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Silent Winter

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  1. Silent Winter
    Indeed, . For what it's worth, though, I actually prefer the specific dialogue/noticeability effects to the simple stat shift. Why? Because Charisma affects FAR more things than just initial reaction and things that would be affected by your "face." In the typical systems, at least. I think it's, in a way, more interesting when a trait actually affects specific aspects/applications of a stat or skill. A good, simple example is the effect on critical hits, rather than simply damage, or ranged weapon range, instead of pure chance to hit bonuses. Oh, my +stat examples were just for example - I don't even know what the actual PE stats and their effects are. I agree that it could be better as per your example.
  2. Silent Winter
    So what you're saying is that they'll all struggle to upgrade their strongholds? Hey, maybe in PE we can borrow from a thug-heavy credit agency and then either pay back the money or be visited by 'the boys' (who will be hard to deal with at lower levels (they'll just nick all your cool stuff and then promise to come back later) - but then at higher levels, you'll trounce them and the agency will decide it's not worth the expense to reclaim their losses ... or they'll hire a dragon to make an example of you).
  3. Silent Winter
    For a minute I thought I'd clicked the wrong thread When I get PE installed, I'll probably roll up a quick test-character to check out the first area and then spend ages rolling up various characters to explore the character creation system before settling on one I like best.
  4. Silent Winter
    I'd never heard of Baldur's Gate before I played the crpg but I still think the name had a good resonance. If it had been called 'Perrywinkle's Gate' then it wouldn't have struck the same chord. The name is hardly the most important thing, but to attract customers browsing on the (virtual-)shelf, it has an impact. Baldur's Gate - 3 syllables, Icewind Dale - 3 syllables, Planescape Torment - 4 syllables, Temple of Elemental Evil - ok, 9 syllables, but it sounds cool Eternity - 4 syllables and evokes fantasy atmosphere Still, as someone who's already going to buy it on day 1 (or possibly day 2 due to the timezones) it wouldn't stop me if it were called 'Obsidian's latest rpg with a heavy accent on bunnies' (or Olrwahaob' for short). I'm just thinking of the masses...
  5. Silent Winter
    I guess it's a lot more programming/writing to have more than one main antagonist, but I agree it would be interesting (not to mention the replay value) to be able to team-up with the 'villain' and end up fighting the 'good guys.' It's been done before in some games (though sometimes not until the final battle 'choose your side and fight' kind of thing). A lot could have been done for 'evil' playthroughs in BG2 (join the slavers, help Kalah, be a tyrant in D'Arnise Keep, take over spellhold (?)), some of which have been touched upon with mods but not very far. For PE, I'm just hoping for different factions having different, conflicting but believable goals and not just 'We want to take over the world' v. 'Hippy tree-huggers' (and I like to play as druid)
  6. Silent Winter
    So not good for sneaky rogues who want to avoid notice - gave me the idea for the opposite one: Utterly forgettable: You've just got one of those faces/builds that blends into the background. People don't remember seeing you, struggle to remember meeting you and couldn't pick you out in a lineup. +1 to stealth, -1 to charisma.
  7. Silent Winter
    Loving this update - Stronghold sounds like it's going to be great. I'd support the ideas to make it customizable for different classes, at least in some way - or have branching upgrades that mean you don't get everything (adds replayability - so I can go for a library OR a garden with different benefits) Also +1 vote for being able to play it differently (benevolent leader who tries to make life easier for his people v. self-interested tyrant v. 'Fair and Just ruler' who thinks people need to work hard but should be treated equally). Even without that, it looks good enough so far and I love that it'll be something that goes throughout the game and not just something we get near the end and then spend time+money on before forgetting about it. Just played through NWN2 OC - I liked the stronghold there, but it was a case of 'pay money, run into and out of the keep, building's finished, pay for the next one, rinse and repeat' - didn't feel like an achievement to build anything. Building should take some time and have real consequences - sounds like you've got it sorted though
  8. Silent Winter
    You probably don't know the systems from Shadowrun or GURPS, which work this way: You get a certain number of points that you can spend on traits. Beneficial traits cost you points, while detrimental traits give points back. I wasn't familiar with it - cheers for the explanation It makes good sense and provides incentive to choose (and try to balance) your own positive and negative traits. (and as you say, it means the designers don't have to try to contrive a balance for a certain trait).
