Lephys

Maybe I'm weird (Okay, I'm definitely weird...), but that rocky/barren screenshot is possibly one of the most glorious I've seen so far. Really though, all of the environments are looking SPECTACULAR.

Not that it would completely take the place of the entire basis of firearms' existence in the P:E world, but they could always throw in some facet akin to "casters" in Outlaw Star.

No no, I understand. To put it simply, the thing about buff-type things is to use them sparingly, much like seasoning (good example). I'm only trying to encourage thinking regarding the possibility that there are methods by which to allow food to be a factor without oversalting the pizza, so to speak. Look at stances. The ones that bestow some kind of benefit and detriment, and are not resource dependent, or duration-based. They are simply mutually exclusive. You can activate a different one, but only by DE-activating the current one. You could use none, I suppose, but the system is basically designed to assume that you're going to use one of the given options at any given time. They aren't really a "bonus," so much as a "difference," because "stanceless" isn't the norm. The norm is simply a stance, whichever one you want to use. Then, you have restrictions on swapping, so you can't just insta-juggle them to get whatever different factor values you want at any specific moment. So, the decision of WHICH stance to use is somewhat preparatory, but it's hardly a pre-buff. It's not a temporary thing that you always need to set just before going into battle for maximum effect. Yet, you might need to make the significant choice of CHANGING it before engaging a certain group of enemies. Same with weapon types. You might need to whip out your crushing weapons (for example) for maximum effectiveness against a particularly tough group of foes with a high resistance to most other stuff. The thing with food is, I don't think it would be the end of the world if you did have some kind of long-term duration on them. But, that would really depend upon the distance between rest points and such, so I can't even begin to decide whether or not there should be a duration, or how long it should be. But, does that make sense? Food could (the key word here) offer a variety of bonuses that the typical stronghold/inn-resting wouldn't. I mean, food isn't going to tread on the hedgemaze's territory by boosting your Stealth. "This sweetroll makes my footfalls quieter! 8D!" So, yeah. I don't think it's some kind of automatic oversalting, just the sheer possibility of food being in and granting "bonuses." You could have findable food be rarer/expensive or whatever, with some form of cooking/survival/other skill offering you a greater variety of options more often, rather than just downright "better and better" bonuses. Interesting bonuses. It's just a possibility. Just as the addition of food overdoing things is. I simply acknowledge both, and choose to explore the former as much as I can before ruling it out, rather than exploring ways in which it could be ruled out. To me, ways in which it could be ruled out are simply ways in which NOT to do the mechanic, not reasons why it shouldn't be attempted.

I don't think there's any threat to the existence of... I'll say mystery, because "ambiguity" just sounds so much like murkiness in communication, which isn't really what we're going for, I don't think. The toggle Josh was talking about seems to only affect the actual communication of the objective in summation from the quest text -- whatever that objective may be. The objective could have just as easily been "Find out what happened to Sammy." In which case, what info do you have, other than Sammy's name and the fact that someone doesn't know where he is but wishes to know this? I don't think the "tell me the objective so I don't have to reread the quest text/journal entry" is going to take "My nephew, Sammy... he was supposed to have returned from Helmsington Abbey 3 days ago. I noticed you were leaving with master Nephan and his caravan, and I know his route takes him that direction. If it's not too much trouble, could you find out whatever you can about Sammy?", and post "Defeat the Crimson Bandit Leader who's secretly holding Sammy in the tower east of the old bridge in a cave past some bears, and free Sammy" as your objective. Basically, if there's mystery there, then the objective will simply clearly state the mystery. If there's a very specific thing you know you're supposed to do, then it'll state that. It's only going to tell you what your character already actually knows. It's just a matter of whether or not you want it summarized in a gamey fashion, or left in its original form in the journal only.

EDIT: I've said my bit, and clarified things, and you either believe me or arbitrarily label me a liar. I'll not waste my time "discussing" with you if you're going to ignore my very words and meanings.

