Hiro Protagonist II

Good point. It kinda does have a "WOW" vibe to it. It's not blatant. But you can sense the influence. In all, I'm not quite sure what to make of that. But I do know that I'm not all that happy that the Devs themselves have seen fit to assign those Labels to the classes. They call Rogues "heavy hitters". WOW calls them "DPS Kings". But in the IE games, and of course in D&D, they were nothing of the sort. They were the sneaks and the scouts. They were the lock pickers, trap disarmers, trap setters and pickpockets. In combat, they weren't the heaviest hitters. Not by a long shot. They could backstab for massive damage but only on occasion. They used the lower tier weapons, like Daggers and short swords. Not the big guns that the true heavy hitters used, like massive swords and greataxes. And it seems that the "WOW influence" will extend to the other classes too. This update defines Mages as "Mob Rulers". WOW calls mages "crowd control". In the IE games and in D&D Mages didn't have such titles. Mainly because you could make your mage do just about anything extremely well. And of course, the Warrior classes are the "front liners" in POE, aka "tanks" in WOW lingo, I don't have a problem with that at all, but in the IE games, Fighters were the best fighters. THEY were the heavy hitters. I'll keep an open mind. But when this game comes out and I play it, if combat feels like WOW or Dragon Age Origins, my Rage will be severe. It's the same in 4th Edition. I've never played WoW so I didn't know they were similar. When I read the update, it felt like reading a 4E update. There are so many similarities, it's uncanny. You have 4 different types of characters in 4th Edition. Strikers (the heavy hitters like Rogues and Rangers), Defenders (Fighters), Leaders (Healers) and Controllers (Wizards). Even the update references one of these names. eg. Leaders of the Band (chanters and priests). Also, the Ranger seems to be very similar to a Beastmaster from 4E. It's very much like D&D, but probably not the version you were after?

I feel 4E is more like 2E and not really like 3E with classes. It's either single class or multi-class like in 2E but doesn't have Dual-class. So it's very similar to the IE games (without dual-class). In 4E, you can't have something like a Barbarian/Paladin/Wizard/Rogue/Cleric/Druid Halfling. But you can have any race for any class in 4E which 2E didn't allow. eg. Must have Human Paladin in 2E whereas 4E allows any race to be a paladin. Multi-class in 4E is similar to 2E with only two classes. eg.Fighter/Mage. It also concentrates on combat on tiles similar to chess. There's no abstract, like I shoot an arrow. Roll and hits. So the DM needs to have rooms/areas planned out. A lot of the time the DM can use a blank tile sheet and draw the area. Certain classes can only move so many squares, some classes can do things that other classes can't, similar to chess pieces. So it's quite tactical in that regard. A rogue needs to flank an enemy (be on the opposite side of the enemy) to a party member to use their sneak attack and you see that in operation. You also have to take into account what you're party members are doing and what squares they're on. A lot of people don't like the combat style but I think it's great. I'm a visual person, so I like to see the areas set out. I know I'm in the minority and prefer both 2E and 4E and wasn't a fan of 3E, whereas it seems the majority favour 3E over the other editions. For example in IWD2, one of the reasons my dislike for 3E is the ability to have a Rogue at level 1 at the start of the game, and still be able to open every lock, search and disarm every trap in the game and when you finish, you're still a Rogue at Level 1. I had a Drow Rogue(1)/Conjurer(14) by the end. It doesn't make sense to me but for others, it makes perfect sense. Because you could level up the skills and not level up the Rogue character. A bit like dual classing Imoen as a Thief (6)/ Mage(24) and increase her thieving skills with her Mage skills every time you level up your Mage levels without actually levelling up her Thief level. That's 3E. shrugs.

This is copying WoW and asking the dev's to stick closer to D&D? This has 4th Edition D&D written all over it. And I'm really happy to see so much D&D stuff in it.

