Osvir

Awesome! :D Btw, try playing these 3 at the same time for a sample conceptual ambience (or mix and match). Don't need to listen to the Rain or Nature for all those hours of course. Dyrford Theme Rain/Watery Sound Nature/Bird Sound I get the feeling that the Dyrford is a slow place. A kind of "soft" and calm area where not much is really going on, and the pictures also portray ruins and that in itself portrays a form of sadness, or abandonment. Someone else mentioned "desolation" and I agree there too. Like that granary (is that a granary?), the building that has no roof, why wasn't it repaired? Is it an area of some unrest or... are people simply poor or heavily taxed here? The sound style does remind me of Arcanum somehow though... Arcanum Wilderness Theme https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ajap5zmDog8&list=PL4C09A3D352D273F1

I believe it could work fairly easily: 1. Regular Longsword equipped 2. Slaying Captain Concept 3. Add Description+Buff/Enchantment+Raise Currency Value When you have the Regular Longsword equipped and defeat Captain Concept with it, the gold value for the Regular Longsword could rise. "This is the sword that defeated Captain Concept". Not only that, it could gain some trait from Captain Concept (an enchantment or whatnot, stat boosts and so on). Potentially explainable that some of Cap' Concept soul latched onto the sword (what with cutting the mans flesh and bloodying the sword as well). It could add a row in the description of the Regular Longsword, at the bottom of it "- Has slain Captain Concept = +1 X thing". If you slay a strong soul or a character with a strong soul, perhaps even a sword could get "cursed" or we could even get the whole "Talking Sword" thing we discussed a long time ago. The only real issue I can see with it is the Player and situations where: "I wanted to take him out with my Fighter's weapon but I accidentally took him out with my Ranger's weapon... gaaaaaaaaaaaaaah!". This doesn't make the mechanic bad, in my opinion, it's merely an affirmation from the Player's side that they made a mistake. Also, you bind souls and magic to the material "bronze" (IIRC), so in my speculative mind we might already see some Bronze Weapons that becomes stronger and better the more they slay.

Saw this on the annoying orange: And thought: "That's kind of true in every game" Topic: Could the value of an item grow as you defeat V.I.P enemies? Modding thoughts/reflection: Not to mention the modding opportunities for it, could potentially reach Fable levels of weapon molding. Why do I bring up modding? Because I don't know how hard something like this could be to implement if there's no script, code or trigger for it to happen. If Obsidian would entertain the thought and implement it in maybe 3-4 instances (bosses?), it would be easier for modders to copy+paste the existing ones and modify it even further. Thoughts?

You have to consider their different skill sets and abilities. If "Everyone is a winner" then every single fight should end in a draw. There's so much emphasis on the Player in these discussions, but what about the enemy Rogue and the enemy Fighter? Sure, AI can never be as good as the mind of a Player, but that doesn't mean that an enemy character (statistically) is at 50% of a Player characters potential power. If you can create a powerful Fighter, that means there will be powerful enemy Fighters. Same thing applies to the Rogue. Let's say I roll a Fighter, and I'm walking some backstreets in the night. Would I survive an encounter against a Rogue? I agree that if a Fighter and a Rogue would not be using their abilities and just auto-attack each other face-to-face, then the Fighter should win every single time. But if both of them start using their abilities and their different advantages against each other... who can say who would win? Balance means more tactic and more strategy. Chess is one of the most balanced games that exist, both Players have the exact amount of equal strength. By your definition of balance, does that mean that both Players win? Because "balance = everyone is a winner"? Finally, balance doesn't only affect the characters, balance lies in the world, the economy in it, monsters, quests, abilities, gear, droprate/loot, experience. To draw a parellell to Chess again, balance lies in the game board, not in a single Queen, Pawn, Tower or any of the sort. You have to utilize all your assets to win. What difficulty will you play or looking forward to play Volourn?

I read this as "deep stash", in such a way that the stash itself is very philosophically or spiritually deep. In a "That's deep man" kind of way. .............. for the record: Osvir is very tired today.

Well it is convenient. I start a character, get to this point, the game Auto-Saves perhaps. Next time I want to play with a new character, I just load this save (skipping the prologue/tutorial) and I can create a new character.

Chargen = Character generation What I'm wondering is a typical "Are you fine with all the choices you've made?" type generation. We see it in Fallout 3 and New Vegas, as well as in Morrowind, Oblivion and Skyrim. Let's say I make a character, I do all the tutorial and prologue stuff, then I'm not entirely liking my character... will I have to start from the very beginning or could I get an option to change class, appearance and so on?

