[Update #90: Shipping and Strategy Guide]

 

You are wrong, game collection is a thing and it's no more "ridiculous" than any of your hobbies or interests just because it doesn't interest you. Plenty of people intended to keep the box sealed and care if there is a game inside.

 

If the only "seal" is a box flap, is that going to piss off collectors? Remember.. these boxes are not meant for retail. There's no real reason to seal them.

 

Are backers who really, really want a physical manual to read before they play the game more or less ridiculous than people who don't want to open the box? Whatever they do, Obsidian is going to make some people unhappy. All they can do is ask for majority opinion. Hence the poll.

 

I agree the ideal solution would be to allow people to select on the backer portal whether they want delayed or immediate shipment. Who knows.. if enough people make a stink, maybe Obsidian will do that.

 

I never said that people who want to have the manual when they play the game are ridiculous, nor do I think that. However, they can have the manual and the game (a few weeks later), getting exactly what you just described them wanting and people who want everything together will have what they want. The people who want the physical goods asap will only be temporarily disappointed with option 2 but will ultimately get what they want after having to wait a few weeks, while those who prefer a sealed box with everything inside will be permanently lacking that with option 1. That's the difference. That's assuming of course that the boxes will be sealed, which I think is a pretty safe assumption and is precedented by other games but feel free to cite some evidence to the contrary if someone from OE provides some.

 

Obviously the ideal solution is to let each backer decide between the two choices, but without that the current plan causes a potentially permanent issue for a lot of backers while the alternative plan created only a temporary one.

[Update #90: Shipping and Strategy Guide]

 

 

 

This is exceptionally upsetting to me.  So sick and tired of this impatience that is bred in the gaming world.  I do need this cleared up, however.  I paid in for a signed collector's boxed copy (the $250 tier).  Am I actually going to get that with the physical disc later?  Or am I getting a signed box with a cloth map and all the other physical stuff first?  Because the latter is not a signed collector's boxed version of the game, and I want it to be clear that if so, I am not getting what was promised.

I don't understand, what's the difference?

 

Many people are collectors (or fans) who intended to have a single boxed copy with the game disk inside, they did not intend to open the box but rather planned to keep it sealed. With the current plan ("option 1" from the poll which 75% voted for), the box will arrive with everything except the game inside and then the game disk itself will arrive at a later date. So, the box will be incomplete in that there is no game inside and then you'll have a (probably cheaply packaged, not that it really makes a difference) game disk separate from the box.

 

The other option in the poll was to have averything arrive at once, so the box would have arrived with everything including the game disk, but would not have arrived until the game disk was ready.

 

It's a bit ridiculous... If you keep your box sealed it'll change nothing.

 

It's simple: You will not have a sealed Boxed "Pillars of Eternity," if there is no "Pillars of Eternity" in the box. The fact that you intend to open it anyway doesn't mean everyone else that cares about having a sealed physical copy of the game is ridiculous.

 

 

I imagine that the box when it arrives will contain the game disc box/compartment inside it so that when the discs arrive its just a case of putting them in their proper place. as for the notion that some people didn't want to have to break the seal and open the box (but will now have to just to put the discs inside)....... Well without getting insulting I find it ridiculous, I mean why would you buy an edition with a hardcover art book and map etc inside if you don't want to look at them/read them? I mean sure the whole thing will perhaps retain more value if it all remains sealed but I don't imagine any of us are going to be selling them? or am I wrong?

 

Also if the cost for doing things this way were prohibitive I don't think obsidian would have even offered the choice, they could have just announced a delay on the physical goods like inxile did with wasteland 2 and have done with it.

You are wrong, game collection is a thing and it's no more "ridiculous" than any of your hobbies or interests just because it doesn't interest you. Plenty of people intended to keep the box sealed and care if there is a game inside.

[Update #90: Shipping and Strategy Guide]

 

This is exceptionally upsetting to me.  So sick and tired of this impatience that is bred in the gaming world.  I do need this cleared up, however.  I paid in for a signed collector's boxed copy (the $250 tier).  Am I actually going to get that with the physical disc later?  Or am I getting a signed box with a cloth map and all the other physical stuff first?  Because the latter is not a signed collector's boxed version of the game, and I want it to be clear that if so, I am not getting what was promised.

I don't understand, what's the difference?

 

Many people are collectors (or fans) who intended to have a single boxed copy with the game disk inside, they did not intend to open the box but rather planned to keep it sealed. With the current plan ("option 1" from the poll which 75% voted for), the box will arrive with everything except the game inside and then the game disk itself will arrive at a later date. So, the box will be incomplete in that there is no game inside and then you'll have a (probably cheaply packaged, not that it really makes a difference) game disk separate from the box.

 

The other option in the poll was to have averything arrive at once, so the box would have arrived with everything including the game disk, but would not have arrived until the game disk was ready.

[Update #90: Shipping and Strategy Guide]

 

Update by Brandon Adler, Producery Fellow

 

Hey, everyone. This is just a quick and dirty update for you on the backer poll we mentioned in our update from last week, some pics of the strategy guide, and news about PAX East. Our next update will come out in the next few weeks when we will discuss how backers can redeem their game from the Backer Portal.

 

Poll Results

 

First, we would like to thank all of our backers for taking the time to vote. It is very important to us that you are able to express your choice and voice your opinion about the shipping of rewards.

 

At close to 75% of the vote, it looks like shipping the physical rewards at the game's release and the game discs at a later date is the winner. This is how we will proceed with the shipping.

 

We realize that some of our backers have been asking about the possibility of selectively opting out of this choice and instead getting their items shipped to them all at once, multiple weeks after the game's release. We don't have an answer for this right now, but we are discussing the possibility with Paradox. Depending on the logistical realities we may not be able to provide this option, but we will explore the possibility. As for now, everyone will have their physical rewards shipped as soon as possible, and their game discs at a later date.