^ To be clear, I don't think you should ever obfuscate how the game works (mechanically); only specific information within that system of mechanics. In other words, you should always know the relationship between Deflection and Attack/Accuracy, but you may not know what a given foe's Deflection value is until you find out. I don't think you were meaning "obfuscate the actual mechanics" when you said you have to figure out how the game works. And, well, it's a bit different in Demon's Souls/Dark Souls. More like a puzzle. Which is fine. I don't mean that that's wrong, inherently, as a method of design. But, I don't think that would work in a game like P:E. Especially since the game isn't intending to be built around such a thing.

True. In a way, I'd almost rather it be purely one way or the other: either let me assign ALL points and levelings-up as if it were my own, hand-made PC (so that the only things you can't change about your companions are their personality, appearance [save for equipment and coloring/dye], class, and maybe starting equipment), OR just make up a "this is how that person would advance" and let me pretend that it's just beyond my control, and it's naturally happening according to that character's focus and desires (as if they were a real person). Of course, if it's blatantly ridiculous, I'll probably still get a little upset. "Yay, my Fighter leveled up again... and took a point of Proficiency with thrown fruit rather than his Longsword... yet again... *facepalm*". Anywho... yeah, I mean, the fewer actual feasible options there are, the more becomes a "compare and contrast, then choose," no matter what everyone's intentions. It's a tricky thing with almost any design choice, and I sympathize with developers.

I wasn't aware that things were only true because kings mandated them. I've slammed no one down. And your idea of what the game will be like is exactly as absolutely non-existent as mine. Which is exactly the point. You're inadvertently opposing my point with my own point, because you're under the illusion that I'm against discussion and speculation, even though I specifically emphasized that this was not the case. Again, you and I are talking about completely different "they"s. I'm not referring to everyone or no one here. Some people are not only complaining about speculations, but they're spreading the speculations as truth in various threads whenever newcomers or people who've missed little details come asking about them. Which is even worse, because "this game MIGHT do this" and "this game IS DEFINITELY going to do this" are two different things to hear when you're wondering whether or not you should bother to follow/invest in a given in-development game. Such things are in no way constructive. I never said they shouldn't be allowed to be posted. But they are not actually aiding any kind of discussion or collective understanding or exploration of anything. If anything, assuming a mere possibility is definite serves to cease the exploration of further possibilities. Also, for what it's worth, you're the second person to defend yourself from what was neither an attack nor directed at you.

That's rather interesting, actually. But, it is sort of a clunky functional equivalent to "the AI leveled them." I mean, the "AI" isn't actually thinking and pondering, then spending their points when they level. It's simply saying "Oh, they're joining your party? They should be level X, because. And they should have their points allocated thusly, because." Whether that's because it allocated the points one at a time, or just set them to values from a sheet, the sigh-inducing effect is the same: The player had no say in their allocation.

It's highly possible that the "we" to which you're referring is not the same "they" to which I'm referring. If you're not being irrational, then I'm not calling you out when I call out irrational complaints. Being irrationally against something is no worse than being irrationally in favor of the very same thing. If someone said "The game will be really good because we'll get to fly rainbow pegasi, and that's why I backed the game! 8D!", then I'm not going to just say nothing to them just because they like the game's design and I like the game's design. Why? Because we don't know that we're going to get to fly rainbow pegasi, so that's not a valid basis for liking the game's design. Speculating? Fine. Speculating, then complaining about the speculation as if it's the actual finalized design? Not fine. Some people are doing that, and it's pretty pointless. If you aren't doing that, then go you! 8D

Just for that, if we both survive a nuclear apocalypse, I'm never sharing a single bottlecap with you, u_u.