Almost. Far be it for me to speak for others, but when Obsidian starts a poll asking whether or not we would like more stretchgoals, I get the impression that they're asking "Would you like to put money towards more stretchgoals if we make them available?" They want to know what the public demand for them are, and whether it's worth their time to consider further goals. So I imagine that they're not just asking "Do you want to see more stretchgoals?" but "Would you be willing to pay towards more stretchgoals?" If Obsidian wants an impression of how many people are willing to pay more for stretchgoals, then I shouldn't answer positively to the poll. On the other hand, I don't want to answer negatively to the poll either. I'm not against there being more stretchgoals available, and hence likely a release date for PoE being pushed back. It doesn't sound altruistic, but if others want to make my game better on their own behalves, I'm all for it. I myself just can't justify putting forward (much) more money, stretchgoals or no. I just don't want to give Obsidian the impression that there is more demand (money-throwing demand) for strechgoals than there is. It feels like you're reading between the lines when it's not required. The question is quite simple and I don't see it as a conditional question. Also, voting yes doesn't mean you have to put money in. There's no lying there. If anything, it may encourage people who have been holding off and not backed the game to put money in now. Just like the original Kickstarter. You're voting could actually sway other people who haven't backed the game. So in a way, your vote has helped to fund the game even more without you putting money in yourself. When Obsidian put out more stretch goals in the original Kickstarter, it encouraged people to put money in. eg. Linux and Mac? You now have Linux and Mac users donating. There may have been other stretch goals which tipped the balance of someone thinking of backing the game to actually backing the game. When Obsidian released these stretch goals, the original backers didn't have to put more money in. There was no obligation. If you've got people wanting more stretch goals and holding off voting because they see the poll as some conditional question when it's not, then that sends a terrible message to Obsidian imo. If Obsidian wants to get an impression of how many people are willing to pay more for stretch goals, then they would have polled differently. Personally, I think Obsidian should just put the stretch goals up on the Backer Portal and release an update about it. It may sway some people in putting in money that at the moment probably wouldn't including new people who haven't backed the game. At the moment, there's uncertainty which doesn't send a good message considering nearly two months has passed when the poll went up.

Let me get this straight. You think that by answering yes for more stretch goals for the game, that you have to put in more money? Or the only people who can contribute in a monetary sense are the only ones who should be voting Yes? That's really gone over my head.

You're so caught up in irrelevant technicalities, semantics, and misconceptions/misinterpretations-turned-perceived-strawmen that you're completely blind to the simple fact you can EITHER: A) Harm the dragon down to 1HP with a couple of successful dice rolls, then hit it for more-than-0 damage with just ONE more successful attack roll (this from a party of 6) and the dragon is dead. OR B) Not do option A, and you actually have to fight the dragon for significantly longer than 2 turns. Caught up in 'your' irrelevant technicalities, semantics, and misconceptions/misinterpretations. Of course, because if you're going to argue from something you make up along the way and try to present as fact when in fact it's complete fiction, then we'll call you out on it. A) It doesn't take a couple of successful dice rolls. Again it's got nothing to do with RNG. And you actually have to fight the dragon for significantly longer than 2 turns. You have to prepare your party, you have to prepare your mage spells, you have to prepare your other party members. You have to coordinate the party members with your cleric. All this takes significantly longer than 2 turns. B) And you actually have to fight the dragon for significantly longer than 2 turns which you do with Harm. All the above I mentioned does take significantly longer than 2 turns. No it's not. It's not ridiculously encouraging and it's not a lottery. But keep believing that story you've made up for yourself. As I said before, there are better builds with other classes that are better than the Cleric's Harm spell. Which is one of the reasons why I don't use Harm anymore. Because it's easier to kill a Dragon with other builds than a Cleric with Harm. So do you have a problem with these other builds that are more effective? Did the dev's get it wrong with those other builds because you can kill a dragon in less than a minute? Must be the RNG for those builds as well. Also, I don't 'believe' in anything when it comes to Baldurs Gate 2. I go on Facts. Perhaps something you should try some day.

If you vote yes for more stretch goals, there's no obligation for you to put more money into the game.

