Osvir

There's been tons of discussion on this matter. Go to those threads. You should know you can't edit after a certain point of time but, what's your input/feedback on the poll? What do you think of the topic (Walk/Run) and what sort of tweaking? You can ignore voting and comment too of course you're a bit vague Messier-31, what could be better? EDIT: This would be awesome too! Crawl through a hole, crawl up to a fortress sneakily, swim, hide.

I somewhat agree here. I think it is interesting but... just like with how I would want a Spiritshift Druid to be a path rather than "automatic gain", I'd want a Beastmaster Ranger to be a path. The standard Ranger = The traditional IE Archer, and the Animal Companion being a Ranger Skill/Ability you choose to get or not get. Generalist Druid = Standard Druid, and Spiritshift form being a choice. With how skills and talents work, regardess how the UI works, it allows me to build a melee Druid with or without Spiritshift with the clever use of some talents/skill points/attributes. If "Spiritshift" is a "Talent" you pick at Level Up, rather than at character creation, I think the Druid would be more fun. Why am I talking about the Druid?? Because I feel the exact same way with the Ranger. Animal Companion being a choice, a Talent/Ability you pick/choose (if you want) at Level Up. Probably not going to happen due to the code/strings/triggers/scripts tied to the Ranger/AC mechanic but... *shrug* I dunno, I feel like I voicing my opinion on this still. I feel I want a traditional IE Archer in my party... is the Fighter or Rogue the go-to Infinity Engine-esque Archer in Pillars of Eternity?

@kat7ra: Yep, it's one of those "If Obsidian has some extra time" before release I think.

It's the dynamic in the class that is the diversity. You have 3 of the same class early game, then mid game maybe 2, and late game maybe 1. So in the end, the Class would be functional on its own, which would allow for a standard build with it (every class different in party) or you could continue with more than 1 if you want to (summon more demons/monsters/beings than you can on your own, and stronger versions too), and could summon creatures on its own. The "hook" would simply be that it's a class that is stronger when there's more of it. It'd still be able to summon on its own in early game and mid game, but it would be most "Powerful" with more than 1, but at the same time by being more "Powerful" you also compromise the group. I think that should be a fair balancing methodic. EDIT: Just like having 2 Rangers with 2 different animal companions could be beneficial to the party composition you want to build, 2 Ritualists would be balanced to be as well. 2 Fighters (1 Tank, 1 DPS, or 2 Tanks) is the same. Or 2 Wizards in the party with different Spells (One might have more Damage Spells, Glass Cannon, another Wizard more De-Buffing, Blinding, Fear and similar spells) etc.

I think, that if a game wants to do romance the best, there should at least be like 50 different companions you can pick up, all catering to different playstyles. Naturally, this isn't a "Hey! That's easy!" thing to do. You wouldn't be able to get all of them on one playthrough, as they would be tied to Choice & Consequence in the story, so if you an evil path, the questline would adjust, or if you play a good path, the evil companions are mid-bosses or even end-game bosses. I think it'd be easier to write romances that way as well, as you wouldn't need every 50th character to be romanceable, but 1 or 2 out of 10, and if there are 5 different paths in the game, there'd be 10 companions to recruit in each different storyline. And even then it shouldn't be something that's obvious, and other factors included.

Not all of us gayfolk would write a world where everyone humps everyone. I personally prefer Robert E. Howard's take on things. And I believe the movie Osvir spoke about was Caligula.. but that may be because, for reasons that are obvious to those that have seen it, the only non-comedy movie I've seen that's set in Roman times. I haven't seen it, but I've heard it's good and IIRC has some of the content I spoke of earlier. The explanation might be as simple as that, that he wants more versatility and more representation and diversity, which I think is cool and good. From a narrative stand-point, I think romance would be more cool as something "happening" rather than being a gamified reward system.