 

This is exceptionally upsetting to me.  So sick and tired of this impatience that is bred in the gaming world.  I do need this cleared up, however.  I paid in for a signed collector's boxed copy (the $250 tier).  Am I actually going to get that with the physical disc later?  Or am I getting a signed box with a cloth map and all the other physical stuff first?  Because the latter is not a signed collector's boxed version of the game, and I want it to be clear that if so, I am not getting what was promised.

 

Yep, unless they do decide that they're able to provide an opt-out option for those who want everything at the same time, your physical rewards (your signed CE box) will arrive without the game and then the game disk will arrive later. I really hope that they work something out for those that want a box with the game inside. The box was described as including the game and other things, so separating them is a bit of a failure to deliver on that promise.

 

Is a 75% majority vote enough to not deliver on something that was agreed to? The vote is pretty disengenuous because it just shows how many people weren't planning on keeping their boxes unopened in the first place, which was obviously going to be a strong majority. Those who wanted to have a single box that they kept unopened knew they were in the minority but it didn't matter because the description said they'd get a box with the game and everything else in it. It should also be mentioned that a lot of people seemed to misunderstand the poll and the poll was open to those that didn't even get physical rewards. So, apart from the fact that the vote shouldn't be used for this decision in the first place, it's also likely innacurate.

 

Anyway, maybe I'm being overly dramatic, but it seems messed up to let a poll determine that 25% (or perhaps far more) of physical backers won't get something that they really want which was promised to them. I really hope you guys work something out with Paradox for those that want everything together.

[Backer Reward Shipment Poll]

I voted for option #1: It is a good idea to protect the game against illegal copies during the shippment period.

 

Of course this will delay the pirating of the game only for a few days but with a little luck long enough until every backer gets his copy first. (Steamkey, e. g.).

 

Some weeks before we talked about getting or not getting the "making of...-DVD".

 

Regarding the outcome of this poll (for disc shippment) this could be a good chance to produce the "making of... DVD" and ship it together with the game disc(s).

 

In this case there will be no excuse for not getting the "making of... DVD" instead of a "making of... download".

 

This DVD would be the better choice than any kind of notepad or what ever should replace this DVD.

 

In what way does picking option 1 protect the game against illegal copies during the shipment period more than option 2? It doesn't. The game ships at the same time with option 1 and option 2, yet it seems like everyone's voting for option 1 and many people are seriously misunderstanding the difference between the options.

[Adult Language Filter option]

 

 

Did ya read these articles? It wasn't like they randomly performed an act, they practiced what they saw. Some actually acted it out before they performed the massacre. BBC did a documentary back in the early 2000's for the last city on earth that hadn't received a TV signal. The people were all Buddhists and practiced peace and lived very religious and disciplined lives. After the TV signal had been established, and the equipment had been installed for the local population after only 2 weeks the young Buddhist boys had chosen to watch American Wrestling on TV. They were acting out what they saw on screen and the people quickly quit performing their religious acts and chores. Further, in less than 3 months the entire community had established a loss of moral and people were showing signs of anxiety and depression where there wasn't any before. It goes to show you how the impact of the media can have on a society. 

Perhaps they had been brainwashed with a very structured, limited view of the world all their lives and the introduction of media which displayed things challenging to their worldviews led them to change their behaviors. Maybe they became anxious and depressed because of the conflict between the way they had lived before and the things they were now being exposed to, maybe there was more to it than them seeing some wrestling. How exactly did the entire community establish a loss of morals? Is it possible that they were just, you know, happier and more free? North Koreans live very disciplined, religious (they worship dear leader) lives, and that system would likely be disrupted with access to enough outside information on a regular basis.

 

Also, why are you so sure that it was the violence in the shows that led to their changes? It could just as easily have been anything else they saw or simply a conflict between their rigid, pacifism-based ideology and the introduction of outside sources of information, some of which contradicted their ideals. You're engaged in some serious confirmation bias to conclude that those stories of mass murderers and this one you just provided display a causation between playing violent video games/watching violent tv shows and becoming mass murderers or completely losing your morals. I'm not saying that they don't, by the way, just that you haven't (nor has anyone else as far as I know) provided any reason to believe that they do. I happen to believe that fictional violence and morality can exist together in the world, but that's just my opinion I suppose.

 

 

Sorry, I had a typo! I meant Morale, not moral or morals. The wrestling affected the boys because they actually got in fights, even some American's don't know wrestling is fake, but for some of the children they were actually trying to perform the same moves on the other kids and people were getting hurt. The Documentary made it sound like they stayed with the community and documented their habits over several months. They clearly specified prior to the signal coming in it was a very quiet peaceful town and everyone was very helpful and well behaved. In only a short time did it start affecting the community with the children being the most affected the fastest. Also, the majority of the adults wanted the equipment and tower removed. The kid's of course liked it and wanted it to stay, although I would too if I were in their shoes.

 

Well I'd have to watch the documentary myself, which I may do if I find the time, but ultimately it doesn't suggest anything universally bad about television. Certainly more compelling than the articles about the school shootings but, like I mentioned, the violence that began could have been brought about because it was a shocking introduction to violence; these people practice a religion which specifically supports non-violence so it's reasonable to think that these bursts of violence could be temporary and that they wouldn't happen when tv is introduced to children that are already more familiar with violence from other sources. Then of course there is the argument that it doesn't matter, that's it's definitely better to have all the information and be able to choose to be violent than to be deprived of access to information in order to maintain control.

 

I'm just saying that I haven't seen anything compelling enough yet, and that those types of news articles get trying because of how frequently they are cited.

[Adult Language Filter option]

Did ya read these articles? It wasn't like they randomly performed an act, they practiced what they saw. Some actually acted it out before they performed the massacre. BBC did a documentary back in the early 2000's for the last city on earth that hadn't received a TV signal. The people were all Buddhists and practiced peace and lived very religious and disciplined lives. After the TV signal had been established, and the equipment had been installed for the local population after only 2 weeks the young Buddhist boys had chosen to watch American Wrestling on TV. They were acting out what they saw on screen and the people quickly quit performing their religious acts and chores. Further, in less than 3 months the entire community had established a loss of moral and people were showing signs of anxiety and depression where there wasn't any before. It goes to show you how the impact of the media can have on a society. 

