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curryinahurry

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Everything posted by curryinahurry

  1. curryinahurry
    Actually, I was thinking of a combination of situations. As Indira Lightfoot mentioned, there will be that Adventurer's Guild, but also in non-plot specific situations, like dealing with a merchant, or in certain sidequests, the SOZ system might work well. In the main quest, or in plot relevant (or any other the devs think is pertinent) situations, I would expect the NPCs to chime in as the folks at Obsidian deem warranted.
  2. curryinahurry
    Ok, so you just would like bigger portraits. I think that's fine if there is also a mechanism, like the SOZ dialog box I posted, so that other party members can participate at the behest of the PC (if Obsidian is planning on something like that in game- not the same as three or four way conversations). Maybe this can be handled with a little speech bubble icon above the character portrait of any potential participants.
  3. curryinahurry
    @ Rahelron In a long conversation, how would you track who said what? Would the dialog / combat log track this and the large dialog screen your showing display the current speakers? Or did you have something else in mind. TBH, its a bit much for me; taking up that much space on the screen, but maybe if the size can be dragged lrger or smaller.
  4. curryinahurry
    I posted about this in another thread, but I really liked the way Storm of Zehir handled conversations, including the interface. Of course the graphics should match PE, but something like this would be great.
  5. curryinahurry
    I also hope that you folks will allow us to change the portrait locations from along the bottom to right-justified. The other elements are less important, but between the location of the portraits and the action bars above (plus status icons), bottom justified will remain an ungainly solution to me.
  6. curryinahurry
    @ Karkarov; I like it, especially if it can be re-oriented to a side panel. Both because of portrait location and that I don't want function keys above the portraits; to the side seems less unwieldy. The problem is that Obsidian is going for a full border effect, whether its bottom, right, or L-shaped to follow their aesthetic goals of an interface reminiscent of the IE games. Just my 2 cents. It does match the overall game aesthetic nicely.
  7. curryinahurry
    If I remember correctly, in Storm of Zehir, your party members not designated as speaker would have an opportunity to chime in in a dialog panels by having a note by their portrait. PE could do the same thing, and to address the potential for party members having every skill to unlock conversation options; that could affected by influence, factions, etc. In other words, if your PC doesn't pass an influence check with the party member in question, they may not offer their insight. Likewise if the potential questgiver/person of interest is from a rival or even disliked faction. Here is a description of the system from an interview with Anthony Davis: http://www.gamefront.com/obsidian-dev-posts-example-of-storm-of-zehir-party-conversation-system/
  8. curryinahurry
    Looks great. You folks have really captured an IE/ ToEE feel early in the process! I like the sconces/urns; once there is animation that should look great. I also like the various portals, and of course, the sinister doohickey. I hope that it is possible to animate the sconce lights because that would really make environments of this sort feel alive . Cheers
  9. curryinahurry
    Leif, I think that plot related feats and abilities wouldn't be class related. When NWN2 came out, there were some excellent trainer mods that came out that allowed players to level up their characters and then try them in combat. I'm not expecting anything like that, but a spreadsheet or planner allowing us to see how core abilities, feats, skills interact would be really handy considering this is a brand new system Obsidian is developing. I think it would be great if they released something like this at the same time as the beta (for all backers, not just the beta key purchasers) as another way to ramp up the anticipation of the final product. It could be set up as a planner for only the first 5 levels or so; just a teaser. That would be another way to avoid spoilerish content.
  10. curryinahurry
    This topic reminded me of when NWN 2 came out and there was all kinds of rage on the Bio boards that the character presets were ugly. It was a bit jarring (and amusing) to read some of the comments and how angry some people became that their elves weren't pretty, and then proceeded to rant about it for 20 pages.
  11. curryinahurry
    I have been thinking about the comments on the board and agree with Gumbercules assessment about giving options to the players...although I will say that a truly minimal UI maybe too much additional work for the Obsidian people. It may require re-thinking not just the positions of items, but also the decorative elements included to evoke a feeling reminiscent of the old IE games. That said, I think some variation of the UI Obsidian posted, as re-imagined by Sensuki for example, should be fine for some. For others, a vertical orientation will be preferable. Especially for those of us who have widescreen monitors, or just plain dislike portraits at the bottom of the screen (like me). I decided to do one more iteration of the UI I posted before, thinking that in the last one, the bottom frame of the U was mostly useless, and the left frame was completely useless. this is the result: I'm thinking that a solution like this keeps the valuable screen space at the bottom visible on widescreen monitors. Less frequently used actions buttons like settings and formations can go on the left, with the dialog box floating or docking on the left. The remainder of the area can be used to add framing is consistent with the games desired aesthetic. I went with Celtic as it seems to be a source material for a good deal of the lore and critters. It might be nice if we could have a variety of skins to choose from in this regard based on different regions within the game.
