jamoecw

given that you always lose a set fraction of health for loss in stamina, i can see stamina in excess of this ratio to be useless, while health would not. so if one normally gets double the health than the ratio of loss, then one can dump health if they want, or boost stamina. if one normally gets half the health than the ratio of loss, then one can dump stamina, or boost health. if they are matched then it would make sense to raise or lower them in tandem. ultimately one would figure what ratio he would want based on how he plays, then work to get that, if want more health at some point he would also want to boost stamina, and vice versa. this makes hit taking ability twice as expensive as one would think, thus the numbers of gain would have to reflect such (either by gaining more for strength and stamina, or less for dexterity and intelligence). this also means that how one plays is going to influence what sort of value crit dmg and duration is going to have to their build (given the specialness of AoE/duration to certain abilities/builds, and the rarity of crits). i am sure it will be a fine system, though as you have said, comparing it to a system that has other factors which invalidates certain attributes makes for poor comparison.

It's only basic physics if you think about weapons like swords and maces. Crossbows, guns, wands, and spells don't seem like they would intuitively gain damage bonuses from increased Strength. That's where you get A/D&D's quasi-simulationist damage bonus breakdown and dramatically variable weight to the Strength stat based on class and weapon type. not exactly, hitting the strongest point on plate armor with a mace deals concussive force distributed across the entire piece of armour, mitigated by padding underneath. hitting the same spot with a sword does the same. more strength means more concussive force. with a crossbow or gun, more strength means a steadier aim. now we get into accuracy, hitting that one spot with great accuracy with a sword or mace is pretty pointless, while hitting that spot with a crossbow or gun is less so due to its penetration. this is due to the presence of vitals under the armour, which knowing this is a function of intelligence. so if one were to hit the best possible spot in the best possible manner using a sword one would use the point at a **** in the armor and angle it towards a vital spot, at which point strength is generally multiplied by leverage to levels in which massive strength is rather pointless, while a mace would hit a weak point which would cause damage with little mitigation or distribution, and thus extra strength is not a significant factor. for crossbows and guns proper body positioning and sight picture trumps strength by a vast degree for steadiness of the shot, and thus is not a major factor in hitting your target, and thus intelligence is more important in that regard too. without plate armor little extra strength is needed to penetrate the skin using a blade, and simply being able to get the mace up to speed is more important than strength, in both cases strength has diminishing returns the more you get above the minimum required to use the weapon. therefore strength is rarely needed when in an ideal situation, strength only becomes a beneficial factor the further away from ideal you get. which is for the most part based on dexterity and intelligence. for simplicity i'd have weapons have minimum strength requirements, then not use strength for damage beyond being able to use a heavier weapon or a stronger bow. edit: now that i think about it, if strength mitigates encumbrance, and encumbrance mitigates attack speed, then more strength = faster attack speed = more damage. which is realistic in a lot of ways.

trouble in chrome as well, though IE works fine.

Wait, you didn't have a rogue/thief in the party? Isn't "have a rogue" one of the "rules" of an adventuring party? in PnP DnD it is, in IE games it is more of a tendency. you can get away from having rogues in your party, especially in BG2. you can unlock stuff via spell, find traps via spell, and 'disarm' traps by running summons through them.

don't get me wrong, none of the characters actually helped you do better at crafting, but they all had some personal stuff (the astromech was just a series of skill checks) that would result in a reward of some sort. you could get multiple lightsabers in the first game, but they weren't anything special (aka, merchant fodder). in fact the crafting system itself (not the method of getting stuff, and what not for crafting) is perhaps the best i've seen in a game, though like pretty much everything in the game there was not much content to it. all other rpg games with crafting slots have used them as glorified equipment slots. given that some of these guys have worked on KotOR i think that the crafting and companion growth will be alright, as long as they are able to put out the level of content that the IE games had. ya, the google doc is basically like KotOR's system, except that you didn't forge stuff, so you find blade and what not already made out of the different materials. also that the DCs were of skills that were non combat skills that were used for other things as well.

