Gromnir

never played it, but we did see frequent complaints about south park bugginess at release. it were one o' the only things we do recall from reviews o' a game we had no intention o' playing. we like south park (most o' the time) but a sp game didn't grab us. regardless, we do recall bugs being mentioned. HA! Good Fun!

They hate America. doesn't kotaku have an asian slant? is americans who is fans o' japanese games and entertainment who created the site, yes? at least that is what we assume from the name o' the site and our brief and indifferent perusal o' their content. articles is as likely to be about japanese tv commercials and the latest bizarre japanese pizza hut menu items as they is 'bout games. the thing is, we believe they do a better job with the culture stuff than they does with games. after all, their game reviews is having same draw as their culture drops. kotaku, rather than saying anything that would interest Gromnir, tends to focus on surface appeals to quirkiness or what the anime-watching crowd might think is kewl. there is definite worse sites for game previews and reviews, but even so, we would prefer to french kiss an electrical outlet than spend 10 minutes at the kotaku site reading their game content. am not their target audience. HA! Good Fun!

but I know you have troubles understanding simple points. going for irony? *shrug* then again we did mention only a post ago that people is easily distracted and we knew that convincing folks that a tank skill were useful for a tank character would be difficult at this point. HA! Good Fun! ps complete aside, but we were playing with chanters in anticipation o' utilizing kana, and it seems that "thick grew their tongues" is working opposite o' what we expected. 'course interrupt related talents and abilities all seem a bit weird at this point. That's.. I think that's the first time I see a reverse strawman. Is that a thing these days? Is there a term for it? until folks take a test on their reading o' copi, there should be a prohibition on their use o', or references to, logic fallacies. say, "strawman" is not like abracadabra or hocus pocus, chum. HA! Good Fun!

but I know you have troubles understanding simple points. going for irony? *shrug* then again we did mention only a post ago that people is easily distracted and we knew that convincing folks that a tank skill were useful for a tank character would be difficult at this point. HA! Good Fun! ps complete aside, but we were playing with chanters in anticipation o' utilizing kana, and it seems that "thick grew their tongues" is working opposite o' what we expected. 'course interrupt related talents and abilities all seem a bit weird at this point.

is weird. in multiple threads we got folks complaining how the engagement system hinders combat movement. at the same time, when a fighter can actual engage three foes, some o' the same folks is trying to tell us that engagement is pointless. is weird. engagement for the tank is more significant than many s'pose, particularly in synergy with other abilities and other classes, but there is no way we is gonna be able to convince anybody at this point. ability to hold 3 opponents is just one tanky ability fighters have that paladins do not. perhaps paladins make up for the lack o' pure tanky abilities with their impressive selection o' buffs and cleanses? is worthy debate material and we have no doubt that a defense focused paladin will be a viable tank regardless o' whether or not it is optimal. folks is so easily distracted, but am thinking it helps prove a point-- you not need optimal to be successful in poe. the starting attributes in poe is ultimately less important than the abilities and talents a character will acquire. start attributes are having impact, but they is only one aspect 'mongst many factors that will determine character efficacy. the game were designed to be more balanced than the typical crpg, and so it is. sure, there will be exploits that will need obsidian attention, but non-optimal attributes or a couple bad talents won't cripple or even hinder a joinable. on the other hand if obsidian combines bad attributes, plus bad abilities, plus bad talent selections, plus recruiting at post level 2, then we has the potential for a few teeth gnashing moments. for now, am cautiously optimistic. HA! Good Fun!

paladin tanks are a bit misleading. sure, they got great potential defenses, but tanking is as much about getting and holding aggro as it is about being a damage sink. fighters got superior engagement when in defender mode. fighter abilities is also more tank focused than is paladin abilities. am of the opinion that the deeper you get into the game, the paladin-as-tank builds will be decreasing in efficacy. that being said, particular on normal mode, we expect that the paladin will suffice in the tank role, even if it ultimately is not as impressive as a fighter tank.. or a monk tank. 'course, everybody has an opinion. HA! Good Fun!

