Gromnir

By Directors Cut, do you mean the "Alan Smithee" extended version? The one that Lynch disowns? ... Justin, just curious but how far along are you with the music and sound effects? am assuming that any and all extended versions were disowned by lynch, yes? our understanding is that post release lynch has never even agreed to speak o' dune in interviews... which we find most amusing. ... am hopeful you is happy. am having back issues today, but we did hobble over to our dvd rack and peek at our metal box containing the extended cut. "TWO VERSIONS OF THE FILM Original Theatrical (Directed by David Lynch) and Extended Version (Directed by Alan Smithee, Screenplay by Judas Booth)" smithee being the pseudonym for the director(s) who didn't want to be named, yes? HA! Good Fun!

agreed with suggestion. of equal importance to Gromnir is some indicator o' which enemies is suffering from debuff. some such debuffs is indeed obvious. if rogue uses as crippling strike, we gets an actual graphic indication. unfortunately, not all lingering negative effects has such easy-to-spot visual indicators. half the time we can't tell which wood beetle or spider is affected by a debuff, particularly as they is all jumbled together. is most annoying. HA! Good Fun!

any time friend or foe is victimized by a knockdown effect, all we hear is Dune thumper meant to attract sandworms. is very distracting such that we don't even notice music. on the positive side, the annoying sound did encourage us to watch the sci-fi dune miniseries just the other day, and we will probably watch 1985 lynch version this weekend- director's cut 'course. HA! Good Fun!

if corpses result in a resource drain, buffy style dusting o' enemies is okie dokie with us. if enduring corpses has potential to cause even small slow-downs, we is in favor o' dusting. that being said, 1007 piles that is obscured by tall grass or trees or whatever and is not illuminated via tab is irksome. HA! Good Fun!

untrue. we know that obsidian's beta testers believe perception and resolve is weaker. is an important distinction. developers may know that testers is wrong. developers may need only discover some way to make usefulness o' perception and resolve more obvious. and yeah, perhaps perception and resolve is weak. we don't know. HA! Good Fun!

given problems such as disappearing quest logs and disappearing equipment, am agreeing with you that combat feedback is a low(er) priority. that being said, we will note that all the folks making claims 'bout lack o' balance w/o any feedback from which to base such claims strike us as... odd. also, obsidian could very easily give far more detailed written descriptions o' how abilities and combat works via a message board update. we would rather have detailed in-game feedback, but in its absence, some illumination from developers might prevent them from knee-jerk altering ability balance when all that is genuine required is explanation. HA! Good Fun!

Because we can comprehend the concepts behind them and how they affect certain builds. We don't need to wait to know that almost all conceivable builds have a major need for MIG. Which is why I have suggested giving the healing influence of might over to RES. Probably shouldn't discount how much people will make decisions (at least initially) on what *sounds* good, whether or not the implementation gives commensurate effects in-game. which is the problem. folks is acting as if they know what is the actual benefits of taking 1 point of might over 1 point of perception. you don't. Gromnir doesn't. perhaps the obsidian developers know, but they ain't giving us an easy way to discover the actual relative benefits. activated abilities and spells would appear to be the method by which enemies dish out the pain. now, if Gromnir has a ranger who sends his animal companion to attack the most dangerous enemy in a group and with our high perception we could virtual guarantee that the enemy never activated an ability or spell, that would be a very powerful limit on enemy power, no? unfortunately, from the combat log, which retains only a very brief amount o' info, we can't tell what we is or isn't interrupting or how interrupt percentages work or even what is the kinda actions we is interrupting. interrupt, particularly for our ranger who would appear to be doing most o' her damage via her animal companion, would seem to be a very powerful ability... but that is just a guess, 'cause we don't know how it freaking works. might Sounds like a good choice for mostest characters. for mages or other characters who perhaps focus on aoe abilities that don't need to hit a particular foe, intellect actually strikes us as probable the bestest ability, but as a practical matter, we don't know how much intellect increases aoe size and duration... heal/buff priests would seem to greatly benefit from intellect, but again, am not certain how much they benefit. it seems as if folks is reading descriptions o' abilities and deciding that might is a clear win and perception is a dog... and folks could be absolutely correct, but Gromnir don't see any reasons for such conclusions other than gut level feelings. HA! Good Fun! ps the reason d&d ain't used is 'cause it has obvious dump stats. at the moment, people believe that perception and resolve is dump stats, but they could very well be wrong. in d&d, a mage benefits not at all from strength. the obsidian developers did not wanna make obvious dump stats. if all abilities were genuine useful, there wouldn't be dump stats. again, am thinking most o' the complaints 'bout abilities is based on lack o' understanding and inexperience with the new system. the problem is that even as we get more experience, the lack o' detailed understandable feedback from combat (again, logs is very short and not as detailed as we think obsidian believes) makes it near impossible to get a grasp o' what is actual going on in combat and how each ability contributes.

