Osvir

"I don't know" was my answer. I like the combat, and thus my answer will be colored off that. I like the changes, so... "what was the point of all the changes?" uuh... I don't know how to answer the question, is what I'm saying, because I like the combat. It could be improved upon, tweaked, balanced, AI improvements etc. Will it? I don't know, most games I play I feel the same about.

I think it is a useful and fun ability @Sarex: I don't know, it's a Backer Beta, a slice of the cake in a non-spoiler area, mid-game with little content. It is heavily taken out of context of the full and real game. Combat is more than just encounters between level 5-8.

Nope. I think that you can metagame/powerplay any game, there's almost always a loophole that the Player finds (I can't think of any Single Player game that does not become metagame-ish or powerplay-ish after understanding the system more), that the developer didn't think about. For instance, a famous example: - We have yet to create an AI that defeats the world champion in chess! Is it because this chess player is the master of metagame/powerplay, or because we simply can't make an AI good enough? EDIT: My point, though, is that I'm not 100% sure that we see is what we get. It's a work in progress after all, is combat fully implemented? And does this mean that no balance tweaks, AI adjustments, bugs and such will be in? Are the bugs features? Are those exploits features? That's what I mean, this is a beta, not a feature complete game. It's a loading screen, boiling water for the unfinished potatoes, a steak just put into the frying pan. You gotta let it cook a bit, it's raw.

It's Beta. EDIT: I'd prefer a functional Combat Log as well, and that some bugs are gone, because that's not what the game was pitched to be about <- that is a snide parallell. It's beta.

I'll summarize it in one sentence: melee engagement mechanic is here to harshly penalize player characters who are within the range of an enemy melee unit for any attempt to move away. Long version: 1) Melee engagement (I think we should use an acronym - how about MEE?) favors standing still over tactically repositioning party members during the course of an encounter. The funny part is that if you like mindless combat and standing still, your experience will be exactly the same with or without MEE. This is also the part the pro-MEE crowd seems to not understand: MEE removal won't change their experience in any way. Anyone who already chooses to stand still will never trigger an AoO anyway. 2) MEE works both ways and is proven to be exploitable by bouncing aggro between the party members. 3) MEE is not affected by action cooldown and has no internal cooldown. It just happens whenever the requirements are met. Which means MEE is the ultimate "it's magic" anti-movement tool. It's here only to prevent the combat from being more tactical via reactive repositioning. It serves no other purpose. 4) Combined with high movement speed that most enemies currently possess MEE promotes the abuse of various CC mechanics and strong openers in order to resolve fights as quickly as possible - ideally before enemies are able to get close. This in turn promotes metagaming and powerplaying over role-playing. Sensuki is going to post a thread with a more detailed analysis. 1) Rogues, Wizards, Barbarians all have tools to be more mobile. Fighters are also mobile by knocking down a target, thus breaking the Engagement and can re-position. I think there are other spells, talents, passives, that makes Disengagement less "immobile" and allows you to escape a Disengagement Attack without any problem. In essence: You react, you use skill, you re-position. 2) Sounds like an "Exploit/Abuse" a la "Potential Bug & Balance Fix". 3) There are reactive re-positioning, but perhaps there should be more reactive re-positioning incentives. 4) Nope. It's one way to deal with combat, it's one way to play the game. Shevek demonstrates in his Video that it promotes just as much Select All->Auto-Attack as well. The game promotes you to play like you want to play... who is it that finds these metagaming and powerplaying events? Does that not mean that... the one finding them is trying to metagame/powerplay?