just for the heck o' it, we made an elder tank in the bb and level'd to 8... same attributes as in the genesis post. we armed our elder with a fine hatchet and the fine large shield-- no ring o' deflection or any other goodies. is wearing plate. took vanilla talents and abilities-- constant recovery, defender, fighting spirit, knockdown, unbending and vigorous defense for abilities bonus knockdown, weapon and shield style, wary defender and rapid recovery. coulda' optimized talents and abilities a bit better, but we figure we ain't gonna get elder at level 1. with defender modal active, we got following stats: health- 827 endurance- 166 accuracy- 45 def- 102 fort 75 ref 83 wil 61 vigorous defense gets us a +20 to ALL defenses for 17.3 seconds, and the tank elder will effective have much greater endurance than we see listed. am having difficulty finding a way to complain about elder. *shrug* the other joinables will be similar in that how they is level'd is gonna have as much/more impact than starting attributes. durance will never be tanky, regardless o' his resolve, but he will be a very reliable support/heals. like it or not, aloth's effectiveness will be determined more by how you got your grimoire(s) filled than the attribute spreads-- use spells even remotely coherent, and he will be almost indispensable. etc. am not worried about the joinables based on initial attribute allocations. that being said, am far more concerned with talents and abilities. these joinables can be well and fully buggar'd if they gots horrible talent and ability selections and they is already level'd to 3 or 4 or whatever. HA! Good Fun!

people always reference their attributes in their build comparisons, but talents and abilities are likely more important than the attributes. say you got same attributes for two classes is less meaningful than you might expect. HA! Good Fun!

well, you weren't compelled to go to the inn as your first stop, but we get your meaning. the biowarians sure did learn their lesson for bg2. starting poe attributes is about as important as starting d&d 3.5 attributes. the starting point spreads is not inconsequential, but unlike d&d, there ain't the same opportunities to ridiculous inflate the staring attributes. poe attributes, while meaningful, is ultimately less important than talents and abilities, simply 'cause you is gonna get more abilities and talents. poe attributes won't get the d&d treatment whereby you effective need boost your prime attribute through the ceiling or you will be a constant fail. find ways to boost and stack an attribute will not supercede talents and abilities. we played the beta for many hours... too many hours. as often as not, we used the bb fighter as a tank with tank abilities and tank talents. our bb fighter ended up with very impressive deflection and were a fireplug tank that ruled engagement. the bb fighter gots crap resolve and perception. the attributes is having similar long-range impact as the starting point-buy abilities o' a 3e d&d pnp character. that isn't a bad thing, but am believing people is again looking at poe with their crpg experience as a filtre. compared to most crpgs with starting attributes, the initial poe numbers is gonna have far less meaning-- far less long-term meaning. *shrug* khalid were potential a fantastic archer, but he did stink up the joint early in the game. when we look at the starting attributes for the poe companions, we is hardly discouraged. with talents and abilities, we has no doubt we can make any o' the poe joinables effective. after all, the difference between effective and optimal, when looking only at starting attributes, is not particular large in poe. HA! Good Fun!