we had a german poli-sci professor at Cal that never got tired o' pointing out just how homogenized both major US political parties is... which is kinda fascinating when you realize how much more diverse the US is compared to the majority o' european parliamentary nations. we got left v. right here in the US, but folks who actual gets elected is almost invariably extreme moderate compared to what folks elsewhere considers left v. right. HA! Good Fun!

am gonna repeat this again, 'cause we ain't seen an answer yet: how on earth is folks deciding that the current abilities is poorly balanced? given the lack o' combat mechanics transparency, how is folks deciding that might outshines intellect or that perception is a dump stat for all builds? is this a gut feeling kinda thing? is there a thread wherein combat mechanics/numbers has been parsed and we simple didn't see it? is a bunch o' threads speaking to ability score improvements, but Gromnir is still not certain how primary and derived stats affect gameplay, at least not with any certainty. how can folks be so convinced o' improvements if the only thing they gots to base conclusions 'pon is wiki links and gut feelings? am genuine confused. HA! Good Fun!

Not really, Gromnir brought it up previously and basically no one else has said anything, except Nepenthe noting it wasn't a very flattering comparison for US police. Given the context I wouldn't be surprised if he thought I was Russian rather than being a proud citizen of the least corrupt* nation of earth**, and he was Scoring a Point by mentioning eastern Europe's police. *alternative interpretation since it's a perception index: country best at self delusion, burying their head in the sand and being smug about not being corrupt. **OK, equal with Denmark. Bloody Scandics, always getting in our way on the indices. I notice you and Zora aren't debating each other anymore, you both get did a little personal in your last debates. I enjoy you guys debating because you both have intellectual and interesting styles of debating etiquette My advice is both apologize to each other and both admit things got a little heated? Also I learnt something years ago, and I know this is hard to implement on a forum, but in life you can sometimes lose an argument or debate when you win it , because the person you are debating with gets such a bad impression by the end of the debate that they decide they won't discuss anything with you anymore...they would rather just avoid you because of the potential acrimony that comes with having a debate. And to be avoided in life because of what people perceive about you is never a good thing, especially if the person has lot to offer other people. And both of you do have a lot to offer others *chuckle* closest to heated we has gotten in months is ros bs notions wherein he assumed that he knew what life is like for Gromnir simple base on fact that we is American... and speaking to his ancestors raping our ancestors, we kid you not. zor can't get us heated. we like zor posts. is too little humor on these boards. HA! Good Fun!

bester mentioned how he/she would never come to the US because of cops. bester is eastern euro (you may scroll up). zor is just a honk for euros who is naturally contrary and has inexplicably defended weird russian choices on more than one occasion... the ukraine thread being indicative o' zor's more obvious tinfoil hat moments. *shrug* HA! Good Fun! ps please do not forget the silly rt links we has seen in this thread.

*groan* the difference 'tween 10% bad cop in the US and 10% bad cop in eastern europe is brobdingnagian. bad cops here include the a-hole who gives us a speeding ticket for going 5 miles over the speed limit and acts like being a cop instantly added 6 inches to his d&$#@... and he wants to prove his extra length to you. 10% o' US cops is jerks, which ain't surprising as at least 10% o' the population is serious jerks. 10% o' bank employees is jerks. 10% o' supermarket clerks is jerks. 50% o' dmv employees is jerks... go figure. what you folks in eastern europe means by bad is that sodomizing folks with baseball bats and running white slavery rings. *shakes head* serious folks. some of y'all gotta get a grip. no doubt there is folks here who genuine believe that cop encounters in the US is dangerous and even potential lethal, and if you feel that way perhaps that approach will serve you well. but statisticaly speaking, violent crime has been on a steady decrease in the US since the late 90s and in spite o' the fact that everybody and their brother has smart phones and instant access to video and photographic image creation, valid claims 'gainst cops has also decreased save in some noteworthy locales. now sure, we also has bad cops here that folks in eastern europe would recognize as bad. is corrupt US cops who hurt people and steal and is racist aholes, but am not certain if this is media nonsense you people is buying into or that you watch too many movies like training day or... lord knows what you people think. *shrug* we has dealt with many (too many) cops while we worked juvenile hall and then during our brief stint at US attorney's office. we lived on a reservation as a kid, so we dealt with white cops in south dakota, then we moved to one o' the more notorious neighborhoods in chicago. we got loads o' experience with cops, and our worstest genuine experiences, with one exception. were that we couldn't get cops (or firemen) to come to our neighborhood in a reasonable and timely fashion. bad cop in south chicago were not so much cops shooting innocent folks, but that cops didn't show up til they weren't needed no more. this ferguson stuff gives people an extreme distorted notion o' reality. is too bad. there is bad cops. there is racist cops, but genuine dangerous cops in the US is probable less than 1%. at the moment in ferguson, you got cops with 0 practical crowd control experience from a dozen or more municipalities trying to work together and protect themselves and the public and they is doing a poor job. shocking? mot really. Following Police Instructions Does Not Make You A Punk. get young males o' all races to actual believe the aforementioned would save lots o' grief. HA! Good Fun!