Perhaps they had been brainwashed with a very structured, limited view of the world all their lives and the introduction of media which displayed things challenging to their worldviews led them to change their behaviors. Maybe they became anxious and depressed because of the conflict between the way they had lived before and the things they were now being exposed to, maybe there was more to it than them seeing some wrestling. How exactly did the entire community establish a loss of morals? Is it possible that they were just, you know, happier and more free? North Koreans live very disciplined, religious (they worship dear leader) lives, and that system would likely be disrupted with access to enough outside information on a regular basis.

 

Also, why are you so sure that it was the violence in the shows that led to their changes? It could just as easily have been anything else they saw or simply a conflict between their rigid, pacifism-based ideology and the introduction of outside sources of information, some of which contradicted their ideals. You're engaged in some serious confirmation bias to conclude that those stories of mass murderers and this one you just provided display a causation between playing violent video games/watching violent tv shows and becoming mass murderers or completely losing your morals. I'm not saying that they don't, by the way, just that you haven't (nor has anyone else as far as I know) provided any reason to believe that they do. I happen to believe that fictional violence and morality can exist together in the world, but that's just my opinion I suppose.

[Adult Language Filter option]

ohh boy, lots of reply's!

 

 

 

Night Stalker, what is your background? as I mentioned I don't know the specific language used to code their game, but even in my basic logic coding classes a function was as simple as creating an if/then option. It seems to me they would have to classify a class for the adult language and place a query for the class, then either hide it or change the word. It really was like one of the first thing's they taught us in school, so I don't know why it would be so much more work?

 

I am not sure I fully follow you. What are you suggesting when you say "to classify a class for the adult language and place a query for the class"?

 

I think Night Stalker has covered most of what needs to be done. Throw in localization in there and the effort is significantly compounded because of all the extra translation passes. Translators are not cheap and from what I understand charge by the word. And let's not forget the voice overs. If an actor dropped the F bomb then that audio will need to be edited out.

 

It's also not clear if the dialogue system is the only thing that will need to be reworked. There may or may not be inappropriate words in the popup speech bubbles from the locals on-screen or the in-game interactive cutscenes (or whatever those things are called). On that note, just deciding what word is "inappropriate" and should be filtered out is going to eat up a lot of time because everyone is going to have an opinion about this. Having the user input the words in manually in some text box is not foolproof because the voiced audio has to be considered.

 

 

 

I was speaking from a Javascript or Actionscript point of view for creating a function to call out. I assumed it was similar in C and I know that Unity likes Javascript, so I assumed it would be quite easy to implement. You guys have all brought up something I had not considered as far as localization. Since the F word was the only word I had specifically seen used so far and in English it does have a negative connotation, I believe in German it probably still does, but it also means to strike if I remember correctly from my childhood. I didn't think they were going to do a literal translation from region to region, and the swearwords probably would be the same across the board. I think it's fairly universal with swearwords what's definitely something you don't teach your 3 yr old to say, there may be some gray in there, but a lot of stuff is said in PG and PG-13 that they hear, or even prime time TV too, so it's just a matter of finding the context of the scene. That's what I was talking about initially when I said the F word is used lazily as a nonsensical word, people say it out of habit and often not for the reason they state it initially. 

 

 

 

 

And it is really simple to remove it from a coding standpoint

 

It might be simple enough to add an option which automatically replaces any occurrence of certain words in dialog or other writing, with different words (like "f**k" --> "frag").

 

However, re-recording voice-overs for any such content wouldn't be so trivial or cheap.

 

 

In Audio there's a part after thing's are recorded that they have to edit in later called ADR, that's when this comes into play and they add in the bleeps or swap in a safe word. There's a few ways to do that and it depends on how many lines are in there using it or may need changed. It could be a nightmare to do, or it could be less than 5 minutes to do. Although I've seen youtube videos that bleep stuff out, and the users have nowhere near the budget Obsidian does, and probably not the expertise they do either.

 

 

...

for the research that has shown over the past few decades the games kid's and the troubled people who were playing were directly related to the mass shootings and massacre's involved.

...

That's a load of crap politicians love the idea so it gets a ton of air time but if you actually read the literature in the field it's all over the place. The small studies are hideously under powered to detect real effects and thus find effects both ways some say video games increase violence others say it decreases violence, which is generally a sign that the experimental designs suck or are lacking power! If there is an effect your expect the direction of the effect to remain the same even if the size of the effect varied.

While the big studies have tended to find no effect or possibly a small reduction but with out enough strength to be certain.

 

Keeping in mind correlation does not equal causation the general tends at a society level have been for decreasing per capita violence over the last 20 or so years while the amount of game playing has drastically increased, many of which are violent.

 

 

If you read the gentlemen's response I was replying to, I wasn't speaking about the language as much as his examples of gore, nudity and killing in games and media. I've already stated I have no issues with the adult themes and content being in the game, I specified that not all people who encounter these thing's will be affected by it. it's only a request to control how certain aspects will be displayed. They've already done it by making the gore an option to turn on or off, that took a lot more time to animate, texture, design, and test than what I'm requesting.