Honestly from the sound of it, you're still using the pet incorrectly. You talk about how much micro-managing it needs, but if you have a ranged ranger then it would probably need LESS management than it would for a melee ranger. You also refer to it as a seventh party member. To me, it sounds like you have the pet on the front lines with your tanks. That's not where the pet belongs, even if it's a bear or antelope. The pet should never be initially targeted by anything for engagement, it should single out a roamer or something presently engaged, and then the ranger follows the target of the pet. Pets tank just like rogues do, which is to say that they are not suited for it at all. Hang back with the pet, wait until the field is settled. If you find yourself missing a tank because the pet isn't grabbing aggro, then your party is imbalanced. The only time the pet can rush in is when the ranger is also melee. The ranger has higher defenses, access to higher DR, and has more endurance than the pet. The ranger will tank while the pet deals damage. The pet is not a meat shield, it is the method by which rangers deal damage. this is not our first rodeo. we never send the animal companion out front first. given how many times we has played the beta, we know how and when and what direction beetles and spiders and cultists will attack. if we didn't, we would be kinda screwed with the animal companion. however, the animal companion must be sent in to attack enemies at some point or it is worthless. hard-mode battles happen fast and frequent involve large-sized mobs that, gosh, sometimes make their saves v. slicken or get past a tank or whatever. try and fight more than one average or weak enemy = animal companion death. try to have animal comp run away from multiple foes = animal death. etc. and yeah, it is equivalent o' an extra party member as far as balancing is concerned. count the number o' party member icons... then add 1. the animal companion is a fragile extra party member with increasingly terrible accuracy, but the obsidians gotta treat the animal companion as extra beyond party member numbers... that is why poe has so few summons. persistent summons is effectively an extra party member, albeit a weak, taciturn and frequent annoying party member. HA! Good Fun!

after another +8 hours o' ranger play... meh. it isn't a hopeless class as it were in previous builds, but there is no way we would play a ranger our first time through poe on hard mode. the animal companion continues to require constant attention and care during the beta combats we have now completed literal dozens (hundreds?) of times. for Gromnir, meta-knowledge o' battles is almost a prerequisite for keeping the critter alive. also, the class still don't work particularly well as designed-- it is not a ranged-heavy hitter on par with the rogue. the class is not exactly great, but it ain't guaranteed to frustrate neither, save for our previous observation that we cannot possibly recommend playing a ranger for a first run o' poe on hard mode. as complete impossible as the suggestion is to be accepted by obsidian or boardies, we once again will put forth the notion that the single best way to improve the ranger is to comple discard the animal companion. the synergy between ranger and companion still needs tuning, the companions themselves are more nuisance than anything else, and we suspect that obsidian has more than a little difficulty balancing what amounts to a 7th party member. get rid o' the ranger's parasite and rebuild without all the attendant headaches and hurdles. HA! Good Fun!

yeah, it can be a boring class, but that is a selling point for some folks. boring to Gromnir is blessed low-maintenance to another player. even so, we woulda' liked more options for abilities that required player involvement, but we woulda' wanted stuff such as sock suggested earlier in the thread. improve paladin by including more abilities, optional abilities, that would still be defensive and support in nature, but would require more player monitoring, for those o' us micro-managers who have control issues... or whatever. HA! Good Fun!

Not class is "intended as [role]". Even assuming so goes against the design goals. Yes, Paladins are good at Support, and can make great tanks, but that is no excuse whatsoever to argue against being able to build them like anything else. It is needlessly and meaninglessly restrictive. This is not an MMO. Ultimately, each class should have any number of different roles or approaches as determined by their builds or the playstyle of the player, without any intended pigeonholing. This is really what it comes down to. There is no inherent reason why Paladins need to be a support class, nor any reason why paladins should be less engaging and interesting than any other class. Using "it's intended as [x]" is merely an excuse and symptomatic of shallow Rock-Paper-Scissor gameplay favoured by MMO:s and new-era FPS:s everywhere. Especially in an RPG, every class should have a wide range of viable builds able to perform admirably if built in those directions, and potentially always be just as interesting, engaging, and reactive as any other class. Anyone excusing bad mechanics with "it's intended" is really just mouthing off cop-outs. obsidian disagreed. when they announced the paladin class, they specific identified its role. obsidian did not hide the fact that the paladin were s'posed to be a support role class that were excellent in defense. http://forums.obsidian.net/topic/66195-update-78-the-leaders-of-the-band-chanters-and-priests/ http://forums.obsidian.net/topic/63968-update-56-paladins-and-wild-orlans/?p=1342013 the poe paladin is s'posed to play like 4e warlord or 3.5 marshal. the poe paladin had an intended role, just as all the other poe classes had roles. 11 classes. if you got 11 classes, it makes sense to have them be distinct. why have classes at all if you can let players customize complete out o' the class role? actually, Gromnir would be perfectly ok with no classes-- let the player make their own class from a wide variety o' abilities and talents. get rid o' classes and have free customization is a wonderful idea and it would get you and dune what you want. 'course that ain't what we got in poe. we got classes in poe. the more classes you got, the more narrow defined they must needs be. it were never hidden by the obsidians that the classes were designed to fulfill roles and that each role would be distinct, which is perfect rational and reasonable. folks who want a bunch o' classes and wanna freely customize outta the roles attached to the classes is what don't make sense to us... and apparently not to the developers either. HA! Good Fun!