that is why i used KotOR as an example, because you needed a prerequisite skill to assemble things into slots, based on what you were trying to put in there, otherwise, ya it isn't crafting, but equipping something (most systems that use slots forget this). i don't think you mean that i mean that everything can be purchased or found as loot. that nothing is special in that it takes something to get (hopefully in opposition of getting something else of equal value), possibly as a quest reward or something. i also suggested that you could try to 'install' something you didn't know how to, and if you succeeded then you would then know how to do so in the future, or you could just be told to how. that sort of thing could have synergy as well so something similar would allow you to somewhat know how to 'install' something, and thus better odds at guessing how to do it. maybe i am missing what you are saying again, dunno. right now it sounds like you missed something i had said, or i am miscommunicating or something.

pretty much just a content difference, craft a lightsabre with evil smiting crystal (+4 vs. evil), +4 crystal (+4), and balanced grips (-4 off hand penalty). then go to HK-74 (companion that you have spent time doing his companion stuff) and get him to modify the power cell to add +4d4 fire to damage, then go OLD HAG (another companion that you have spent time with) and get her to get her to adjust the frequency to cause the blade to create toxic acid when it comes in contact with flesh and get a +4d4 acid damage modifier. now all of this is done without needing a lightsabre with these properties anywhere in the code, it all comes from individual pieces, so the devs don't have to hand make 200 different yet nearly identical items just for a lobotomized crafting system (and much more work for a non lobotomized one). now if completing the weapon itself was only a 1 in 4 chance of working, then it would take 1 to 4 days (average 2.5) to make, and if your companions also needed an equivalent amount of time then you'd have to live without those parts to help you while making your super weapon, maybe you take it easy, or maybe you use your backup weapon. you aren't displaying a lifetime's worth of study and work, nor are you grinding in anyway. so it isn't tedious, and it don't create a logic disconnect within lore (you aren't rivaling the gods or some super advanced civilization in craftsmanship), you don't waste precious skill points, and best of all it is fully dynamic, drawing on side quests to help you.

The thing is, I was literally as prepared as I could've been. Well, without taking on the two crazy evil dudes, but, I didn't trust them. Anywho, I don't attribute having to get lucky in a randomized system to difficulty. Having to figure out the best tactics to use to get the job done... THAT'S difficulty. In other words, what was the strategy for taking down Tarnesh? Don't let him cast Mirror Image (and, subsequently, like level 5 Magic Missile or whatever). But, even if you opt to "not let" him do that, you can just get a bunch of crappy rolls that completely negate any amount of effort you put into affecting the situation. I'd much rather have a tough fight that's tough because of what you have to figure out with what you're able to do, rather than tough because of factors beyond your control that you have to hope cause planetary alignment. Which is one reason I look forward, so much, to P:E's hit system and mechanics. I'll take a "Man, that guy REALLY keeps you on your toes!" boss/baddie over a "Man, that guy does like 1,000 damage!/that guy resists everything!" boss/baddie, any day. my first playthrough i missed them (i stayed off roads, as i felt it would avoid potential ambushes), and it took me 8 times to beat him. now with those two it takes me on average 3 times to beat him. the trick is to get your hit frequency up in order to stop his spell casting, imoen with a shortbow works well here. i also send my character ahead so he gets hit with the magic missile or fear spell. finally don't play anything that can't take a hit, it is gg if you die at anytime, so your safety is paramount.

