Lephys

^ I was talking about the improvement of a given spell. But, yeah, it serves as a nice differentiator between spells of different levels/tiers, as well. But, yeah, my main concern (not so much "Oh no, this is gonna happen!", but just "this is a concern that should be, and hopefully is being, considered) is just the fading of lower-level spells into uselessness, purely because they didn't scale or improve in any way at all (in terms of effectiveness -- I get that we get to cast more and more of them as we go). Again, if you have a spell that, for example, does 1 damage at the end of the game, it doesn't really matter if you can cast it infinite times. It's like LvL-0 spells in Pathfinder. Sure, you can cast Ray of Frost infinite times, but it does three damage, and everything pretty much resists a LvL-0 spell later on. There are still useful LvL-0 spells for non-combat stuff, but, in terms of combat, that level of spells just becomes useless later on. Which, it's fine, 'cause you get much better spells. It's not like Ray of Frost is your only ice spell or something. *shrug*... It's more the principle of the thing, to me. Even with Wizard magic being largely external (they don't actually channel magic through themselves, or use a font of mana or something, or their own willpower, etc.) in PoE, it's still like science. It's formulas and such, and getting ambient soul essence to catalyze like you want it to. No different from chemistry or something, really. If you can make an ounce of acid with chemicals, then, with different amounts of those same ingredients, you can make a gallon. If you can make a certain "amount" of fire projectile, then you should be able to make a different amount of fire projectile. That's just always bugged me about any system in which this one spell does this one, specific thing, this exact amount of damage, and has this exact size and speed and range, for eternity. "Oh, you've literally become god and created your own planet? Still, when you cast 'Firebolt,' it's going to do 6 damage and have a range of 30 feet, and travel the speed of an arrow."

It's not like I don't understand the strangeness of, in isolation, being incapable of casting a spell just because there's no threat around. However, there are plenty of things you can't do in the game, simply because the game refuses to let you. There are ALL those locations on the map you can't travel to. Look, that one's even on your way to another place? Along the road itself? Can't go there. Why? Because there's no content there for you to go to. It makes literally no sense, in the game world. But, it's the way it is, and it makes sense from a game design perspective. You SHOULD be able to burn entire forests down with fire magic, easily. But, you can't. Why not? I don't know. There might even be a good reason. Maybe you're fleeing like 500 orcs, and they're chasing you through a dense forest. Get to the edge with haste, spin about, and set it ablaze. But you can't. It's really no different. The restriction to combat-casting has gameplay-related ramifications that are simply gone if you can just cast stuff before you even walk in. Whether or not the lore supports it is another issue, but I see no reason why it couldn't. There's already no healing magic in PoE's world. People questioned that. Maybe magic is also limited in that you cannot maintain a spell effect for very long on a person. Thus, it's not so much that you can't cast outside of combat (in-character... in the game world/lore, I mean), but that no one would, really. Sure, you'd spot some foes, then cast your spells, then attack. But, maybe casting spells that close to foes gives away your position. And maybe moving to the minimum safe distance to not be detected casting your spells would put you so far away that, by the time you pre-cast, then ran back to engage those foes in combat, your spells would wear off mere seconds into the fight. Stuff like that. Nothing dictates that magic has to work a certain way. And they have a reason for it from the game design perspective (having to cast in-combat drastically changes the approach to tactics people take, since you can't just rely upon pre-cast spells and always build on top of that when combat starts). That's good enough for me. Like I said, it's a trade-off. What you lose in casting outside of combat, you gain something in place of when you must cast within combat (and/or start combat when you cast spells).

Hey now... Game Dev Tycoon is pretty fun for what it is. But, you're right. I think it would benefit from an Employee Tetris component. We should pitch that to them.

Yeah, sorry. I got a bit carried away with digression. I'd be interested to see a unique attempt at an MMO, though. And, for what it's worth, GW2 was the closest I've ever come to that same thing. As I said... they had a lot of good ideas, compared to the typical mold. But, I still think they ended up just butting their heads against the mold a bit, instead of shattering it with a Leonidas kick and strolling outside of it. I think people are just too afraid to design a game to get subscriptions from anyone other than the current MMO crowd. As if there's absolutely no other way you could make a massively-multiplayer game that was worth paying $10-a-month for. I realize it's very expensive, though, to even attempt.