 

As far as the citation goes, I can think of the Columbine killings in Colorado, where the kids emulated Doom and Duke Nukem the game when they went on a massacre. Some wisenheimer even made a Columbine video game where you go around shooting people, It may have even been one of the shooter's of the tragedy. http://extras.denverpost.com/news/shot0504f.htm In addition, there was a more recent study listed in the NYTimes about the effects of these troubled people, http://thelede.blogs.nytimes.com/2007/07/05/tieing-columbine-to-video-games/?_r=0 and here, http://education-curriculum-reform-government-schools.org/w/2012/12/violent-video-games-promote-violence/ That's not even other cases like the Virginia Tech case, or the other one where the kid's emulated the Matrix and dressed up like Neo and Morpheus... there's lot's of these stories where people emulate what they see. It's quite silly, some game developers are reckless in their designs, like in GTA where you're rewarded for killing prostitutes, which reminds me of another GTA game where a teen was playing GTA with his 4 or 5 yr old brother in the room and driving around stealing cars and what not. One morning the young boy tried waking his mom up to take him to school and she wouldn't wake up. He took her keys and tried to drive himself to school. He managed to drive about a mile before crashing into a tree. Luckily he survived and told the police his story. I wrote about that back in ~2010 or so for a class assignment. Here's another one same thing except he missed the bus and didn't make as far. http://geekologie.com/2009/01/6year-old-misses-bus-steals-fa.php But these are only a few cases. It could go on for pages across all forms of media. And my goal isn't to have it completely removed, only an option to control my environment for innocent eyes and ears. 

 

 

Those articles don't help your case at all. It's just a bunch of sensationalism. So, these kids that carried out mass murders played violent video games, and therefore it's clearly the cause right? I wonder if they all had fathers with facial hair, perhaps facial hair on parental figures causes mass murder? How is it that ~99.9999% of youths that have ever played violent video games were able to resist the demonic urges they instill  in their victims?

It's easy to scare people by pointing out that the kids in question carried out acts which specifically reference or relate to these video games, but there's absolutely no reason to believe they wouldn't have carried out the crimes without any input from fiction at all, or perhaps would have referenced a history book or a fictional story about war instead, in the absence of violent video games, tv shows, and movies. Seriously, especially considering the percentage of teen boys who have been playing violent video games for decades now while vioent crime rates decrease, the argument that playing them leads to less violent crime is more reasonable (though still largely baseless) than your assertion. It doesn't really matter and it's sort of off-topic, but seriously there's just no research to support what you're saying here; and news articles aren't research papers.

[Does the term "realistic" have any meaning in RPGs?]

 

People who argue that realism has no meaning in fantasy games are usually just using it as a cheap shot when they start losing an argument on some unrelated issue and those against them on the issue make the "mistake" of mentioning realism. It obviously matters, but it's always good for a bunch of thoughtless support to say stuff along the lines of "why should realism matter (in relation to whatever is being argued) in a game with freaking dragons and with people that can get hit with 30 arrows and survive?"

It's obvious that realism does matter. Like you said, if people can just walk through walls and fly around and characters never die (or do die for no perceivable reason) when PoE ships, people will be asking a lot of reasonable questions about why these things are in the game because they deviate from an implied baseline of reality. Specifically, reality is important in that internal consistency is very important, and most of these fictional worlds in fantasy closely resemble our own, meaning that internal consistency of those worlds often relies on reality.

 

Realism doesn't matter at all... What you are talking about is challenge, but even that doesn't matter. What matters in the end is that the game is fun for you.

 

No, that's not really what I'm talking about, though it would apply to the examples I gave of walking through walls, etc. An example having nothing to do with challenge would be "Why do none of the humans have heads?" We expect them to have heads for a reason, and if a reasonable explanation isn't given as to why they don't, then a problem is perceived. It's not about challenge but rather about, as I mentioned, internal consistency which, like I said, often has a lot to do with realism due to these worlds being based on and using aspects of reality.

[Does the term "realistic" have any meaning in RPGs?]

People who argue that realism has no meaning in fantasy games are usually just using it as a cheap shot when they start losing an argument on some unrelated issue and those against them on the issue make the "mistake" of mentioning realism. It obviously matters, but it's always good for a bunch of thoughtless support to say stuff along the lines of "why should realism matter (in relation to whatever is being argued) in a game with freaking dragons and with people that can get hit with 30 arrows and survive?"

It's obvious that realism does matter. Like you said, if people can just walk through walls and fly around and characters never die (or do die for no perceivable reason) when PoE ships, people will be asking a lot of reasonable questions about why these things are in the game because they deviate from an implied baseline of reality. Specifically, reality is important in that internal consistency is very important, and most of these fictional worlds in fantasy closely resemble our own, meaning that internal consistency of those worlds often relies on reality.

[Backer Reward Shipment Poll]

Looks like I'm clearly in the minority on this one. I voted for option 2 for a couple of reasons. First, it enables those backers who are collectors to have a collector's edition box with an actual game in it (which seems kind of important), as opposed to a collector's edition box with all the extras and then some simple separate box with the game... going with option 1 takes that away from those who didn't intend to open their boxes, while going with option 2 only takes away the ability to get your hands on the physical extras earlier. In other words, going with option 1 takes a little something permanently away from some of the backers who will never have a single collector's edition box with the game inside, while going with option 2 only temporarily withholds some physical extras from those who want to open them right away. Also the second option is cheaper since it requires only one shipment.

[PAX South 2015 live thread]

I think the problem is pretty clear when a dev can't come into this thread and post something without getting some disrespectful responses. Sure, have a laugh and tell the dev attempting to interact with the community here that they need to grow a thick skin and whatever else you need to say and then scratch your head and wonder why the devs don't interact more here... really?

 

I think they just have no desire to come here and willingly put themselves through any sort of verbal abuse or discomfort for no reason. Actual discussion about the game design leads to bickering about who's right, potential personal attacks between posters, and ultimately anything good you could get out of the discussion can be had by reading the discussion w/out interaction; attempt to discuss anything else, including the clearly negative environment here, and you get negative people telling you to get a thicker skin and wondering why the devs don't interact more. hmmm. As many others have said, I doubt I'd be casually interacting here much either. First of all, it's a terrible use of their work time to do so as simply reading the forums seems much more productive most of the time, and in their free time they'd rather not be insulted or abused because they're just not into that sort of thing.

