majestic

Well, I'll come out and say it: That is wrong. Whether the Templars really need to use lyrium or not doesn't matter because there are Seekers having those powers who gain them by training and faith alone. You're drawing up a huge anti-religious conspiracy from a silly retcon that was retconned again by adding Seekers into the game. There's no organized conspiracy here, just two or more writers taking liberty with established lore. That's unfortunate to be sure, but not really unexpected, especially not from Bioware. The only other more retcon happy bunch is working at Blizzard, and oh boy, compared to them Bioware is especially tame in comparison. No, they are not atheists, they are satanists, Illuminati. That's why they use eye symbol. People always confuse, of course atheists attack religion, but atheists are just tools, behind them are satanists, these people, the Illuminati, are not atheists, they are very "religious"... As i mention, they give you doubt about God, but they show demons existed. Demons in this game are not solely bad and evil. You may become friends with demons, sex with demons, working with demons, ect. They are beings of another realms want to be in this world just because they want to be in this world. In this game, demons is not your enemy. In this game, they try hard to destroy the very basis of religiuon, that is faith to God, in other way they show you making deal with demons could lead to something either good or bad, but you can make deal with demons, and demons can give you anything you wanted In this game, you may deny the existence of God, but you can't deny the existence of demons...Bioware is not atheist, but satanist, Illuminati. Except that demons simply being a name mortals gave spirits who embody negative (mortal) traits and emotions. Like everything in the Fade they are a reflection of the real world and exist only because there's both good and evil in everyone. The bad things also happen to spirits of positive traits should they ever join with mortals, like Justice joining Anders and becoming Vengeance in the process. Oh and by the way, where is the good that comes from dealing with demons in Dragon Age? That's silly. While I'm not a satanist I have to work closely with many of them on the HAARP base and some of our chemtrails subconctractors often demand satanic rituals before we're proceeding at meetings. Can't be too careful these days, look at that terrible Snowden business. Not once ever did they burn a kitten in their proceedings, that's just propaganda. In fact they never burn anything in the first place, that's just for TV - kittens are far too delicious to simply burn.

Well yeah, that's why many of them prefer to be called "illusionists" now. The only people going around calling themselves magicians are those crappy ones who can't perform without a group of actors pretending to be amazed for the cameras for their TV series. Err, I might be too opinionated on this. I thought those people called themselves psychic and starred on The Next Uri Geller. Ah, who am I kidding. Uri Geller makes clocks tick again, he's awesome. Certainly not like those magicians who only do make believe.

Firewalking has been explained by science 80 years ago. Sorry, I guess I now ruined shaolin monks for you. And for themselves. Because, obviously. So I do have a question here: What do you think of D&D's divine magic system? In case you don't know anything about it, in D&D there are many gods, they are real for as long as there are people worshipping them and in return for said worship they gain access to what's called divine magic (as opposed to arcane magic which is either trained or innate, depending on your class). There's an explained way how this power transfer works, the existence of everything involved is a proven fact, however it still requires faith to work (both ways). Are D&D priests scientists? Or sceptics? Your entire point about something mystical not having any explanaition, cause OR effect is a little strange. Sure, it's true for God and concepts like qi in our real world because those are not observable, have no apparent cause (how could they, without being observable) and also aren't measurable. A sceptic now would say those don't exist, someone having faith would argue it is of no consequence because it is faith. But how can you take that concept and apply it into worlds where the mystic has real, factual effects? Templars have anti-magic powers. Force users have abilities. Those are real, and according to your definition that alone makes it science, not faith? How can that be true?

You lost me there. Honestly, what is your point here? "The force" didn't suddenly turn from mysticism into science because Lucas thought the midichlorians were a good idea. The force quite clearly exists and can be manipulated by force users to achieve a wide variety of effects. Those are both observable and measurable and therefore require no faith - these things are the factual reality of the Star Wars universe. The real mystic quality of the force arises from the various orders of force users and their philosophical differences, which are seemingly represented as the dark and light side of the force - again, which according to Star Wars lore may or may not be a real or philosophical dualism, that is something we do not know. The midichlorians don't change that. They merely give an indication as to how powerful a force user could become - in theory. You're reading far too much into it. If science would find a genetic predisposition necessary to become a shaolin monk* that would change nothing for the monks and their adherence to buddhism. Because faith has no observable prerequisites - it wouldn't be faith otherwise. * Other than an aptitude for martial arts - unfit people are weeded out during training after all. That's the same for any elite group whether it is sports, warfare or organisations like Mensa.

