Lephys

Waterd... your argument is inherently flawed. According to your line of reasoning, the optimal way to play would be to pause with infinite frequency. However: A) The characters on the battlefield can't even act often enough to warrant consta-pausing, really (Sure, SOMEtimes you may need to pause to react to some things in quick succession, but, other times, nothing worth a calculated reaction may occur for 5+ seconds at a time.) B) You're leaving out factors of optimization (as others have already touched on). The actual optimal way to play would include familiarizing yourself enough with the game and mechanics, enemies, attacks, etc., such that your need to pause in order to keep up with optimal command delivery would be significantly reduced. What you're saying is a bit like saying "The optimal way to drive is to go as slow as humanly possible, so that you can always react to everything." However, the optimal way to drive includes reaching your destination on-time, as well as not-causing disruptions in the flow of much-faster-traffic all around you by being all-but-stopped on the other side of a hill. Besides... how would you even solve this "problem" with pausing? Just make it real time without pause? "Need to use the restroom? NO PAUSING FOR YOU! Did your child just spill something in the kitchen? TOO BAD!"

The key word is "slightly." I think the short version is that seeking perfect balance is futile, and often leads to unintended fun loss. Seeking balance, however, is fine, in moderation. But, I have to shake my head in disbelief when someone uses this argument, wrongly, to back up such things as "don't worry... I know this class is lame right now, but in like 5 more levels, it'll be really fun!" If the goal is fun, then I don't understand how fun loss up front should be endured in favor of bonus fun later, while trying to distribute the fun more evenly is somehow a fool' errand.

What if the Fighter built up some kind of resource, from doing generally fighty things? Then, "spent" that resource to either produce more offensive or more defensive (or even more support-related) effects with his abilities? I know that's really general, but I'm just curious if maybe such a mechanic would make it easier for the Fighter to still be a stout/hardy "defender" while not still just being a meatshield. Also, maybe (alternatively, OR in conjunction with this mechanic) some type of combo system would work well? The Chanter already has this, so it wouldn't be some completely unique/isolated new design to tackle. Maybe you just have several different ability types. Something pretty clear-cut, and you have different effects for the following ability (within 3 seconds or something?) depending on the specific ability types used. I really think something like that could be applied to the Rogue, as well (even more easily, probably, since the Rogue already functions on a conditional ability based on the number of Afflictions present), to make it more versatile in what it does. Instead of simply "Sneak Attack procs and you do more damage," a handful of effects could be introduced, depending on the types of afflictions present. Or, maybe some other "triggers" that actively produce an affect based on the afflictions present. You could have an active-use attack that boosts a particular affliction, for example. The enemy's bleeding? Maximize that bleed. That sort of thing. Instead of just "keep afflictions on them to keep proc-ing the same effect to keep doing maximum damage." It's interesting how dynamically the conditions for Sneak Attack can be met, but the result seems to be strangely monotonous. It kinda feels like the Rogue just gets an intermittent buff. *shrug*. Just me thoughts.

@IRMA: Could you kindly explain how proper quest staggering is somehow directly affiliated with the freedom to decline quests? I'm not understanding how what you're against has anything to do with Sawyer's opinions.

^ SYNERGY! 8D

If it would help minimize bug potential, seems to me that just a global "you're still stealthed or you aren't" status would be fine. Or, in other words, it would be great if the Rogue (for example) could still be unseen while the rest of your party is seen, but it's also fine if Foe A spots your Rogue, and Foe B automatically knows where he is, too. Well, not so much knows where he is... but... Basically, being detected by anyone could toggle you out of "stealth" status, and I'd be fine with that, if it means gaining the tactical repertoire of individually-stealthed characters. I think it's a happy medium.

If you can manage to create Jake the dog and Finn the human, perhaps then they will not charge you for their services. Adventuring would be its own reward. It's actually just a prestigious hallway within the inns.

Regarding Perception... what if it were changed to simply pit your Interrupt-causing value against the foe's Concentration, independent of Accuracy/attack resolution? I mean, if what you're interrupting is concentration, it's possible to miss someone but still "shake" them, right? *shrug* Might make Perception more potent/worthwhile.

Sure it does (change anything). You could change absolutely nothing about Might and still have a mage not hit for crap damage with melee. I'd say that's a significant fact, rather than an irrelevant one. I don't understand why it's fine for all the inherent class factors to handle the Fighter's melee potential, then expect a single attribute to be solely responsible for handling a Wizard's melee potential. The stat works exactly the same for both classes, so it can hardly be the stat's fault that some discrepancy exists.

That's borderline "all spells that hurt things are just a source of damage." I mean, how many specific spell effect variances is it feasible to ignore, just because of the similarities? I don't think it's fair to say "I don't really care about nuanced tactics, so these spells are essentially the same, but magnitudes of one another."