The problem with slots is, while it deepens the crafting system, it doesn't prevent it from still being a glorified shopping list. Now you're shopping for things AND properties, instead of just things. In other words, you've just broken down all the items on the list into sub-items. The dynamics I'm after have to do with the actual crafting process. I want to have materials, and have a goal, and dynamically produce results, at the very least. Just like anything else in the game. Dialogue: You want someone to give you an item? You persuade them, and/or threaten them, and/or kill them and take it, and/or trick them, etc. You want to get the item, but you have to deal with unknown factors and actively work toward achieving that goal. In a good dialogue system, at least. That's why everyone complains when a game has some Speech skill that just gives you "jedi mind-trick them into giving you the object" as an option. Also, something else you got me thinking of... there's always going to be that "how do we balance the non-crafting experience with the crafting one?" You've got to be able to find useful things that take advantage of the full range of equipment properties, but then you've got to be able to craft interesting things as well. So, A) Make the advantages of crafted goods lie mostly in the uniqueness and specific properties and property combinations of the items, rather than the complete difference in quality/available properties (the keyword being "mostly"), and B) allow the system to use a salvaging mechanic, so that the otherwise redundant found items can actually be used for their materials to make specific crafted items. Heck, maybe even tie the two together. Maybe (as we've touched on before), have a skill aspect (pure technical crafting process/prowess), and a knowledge aspect. Maybe you are skilled enough at the forge to be CAPABLE of working with some special meteorite metal, but you can't do so until you actually observe and study something worked from that metal. So, you find a meteorite sword, and now you can study meteorite to make more and more various properties for meteorite-crafted items at-will. So, instead of hoping you find the 7 meteorite weapons in the entire game world, with their 7 spiffy combos of properties, and hoping those combos are to your liking, you can actually make your own once you find that first weapon. Of course, that's also where a research-y system could come into play. Not really sure where to start with that, exactly... Anywho, the strength of being able to craft items in a world in which you also find them is clearly in the specific control you have over the finished product's exact properties. If you just make the exact same stuff you can find, then it's a weak system (you're just doing something un-fun to produce a sword without paying a merchant for that sword, and/or waiting 'til you find it). If you make drastically different stuff, then no one's going to NOT-craft, because it's obviously superior to simply finding and buying stuff. So, you make it about control. You want a nice sword, with specific properties, so you craft it. And yes, does a socket-some-gems-or-what-have-you system accomplish this? It does. So then, why even have a "crafting" system for making items, when you can just find/buy them all and socket in what you want? That could work, too. My concern is more once you've decided the game's definitely going to have a legit crafting system in, making it not a glorified shopping list, plus a socketing system. If you're going to do crafting, I say actually do crafting and make it worth it, or just don't worry with a "crafting" system at all. Just say "You can customize your weapons and armor with magical gemstones. YAY!" i am pretty sure i have lost what you are asking for, nothing you have described is either more dynamic than what i have stated (and thus less like a shopping list), or even possible to do with our current level of technology. since an item has a material (a slot, or multiple slots), a type (slot), magical properties (multiple slots), or an item is unique and thus making it always makes the same thing, all from a list. as for how you get the things to fit in slots, maybe you make them, or maybe you find them, making everything means that you can't balance it against other items unless there is a cost per item, which has nothing to do with slots in it of itself. as far as research goes, don't you work towards a goal? and would attempting to make an item and failing a few times be like that? as far as the dialog comparison, once you fail a dialog choice you can't retry again most times, isn't that the same as losing all of the material in an attempt? aren't you against that? not being a smart ass or sarcastic, but you seem to be contradicting yourself, or asking for above average human level intelligence in the crafting system, which i know you aren't asking for, and just saying 'i don't get what you are saying' is not going to help you explain things better. OK, but you were still limited to two (2) bonuses to the lightsaber (and no temporary/semi-permanent "magic" buffs), whereas with a D&D-style RPG, you can potentially have a lot more, if you're not careful with limits: masterwork (+ATK roll) Keen (+Damage roll) Chained (+disarm DC) Balanced (-offhand penalty) Enchanted to throw electric damage Enchanted to (something) Wizard/cleric buffs anything else I'm forgetting actually once you enchant a weapon with a +1 enchantment you could then apply effects up to a total of +4 equivalent enchantment (until epic levels), so you had 4 slots and some things took up multiple slots, of course the base item could be made of different materials or be a different type of weapon, that is is like combining 5 items to make one. as for temporary buffs, you could apply what ever temporary buffs you wanted, just like DnD (same basic system, just a lack of weapon temporary buffs, though weapon buffs that buff you still allowed you to temp buff yourself as well, so temp buffs stacked with permanent ones). the big issue with it is the lack of content, 3 kinds of lightsabers, and 2 types of guns.