Well, combat experience is pretty much null.. maybe trash-quantity-wealth is null in PoE as well in a conceptually similar fashion? - Objective Experience - Objective Economy? (Wealth is accumulated from Stronghold/taxes, Quests & Tasks, Faction-work, Bounties etc. etc.) A store with few weapons in an isolated area in a forest might buy weapons for a higher price when bandits are hanging around in the nearby area. Or underarmed caravan merchants, though they would probably pay better price just hiring you as an escort rather than paying for some shoddy, dented & used swords. Could this work?

- I did not search the forums for a similar topic. First of all: Divinity: Original Sin just had a massive update! (UI, Options, Features, Mechanics, Presentation, Background pic in loading screen now, previously control bindings) And it is awesome *nod* Regardless, I went into their options and messed around a little bit with it. One thing I noticed was that they use lots of horizontal scrollbars. Example: Sound Options - They range from 0-100 - A slider My suggestion is to have number inputs as well, 3 decimals. A small box where the number is shown. It is a minor detail that's not really necessary, but I thought about it and reflected on Pillars of Eternity and wanted to hear some thoughts.

Should create some focus group where people can transform that pissy attitude to creative attitude. One way to make people play like you is to create content/mods for people, and no one has to become angry about it

Yes we know. The point isn't about accessibility of the items, but the nature of it being "unlimited" that I can hoard 1'000 items or more in an unlimited scenario, so that when I do go "home" I can sell all those for more wealth. If the stash instead was limited, I wouldn't be able to sell all those items when I do go "home". It boils down to a question of economy, and depending on how that's handled the unlimitedness might not matter whatsoever on Expert Mode (imo everything should be more expensive on Expert Mode, and sell for way less, regardless if there's a limited option or not). Yes, I did exactly that too. I do the same thing in Skyrim as well. But there's a limit in those games where you simply can't carry more, encumbrance or whatnot. If I can pick up everything, everything, without that encumbrance, without having to go back and forth, I can safely pick up everything and when I do return, I sell all items I found. It becomes very very accessible. There is no penalty whatsoever in the Pillars of Eternity stash system. In Baldur's Gate I would explore an area in like 30 minutes, I would only pick up rare items or items that I found interesting or items I saw gold value in. In Pillars of Eternity I will be able to pick up every single item on the ground, all of those bandit leathers, longswords, axes and all those common items throughout the entire game. And if in Baldur's Gate I earned maybe 1000 gold during those 30 minutes (when I return "home") I would earn maybe 1500-2000 gold during those 30 minutes under the same economic circumstances.

But it doesn't have to be a discussion about "saving time" if you just don't pick up every single item laying on the ground. In an "Infinite Stash" game, from point A to B, it takes 30 minutes. You can loot everything on the way if you want to. In a "Limited Stash" game, from point A to B, it takes 30 minutes. You can't loot everything on the way, however, you can carry stuff back and forth if you choose to do so. If doing so you would add another 45 minutes to your game time. This is why I am suggesting that a "Limited Stash" would fit better in an Expert Mode (where it justifiable to say "Hey, the world is dangerous, go back-and-forth at your own risk"), a Difficulty Option with a descriptive "Tooltip": "Traveling the world is dangerous in X Mode, choosing this difficulty option means there is a risk if one travels too much". Something insinuating the risk of traveling or random encounters being difficult as is due to the difficulty mode. Maybe even being a sub-difficulty of Permadeath: "Must have Permadeath on". Or maybe not, potential Roleplaying purposes on softcore *shrug*

There is a difference between difficult and tedious. I would compare walking back and forth to pumping opponents HP on higher difficulties in some games. It doesn't increase difficulty it increases time I spend killing mobs. And spending more time on the same task is not difficult it's tedious. But would you risk going back and forth if you pick Expert Mode, Ironman, Permanent Death? I mean, if you would pick those options you'd know the enemies would be difficult and one bad random encounter could mean "Game over". Would you risk it? Personally, I'd try to trek forward and pick up what I need rather than picking up everything (in a "limited stash" hypothetical scenario). What makes a "limited stash" more difficult isn't exactly the "limited stash" per say, but it is the factors within the nature of Expert Mode/Hardcore. With a limited stash you'd either go back-and-forth several times and probably face way more difficult encounters (because it is Expert Mode) than the one who conserves their inventory and stash in a more strategical and tactical manner of what they find on the way. Scenario 1: Forward - Limited Stash, I choose to not go back-and-forth but instead pick up what I feel is critical to the path ahead. I get 10 encounters. Due to the fact that I can't pick everything up to sell later and accumulate some form of wealth my gear and general set-up is going to be lower than if I did. Thus, progression becomes more difficult. Scenario 2: Back-and-forth - Limited Stash, I choose to go back-and-forth everytime my stash and inventory is full. Because I want to minmax that wealth yo! I get 100 encounters. Both of these examples are considering a higher difficulty. Now, to the question: Would I survive in "Scenario 2"? Maybe? If I play super careful maybe my entire party survives as well, but I believe that there'd be consequences where I lose a party member or two, if not "Game Over". The point I am trying to make is that it won't (hopefully) be a breeze to travel around the world on Expert Mode, and that's why a limited stash (on Expert Mode) would make the game more difficult no matter how you look at it: Back-and-forth = Means more traveling the world means more random Expert encounters means more risk of "Game Over". Forward only = Means less crap to sell means less wealth means lesser gear means harder encounters means more risk of "Game Over".

