Ark Evensong

Wh-What? ... No, the pledge tier/packages don't work that way. For a Wasteland 2 key, I'm pretty sure you had to have selected a tier that included it during the Kickstarter. Maybe - just maybe, if you backed during the kickstarter and haven't finalized your pledge, you can still select a Kickstarter tier that includes it, and pay the difference. I'm pretty sure none of the post-kickstarter tiers (which are now available on backer portal) include Wasteland 2. It's not available as an add-on, either. Kinda makes sense - WL2 is made by inXile, not Obsidian. (Different publisher, too.)

Pretty sure there isn't. I mean, I haven't signed anything. You usually get those NDA thingies out of the way before handing out the actual keys. (Unless, you know, there are some people who got it early, and haven't told anyone yet because of an NDA ... Even then, it would be lifted by tomorrow.)

The way I remember it being explained, (on the non-expert settings, anyway.) the first time your health reaches 0, you become maimed. Meaning a bunch of offensive and defensive penalties. The next time you go down, you die. (I'm ... not entirely sure how "next time down" is done. Do you get to burn through a full stamina bar each encounter, or do you get a few "we really mean it this time" health points?) So, both outcomes are in, but you only risk death if you decide to push on after being maimed.

Off-topic tangent, but : Demons? I haven't heard anything about demons - in fact, I kinda expect (and hope) there won't be any. (Other fantastical creatures and monsters, sure - plenty of those.) That said, I don't see any inherent problems with wildlife attacking at range. I'm having a hard time thinking of any real-life examples, though (at least at "ranger companion" size), and I can also totally understand keeping to melee for (ease of?) balancing reasons.

I'm not with Obsidian, but I doubt this would be a problem. I imagine the key is yours to do with as you please - to use, not use, or give away as you see fit. I suppose selling it would be frowned upon. And depending on how the Backer Beta Forum will be set up, might have to jump through some hoops to give the recipient access/recognition there?

Well, there'd have to be a balance of some kind. If you develop all three versions absolutely concurrently, you just might end up fixing the same problem three times. Or end up fixing things that would've worked themselves out later. Bugtesting, too - it'll probably muddy the waters between global and platform related bugs. Easier if you test your cross-platform with a known-issues list. Anything new is likely to do with the platform implementation. As such, I see no problem whatsoever with having one version be a couple of weeks ahead of the other ones. But yeah, designing your code with multiplatform in mind is good practice.

We sure do. The Backer Beta will not include the full game - only a comparatively small area, not on the 'critical path' of the story/game. Basically side-quest material. So no story spoilers.

Well, I haven't played Divine Divinity, so I'll take your word for it. As long as the standard range is 'enough', I guess it's fine? Still not a fan of the concept, though.

In Arcanum, the Perception stat was tied to how far you could scroll the screen/view away from your character. Interesting enough, but I'm not usually a fan of tying User Interface usability to character stats. For fog of war, I guess it's acceptable in rare circumstances? (Dark caves, or .. I dunno, just not most of the time.) Otherwise it becomes a must-have for the player instead of the character.

Ugh, Fine. Hehe. Alright, Ark Evensong, Absent God-King of the Non-Obsidian Obsidian Order it is, then. It's older (except for the Absent part), and it's more of a title than an explanation where my nick comes from, anyway. Still a mouthful, but if it doesn't wrap nicely under the name, I guess I could shave off one of the Obsidians? (Not as amusingly convoluted, though.)

Wow, that is some atrocious image compression. (Huh, once clicked on/zoomed in, they're not that bad. Not great, but very legible, unlike these previews. Hmm.) Other than that, good to hear! Managed to finally sign up on that Obsidian Order of Eternity thing - $8 is enough to fix one (1) tiny graphical glitch or something, right?

Eh, well, then we're no longer talking about a simple renaming, but an entire overhaul. Anyway, the part about going down and getting up with a penalty is already in. The first time your Health hits 0, you're Maimed, and indeed get huge penalties to offense and defense. The next time you run out of Stamina, you're dead for good. (On the non-Expert modes, anyway. On Expert, it's 0 for the first time, and you're gone.) For most classes, damage to Stamina is converted to Health damage on a 4:1 ratio - Basically, you can go down 4 times from full before you're gone for good. Barbarians convert it on a 8:1 ratio, so they can go down a lot more often. 4:1 is fairly clean. It's simple enough to grasp after the initial "Huh, I have two Health bars?" confusion. I'm really not sure how you envision filling up your Fatigue meter. What conversion rate you do use? Percentages? Or will having a large amount of Combat Hit Points make you last less fights? If you are using percentages, you really should just stick to a 100 pool for everyone, no exceptions.