so you're are looking for something more dynamic than a glorified shopping list? well in order to get dynamic stuff on a weapon you need to isolate the different effects so they can be applied individually. then you come up with a method of applying them to the weapon, one way that is often used is to use slots and components, this way you have control over what goes in what and how much in order to keep some balance. being able to deconstruct weapons to grab the components should also be feasible, though not all games that use slots have this ability, either stuff you find lacks special components, or you simple cannot deconstruct stuff, though it has been done before. now we get into the issue of spending points on a non combat skill, which then has to balanced against combat skills, when it doesn't help you in other utility tasks, though some games do link the crafting skill to utilitarian skills that are non crafting specific. the final issue is balancing what you find in the game with what you make, if what you make is inferior to what you find then there won't be a point to crafting things as you will always end up using what you find, but if you can make the best stuff in the game then ultimately the world is devoid of skillful smiths and enchanters that have spent their entire lives dedicated to the craft and science of making things. now with age of decadence, in the demo you can make better stuff than you find, mainly because you find small items with good ore, then reconstruct them into a larger more useful item. the main game will have these items, and artifacts that you can't make, so maybe there won't be any real use for crafting, after all why spend points that could be used for combat when you don't actually gain anything? possibly there will be a blind spot in the artifacts and items that you can use your craft on, but that pretty much means that whatever skill is tied to that blind spot is also tied to crafting, and they come as a package deal (restricting the player, which is probably not what you want). KotOR on the other hand had a system that allowed for as much diversity, did so while not breaking lore by having you craft super stuff out of basic materials that everyone else had access to, and tied the crafting to skills used in other areas of the game. frankly the system itself is far better than anything that has been shown since or even suggested in this forum, all you need to do is tweak it a tad to fit the game. as far as a research system why not just use a variation of RtK's, where you attempt to make something, should you fail you keep the components but lose the time you spent attempting the task.

What you described is a balancing of the classes according to how to book assumes the game is being played. That no one is doing it like that is another matter. My point was that the creators of the book did xp tables for a reason, not just to make the game more "complex". complexity for complexity's sake still has reasons for why it does what it does, just that it could be done much simpler with the same result. if you look at the earlier post about how if you custom made thieves that they would level faster it just goes to show how D&D is balanced. thieves are usually considered weaker than other classes in 2nd edition unless you dual them into certain other classes (then they get to be better than normal mages). D&D created certain classes and such to get the whole tolkien fantasy thing going, but as anyone knows hobbits (thieves) are useful, but not powerful. so they tweaked the exp gained to make them closer to each other, instead of tweaking the classes to make them more similar in power level (which they later tried to do with 3rd ed. hence the singular exp tables). they want to create an adventure full of wonder and asymmetrical parties with asymmetrical fights, but most people have issues with asymmetrical stuff, and thus tend to have symmetrical challenges, that don't make good use of the weaker (utility) party members.

i know exactly what you are getting at, and for a MMO it would be pretty awesome, but for a SP game not so much. being really good at getting ore and then grinding the rest would be pretty crappy. if you made it so that you could become a great fighter and a great crafter then things get a little skewed in the world considering that you don't spend lots of time achieving such. in an MMO you spend lots of time so you can scale things to less world skewing proportions.

this sounds like a good solution for an alchemy skill, but I'd like crafting to be a bit more reliable. unless it's for complex machines rather than weapons and armour. i guess it really depends on how complicated crafting is, if you are taking a +1 short sword and reassembling it back into what it was before it got taken apart all you have to do is assemble the pieces and wrap the handle properly to keep it all together (precision screws are rare in pre industrial times), maybe tap some of the pieces to get them to wedge together, and then you are done. taking pieces from 3 or 4 short swords and reassembling them to become a new short sword means adjusting pieces, making wedges to fill gaps, tapping them into place, doing some light welding (or some other method of joining) to keep the wedges from coming out (and thus the sword falling apart), and then wrapping the handle to keep it all together. not super easy (unlike machined parts of today), so spending 2 or 3 nights getting it right via trial and error doesn't seem too steep of a price.

