JFSOCC

I don't see why animals with environment art approprioate camouflage couldn't make it into the game. I think that would be cool especially for ambush predators. A player with a keen eye will quickly notice them, and other players will be ambushed.

A non-list UI for Saves where you can build a branching tree of savegames.

{: ? never seen all of those before. this wouldn't be possible because they would have to do that with all of their portraits, not just one and it's just going to be hell. not just that but you're going to be able to use your own portraits, I doubt most players would have several similar images for different states of their... I dunno, night elf mage?

A good tutorial doesn't insult the player and takes place during the entire game. It eases you in without being an explicit tutorial. Generally it doesn't hit you over the head with "do this" but rather would set it up so you are rewarded for "doing this" without asking. It helps too if the player can see other NPC's 'doing that' before trying themselves. (again without the game going: "look! look! see that, that's what we want YOU to do!") Respecting your audience is important. If they don't get it, damnit man we're in the age of the internet.

will do, I tend to read...everything. So I'll get back up to date during today.

This is certainly a nice simplified resting mechanic we can all get behind! Nice to get back to the forums after a short absence and read all this

No, you can't break down existing enchantments. All enchanting is done using three ingredients: a critter part, a plant/herb, and a gem. The counts of each ingredient may vary, but there are always three ingredients. Additionally, there may be a copper cost that's subtracted directly from your total wealth. that's a shame, but thanks for your answer all the same. I do like enjoy gems as part of enchanting. That's something I can easily believe.

obviously ironman mode is different, but I'm pretty sure yu'll be warned well in advance what you are getting into. You know, what with the name and all.

88 dollars for a game? are they nuts?

We are in our Alpha phase right now. We are currently going through all of our previously created areas and revising anything that we think needs more work - both art and design. Programming is nearing feature complete. We are tracking to be feature complete in a couple of weeks. This means that we are feature locked and most of the programming team will be diverted into bug fixing, feature polish, demos, etc. Narrative will have a full pass done in a few weeks, as well. We are almost completely finished with the first pass on our crit path narrative. Audio and VFX are still a ways off and won't be finished until July or August. They come onto the project later than the other teams because they require that content exists in a locked down form before they can do their work. Character Art is working on creature variants, armor variants, and other miscellaneous items. Soon they will be adding in unique armors and weapons. Also, they will be creating head and hair variants in the next few weeks. Animation is finishing up the last remaining A priority tasks and is moving on to some of our B priority animations (special attacks and whatnot). UI/Concept Art has most of the UI in at an Alpha level. Kaz is finishing up things like Scripted Interaction slides and special UI screens. Also, he has a ton of portraits and areas to paint in the near future. Production is figuring out project finalization, localization, Kickstarter rewards, convention plans, expansion planning, and a ton of other small things. this information is very interesting. Sharing this might even beat regular updates. (though by a small margin ) When you got something to show, could you please show some of your animation work? I know there was an animation update, but that left me underwhelmed. I love the last image btw, I always love it if the world I'm in feels slightly otherworldly, and that blue-lit cave looks beautiful!

So others have pointed out that combat xp is no thing, my argument is different: What does that matter that one player would find max level and the other player would not if the player challenge remains similar? They will still have the same enjoyment of the game.

for gameplay purposes, yes, predictable is better. You can manage encounters by having a varied enough roster. And I don't think the second time you get the same monster it will pose no more challenge, the idea is that you have a bestiary large and varied enough that having the same encounter more than three times is unlikely. Bosses can be intelligent, especially with the predictable guys backing him. I think that gives enough space for variation to never have a dull encounter.

Level scaling can also be used to keep tough encounters tough. I support level scaling, it means I will always have challenges left. But I'm also happy that not everything scales. as is, I'm satisfied with the current choice.

I like being able to modify my gear, so I'm happy. I wonder if it is possible to "salvage" enchantments/modifiers from existing gear, in order to craft it onto different gear?

imagine having a dialogue skill/perk/feat which allows you to talk *more* Would be worth it if you don't have a "return to node 1" dialogue option.

good AI isn't intelligent, it is predictable. And interesting challenges can be made by combining enemy types in different compositions, increasing combat complexity. So at first you find an enemy which debuffs your speed and stays at range, the next time you find that the same enemy type is combined with an enemy which does AOE damage. You now have a more complex challenge as you're not just trying to close range with the speed debuffer but also need to stay separated enough while crawling to the ranged guy to not die of AOE damage. Next up, the encounter is indoors, and the way through is blocked by a fighter, adding yet another level of complexity. You still know that the first enemy type always does ranged damage and debuffs speed, but your encounters have evolved to become more interesting tactical puzzles nonetheless. You don't need intelligent AI for that, you need predictable AI and intelligent placement by the devs.

If I find out after playing a while that a toggle is not to my liking, I don't want to have to restart to change it.

tsk tsk, don't corrupt the newbies just yet.

I'm very interested in the visual narrative PoE will have. I want to know how much of the story and world lore is being told by environment art and props.

well it serves Obsidian to get that section up to date

I think a 2D map with some after effects, like floating clouds, birds, some ambient audio based on your location would be enough to "dress up" the plain 2d representational map.

T_T... Why did you greet only the awesome backers? *sniffle*... , okay, okay, jesting: complete. I really appreciate the breakdown of your process, Justin! I mean, I'm very, very far from an expert (very) or anything, but I at least understood your process in terms of approach and whatnot. It's pretty cool to read about, ^_^. Unfortunately, I can't listen to the track at the moment, but I will definitely do so ASAP, and will be sure to come back and complain provide feedback on it, . You thought the jesting was actually complete? MUAHAHAHA! Lastly, your mention of "listener fatigue" makes me think of FTL. I can't speak for everyone, but to me the music in that game seems to have staved off listener fatigue a great deal (I really had to stop and think about it when someone brought up that the music "never" really gets annoying, which just goes to show how unannoying I find it). That's also really, really important for that game, though, because of its Roguelike nature (not only are you subject to some of the same music for durations of a single playthrough, but the game is designed specifically to be played through a lot of times.) Anywho, I know you're probably really far along with stuff at this point, so it's not going to help with any foundation or anything. But, if you're ever having a problem with listener fatigue with a given track, you might want to listen to some FTL music for inspiration? *shrug*. It could be helpful. Or maybe not. Who knows... I'm just a Punsmith. I'm off to ham things... with my hammer. I stopped at cleared areas in FTL so I could keep listening to the music. Yes, very little listener fatigue. I think the key to that is how melodious the music is, after a while, you learn it. I am a big fan of melodious music, and I hope to hear some of that in the future, but as others have aptly said, the piece we've gotten in this preview is meant as background music. As such it's good (but not great, sorry) I'm resisting the temptation to let you listen to something I like. First off, because most threads you've replied in are overloaded with them, secondly, you'll have to make your own choices. Lastly I probably already did in one of the other threads... And as I type that, hmmm, temptation oh well, one very short one then, see it as inspiration

That was an excellently written update! Perhaps my favourite so far. As for the music... I'm happy to see it more subdued and not too bombastic (I guess that's Bach's influence for you) But I'd love to hear something more melodious (I know, you just can never satisfy them, can you!?) Is there any plan in the works to have these tracks be performed with live instrumentation? So far so good!

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