 

I think it would be very easy to encourage more devs to interact with the forum in their free time by behaving professionally. If communications between fans and devs didn't include language or attitudes that one wouldn't use with a stranger or acquantaince in the workplace, then I imagine it would occur more often. Imagine going to a con and a dev sits down to talk to you and your friends and one of your friends starts harrassing them about design decisions and insulting them, would you be surprised if they left and didn't choose to come back over? I sure wouldn't be. To be fair, most of the polite posters here wouldn't be associating with the more negative types in person, but the nature of the forum is that we're essentially all sitting right next to each other here and you can't really avoid a bunch of negative posters without avoiding the forum (or that area of the forum) altogether.

[I learned that fights don't give you experience]

 

When I first played the BB I got to level 8 doing the quests.  My last playthroughs I have gotten to level 9 with the extra beatery XP. 

 

I really do not understand why you are arguing.  Some people are focused on getting XP so they can level up and get more skills/spells so they can kill more things.  Others of us what choices and enjoying doing quests and tasks in different ways.  We want to role play to the fullest possible extent.   I did not find it that eay to level up in BG 1.

 

Read carefully what I said: "Ask anyone who played the beta in the beginning, their original version of the xp system was pretty bad."

 

Also read that big post before. Removing combat xp, removed a style of gameplay for us players.

 

 

I played the beta in the beginning, and I don't think bestiary XP was a good addition nor do I think that a change to per-kill XP would be an improvement; in fact I think it would be considerably worse. So, no, you should stop making sweeping implications about everyone who played the beta in the beginning that, if you were actually involved in those discussions in the beginning, you know are untrue. If you're talking about the fact that the quest-only XP was a bit buggy or wasn't yet implemented very well as of the first backer beta release, then I'm not sure what the point of that statement is as it doesn't actually support a change of the type of XP system.

 

Also, "removing combat xp" not only doesn't remove a play style (it adds other legitimate play styles in addition to the "slaughter everything" approach), but it also wasn't "removed" at all because it wasn't ever implemented or even planned in the first place.

[To the Development Team]

@rf5111918 I haven't read through others' replies to your post so some of this may already have been addressed, but there are some problems with what you've said here. First of all, you're right in a general sense that those who are satisfied are less likely to speak up than those that aren't. That's a pretty basic point which doesn't really need to be said as the devs are surely aware of this likelihood, not that you saying it really hurts anything. The mistake you've made, though, is assuming that you are a member of a silent majority that is satisfied with the game simply because a majority are silent. The fact that the dissatisfied will speak up doesn't prove that everyone that hasn't said anything will be happy with the final product.

 

I imagine, by the way, that most people will be satisfied, but the fact that they are now silent doesn't indicate this. I would guess that a strong majority of backers simply don't check the details of progress enough to know how satisfied they will eventually be when the game is released. To be fair, there are plenty of people that stop by the forums both to say what you've said here, and also to say just the opposite: that they've only just discovered X or Y about PoE and they're quite unhappy about it. Most of the silent majority is likely silent because they're not following the development closely enough to know or care whether or not they have any particular problems with the game.

 

The main issue with what you've said is your suggestion that those who are in some way dissatisfied with the game are people with too much free time whose opinions are rubbish. You don't know anything about these people's lives, and if they're taking time out of their busy (or not so busy) schedules to attempt to make this game better, then you should be thanking them rather than insulting them. Criticism and intense scrutiny can be a great boon to the quality of the final product. Having someone (or, better yet, many someones) pointing out all the potential mistakes in something while there's still time to correct them will almost certainly be a huge help to the project. I'm not sure what downside even exists to this. I'm not worried that the devs' feelings are going to get hurt or that they're going to sacrifice good parts of their vision due to backer feedback because I have a bit more confidence in their self-confidence as experienced game developers.

 

To put it simply, the criticism likely helps a great deal. The occasional personal insult or accusation directed at the devs can be brushed off as easily as those that spend their time trying to help improve the game can brush off the implications you've made about them in your post. The scrutiny and suggestions will give the devs new ideas and make them examine their design more closely than they otherwise would have. So, I'm very grateful to the devs for making what looks like it's going to be an awesome game, and I'm also thankful to the people here that spend a great deal of (unpaid) time attempting to encourage improvements to the game.

[I love this game]

 

 

 

All the new DA suck to me Dr3 is imp the worst out of them all it reminds me way to mutch of World of warcraft or somthing like that or some type of online MMORPG

Methinks people overly associate open-world games with MMO's. What's the difference between doing a quest in BG1, and doing a quest in DA:I? It's not isometric, and there are fewer map transitions. Seriously.

 

I'm not going to tell anyone to like DA:I, but at least dislike it accurately, please.

 

Anywho, while I think DA:I is great, in its way, I feel that PoE is also going to be quite great in different ways.

 

Quests in BG1 are actually real quests where you talk to people to get it and and to turn it in and get cool conversations.

 

Yes, Baldur's Gate really set the standard with its amazingly complex quests:

 

Nessa the Cow

Candlekeep

50 ex.

• Dreppin, in the north part of Candlekeep, will ask you to get an antidote from Hull for his cow Nessa.
• Speak to Hull in front of the gates to the keep. He will tell you that you can have the antidote if you fetch his sword.
• Enter the barracks and take the antidote from the unlocked chest and give it to Drepping.

Rats in the Storehouse

Candlekeep

50 ex., 5 gold

• Reevor in front of the storehouse on the east side of Candlekeep will ask you to clean out the rats in the storehouse.
• Enter the storehouse and kill all the rats. Speak to Reevor again for your reward.

Phlydia's Book

Candlekeep

50 ex., Lynx Eye Gem

• Phlydia in the top left corner of Candlekeep will ask you to find her book.
• Just to the east, Dreppin will tell you that her book is in the hay behind him.
• Find Phlydia's book in the hay and return it to her.

Crossbow Bolts

Candlekeep

50 ex., 10 gold

• Fuller in the barracks in Candlekeep will ask you to buy some crossbow bolts for him.
• Buy some bolts from Winthrop in the Inn and give them to Fuller to get a reward.