I know - but as long as we're having options - why not allow the obfuscation of dice-rolls too? This was my thought exactly. If you can't see the targets, there's not much point in seeing the attempts quantified. "I missed. I have no idea if by an inch or a mile, but I missed. I keep missing... am I just getting crappy rolls? Maybe his defense is way too high. I'll try this fight about 5 more times, then assume something." I'm not bashing the idea of obfuscating it all, but, I'm just saying that there's no point in obfuscating only part of it, if you're going to do so. Go big for go home, That would be a pretty cool game mode, actually. The player's knowledge would be much closer to the characters' knowledge. Come upon some bandits, with certain equipment, etc. and it's going to be a bit of guesswork. "That guy looks like he's moving about in quite an agile fashion, so I probably shouldn't try hitting him with AOE spells." You try some stuff, and figure out relative difficulties in doing certain things to certain targets. Then, you come upon some of those same bandits later (same order or whatever... faction... so you can assume they're similarly trained), and you know "Ahh, that guy is one of those knife-thrower guys. He's going to be fast, but doesn't have very good deflection defense. THAT guy, on the other hand, should probably be taken down with spells." You're more seasoned now because of actual experience, so you fare far better. "Yep, I'm hitting this guy consistently now, and even critting a good bit." Like I said, I'd never force that upon people as a default, and I rather enjoy seeing all the numbers. BUT, also, that could be a really fun way to play.

I think it's kind of like... your soul is a battery. And electricity is the result of a connection to a deity. So, the deity allows your soul to become charged with electricity. But then, you do what you wish with that electricity (coming from within YOU, from your battery, and not from the sky or heaven.) In other words, your powers aren't your ability to somehow summon lightning or fury straight from a deity. You are directly generating and aiming the power. But, if not for the connection to a deity, you wouldn't have a source of electricity with which to charge your own battery. So, whatever machine you decide to shape and operate using that electricity is up to you, in other words. The deity doesn't bestow upon you a copy machine, and say "YOU SHALL ONLY PRODUCE PAPER COPIES OF THINGS WITH YOUR POWER!". The deity just gives you the electricity, and then you build your own machines and use it to your own end (probably influenced, at least, by the properties and such of your deity, or you wouldn't be much of a priest, now would you? "I dedicate my life to the deity of protection! SO NOW I'LL JUST USE WRECKLESS EXPLOSIONS AND FIRE AS ALL MY SPELLS! MUAHAHAHAHA!") I may not have it pegged perfectly, but I think it's something similar. I mean... if the priests powers/energy had absolutely NOTHING to do with the connection to the deity, then all other classes would simply have the ability to do all the same things WITHOUT being priests or worshipping any deities, but would simply choose not to. So, at the very least, even if it's not something that's actually allowed by the deity (the metaphorical flow of electricity into the priest's soul battery), then it's something that doesn't happen without channeling all your soul potential into a connection with a deity. Kind of like forging your soul into a weapon, instead of some armor, or a brazier. You have fire and metal, but you have to pick the mold. You can't make an armor-sword-brazier. So, forging holy powers out of raw soul "ore" requires deity connection. Heck, maybe some deity is all "Agh... THAT guy is using his abilities in MY name? I HATE that guy! How DARE he!", and actively tries to smite that priest to stop him from using said deity to beget his own priestly powers. *shrug* Which... is kinda all what you already touched on, Nemir. Sorry. I was just kind of analyzing "out loud." 8P I agree with you in that the nature of a Priest's powers (as opposed to some other class's powers) MUST rest upon a connection with a deity, in whatever fashion. Regardless of whether or not the deity actually bestows/generates the powers/energy or not.

Other games at least afford you the opportunity to spend the points. Which I think is a good way to go about it, I think. Of course, I don't think they should be blank slates. Maybe you only get to spend points from their Level 3 or 4 on, or something. If the AI or whathaveyou didn't spend ANY of the points, then they wouldn't really be the companions they were supposed to be. "The whole story keeps talking about this guy being really stealthy, but he has 1 stealth because I never put any points into it! HAH!" Unless the game could react to your point spenditures... But I doubt that, . Besides, that kinda makes a conflict between the purpose of the Adventurer's Hall, and the more-pre-tailored-properties style of the companions. Anywho, I agree about leveling in the background and having the AI spend all the points like an idiot being a terrible thing.