  9. Silent Winter
    I don't like the idea of purely detrimental traits - otherwise why would anyone but a masochist choose them? There should be some encouragement/balance to them. Maybe picking one benefit causes a corresponding detriment to be chosen. OCD - you receive a -1 penalty to attack and concentration checks if your pack isn't systematically organised or if you left any unclaimed treasure lying on the dungeon floor. On the other hand, if you keep a well-organised pack, you receive a +1 bonus to spot and concentration checks. Tinkerer - you get a bonus to any checks when dealing with complex machines / experimental apparatus. However, you are likely to trigger any traps just by looking at them (LOL)
  10. Silent Winter
    Attack Roll (1 = critical miss) Troll moves to melee range AC Penalty (+4) for having ranged weapon equipped
  11. Silent Winter
    Great idea - If not a display case, then maybe they could have a mannequin to fit the armour /weapon to (should be quite easy to include in the engine). Would make a great use for the old armour / weapons, beyond selling them (and usually, late game, you don't need the money in these games). It could bring back nostalgia - "That's the sword I used to kill wossisname, and that armour saved me from being roasted by the fire-beastie"
  12. Silent Winter
    I like those 3 - still feel wizardly (or perhaps shamany from the tribal one) but different. This one is from Xurge3D (makes outfits for the Poser program) - stylish yet with freedom of movement
  13. Silent Winter
    While I have no problem with the finding of gold-coins or the odd ruby, I like the idea of less common treasure. A set of things to collect might be interesting. It couldn't be overdone though (how many priceless paintings will be left in dungeons? ... then again, why do people leave magic-swords lying around?) Finding some magic weaponry is fine, it might feel odd if the only weapons you find are of the uber-attack kind - but it has been overdone in the past, so less +1 weapons and more interesting treasure (perhaps with a dual purpose, collect v. sell) would be cool. Having said that - every unique item needs creating, describing and scripting in game so I don't want too much dev time on easter-eggs.
  14. Silent Winter
    Josh has said there's going to be visual aids for spell placements (so a circle showing the range of your fireball - a bit like TOEE I think). Personally, I prefer it without - makes spell-casting more challenging - but I can see the frustration of letting rip with a fireball and missing the enemy entirely.
  15. Silent Winter
    This is a great example of how to do the combat/general log - the different colours make it easy to follow what's going on and there's all the needed info available.
  16. Silent Winter
    I don't mind if I get the pronunciation 'right' but it's nice if I can at least read it in some way (so not the Thsxglshjnce kind of names). {example in point: Even with a pronunciation guide at the back of the book, I still mentally pronounce the Queen of Andor as [morGAHsa] rather than [morGAZE]}
  17. Silent Winter
    This one, to me, is the best arrangement. I find the descriptive text in italics to be nicely separated from dialogue so that my brain makes an auto-switch between 'voices' and it looks consistent. Doing it novel-style (no italics) is ok, but doesn't look right to me with the NPC name making it look more like a script so the non-quoted parts still look to be part of what the NPC is saying. Not sure it'll be possible to separate the initial 'scene-setting' description from the character name as it'll probably be part of the NPC's dialogue-files like in IE games (and thus the engine sees it as just text to display with his name). That doesn't bother me so much though.
  18. Silent Winter
    Sounds great Love the stronghold ideas and the Wicht creature looks and sounds creepy Conversation UI looks great I'd also like to know if we'll be able to see NPC portraits when talking to them (a la BG2 - I think BG1 didn't show them). I don't expect a portrait for every NPC but if it's possible in the engine then we can add our own / make mods to add them. (My BG2 override folder is full of stuff like this).