No irony there. More than once you said you could kill a dragon with one hit with Harm. And also highlighting the fact that you're all over place with your posts. You say one thing and a few sentences later in the same quote you say something else. It's what happens when you over exaggerate questions, examples and arguing from a point which you have no experience from. Wait, so... there's no doubt that it simply won't work, but at the same time: ??? I'm confused. Another straw man argument. tsk tsk Lephys. I never said "there's no doubt that it simply won't work". Always changing the context of what I say. Having gone against Firkraag before hand and having experienced a dragon encounter, I changed my tactics and so I was able to prepare better for the next fight. Things like Wing buffet from the dragon, distracting the dragon, timed response with Jaheira casting the spell and running in, and a few other things mixed in as well. For example, if your cleric happens to get a wing buffet before they pull it off, then the spell is wasted, if the cleric takes too long to get to the dragon (only two rounds) then the spell is wasted and many other things if you don't plan it. Yes, it takes thought and planning which you don't think it does. If players think like you and all you need to do is have your cleric run in and touch the Dragon, then yes, no doubt they'll get their arse handed to them. There's also spells from your mages that coincide with it. It's not random chance or RNG as you want to believe. Some people might be able to pull it off on the first go. A lot of people may not, especially if they think there's no need for any thought and planning which you seem to think - which is entirely wrong. One small mistake... like... not knowing the rules and abilities? Do all other builds in the entire game, and all other strategies that involve a 15-minute dragon fight, require significantly less "skill" (just... thought and planning, really, but, we'll just ignore what words mean, for now, I suppose) than a build that could feasibly allow you to hit a dragon with Harm, then strike it once more before it heals itself for a large sum of hitpoints? Because, if beating the dragon at all requires a lot of "skill," then the difference is still that you can either use that lot of skill to potentially end the fight in 2 turns, or fight the thing the "normal" way by actually having to use spells that don't take it down to 1 hit point from however many the dev team decided to give it. In other words... what's more difficult? Actually fighting the dragon until it's dead? Or having a couple of lucky dice rolls be in your favor until the dragon is dead? I'm guessing the former, which involves a lot more time, resource-use, and strategic healing and tactics until the dragon's actually dead, requires more skill and effort. Unless you're somehow saying that successfully using Harm on a dragon, then killing it in one hit after that is the only thing in the game that requires you to pay attention to how you build your party and allocate all your level-ups and gear and whatnot, and that any other method of defeating the dragon can be much more easily achieved by just blindly using whatever party build you happen to make with hardly any planning or thinking or effort involved at all. One small mistake? Player ignorance on purpose because they couldn't be bothered to RTFM? No that would be too hard to read the manual. Also why wouldn't you know the abilities of your spells? Again, RTFM. Also 15 minute dragon fight? LOL. What the hell are you doing for a fight to last that long? Maybe you haven't read the manual and don't know the abilities of your characters. And it does take thought and planning to pull this off as I said before. But you can ignore all the thought and planning that this requires because didn't you say all it takes is Boom, click, click and done? And your 'guess' would be wrong. And that's what it's been these last few pages - 'guesses'. And your ignorance is really showing because it can be more difficult to pull off a Harm on a Dragon than it is to kill a dragon is less than a few minutes. Because the cleric needs help from other party members to pull it off. And without using Harm, that's pretty much all it takes to kill a dragon - a few minutes. Not 15 minutes. A quick check on Youtube even shows solo players beating Firkraag in a few minutes. Perhaps my search abilities are flawed because what I don't see is a Cleric using Harm on Youtube. You would think so if it's so easy. But you do see other classes. Here's a youtube video of Firkraag being killed in less than 5 minutes by a normal party and not the 15 minutes you seem to think. This party gets wing buffeted in the first minute. If you already had Harm casted by your Cleric, he would've been at the other end of the dungeon on his arse. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4xv2jVv2SL8 So yes, Harm is more difficult to pull off because you have to have all the variables in place (such as party members helping your Cleric) and nothing to do with lucky dice rolls. Also, there are other builds (not clerics) that can kill a dragon far easier than a cleric with Harm and with a lot more certainty. I'd have to question if you've really played BG2, because a lot of what you say is completely wrong. So you die. And then the apocalypse occurs and the world ends... Oh wait, no, you continue, just like you'd do if you died while using any other strategy in any other encounter in the whole game, and you try again, with completely new dice rolls this time. And it eventually works. The 1st time, or the 100th time. You don't decide which time it works. The dice do. Welcome to luck-based challenge elimination. ah no. It has nothing to do with RNG. You really want to believe that even when it's not true. Wait... I could've sworn I just saw that same line in this thread somewhere recently... *ponder* This can all be summed up with you having no idea what you're talking about. Even other people in this thread disagree with you. And I have to question if you've ever played BG2, or even gone up against a dragon, because everything you've said on this matter is completely wrong.