I hate this - because I put my weapon away and then forget it's in my pack and when out of town, my character launches themself bare-fisted at an ogre A "Readied" Mode could function in a way that that wouldn't happen. There could be a "Readied" Equipment Slot. Essentially you'll stow away your weapons when you're not "Readied", and if you are attacked, the characters would equip all their weapons when you click "Readied". "Prepared"? "Alert"? "Hostile"? "Attack"? *shrug*

Well, many have suggested "Use the Slow-Motion feature!" previously in discussions, and I'm going to do the reverse here I think, "Use the Speed Up-Feature!" Good point on "Both" in the poll, and I agree somewhat. It's easier to define "Yes" or "No". How would you want Both to function? In what way? Would the characters enter combat "tired", or would there be no penalty to it? Is a Walk animation even necessary and wasteful to resources if no one is going to walk around anyways? How would you want both running and walking to work in sync? Auto-Run On/Off (Infinite)? Consequences/Penalties? "Both" is in itself its own discussion. I'd prefer walking, and running animation when in combat (readability, player understanding). Or running to cost a small amount of Endurance over time. How would you want both to function in unison? I think for a game like Pillars of Eternity, and budget, "Both" introduces more problems than one or the other.

I've seen "Walking" animation in the game by my Player characters. I know it is in there. It is a question of how easy it is to re-direct the "Move" Command to play "Walk" animation instead of the "Run" animation. It could be problems in the code by doing that, because walking animation depends on this or that. Skeletons might not be tuned correctly etc. there might be an issue with combat if you do that, or other "dependables". Then again, it could be as simple as a switch (to make, maybe tops an hour, 2 hours? Granted, if all the right conditions are met in the code). Essentially: Do "Walk" instead of "Run" when "Mouse-Click Move" command. But I doubt it is that simple. Also depends on if the pathfinding of "Run" can be re-directed to "Walk" and if it is compatible. Emotionally immersive & pacing/narrative: Running around everywhere feels like you're on a rush somewhere, "You really shouldn't be in the Dyrford, you've got more important things to do!!! HURRY!!!!". Technical Aspect/Beta Testing/Promotion: For these purposes, Running is really useful, you get around the world faster and can do stuff faster due to it. As a Beta Tester I appreciate running around, it is convenient. But in the real thing, I'd continue to ask the question "I wonder how this would have felt if the characters were walking" I think, from time to time. Like walking in on the Cultists in the Skaen Temple, or walking in on Tryndil, or walking in on Lord Harond (Sound/Volume, another aspect, for another thread). "Walking in" on things. Obsidian can also show off way more of the game by having "Running" animation in trailers, Let's Plays and so forth. If the characters were walking around everywhere, Jesse would've gotten to Part 14-15. It'd take lots of time, potentially more than a month, and would be too much of a waste of time, showing off way too little in too much time. Running around essentially helps testing & promotion a lot. Expansive Start: Ideas (shelf material): A more advanced idea would be to "Start Run Animation" when combat starts and there is X distance between target and character. I think this could merge extremely well between in-combat and out-of-combat "transitions" and even give some clear visual feedback on "Now you're in combat" & "Now you're not". Another idea is, you go with "Readied" movement when in "danger zones" (dungeons, battles) or even having a "readied" mode (like "Scouting" mode). Whenever you go into "Readied" mode you'd show hostile behavior, and NPC's could even react on it :D (Fighting in a city against some thugs, the civilians cheer you on, and if you're the thugs they'll boo at you or run away). Or interacting with a farmer, and he'll become defensive/aggressive/raise weapon/"Readied" too, if you raise your weapon or have it equipped. Or perhaps run away. I play Project Zomboid on a roleplaying server, and it's a great game to roleplay with others. You have an "Aim" state, be it a melee weapon or a ranged weapon, a "Hold down button" aim. What I'm presenting is a toggleable "button", a trigger, "Go Hostile" and NPC's can react, or you can see NPC's "Go Hostile" before you do as well. Readability /Expansive End