For what it's worth, Valorian is simply questioning if their relative uselessness actually holds true only within the group "ranged offensive attack options," or if it holds true out of all available attack options. I think it's a fair consideration. It's not simply "defending bows," and he's not just saying "obviously they're fine" or anything. It just looks like the vast majority of in-depth analysis presented has been between bows and other ranged options. It's not unreasonable to seek out further in-depth comparison between bows and non-ranged options. What we don't want to happen is to prematurely deduce that bows need an upgrade, upgrade them, then run into "Okay, bows and arbalests and guns are cool now, but now all melee weapons suck. There's no reason not to use ranged weapons." Also, I don't know how much trouble this would be, but it seems like some sort of arena, or just a test area within the current beta-build maps, with a little menagerie of combat encounters set up ("Here's a group of low-armor foes. Here's a group of medium-armor foes. Here's a group of high-armor foes. Here's a group of high-deflection foes... low-deflection foes..." etc.) would probably be extremely beneficial in gathering this sort of data. *shrug*

Well, functionally, that's exactly no different from the point limitations in the first place. Besides, unless you have lower-than-average scores start costing fractions of a point, you're still not addressing the issue of dumping stats. In a way (the key words here being "in a way," ), this would actually encourage dumping stats. Because, that stat you already were okay with being 7 could easily just go down to 4, so that you can put another 2 points into Stat X to get it up to 18, since you now need FOUR points instead of TWO to get that same score.

Just because I'm not giving you something you, specifically, can follow and comprehend, doesn't mean I'm not giving you anything of substance. That is not an insult. Minds think differently. But, I don't understand in the slightest what it is you expect me to do, other than "throw up my hands" when you disregard my entire thought process as irrelevant or pointless, simply because you don't intuitively grasp my perspective. It's downright preposterous. If there's an issue with what I've said, point it out, and how/why it's an issue. If you can't do that, what kind of response do you expect? "I have no idea what your point is, but it's wrong because of reasons..."? Also, I think you too often assume my posts are directly attempting to refute someone or something. The vast majority of what I share in discussions is simply food for thought, which is what the vast majority of discussions should be. I don't know if it's the ambiguous tone of internet text, and/or the way in which I specifically word things, or what. But, people get awfully defensive, for no reason that I can come up with. I'm not an enemy. I'm just a collaborator in a discussion.

It's not my sole responsibility to do this. I'm working at it, along with everyone else in this thread (and many others) who's not unreasonably focused on protesting general design evaluations. "Like what?"? Well, I can't answer that, because it'd be shunned as a --*gasp*-- generality! Tell you what... I won't reply again until I have the EXACT formula to fix everything, all by myself. You're welcome,

That might suffice. If not, some kind of selection-circle link would be nice. It's not like the link visuals would ever span the whole battlefield or anything (we're talking melee engagement here), so I don't even worry about that sort of thing becoming intrusive. But, I think having definitive visual connections between both entities might be the best way to go. Especially if you ever get a big clusterfest going on (which I've done a few times now in the beta). I fear that an arrow may lead to "wait, am I engaged with Orc A, or Orc B who's standing directly behind him?! They're both attacking me!" Especially with the whole "I've got a spear/polearm and can engage you from behind this other guy" mechanic. *shrug*

Oh noes! *begins casting Remedy*

It's really down to definitions here. If, for example, kiting simply isn't effective the majority of the time, (just for example), is that the developer trying to control the player's decision making process? I mean, what if your playstyle is to just run at things and hit them without a care in the world for armor values/damage types, etc? Wouldn't you just be out of luck? Or does the game need to accommodate you, sheerly on your desire for something to work as opposed to not-working? I guess what I'm asking is, what draws the line between something simply being outside the boundaries of the game's "field" of play, and something being a wrongfully-closed-off playstyle?

Yes, I have. I have not completed it, yet, but I have played it a bit. Not that this matters to your superiority complex, or anything, since now you'll simply say that, since you've played it more than I have, I somehow lack the privilege of commenting on game design concepts in general. And, from my personal experience, I start with like 1500cp, and I want my Wizard to use a Rapier. Well, the local weapon shop sells weapons for about 4000-5000cp (if not more). Thus, the very first combat I engaged in got me not only loot I could sell, but some stuff I could actually use in my current party. Is that concrete enough for you? Also, ("ABSTRACTION" ALERT, HIRO!) any of these things could be tweaked before release. Not only that, but, in the beta, we're not even starting at the beginning of the game. So, loot could be made more valuable, more frequent, etc. Foe locations could be changed up. Foe numbers could be changed up. Objective XP could be distributed more pervasively. There are all kinds of things that could occur for the final game to not end up exactly like the current beta build does, or for things like "I don't even need any loot at all" to not even end up being true. Also also, there doesn't seem to be a happy medium with combat rewards. If killing all the extraneous mobs in an area gave you, say, 900 more XP, then that would be pretty significant, and combat would be the way to go. Because XP ALWAYS helps you out until you're at level cap. "So just make it less" some people said. Okay, so if all those mobs gave you like 200XP, well then, you're basically back to "I don't really NEED that XP. I feel like I'm not really getting anything for my efforts." Just like the current sentiment with loot, as it becomes circumstantially unnecessary after a bit. So, where's the happy medium? Fighting everything is either THE way to go, or it's just another option. I think most people have agreed that the current system needs to be changed. There's no doubt about that. Its exact, current state isn't perfect. That's precisely why it's a beta. Basically, just because you feel the combat encounters aren't enticing enough doesn't mean the obvious conclusion is "TOSS IN INDIVIDUAL COMBAT XP ACROSS THE BOARD TO FIX IT!". There are numerous factors to adjust/options to take to fix what ails the current build.