@Infinitron: Well... there's that too of course a valid point.

@Helz: This is pretty much what I said: "I have an idea! Maybe this could work? Oh, wait... it doesn't get rid of the problem". Sorry, the whole "but wow"-thing bothers me, it reeks of ignorance. These are thoughts/ideas/analyzing for a harder difficulty tier. Expert Mode or beyond that. In a previous post I stated that I don't mind an unlimited stash at all, but I would like to see it being handled differently on a harder difficulty.. or have options to make it harder on a harder difficulty. Why? An unlimited stash is a benefit, it makes it easier to accumulate riches. And with riches you get better gear, items and general stuff. Bribe your way through difficult encounters and so on. There is no real catch with having an unlimited stash from a gameplay perspective. You don't have to run back and forth, you can hoard everything you find without any problems and keep it for yourself or do whatever you want with it. However, an unlimited stash does make everything easier for you. Which means there is potential to make a hard difficulty even harder by making the stash limited instead. Unlimited = Makes life easier Limited = Makes life harder Makes sense? I want a limited stash not because I want to go back-and-forth, but because I want a harder experience on the hardest difficulty.

That might be an option for Expert mode. I think it would only add to the difficulty if the loot you don't add to the stash were to disappear over time. Otherwise it boils down to whether you want to make a bunch of extra trips back and forth to collect the remaining loot. Interesting!! Timed loot in the stash. One could reason that bandits comes and steals your loot, or some greedy soul demons. This might be more difficult to modify in though, as I believe the code would first and foremost need to support it. What would happen? - You stash up 10 items, let's say that's the max amount on Expert as well. You can only carry 5 of those items (apart from the gear and items you are already carrying). In an attempt to do the whole back-and-forth selling remaining loot, the 5 items left in the stash disappears. So basically you wouldn't be able to do a back-and-forth thing. Or the loot could be timed in another fashion, you can drop items into the Stash, as many as you want in fact, but the next time you go to the Stash, everything but the things you pick up disappears. Example: 1. I get some loot that I won't need right now, or stuff I want to pawn. 5 items that I stash. 2a. I adventure some more, return, stash some items. If I don't choose to pick any of the 5 items up, they disappear. 2b. I adventure some more, return, stash some items. I pick up 2 items and the 3 others disappear. The newly stashed items get the same treatment (next time I return). I don't know how it would actually work in practice though, but it sounds as if it would add a new layer of strategy (albeit, stash strategy). The apparent issue then is that I could exploit it by disregarding the stash entirely and do millions of back-and-forth deals everytime my inventory is full~ but people who would do that probably suffers from hardcore OCD. Which brings up another question... does dropped items on the ground stay there even if I leave it there and return 5 hours later?

I don't mind the bottomlessness of the stash. But some thoughts: I'd like to either be able to modify (custom-make) a mode which creates a limited stash, or, have a limited stash in the harder difficulty tiers.

I just felt like saying... Wrong. Again, Skywind and Black Mesa are two fan-made projects that have great voice acting and it's made by fans. Wrong. Sure, you need to train before voice acting, before going up to the microphone, but you don't need to be a fully trained, experienced, or educated voice actor to be good at it. What you need is a good voice, a good microphone and some self-awareness, self-confidence, and self-insight about your own capabilities. You need to believe in yourself and reach for perfection in your acting (just like any other creative work, be it dancing, writing, drawing, music or whatever), check out some tips and tricks on the internet, listen to what others have to say about voice acting. We have google today, anyone can pick up whatever they want if they are devoted for it. And if you really have no clue what it takes to be a voice actor (bad or good), don't open your mouth at all. This thread is filled with misconceptions and comments that make me wonder if people have any idea whatsoever. Why is Bioware asking their fans to voice act in their game? 2 things I can think of: A) It is probably cheaper than hiring some expensive famous actor. B) Fans will spread it mouth-by-mouth (or through the internet "Check it out! They are letting us join if we provide good enough quality!!! Awesome!"). Widening their player-base. It is a Marketing Stunt, a big company like Bioware wouldn't do this unless they believe they get something in return for doing it. If Obsidian would do something similar, that's something they could save some money on. And if they won't get any good material from their fans, then I believe they'd widen their player-base at least somewhat. This is only if they'd create some sort of "competition" like Bioware is doing and it surfaces on Kotaku or other game journalist sites.