That's not what it's about. It's about the balance between choices made by the player, and how there shouldn't be arbitrary severe differences. If I pick a Fighter instead of a Wizard, there shouldn't be 70% of the enemies in the game that I need a Magic Weapon buff just to damage, while my having chosen a Wizard would've resulted in EASILY wiping the floor with all those foes (or, at least, being SIGNIFICANTLY more effective against them). Or... better, more blatant example: If I put all my points into survival every time I level up, there doesn't need to be 700 instances of blatant Stealth usefulness in the game, and only like 5 instances of survival being useful. Of course, it's really easy to point out BLATANT examples, and much harder to point out more subtle ones, because they're always going to come across as just a solitary situation in which a class wasn't as effective as another class. The point is... it's not about a class and another class being able to take each other in a fight or something. It's about your decision to use swords instead of magic not arbitrarily affecting your usefulness throughout the majority of the game. Sure, you're controlling a party, but, at the very least you personally built onecharacter from the ground up. So, again, you don't want to have to rely on the rest of your party most of the time, JUST because you picked a certain style of combat via your class choice. It's the same for combat as it is with anything else. You don't want one choosing an Elf to prompt oodles of NPCs to just bestow you with free gifts because you're pretty, while choosing a Dwarf has everyone attacking you because they don't like you as much. Just because you want to be an Elf instead of a Dwarf doesn't mean you want no one to ever hate you, and just because you want to be a Dwarf doesn't mean you never want anyone to like you and hook you up/help you out because of your race.

*shrug* I understood what Jarrakul meant the first time. While I see how his example could support a different point, he gave plenty of context to indicate what point it was supposed to be supporting. I think people, understandably, lead busy lives today, and just don't really like to take in a whole not-super-short post from beginning to end and process that before responding. An example's a lot more intuitive to process quickly than a random person's raw point declaration, and yet, the same example could support any number of different points, depending on the context. Really, the easiest thing is to simply ask if you're not sure. If you're 90% sure, even, just say "It really seems like you just want the Rogue to be as potent as the Fighter, in combat. Is that what you're saying?" Then, if you find out it is, you can go into detail about the folly of that. And if it isn't, the poster in question doesn't have to sift through your elaborate response to try and point out the core misunderstanding that holds the whole thing up. You're both on the same page, and he can just say "'nah," and explain it again, emphasizing the specifics of his point. But that's just me... -___- (None of this is meant in a hostile fashion. Purely a matter-of-fact one). Also, for what it's worth, I think a good example for this whole Threshold of Usefulness idea is that, if you're a Rogue, and, say, a Skeleton shows up, the things that specifically make you a Rogue should come into play in some minimal fashion in your usefulness in handling the skeleton. Something like a single enemy shouldn't be reduced to a classless-husk level of usefulness (even if their level of usefulness is still above 0). It's all about overlapping. If a Rogue can't backstab a skeleton, then he needs to be able to do SOMEthing else specifically useful (even if it's less useful), as a direct result of his being a Rogue. Hell... maybe his backstab/sneak-attack effect just does something different. Instead of additional damage (because they aren't fleshy), he strikes key bones/joints and slows them down. That way, he's less effective, but he's still Roguin' it up, instead of just being a warm body who can hit things with a stick (which even a Wizard can do).

