Gromnir

the other extreme is just as bad. "Good evening Mr. Bond. Sit. Have a martini. Shaken, not stirred, correct? I am about to unleash a ********* that will kill ***********, but that is no reason to be uncivilized. Do you like my collection of etchings? You do not have voiceprint authorization for that action, Dave. My programming has changed. The success of the mission must come first. Would you like to play a nice game of chess? Am I not all the more terrifying because of my emotionless and monotone voice?" the shodan, hal 9000, yxunomei stuff is as overused as the Sarevok Evil Laugh. is ok to use, but be original or purposeful in using either extreme. HA! Good Fun!

thumbing noses at cliches w/o a meaningful purpose is stoopid. ps:t sales were stoopid given how much interplay spent on development. why no swords? 'cause chrisA were tired of swords? took YEARS and many reduced price releases for ps:t to finally break even... which is a loss as far as publisher and anybody that matters is concerned. is not as if there were no swords in game, just none usable by tno. why? people like swords-- they like elves and dwarves. the planescape setting had swords and elves and dwarves and were just as nifty and irreverent as ps:t. so what were the Purpose in subverting the common tropes people actual were wanting? chrisA's tongue-in-cheek mockery of crpg tropes were very funny. am wondering if the titter he got from avoiding tropes people Like were worth the crappy sales his game got. were a joke for himself with a Big cost in long run. were there a reason or explanation for absence o' swords or were it simple a frustrating absence for peoples who like swords? keep in mind that ps:t were our favorite crpg, but chrisA were perhaps a bit immature with his practical joke on crpg fans. subvert dominant paradigm and embrace iconoclasm... but do with a purpose other than just to be different. callow teens maybe get piercings, dye hair or go goth for a year or two. "Look at me!" is kinda childish, but nobody gets hurt. the thing is game development is too expensive and chrisA is too old to be indulging such immature impulses. HA! Good Fun!

Actually, real balance is an undesirable state. Real balance means that everyone has an equal chance at everything, everyone does the same damage, etc. Real balance means everyone is equivalent. Which makes for an *incredibly* boring game. this is called strawman. *shrug* people, against their own advantage, want to win. if you, as a developer, provide a clear winning build, power or whatever, a disproportionate % of people will choose the win. such an eventuality is not good for numerous reasons discussed above. HA! Good Fun! No offense, but it's not even remotely close to a strawman. In fact, calling it a strawman is closer to being a strawman. It's math. Pick your variable. Damage? If any class deals 1 more point of DPS than the other classes, it's "A clear winning build" because it'll be superior to everyone else at all times. Experience? If any class or skill allows the player to gain more experience than the others, it's "A clear winning build". You have two options. 1. Everyone is the same. 2. There's "A clear winning build". Every system that does not make all choices identical will have "A clear winning build", because the math will work out differently for each choice. The only way you can get a system without "A clear winning build" is if all of the math results in the same value for every choice, which means you have everyone the same. it is strawman 'cause we never made the argument that he is trying to beat the stuffing out of. do you know what strawman is? regardless, am just repeating self if we again explain. save to nrefute the ridiculousness of you claiming that a 1pt increase in difference would be viewed as = "a clear winning build." such a notion is only possible if you has been complete ignorant of boards such as these, or is being willful obtuse. getting people to agree 'bout anything on these boards is extreme difficult. people will disagree 'bout your math or the circumstances in which math actually apply. and the more choices and classes you got, with more powers and skills, the closer it becomes to impossible to have some simple mathematic comparison that folks agree is valid. d&d 3.0, before splat book explosion, had lots o' choices, but a limited number o' classes and there were no single winning build people agreed 'pon... but there were probable 10 or so builds that were commonly mentioned as superior. your 1 and 2 is... silly. HA! Good Fun!

If you look at the old greek literature, the human nature was celebrated at every doorstep. For example, envy was very much understood as a motive, not shunned or ignored. a bit myopic. greeks had different values, so some stuff we see as admirable (e.g. humility) were not embraced by greeks. also, while sophocles could make us weep at the beauty o' the human spirit, he were hardly the only writer to consider humanity. aeschylus, on the other hand, often focused 'pon human frailties in all their unvarnished corruption and evil. HA! Good Fun!

heroism black hound religon pe should be this much fun HA! Good Fun!