hard mode is particular hard on the ranger's animal companions. hard mode increases the size o' mobs, and it is difficult to protect the animal companion from the flood o' beetles or spiders or whatever the developers throw at us right before we get hit with the kitchen sink. frequent enough, protecting the animal companion is converse either impossible or simple not worth the effort as keeping the critter safe also negates the animal companion's usefulness to the ranger. am admitting we haven't played more than about 2 hours o' ranger since 480 were released. we will play a bit more and see if it has genuine changed enough to warrant a reappraisal. HA! Good Fun!

these are excellent suggestions and more than more smite fixes, we would rather see such stuff added to a paladin's catalog o' abilities. dunehunter, the paladin is intended as a support class. if you wanna do serious melee damage, the rogue is an ideal alternative. *shrug* HA! Good Fun!

am admitting that we prefer more micro-management, but not everybody does. we like pressing buttons and controlling details o' combat. based on boardie feedback, other folks is less enthusiastic 'bout the minutiae. heck, am recalling that when the beta were first released, one o' the most oft-heard complaints were that combat were far too frenetic, particularly in hard mode. a class that didn't require constant handholding were a bit o' a boon. yeah, obsidian has worked a bit to make combat less overwhelming, but even so, for folks who don't have tens o' hours invested in poe combat, we suspect that the pace o' combat will be unexpected. perhaps some o' those folks will see usefulness in a poe paladin, yes? create 11 balanced and genuine unique classes for a crpg is no mean feat. paladins are low management support characters with excellent defensive qualities, so they is kinda meant to be boring to folks such as Gromnir who enjoy pressing buttons. that being said, we recognize the niche the paladin fills, and that niche don't need smite. HA! Good Fun!

paladins have (had) a role and that role is that they are low management support characters with excellent defensive qualities. obsidian did not envision that paladins would contribute much to the damage potential o' a party via their melee (or ranged) attacks. smite is a minimal concession to the fanbase demand for more direct combat efficacy from the paladin. sadly, the more smite is improved, the further we go astray from the new and intriguing obsidian vision for the paladin. improve auras and other support abilities o' the paladin makes sense. improve defensive qualities o' the paladin makes sense. improve smite? our opinion o' paladins started off as less than positive, but as o' 480, paladins are excellent in support, and they extreme durable. am disappointed by the apparent need to make the poe paladin, which is an impressive and intriguing class, into something with more damage potential. am all in favor o' adding to paladin catalog o' abilities, but we woulda' rather seen more diversity o' their support and defensive qualities as 'posed to giving them smite or smite 2.0. HA! Good Fun!