A drop in the ocean.

And, either you're just arbitrarily pointing out the irrelevant fact that Josh can't "get rid of it totally," or you were suggesting that was somehow his goal. Thus, I asked if you could provide some proof that that was his goal. It was a simple yes-or-no question. Yes you did. Stop lying. You suggested that I said it was his sole goal in life. I caught you out on that straw man argument. Then you change it to being I suggested it was his main priority with his design process which I never did. I caught you out on that straw man argument again. Neither of which I said was the case. And now you're changing your stance again. Nothing worse than someone making up an argument on the run, changing their stance when they continually get caught out and denying what they've said. Now you're changing the question again and suggesting this is what you asked originally. So yeah, if you're going to quote me, then stop asking exaggerated questions and using straw man tactics. ... Which you even quoted. So, thank you for that bit of trivia, I guess. Nice selective quoting, because you also said this: "The fact that they allowed it just means that they did it wrong, not that they wanted you to kill the dragon in 1 hit." in the same block of text I quoted. Again, you can't kill a dragon with one hit. Absolute BS. But not surprising coming from someone who's never tried it. Anyone can tell you it's not up to moving your cleric up to a dragon, clisking on it and it's up to the RNG gods. Now you're just making yourself look like someone who knows nothing about this, arguing from something you have no knowledge or experience about. But keep on dreaming. One of the most effective things is not to use this tactic, because you'll no doubt get your arse handed to you. Here we go. It's so easy according to Lephys but Lephys can't do it. And wants other people to do it for him, and then post it on Youtube. As said I before, it's not Boom. Click... click... click. Done. But keeping believing that. It's hard because there are many variables to pull it off and it takes a lot of skill to get all those variables working together. One small mistake by the player and it won't work. And if it doesn't work which it probably won't, you have no Heal spells for the rest of the encounter. Yeah, good gameplay tactics... not. And you would die in the first round or two if you relied on Harm for a 6 Cleric party . Shows you're not speaking from gameplay experience. Keep up that theory crafting BS. WTF? How can you support a "more likely to Harm a dragon to near-death build?". That doesn't even make sense. Can you show us what a "more likely to Harm a dragon to near-death build" is, because I would really like to see this. I want to see this "Near-Death Dragon Slaying Cleric" compared to other normal clerics that can cast Harm. Considering you said it's easy to do this build. Yes Lephys, this quote is for you: "You keep saying that word... I do not think it means what you think it means."