The concept and idea of life energy is universal to esotericism and not exclusive to shaolin monks or even other chinese traditions like TCM or martial arts. It exists as prana, mana (yes, mana), energy or ruah in a lot of other traditions and mysticism, and while the force shares some similarities and may even be partially based on qi, it certainly isn't synonymous. And no, qi isn't science, it is faith.

Oh boy. Midichlorians or not, the fact alone that "the Force is strong in [Luke]" after knowing about for for a day or two just tells bare and plain that is some innate ability and not something gained through training and meditation. Empire Strikes Back then shows that you can improve upon your innate abilities through training. The idea that the Force represents some religion or mythical force that anyone could access through training and faith is a (now apparently proven false) assumption on your end. Nothing else. You're making an awful lot of those and then react annoyed if your own ideas don't match up with those of the writers. Do you do that if reality isn't to your liking as well?

This makes no sense. First Lyrium is a magical substance that gives you access to the spirit world. It is hardly HNO3 or whatever. Secondly in DA:O it was just a skill Alistair could teach anybody, like one might teach any combat skill. So I am not sure what the basis of that assumption was. You did not get any scene of Alistair teaching you intense meditation or anything. Of course lyrium is a "magical substance" but actually it's a mineral dug up from earth, is "magic in raw form", so in other word means it's "the Fade" in chemical form, since magic come from the Fade, lyrium is a physical Fade. You consume it, you get the Fade inside you. But according to Alistair in DA:O, we don't really need lyrium to learn Templar ability, that give the impression that Templar ability is something you gain by dedication, training and understanding of religion (this goes the same with Jedi). I compare the ability with Spirit School magic of DA:O, there is so much similarity, so i assume the anti-Magic line of Spirit school is NOT actually magic, well the school itself is ANTI-magic. Since Spirits are The Maker's first children, there you can get the conclusion, Templar have the connection with the divine influence through their understanding of religion and dedication in their faith. I assume it is just the Chantry who is corrupt, want to control the Templars by giving them lyrium to make them addicted, also fooling them by saying lyrium increase the magnitude of their ability Furthermore, anti-magic is NOT magic isn't it? So why would lyrium that is "magic in raw form" giving anti-magic effect for Templars? Eh? For me, there is NO justification for "you really need lyrium to learn Templar ability" in DA2 and DA:I, it totally toss away the religious side of the thing. You are no longer gain power by your understanding and dedication in religion, you gain your power by chemical substance and manipulate it. It have nothing to do with divine thingies, therefore those divine thingies don't exist, religion is fake So now you guys understand my argument? P/S yes you don't see a cutscene video but you get the dialogue scene from Alistair "i could teach you" and "sent everyone who is trained as a warrior" implying Alistair DID teaching Templar ability WITHOUT lyrium There is a thing called story and gameplay segregation, and becoming a templar as player character is a huge part of it, no matter whether you actually need lyrium or not. Templars are the militant arm of the Chantry, and through long, dedicated training and lyrium (or not, depending on which writer you like to take at face value) they achieve powers that help them fight mages. And then you come along and become a full-fledged templar with the abilities in 5 minutes of gameplay and none of the training, without the need to join the Templar order or take any vows. You can be the most sinful person on the planet or you could be a saint, it doesn't matter. Because it is... well, gameplay, and when push comes to shove gameplay always wins against any story considerations. Always has, always will. So riddle me this, regardless of the retcon that templars need lyrium for their powers: Where do the Seekers get their power from, it obviously isn't lyrium? Oh, right, dedication, training and being touched by a spirit of faith. So that's the in-game answer. The real world answer is probably that someone else at Bioware thought David Gaider was full of crap when he retconned Alistair into having taken lyrium in that Dark Horse comic and introduced a secret templar faction having templar powers without lyrium intake just to spite him and get back to the argument of whether it is just a control element or not. For you, the answer can be "oh, like, maybe they didn't like the idea of no religious background for Templar powers" while coming up with DA:I. For Luzianus that answer would probably be because the Maker took pity on Cassandra for looking like a man.