return to krondor had an alchemy system where even if you knew the formula from a wiki or previous playthrough there was a high chance of failure until you succeeded as you character didn't know yet. and the witcher has been mentioned for its extra effects when brewing stuff (i think skyrim had this too, though i could be mistaken). you can probably link crafting to an existing skill, and then to an attribute for skill, then modify the chance of success by whether your character knows what he is doing (recipes). i'd also make it so that you can deconstruct an item to its base parts, but can't make parts themselves, then you just assemble parts correctly over the course of a night (like the witcher), and if you have a recipe and necessary skill to follow the recipe then you succeed, if not then you still have the parts, unless you critically fail (tying to do something well beyond your ability) then you lose 1 or more parts. as long as nothing is just a straight bonus, but has some other effect attached to it that needs to be negated or augmented somehow then it won't be too stale, plus you have to hunt for recipes if you don't want to risk wasting time, which hopefully will matter somehow.

even if you make something that is just as good as what you can find, all the points that could have gone into making you better at using the item went into getting it, so you are still gimped. what you make should be at least equal what you can find+the skill points that could have gone into using it better, otherwise you are gimped for making stuff yourself. of course spending 10 hours collecting stuff to make the thing you can make would make just spending points to use the item better a more efficient route if what you can craft is equal to 'what you find+the points spent that could have gone into using it better' though it would be cooler, so if you reward all the extra time or not is debatable. ex. it takes 100 points to max out crafting a rapier, it takes 200 points to max out rapier use, the best rapier you can find is a +5, at 200 points in rapier use you get +4 to THAC0 and damage, at 100 points of rapier use you have +2 to THAC0 and damage, if you max out rapier use your total THAC0 and damage bonus is +9, therefore the best rapier you can craft should be a +7. personally i think the idea of divorcing skill point usage from crafting is the better idea, otherwise the ancient super sword that was forged by the gods should be weaker than what some guy did on his off time while trekking through the countryside.

well if you can respec, then i guess it really doesn't matter what they drop, you'll just respec to use the most powerful drop you have, not a good solution, but a solution nonetheless. as for money, isn't that a method of exchange? the less efficient it is the worse off the character is, assuming money doesn't lose its value due to getting so much. and the scenario was what if all 10 drops of greater than +2 were not greatswords, which is far more likely than all 10 +2 drops being a single weapon (doesn't matter which one, does it?). True enough. I was simply considering the probability that there are other means of acquiring equipment of at least a certain caliber, besides bossy-type foes. So, the bossy-type foes don't need to be restricted to specific loot simply to eliminate the possibility that your access to a greatsword beyond "Rusty Greatsword of Meh-ness" isn't determined solely by chance. To look at it another way, if 5 different bosses dropped fixed loot, but only one dropped a greatsword, and you happened to only specialize in greatswords, would you suddenly have absolutely no reason to tackle the other 4? Or, even if the loot was fixed and not random in nature, how would you even know what they dropped until you fought against them? Or, once you found out, would it be unacceptable that all of them didn't drop greatswords? OR, what if none of them dropped greatswords, but you could get some awesome legendary greatsword through other means? That's what I was getting at. The world isn't shattered if each playthrough has Grogg the Ogre's renowned weapon potentially being a different weapon. That's all I'm saying. Not "Oh, we could just randomize everything in the game." Also, Hassat is right, in that, if you have.. say... 50 named weapon drops in the game, and they WERE all randomized, the odds of NONE of them being one of a handful of different weapons would be pretty ludicrous odds, for what that's worth. the two solutions you proposed is: 1. that not all drops are random, though some is (either loot drops or non loot drops) 2. increase the number of good drops to decrease the odds of auto fail. 1. this really isn't any different than if bosses dropped fixed loot, and sub bosses dropped random good loot like was said should happen earlier, is it? 2. doesn't eliminate the issue, just hides it better. That's what playtesting is for. name one game that is dependant on RNG rolls that the dev didn't realize that something creative should be done to ensure you didn't auto fail a playthrough every so often? keep in mind one person not failing doesn't mean anything. if the odds of auto fail is .1% and the game sells 100,000 units in its lifetime, and each unit has an average of 5 playthroughs, then 500 playthroughs will auto fail (most games sell more than 100,000 units BtW). i am not saying that there shouldn't be a random element to drops, i am just saying that you should be smart about it, and not do the whole 'if you auto fail, just start a new game and hope it doesn't happen twice' sort of mentality, which should be a thing of the past given how easy it is to avoid such issues without making it so that you know where to go to get what.