... is quite encouraging in that regard. After having watched some of these very same Obsidian devs play the old classics like Icewind Dale 2 (Adam) and Arcanum (Avellone), and get their asses kicked in easy encounters. this statement from Sawyer does not have quite the awe inspiring impact it he probably meant it to have. Besides, Gamers have always been 10000 times better at Games than the devs who created them. We're the ones who discover loopholes, exploits and cheese tactics. Not only loopholes, exploits or cheese tactics. Gamers have more time on their hands to become skillful at a game. A developer might know that this or that is a great tactic and they know that it can be utilized, but a gamer "perfects" it to do it faster, stronger and better. A developer will probably know that "This attack can be dodged, but it is difficult even for me" whilst a gamer will know that "I can dodge this attack, it is easy because I trained for this". Gamers train to become great at playing games, developers train to become great at creating games.

Does Chaos Wars make all fan/amateur voice acting bad? EDIT: How many did the voice acting for Chaos Wars, like... 5-6 people out of millions of potential good voice actors out there? Oh, and a little bit of digging: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chaos_Wars http://www.gamegrep.com/news/10646-theres_a_reason_chaos_wars_voiceacting_sucks_so_badly/ Is it even fan translated?

I think it's just 'learn' (temporarily) or 'fail to learn' the spell - then if you learn it you can use it (once?) in that combat session. Trap spell sounds cool - though I'd question the wisdom of only having trap spells in your grimoire - perhaps if you could 'trap' any spell (at a cost in materials/gold/spell slots for the day/encounter) then it'd be useful. You could cast the spell but if it were stolen, the enemy would get a backfire. Edit: I misread - I see that's what you meant by 'Enchant a grimoire with a trap' I think it's 'single-target only' spells, so not ones that affect an area in-between. Eg M's Missiles works with it but not 'Fire-beam' (I forget the spell names). Arr, but what if those Missiles backfired and instead of firing back at the enemy they fire at your own characters? I can think of 3 states State 1: Success! Cast the spell back at the opponent! State 2: Failure... you failed to cast the spell. State 3: Backfire. Whooopsiiie, your Wizard just hit your main character in the back of his head with a couple of Missiles. Onto another note that I noticed in the video or I think I read it in the update: The battle is over, your opponent is dead. You pick up the enemy grimoire to learn a new spell, there is a resource cost of copper. I'm wondering if copper is an ingredient or a "medium" that you use, a component to be able to pull out the spell out of the grimoire. Alchemy, kind of. Which makes me wonder if there's going to be a Wizard boss or just an NPC Wizard (Quest guy or VIP character in the world) who stashes up on lots of copper. Or if a Wizard can be stronger in a cave where there are lots of copper veins or something. Is there some "kryptonite" equivalent in the world? If copper is used to pull spells out of a grimoire, can I boost a spell by using more copper?

The Wizard being able to steal a spell from the enemy in combat (from their grimoire), is that a dice rolled gamble type of thing? Example: - I begin to cast the spell to steal a spell from the enemy grimoire - Dice rolls - I fail, and instead of throwing a fireball from their spell it blows up in my face. Furthermore, being able to attribute certain spells with additional properties.. for instance, "Trap Spell" in the grimoire. So when I try to cast a spell from the enemy grimoire, it is actually a spell that has been placed there specifically to be a "trap"... or could I attribute a grimoire entirely with a "trap enchantment" so that all spells that are pulled from the grimoire backfires if anyone else tries to use it? The reflection shield spell, if I have 2 wizards, can a spell bounce between them and hit anything in-between? (of course, it is a bit of a radical tactic as it will eventually blow up in one of my wizards faces, but until that point... would anything in-between be damaged?). Loving the update :D

Here's another for ya! http://www.gameinformer.com/b/news/archive/2014/02/25/bioware-offering-the-chance-for-your-voice-to-appear-in-dragon-age-inquisition.aspx Now, many people here don't hold Bioware in high regards, but whatever really... Bioware acknowledges that fans with the right devotion and voice can achieve the same high-quality voice acting that paid actors achieve. Not to forget to mention that it is cheaper. This whole misconception that "An unpaid unknown amateur person can't voice act because he's not paid for it nor known for it" is so much BS on so many levels. Again, take a look at Skywind, take a look at Black Mesa. If you're too lazy to scroll or look for it on page 5, here's a link to the post. Saying "fans can't voice act ffs" is untrue. Sure there are bad examples where it doesn't work, but there are great examples where it totally works.

Divinity Original Sin was already supposed to come out. Larian used the Kickstarter to get a bigger budget to make more content. https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/larianstudios/divinity-original-sin check their Kickstarter pitch video again for reference. Sure, D:OS had a smaller Kickstarter budget, but they also already had a budget for the game before the Kickstarter.