Sacred_Path

The stronghold stuff sounds especially delicious. Needs moar Tim updates!

The game where I used the most cursed items by far was Wizardry 8. These were usually melee weapons that you couldn't unequip without casting a high level spell or a bishop using a standard action. So equipping these cursed weapons meant losing your ranged attacks for the time being. OTOH you'd want to use cursed weapons because they were generally more powerful, sometimes vastly so. Not very exciting, but cursed items ended up getting used without being ultimately superior.

There is only one credible way of implementing pickpocketing, and that is via the stealth mechanic. In reality, most pickpockets operate in pairs; one chats up the victim while the other rifles through parts of the clothing preferrably without body contact to the victim (i.e. jacket pockets, backpacks). In those cases where a pickpocket operates alone they will almost always try to touch you beforehand to divert your attention; but speaking for myself, when a stranger comes up to me and touches me I instinctively move away, and I don't know how people can so gullible as to just stand there. Therefore, since our CRPG pickpocket will almost certainly work alone, and victims don't tend to wear modern ziplocked backpacks, the only way to steal would seem to be for the victim to be oblivious to the fact that you're even there. How the pickpocketing then is handled interface wise - wether you should just get a random item or a "shop" inventory opens up, whether there should be opposing rolls and wether your stealth skill should give a bonus to your roll - I'm neutral about that. Consequence is the most important thing to get working. What you suggest could easily, in a game with just global reputation like in IE games, be simulated via a drop in reputation. Personally, I don't really see the need for that - it's one more thing that needs to be taken into account during balancing, and as you said consequences of failure are usually rather harsh anyway. Every new attempt to steal can mean disaster. I'm also not of the opinion that save-scumming needs to be prevented - it's one of those things that players can easily regulate themselves (as long as you don't make "no reload" stealing nigh impossible because of very low odds).

I actually have the same attitude towards pixel secks in general.

Hmm dunno, I know a lot of RPGs where you can avoid combat with stealth or maneuvering just fine. JRPGs much maybe?

Pausing just to check what everyone is doing doesn't fall into either category IMO

wait, when did anyone say there should be no pause function

okkoko = obyknven's alt?

I'm very confused that you think the "essence" of IE games was the pause function. Tactics IMO aren't necessarily deeper if you can have 4 modes active in contrast to having only one active at any one time. On the contrary, it would probably enforce player choice better when it comes to i.e. defensive vs. offensive stance, or melee vs. ranged (Power Attack vs. Rapid Shot) etc. Essentially though, it may just come down to the number of possible modes. If you have 4 channels max and a max of 2 modes per channel, it may not be as bad. But it would still take a lot of micro managing to just keep an overview of what everyone is doing.

pausing is the essence of tactics? (IOW you have a real time game, not a turn based one)

They should well exist as outlaws, as they do/did IRL, but they should also exist in the established power spheres. Guards should abuse you, merchants should give you bad deals, etc. CRPG worlds tend to be much too easy on murder hobos.

welp, for 'Power Attack' and 'Rapid Shot', I wouldn't have minded pausing every time I need to activate them. Honestly. As it now seems, I may be pausing a lot more often in the end just to check if everyone's 3 or 4 modal abilities are set up ideally.

I don't feel that the dilemma (if you want to call it that) is solved this way. It sounds like maintenance-heavy mode swapping. What made you decide against having only one mode active at any one time?

Sawyer said on twitter (not a quote): mature themes doesn't mean only dealing with mature subjects but dealing with any subject in a mature way. So I wouldn't expect the comical tone of Fallout, but also not "everything is better with rape".

Can you guarantee that there will never be chimp that is as smart as healthy human, even if one is breed and geneticaly manipulated to add intelligence? You think RPG system should take into account people of a race not really belonging to said race? The question is how you define races in RPG system? Are character different race if s/he is breeded and geneticaly manipulated to be most superior specimen of his or her race? Because rpg don't usually follow definition specifications and rules for races or species. I think the problem is non-existent, especially because there's often one race for every attribute. So a DnD Orc that has been magically altered to be smarter may simply use the attribute bonuses (none) of a human.

Can you guarantee that there will never be chimp that is as smart as healthy human, even if one is breed and geneticaly manipulated to add intelligence? You think RPG system should take into account people of a race not really belonging to said race?

A chimp will never be as smart as a healthy human, no matter what he does. This limits creative possibilites; you can't have chimps that are nuclear physicists, for example.

I want realistic choices first of all. In a wartorn land where everyone is armed, that will come down to all kinds of violence and exhortation. Also it's possible they'll include just a tiny reference to rape just so Roguey can go ape**** over it again.

And I don't get what's interesting about a Fighter offering deep insights like "I am Remond of the Nine Hills and I hate Orcs! Hurrrrrrrr. Feed me strawberries to keep me happy." The Ultima companions were a compromise between interactivity (they offered some unique dialogue every now and then) and leaving all strategical aspects to the player.

Ultima. They were basically puppets and you had full control over their (very limited) development, inventories and combat behaviour (although in U7 they could run away and drop items! Forsooth!). IOW, they weren't much in the way of companions. That's how I like it (if I don't get to create my own).

As far as ****-flinging goes, the outcry following the crafting update was still very civil. Just sayin

Did they now? Could've saved me a lot of nerdrage.

exits could be collapsed areas ending in tunnels leading to the surface, maybe one ending in a (small) unique outdoors location you couldn't otherwise access. At least that would be an alternative to the usual suspect 'portal to the surface'.

If there are going to be respawns those dungeons better be circular design. last thing i want to after spending 30 minutes clearing a dungeon, is spending 10 more minutes fighting way out if I am running low on potions, something breaks, or etc exits shouldn't be placed sparingly IMO, for this and other reasons

I'm partial to respawns too, especially because with objective XP they can't be farmed. Now dynamic population of the dungeon like you describe would be great too.