Who gives a ****** about it?! am suspecting that you have a ... problem. Gromnir says that developers does, and always has, worked to prevent the power builds that results in a clear win. you disagreed, saying that developers hasn't done so in past and that there wouldn't be a point in any event. we give examples wherein developers has done exactly the kinda curb o' powergame shinnanigans we describe. you largely ignore examples and pretend such measures never were or you attempt to redefine. for example, we note that the 3e ranger did not break the game, but any person with a powergame leaning would only take 1 level... and an extreme large % o' player were only taking 1 level. ranger weren't too weak or too strong or even bugged, but a disproportionate number o' folks had 1 stinking level o' ranger. etc. is developers looking for game break? sure, but that ain't all they is trying to prevent. a clear win build is not a build that wins game. a win build is a clear best build. there is similar reason they wanna rid selves of clear worst builds. regardless o' people liking the notion of bards, if they is the least powerful class, few people will play. balancing is not simply removing the, "I win button." "There will always be better or worse builds." so? is more strawman as nobody ever denied that point. lord knows that telling us that there should be a difference between 16 str and 18 str is pointless... but it is not relevant in the present context... though am glad you ignorantly bring up as it is just one reason why developers changed to point-buy. duh. oh, and adding lots o' exclamation points makes you seem desperate. ideally, any 1 power or skill or stat choice is gonna be equivalent to any other power or skill or stat choice... but that is an idealized notion and developers ain't gonna kill selves trying to make sure that a player always gets exactly as much juice from adding 1 point of str as they does by adding 1 point of charisma... or whatever. never has Gromnir argued such a point. that being said, developers continues to work to avoid the situation in which peoples feel stoopid for Not choosing a particular power, skill, stat choice or build. look at hiro's post above: "I don't understand why people are comparing powergaming to cheating. Powergaming isn't cheating, it's just min-maxing and optimising your character. Doesn't everybody want the best out of their characters? I know I do. " crpg is about making choices. you get to make make choices in dialogues. you also gets to make character building choices. hiro is a normal player with understandable motivations who want to optimize his character. if there is one clear optimal power, skill or build, he will take it. providing clear optimal choices makes the other choices largely meaningless for anybody who has a tendency to powergame... which is bad. am suspecting this ain't ever gonna get through... but it not matter. "Who gives a ****** about it?!" well, clearly the developers do. that is why they fix such stuff. that is why they will continue to fix. HA! Good Fun!

am not sure how you isn't getting this. perhaps it is confusion 'cause of nomenclature and unnecessary importance put on labels. a class or build that is disproportional powerful IS a balance issue. you answer your own questions, and somehow get to wrong answers. is wacky. why didn't josh include his avatar o' death kit? why was harm changed? why has developers admitted that some weapons, powers, skills, abilities is too powerful? is not that such stuff necessarily broke game, particularly in a party based game. iwd developers nerferd missle weapons from bg standard. bg2 developers nerfed grand mastery. allowing fighters to keep bg1 grand mastery bonuses in bg2 wouldn't have hurt mages or anybody else, but they removed anyway. developers on bg2 boards specific referenced kensai/mages and the potential problem o' giving them bg1 standard grand mastery bonuses. is a potential powergame option that were removed. try to separate balance from powergame is nutty. oh, and the ranger is a wonderful example to be using, 'cause the 3.0 ranger were front-loaded. were not too weak as to be unplayable or too strong as to be game-breaking, but it were clear fodder for powqergamers who would take 1 level of ranger. to circumvent powergamer impulses, monte cook came up with his ranger variant. josh sawyer tried to implement monte cook's ranger in iwd2... which created a very amusing incident that black isle were forced to claim never happened. 3.5 d&d eventual addressed the issue, but... *shrug* is yet another example o' both pvp and crpg developers wrestling with a way to deal with and overcome powergamer nonsense... in spite o' your claim that doing so is a waste o' resources. HA! Good Fun! ps kensai/mages got eaten alive by ranger/cleric duals... just saying.

