motorizer

Well I for one am glad that obsidian are trying to address the problems in the games they are inspired by rather than just copying them (no one ever said it was going to be baldurs gate 3) But you're never going to please everyone, I'm happy with everything so far, but there is stuff I would have done differently if I was the designer.

The problem is that most games of this type can't be played enjoyably without reloading after losing a fair fight. Suppose you have a party-based cRPG with permadeath. Further suppose that it's a reasonably difficult game. I.e., you can get party members killed in fair fights, even if you're a reasonably competent player. Now, suppose a party member does get killed. The result is that your party is materially weakened. This means that if all else remains the same, you will be more likely to lose more party members in further fights. This creates a feedback circle, with difficulty rising exponentially after every loss. With the difficulty assumption above, this makes it extremely unlikely you'll even be able to complete the game. If you lost one party member, you're more likely to lose a second one, more likely than that to lose a third, fourth, fifth, and last. Unless you magically upgrade your gaming skills so much you'll be able to make up for the loss with that. Which is unlikely. Game over. To break this cycle, you need some way to make up that loss. Options are: Resurrection magic. This is IMO worse than stunned-and-get-up, since it nerfs death itself – what should be if not the biggest penalty for failure in the game, at least one of the biggest. Magic resupply of (near) equivalently powerful replacement party members. E.g. an adventurers' hall where you can hire another meat shield of more or less the same level, ad infinitum. Level scaling. Joy and happiness. In my opinion, none of these options are particularly attractive. Sure, it's unrealistic to have people beat up to incapacitation only to get up and prance around merrily afterwards, but from where I'm at none of the others are any more realistic – nor, IMO more importantly, do they make for any more enjoyable gameplay. I quite like PE's current approach to this – characters that are beat up badly enough become maimed, which significantly reduces their effectiveness until they get some medical attention that's more sophisticated than you get in the field and presumably costs money. That's enough to motivate you not to get them carelessly beaten up, but not so severe that it'd be an automatic reload trigger. I'm all for hardcore modes with permadeath, though. That can add to the replay value a great deal. But with that you know what you're getting when going in. Don't believe me? Then I challenge you to play Temple of Elemental Evil from level 1 through 3, not in Ironman mode, without reloading after losing a fair fight. It can be done, but it's sure as hell not my idea of fun. I don't want a game where your party can't die...and I doubly don't want a game where they can be resurrected...I'm hoping the health/stamina system of P:E will allow characters to fall and get up without actually being immortal.. a sort of middle ground. It should be possible for them to die permanently, but it should be feasible to complete the game without it happening if you are careful.

Or whatever magical line your party just snuck past that awarded experience could also flag the mook as unkillable / no xp. Your example is what I call getting lost in the minutia (not you the poster). They are so worried about improbable one-offs (sneaking past then going back to kill, who the hell does that? I know, I know, EVERYONE will claim they do just that) that the whole system suffers for it, imo. I'm hoping the xp won't be for sneaking past an imaginary line, or for avoiding or fighting a group of enemies, but for actually achieving whatever it is you set out to do. If the quest is to rescue someone then the xp should be for rescuing them IMO

Like others, I think this would be good in a sequel, where it was part of the design from the start. and it should include other elements like sea monsters, storms, scurvy...etc... but I wouldn't be against including it, though I doubt it would happen at this stage unless they already had something planned

But you said in your first post that it was not a "new torment" despite the fact that it is new, called torment and it was obvious what he meant

As mentioned in the class name thread, being able to rename your class at character creation could add a bit of flavour to your concept of your character's background.

Fighter sounds a bit dull to me but I don't mind the others. Being able to rename the class for your own character would allow you to add a bit of flavour, you'd still be a fighter or whatever but the classname could be knight, gladiator, warrior, mercenary, axe maniac, pugilist...whatever you want to put in. Something that adds a little to the background of your character.

I agree, and I'd rather enemies were scared of you because of something you've done than because you can survive being stabbed 17 times with a sword. But yeah it would be nice to see some enemies panic over you later in the game.

If they don't come up with some "chosen one" type BS and you are just a person, and if the location is different and the locals don't know your past..... then it could be done both ways, Those that want to could import their character for the sequel and those that don't could just make another. But that would only really work if you don't get to epic high levels

In fairness to dragon age 2, the plot was a deep seated rivalry between factions that took years to play out, rather than a standard "big bad destroying! only you and your rag tag bunch of friends can save us! despite our large standing armies!" However, due to the backlash against it (and it had many other faults), it looks like we're back to OMG!! DRAGONS! for DA3

??? I don't see how that is exclusive to a system with level determinant metrics. Practically any system, from equipment-based to influence based, can have situations where you are wildly overpowered. A level determinant system is easier to balance for a game with a power curve similar to D&D 3.X/PF, because when characters go from barely being able to hit 10 damage to a single target to slamming down meteors, sticking with the same hp/damage reduction/defenses throughout the entire game would either lead to overly fragile high-level characters or overly tough lough level characters. If you disagree, please explain how you could successfully balance a game with the power curve of D&D level 1 to D&D level 12 without using "stat inflation". New player character, new regions? Frankly, trying to have the same character for more than three games would probably end in failure. Even without a D&D power curve, there is only so much you can do with one PC before things become stale. I'm not looking for a quote now in about 2 million comments but, I'm certain they said very early on that there would be the ability to carry your character forward for sequels. I'm not getting into D&D rules as I don't play it and I don't study them, but if they don't know whether you are going to have 10HP or 100HP when you enter an area, how the hell can that be easier to balance?