Playing the Beta, the characters are running everywhere. This isn't much of a big deal, but in the Infinity Engine games characters were "Walking" everywhere and with Boots of Movement Speed or similar could be abstracted as "Running". I know there is a walking animation in the game, because NPC's use it, as well as the Party Characters use it from time to time in-game. This isn't a plea, or a demand in anyway based on the results of this poll, but merely a question and a personal curiosity what the community here thinks about walking/running as a go-to for exploration/movement/pacing out of combat. I voted "Walking", because I'd like to see, feel and experience it myself. Is it better? Worse? Will I get withdrawal and want to run because everything is so slow? Or will I be immersed in it? Will I enjoy it? Etc. etc. I would like to see a build have the option to toggle Walk/Run for above mentioned testing purposes.

Sure, these are all options, but these games are beatable without any spellcasters, with an underleveled party, with a party that can't use shields at all and without any archers. That's part of the reason why they have replay value. Fine. Use the wand of monster summoning. Drink lots of health potions during the fight. Use a team of stealthy characters for sneak attacks. Use oils of speed. Ignore fighting the bandits completely even, infiltrate their base and pretend to be a bandit yourself. You don't even need to fight all of them at all. Sorry, a bit irrelevant as the discussion is about combat, but thought I'd throw this in as well. I wanted to point out that you could defeat many battles in the Infinity Engine games by using many different tactics. Thus far in the BB, there's many different ways to overcome battles/obstacles as well.

I think Romance can fit a character/companion if it fits their character/personality and if it fits their motivations/lore/story/plot/narrative/goals-in-life etc. etc.. Take Alistair for instance, again, from Dragon Age: Origins. As a male character, I can not find anything in Alistair's personality that would make him get the "hots" for the main male character, unless he gets inspired/influenced by Zevran. I feel this is implemented into Alistair's character because BioWare wanted to be accessible and diverse for everyone. And therein lies a big problem about romance, it can easily transform into something "plastic", a reward system. I think "Romance" would flow best in a game if it showed both how cruel Love can be, as well as how beautiful it can be. "Romance" can also be poetic, "romantic", and be appreciative of the beauty of nature, of life, and of love itself, but that doesn't mean it have to be directed towards any specific person, but rather just... PLUR (Peace Love Understanding Respect-jargon) But then again, after seeing Dragon Age: Inquisition, and some of the romances from AngryJoe's review, I started to think that... maybe Ferelden is a bit "Roman Empire" inspired? During one the Ceasar's periods/eras, IIRC (I don't remember which one though), orgies were common place, and sex was liberal between man and man, and woman and woman. Though, I think this was more common among higher ups in the hierarchy, rich people conducted these acts moreso than the poor folk. There's a movie about it that's been applauded even, don't remember its name. Regardless, if Ferelden is inspired by the Roman Empire and this "Era", then I guess it'd make some sense for Alistair to pique his interest. In many games you are also the "center of attention". NPC's will want to either be you, or want to be with you. In Mass Effect, Shepard is a famous person, and with fame comes fanatism, or even obsession. How many teenagers or even adult women or men can say that they're not attracted to successful people? I find it that, if people were given the chance, they'd choose to be with someone successful, and the more successful the person is and there's a mutual love between the two, then you'd probably choose the one who's more successful. In a party of adventurer's, traversing the land, I could expect that some summer-fling romance or sexual desire/attraction could occur, but I also believe it could be a journey without love, and that the journey and adventure is the focus, concentrating on the task at hand, the objective and the mission. The most important aspect, I feel, is that there has to be a thematic motivation in the companion character, and that he/she/it should not be swooned by the Players word or a gift system. Hypotethically: If Aloth would be a character that you could romance, it shouldn't be a dialogue thing you do, but rather something that "pushes his buttons", whatever that may be. Taking him on a journey, doing a questline to get to know him better, or even keeping him around in the party for a duration of time. For instance, if I have Sagani in the party half the game, she might develop feelings based on my actions and how I act to her, but if I drop her in the Stronghold 1/4th of the way, and then pick her up again 3/4th's of the way, I might never even see a "Romance" option. This goes for all interactions with companions, in all aspects, that they would do better if they were "dynamic" in this way, and not "static" until Dialogue Button is pressed.