  19. Silent Winter
    I like that idea - would actually encourage potion usage too (sometimes I forget about certain potions until it's too late).
  20. Silent Winter
    Reactive AI would be cool (relative to the enemy's intelligence/training as KaineParker suggested, though even tribesmen wouldn't stand still for a 2nd fireball - they might still know enough to scatter unless their numbers were such that 'overwhelming charge' was their tactic ["Zulus, thousands of them"]). I like to control all 6 party members myself (first thing I do is turn off AI, and not just because it has a reputation for sucking). RTwP is great for me but I'm curious about the slow-mo idea - how slow? Will it be smooth? Can we even control the speed? Sometimes I like to take my time over decisions in a big fight, especially if things are going sour for me. But I do remember one frantic battle in IWD when I thought I had the enemy bottle-necked in a doorway, only for reinforcements to arrive on my flank - had to pull back bit by bit, pelting the oncoming foes with magic while my melee characters retreated to cover the mages who could then fall back to the bridge. I was able to pause and consider of course but it still felt exciting - might have been even better if it was slow-mo, giving me time to issue commands but not infinite time to consider my actions. Don't want an action game though - still want to be able to have at least a little time to consider and issue commands to my 6 party members.
  21. Silent Winter
    Ah, fair enough then. Assuming there isn't an equivalent "Apples of HP restoration" or something then I may end up not hoarding potions. The invisibility potions were another one I hoarded in BG, for the reasons mentioned - don't know when I'll get another one and I 'might' need it more later. It'd be great if we were encouraged to use consumables (not just potions) more, either by tough gameplay or situational rewards (like the 'walk through walls' suggestion - good idea).
  22. Silent Winter
    Just thinking out loud: What might be fun is if different societies/settlements act differently, e.g. - In a close-knit village, if you try to steal from one person (let's call him 'Bob') then everybody becomes alert (since Bob tells his mates) or comes to Bob's defence. - In a big and heartless city, it's only the one person, Bob, who becomes alert as everyone else ignores the situation 'nothing to do with me, I'm off') Guards might be more effective in the city (better trained) and more likely to side with the local in the village (his mates).
  23. Silent Winter
    I'm another that hoards potions for a rainy day (I expect I'll finish PE with 20 health-potions on each party member). IF the rest+recover spells thing is limited though, we may end up needing to use more potions for healing. I like the idea of potions being ability-modifiers - maybe a health-type potion could increase the potency of the cure-wounds spell. As suggested though, it'd take a lot of potions to do that thoroughly for each class. Perhaps generic potions of: 'extend ability time' (for time-limited abilities/spells) 'increase yield' (for damage abilities/spells) 'faster recovery' for cool-down spells. It might help to include potion-usage in the tutorial section (be it in-game or separate) - put the player up against a tough group of foes and talk them through using potions to overcome the odds - gets the player into the mindset of using those potions rather than waiting.
  24. Silent Winter
    Picking up on the spirit-shifting side - if it's not going to be a full animal transformation (and I do like the partial transformation idea) - perhaps it could be represented by an aura (semi-transparent floating Wolfness) rather than needing all new models. Just thinking out loud. NPC reactions could be interesting, but in my limited experience people tend to just attack on sight when you're in beast form. Maybe in areas with lots of Druids NPCs won't raise an eyebrow when a spiritshifted druid wanders into town, but in more urban areas the guards may react somewhat nervously or aggressively to the clawed animal walking about. It would be cool if there were some kind of reaction to your shape-shifted form. Would probably take too much time to code different reactions to different forms but a general 'Is it a monster?' kind of reaction would be good. Also liking the idea of some kind of 'plant' hybrid form - perhaps rooting himself for resistance to knockdowns or drawing up nutrients from the ground to heal.
  25. Silent Winter
    I'm glad I'm not the only one who thought that (but I had to include it in the poll anyway) I'm torn between liking novel-style and liking parantheses (perhaps because many BG-mods used parentheses). I guess I don't really mind as long as it's consistent.
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