Before the game starts? maybe but it's not a given When the game starts the characters are novices even in their chosen fields. Do they bring previous experience to the table. Sure but you're speculating as to how extensive that experience is. Exactly the same way I am speculating that a character might have sufficient skill to be a master smith when he starts the game. no, during the game you advance 5-10 years worth of experience relative to the average person. you start off barely above a pack of rats in battle prowess most of the time, hardly a novice. by the end of the game you can go toe to toe with things that can wipe out whole villages. i used 5-10 years based on a soldier who goes to a protracted war, and thus would be equivalent to a novice going to work for a blacksmith for 5-10 years that was dedicated to learning the craft. on the one hand adventures don't last 5-10 years, and typically the characters start as pretty pathetic (sub peasant teenager competency) and end up a grizzled veteran. so the amount of experience is inflated already. on the other hand being dedicated to adventuring means one can't also be dedicated to crafting. so where do you draw the realism line? it would seem you have drawn it someplace different than those you are arguing with, which is pretty much what the whole argument boils down to.

If you use the middle ages as a model you're right that it would be unlikely but certainly not impossible for a character to be a "master" smith. Apprentices could begin as early as ten years of age, with a term varying from 5 to 9 years (usually 7). At the end of their apprenticeship they would serve as journeyman. To be considered a master craftsman required a sum of money and the fabrication of a single "masterwork"" which was judged by other masters. So a very exceptionally gifted individual could achieve master smith status in his late teens, and possibly in his mid teens. Unlikely? Yes. Impossible? Not at all. Since adventurers can be considered as somewhat exceptional to begin with, I don't see that it's too much of a stretch to allow characters to craft weapons or armor. also keep in mind that in a typical game characters gain 5-10 years worth of experience in the combat arts.

Coming in with a goldilocks and the three bears here (too hot, too cold), I think it probably should at least be restricted to a particular type of item, to support the narrative (when it matters). If some troll bandit lord is notorious in the area (in the story), and he's so successful and feared because of some iconic, fearsome weapon he carries with a specific name, I think he should probably always drop a weapon with that name with similar properties (the same general theme, at least), rather than one time he drops some loincloth or something instead of a weapon ("but hey... at least it's still a +5 item! 8D!"). But, yeah, I don't think it's necessary at all to restrict anything to ONLY the same exact item every time. For what it's worth... the problem with this would be if you only get good weapons from loot and that in the second half of the game there are say 10 enemies that might drop above +2 weapons that you are proficient in, and one of the final encounters requires a +4 weapon or higher. now for the first half of the game you have been getting pretty much only greatswords, so you specialized in them and was really good with them. all 10 of those that may drop the better weapons failed to drop greatswords, and as a result you have to fight the battle that needs a +4 or better with a weapon you can't use very well, which of course makes it harder, using up more resources than normal, and since you run around with roughly the same combat ability from early levels as you do at higher levels, the second half of the game drains more resources than the early levels when they don't expect you to need them as much. so then the game goes from super easy, to super hard, all due to dice rolls. so if you have random weapons from boss like enemies you should have the ability to trade in the weapon for an equivalent weapon of similar type (so that you aren't screwed over), or maybe each of those ten are guaranteed to have a different weapon, so that you may not have your favored weapon right away, but you will get it at some point. it is kinda like in the IE games when you picked a weapon that doesn't have a more powerful form, and as such you are gimping yourself by specializing in it, only that what that weapon is is random, which is bad (though no weapon should be gimped just because anyway).