When "Scouting"/"Sneaking" I've noticed that the circle is filled with red, and starts to go counter-clockwise to visualize how "spotted" the player is. If one were to take that filling, but have it fill "50%" of the circle and be static, 1/2 half of it covered, and would represent which way the character is facing (right-click and drag positioning would be more important). That is probably the easiest part, then to take into consideration 1'000 other things. Some sort of facing system could be helpful, but also difficult to implement and a bit too late, probably. EDIT: Pretty much this (if the link doesn't work, 2:14) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dhIP_1CvrSk#t=134 Haha, it's a vacuum cleaner, but consider the "circle" on top of it, and imagine that a uhm... Fighter is standing on top of it.

A thought occured based on your occurance of a thought: Could these NPC summoners summon the Player as well eventually, if they could be upgradeable/strengthened? And teleport them widely across the world?

(post truncated, you can click on the quote upper right-corner to be directed to the original) There are several ways to get out of Engagement, and move around, or help with breaking engagement for someone else (Knockdown, Blinded). Though, there aren't any ambigious tools that everyone can use (I think). I'd like to see a Talent that makes it easier to break out of disengagement without taking a hit, or an Smoke Bomb item to blind everyone, but the character can escape (and AI too of course). In the IE games: - Low health - Move (Instantaneous, Reactive Re-Positioning) In Pillars of Eternity: - Soon low health (Preparation) - Disengage Skill (Recovery Time, Reactive Re-Positioning) - Move Re-positioning is readily available in Pillars of Eternity for some classes. And perhaps some might think my next idea is too much "League of Legends" but, if every Class had some sort of "Disengage" ability or attack, a Talent Skill, Disengaging might not be much of an issue. As you can then choose to stand your ground, or choose to use re-positioning tactics. - Throw Sand/Dirt/Gravel This talent allows the Character to resort to underhanded tactics, and throw sand in the opponents face! This allows the Character to escape in a brief window! If successful, the Target will be blinded, and the Character will not suffer a disengagement attack if moving away / 1 Per Encounter, Duration 0.X EDIT: I also think it's odd that there aren't any "Resurrect" spells, abilities or items in the Beta. According to both Update #24 and the Official Wiki ("Vitality"), there's supposedly ways to bring back people into the fight. As I said, I haven't seen any of this in the Beta, and this is also an important feature to consider or abstract in the current Combat system (when someone is downed in the Beta, you can't bring them back in-combat, at the moment, but with this feature of bringing back units, it'll add more control too). Will the final version have "bring back" Endurance healing spells? And/Or have I completely missed it in the Beta? In other words, 0 Endurance shouldn't equal "knocked out for the duration of combat", but there should be interactive ways to bring them back in-combat too.

That's what I also said, but thought "Oh might as well" when it wasn't adhered to. @Post: Well yes, the summonings would be as strong as the 2-3 party members. The Ritualists themselves would be mostly static objects. In essence, the Class could be one of the minions instead and no Ritualist would be needed, mechanically. I just thought it'd be more lore interesting if you were a Summoner Class instead of Minion/Demon Class. So, when you have no summons, a party with 3 Ritualists and 3 standard Classes would essentially be a group of 3 characters running around, and when battle begins, they'd potentially get the power of 6-7 characters. A Group of 4 Ritualists, even 7-8 characters. 6 Ritualists, a group of 10 characters (In Strength, but not perhaps in "Units" or amount, the Karaz'Gul example strong summon could perhaps represent the strength of 7-8 characters on its own). EDIT: Very useful against bosses, obviously, but the Resource management is the key element, and loosing control of it. Do you risk that super powerful demon against a powerful boss, and you might end up fighting the Demon instead? Your strongest weapon may become your weakest point.