Biggest problem for me was having played for like an hour and 15 minutes, and needing to stop, pack up my laptop, and go somewhere, but not being able to save for the next 20 minutes (I'm a slowpoke when it comes to turn-based combat *points to avatar <<<<<<*, ). That's the reason I can't really advocate limiting saving. Especially if the reason for it is to somehow deter or "prevent" you from reloading to alter the results of a given snippet of gameplay choices/happenings. That's like punching everyone who walks into a store in the face, and saying "Well, anyone who walked in and was thinking about stealing something will now think twice about it." The only reason for limiting saving is to deter people from doing what they could simply not-do in the first place, and what they could STILL do in a much more annoyed mood with limited save points.

it was a big relief to me when I found out I could do it in the Commandos games. But then, it was rather essential for solving the encounters there. I had absolutely no idea! Of course, I only played the first one.

*shrug*... What I see is a lot of "possibly"s arbitrarily replaced with "probably"s. It's not that people are saying it's DEFINITELY going to suck... it's that they're saying it's PROBABLY going to suck, for reasons unknown. Example: No kill XP. Suddenly, the simple fact that they're awarding XP in a different fashion generates an uproar about combat never giving you XP. Even though, no one ever said that killing will explicitly NOT ever grant you XP. Just that the act of slaying won't inherently be an XP-worthy thing, with a simple adjustment to the amount of XP for whatever it was you killed. And, instead of saying "Okay, I just wish we still got XP for each kill, that's all. It's a preference thing, and therefore I am unhappy," oodles of folk still have their torches and pitchforks out and will adamantly defend their ire at the "fact" that they won't be receiving XP for any kills anymore. People would rather find a reason to hang on to the torches and pitchforks than put them down and admit over-reaction. Then, of course, the even easier thing to do at that point is simply to pretend anyone pointing out reasons why they're overreacting just likes the change and doesn't like the way THEY (the overreacters) want it to be. That's what's bothersome. Not disagreement, or displeasure. But irrationality. Pointing out potential problems before the game is out is one thing. Bashing the game for "definite" problems that we don't even know exist is another, entirely.

Is Sammys situation so clear-cut? To deal with Sammy you could tell him to move to a different town and never show his face here again. This might suffice for Frank or it might not. Well, "Kill Sammy the Idiot" is merely the objective as communicated to you by Frank. I would assume it's not some kind of restriction on what you can do in relation to the situation. I certainly hope not, and have no reason to believe that's the case based on the team's expressed intentions with the game's design. I think whether or not simply getting rid of Sammy (without actually killing him) would suffice for Frank is more a question of "Can you then convince Frank that you killed him and/or prevent him from finding out that Sammy still lives?" Which is kind of the nature of the depth of scenario we want out of these games, . It's more like a PnP campaign. There's stuff, and you can interact with and influence things, but you can only control so much, and the situation plays out according to all the factors: those you don't control notwithstanding. Maybe convincing Frank involves lying. Or maybe he wants to see the body, and you persuade him to trust you by taking advantage of your expertise in that area and his personality. Maybe you convince someone else that he trusts more than he trusts you, to go in on it to help Sammy and tell Frank that they saw Sammy dead. Maybe you lack the capacity to convince him and/or generate the result of Frank being appeased by what actually happened (or, at the very least, what he thinks happened), and you must now deal with his wrath. Maybe there's some sub-branch of the plot that involves "forging" Sammy's corpse to show to Frank (maybe dependent upon previous contacts/connections and/or skills and resources at your disposal, etc.). That's the beauty of a good RPG. Frank wants you to kill Sammy. What do you do with this information? Then, what happens based on what you choose to do, and what do you THEN do in reaction to that? And, alas, a story is woven. How about we just found the Association for Arcanum Ambivalence?