Exactly, you shouldn't have posed the question in an exaggerated manner. And there was no confusion on my side. I can see through these straw man arguments. And now you ask another exaggerated question. Where have I stated that the main priority of Josh's design process is to ensure that no degenerate gameplay exists, ever? I can imagine Josh has many priorities with the design process of the game and I would never say his main priority of degenerate gameplay is more important (or his main priority as you've suggested) than the other design processes of the game. But nice try with the straw man again. The fact is the dragon can't be killed with one hit and it's not easily dispatched with the spell. It requires a lot of effort to pull it off. You obviously don't know what you're talking about. And the whole point is the dev's did allow it because it's an option given to the players. The fact that it's hard to pull off is why it's allowed. The fact that they allowed it means they did it right and kept with the spirit of the D&D rules at the time. The analogy doesn't make any sense. But keeping using those circular arguments to convince yourself. Really, if you weren't being so stubborn and jumping at the merest opportunity to have a go at me before you even apply a few ounces of thought to the things I'm saying, you could make these connections instead of assuming they don't exist, and we'd both be saved the time of my having to explain every single thing I say. (this is to show you should be applying this to yourself) It's not really a viable option because the chances are very small. And if you tried it, you are likely to fail. Also, there are far better spells later in the game than Harm. LMAO. Harm isn't hard to pull off with a dragon? Fraps your battle and show us. More fuzzy logic with the rest of your reply. So you're going to replace your Heal spells with Harm spells? One of the most beneficial spells in the game is going to be replaced with one of the most unreliable tactics in the game due to your characters ability to hit with it. Talk about theory crafting going into the stratosphere. Yep, our healers are now frontline fighters with very little or no Heal spells because Lephys seems to think it's a viable option. And when our characters are taking a beating, there's no Heal spells to heal our characters. What a poor play style. Silly theory crafting there. And that's what it is, your theory crafting against other people's experience. It's not a statistically good idea. It's a statistically bad idea. The fact is it doesn't allow it to be a ridiculously easy fight, since trying to pull it off is hard. It's still a tough fight to use Harm because of all the variables you have to put in place. It's harder to pull off Harm than by using your normal tactics against dragons and you should be rewarded for that.

I never said it was his sole goal in life. Nice straw man argument. Could you perhaps stop with the straw man arguments? And another irrelevant over the top analogy which has nothing to do with computer games. No it doesn't. It's working as intended. The fact that Harm is incredibly hard to pull off makes using the spell against a dragon an unviable option. I have no idea what the odds are but you wouldn't waste your time doing it because it has a very low chance of success. Which is why I never do it anymore. Not because it's a cheesy option which I don't think it is, because it's an option given to the players, instead it's difficult to pull off. It is not easily killable with Harm and I'm not the sort of person that reloads well into the night to pull off that spell. I'd rather move on with the game than try and spend hours pulling that off. There is no contradiction even if you want to believe it. And if you're going to use analogies than at least use some logic. Your house analogy makes no sense. If you're going to use an analogy like that then a similar analogy would be having the Dragon with no defences at all (house door left open), with a big neon sign that says 'use Harm on me because it works all the time' (entering the house with door open works all the time). The FACT is Harm doesn't work against the dragon unless you have a lot of variables in place. If one of those variables isn't in place, it doesn't work. BS with the dev's not wanting that. The dev's obviously wanted different ways of overcoming obstacles. Harm is an option to get past some of those obstacles. If you're foolhardy to try it and succeed then great, then it would be an option for them to put it in and the players to try it, albeit with a low success rate. The fact that the dev's made it an option with an incredibly low success rate makes it an allowable option by them. Are you suggesting the dev's only wanted you to use Harm against low level enemies and not all enemies in the game? What a load of BS.

It is and it isn't. Most people don't play humans because it's better to use other races for classes. If you play a Rogue, you go Halfling. It's a no brainer because of the racial benefits (powers) they get for rogues that Humans don't. Similar with other builds. Certain races / classes are quite OP compared to their human builds. But what we found out was the human builds have the Heroic effort power that you can take (it's optional to take it) and we found it was an absolute must. Many times you roll and it was a good roll and you missed. It was hard not to metagame and think I must have just missed him and then throw down your Heroic Effort and it becomes a hit. You only had one heroic effort per encounter and after the encounter, you got it back straight away. No resting required. So you always used it every encounter because you know you would get it back. But as I said, there were better races to play than Humans because those other races were usually more powerful.