I like the video, it does give lots of clarity. No ill intended Sensuki, but I only managed to listen to your Part 1 response for maybe 10-15 seconds (also Shevek, I think you should view his video as a "Forum Reply", but in video format instead of text format ) Shevek's video also gives me lots of insight: - Shevek likes to play in a different way, and he's fine with playing his way than the way I am playing the game. I enjoy the way I play the game (With more micro-management, more actions, abilities, spells, tactics and strategies). But, playing the game like I do requires more pausing, and perhaps that's the problem more so than the combat animations and the pace of combat... namely: The way I play the game is the problem I have with it xD it's all my fault! When I was testing, searching for bugs, I didn't consider the gameplay much (and it was way more difficult in earlier builds to get a sense of what was going on at all times). This build however, I am being taught the system (through the GUI/Ring helpers), and playability is stable and much more optimized. It's fun! :D but I wouldn't mind some more tweaking in visual clarity, and a bit more slower paced combat, and other minor tweaks to make readability better (Your Combat Log also seems to function properly, mine does not). Insight: - Other people likes to play differently. They'll have different builds, different characters, different gear, positioning, strategies, tactics. I feel the more hardcore tacticians want their playstyle to be supported more, and casuals are fine with a simplistic combat (as seen in your video). For tacticians it's a question about AI, I suppose, something that isn't entirely tuned at this point. I do think, seeing what's going on in the video, that Hard might be a bit too easy though (Again, AI tuning and balance). I like the Engagement Mechanic, but I think the Disengagement Mechanic should be tuned/tweaked a bit (For instance: A Fighter holding 2 enemies should be able to switch between those two, presumably adjacent targets, without getting Disengagement Attacks, because he's essentially engaged with both of them. But the enemy he chooses to not actively Target, should not suffer a Disengagement Attack from the Fighter, if the AI so would choose to go after another Party Member. This could help AI targeting, without having them stomped by the Players Disengagement Attacks). If my Barbarian is attacking and targeting a Beetle that is focusing on attacking my Fighter, then the Barbarian shouldn't get a Disengagement Attack when leaving that target (in my opinion). I made examples in another thread, about "Facing". That is a bit of a "grand" idea though, and I don't mind if it's not considered/developed, but I believe the Disengagement Mechanic could become more interesting with it. Some of the Beetles are thrash mobs, wolves, the wyverns, but Medreth's group shouldn't be a thrash mob (and you dealt with him and his cowled followers as if they were nothing), neither should the adventurer's party in Dyrford Crossing, or even the Crystal Eaters, or Kongrak. This is Beta. AI isn't tuned until much later, or might be more of a focus now that more people can play the Beta without the bugs of past builds. Or perhaps AI is really well done, but stuff like optimization (it's Beta), balance bugs (It's Beta), or AI bugs (it's Beta) or pathfinding bugs (it's Beta), stutter lag (it's Beta), or lag spikes (it's Beta), is so appearant (it is Beta) that it takes so much attention from the Player's enjoyment of the title (it's Beta). If Baldur's Gate was stuttering, laggy, AI behaved oddly at times, pathfinding, it wouldn't be very fun. In fact, playing Icewind Dale 2 on my machine is no fun at all, because first I need to get several mod fixes and patches to even make it work, and even then it can suffer massive slow-downs and graphical artifacts. It's because it's an old game, and it has bad compatability with my OS (Known issue). But when Icewind Dale 2 works properly without lag or slowdown, it's super fun! :D Parallely: When Pillars of Eternity has no slowdown or lag, it's going to be even more fun than it already is

I can't debate that. I don't know who 99% of the people are behind their username on the internet.

I noticed this with Rumbald too, [Mercenary] *Missing String* It's cool that they react to your backstory, but shouldn't I be the one having the Dialogue option: 4. [Mercenary] "Well... for a bit of coin anything can happen" Or similar. Or Lord Harond's guard saying [Mercenary] "My lord, a mercenary...". Of course, I can narrate this part myself, and doesn't have to be a dialogue option really. It's semantics, in a way. I also felt that... when I was in the Skaen Temple, my character had the job to find Lady Aelys and deliver her back to Lord Harond (My character was aggressive, evil). But I got stuck in the dialogue, with no option of [Mercenary] "I don't give a sh**, I've got gold to collect!! (Attack)". It'd be fun with some Background Projection in the dialogue too, that causes Background Reactivity

That's not true actually, there are way more role players and storyfag gamers on the RPGCodex - that is why Planescape: Torment keeps winning the best RPG every time. Well, okay. I only read on the PoE part on the Codex by the way, and I often feel the disappointment boils down to disappointment in "math" in some way or the other by some members. People who parrot your expression, potentially.