A good DM/GM ensures that all aspects of a character are brought into play during the campaign, so those electing to min/max to the point of having preposterously low scores pay a heavy penalty. i have never seen a fighter need decent intelligence, as it is an ability which influences skill points and arcane spell casting and little else it is an obvious dump stat that is hard for a DM to force the entire party to have decent scores, instead of letting the wizard step up for the party. charisma is pretty useless for a simple dungeon crawl for most classes, and wisdom is only needed for most classes for its will save, which can be augmented in other ways. physical traits are harder to make into dump stats, which penalizes the non warrior classes more which is a trend i tend to see in DMs trying to eliminate dump stats, of course they also tend to curb magic a bit since if you do stack various abilities and effects you can get very OP spells and thus nerfing them to keep this from happening requires one to think more along min max lines to be useful in a party, along with more emphasis on physical traits makes mages less useful in most cases. of course the flip side is mages/clerics so powerful the fighters just sit back and does nothing.

in DA this was how it was, you'd cast fireball on the enemies that didn't charge you melee people, then magic missile on the big threat in the melee, then flame arrow, then acid arrow, then magic missile again, then restart the process. if the single threat went invisible due to using an ability when you wanted to cast a spell on him, then your que gets wiped and the character casts fireball on the big threat then auto attacks him waiting for the CD to expire as you didn't trade the ability to perform certain quests for the ability to have him need slightly less hand holding (you would have to spend 5 minutes and the start of combat to configure his AI, and maybe pause the combat once or twice and do it again due to things changing, as opposed to keeping an eye on his symbols and what the enemies were doing that might disrupt your orders, all from a fps viewpoint that can't see the whole battlefield) that probably won't make a difference in 90% of the fights anyway.

"mass gained matches the velocity of the original object"? You can't compare mass with velocity. But granted, even if the velocity drops you might get to apply the advantage of the sling (which produces a higher momentum than a simple throw with your arm because of higher velocity). Permanent magic effects are probably the best source of paradoxes you can find in magic systems. Because you get the magic effect for free. all mass has velocity, and if that velocity matches is what i meant, i am not saying that mass equals velocity or some such nonsense, and yes magic creates paradoxes like crazy. True, this seems to indicate that momentum is not conserved. Or ... Magic ;-). You forgot that shrinking the ballista is part of a load/fire cycle. Now your ballista does some more damage per minute but wastes a lot of mage spells that could be used to deal damage directly. there is a glove that stores a weapon by the same principle in DnD, it is a free action to grow and shrink it, applying the magic to a larger weapon you can get this result, same principal used. Because magic breaks laws of physics you have hundreds of paradoxes for free. A grounding in reality doesn't help, you left it already. The only solution is constraining what you can do with magic. A game master in PnP sessions does this automatically, he either accepts an idea or he just says no. If you don't constrain, then magic becomes unbalanced as can be seen in Oblivion (or Skyrim?) where combination of spell effects simply leads to overpowered spells. But as long as people have fun with being overpowered it works for bethesda ). But cRPGs are never really completely free form, most paradoxes are simply avoided by the limits of the program. as the idea for crafting with essence is to essentially create a free form method to craft magical items i am simply pointing out flaws that occur when you do this, thus making something less free form will fix these issues, such as KotORs method (power crystals and various parts). minecraft has obvious paradoxes already, so the inclusion of others isn't as big of a deal, but in the IE games there was some semblance of normalcy, and thus obvious paradoxes would be far more jarring. so when people see that you can do X with an object via magic, and wish to do X to another object which should produce superior results and you can't then you have a quirk. if you have too many of these in a system that alludes itself to being free form then it becomes pointless. if you lack those quirks then it becomes a system which can break the balance of the game. thus using enchanted parts that already exist can restrict their use in a way that doesn't feel as cheap as having custom enchanting that only works on a limited set of enchantments and objects. in other words magical items are magical due to some unknown process with unknown restrictions, and we just use the result to make things, instead of tinkering with magic itself.