Hull's Sword

Candlekeep

50 ex., 10 gold

• Speak to Hull in front of the gates and he will ask you to fetch his sword for him.
• Enter the barracks and take Hull's sword from the unlocked chest and return it to him for a reward.

Firebead's scroll

Candlekeep

50 ex., Potion of Healing

• Firebead Elvenhair in the inn in Candlekeep will request that you retreive his Identify scroll from Tethtoril.
• You will find Tethtoril walking around the library. He will give you the scroll.
• Return the scroll to Firebead and he will give you a potion of healing.

 

 

You may be right about BG1 not having groundbreakingly deep, complex, or fun quests (I'm not commenting one way or another on that), but this argument you've presented is terrible. You listed the quests of the tutorial area. Candlekeep is an actual tutorial, with actual 'tutors' scattered about to teach the player how to play the game. The complexity of the quests in the tutorial area doesn't really matter much, they displayed the basics of how to communicate with NPCs, buy things at the store, engage in combat, etc.

 

As for the quality of companions in BG, yeah they were mostly caricatures to an extent, but who cares? I don't understand the snobbish hatred against levity and fun that can come from things such as one-dimensional, boisterous caricatures like Minsc. Computer games don't have to be all art and no entertainment and, in fact, art can be entertaining; I just don't see why it's so important that light-heartedness be crushed in order for some people to convince themselves that they're doing something worthwhile. Yeah, BG characters were simple and flat, yes there were fetch quests, but playing BG (and BG2) has provided me with who knows how many hours of fulfilling fun. Maybe the New Vegas or MoTB characters and writing were out of this world and deep and artistic, but the former uses what is essentially a first person shooter engine and the latter suffers from NWN2's terrible camera, etc. so I may never play either one. The BG games were fun and had solid gameplay that I (and apparently many others) did not find tiring.

 

All that being said, I'm really enjoying what I've seen so far of the writing in the BB and I'm looking forward to the mature writing and the complex companions in the final game, I'm just not sure that all the disdain for the simpler or lighter pleasures going on ITT is merited.

[Stop Right Now Thankyou Very Much]

that the only person ever making threads on this topic is Sensuki (check it out, it's true!) and that he keeps spamming the same "proofs" and points to try and get OE to change it just cause he's got some personal issue with it (tell me, where did engagement touch you?) does tend to make that rather easy though.

 

It doesn't matter if only Sensuki or only you or nobody is presenting the argument, doesn't make the point being argued any more or less valid.

 

 

I am well aware he's on a (lonely?) crusade against it and tries to grasp at every tiny inconsequential straw to get Obsidian to remove it.

And here people are saying "Sure, they can improve the AI, but Sensuki will abuse it with engagement again!" conveniently forgetting he does the same without the engagement, and if the AI is improved he can and will still do that, so it's neither an argument for or against engagement, all AI related instead. But feel free to ignore that elephant in the room...

 

The kiting thing was just a bit of amusing irony because the stated purpose, or one of them anyway, of implementing the engagement system was to eliminate kiting. So, it's just amusing that apart from being an annoying system it also didn't do the one thing that was the whole point of its implementation.

 

 

EDIT: It's telling both of you had to resort to petty insults rather than argument my points...

 

Well, some guy explained to me that gravity existed because of how retarded I am, at which point I explained to him that gravity couldn't possibly exist because his argument resorted to a personal attack. In other words, sh*t arguers don't invalidate points just by supporting them.

 

 

Isn't positioning and movement MORE important if there's an area of engagement allowing you to specifically place melee enemies properly or if you improperly place yourself you have to deal with the consequences.

 

I am still amused people reading "positioning is important" when they want to remove an element that does exactly that, and replace it with one where you can just move anywhere you desire during combat, making position frivial, not important.

 

Sure, it's important in that the only viable tactical option now is to not do it. I think that engagement is a cool idea, but if its implementation leads to removing the entire 'feel' of IE style combat, creating a 'no-brainer' combat situation wherein tactical repositioning consistently does more harm than good, and it doesn't even solve the kiting problem it was intended to resolve, then I just really don't see the point.

 

The worst part of it is the support for it. The engagement system encourages static combat and punishes tactical repositioning. So, there are a bunch of people here that will play the game by sending in their party and not bothering to tactically reposition because they don't pay enough attention to combat to do so anyway (their playstyle is being actively encouraged by the mechanics now). Some will move around and suffer engagement attacks w/out realizing or caring, but essentially the point of both of these groups is that the mechanic should be left in because it doesn't bother them at the moment for whatever reason. Removing the engagement would allow them to mindlessly stand still and auto-attack without penalty as they're doing now, but would also allow those that prefer tactical repositioning during combat to do so.

[Not encouraged]

 

The point is, Obsidian would have made this game with only 1.1m. What do they use the extra 2.9m for doesnt make any difference to me. They had an extra 2.9m to work with - kickstarter works and there is no problem. They could have considered that 2.9m as profit  and they probably did in fact.

Initial goal on kickstarter was 900k iirc. And it's not enough for the game of this type and size. Neither is 4+m, for that matter, with all stretch goals Obs promised to deliver. They were likely going to invest some of their own money in this or snatch a little from other projects. And "invest" means "put money in and expect them to come back with profit", yes?

 

Anyway, what do you have against this certain devteam having a little profit from their work? They should get something in return, you know.

 

 

You do realize that the devs are getting paid as a part of the budget, they're not working for free and hoping for a salary out of additional copies sold. They're getting paid either way because that's a part of the cost of making the game, any additional money from copies being sold will go into the Obsidian coffers to be used on other projects I imagine. Will the devs be rewarded if a bunch of extra copies sell? Maybe so, but I'm not sure why that matters. Although it is likely that enough sales could incentivize Obsidian to pursue this sort of game in the future, they already made all the sales they needed to make the game. As Sheikh keeps pointing out, this is the entire point of KS.