I like the Map (both graphically/artistically, I think it is pretty) traveling is easy, no random encounters yet, but I still think it'd be awesome with an expanded World Map travel system with random events taking place on the map dynamically (And the Survival Skill could affect how far you see or similar). It has all the old-school feels, and is simple and functional. It works. I guess something I'm thinking about would be: - Dead State World Map Traveling (You can walk, ride, or drive, with a high Survival skill you can choose to avoid some random encounters, or engage them) ... combined with... - NEO Scavenger Survival Traveling (You have to scavenge supplies as you travel, over a hex-based field, craft, forage, survive, fight, hide, sterilize water, protect yourself from airborne disease, warmth, hunger, etc. etc.). It's pretty hardcore. ... in a high-fantasy world... - Pillars of Eternity Setting :D

I guess I'm only responding to the topic title, but "Saving the Wizard Class". I read the document but I'm not 100% sure I followed, it's a well-thought out idea wrapped in a great presentation in my opinion. It tends to be a tad bit too formal at times, and some times vividly explaining colorfully but I think I'm going to have to read it again to wrap it around my head. My latest play on Path of the Damned got me thinking of a party RP concept, and a bit of a new, re-invented and innovated Wizard Class but retaining it's core values. 6 Wizards that are "ritualists". A "Ritualist" is a "Wizard"~ but they get stronger the more they are, and they synchronize really well with each other and cast spells together (6 Wizards together summoning a Demon from hell, or putting an aggressive Dragon to sleep, a puzzle involving having to run around with 1 character, and 5 Wizards need to be focused on sub-duing or maintaining an illusion barrier from predators, 2 Wizards casting a stronger Fireball spell). Thinking about it... there could be a Talent or Skill a la "Spell Sync" or "Animancy Link" with a description like: "Animancy Link" (Passive) - "The Wizard syncs with the Soul of another ally Wizard, empowering spells cast, and casts spells at the same time" ((Mechanics: - If 2 Wizards casts the same spell at a Target, they will channel the spell at the same time individually, and cast it synched together. - If 1 Wizard is ready to cast the spell, but the other one is recovering, the 1st Wizard would wait for the 2nd one. - Spells would be more powerful, burst-wise, but takes longer to channel and concentrate upon.)) Regardless: I had 3 Wizards in my party (including BB Wizard) and the rest BB party. It was surprisingly fun playing with more than one Wizard, and extremely effective as well. Of course, I had a Fighter to take up most of the aggro from the enemies (Nyfre, upper floor) and clog the enemies in the doorway. Fear spells, weakening spells, illusion spells, and DPS spells. It made Path of the Damned enemies into maybe a low-mid Hard encounter. We've discussed how the Wizard is usually the weakest class early-game (but still viable), and the strongest character late-game. Could an Early Game Wizard Party (More than 1 Wizard) be a thing...? It'd make sense that Low Level Wizards would band together under one banner and aid each other as well, and Late Game you only really need 1 Wizard, and can mix up your composition more freely. It springs to mind the beginning of Icewind Dale, where there's several (IIRC) evil entities that stand above the ravine to cause the snow avalanche. Wizards that join together to create marvelous and grand magic, as well as powerful and corruptive magic. The College in Winterhold, and even the Circle of Magi, are all some form of Wizards banding together to utilize their powers together, for whatever reason. Having Wizards be balanced from Early-Game to Late-Game as: Strong in numbers (Early Game), Strong individually (Late Game), could make it quite interesting, and it'd almost be as if you're the one building a Spell School-, Magic Study-, or a Wizard Cult Group yourself as well. In essence: A Wizard in Early Game is "half" a Wizard. Having 2 Wizards makes up 1 Wizard (duh), but it adds choice into your early game composition in a way that adds even more strategic elements. Essentially with 2 Wizards, and 4 other random classes, you'd have 5 viable combat characters. As the game progresses, that 5 eventually transforms into 6. TL;DR: Just some thoughts about Wizards, and a bit of an experience/feel/effective build (currently) in Pillars of Eternity.