gonna need more input. do you prefer high maintenance or low maintenance characters? is a few classes that is excellent, but they require a great deal of micromanagement. do you have preferences about melee combat? perhaps you like to see your character in full-plate and swinging an anime style weapon o' impossible size? is three extreme broad groupings o' classes that the obsidians to reveal them to us. front-line/tanks is barbarians, monks and fighters. mob-rulers/cc characters were revealed to be wizards and druids.... they can do big damage, but they do it to groups more than single targets. heavy-hitters were the designation obsidian used for weapon-based characters who could, well, hit a single target hard. leader/support characters include the chanter (remote similar to a d&d bard, but not much alike) priests and paladins. ciphers, a caster class, got their own announcement, but they is having a differing role depending on who you ask on this board. they are excellent at doing damage to single targets and groups, but they are less flexible than wizards. they are kinda a sorcerer/psionicist amalgam, to use d&d vernacular. https://forums.obsidian.net/topic/66380-update-81-the-front-line-fighters-and-barbarians/ https://forums.obsidian.net/topic/63765-update-52-monk/ https://forums.obsidian.net/topic/65829-update-74-the-mob-rulers-wizards-and-druids-and-our-partnership-with-paradox/ https://forums.obsidian.net/topic/65025-update-71-the-heavy-hitters-rogues-and-rangers/ https://forums.obsidian.net/topic/66195-update-78-the-leaders-of-the-band-chanters-and-priests/ https://forums.obsidian.net/topic/64452-update-65-ciphers/ however, please note that all o' the tanky classes can do very reliable damage to enemies, as long as you build 'em the right way. paladins, can tank even though they are a support character, though the likely cannot tank as well as the three "front-line" classes. rangers don't currently work very well as the ranged-weapons-with-pet class they is s'posed to be, but there are some melee build s that work okie dokie if you look hard enough for them. also, be advised that some changes were made to many classes during the beta, so info in the links can be a little dated. *shrug* with 11 classes, each one is necessarily distinct and focused. however, particular since the beta started, the classes are flexible enough so that the notion o' the class' role is a bit misleading. you can customize to a significant degree. also, the developers worked hard to avoid the possibility o' overt bad character builds. attribute choices impact your character less in poe than in many games. the differences between weapon choices within the three broad categories o' weapons (yes, we know that is confusing) is almost incidental. choose talents after looking at excel spreadsheets til your eyes bleed, or choose 'cause a talent sounds kewl should not result in a insurmountable obstacle to success in the game. is tough to go terrible wrong. for instance, Gromnir is gonna play either a priest o' eothas or berath, or a rogue that dual-wields spears. regardless, am gonna use attribute allocations that most o' the number crunchers on the board would laugh at. in the beta, we had great success with all our intended builds, even though they ain't anywhere near optimal. so, we advise that you don't sweat the details. HA! Good Fun!

already addressed your query a few times. see our discussions when silent winter brought up the point earlier. though one wonders if the console fix for such issues is less cheating or more? is very confusing when reason and rationality is abandoned. *shrug* done. even Gromnir has a threshold for endless repetition. HA! Good Fun!

^Straw man. You don't know how to argue Gromnir. That much is obvious. Prime Junta was right. *groan* does folks think "strawman" is like abracadabra or hocus pocus? at least we see fewer claims o' ad hominem. that being said, you is getting off-topic. say something relevant. example: respec is a relative simple fix to dealing with the inevitable diminution o' player choice resulting from developer error and/or rules obscurity. is not a perfect solution, but the possibility for exploitation appears minimal. if the arguments against respec is that it feels wrong even to folks who do not use it, we remain unmoved. if the argument is that use o' respec is "cheating," we is equal unmoved. regardless, much like elerond, we see parallels. it is difficult to have a feel or proper role-play discussion without it turning into mindless repetition. there is no rebuttal for feel, when there is a lack o' empathy. HA! Good Fun!

I hate not being able to save freely. I've played plenty of games that don't allow it with no real problem in terms of difficulty, but having to wait for the save point can sometimes be a pain. That's where you get in the habit of leaving your computer on while you do other stuff because you don't want to lose progress but you have other stuff to get done. clearly you two can be dismissed as casual modern gamers. you don't count. HA! Good Fun!