Genuine question: what kind of feedback do you think would tell you whether changes were making a difference, and did the IE games give you that? The only way I ever found out empirically what made a difference was to build a different character or pick up an item with a big stat boost. E.g. equipping the gauntlets of ogre power on a feeble fighter/mage in BG made a dramatic difference, but it was an item with a pretty dramatic effect. Everything else was just numbers. There's a neat comparison screenshot of INT's effect on AoE (I can never seem to find things I want to cite), but given the scaling of most stat effects, again you need quite big shifts to show up anything. actually, in games such as iwd2, the combat log gave extreme detailed feedback. we could see to hit rolls and how they were individual modified and we would see enemy ac plain as day. mage spells would obvious not need to-hit, but we could see ref/fort/will saves and various modifications, and we could see how damage was calculated including such stuff as feat or ability modifiers. the combat log would be retaining many pages worth o' info. similarly, as we has stated elsewhere, a simple and obvious dynamic character record sheet would help. in ie games, switch between dual-wield o' stilettos as opposed to a bastard sword would immediately reveal a bab change or thac0 change on iwd2 or bg2 character record sheet. change armour would similarly reveal a change in ac on character record sheet. combat feedback need not be as arcane and obscured as it currently is. HA! Good Fun!

btw, the only thing wrong with quest and task experience is that like so much else in the game, it is not freaking working. if our quest log disappears same as our companion mage's grimoire, then we ain't getting xp for doing quests and task. and serious folks, if you thinks you is coming up with a new pov on this, you ain't. back in 2001-2003, the black isle folks were alternatively working on either baldur's gate 3 or fallout 3, and at that time the advantages and disadvantages o' ad hoc v . quest and task based xp awards were debated into insensibility. the black isle/obsidian guys has been vocal proponents o' quest awards for a Long time, and we has yet to see a new argument in favor o' an ad hoc approach. HA! Good Fun!

Kill XP vs Quest/Objective XP vs hybrid XP systems has been a topic for theoretical debate for a year now (probably the second most popular debate after Romance threads). has been a debate involving these developers for much longer than a year if one wishes to go back as far as the bg3 and fo3 development debates. same issues. same developers. HA! Good Fun!

LOL arcanum and fallout had numerous strengths, but balance was not a strength of either game. as PoE is aiming for more balance, we would not expect fallout or arcanum to represent useful guidelines or benchmarks for comparison. HA! Good Fun!

doubt it "The spike in the number female gamers is likely tied to widespread smartphone adoption." female gamers is still a distinct minority as it relates to pc and console games. sure, nearly a bazillion women played angry birds, but if you think that fact is gonna do anything other than prompt game developers to make more smart phone games that appeal to women, we suspect you will be in for a surprise. HA! Good Fun!

intellect may expand the aoe and duration o' purely physical attacks...s'posedley. likewise, am thinking that dexterity affects likelihood o' various soul powers/magic abilities successfully striking opponents. am beginning to suspect there are no pure physical v mental attributes, but the feedback is so poor that we can't say for certain. HA! Good Fun!

am having too much difficulty figuring out what abilities do, and to what degree they do it, to be able to genuine balance abilities. for folks who try and maximize aoe attacks, dex would appear to be far less necessary than the genesis poster suggests. conversely, intellect would be very important. alternatively, our ranger build were clear wrong as we were thinking con would be less important for a ranged character. unfortunately, our companion meat shield were transmitting lethal amounts o' damage to our ranger, so apparently con is far more important than we expected. perception appears to be useful in dialogues, but am admitting we don't see its use in combat. as we hasn't faced many enemy spell casters, resolve would be having relative limited use as well... although much like perception, given the lack o' useful feedback, we cannot guess how important a resolve-based defense against interrupts is. perhaps interrupts and interrupt resistance is the single mostest important factors in combat, but we can't tell from feedback we get in the game. am not knowing how folks can be claiming that abilities and builds is poorly balanced when we is personally having so much difficulty figuring out exactly what abilities do. HA! Good Fun!