Firstly, I wasn't trying to imply that you were suggesting spell scaling, in general just-plain causes issues. I realized you didn't mean that, so I was just sort of emphasizing the clarification is all -- that it's the combination of scaling + another aspect of spell improvement that causes the usual issue. Yeah, if Fireball 1 is better 'cause you've gained three levels, and you get Fireball 2 (or any other boost to Fireball), then you're literally just getting redundant boosts to Fireball. Secondly, I'm not sure what you mean by "you can't (easily) have spellcasters gain access to entirely new spells as they increase in level." Sure you can, right? The sheer fact that spells scale as you become more powerful has nothing to do with how and when you gain spells, and in no way prevents you from introducing beginning or additional/new spells in any fashion you please. Are you meaning that, since you can choose whatever spell you want (in PoE) at each level (and possibly learn them in various orders, depending on what grimoires you manage to find after battles), that you might learn "Holy Hand Grenade" before you learn "PewPewbolt"? Because, while true, it doesn't change the fact that, if you don't learn PewPewbolt until level 7, then it's still a "new" spell to you when you learn it. Whether or not it's affiliated with a level or potency is a completely different matter. *shrug* Honestly, the way I've always hoped to one day see a magic system work is to have the whole "you gain 'better' stuff as you go" aspect deal specifically with the complexity of spells, rather than the damage of them. Instead of "Okay, you're level 4 now? Time to give you a 50-damage spell instead of a 20-damage one," you could gain a more complex spell (one that boosts your tactical "seeds" from which to develop specific combat tactics." For an extraordinarily simple example, we'll go back to my favorite buddies, Firebolt and Fireball. Maybe when you hit level 2, you learn Fireball. Well, now, you can do more than just hit one target with fire damage (Firebolt). But, that doesn't mean FireBALL has to do 3 times the damage of FireBOLT. It CAN, in total numbers, if you hit 6 enemies for 10 damage instead of 1 enemy for 10 damage. But, if you ask me, a single-target fire projectile spell should be just another tool in your magic belt, so to speak. What if there's ONE guy on the battlefield, and I just want to hit him with fire? Why would I use Fireball, or Magma Storm, or SUPER IFRIT WORLD-MELTING ASSAULT CELESTIAL 1,000 LOTUS BLOSSUM DRAGON STRIKE!? I probably wouldn't. So, even though those spells are cool, if I have the magical power capability to summon THAT much fire damage that behaves in a certain manner, you'd think I could just form ONE really, really potent Firebolt and be done with it. Now, that's not to say I think it's just plain bad to have any kind of power difference between spells. Namely, when you use something like the spell level system (a la D&D -- the system that PoE's pretty much using), you have tiers of spells. And this works. Why? Because when you're level 7 and have 4th-level spells, you maybe can only cast two 4th-level spells, but you can now probably cast 8-or-so 1st-level spells per encounter. (Just an example... I dunno when you can cast exactly how many of whichever level spells, in the actual design, or when something shifts to per-encounter, or at-will). But, yeah, it's balanced by the limitation. However, as I mentioned before, if Firebolt does 7 fire damage, and you reach 4th-level magic, and there's some 4th-level spell that does 100 fire damage to a single target, and most things have like 3 or 4 armor now, then what's better? Using the 4th-level spell, or casting ALL 8 of my Firebolts and doing 24 total fire damage to the thing over a lot longer period of time? So, yeah. Even in that system, there's definitely room for SOME scaling. Maybe Firebolt gets like +1 damage per level (just for example). And then, maybe Fireblast (a made-up "upgraded" Firebolt spell of 3rd-level) gets +2 damage per level. etc. *shrug*. This is all just to point out how things could function, and not specifically what values should be used or exactly how it should be set up, etc.. Another thing I'm fond of (but don't think would necessarily fit into PoE's current design) is the improvement of spells as you level via the addition of effects. In other words, you level up, and instead of "Yay, Firebolt now does more damage, according to your level," you'd get something like "Firebolt now has a chance to knock the opponent down." Or, even better (in isolation, admittedly), the Mass Effect ability-improvement tree approach in which you get to choose from a few different options. In ME's case, it was just a pair of options each time. It was pretty basic... I could see more than two, though. Maybe you can add armor penetration, or DOT burn damage, or increase the number of targets the spell can strike (half damage to each, but it's something you couldn't do with the spell before as it was only single-target, even if there were two very-low-health enemies standing around.) Anywho...

I didn't say how encouraging. Just... encouraging. As opposed to, say, even intern Steve who doesn't even play vidya games being able to beat them after half-an-hour at the test comp.