4/ And then, when you get very tired, you die. Really, I think "Health" being connected to the thing that makes you die when you run out is a lot more important than "Health" being connected to the thing that keeps you fighting, standard naming conventions be damned. The way it works now, I believe Full Health and Full Stamina are the same number. In your example, it sounds like everyone would have 100 "True Health", so you'll have to implement some scaling for the damage done to that, which will only obfuscate the way it works under the hood. Lore-wise, it also depends on what healing spells are supposed to do. Do they knit your wounds back together, or are they more of an Adrenaline/Painkiller combo? And if it can actually heal your wounds, what consequences will that have on the world? Will you still need doctors? etc. etc. Regardless, there was already mention in one or two of the videos that Stamina was likely to be renamed to Endurance. ... I'm not really sure whether that will clear up any confusion, but it makes more sense than Tired=DED. Fake EDIT: Ninja'd by Fatback

You know what's great about the Buy Add-Ons fuction in the Pledge Manager working again? Being able to sign up as a member of the Obsidian Order of Eternity without jumping through hoops - because I was too much of a cheapskate two years ago. Granted, I wasn't active on any forum or discussion back then, and my wallet was hurting. But it's been 2 years, and any financial hurt has long been forgotten. (Or maybe there was a real easy way, and I missed it somehow? But anyway, I signed up.) You know what's less great? Deciding on a title. Currently I'm having trouble deciding between the following two: Absent God-King of the Non-Obsidian Obsidian Order Official Arcanum Inn Anagram Name Bearer of the Obsidian Order They're both rather long, and their origins are over a decade old, but, ugh. Decisions! Maybe this isn't the thread to discuss this, (You know, For Announcements Only, perhaps?) but opinions are appreciated. (Maybe I should just roll a d2 flip a coin?)

Yeah, I'm pretty sure he meant that the Steam Beta won't turn into the full game upon release. Whether there'll be a non-Steam Beta remains to be confirmed, I think.

Also possibly useful as a debugging/testing tool? I'm pretty sure someone has to run around the game checking whether there's enough (local) variation in NPC faces/hair, and whether it matches up with the description and/or portrait of said NPC. Big Head Mode would make that easier/quicker to check, I think. Could easily win its 'implementation cost' back that way.

Hmm. Playing around with disposition modifiers based on race (/culture/background/class/gender/hair color/whatever) could be interesting. Not sure it would have the desired effect, though - Not every Thomas, Richard and Harold is going to respond to dispositions, and it'll make those who do care about those specific dispositions look especially racist. (Even if they're specifically not.) Then there's the question whether "Death" is actually associated with Cruelty and Deception in Eora. I imagine depends on culture - so while some inhabitants of the Eastern Reach may indeed see "Death Godlike" and think 'Cruel' and 'Deceptive', others may think 'Stoic' and 'Honest'. If you want a more general level of distrust, perhaps look at the Location and Faction reputations? Add some negative points there. More "regular people" should react to those. (Not sure I'd like to see such large changes based on race, though.)

Yeah, I know it's pretty much the tutorial, and thus a showcase piece, but one can hope, right? I really wouldn't mind if like 90% of all dialog options where you try to get something done would be behind some threshold. (Set to values where most characters would unlock half or so?)

Also, if the demo video is any indication, unless you're hyper-specialized, you'll be offered multiple attribute- or skill-unlocked options in most situations. That's pretty cool, I think.

No, the point is that if they'd gone with an Objective XP system, rewards for the non-combat solutions would most likely have been better balanced against the combat rewards. (As such, you wouldn't get 5 times the XP if you choose to fight over other options.) No respawning/No random encounters only makes this worse, as you'll have no way to catch up with that XP gap. Unless you go back after collecting the "no-combat" XP rewards, and then kill everything anyway. That's no fun, and reeks of exploiting game mechanics. (I don't know if the situation with D:OS is that bad, haven't played it yet.)

For the Beta? Yes, August 18th. Final release? No. "Winter this year." Portal upgrade so you can edit your pledge and buy into the beta? No. "Soon."

Just to voice possibly the last remaining contrary opinion, I think it looks just fine as-is, even without color coded NPC names. In fact, I'd rather not see those, either. Different colors (and thus contrasts with the background) can be quite jarring. Won't complain (much?) if it does make it in, though.

I'm not familiar with Josh's twitter personality, but that tweet sounds pretty playful to me, not sour at all. As for Big Head Mode, I'm having flashbacks to DK Mode in Goldeneye on the N64. (Except that was Huge Head + Huge Arms). I'm also reminded of some jRPGs, and their often more cutesy look. (Chibi, I think the term was? Small body/limbs, big head? Hmm.) Anyway, I think it's pretty cool.

Eh, it's a little about UI convenience if you're going to change the loadout of those two weapon sets a lot between combats. (Which you're much less likely to do when you have 4.) But I see the point now. Strategic versus Tactical choices. Sure. Considering the way weaknesses/resistances are set up, it makes sense to go for making do with what you've got versus (almost) always having the best tool for the job available. I'd probably still prefer more weapon sets by default, but I can understand the reasoning. Guess Beta will convince me one way or the other?

Considering Sensuki sent those questions over a month ago, asking about pathfinding issues in the demo would've been pretty ... remarkable prescient?