Optimize, stablize, potentially add minor stuff, potentially remove minor stuff, bugs, balance, user feedback, AI, playability, tweaks, experimenting, fixing etc. etc. Pre-production is gathering all the ingredients, all the spice and flavors, begin boiling the water. "Alpha" is thawing frozen vegetables, "Beta" in the frying pan, "Release" in your mouth (that.... doesn't sound right). EDIT: That doesn't mean you can't add some more salt or pepper in the Beta, but adding too much and you'll ruin the dish. And it isn't very wise to plan your budget on an expensive rare ingredient mid-frying that may or may not improve your cooking skill (oh and going down to the store mid-cooking might burn the food or make it stale if you turn off the heat). It might be more expensive than what is required, and you can achieve a similar taste with a cheaper replacement ingredient.

prodigy, I've been here since about the time the Kickstarter started, no need to tell me

Whilst I think it's cool to view the "Unlimited Stash" as your own caravan of sort, where are these men and women? How are they explained? In the very opening scene of the game it's contrarian, Unless you mean in the BB, then sure, there could be a caravan with you.

Maybe I didn't explain well enough, or formulated myself poorly. I feel, that the character I make up, is driving, and telling, a story in a different way than the character of your choosing that you play as in the Diablo series. I can't speak for or against Deus Ex, haven't played enough of it.

@GrinningReaper: Well, depends on the narrative, destroyed gear could equal to a fake/illusionary durability and repair system. You took damage, so you used the enemies gear to repair your gear, thus, no loot out of the ordinary 'cept some coins. Maintaining your gear as an adventurer would be an adventurer's day-to-day life, when on the road. Kind of like constantly climbing Mount Everest, in the wilds, with no transport, cars, vehicles, but slow moving feet and face horrors, bandits, magical storms, weather etc. Just saying, that you can always create a solution or an explanation. "Scripted Events" was a solution to both make up for lack of jumping, or other acrobatic movements, and Darklands influenced awesomeness. A good narrative method can make up for a lot of things. But how do you explain, in-game, "You loot all of the damaged opponents gear automatically and repair the damage done to you" without it sounding stupid? If, in case loot won't drop, and only coins, some random tables, and hand-placed loot, what's your backup mentality? Acceptance or griefing? I personally would prefer if all loot was dropped (and Unlimited Stash removed too, or "Explained/Unlocked" like the Stronghold), and curious if a hybrid crafting+hand-placed loot system could even work well, but hey, if it's no loot, and if it's always run, and Unlimited Stash, I don't dislike the game for it. I'll still question those design choices though, but those technical elements aren't part of the core game for me anyways