That's what I've been saying from the start Captain Shrek. Start as a peasant, a caravaneer, or heck... even based on "Culture". Imagine if "Culture" was your Starter Pick Class, and then as the game goes along you "Grow" into one of the Class archetypes? This can be abstracted, I suppose, seeing how the real thing starts. For instance: You're an ex-Slave, now a traveling innate Wizard. Abstraction: You've picked up Wizardry from one of the caravaneers, who even gave you a book of magic, as a token of good-will (Or whatever, abstraction~) If you take that angle or perspective, in a shrewd way, it's a class-free game Not a true one though.

It's the mechanical concept in battle that I find cool, having 2-3 robed dudes on the battlefield, chanting in unison in a circle to summon a creature to protect them (and therein lies their strength). Individually they are weak, but together their magic is strong The creatures summoned are the Ritualists defense and offense. EDIT: Azir, League of Legends. And before any literal misunderstanding, this video represents a concept, that the Champion does near 0 damage, it's the minions that matter. It's also one of my favorite champions :D what I'm saying is that, instead of having a single character summoning a creature, there'd be bonus effects if more than one helped out with summoning. Demon's sprung to mind because "Devils" strike a hard bargain, and I forgot to mention in the OP. Every Summoning would cost a Health Price. So, having more than 1 Ritualist in the Party would be beneficial to this resource... as a single Ritualist could lose a lot of blood.

This is about issues of the Engagement System as it's currently is implemented, Chilloutman, and I think it is also a bit about "Should Obsidian focus their energy on a new system? Or the current system?" and there is only one party that can answer this question really, and that's Obsidian. The system has its flaws, no doubt Hormalakh, I believe this is because it's a work in progress title (and that the Beta is not what's first to be polished but the actual game is), others believe it is a bad system based on its current iteration/revision. We have no idea how the system feels like next build, or if Engagement is as exploitable or not, if there's more stability or if it's worse. Well, I have no idea, but I think it would be much improved in one or more aspect It's a weak system (technically!! Code, script, slowdown, clarity), currently, to be honest, but this is what I'd expect from any in-development project. Every Early Access I've participated and experienced have all improved every single build, and Pillars of Eternity Public Beta too. I expect a Beta to be weaker than a final product, sometimes overpowered, sometimes underpowered. Balance, AI, Clarity, Stability. The combat system is easy to exploit at the moment, and crush your enemies if you use techniques and abilities in a specific sequence and cheese every battle, or even exploit bugs (I really think this all just boils down to: The Disengagement Attack/System is not working as "expected"). Will it be as easy to exploit, or bug, in the next iteration? I believe you can exploit any game if you are deductive, patient, methodical, and if your purpose is to break the game.

I consider the Beta to be a work in progress product Hormalakh. Stuff that I could do a couple of builds ago I can't do, overpowered or some bug things. The gameplay and general playability even feels better, more stable, than a couple of builds ago. Because often times I couldn't even play the game in earlier builds due to crashing or major lag. In this build, examples: There's a water sound, as if you're walking on water, on solid ground in the Skaen Temple (or was it the Caverns? I should check that out). Stuff is improved each build, and I might assuming things, but I feel the Backer Beta is holding out on us greatly. Obsidian's priority number one should be to develop the real thing based on their own wisdom and experience. Backer Beta: The Backer Beta feels like fan-service, we get in on it early, get to feel gameplay and get to hunt for some bugs, experience narrative and a side-quest area in the Dyrford, leave feedback and discuss/debate. But it might not be the first thing to stablize and update. Isn't the Backer Beta a separate work-project? Now, Public Beta is important to any company, but, in terms of in-office employees and time spent, wouldn't they potentially add to their work force on the actual game if they dropped the Beta completely after a certain stable enough Build? Is the Beta area we play being designed the same in the real thing? Will Medreth's group even be there, Nyfre? In the real thing, is the code running better across the board? Less bugs? The real thing: Speaking of Beta & real thing, and comparing to Jesse Cox playthrough (and considering stability). It would look like it runs better. Jesse Cox playthrough looked much more fluid in my opinion, than what I experience in the Beta. Combat, movement, spell casting. Lots of the stuff looks to work better in their own build. Granted, the game is probably designed to function the best, at the moment, for their machines. It looks way more stable. So... well... yeah. I think it'll just become better and better I didn't play Divinity: Original Sin during Early Access much, but I jumped in once a month or so, and everytime I was shocked by how much it had changed. I had a bit of a moment like that when this v364 was released :D it's improving everyone! :D That's why I want to be careful with prejudice against the vision of this system, because frankly I don't know 100% yet what it's like when finished. I can presume, but not be certain. Which obviously is because it is a work in progress product altogether. That's the reason why I am saying "I like it!" so vaguely, because I want to see how it'll feel when it's improved. If Sensuki could pull out a no removal system out of v364, how come he wouldn't be able to do the same thing for v483?