 

I don't know what is leading people in this thread to believe that Obsidian is operating at a loss on this project when it made four times its original goal, any actual reason to believe this? And, if they are operating "at a loss" (by which I mean the company has put some money into it, which has nothing to do with the devs' salaries btw), then it's only because they decided to put extra money into the game because they saw that it was most likely going to make a profit which would be a return on that money. This isn't a justification for changing the nature of the game in a way that betrays the promises made to the backers, it's a calculated financial decision made by Obsidian.

[Experience from combat or not - an immersion perspective]

 

Attempting to apply realism to this process never really makes sense. The idea that "gaining experience by using your skills makes sense" leads to The Elder Scrolls type XP systems where people stand in one place and swing their sword at the air 1,000 times to max out their sword skills. The XP system is an arbitration of your characters' progress.

 

The idea that using skills or killing should give you XP isn't any more realistic than the quest XP system because the XP you gain from killing a goblin with a sword can be applied to making you better at using a bow or summoning spells when you level up, and along the same line the XP gained from unlocking a door can be used to make you better at using a sword. So, how is it realistic that killing goblins with swords makes you better at summoning spells or unlocking doors makes you better at killing goblins with swords?

 

But then again that boobplate physics totally ruining our immersion...

 

 

Well, joking aside, I'm not really a fan of the boobplate. It doesn't ruin my immersion but I'd say this is a case of the difference between trying to attain realism vs. internal consistency. The boobplate often violates the internal consistency, which doesn't have anything to do with realism.

 

If the male warriors are decked out in full plate and packing steel while the female warriors have decided to don their ever so lovely chainmail bikinis (not the same as boobplate I know, but the same principle applies), then you've got a bit of a consistency issue that may or may not be a problem depending on the tone of the game.

[Experience from combat or not - an immersion perspective]

 

 

What if all the options in a quest go against your role-playing style and therefore you have to reject said quest? You won't get experience if you reject a quest right?

Then you dont do the quest. Or you pretend yuor character has some side motive for doing the quest and is really upset that he has to do it, but does it anyway. One of the options of roleplaying in this situation is that if the character does not want to do the quest, he just goes back to menial jobs instead of adventuring, Which means you quit the game and play another character or just do something else and leave the computer.

 

If the game does not give you enough options t realize the roleplaying of your character well, the game is at fault, not you or your characters you made up.

 

My point was that you will be punished for role-playing in a situation like that when it shouldn't be the case. Realistically speaking you improve your skills through practice not by finishing a quest line. Gaining experience by using your skills makes sense, gaining experience because you "finished a questline" does not make any sense.

 

 

Attempting to apply realism to this process never really makes sense. The idea that "gaining experience by using your skills makes sense" leads to The Elder Scrolls type XP systems where people stand in one place and swing their sword at the air 1,000 times to max out their sword skills. The XP system is an arbitration of your characters' progress.

 

The idea that using skills or killing should give you XP isn't any more realistic than the quest XP system because the XP you gain from killing a goblin with a sword can be applied to making you better at using a bow or summoning spells when you level up, and along the same line the XP gained from unlocking a door can be used to make you better at using a sword. So, how is it realistic that killing goblins with swords makes you better at summoning spells or unlocking doors makes you better at killing goblins with swords?

[What You See Is What You Get Loot System]

+1 for WYSIWYG.

 

 

Also, for those suggesting that enemy equipment should randomly (or otherwise) not exist after combat because it was destroyed due to the combat:

 

How does it make sense that the enemies' equipment is destroyed during combat while your party's equipment remains intact and unscathed? Was it that last 1 hp that destroyed their gear? I mean, if my party goes through 100 battles and takes enough damage throughout those battles to have reduced every party member's HP to 0 dozens of times over yet their gear isn't any the worse for wear, how do you figure it's more realistic or somehow makes sense that the enemies' gear falls apart during one fight?

 

@Osvir the above wasn't directed at you by the way but rather those that dropped by the thread earlier to suggest that enemies' gear being destroyed during combat would be more realistic/make sense.

[Suggestions for PoE From here on in]

-Can we get rid of the "recommended" thingies on the stats at character creation? I don't want Obsidianparent to watch over me while I'm playing the game.

 

-I would like it if we could exit areas from any part of the "edge of the map", not just at the transition markers.

 

-Again, I want to open doors before going into a building. It's worth repeating.

 

-The Grimoire feels a bit weird to use to me. Most annoying thing is that it doesn't have the "right-click to get details" control scheme that's mostly used everywhere else, at least not when you're looking at the spells currently in your Grimoire.

 

-I know it's not finished yet, but it'd be great to have a "silent" option for the voice-sets when creating your character.

 

-Walking toggle would be nice.

Emphasis mine.

 

All of this; except for the first one as someone mentioned that expert mode disables it anyway so as I'll likely never even see it, I really don't have a problem with inexperienced CRPGers having a suggestion to work with.

 

Emphasis on exiting from any edge of map and opening/closing doors seperately from entering/exiting (hopefully such things are possible to implement). This would go a long way for advancing the general IE "feels" I'd think.

[Suggestions for PoE From here on in]

You are reading a level of specificity into their pitch that simply was not there.

That may be true, I'm open to a more lax interpretation than mine, but it seems that you and others want to remove altogether a part of the statement, which is just changing the meaning. Either the "of Icewind Dale" part of the statement has no meaning and shouldn't have been included (in which case there's no way around the fact that they're not following through on something here) or it does have some sort of meaning and that meaning needs to be defined. I don't expect or necessarily want a carbon copy of IWD combat (though I wouldn't mind it either). My expectation can be summed up by what Sensuki described as his agenda: "fun combat that feels closer to the Infinity Engine combat experience, while not being the rules of D&D."