1) Some people might call them cheesy exploits. I call it thinking out of the box. 2) I wouldn't reload with Harm in BG2. In fact, I stopped using it after my second or third play through many years ago. There's too many variables to pull it off. Also, D&D pnp isn't balanced either. And your example is not entirely true. You can do a 'type' of reload with Heroic Effort for Humans. In fact, I would say the Heroic Effort power is quite over powering. I only know because our GM decided to have all of us players choose Human Characters because our original characters were OP. I had a Halfling Rogue. What this did was make us optimise our characters again and we found Heroic Effort was a god send. eg. Attacks enemy with daily. Rolls dice. miss. Heroic Effort, Hit. If I was to play d&d pnp with a rogue again, I would definitely use a human. At level 3, I had a +14 to hit with sneak attack which I was able to do every round and an AC of 20. They're just as every bit as powerful as Halfling Rogues and you have Heroic Effort to do a 'type' of reload with a +4 to your attack roll.

Yes, that is the intended meaning. I've also explained the intended meaning previously. I don't think I've ever used "degenerate" as a description of players, but of gameplay. I don't believe players are ever at "fault" for using whatever tools designers provide for them, including features like save/reload or rest spamming. It's the designers' responsibility to design systems and individual sub-systems that work well together and promote enjoyable gameplay. BTW, in my own tabletop gaming scenarios, I've heard plenty of players (and DMs) deride other players for "abusing" clear rule loopholes. I don't think this is helpful for anyone and, unless you're in a tournament environment, I don't know why any DM/GM wouldn't simply talk to the players about adjusting the rules for the long-term health of the game. With PE, the rules we give to you are ours to write. If a player "abuses" any rule we put in, we are the people to blame, not the players. I.e, we, the designers, create degenerate gameplay opportunities. Players simply recognize the opportunity and take advantage of it to win the game, which is usually one of their major goals. But because those opportunities often become the de facto tactic or strategy for overcoming an obstacle, what could have been a dynamic element of gameplay becomes static -- generally undesirable. Read the quote from decado to which he's responding, with the first words "out of his mouth" in response being "Yes, that is the intended meaning." Basically, word-emphasis aside, the point still stands. Degenerate gameplay will always be in games like this and there will be players who use it. I don't see how Josh can get rid of it totally. I'd really like to see how they eliminate degenerate gameplay opportunities in PoE. If there are opportunities, then it appears Josh is saying, the dev's including himself are to blame. It doesn't contradict the design. On one of my very first play throughs of BG2 (possibly my first play through), I used Jaheira to use the spell Harm on the Shadow Dragon and reduce him to 1 hp. An incredibly low chance of success and it worked. If designers are going to put a powerful spell like Harm in the game, then designers can't cry foul if someone uses it against a boss. If they don't want players to reduce a boss to 1 hp, then they should put safe guards in place. eg. Immune to certain spells. Otherwise, it's working as intended. It's just another way to get past an obstacle, albeit a very low chance of success and the stars have to align for it to succeed. And if you did it on your first attempt, how do you know it's degenerate gameplay? You don't.

Really? Can you supply some links? Because Josh Sawyer says here: Looks like degenerate gameplay to me. Obviously not having a go at Josh. Because the IE games did have faults which Obsidian are trying to correct. If you're going to quote people, it helps to have some links to back you up or at the very least, quote them with what they say.

That's what I said. They can't be bothered to make the effort.

Sounds like most of those backers don't care. Even if you sent out a poll to the backers, most won't reply as shown in Update 69 and the new Stretch goals. Less than 2000 replied to it, which means over 73,000 couldn't be bothered. I don't see the point in making a case for the majority when the majority don't seem to make an effort. This is nothing new, a similar thing happened with inXile and their polls, especially with the Turnbased vs RtwP poll. Most people don't care.

Giving it more thought. I'd be very surprised if random encounters are put into the game. I think PoE will be more like IWD where you click on an area and you're teleported there. No random encounters, no danger at all. I very much doubt it will be like the Baldurs Gate games. The reason being for the reasons I outlined and there is next to no reward to get involved in combat. The loot would be trash. We know, which has been confirmed by Obsidian, that most if not all of the high powered magic items will have fixed positions in the game. Also, I very much doubt Obsidian will spend the man hours creating intricate random encounters that rewards players with multiple ways of overcoming a random encounter. A random encounter is supposed to be something simple, like waylaid by bandits or coming across a merchant and also a means for escape if you want to flee. If you block that avenue for fleeing than you're limiting the choices of the player, and that is bad game design for something as frivolous as a random encounter. So for me, most random encounters are pointless because no xp for kills, trash loot and just as easy to run away, unless it's something worth while like a wandering merchant.