complete off-topic, but the ghetto slang for head lice is hoodrats. is actual a very colorful bit o' nomenclature when you stop and think 'bout it. in any event, given Gromnir's background and experience, we gets peculiar imagery of cops dealing with abuse from hoodrats. HA! Good Fun!

am getting that euros didn't like bush sr. or jr., but the full blinder obama fascination as it relates to foreign policy baffles us more than a little: http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/nilegardiner/100227825/the-obama-doctrine-is-a-huge-failure-because-it-isnt-based-on-us-interests/ http://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2014/08/hillary-clinton-failure-to-help-syrian-rebels-led-to-the-rise-of-isis/375832/ http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/opinion/2014/06/us-foreign-policy-syria-iraq-be-201462974743184637.html http://www.forbes.com/sites/stephenharner/2014/08/12/time-for-honesty-and-change-in-obamas-failed-china-policy/ http://www.huffingtonpost.com/joseph-amodeo/obamas-lets-have-tea-appr_b_5651749.html http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2013/04/02/Why_Obama_Has_Failed_in_the_Middle_East http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/right-turn/wp/2014/06/12/obama-isnt-napping-hes-surrendering/ http://www.nytimes.com/2014/05/18/opinion/sunday/douthat-grading-obamas-foreign-policy.html?_r=1 http://www.cnn.com/2013/08/09/opinion/ghitis-obama-mideast/ http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/opinion/commentary/ct-obama-putin-ukraine-terrorism-oped-0805-jm-20140805-column.html ... the only explanation we got for the bizarre euro-liberal apologists for obama is the fact that there is no fear o' obama. whatever failings obama may have and regardless o' the mounting failures he has made, very few liberal europeans fears US excess. so, regardless o' mistakes with china, russia, libya, syria, IS and the obvious lack o' respect o' the US by palestinians or israelis, liberal europeans see obama as a welcome and pleasantly impotent alternative. HA! Good Fun!

am gonna add that Gromnir has had all these issues and more. your number 6 is not a bug and may be the most disturbing as it is not fixable as a bug. distinguishing between friends and foes is troublesome. inability to determine which foes is currently suffering status effects is also problematic. for example, the ranger has a debuff ability that it may use once (am thinking it is once) per encounter, but there is no easy way to identify which enemy Gromnir has targeted with the debuff. beyond the simple visual problems related to unnecessarily chaotic combat, we have more than a few problems understanding what is actual happening in combat. in the old ie games, if Gromnir equipped a two-handed sword in our fighter's hands, and had him don splint mail, we could look at the character record sheet fort that and instantly see what his thac0 would be, as well as his AC. it would be easy to see damage potentials as well. PoE feedback pre-combat is non-existent as far as we can tell. am believing that rangers get a bonus to accuracy with ranged weapons, but equipping a bow doesn't change accuracy numbers on character record sheet at all, and such accuraccy bonuses are not readily apparent from combat log neither. armour can be puzzled out by looking at the armour icon itself, but the actual impact o' the numbers provided can be confusing-- if there is class ability or trait modification to the efficacy of armour, they is enigmatic. the combat log itself allows only an extreme brief look at most recent combat, so attempting to reverse-engineer combats is creating numerous problems. am understanding that weapon types (piercing/slashing/crushing/etc) weapons have greater or lesser usefulness when used against particular armour types, but the brevity o' combat logs is making such information unnecessarily obscure. our ranger appears inordinately weak in combat, but am having difficulty puzzling out the why behind this fact from combat logs. we took a talent that suggested that our efficcy with war bows was increased, but am not certain what that means, and so far we haven't seen evidence o' that fact. our bear companion does considerable damage, but our only option for using the bear is to have him/her attack a single target with mundane attacks. the comp is actual a poor meat shield as our ranger suffers similar/same damage as the bear, so we is in point o' fact receiving 2x or more damage than other party members in the party... which isn't a problem in and of itself, but am finding that there is difficulty protecting our bear. our cipher does better in combat, but am uncertain how we is generating focus, and more than a few abilities do not appear to be translating into game the way we were anticipating their usefulness from their description. our cipher can build focus in combat via ranged weapons, but am not certain why/what actions increase focus and to what degree focus is built. etc. 'course, much like the genesis poster, Gromnir has largely given up on further gameplay beyond character creation as disappearing gear and quests makes even a diehard gamer such as our self see play as somewhat pointless. there is enough intriguing aspects to PoE that make us enthusiastic about the possibility o' playing, but the reality is too damn frustrating. only way to gain xp is through quests, but quests disappear? mage and priest can't be armed as their gear evaporates. our cipher is a closet exhibitionist who casts his armour into limbo after each reload. etc. playing PoE is intriguing as it is frustrating. we need a break... or a patch. HA! Good Fun!