  12. curryinahurry
    Ok, so there have been some nice edits since yesterday; Labadal, Sensuki, Malekith, and also some ideas from Karkarov (sp?). I took some of the ideas along with Josh Sawyer's comments and did this: Action keys below portraits. The action keys could have corresponding pop-up, or roll-outs for sub-menu activites (as the above for spells). I would also like to have a pop up character page available for the character I select in combat, as this saves all sorts of time. I would also still like to see a transparency slider.
  13. curryinahurry
    With regards to the comments about the relative locations of character portraits vs. action buttons...I want to clarify my thinking on why proximity may not be particularly important. I think that the reason most people would prefer (I'm basing this on comments on this topic) vertical portraits, besides the IE throwback feel, is so we can easily track status of the characters at a glance vis a vis hitpoints/stamina, spell effects, etc. The vast majority of players will likely click directly on the character model or keystroke the appropriate character by their number designation. Therefore, if you're primarily going to click in the middle of the screen to select characters, it makes the most sense to put that action buttons directly below (middle bottom), but really, anywhere along the bottom would likely suffice. Feel free to correct me if I'm wrong, but I almost never click on the character icon for anything besides cycling through inventory, or some other on pause activity.
  14. curryinahurry
    Rostere, it looks pretty good on my 24" screen at a 1440 resolution, but, yes I think its a bit small
  15. curryinahurry
    The Itis, my thinking is that the UI can be designed in a way that if someone wants a "Classic" IE feel to their interface, that would be fine, and if they wanted to customize it more by moving palettes and adjusting transparency, that could be accommodated.
  16. curryinahurry
    Actually, there probably won't be any need for a minimap in an isometric game...Not sure at this point why I left it in.
  17. curryinahurry
    I was thinking that dialogue would either float in its own palette (see above the character sheet palette ) or could dock in the bottom frame on the right side.
  18. curryinahurry
    Ok, so this is more of what I am hoping for; a BG2 style frame with floating palettes, and a transparency slider for the frame: and:
  19. curryinahurry
    Cheers
  20. curryinahurry
    Ok, I'm going to try to upload a mock-up I did a while back in an earlier UI thread. Basically, I would like a BG2 style interface, but with option to re-rearrange or float palettes and a transparency slider for the frame. And:
  21. curryinahurry
    I'm not looking for a minimalistic interface, just one that allows for some customization and isn't nearly so cluttered. Also the stylized menu buttons in the center borders on illegible, and the statuary + columns means there is little room for quick items, equipment & weapon sets, or formation buttons - a key element in the old IE UIs. Sensuki's edit might help, but to my eye, it still looks way too inefficient.
  22. curryinahurry
    +1 for opacity slider on the UI...actually having a fully dockable set of palettes and a toggle to turn off the border would be great. And I agree with whoever made the comment about the border and UI not matching. As a matter of fact, if you plan to use an "old parchment" feel to these cutscenes, then you folks may want to re-think the UI color scheme.
  23. curryinahurry
    I'm not a fan of portraits at the bottom of the screen(right side is much better). Also, I liked how the NWN games had floating tool-bars for spells, etc. I think being too slavish to the IE games runs the risk of being detrimental to the game; both aesthetically and in terms of practicality. I do like the text screen concept.
  24. curryinahurry
    I think a lot of the thinking about the usefulness of non-combat skills in these types of threads comes from an understanding of what will be useful based on prior experience in D&D type CRPGS (including DA). The folks at Obsidian, having done the Fallout games, and Josh Sawyer being a fan of Darklands, might employ a much wider range of skills than we typically find handy in fantasy CRPGs. Overland travel & exploration could be aided, by skills like ride, wood-wise, tracking, local lore, herbal-ism, survival etc. In dungeons it could be stone-craft, mining, religion, lore, metallurgy, etc. Carpentry or a build structures skill, might allow the party to circumvent obstacles. there might be skills for speaking different languages; reading & writing, alchemy, artifice. The fact is that a combat oriented character might find a great deal of skills to invest points in while staying combat-centric, and we already have been told that combat will be a focus of the game, so the non-combat oriented optimization would only serve to gimp characters. If a player wants to create a sub-optimal character for RP purposes, that is his/her choice. If Obsidian wants to include pre-rolled arch types, that is fine. I just don't see any need to have pre-optimized kits at the beginning of the game when we have no idea how the game will play out or what types of character builds will fit the gameplay style we might want to pursue.
  25. curryinahurry
    I would disagree with this definition (vis a vis "fun"), but even if we accept it; the problem with playing a game anyway one likes, is that one runs the risk, with that level of freedom, of ruining ones own good time. Since people seldom blame themselves for playing games incorrectly the blame falls back on the game developer. Remember, what started a lot of this discussion (and also the whole xp for kills vs quests), was the desire on the part of Obsidian to discourage degenerate gameplay. That concern seems to track back to people ruining their own good time, and blaming the game and game designer, which in turn hurts the company's reputation. I think many of the people who are advocating less flexibility aren't necessarily trying to tell other s how they should play, so much as trying to make sure PE is successful in its intentions. Which is ultimately to play the game the way that Obsidian envisions it. That and making sure that the limited resources Obsidian has at its disposal don't get wasted at the expense of better dialog, quests, etc.
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