Again you could view almost anything that conditionally provides a bonus in exactly the same light, if you wanted to. Armor. The only time you will ever have fun with the extra DT "buff" is when you proudly buy the armor to get it. After that, it's just something you incidentally have whenever wearing that armor. The only difference is that it doesn't wear off at any point. But, you might find better armor, though, or "need" better armor for some tough fight. The moment you actively leave that fight to go back to town to buy new armor just to have the benefit of bonus DT protection, it becomes tedious. Resting. It "buffs" your spell ammo. So, maybe you run back to that rest location to have 10 spells instead of 9 at your disposal, for that really tough fight. Tedium. See... you're looking at the only possibly dynamic of this as being your active use of the stronghold resting bonuses because you NEED them. You don't NEED a training yard at a stronghold, but you can buy one, and then you get a bonus. You don't NEED mithril plate instead of steel plate, but you can buy it, and then you get a bonus. You don't NEED any specific Talent you can take from a given list of options (all of which you cannot have, because you only have so many total points with which to choose), but you can take any one of them, and you get that bonus. I'm sorry you're so negative about it, as well. But, it's your choice. You can feel like these types of things are all terrible decisions and they can't ever be good things, if you'd like. I had just hoped to at least convince you of the possibility of doing them better than we've seen, and of how the inherent qualities of their sheer existence do not make them bad. So you wouldn't have to feel so negative every time you thought of things that are already in the game, even, like the stronghold resting bonuses. If we disagree, we disagree. But a possibility is a possibility, whether it's my preference to focus on it or not.

Agreed. That's the sort of thing that makes for a good option. Doesn't really affect the functionality of the game. Either way, you have to find Sammy the Idiot to complete the objective. It's a simple matter of whether or not you'd like the interface to summarily pluck that objective out of the rest of the text or not. It's almost like toggling auto-correct or something. That, and the system-y dialogue info you can toggle (that will be off by default in Expert Mode). Again... it's not changing the function, either way. If something's checking Intellect, it's checking Intellect. Do you want to KNOW that, or figure it out? Either way, it's happening. It's stuff like "I want to be able to toggle on location indicators for things I'm supposed to have to find" that's a terrible option. Might as well toggle combat auto-victory or something. That's toggling the requirement of effort, essentially. Which is pretty much the nature of cheats. "I don't WANT to manage my health and be able to die... *GOD MODE*" Even difficulty adjustments don't give you additional tools. They take something that already existed/happened (such as enemy damage), and adjust it to make that factor less apt to end you as quickly/easily, thus making your overcoming of it easier. They don't just negate the game's design aspects. Anywho... I digress. Quite often we see a "Why not just make it an option?" on here, anytime there's dissent amongst the populous regarding how a certain thing should be designed, and I just though this made a really good example of what IS appropriate to be made an option. 8P

I hear ya. I'm also not very fond of edge-scrolling. Which is weird, 'cause I used to do it all the time (and be fine with it) in all the old, old strategy games. Then one day, I discovered things like right-click-drag scrolling (a la Black and White 2), and arrow-key (or W A S D) scrolling. And wow... SO convenient and intuitive. You're mainly interacting with things with the mouse, so either a mouse function allows to move the whole field of view instead of just the cursor OR the keyboard (which you've most likely already got your other hand situated upon) can perform that function while your mouse is free to interact to its heart's content.

Crap! What have I DONE?! Next I'll say "elder" or some- *claps hands over mouth* O_O I'm doomed! Wait, I didn't say "the" yet... -______-.......