those are the biggest problems? contrast and music? ... am thinking that if obsidian need only concern selves with music and contrast, they would be popping champagne corks and breaking open the caviar. am personally not having any problems with static trees. this is a ie game throwback, which makes it a squad-based tactical combat game with rpg elements. am more concerned with combat and rpg elements than if periwinkles pop with enough indigo and if they sway properly in breeze. the trees don't bother Gromnir, so we won't bother them. live and let live, says Gromnir. if the trees wanna be stolid and unmoved by Gromnir, then we must need accept thieir stoic and statue-like indifference with grace and courtesy. now, where visual contrast makes combat more difficult than it should be, we agree that there is a problem. bugs rush through grass and obscured big red circles and small red circles overlap with green circles and is seeming obscured by environment. rel combat is 'posed to be confusing, but this is a game. our serious concerns is the bugs, and with lack o' useful combat transparency. am rare understanding what the hell happened in combat, or why. why is our ranger so damned ineffectual? we honest cannot tell from game feedback. we got a bear companion that we may direct to occupy targets, but his/her portrait seems to have disappeared, so we has no idea what status effects he/she is suffering and if there is special abilities he/she could activate. why did we almost party wipe in our first encounter with beetles, but we roll-stomped each successive encounter? combat log is somewhat brief and so we can't genuine review to seeming figure out what went right or wrong, and am not quite sure how to complete decipher combat logs regardless as numbers don't always match our expectations. we should probable make note o' this elsewhere, but while party members gots icons on portraits to describe status effects, there is no such indicators for enemies. we put some kinda debuff on a beetle and wouldn't you know it, the beetle had the temerity to move. so, which beetle gots the debuff? gotta look at stats to figure it out... at least am thinking we can figure it out that way. as this is a squad-based tactical combat game with rpg elements meant to evoke ie game nostalgia, we is far more concerned with rpg elements and combat mechanics than we is with immobile trees and music. we ain't had any iwd-level music awe moments, but we ain't particular distracted by the music quality (or lack thereof if that is the argument) neither. advice to developers: back burner music and petrified tree concerns and instead focus efforts on legion o' bugs and the lack o' combat feedback/transparency. HA! Good Fun!

am agreeing that the lack o' feedback to be explaining what is happening in combat makes combat that much more difficult to comprehend. am genuine surprised at the lack o' useful information via the character record page... should be far more dynamic. having to puzzle out combat through trial and error, particularly when facing so many bugs, is making combat even more difficult understand than it otherwise would be. nevertheless, we do believe that the extreme steep learning curve sans a tutorial stage is greatly exacerbating the problem. the more we play, the more we get a feel for combat... feels less chaotic as we begin to understand what is going on. is not that the combat itself is bad or frenetic, but we agree that density/depth and lack o' useful explanations is making it seem frenetic. as for the writing, we simple hasn't genuine seen particularly compelling writing as yet, though we do frequent seen it listed as a positive from beta feedback. strikes us as a bit forced or based on past games rather than the current one. HA! Good Fun! At the moment the more i play, the less i want to play it again. that is complete fair. having to puzzle through combat without useful feedback is bad design. having all experience awarded through quests, but quest logs evaporating makes playing beyond a certain vague point largely... pointless. disappearing gear, inability to identify friends from foes or friends form friends, the annoying knockdown sound effect, etc. takes a serious diehard to voluntarily keep playing given the current state o' the game. am betting we restart with different characters 'till we exhaust all non-companion represented, but that is 'cause we is an idiot. sane people would give up and wait til obsidian fixed some o' the more glaring issues. HA! Good Fun!

am agreeing that the lack o' feedback to be explaining what is happening in combat makes combat that much more difficult to comprehend. am genuine surprised at the lack o' useful information via the character record page... should be far more dynamic. having to puzzle out combat through trial and error, particularly when facing so many bugs, is making combat even more difficult understand than it otherwise would be. nevertheless, we do believe that the extreme steep learning curve sans a tutorial stage is greatly exacerbating the problem. the more we play, the more we get a feel for combat... feels less chaotic as we begin to understand what is going on. is not that the combat itself is bad or frenetic, but we agree that density/depth and lack o' useful explanations is making it seem frenetic. as for the writing, we simple hasn't genuine seen particularly compelling writing as yet, though we do frequent seen it listed as a positive from beta feedback. strikes us as a bit forced or based on past games rather than the current one. HA! Good Fun!