The fact is there is no xp for kills. We all know this and it can't be disputed. If we're taking the IE games as an example, and going by my view of Risk vs Reward for a random encounter, if the reward isn't worthwhile to engage in combat, then the best option is to not engage in combat at all. Because there is no xp reward for killing, you're going to waste valuable spells and health on a purely random encounter. Then overcoming the obstacle through other means (if possible) seems the best option. Also, we know there are limited rest spots in the game. So why waste spells and valuable health on killing for no xp for kills in a random encounter with so little reward in loot? If that means fleeing to the edge of the screen like in the IE games, then that would be one of the best options, especially if the rewards are some random loot that can be picked up anywhere in the game. If overcoming the encounter by other means instead of killing the enemy nets you xp, then a non combat method is preferable. Seriously, why waste valuable spells and health in a purely random encounter when a rest spot might be miles away? Unless there's some really cool loot, then it's not worth it. Again, Risk vs Reward. I don't see the risk in engaging in combat if I can run away in random encounters like you could do in the IE games. And if overcoming the random encounter nets you xp though non-violent means, then running away seems the best option.

So running away rewards you xp for overcoming the encounter? How do you define combat in a random encounter? If you define it by killing the enemy, then there is no xp for killing enemies. But if it rewards you for overcoming the encounter, then look at my above response to DCParry.

Prove it. If there is random encounters in the game, then are there any actual reason that is based on something that have be said by developers that you would not be rewarded with XP by solving them by some means given you by designers? If not then burden of proof is on you IMO. Burden of proof is on the person who makes the claim. Azmodan made the claim and it's for him to prove it. Not for anyone to disapprove it. That's shifting the burden of proof onto someone else and in this case it's not for us to prove a negative. We can only speculate on what might happen in random encounters going off the IE games. The only two randoms that were moderately difficult for low-mid level parties were the Wyverns/Spiders and the Bandits with Ice Arrows. The bear or Winter Wolf encounter near Nashkel might be troublesome on the first time, but after you've levelled, it was easy. The bear never dropped anything. Everything else was a waste and I always ran to the edge of the map to continue my game.

Hi Hiro! Nah man - a random encounter is still a challenge. You will still get an XP value for solving the encounter. Its just the solution can be any one of the following: 1) Kill them 2) Sneak around them to a pre-determined map-end marker 3) Talk to them and avoid a fight based on reputation (maybe you have a good reputation with Group X, the Group these mercenaries are from) 4) Polymorph your enemies into hamsters and then turn them to stone, then pick up the stone hamsters and sell them at the next town 5) Charm them and walk to the pre-determined map-end marker 6) Talk to them and pay them double for not killing you How about them apples? All of the options above would resolve the random encounter. I as a GM would be willing to give you XP equivalent to option 1, at least, in reward for taking any of the above actions. 1) no xp for kills in PoE. 2) run away like I said 3) Most people in this thread defending PoE's skill check are saying "Speech>10 = win" is a terrible design. Especially talking your way out of a random encounter. 4) Waste of spells. I'd rather run away. 5) Again waste of spells (see 4) or charm talking is a terrible design (see 3) 6) I'd rather run away and save my money. Also, due to limited rest stops, it's probably the best option to run away instead of wasting valuable health on a random encounter with seemingly no good reward for it. My view comes down to Risk vs Reward. Is it worth the Risk? Random encounters? No. Unless there's a really good reason why I need to engage the enemy, I'll run to the side of the screen and get out of there.

Yes you are. That's something we both agree on.

There goes those random encounters. Not that the random encounters were hard to overcome, except for the wyverns, spiders and ettercaps with poison in the Cloakwood Forest. No fear of being ambushed because you get no xp for kills. Unless Obsidian wants to make us fight for no xp in random encounters. Random encounter?, no xp?, okay just runaway or reload.