Indeed, even with the midichlorians as an explanation (one which I intensely dislike) joining the Jedi or becoming a force-user in the first place was limited to a select few. Jedi are simply space wizards (or sorcerers in D&D terms because their ability is innate, not trained). Sure Vader gets called out on adhering to an outdated religion in A New Hope, but it's not like anyone could use the Force if they wanted it enough, or were religious enough. The midichlorians suck butt like much of what Lucas did with the prequels, but to construct a science vs. religion debate or conspiracy out of them is ludicrous at best and borderline paranoid at worst.

Sure, because using the not really modding-friendly Frostbite engine was totally Bioware's decision. And why did they choose so? Because when they are not busy enough with creating their satanist illuminati conspiracy they get a kick out of hating you in particular. Yeah, that seems just about right. Lex parsimoniae be damned, stupid Ockham obviously had no idea what he was talking about.

You're not missing much by not having played Legacy as DA:I neatly gives you enough exposition on the matter. You're just left wondering what and who the hell is going on at first. IMO the main story picks up a good deal of pace after Haven, especially if you're interested in DA lore. You know, that awful statanist conspiracy is just about to start and all. xD edit: You're right about the game being slightly offline-MMOish. As I posted a while ago, there was way too much Bethesda crap in my Dragon Age.

Hiho. *waves* It's probably more accurate to say that this is the first time I actually use my account to post a bit. It's been around forever, I just barely ever checked back here after the community split up into loads of different boards. Nice to see so many oldies around. ^^

No, I don't think so. 99% of the people probably don't even bother with the lore. She's just really good and interpreting things the wrong way, which is why I said it is willful. Nothing of the sort really happens in the games, and nothing of the sort is written in the lore. It's just her willful misinterpretation, and I say willful here because it's not possible to read that much text and accidentially get everything almost but never quite right, and it is liberally seasoned with flat out lies. Or she never played the games and just read about the lore on some weirdo conspiracy site, in which case she's a victim of exactly what she's saying Bioware is doing. Having an agenda. Take the interpretation that the Darkspawn are the Maker's curse to punish the hybris of man, yeah, it's not like there haven't been real life precedences. The bubonic plague was seen as exactly that, a punishment of God for sins committed. So did the Catholic church in 14th Century Europe have an anti-religous agenda as well? I like that interpretation, so I'm keeping it. Bioware is just an extension of a catholic conspiracy that started seventeen centuries ago when emperor Constantine apparently converted so that heathen pagans eventually would be able to destroy it from within.

No, she does not give you credit but you can use her to spawn an infinite amount of robes that sell for a surprising amount of cash and can be broken down into components. After you train with her and she is in her underwear just tell her to put on some clothes. She'll equip a robe, just take it away again and then once again tell her to wear clothing. Repeat for as long as you like. I'm not really sure if the bug has been fixed by TSLRCM, which is about the only real way to play KOTOR2.

Geez. Of course it could work, (A)D&D is a turn based game after all, so any turn based implementation of the rules can and would of course work. Which is entirely not the point, so whatever.

Reminds me of people telling me that they never watched The Addams Family because it was "just a Munsters clone" - not only did both TV shows start airing within a week the frigging Addams Family was based on a comic that premiered in '38. Geez.