You assume that your opponents here are making an "irrational feeling argument". They aren't. There are bottom line givens here. And that is what we're arguing. Given #1: RPGs are about choice and consequence. Given #2: A respec feature serves no function but to reduce or flat out remove the consequence from the equation. It's Obvious, then, why you'd want a respec feature. You're a casual modern gamer. You want choice but no consequence. You applaud games like Skyrim, where you can build a savage Nord warrior....but still be able to be the Archmage of the College, without having to start over and rebuild yourself a mage. You applaud games Like Dragon Age, where if you find a super powerful Sword with a strength requirement you don't meet, you can simply drink a potion of "we'll-bend-the-rules-for-you", so you can re-allot your stats, so you can meet the strength requirement, so you can use that sword! <gag> You're probably not going to enjoy PoE, my friend. So my advice to you would be to save yourself the "frustration" and "disgruntlement", and focus your attention and energy on.... IDK....Witcher 3? Or some other game coming out soon designed for casual modern gamers who can't stand to face down the consequences of their choices? hate skyrim and calling us a casual gamer is kinda amusing. even so, why do you care? if is an optional feature that you believe allows folks to "cheat," why do you care? don't use it. problem solved. the obsidian developers is very concerned about balance, so the notion o' being able to respec to cheat is kinda a repudiation o' their goals. even so, we agree that there will be loopholes. folks with meta knowledge will be able to use a single respec to game the game. so what? is a single respec, so you is gonna need describe an actual scenario that would 'cause serious game imbalance, particularly, as we already noted, the game is meant to offer equal juice per squeeze as it were. yeah, some guy, somewhere is gonna figure out that it is better to have high athletic skill early and high lore late. so what? a woman in kentucky may find a pivotal point in the game where she sudden needs high resolve and will alter her character to meet that attribute point check. so what? why do you care? and again, to call respec cheating is ridiculous if the player using the respec is fixing developer created problems. the developers, unintentionally o'course, is gonna cheat people outta playing the character they intended. josh recognized that the game still requires work, and changes will continue to be made, but 'cause o' obsidian errors, oversights, and simple lack o' mechanics transparency, many folks will be cheated out o' playing the character they expected to play. take a talent that doesn't work and find out 15 hours into the game that it is having an opposite effect from from what is described? how could any reasonable person suggest that respecing a character to change out that broken talent equals cheating? how on earth is changing that broken talent to one that works reasonably diminishing the choice and consequences o' gameplay? you have gone beyond the pale... again. HA! Good Fun!

I'm genuinely curious about this, though--I was actually surprised how much he emphasized community involvement, more than many of the other devs I've spoken with over the years. It seems like they pay a good deal of attention to feedback--is that not the case? *prepares to bolt if bringing this up is like leaping into the hornet's nest* --Arv http://twitch.tv/arvaneleron one of the greatest strengths of poe will also be one of its greatest weakness. josh did mention in the interview just how much impact the input the community had on the game, which should be reassuring. to know that there is a possibility that features will be changed based on some kinda community consensus, which is 'bout as rare as a unicorn in central park, results in more folks becoming invested in the game, and not just monetarily. fans already see poe as their game, which is a good thing. more than a few things has been changed in poe as a result o' fan requests, and so fans see that they has made a difference. unfortunately, that is a double-edged sword. fans can be idiots. the fact that we can be idiots in large numbers is cause for concern rather than applause. josh, in the interview, made comment about dealing with the feeling requests. sadly, more than a few o' the feeling changes arguably make the game worse rather than better. a fighter that is exceptional at simultaneous exacting and absorbing damage were a given in the ie games, so that is what the fans o' poe expected and clamored to get included into poe even though the poe fighter had a more limited role in poe. similarly, the paladin, were meant as a support character that were excellent in defense. the paladin's role were important to the developers 'cause it helped differentiate the numerous classes they created. got multiple support characters that is all good offensive and defensive and is great with melee weapons? what is point o' making multiple classes f they is all capable o' fulfilling the same role? even so, the fans wanted a poe paladin who could smite the wicked rather than one who were mere able to hold up a shield and defend against such villains and monsters. well, in response to public demand, we received a smite ability. is not that smite is bad, but it don't improve the paladin more than giving folks more o' the paladin feel they expected. wasted resources? perhaps. from the interview we could see that josh saw value in the way 4e differentiated the roles o' classes. rogues and wizards in 4e played very different, they had different roles and each class could excel in that role. unfortunately, 4e rogues didn't feel enough like 3e or ad&d rogues, and 4e wizards didn't feel enough like mordenkainen or tenser to d&d fans. the obsidians ran into the same problem with the poe community. expectations got/get in the way o' obsidian making progress, and their obstacle is the feelings o' the community. is nothing wrong with fulfilling wishes based on nothing save feel, as long as such stuff doesn't measurably impact developer notions o' balance and their ever-shrinking pool o' man-hours. add token bestiary, exploration and traps/lock xp? were easy to add, and so we got such token features included in poe. why? feel. were not a tough fix and it appeased those who wanted some kinda throwback to ie game xp awards. token xp grants didn't fundamentally alter the quest & objective xp mechanic obsidian adopted and were a cheap fix. win-win, eh? Gromir paid money to obsidian to make poe 'cause we trust that they can make a good pc crpg. at some point we gotta step back and let the folks that know what they are doing, do their work. why hire somebody if you aren't gonna trust 'em to do the actual work they were hired to do? Gromnir wants input, but if developers offer a rational and reasonable reason as to why they chose to do A instead o' B, we typical trust 'em. yeah, we want explanations and, from time to time, we will rail and moan like a little kid if we disagree, but for the most part, what we is looking for is transparency more than control. am thinking poe will be a stronger 'cause o' its transparency. at the same time, we believe that the game were somewhat diminished by the obsidian decision to actual listen to us, 'cause as we said already, we are idiots. HA! Good Fun!

