree to some extent, 50's a bit much to 'get into adventurin' really. I'd expect some higher starting level then 1 for it. PST it made sense what with the whole soulless immortality thing going on with amnesia thrown into the mix. I can understand you working at a smithy in your 20-30s (weather it was your own or not) and you got wrapped up into things but then that's a bit hard to explain how you just kinda... picked up mage spells on the spot or whatever. Which, to me anyways, kinda brings up a point of how I view classes, they're a way of life.. its what you've done up to that point but your still green so to speak. Though on principle I agree with ya in the general sense of the idea of having backgrounds that work for more then some 18-20 year old who just stepped out into the world. ...seriously though 50+ as a 'start of an adventuring career' is an issue cause... your 50+ in old ass medieval times. Considering magic can't close up wounds and make you all good to go I doubt its excessively prolonged any humans live unless they've spent most of it honing there souls energy like a monk or something. And being 50, starting off as a lvl 1... can't see that of being much of a goal up till that point you know? It's possible though I guess, just kinda bizar.

Not a big fan of durability systems and 'repair' in the first place, world doesn't really work that way and it's usually just exists as a money sync. Outside of just sharpening your blade (general upkeep) if your weapon is actually becoming damaged your only real option is getting a new one. If your sword chips you don't throw ducted tape at it, 'reforging' its not going to solve the problem. You make a new sword, maybe you melt down your old one to re-forge a new sword entirely but... you make a "NEW' one, not repair. DnD got this, weapons had HP but you don't repair weapons. They don't have direct durability degrade in combat, if something breaks your weapon that ****s broke and you replace it. And in a game like this... that's scripted stuff or horribly unfun monsters that'll constitute constant reloading (rust monsters as someone mentioned). So I'm happy the durability stuffs getting tossed out. I get the concern for the games economy, something I always get kinda whiny about in games. Not a lot of good ways to handle money syncs unless you force that kinda thing on players though which is kinda a bummer. Anyway as for crafting, I like it but I think its kinda a dumb thing for a player, and adventurer, to be doing. It's one of them little irks I got where, I want to be able to make a sword I want... but it doesn't really make much sense for my character to be doing it. I've spent all my chars live adventuring, the whole game 'adventuring' but I'm supposed to also be a better smith then the guys who 'do the smithing' there whole life? I mean it's their freakin' job. That's something I think Diablo 3 got right, initially (one of the few things). You could craft (sorta) but it was handled by an actual blacksmith in the game... course the way they handled the actual crafting was garbage and it was all random BS but ignoring that... going to an actual smith and bringing him supplies and picking the sword/properties you want to craft ultimately has the same effect... you can also tie money into that as your payin' the smith then. Good amount of folks bitch about that cause they want to actually be the one doing it even if the outcomes the same but meh. My thoughts on the whole thing for whatever its worth.

Figured that was the direction they would go with the conversation stuff but love to see confirmation of it.

Agreed Lephys. Having custom hotkeys per-char for constantly used stuff is good, but when you got an overflow of abilities, some of which you don't use 'that' often, or its something you have to pause to line up/aim properly, using a popup menu - circular or otherwise - is my preferred way to handle it. BG style of clicking the spell thing and button-clicking to cycle one by one is... just bad. I don't know why anyone would prefer that over something as simple as a pop-up radial. But yeah, often times to much crap can get placed into it to the point of them being completely redundant. I liked ToEE setup, but it was also 'completely' turn based. Everything you did was leisurely and you didn't need hotkeys for spells and basic actions. Either way hope they use fade in menus for the excess of abilities that your hotkeys wont handle and I PRAY they don't have hotkey cycling, that ****s awful.

@Morgulon The Wise: Yeah if they keep the current painted look, but do like.. 3 versions and kinda animate a shift to, and have them blink a bit or something. Or have different versions based off there 'state' (like sleepy, poisoned, heavily wounded ala Doom) and just to a few-frame-shift to with some blinking or something to give it all a bit more personality 'awhile' still allowing players to add in non-animated ones (as well as animated ones) I'd be totally down for it. The second it gets to 'complex' for the average person to add there own portrait in is when I think its not worth it anymore. That's the kinda thing I'd be fine doing but people being entirely reliant on the community doing it is just... ehh... yeah. I'd be ok either way but that's my stance on animated character portraits heh. @Grotesque: I cannot agree any less. That is, I think all that GUI was about as horrid as it gets. It feels like a poorly done mod GUI cause AHH BONES YEAH MAN. Maybe if that games entirely about Tombs and Skeleton monsters and your main guys a rogue skeleton whos gained full sentients and he fights the horde of bad skeletons or something? I dunno maybe that's that game but the basic hp and mana orbs and stuff are all over the place its clunky. The placements of everythings just all over the place and it looks bad. Just... gods I hope it has nothing in common with any of that.