... NEVER... ... would I turn down such a request! 8D!

I second that question about staves. At the very least, it'd be cool if a staff were to a wand/scepter/rod as a greatsword/polearm is to a longsword/shortsword. Maybe better range and potency, versus weaker, faster attacks with the one-handed magical implement AND the ability to wield a shield? OR, mayhaps the staves all hold the active-use charges of spell-like effects, and the rods/scepters/wands are just weapons? *shrug*

I think an indie, Kickstarted MMO could be pretty interesting. The problem with MMOs is that no one wants to change the mold, at all. Oh sure, they fill it with different weapons, and lore, and races, etc. But, at the end of the day, they're always pretty much the same. Even stuff like Guild Wars 2, which throws out some pretty on-the-right-path ideas when in development, doesn't really actually break the mold much. You've got "dynamic" events (which have appeared in some form in various previous games) instead of just straight up quests -- which is a vast improvement over static, individual-instance quests. But then... what do they do? Just repeat themselves exactly, over and over. No advantage taken of the dynamicism at all. "Hey, maybe this event has a few factors, and the game actually roulettes through them whenever this event 'respawns.' Maybe this time, a merchant in a different place needs an escort through a different route (or different path through the same area), and has different goods with him, and different guards to help you out, etc. Maybe different enemies attack (instead of just the exact same bandits). But no. Same merchant, same schedule, same routes, same bandits, same everything, every time. Sure, it was more interesting than everyone just, somehow, all individually protecting the merchant, alone, one at a time, and they're more active quests, at least. But, jeez. At least SOMETHING could be mixed up to feel different. If there were just a way to simulate a dedicated team of GMs just sparking different specific scenarios out of common scenario components or something, that'd be pretty amazing. If different stuff was going on every time you played (even if sometimes very similar stuff, or repeat stuff eventually happened again), an MMO would actually be about what you're doing, and not the just about the reason you're doing it (to gain levels and gear and complete stuff so that you can be lvl XX and look uber.)

That would be such an amazingly fun manpower budgeting software solution! You input the specs on all your employees, and it builds them into Tetris shapes. If you can't clear the lines before your shape-ployees hit the top, then it's not gonna work.

But the Godlike are humanoid. In fact, I think all the races are humanoid. Even if you meant "very, very human-like," I believe the Godlike are variants of any race, like a sub-race. So, you could make a Human Godlike. Just for what that's worth (you're still free to wish to not do that.) I don't know that DEX, in this game, actually affects attack speed. I think just your base weapon speed, plus your armor detriment (heavier armor = slower action speed), plus maybe some bonuses from things like talents, skills, or specializations? That's your attack speed, that we know of. As far as I know, DEX will only grant you increased accuracy (and, consequently, fewer misses and grazes and more hits and criticals, overall.)

It's all semantics on the class differences outside of combat issue. Regardless of how it's represented (skills, abilities, simple class-based dialogue options, etc.), the point there is, it's nice to have unique distinctions between the classes, as represented by their ability to function in and interact with the world around them. It's just like combat. If a Wizard and Fighter just did the same things in combat, who would care which you chose? But they don't. A Wizard friggin' hurls magic around, and does lots of things the Fighter simply cannot do. "I want that circle to erupt in flames!" Too bad... you're not a Wizard. You can probably DAMAGE that circle of peeps with some physical attack, but you cannot, from a distance, cause it to erupt in flames. One part of that is the sheer fact that it's a unique distinction between the abilities of the two classes. The same goes for out-of-combat stuff. Now, obviously, you might have 100 Wizard spells for combat, and not have quite that variety of options for out-of-combat interactions and such. But, still. The principle is the same. If I'm a Wizard, it'd be REALLY nice to come upon some quest scenario involving a Grimoire, and get to go "Oh hey! I'm a Wizard! Guys, I USE grimoires!", and pick something spiffy that changes the way the scenario is able to be played out, as opposed to not having a Wizard in your group and just scratching your head, wondering what to do about this grimoire. Instead of "Oh, all the game's going to check is whether or not you've got 50 points in the Grimoires skill, which ANYONE can take, 8D!" That sort of thing. Also, a quick final note, regarding class's effect on dialogue... I don't think your class should just inherently dictate how you speak or what you talk about. Like... A Druid shouldn't just have all-Druid dialogue lines, while a Priest has all Priest ones. But, I definitely think that factors unique to your class should interact with the dialogue/event system and affect what options are available to you, whether or not they're implemented as 1-100, put-your-points-in-when-you-level-up skills. In another thread, I referenced Etiquettes from Shadowrun, because they're a very simple example of this. You either have an etiquette, or you don't, and it applies to a number of situations in different ways. It's like a knowledge skill, sort of, only you don't have more or fewer points in it. You can even stack that with stat checks. Want to talk your way into this Wizard society? Maybe you need the Wizard Class "etiquette" AND a Resolve of 13 or above. Basically, your unique class knowledge would unlock the sheer option in the first place, but wouldn't automatically make you succeed at it (it wouldn't just have to be a class check, then success or failure.) Your success or failure would still depend upon a relevant stat check.

