Dayen

My response on what game categories I like only accounts for games released to date, which I think is unfair to the genre of tabletop simulation. If there were a good platform that didn't cost $400 like Fantasy Grounds, I'd find the genre far more interesting. If you're considering this as an avenue for low-overhead production, I'd encourage it. Especially if you duplicate the lightweight mechanics you use for your games. Also: I don't pre-order (although I will support a handful of companies whose work I find pleasing via crowdfunding, including Obsidian, because being a patron is different than being a mark). I don't buy season passes. I rarely buy DLC (notable exception: Paradox Games' grand strategy games tend to get my money for DLC; obviously GOTYs excluded). I'm not interested in post-market capitalization schemes. I generally finish a game (or not) and then I'm done with it, so DLC holds no value to me unless it's an old school expansion to a game with a bunch of new content to promote a new story line. Which comes with the caveat that the first story line had to be worth playing through (example: Dishonored had an excellent story line; Dishonored 2 was incredibly boring by comparison). An important point: if a game looks like it's being parceled out through DLC, I will not purchase it. It has to be a complete game when it ships, which is a significant factor in why I do not pre-order.

Oh my. Obsidian said the profits from the game will go towards funding the expansion. That means they'll have about 2 times as much money for the expansion as they did for the main game. Needless to say, I'm very eager to see the end result. Hopefully it begins with hiring Nick Offerman to do the narration.

That's astonishingly good for a game "with no market" in the first couple of weeks.

Are you using a party? If so, you failed to read the thread. A party on hard and under is able to steamroll with a minimum of forethought. It depends. Some fights -- particularly fights where it's impossible for the tank to maintain aggro either because the opponents are too large or they're ghosts -- are very hard no matter what the setting is. Plus you need to really, truly understand the interrupt mechanics to successfully fight mages on the harder settings. (Or, you know, geek the mage.)

Been reading (and totally enjoying) Ann Aguirre's Sirantha Jax series between boring work-related non-fiction.

You've misinterpreted their purpose. It's actually about time management for Putin. He just can't possibly service all of those men (and save the world)!

As far as what Russia is and isn't doing, we've got questions to be sure. Are they at the same point with Ukraine as they were with Georgia ca. 2009? Signs point to yes. But are we, as the US and EU, at the same point with Ukraine as we were with Georgia ca. 2009? Signs point to no. Is Russia's economy in an irrecoverable tailspin? My assessment is yes, although Putin has several tools at his disposal to ameliorate the situation that most democratically-elected leaders do not. Which raises the question: whose companies will be repatriated next? I'm sure the Oligarchs are asking themselves the same question. (Side note: Browder's book, Red Notice, is a fantastic read if you're interested in how "commerce" is conducted in Russia.) Russian economic collapse is a foregone conclusion at this point. Putin cut is his own salary, which is a clever way to signal to his theoretical German allies that they can stop. But it doesn't appear Merkel was paying attention.

I never really got involved in the debate either way, but the most surprising result -- for me -- has been the noted improvement in disclosure of conflicts of interest in games journalism.

You can upgrade your favored items pretty much until the current campaign is at an end. In some ways, that means everything is viable. In reality it means you have to make significant decisions about what you're going to invest in. There are at least a half dozen "unique" weapons and armor that you can find that would be beyond expensive to duplicate in the crafting and enchanting engines.

Running windowed 1920x1080 and the screen blacked out departing the broken tower. I could ESC to get to the menu -- sort of -- to quit out normally, and the pointer occasionally showed up, but the screen was black. Hardware: SLi 2x GTX 560 Ti with 340.43 drivers installed. SLi disabled for the duration of Beta operation.

LotR is a "polite society compatible" re-telling of the original Germanic fairy tales, myths, and legends. If you had raised, perhaps, Beowulf or the Poetic and Prose Edda, or the Icelandic Sagas, or Kalevala as mature, you'd have won immediate agreement from anyone knowledgeable about them. Beowulf isn't immature because it focuses on ultra-violent handling of a problem. It's an allegory that discusses both that which is necessary and that which is not and attempts to delineate the two through a parable about a monster who eats babies. It even discusses the consequences of improper handling of a problem. The Poetic and Prose Edda are harder to break down, but the maturity of the goals of the Norse gods as encapsulated in that source material is clear. The overriding goal is to prevent the end of the world, except you can't prevent the end of the world, so the real goal is preventing the world from restarting. Certainly, to a modern aesthetic this stretches credulity, but there's an obvious accession to the hierarchy of need there. Does the world need to continue? No, not if we can ensure the coming of a new world.

While I won't argue the fact that Obs has console fans, as they most certainly do, don't lose sight of the fact the OP asked what stretch goals would make you pledge more cash. While I have nothing against consoles, ports to other platforms would not be something that would tease more money out of me. This is what many of us are saying. Not that there shouldn't be console versions at all: just that we wouldn't pledge more money to make them a reality. The entire reason I pledged more to Mighty No. 9 is so it could hit the console stretch goals. Really, are we going to be so petty as to be "why should THEY play my game?". One person posts that they'd pay for more platforms, and everyone jumps on them for it? The original pitch was strictly for a PC game so, yes, it kind of is a big deal. I own consoles and play games on them, but this is not the sort of game I'd want to play on a console.

You just answered your own question with this anecdote.

I don't mind random loot. I derive a lot of chuckles out of Skyrim's wacky drops. Those rare moments where you get something you'd actually want to use are made far more special by the intervening nonsense. With that said, D&D works poorly when all loot is pulled from a table via random generation. Ideally, the system would be able to recognize that a particular character is undergeared and place loot that provides a direct and immediate benefit to the entire party by redressing a weakness of one party member. But that's a lot of work for the development team, so uhh...something to keep in mind for the sequel, Obsidian?

This is kind of what I meant by "patently ridiculous" I'm not sure that's fair. It's completely possible to play an Exalted game that tackles mature themes and realism (I am currently doing so), but it really wouldn't be recognizable as what was intended by the original and subsequent authorial teams. Exalted as a product line has a long and glorious history of having the worst human beings as its developers, though, so this sort of high-brow, adult gaming is pretty strongly discouraged because they'd quickly be out of their depth in discussions about whether or not The Scarlet Empress is an anti-villain who failed or an anti-hero who succeeded. They actually wrote a book specifically about this and managed to focus heavily on the inevitable rape of said character, which is a mind-boggling accomplishment. What made it super-awesome-betterer was that they found five separate ways to justify the rape including "she asked for it." Good times.