I'm sure they said right from the first day that they would be doing sequels if it was successful

How is it easier to balance a game where you might be wildly more powerful depending what level you are when you get to an area? that makes no sense to me...the easiest way to do that would be to make the game linear. Ease of balancing shouldn't even figure in this discussion IMO, that is the developers job not ours, and they are more than capable. Sounds like you want the opposite to me to be honest, I've been playing RPGs for a long time now, and I'm a bit fed up of being epic. I'd imagine the game will go for a middle ground though to be honest...and as I said earlier, if you are battling demi gods in game one, where does that leave for the sequels to go?

Dwarven noble was the best origin IMO. Dragon age has got a setting that lends itself to a lot more intrigue than there actually is in the games, in which I seem to have spent most of my time getting ambushed by loads of trash mobs..

I agree with trashman 100% on this. Progression can go from dealing with small village problems, bandits etc....to minor local politics and territorial disputes...to getting dragged into the schemes, machinations and wars of the nobles of the main factions.. as your reputation and influence increase. Skills can add new ways to defend against that sword blow that would still do serious damage if it connects, or new ways to attack or to avoid conflict altogether by stealth or diplomacy That is progression done in a way that is 1000 times more interesting than 100hp > 200hp > 500hp Someone mentioned jagged alliance 2 earlier, in that game you can increase HP, but everyone has a maximum of 100, and its tough to get there, and to start with high HP means sacrificing other upgrades .. In that game it can gain you an edge, but you still need strategy, equipment and a little luck to win.

I hope we don't get to epic levels.... It would kind of put a stop to the idea of carrying the character forward to future adventures if you became an indestructible superhero, same reason I don't want a "save the world" quest, it just makes sequels kind of implausible.... and my favourite part of RPGs is usually the start when you are weaker... I think you should always be able to come unstuck, weaker foes should still be a threat if you don't take them seriously..getting stabbed with a sword should never be trivial.

Six days in Fallujah was pretty much cancelled because of bad PR. I had to look that one up, seems to have been a publisher decision, so not relevant to P:E also it is one game, compared to the multi million selling GTA series, modern warfare 2, oblivion, duke nukem 3d, doom, medal of honor, carmageddon... etc..etc.... that all had bad PR and indignant spluttering politicians and moral campaigners frothing at the mouth..

There is no such thing. The most controversial games are often huge hits. And remember, while often games feature rasism/sexism/whatever, the only ones who seems to care are idiot bloggers with no evidence it affects sales. The most controversial game of the last years was ironicaly Mass Effect 3 with it's idiotic ending, and not because of some sosial issue. For better or worse, evidence shows that gamers in general don't care about these things as kotaku would have you believe. Right. I'm finding the implicit assumption in this thread that the gaming landscape has changed dramatically since the late 1990s, in regards to child killing, a bit unconvincing. Is there a single shred of proof for this, beyond people's gut feelings? If anything, games seem more violent and provocative than ever, and games often seem to almost court controversy. Not that I expect a non-AAA title like P:E would ever garner the attention of something like Call of Duty allowing you to massacre an entire airport full of civilians. This is true, every even slightly controversial issue ever mentioned on a game forum raises the spectre of bad PR, but I've never seen a good game that had bad PR ever do anything other than sell by the bucketload... the only games a bit of bad publicity has ever harmed are the ones that were crap anyway. I don't really care about the killing kids issue, I think I've made points on both sides of the argument in the past..I don't play these games as a psycho madman so it doesn't affect me.... but bad PR and upsetting politicians and self appointed moral guardians should never be a reason for censorship IMO. If it makes the game harder to sell in some countries though or gets it banned, then that's a good enough reason not to include it. Although if they didn't mention it, and there wasn't a fuss about it every five minutes on the forum, the censors would probably never even notice, it's not exactly core gameplay.

Well a realistic and immersive consequence of killing a kid in a setting like this is getting your head chopped off. A child killer would most likely never be allowed to walk free again... So if you want to talk realism, killing kids and getting caught in the act would realistically be game over..

Why do you need xp for encounters at all? if you quest is get the magic ring, then the xp should come from getting the magic ring, if your goal is to reach the next level of dungeon then the xp should come from that....who was in your way and what you did about them is neither here nor there..

Yeah, I can get behind this, a serious injury that cripples you (or a companion) but will fully heal in time.

Yep, if they run away at the first sign of trouble, and you can't actively target them, then there is no problem. If they can stand there taking punishment, then it is a problem. That said I don't care either way, I've played several games with kilable kids, it never used to be a problem till fallout 1 was censored in some countries, probably due to how gory the deaths were as much as anything.

Also there is the point that you will likely get into far more fights than any real warrior ever did, so chances are you might not just lose an arm, over the course of the game you might end up losing both arms, a leg and an eye...at what point would you give up adventuring for a quiet life? It would have to be limited to one injury per character.... and then it would feel a bit odd if by the end of the game everyone in your party was missing a limb.

I think that pointing out the flaws in a games depiction of a certain culture, when that game Is set on a different planet entirely, seems to be a trap that many fall into... as long as it makes sense in the game world then mixing up influences from one or more cultures is fine. But the closer games get to portraying a real historic culture, the more people point out the differences. The same goes for equipment, there are plenty of posts on here saying "but they didn't use that weapon at that time" or whatever...as though they think the game is set in earths history. I like fantasy as a way to tell a story in a historic type setting without having to slavishly follow history. Myself, I'd like to see a move away from Europe, and twee Tolkien rip offs. I don't care where really, just somewhere new. But at the same time I like my fantasy worlds to be grounded in a consistent believable reality. I'm not a fan of power fantasies either, I'd rather play as a person living in that world than as the uberlord of that world. I haven't voted in the poll since I'd just pretty much tick every box

I think a simple one word title would be best.... Project.