Yeah, sorry about that. I was trying to point out that the powerful buffing being talked about was in-combat only. The reason being the trade-off, as opposed to just "I'll put 5 cool effects on me before we even start this fight," which would be super OP if that were allowed AND buffs were quite powerful (individually and potentially). I understand it sounds a bit stupid, at first... "glance." But, bear in mind, you're most likely thinking of a very specific, familiar buff system, just with pre-combat buffing ripped out of it. This entire spell system is designed with only-in-combat casting in mind for buffs. The buffs being generally more powerful, overall, is just one example of the types of adjustments that will be in place (from what we're used to, with pre-buffing) to compensate. It won't just be "Now I have to pull off the exact same strategies I did in IE games with buffs, but I can't start until combat starts." There will be a different dynamic going on with buffs. I can't say "YOU'LL ALL DEFINITELY LOVE THAT!", but I encourage people to see the potential, and hopefully it will be pleasing once people have tried it out. It's just really easy to hear about stuff like that, and intuitively imagine a lesser system than existing ones -- as if its the same system with a gap, or an extra restriction, and that's that. It's just because that's what human brains do when we're familiar with something and aren't familiar with all the nuances and differences of something new that's similar. The loss hits as more significant than unfamiliar, unspecified gains.

First of all, that's not "just how the industry works." That's how the industry tends to work. I have confidence in Obsidian's ability to know what the hell was in their contract and what wasn't, before just signing it and assuming. Those are the two possibilities. I think they make sure their promises are kept. They're VOLUNTARILY partnering with Paradox (unless you think they're lying), strictly because they believe paying Paradox (in whatever fashion they've deemed fit) to handle the publishing side of things is a much more efficient use of their time and resources than handling it themselves. And, again you keep referencing how "some of us" (ooooh, I wonder if I'm supposed to be in that group... So uncertain...) seem to believe Obsidian's mere existence makes everything peachy. No, I believe their voluntary efforts and cognitive functioning will probably (not "definitely") handle any major problems, such as (purely for example, and since you're so focused on it) "Hey, we wanted to make sure DRM-free versions went out just fine, but now, it seems we've been screwed over by our contract! What the hell?!" Maybe some other people believe they actually ride unicorns and fart rainbows? I have no idea. Take that up with other people. Stop diverting that uncertainty towards me. Just because I don't assume the worst doesn't mean I assume the best. I just don't assume. Secondly, I believe we have a disconnect here, as all the stuff I was saying before that "show me evidence" response to you was in direct response to Sharp_One's paranoia, which involved "They're really out of money and were forced to 'partner' with this publisher," etc. So, when you responded to my words regarding that with "Maybe some of us just don't adopt your sunshine and bunnies perspective," I figured, with the context I had, that you were defending Sharp_One's point. For what it's worth, your curiosity about the details of the agreement regarding DRM and digital distribution, etc., is quite valid. I have no qualms about that. So, unless you share Sharp_One's exact views, and really think Obsidian are lying to us to cover up what's somehow obviously really a worst-case scenario, the only dispute I really have with you, it seems, is that you seem to think I worship Obsidian. I apologize for the disconnect.