Oh well, I'll just consider these Globalist or Internationalism discussion ITT as inspiration I suppose then, lore-fluff Strength in Numbers, Strength in "Demonic" (or other summoned/manifested/materialized creature). Some form of ideology would be tied to "Ritualism" of this degree after all, in a fantasy setting.

Yes. Yes, it is. They tried their new approach and it didn't work like they thought it did. It's not wise to keep bashing a square block in a round hole if it didn't fit the first time. Insider information? Or have I missed a statement (or forgotten)?

What I'm saying is... how much time has Obsidian spent on this mechanic, and how much do they have left on it? Is it wise to introduce a new way, and tune that instead? There's a Swedish historic poet, famous for his witty poems, but also for the jokes that came after him: A Russian, a Finnish guy and Bellman were competing who could swim over the sea from Sweden to Finland. The Russian started, he got 1/4th of the way, and drowned, the Finnish guy got 2/4ths of the way, and drowned. When Bellman was up for it, he got 2/4th of the way, huffed and puffed, tired from the swimming, he decided to turn around. The sentiment: Obsidian has worked on this system for quite a while, and it is probably expected to behave as bug-free and exploit-free as possible in the final product, should they drop all that work, without seeing the end of the tunnel, or take a tour around the tunnel that may or may not be better, in the end. I don't know, so I'm just reflecting~ That's what I want to know, is Obsidian too far out on the sea that it'd be even more of a waste for them to revert and swim back to shore? Or is Sensuki's ideas a nearby island that they can board and rest for a bit? And does this rest on this island compromise the deadline they themselves expect, and will they deliver a better or worse system by resting on this island? Another one, and probably the final one: The train is on the train-tracks, and comes up to an intersection, should it take the turn unknowingly of where the stop is, or continue on the initially intended path to its original destination?

Oh it'll happen, I have faith. But not during my liftetime or any of ours. Maybe in 500-600 years, maybe. I think regardless, it's going to happen either forcefully, violently, or peacefully. Either everyone gets their asses out the gutter, and stands together, or a militaric force in the world will take over, or corporations eventually join together and buys the entire world. I wasn't saying that just because the world becomes "Global" that it's going to be a Democracy... I believe it will be a Dictating Senate. Either it will be cruel, or it will be benevolant, I won't be around to see it, unless I become a tormented and immortal ghost Can't Nationalism be applied to the Planet? One Nation of... Equal Humans! Imagine (I'm a dreamer) EDIT: OH! And naturally! When we become Terran, we'd have 40K Space Suits too, of course, like, isn't that the Meaning of Life? Space Marine suits! We don't even need enemies, just the suits would suffice! xD Anyways, this topic is derailing, if anyone wants to continue on this topic, Group PM (if that's possible) or a new thread in Way Off Topic. Curious to hear more input on the OP too.