Oh yeah, "every game" that's an excellent example. Yet all RPG games I played since the 90's have a clearly better builds and inferior ones. You still don't understand the different between "better" and "broken", So basically you mean that everybody played IWD with the same party? Everybody made Kensai/Mage build for BG2? And everybody played sorcerer/barbarian/dragon disciple in NWN? Newsflash for you, they did not. Regardless the fact that in case of power these were the best builds. what is with you and the hyperbole and strawman? 1) the fact that you has played games with superior builds is NOT evidence of developers indifference to balance duh. am not gonna explain this one 'cause it seems obvious. 2) hyperbole is ugly nobody suggested that Everybody played kensai/mages in bg2... but there were quite a few, and no doubt more than there woulda' been if kensai/mages were better balanced. am sure that the ranger/cleric had all kinda role-play appeal, but the fact that you could dual-wield warhammers and cast all druid and cleric spells probable had more to do with its popularity. and yeah, there were any number o' stoopid bits o' nonsense from the nwn2 games. role-play were reason for so many folks taking falchion as their weapon choice? really? please. am starting to seriously repeat self here, so please come up with something new. powergame has counter-intuitive result of making game less fun for many powergamers as it makes the game too easy. powergamers then do the wacky dance and complain 'bout ease of game. powergame also leads to disproportionate % o' players choosing perceived win builds. if all builds were better balanced, you would gets more replayability and you would gets people choosing for kewl 'stead of power. ignore reality if you wish, but developers invariably claim to spend considerable time on balance might be better to ask self why they do so then to continue to pretend that no such balancing is occurring. HA! Good Fun!

your chosen portrait suggests and all-too-obvious alternative. HA! Good Fun!

Actually, real balance is an undesirable state. Real balance means that everyone has an equal chance at everything, everyone does the same damage, etc. Real balance means everyone is equivalent. Which makes for an *incredibly* boring game. this is called strawman. *shrug* people, against their own advantage, want to win. if you, as a developer, provide a clear winning build, power or whatever, a disproportionate % of people will choose the win. such an eventuality is not good for numerous reasons discussed above. HA! Good Fun!

... am hearing that this were done, at the very least, decades ago. http://arthistory.ab...jmwt_mma_16.htm this one might even be older... just in case you thinks people is important. http://jackiewhiting.net/ArtHist/SchlAthns.htm HA! good Fun! ps we highly recommend http://www.dccomics....night-returns-0 is also older than "like" 25 years. go figure.

as to the embedded video, we went through 90+ pages o' a really bad comic 'cause we didn't want to dismiss berserk w/o reading. is no way in hell we is gonna get snookered a second and/or third time. HA! Good Fun!

it would be nice if none of us had heard of d&d and d&d rules, that way we could play pe w/o the baggage. HA! Good Fun!

"My point was that it's successful and the lead character is very much like a human, not an instrument of fate." you aren't serious, are you? what 'bout the protagonist seems genuine human to you? oh sure, being angry and vengeful is human qualities, but not the way they is done in that manga we read. am not shocked that berserk is successful... in japan. angry hero or anti-hero doesn't necessarily remove us from realm of hero story in any event. angry hero and anti-hero is hardly new. honestly, the odyssey reference we submitted is oddly more remote from the realm o' crpgs. odysseus offends a god and spends 10 years trying to get home. he ian't trying to save world, or revenge himself on a super villain. ultimate solution is not defeating monsters or solving impossible riddle. unlike most homeric characters, odysseus grows. HA! Good Fun!