I get what you're saying, but I don't think one is exclusive to the other. Even though the crafting system of PoE is simple, I do believe the crafting system of PoE could support this. Example, about pacing: - In the IE games, you might have to fight 10 enemies before meeting the 11th that has the first plate armor. My concept idea is that you'd get all the material after looting those 11 enemies, and then you build your own. Time-wise, no difference. In a non-combat approach, you might instead go to shops to get the gear you need, materials, or pickpocket, or find items in chests. Heck, maybe even go to a Blacksmith and leave an item for a day or two and return to get the upgrade (I.E: "Finding your first Plate Armor"). Similarly, I do not advocate for removal of all "whole" gear, but rather a hybrid system. You'd be able to find a complete Plate Armor, and as an addition you'd be able to even upgrade that as well with more material from future foes or shops. One has to consider the Equipment system of Pillars of Eternity, classes, and how you want your characters/party members to act and be in combat as well. A Full Plate Armor might not be the best choice on your Barbarian, or on your Wizard, in some situations. A big shield will mess with your Fighter's accuracy, so having a small shield will do better if you want to hit better and deal better damage. Chances are that a Rogue using Leather Armor, will use some type of Leather Armor throughout the entire game. With that said, I'm trying to hypothetically conceptualize the idea that instead of finding 1'000s of standard Leather Armors for your Rogue, you instead find material to upgrade your Leather Armor into an Exceptional Leather Armor, and then your Exceptional Leather Armor into a Majestic Leather Armor (examples~) etc. I also think it'd be much easier to code or script something like this to even get out NPC Reaction for Legendary Equipment/Gear/Weapons etc. Btw, these aren't necessarily suggestions for Pillars of Eternity, but rather just concept ideas. P.S. Tales of Destiny is my all time favorite story/narrative of all time (plus super fun combat system :D but the story is amazingly well done) probably my most played game of all time. So glad you brought that up (Oh, and Disgaea story is amazing too, Laharl <3)

Well, the Narrative I've seen in the real thing thus far seems awesome (plus, read the official wiki). The plot, world, universe, pantheon, lore etc. etc. is all top-notch awesome stuff (in my opinion). The narrative in the BB is also really good. There's like, nothing more I can say about it xD every lore update or lore question on Josh's Tumblr or Formspring/Spring.me has been good across the board since start. It might be a boring answer but... it's just really good :D EDIT: I didn't answer the questions about the videos/analysis' btw.

Because there's a fundamental inequality when it comes to games: fun > realism. The only way I would find a "random breaking" system acceptable is if it only happens to "standard" items. Even then I wouldn't find it exceedingly fun or amusing. If you have a chance to break the really good/unique items it would honestly make me want to meta-game so I know when to reload until I don't break whatever it is. I'm not in favor of mechanics that randomly punish people for no good reason. That is, I find it opaque and obtuse if two people play a fight in exactly the same way and one person gets a ton of broken junk/crafting resources and the other person gets some nice items. Or in the reverse, if the crafting components are more valuable. That seems to belong in games where you grind enemies specifically for loot. e.g. Diablo, Torchlight, etc., etc. Tying break-chances in to specific classes/abilities (fireballs, etc.) seems even less fun. But what if it wouldn't be random breaking items? But if an enemy wears Leather Armor, you always find Leather Straps on that enemy? (representable crafting items~ "What You See Is What You Get" with a twist~)

*shrug* Probably, but interesting, deep, and intruiging mechanics won't appear out of thin air. Some amount of thought/discussion needs to be put into it, and the more thought is put into it, the more deep it can potentially become, admittedly, who knows if for the better or worse? Speculation/Analysing/Theory doesn't mean anything in Practice. But Theory creates material/resources/ideas/inspiration

Absolutely, I agree, what Sensuki is doing is mostly great in my opinion But that wasn't what I was asking... I was asking what you are doing? Like, I have played the game quite a bit and left feedback/input/ideas (both technical and design), and I don't whole-heartedly always agree with Sensuki's design implementations or design mods (partially because I haven't tried and played them myself to get an idea/experience of what he wants to do). I wouldn't say that the system is mediocre or that it doesn't make any sense (it actually makes a lot of sense once you get more used to it and you actually learn from what the game helpers are telling you). Or, well, it wasn't making much sense in terms of clarity and playability up until this release (due to technical issues). But now it's actually playable! Oh, and I play on Path of the Damned/Hard/Expert with no UI tips now, and combat is manageable if you know what you're doing. Or if you took some time to actually try and understand what you're doing, and how the game does what it does and why it does it... if clicking a pixel away from a combat, and you get disengage attacked, maybe you're not exactly following the designed rules? Maybe, you, Sensuki should stop trying to fight against the system (with your beautiful critical eyes) and try to play with the system for once. You deserve the breather. Try taking a rest from the critical, and try immersing yourself into the short story of the BB, and you know... actually play it. I saw a post sometime from earlier this month where you said you haven't actually played the game yet (neither had I, and it was p. exhausting which is why I took a break from the forum). This build is great for that, in my opinion. Something tells me the collaboration with Jesse Cox was a bit of a way of saying "Try enjoying it a bit too" <- that is a choice, if you "I can't enjoy it because X reason" then you're just "choosing" to be difficult~ Since BB came out, many of us focused on the not so enjoyable task: Namely "Testing", partially because it was mostly unplayable (up til this point). Maybe it's time for some to take a break and try "Playing" some too? And resume with "Testing" later. I've turned off all of the UI stuff now, because I don't need it anymore and I can still make sense of what's happening on the screen (unless massive VFX, such as Web). Also: Upload your no engagement Sensuki, should give a good idea what people think and feel about it. I'd love to try it too :D