on this point we agree... kinda. am not certain why some folks, when considering the damage potential o' the ranger, ignore the animal companion's damage. that is wrong. even so, is becoming obvious that the ranger don't work very well as presented. given the features o' the class, and obsidian commentary, one would expect the ranger role to be a ranged weapon "heavy-hitter." this is not a particular viable build at the moment, and there still appear to be quirks with the animal companions. HA! Good Fun!

for pj, clarification is good, but it brings us full circle. "Ah, but that's not the strawman. That's just dismissing my experience: i.e., that the very presence of respec cheapens the experience for me, whether I make use of it or not. It's the same reason I dislike broken mechanics which lead to easy but boring exploits. This may not bother you, but it bothers me, which is why I'm arguing against it." see, we was ascribing rationality to your argument. you spoke o' choice and consequences being vital. as an optional feature, there is no way you need be concerned with choices and consequences "The very presence of a respec in the game trivializes the character-building choices up to that point, and therefore greatly detracts from the experience for players who consider choice and consequence crucial to the computer role-playing game experience." you were speaking for players and not only yourself. the problem isn't strawman, but your endemic inability to express yourself... which we will return to in a bit. but again, if you is gonna retreat and make this a touchy-feely thing wherein you is claiming that mere presence o' a feature you never intend to use somehow cheapens your gameplay experience, then we is more than happy at the admission, 'cause you ain't using logic at all and any complaint about logic fallacies is complete pointless. "Thing is, those choices and consequences are every bit as central to my experience as role-playing choices and consequences. It's the other side of the coin: the impact I've had on the world, and the character I've become." claiming we misrepresented you is gonna be tough. you may have meant something far different than what you said, but the impact your choices "had" on the world would not be altered at all by respec, and as noted, the only way respec alters your character is if you use the option. but again, we got admission that this is a somewhat irrational and gut-level rejection o' the mere presence o' an optional respec feature. stun similar shows true colors by revealing that he sees as cheating. regardless, is no way to fight an irrational "feeling" argument, which woulda' saved everybody much effort if you had simple admitted. nevertheless, you did finally come around and so am guessing that is a testament to... something. http://forums.obsidian.net/topic/71211-can-you-respec/?p=1587948 quizhang said better than pj and saved much time and effort. we didn't respond to his post either 'cause, well, is no arguing feeling. learn to use your words. HA! Good Fun!