you need weapon configurations, at least two, though on fighters and classes without many abilities you might have more. having those selected be in a different spot means the portraits change positions based on who is selected, which isn't that great i don't see the need to alter formations on the fly (though it is a nice thing, it might not warrant the space) as you generally don't change formation frequently, instead in combat you'd hand place people to make use of the environment and circumstances. animated portraits are only good if you can still import your own (normal inanimate) pictures. everything else i have noticed other people have already commented on. you could have icons instead of words, and then use tool tips to say what they are, that way you can get more buttons in. putting portraits on the side will also free up more room, and enlarging the selected portrait/s to fit a certain space (so that multiple selected doesn't take up as much individually, after all you only have so much room) could work instead of rearranging your portraits every time you want to select someone.

So you think that a cannon ball would keep his speed after leaving the sling of holding and so do much more damage than a simple sling ? Wouldn't it be more likely that as soon as the ball regains it's normal weight, its speed would drop dramatically because of momentum conservation. Because speed = momentum / mass. Higher mass, lower speed. Or better said the same speed as if the sling of holding were a simple sling. the idea is that you could use a sling with a cannonball without needing the strength to do so. and as far as speed = momentum/mass goes it is you are right, if the mass gained is considered to be at rest then the cannonball would decelerate rapidly, however if the mass gained matches the velocity of the original object then it wouldn't decelerate rapidly. now consider that heavy objects are pulled from bags of holding all the time, yet they never fly out of people's hands while trying to accelerate to the earth's rotation, and they also don't unbalance people currently balancing more so than if they had already been holding the object. as an object in motion wants to remain in motion and and object at rest wants to stay at rest, as well as every action there is an equal and opposite reaction, thus pulling an object out of a bag would immediately result if dramatic demand for kinetic energy as is enters the material plane, unless it gains external energy (as in from a hand while in the pocket dimension for lifting it out, and the container for the spin of the earth) which doesn't exert forces onto other objects (which would cause the bag to exhibit the characteristics of mass and thus defeat the purpose of a bag of holding), all possible due to magic. let's get another example of siege weapons and magic of extra strong effects: a ballista and a shrinking spell shrunk down it is a light crossbow, then on uttering a command word it grows to full size loading a ballista requires 3 people (as per 3.0 DnD player's handbook) to load it as a full round action and one person to fire it as a standard action a light crossbow requires one person to load as a move action and 1 person to fire it as a standard action uttering a command word is a free action loading the pocket ballista takes a move action, then uttering the command word a free action and firing it a standard action, and thus you achieve damage well beyond what normal weapons can do. this is basic stuff, i'm sure i could come with far more complicated things, but the point is if you have a free form system you need it to have some grounding in reality otherwise people might make leaps you didn't intend, logical or not. disassembling a magical sword to get the magical blade then using it to make another magical sword with the same blade (and thus the same type of sword) would make more sense, but probably not result in what the OP wanted with the free form system (a glorified KoTOR system).

i didn't like DA:O because i was constantly wiping their ques due to changing battlefield conditions, and if i didn't set up ques, then i either had to trust in their AI (which was pretty poor) or keep track of their CDs and pause the exact time each of them came off CD. of course that isn't taking into account things that would wipe their ques for me (and thus reinstate their AI unless i paused the game and redid their ques, and no i am not talking about bugs). i imagine that i could have customized their AI 2 or three times during battle so that they didn't need such hand holding, but that is more effort than it was worth.