Agh. Bad Lephys! Bad! I completely missed your first post! So sorry about that, Khango! I'll get you situated.

Yeah, but, even if you "disable them" (quotes because I dunno if you really can... *shrug*) and "don't accept" them, the system's still gonna log that data whenever you connect to the net, anyway, right? So, I don't know that people's likely acceptance of something like simple game progress tracking that isn't pretending to be "achievements" is really an issue. Now, if there's actually a way to prevent them from tracking that statistical data, even with the current disguised-as-achievements way of doing things, then I suppose I stand corrected. I'm just curious about that. Because functionally, it seems unnecessary. Personally, I'd have no problem, whatsoever, with Steam telling me "your progress through games will be logged to collect anonymous game-completion statistical data." I wouldn't be like "OH NO YOU DON'T, STEAM! I don't want someone knowing that some nameless person played half their game every time I play half of a game! Next you'll ask for underpants samples!" . But, that's just me.

I think the key, as pointed out here, is to make sure the late-game/toughest optional stuff provides good enough reasons to do it in the event that you have reached the level cap and XP no longer functions as a reward. Earlier quests in the game can be heavily "90% of your reward is XP, and 10% is money or loot or something," but, the more likely it is you're going to complete something after you've capped, the more significant the non-XP reward needs to be for it.

In a sense, it's kind of redundant. Nothing dictates that either of two different spells are "better" than one another. If you have a Firebolt that just launches a fire-based projectile at one target and deals damage, then for a different spell you have Fireball, which launches a fire-based projectile that explodes, deals damage to an area (and maybe knocks people down from the explosive force?), then one is not inherently "better" than the other without specific values coming into play. If the Firebolt does 700 damage to one target, and the Fireball does 15 damage to a 20-foot radius and knocks people down, which one is better? So, it's rather arbitrary to say "The specific function of magic that throws a single fire projectile at a single target is inherently lower-level/weaker/worse than all other fire spells," because it's just an effect you can produce with fire magic. If, every so many levels, you gain "Firebolt II" and "Firebolt III," then that's serving the same function as scaling would. If you don't gain those upgrades, then it's a bit silly to become some legendary Wizard who's lived for 50 years now, and still have a Firebolt spell that you can only do 5 damage with, just because you now have Greater Firestorm that's a "better" fire spell. Why does the world assume that, if you're a powerful/accomplished Wizard, you NEVER ever again wish to just launch a single fire projectile at a single target? "Look, a lone bandit in the woods! GREATER FIRESTORM! Well... the forest is gone now, BUT, at least I got that bandit! Firebolt only would've done like 10% of his health, but luckily I had learned this other, completely differently functioning spell!" A child with a hammer is going to strike more weakly with it. But, after 5 years of growth and training and strength-building, he doesn't need a whole new hammer to hit harder with.

I can't say I blame Valorian for his comment. I mean... Strength Might've been back. @Josh: I'm not going to ask for any kind of quantity of instances ("how much of this will we see?"-type question), but... could you possibly provide an example of the types of things that warrant class/race checks in your design? I'm particularly interested in any and all more active choices pertaining to these (mainly class, in that case), such as the option to "*commune with the beast, because you're a Druid*" or something? I can easily see a lot of reactionary effects (reputation effects and/or mood of the NPC) being more passively prompted by class/race/culture. So, I'm just curious about active options -- things you can do or say (because of unique knowledge/experience) because of your class or similar factors specific to a given character. Basically... how will we see non-"universal" factors at work?