Yeah... OR, Poster B wishes you to simply employ basic reasoning skills to realize that, even without XP, there are still things to be gained from combat within the system. Loot is, factually, a reason for killing things. Doesn't mean it's THE reason, or it's always a great reason, etc. So, "Oh yeah, so we should grind for that?!" is a wildly ridiculous way to go from there. You can "grind" for anything. If there were no rewards for combat, you could just grind for fun. XP did not monopolize grinding. The reason the vast majority of heated-debate threads like this become so "simple" is that many folks seem to be incapable of taking points for what they are, because it's easier and more appeasing to their debate hunger to take them for what they'd like to argue against to further their own point, for some reason.

So says you. *le sigh*

I'm afraid I don't. You pointed out that combat rewards are just illusions, since you need to "spend" them to maintain relative combat effectiveness. But, what do you need XP for? Oh, that's right, to level up, so that you can take on those higher-level creatures in, that's right, combat, instead of getting your face waxed off by them. So, I really don't get your point. There's no incentive to engage in combat, XP or no, according to your line of reasoning, beyond "so I can continue to be effective at combat." But why do you want to be effective at combat? To get XP and loot. But why do you... You see where that's going? I mean, is every RPG really terrible, because all you ever get from progression is the means to further progress? o_O

Well, as a supplement on that note... what if there was a default "you suck really bat at taking a shot immediately after hustling somewhere" modifier on ranged attacks. I dunno, something like -20% to accuracy, ticking down by 5% each second? Obviously those numbers could be changed, as I've just whipped them out of thin air. But, talents/stats could possibly affect that. Or something of that nature. I realize that something affecting movement speed would still be necessary, probably. But, in the interest of mechanical tweaks that could make "I can just run around and shoot you all day without a care in the world" impractical, I thought I'd share.

My thought is... the full extent of inventory management does not end at "can I pick this up or not?". It's what kind of access you have to that item. I mean, in Fallout, you can just go into your inventory, mid-battle, for what... 3 AP? Then use 73 stimpaks. Then "unpause" and continue with combat. I think that aspect is a hell of a lot more important than whether or not, at one point in time, you can pick up those 73 stimpaks or not. See, being able to pick up the stuff isn't the issue, really, since you can always pick up infinite stuff eventually. I realize that always being able to "pick it up" (send it to some stash) immediately, at any given moment, doesn't accurately represent the times when you couldn't go back for a second load, and/or the items would feasibly be taken or moved or destroyed during the duration of your return trip, etc. However, this is no more of a stretch than always having items vanish after you leave the area, just to make a limited inventory more meaningful. If you break into some ruins and clear them out, but you don't take all the gold you find down there, what are the odds, really, that in a 10-hour period, while you run back to town to store/sell things and come back to the ruins, some group of lackeys arrives at the ruins, takes EVERYTHING that remains, and gets the hell out of there? Pretty slim, I'd say. Now, if you got ambushed by bandits on the main highway, and left some stuff lying around, yeah.... 10 hours later, someone's probably stumbled upon it. Anywho, the point is, it's an abstraction, but claiming that the other ways of doing it aren't an abstraction is silly. In some systems, once you're encumbered, you simply move really slowly, but you never stop moving. So, you can basically carry infinite stuff, just really slowly. In many systems, your money has no weight. So you can carry around 3,000 gold coins, but you can't carry 2 suits of plate armor? Yeah, that's great. So, I dunno... I mean, if we want a perfect simulation of encumbrance, then I'm game, I suppose. But, if we don't, I don't think we can really say "Oh no, abstraction!" to the whole "I'm technically picking this all up right now, even though a bunch of it isn't actually going into my accessibly inventory" mechanic. Again, I'd say the problem is with how easy it is to access your stash. There used to be set rest spots, which was at least better than just "whenever you DO rest, just wherever." But, really, I'd still make it something like "If you send it to your stash, it somehow automagically gets transported to your stronghold" or something. That way, it's really not that much different from leaving it lying on the ground, and having to come back to get it, except that the actual act of having to go somewhere, sell things, then come back to get it is abstracted away. You still cannot access it immediately (so no equipping of weapons, or quick items, etc, for combat use), and it still takes time and travel effort to make your way to where the stashed items are (similar to having to go back to the place where you left them because you couldn't pick them up at the time.)

"Meaningless," in this case, is an exaggeration, as it actually just has very little meaning. If it was meaningless, absolutely nothing would be affected. Also, this illustrates that the alleged problem stems from too low an extent of variance between a minimum attribute value and a maximum, and not specifically from the lack of inherently "bad" builds.

Ohhhh, sorry about that. Well, that works too. I guess just... if kill XP went in at all, for whatever reason, alongside anything else, I'd want it to work like that (diminishing returns). I just thought that having additional motivations/rewards for killing the things (such as a lore-based goal/reward) might well to prevent a motivation void from occurring for the act of combat with any given foe.