I'm not even sure there's really anything that makes it "harder." Just more troublesome, really. So, when you do that, no one says "thanks for deterring that action! 8D!", but instead, "OMG, why did you allow me to do this still, but make it a HUGE CHORE now?!" For example, set save points. Some people will still just re-load the game, and play back through those 15 minutes of gameplay to get back to the point where they wish to change their dialogue choice. Plus, for people who aren't even trying to save-scum and can already control themselves, they play for 14 minutes, then die. Boom. Gotta re-do all that. Why? So that other people will have a tough time of save-scumming. It's like lowering the speed limit because you hate it when people speed. Well, great, now the speeders are STILL going to speed (they'll just get worse tickets for it), and the law-abiders are going to get everywhere twice as slow. Everyone hates you, and nothing has changed. So, *shrug*. Maybe they could put in a mode similar to Iron-Man, but in which you are simply restricted to one save file that doesn't esplode when you die? I don't think that's any kind of obligation, but then there'd be an option. Of course, you could simply say "that non-one-save-only mode option was like free chocolate... I couldn't resist." Always restrict game saving. "That mod that someone made was SO easy to download and install! It's like free chocolate!" People. Something's either possible, and you want to do it badly enough that you do it, or it's impossible, and you don't do it regardless of any amount of desire. Such is life.

I just still see that as a bit of a narrow-minded view of a bunch of stuff generalized into "pre-buffs." I mean, resting at the stronghold is going to "buff" you. But, it only does so after resting at the stronghold, and only according to what you've put your money into there. It's not a pre-buff, because you can't go rest at your stronghold before every single thing you do. You can do it whenever you get the chance to return to your stronghold, but then, you're going to be resting anyway (for the healths), so it's not as if it's just something to do to get a buff. It's getting an added bonus when you do rest, which you will have to. When you rest at the stronghold, that is. Pre-buffing is so bad when it's completely managed by the player, 24/7. You never DON'T want to have that extra Stoneskin AC, or extra weapon damage or accuracy, etc., so you actively prep your party to its maximum every time you're going to go into battle, (if you can, and in a lot of other games, you can). But, if food is linked to your rest cycle, then you can't simply stop and eat a snack to get some bonuses. Therefore, again, it's a conditional bonus. If darkness lowers stealth checks, then you could conceivably wait until darkness every single time you needed to perform some kind of stealthy task, and then consider the sheer condition of darkness to be providing a pre-buff. Would that mean that darkness affecting stealth is a horrible idea? I don't think so. You could even have a timer on food usage (depending on how resting is handled -- if resting automatically passes 8 hours or something, then that would be moot, since food would be linked to resting, and resting would already progress time sufficiently). If you just rest for an hour or so, then you wouldn't actually get to eat food every single time you rested, so it would be an even more gradual bonus, but one repeatedly utilized throughout the game nonetheless. Got someone with excellent Survival skill? You have much greater chances of finding quite-beneficial plants/meats and such when you DO sit down to eat during a rest, so you get access to more different types of food bonuses when you do occasionally rest after a certain amount of time has passed since your last meal. Again, all abstracted away and handled automatically. The only thing you choose is what to eat (out of what's available -- also dependent upon choices) when your party is hungry and rests. So, it would simply be another layer. And you could have some rather interesting effects of foods. Maybe one improves move speed slightly for the next few hours. Thus affecting the positioning aspect of combat. Maybe you know there are going to be speedy creatures in the region you're about to traipse through, so you eat that food. OR, maybe you go with some other bonus that you have, because why not? You're the one coming up with your strategy. Nothing says speed is the single best answer to faster enemies. *shrug*. It's just an example. There are numerous, numerous ways of doing it. All of the above details can be tweaked and altered. It's not about the specific results, but the idea, and what kind of layer that COULD add to the system. I don't know everything there is to know about everything else in the system, so I can't say "this would be the greatest addition to the game, ever, DEFINITELY!", but nor can I rightly say "this would definitely just be lame pre-buffs, and would make the game worse." I'd much rather hear your breakdown of why my examples would be problematic in nature, and why you can't come up with any ways around that, than just how much pre-buffs in other games tend to be lame, and how that's one potentiality for some kind of rest-meal implementation in P:E.

The game's only job is to not encourage it, not to somehow prevent it. It's software. You're not going to prevent someone from doing what they want with it. If they get it, then use the game disc as a coaster instead of ever installing or playing it, no one's preventing that, either.