I don't mean to. Stun's deceptive. At first, it REALLY seems like he's just trying to discuss things. He starts out all reasonable. Then, he focuses so hard on some word that maybe would've been clearer if it had been another word, and instead of just saying "This seems to mean this, and that seems nonsensical. Is that what you meant to convey?", he just argues in such a way that I have NO idea what isn't making sense to him, but the more I elaborate, the more things he picks out until I don't even know how to give directions to get back to the main road from where we are. We're like... teetered on a boulder in the desert, on the edge of a cliff, with no road in sight. It's a very gradual process. I never see it coming until it's already devolved so far, because I just am weird. I honestly don't think "just ignore Stun all the time" is a good way to go, because he's got a lot of good stuff to say. *shrug* I'm with you on that. Alas, THIS... ... is quite encouraging in that regard.

You know... that'd be a REALLY good basic background system: Select your race, THEN select the culture you were raised in. I mean... I guess some sub-races would work with any culture? But then, some might not. *Shrug*. I dunno. Depends on how much of the sub-cultures is genetic, and how much is not. I mean, if the Boreal Dwarves develop the complexion/build/etc. that they do because of where they live and the diet they consume, etc., as they're growing up, then being born to Boreal Dwarf parents, in the Ocean Human lands wouldn't really result in your being a Boreal Dwarf -- you wouldn't really be Boreal unless you LIVED and developed in that culture... But... An Orlan raised by foster parents in the Ocean human sub-culture? Sweeeet! Your chosen culture could function sort of (the key words being "sort of") like Etiquettes in Shadowrun. Almost like an abstracted set of various knowledges specific to that culture (knowledge of the mannerisms of that culture, how to act and speak as one from within that cultural group, etc.). 8D!

Methinks that last "class" was meant to be "skill." Mostly obvious, but that sentence actually works as-is to describe possible multi-classing, so I just wanted to point out the error so that no one got the wrong idea (since there is no multi-classing.) Ehh, I think MOST of it is? But, I'm sure (okay... 99.9% sure -- I couldn't give you a direct quote from a dev guaranteeing it) there will be class-affiliated checks, in relation to the lore of the classes. Either that, or there may even be knowledge skills or something that only certain classes gain access to, etc. Well, for example, if you're handling a quest situation, and there's some glowing "activated" grimoire on a pedestal or something, going haywire or whatnot, then I don't think your Ranger is just going to saunter up to it and figure out what to do with it. I mean, maybe you can just destroy it, in an act of desperation? But, maybe that stops the badness (this is a vague example, I'm sorry), but you don't really understand the nature of it. If it was plaguing some nearby village or altering people or something, you don't know how to fix it. You stopped it from continuing to happen, but you can't really undo any persistent effects. BUT, maybe if you had a Wizard in your party, he could've actually interacted with the grimoire, as Wizards do, and at least gleaned some information from what it was doing before having to destroy it. Maybe even deactivated it safely, leaving it intact, allowing even more options in dealing with the remainder of the situation from that point on. *shrug* I'm pretty sure they talked about there definitely being racial/class effects on dialogue and options (checks) and such, but, again, I can't really find a quote that guarantees that, at the moment. Or exactly how it'll work (reputation alterations, dice-roll-style checks, etc.). I'd kinda like it, personally, if they went the slightly more complex route: having something like a small list of class-specific knowledge/lore skills or something, instead of just "check -- class. Wizard? Awesome, you automatically succeed at anything in this game that's looking for a Wizard." Or, heck, even checks to Talents or abilities/spells. "Oh, you know the spell Poison Cloud? Then the game lets you succeed in knowing something about this Wizard-magic-based toxin that's in this area." Etc. That'd be pretty cool. I'll easily live with a simple class check, though.

My god! A company... taking a risk?! You don't say! I thought all companies had crystal balls that told them what the future would bring. That's why no company has ever gone out of business or anything, right? It seems I was mistaken. Your conspiracy theory is PERFECTLY rational: Since Paradox would be out all the costs of the service they're providing Obsidian for PoE if PoE didn't make a lot of money, then it clearly follows that everyone is lying to us and Paradox now owns Obsidian's soul, as well as the souls of all us backers. Also, it PROVES that Obsidian ran out of Kickstarter money, and HAD to hit up Paradox for some money. Excellent work, detective.