Yeah, that's true. But then, wherein is the "breaking point"? Moving to the side... disengaged? Or... moving backwards... disengaged? One thing I wanted to highlight with these two is... https://www.dropbox.com/s/mx4s96hptp733ev/facing.jpg?dl=0 https://www.dropbox.com/s/6gj5f0yb0o9sgfg/facing2.jpg?dl=0 In "facing.jpg" you click "within" an engagement circle (there should've been 1 more circle, one that is around both targets, an "in-battle" or "engaged" engagement circle), and thus you are still inside the "Engagement" (still facing the opponent). In other words: No disengagement attacks. In "facing2.jpg" you click "outside" an engagement circle (in essence the same thing as pressing "Run" in a jRPG), this should then take into account a Disengagement "Check" or "Dice Roll" or whatnot, did you succeed in running away, or did you get whacked in your head? It shouldn't matter whether you are trying to run backwards, to the side, or trying to run past the opponent, if you leave the "circle", you're giving up "ground" and you are probably leaving the "circle" because it is a losing battle. In a wrestler's ring, the one who falls outside is penalized (or outright defeated? Can't remember the rules). Also: How does Blackguards explain "moving to the side"? Returning to my previous example, if you and I are fighting/LARPing, where is it that one does wrong and loses any form of advantage? Because, if we are constantly facing each other, is it when I walk backwards that I am most vurnerable? Or when I am circling around you? When is it that I am at most of a disadvantage in a fight, technically? It comes down to skill (Specialization/Technique), experience (Level), in the end, and human error (RNG), no?

I'd say there's a HUGE difference between a Technical (Mathematical) Gamer and a Roleplaying Gamer... I think the RPGCodex tends to be the former, often, ironically. So... I dunno... do you want to play Calculation? Listen to Sensuki. If you want to Roleplay? Play the game.

But if you are punching in my general direction and I decide to derp and turn around, I'm going to get hit in the back of my head, hard (because I presume you're strong for some reason ). However, if I am constantly facing you, and you are facing me, we could kiss! Haha xD Jokes aside, it'd be a fight, and just because I take a side step, circling you, "tumbling", it wouldn't mean neither you or me would stop facing each other. It wouldn't mean either you or me get some sort of advantage or disadvantage against each other for that matter either. Boxing, MMA, Samurai, any seasoned Fighter would tell you that one of the most important things EVER in fighting is "NEVER take your eyes away from your opponent!". I saw a documentary about some MMA fighter, and they punched him, and filmed it in slow motion. His eyes were constantly, 100%, in slow-motion, facing the direction from where the hit came from. The point: Turning around = Stupid move. Circling around = Facing.

@Infinitron: Ad hominem? Motivate, why is it a bad idea with breaking items from combat and why does it not make sense? Why does it make more sense to equip an Orlan sized Leather Armor on an Aumaua post-combat? There are no Enlargement Spells in Pillars of Eternity ;P Like, for instance, my dude has a Leather Armor, and if I take down an enemy with a Leather Armor, wouldn't it make sense to re-purpose the enemy's Leather Armor to make my Leather Armor into an Exceptional Leather Armor?