It's been posted before, but no. In "true" turn based games that do not have concurrent action like the RtwP Infinity & Aurora Engine (well not counting The Witcher, obviously) games your characters cannot move while the enemy is making their turn. You might be able to dogde or otherwise block attacks, make saving throws and whatnot, but you cannot move or otherwise take action to prevent impending doom. It is possible with the Haste buff or the Boots of Speed to outrun AoE spell projectiles (Fireball, Abi-Dalzim's Horrid Wilting and others) in all the IE games. Simultaneous movement lets you run out of the enemy's range and makes them follow you after engagement. It lets you heal your characters while the enemies pelt them with everything they got. It lets you quaff potions at the same time the enemy is trying to target you. The hit point to possible damage per round ratio is so skewed in favor of damage in Baldur's Gate 2 that without concurrent rounds the combat experience would end up being horribly frustrating and/or boring. Especially when you instantly fail the game the moment your main character goes down because that intelligence draining illithid you could easily outrun with concurrent action has a lucky roll streak and you die. Game over, reload. Could it work? Possibly, I mean it is possible to create a nigh-invulnerable juggernaut of doom within the game rules and unmodded combat it somewhat easy with a few choice exceptions. Metagaming on the other hand would just go from being a bonus for power gamers to necessity and it would suck the fun out of the entire experience for a lot of people. Otherwise Age of Decadence would have a lot more sales. That game really is designed to kill you in every way imaginable and making a successful combat oriented character is an art in itself, and a point of endless reloads to boot because combat difficulty has been tuned so it is hard for metagaming munchkins that know the ins and outs of the system to succeed. It's really awesome (also it has non-combat alternatives for pretty much everything, even if it might simply be to not do a sidequest) and I never regretted investing the 20 bucks the unfinished version costs but it will always be a niche product. Extremely niche, at that.

I still don't know if you're just an account made purely for satire and trolling or if you're genuinely giving lead a run for its money when it comes to density, but you're pretty entertaining, I'll give you that.

Whenever someone says that all I can think of is this. This is a serious game.

Woops. My bad, for some reason I mistook you for the original poster. Edited the post. ^^

Turn based games have their encounters tuned to be doable and DMs don't routinely design encounters to wipe the group. Well, unless you're the developers of Age of Decadence or your name is Gygax, in which case you would do exactly that, but the point still stands: If you simply would impose TB combat on BG2's cheeseball encounters you would end up with a game that is either unplayable, boring, or in some cases both. The same applies to PoE's encounter design, which is arguably not up to par with other RtwP games anyway. So, well, my answer to the question posed by this thread still is: No, not without a complete overhaul of the encounter design, and even then you'd have a chance it would turn out to be like Wasteland 2, a game which I liked but where the TB combat was a massive drag instead of interesting once you finished the first area or two.

The thought of taking BG2's encounters and putting them in a turn based game without concurrent combat rounds (which IE games basically are) is frightening. Enemy mage group just won the initiative roll? Yeah sorry, eat two or three Horrid Wiltings, not to mention the thought of Kangaxx winning initiative. Now that would be glorious. Some parts of the system would lend itself rather well to TB implementation, like engagement. The game would need a complete encounter design overhaul if it went turn based though, the current encounters are sometimes cumbersome enough with concurrent actions. Granted, one could argue that PoE needs an encounter design overhaul anyway, but that's not really point of this discussion. Yet.

As the epitome of the German computer gaming magazine proponents of the PC master race (sorry, I can never really resist taking a jab at the dolts working there), in the past PC Games generally defined flüssig - which means, among other things, fluid, liquid, flowing and and which in this case should be indeed contextually translated as smooth - as having a lower bound of 60fps, not 30fps and they routinely call bullcrap whenever someone says that 30fps is enough for a, well, flüssige gaming experience. As you already figured out the gist of the article is that you should be fine on Full HD with Ultra details if you have a quad core CPU clocking in at 3 GHz and a graphics card with at least 2GB provided you don't use the Hairworks feature, which, as they explicitely stated, kills game performance even with nVidia boards on their high-end system whenever the game shows a close-up of Geralt's head or more than a few monsters using Hairworks on screen.

There are some nice things on sale this weekend (especially Grim Fandango). I also upgraded my Wasteland 2 to Digital Deluxe, not because I'm that interested in the novellas but because the upgrade also contains The Bard's Tale and the upgrade on sale is actually cheaper than The Bard's Tale. \o/

Uh... no. Most, if not all, turn based systems in video/computer and tabletop role playing games feature an initiative check of some kind. The first turn goes to however wins initiative and not to the enemy per se. Some (like D&D) even have a surprise round if you catch enemies unaware after which normal initiative applies, potentially giving the heroes two rounds of combat where the enemy can't do anything at all.

You forgot to mention that Bioware secretly experiments on puppies and helps "big pharma" to enact their plan to reduce the world's population to less than a billion through evil affliction causing additives in vaccines. I mean, seriously, would they be called BIOware otherwise? Willful misinterpretation of lore: Bringing the world fun, games and crazy consipiracy theories since 5000 BC.