PrimeJunta

Edér sounds more Celtic to me. Bradán, Edan, Erryn... that sort of thing.

HH, you are aware that most of the team that made PS:T are back together, writing T:ToN, and many of the others were hired specifically for their writing skills? Colin McComb was Chris Avellone's closest collaborator on PS:T, Saint Christopher himself is on the roster, George Ziets wrote some of the best bits of Mask of the Betrayer, Shanna Germain is a kick-ass writer deeply involved with writing Numenera itself, Monte Cook who authored Numenera also wrote a huge amount of stuff for Planescape, and Patrick Rothfuss is a best-selling novelist? If you are aware of that, what kind of proof about the ability to write a good story would satisfy your needs, exactly?

I'm starting to kinda hope they pull an Arcanum and do both. Sh1t combat is, after all, a venerable Torment tradition just as much as an outlandish world, a personal, philosophical story, and wack companions. Edit: Oh, looks like I wasn't the first to make this connection.

@Bester, fascinating. I take it you have a source inside inXile to be able to be so confident about this?

They've already prototyped Numenera mechanics on the W2 combat engine (and said that it works surprisingly well). I don't know if they've prototyped a RTwP system as well; if they have I haven't noticed them saying so.

@Walsingham, they haven't started developing the combat system yet. They're still prototyping. What's more, they said from the start that this is the way they want to do it. I.e., there is no requirements shift. This is all planned.

Pop quiz: name the Four Pillars of Torment the inXile explained in great detail during the Kickstarter. No peeking.

Thanks for the heads-up. Voted turn-based.

This is exactly what happened to my first party in BG1. I recall this like it was yesterday! :D Ah, the fond memories of being torn to pieces by serrated fangs the length of scythe-heads... I actually encountered my first ankheg coming out of those kobold-infested mines on the other side. The result was the same though.

But that's because we are. You inferior beings will never understand the true power of gaming unless you learn to do it ower way. Also, you are permitted to bow now.

Yes. Yes, we do.

Josh has stated that that's one of his primary design goals with the character system. So as intentions go, I think things are good. We will find out just how good a designer he is when the game comes out, of course. Personally I'm not too worried on that score.

So what will you be doing when pretending to be a bandit? Toasting marshmallows around the campfire? I think it's more likely that you'll be doing bandit stuff, at least being seen with the bandits. That ought to get you a rep.

Also, at times the uncertainty is all part of the game. It'd be boring if the "right" options were always obvious. They might as well not put in any "wrong" ones in that case.

I usually find replying to you to be unproductive but Ill give this a go. Im not objecting to anything. Im just some dude on the internet wondering aloud about the functionality of a game Im interested in. Sawyer mentions wanting to eliminate "whoopsy-daisies", which is a good thing to remove imo, and my mind wonders about how it will work out in this system. I wonder about a hidden "interpretation" column where the NPC interprets something the opposite of what I meant, but now Im completely unaware of that fact. I wonder if its better to have the "whoopsy-daisy" frontloaded, where I can see what my character said, than back loaded, where I don't know how the NPC interpreted it. Im just asking questions out loud. Fair enough. I hope you've had some of those mysteries elucidated in this thread, at least. If you have any suggestions on how to converse more productively, please let me know about that too. I'm open to most suggestions, although "enthusiastically agreeing with everything" is probably off the cards.

Comprehension is a weak point I see. Sure, that's what Im saying. Then what are you saying? Color me confused too. It seems to me that you're objecting to this system because you can't tell beforehand how the NPC's are going to react to what you're saying. If this is in fact not what you're saying, I'd very much appreciate a clarification of your position. And if it is what you're saying, I'd appreciate you explaining your reasoning because the position doesn't make a lick of sense to me. "Entirely predictable" doesn't sound like a lot of fun to me!

Huh. This turned into a group hug. Imagine that.

:reads through thread: :notes differences: Funny how the opinions split on this one. I've had a rule of thumb of disliking anything @Karkarov likes and vice versa lately, but seems like he's got his head on straight about this one. And certain people who I generally agree with clearly have very poor taste on this particular point. It'll be interesting to see how this pans out. I like the sound of it a lot anyway.

Ya think? No accounting for taste, I guess.

I find the style highly different from BG1. I don't like the BG portraits much at all TBH. Airbrush a go go. These are more painterly and naturalistic at the same time, which is a tough act to pull off. Great expressions too, with lots of personality.

Those portraits are without question the best work I've seen in any cRPG. Beats even Icewind Dale. If I ever want to commission a portrait, I'll call you first, Kaz!

My favorite update so far. I'd be very keen to hear more. Even better if you're able to include some of the stuff you'd normally not want to, uhm, show off. You know, the kind of stuff you reminisce about late at the company post-party. I'm sure it happens.

Poking most problems with a stick tends to either solve them, or turn them into other problems, which may in turn be soluble by poking them with a stick.

Karkarov's right. AD&D blows like a hurricane. Do everything right and you'll still get one-shotted frequently from sheer bad luck. Also, any game that has "Save frequently and in different slots" in the instructions is fundamentally broken.

I'll join. I'll also join the Arcanum fan group. I can't make up my mind.