[Suggestions for PoE From here on in]

@Shevek if all they're looking for is having a good time (presumably this isn't the case) then they're not much use because despite what you wish to be true, Obsidian didn't say in their pitch that they were just gonna make a game that most people would have a good time playing. If they had said that, they would have had entirely different backers (if it had been backed at all). The Kickstarter pitch is relevant because it describes the game that Obsidian promised to create. I get that you don't like that and just want a game that the masses can enjoy, but that's not what this game was pitched as.

 

And the point of my question was exactly what Sensuki has been pointing out, everyone has an agenda when they open their mouth or post something on these forums or report their experiences to the dev team; you're not some sort of mythical exception and neither are the QA testers, myself, Sensuki, or anyone else.

[Suggestions for PoE From here on in]

This is a thread for giving suggestions to tweak, change or improve stuff that within reason can indeed be tweaked, changed or improved until the game will be released in spring 2015.

 

Therefore, I propose to set aside perhaps the biggest controversy in the beta forums, namely this:

 

 

 

 

"...add in the fun, intense combat and dungeon diving of Icewind Dale" -- I'd say it's pretty fair to state that this isn't the case at the moment. The fact that people find the current combat fun does not fulfill this promise, because they promised "the fun, intense combat ... of Icewind Dale." This is much more specific than just promising fun, intense combat. Those saying that it's okay that the combat feels more like DA combat or NWN2 combat are missing the point that while it may be fun for you, it's not acceptable in that it doesn't fulfill this specific promise.

 

In essence, plenty of backers - thousands of them - will interpret that Kickstarter like GrinningReaper659 did: PoE will have the combat of IWD.

As much as I'd love to have a new game made with that very combat, it isn't going to happen in PoE, and most likely not in its expansion either.

Also, if I play the devil's advocate for a sec, it only says "the intense combat of IWD", which certainly emphasizes the intensity of combat, and not the combat mechanics, per se. I and hordes of others will have to wait until a game with BG/IWD-like combat will appear - perhaps Serpent of the Staglands will be the first? 

 

I don't see my interpretation as a minority intepretation, and I don't think that expecting them to follow through on this promise should be abandoned. So, in your mind, they might as well have said "the fun, intense combat of Neverwinter Nights" or "the fun, intense combat of World of Warcraft" as name-dropping Icewind Dale apparently can be completely divorced from the promise? Is this not a problem in your eyes Indira? I mean, I think that you like the combat (which is fine), but that doesn't make it okay to just give a pass on not coming through with what they said...

 

If "of Icewind Dale" means absolutely nothing and could have been replaced with "of [insert any game with combat here]" or removed altogether, then it shouldn't have been said in the first place. I'm all about mixing things up and trying to improve on the IE experience, I was a vocal supporter of the removal of combat XP as I didn't feel that removing it took anything away from that experience (and they certainly never promised combat XP during the KS campaign, in fact they essentially stated it wouldn't be in during the campaign); but this is different specifically because they said it would be included. The only ambiguous part of this is defining what exactly constitutes IWD combat, but it's certainly a more narrow definition than "any combat that could be considered tactical," right?

 

 

I could almost understand this incessant complaining (though not agree with it) when many people took issue with the combat. Now that its playing so well and numerous folks have recounted how much they are enjoying the game, this is just being obtuse and obstructionist.

 

I have no doubt that the feedback from their internal testers, who are not working towards their own agenda, is overwhelmingly positive at this point. The dev team itself noted that combat is feeling pretty good.

 

When things are working and feeling good, the last thing you do is start ripping out core systems with 6 months left to release.

 

So, the internal testers don't have the "agenda" of wanting the game to follow through on its promises or they don't have the "agenda" of wanting it to be like the IE games? What agenda are you referring to specifically?

[First Impressions (v364)]

There seem to be a bunch of people ITT getting upset about backers attempting to dictate design to the designers, but there's a huge difference between someone saying that they backed the game and now want to dictate design vs. someone saying they backed they game and now they'd like the company they backed to follow through on promises they made. If Obsidian decided that Pillars was going to have a Wasteland 2 style squad of four adventurers instead of a 'central hero' (as in a protagonist player character) as was promised, there would be a serious problem. If they said the game was going first person there'd be a problem because Isometric perspective was promised as well. Having an issue with them breaking design promises isn't an attempt to dictate design. In other words, these are/should all be discussions of whether or not the issue is an actual breach of the promise

 

I don't mind the combat as it was as of the first or second beta update when I did my playthrough. I don't hate the system and I felt that it provided a reasonable challenge which is all I really care about. I don't powergame and won't ever have 5 naked ranged units or engage in cheese such as kiting or the ironic engagement-kiting that is now possible, so that doesn't affect me too much. However, I don't like what the engagement system does to combat and I'd still enjoy the combat more if it were more like the IE games' combat; on top of that, my personal enjoyment of it doesn't factor into whether or not it fulfils the promise made in the KS pitch, which is what matters.

 

On a side note, the 1-time poster that droppped by with the link to DA:O's metacritic score sent me on an amusing few minutes of checking out scores for other games, and finding that Fallout 3 has a higher score than Fallout 1, Fallot 2, and Fallout New Vegas. Those gaming critics over there very well may have their fingers on the pulse of modern casual gamers, but they sure don't agree with my tastes and likely the tastes of many others that backed a game inspired by the IE games.

 

Anyway, I imagine that plenty of people would be satisfied with the game in its current state in terms of mechanics, but that doesn't mean it's delivered on its promises yet as 'plenty of people' are satisfied playing first person shooters and single player mmos and that's not what this game was promised to be. If they don't satisfy all their backers (which I'm sure is inevitable) that's fine, but if they don't follow through on making the game they said they would make for those that backed, that will be a problem. And before anyone accuses me of thinking that only I can define what exactly those design promises entailed, well, that's not what I think at all, disagreement over what the promises included is pretty much the only worthwhile discussion to be had here though (oh, and the 'feels').

 

Also, the devs should really acknowledge this issue with units fading into the backgrounds because it seems to be pretty serious, hopefully they're working on that.