Name one game that focused on this issue other than online games where players compete each other? Powergaming exist in every RPG game. You are talking about situation in which some skill or set of skills give significant game breaking power. That's called bugs and should be avoided. But it has nothing to do with preventing powergaming. huh? every game we has followed has seen developers concern selves with balance in favor o' powergame. harm from d&d 3.0 were not a bug, but it got nixed. why? heck, there were a particular amusing incident regarding kits and iwd2. josh offered up some potential kits that were quite balanced and creative. fans hated... not powerful enough. as a joke, josh offers an alternative... an avatar o' death. people didn't get the joke-- they loved the new-and-improved kit. were probable our favorite board moment o' the year. ... is this your first rodeo? HA! Good Fun!

if you forgot the dozen or so times josh has answered 'bout his influences, then you probable didn't genuine care 'bout the answers... which makes us wonder why you cares this time. weird. lord knows Gromnir doesn't read every interview or we woulda' known that the lockpick stuff were old news. heck, we typical ignore funroc updates as we has no idea who or what he is referencing. look, the interviewer took personal, but he admits that nothing new were divulged... which were our only criticism. sooooo, color us bemused. HA! Good Fun!

Little harsh but nice post. The problem with any forum dedicated to any one developer or game is that most of the people on it don't understand that not everything the dev/game touches is actually gold or a massive success in the grand scheme. Out of curiosity other than the extreme violence and highly adult themes of Berserk (both of which would never work in a American release without seriously being toned down) what was the issue? most of our posts is tending to harsh. oh, and we actual read the first manga issue before we dismissed. the characters is... not. is caricatures. super-powered swordsman with 2 metre i-beam-pretending-to-be-a-sword and bad guy wearing cobra armour drinking blood from severed head at end o' spear? please. scenarios is ridiculous over-the-top. dialogue is forgettable, and story is not near as original as some folks here seem to think. violence doesn't bother us. HA! Good Fun!

it looks personal to me. Would i have liked more meaty answers? Sure, but they probably save those for the likes of Gamebanshee and Sorcerer's Place. I was happy to even get my foot in the door so to speak. Our website hasn't been able to get an interview with a developer for years. don't know you enough for it to be personal. interview is too familiar for it to be personal. couldn't pick this interview outta a line-up. that were kinda our point. *shrug* grats on getting foot in door. on positive side, maybe josh feels some sympathy for you after reading our dialogue here... gives you better follow-up. HA! Good Fun!

If people enjoy "powergaming" (whatever they consider it to mean), let them. you can keep saying that, but perhaps you should try a different approach: ask self why developers keeps finding ways to prevent powergame. like it or not, and sometimes in spite o' what they say, developers put considerable effort into prevention o' powering through games. so, ask self the why question. developers has been doing for decades. they simply morons? HA! Good Fun!

really? other than the lockpick thing, we got virtually zippo from that interview. HA! Good Fun! Some of us enjoy interviews for reasons other than trying to glean some new micro-piece of update information. you wanted to hear of josh influences perhaps? no, wait, you has been on these boards long time, so you already knew answers to those questions. hmmm. you perhaps saved josh's portrait photo? am not gonna ask why that would be something you want, but who are we to judge? oh, and for sensuki, Gromnir is not half-orc. *shrug* don't take personal, but we just don't get much from these things that seems like they were cut-and-paste jobs from a dozen other interviews. is typical only the micro-piece info that adds anything. HA! Good Fun!

"I really can't imagine how can You show something new and astonishing using the traditional hero story." we stopped with this. lack of imagination is such a terrible burden. HA! Good Fun!

well then, in retrospect, we got zippo from the interview. feel better? HA! Good Fun!

really? other than the lockpick thing, we got virtually zippo from that interview. HA! Good Fun!

the problem is those people don't necessarily have fun. again, the 2 most common complaints we has see for games is: 1) game were too easy 2) game were too difficult same game usual gets loads of complaints 1 & 2. let people do whatever they want to do does not mean you is increasing fun factor... 'cause people is stoopid. why has obsidian favoured point-buy v. rolling for stats in previous d&d games? why not just let people choose whatever starting stats they wish? these is games, so people wanna win. but the Win mentality is not a good in a game that is designed to be beatable by everybody. HA! Good Fun! ps please understand that we do not personally care if somebody powergames themselves into boredom. how you play doesn't impact us at all. nevertheless, we understand why it is in the developer's best interest to consider ways to prevent powergame.

am not sure if a poll works for us. armour class is not a d&d favorite of ours. that being said, you can't just change ac to dr (damage resistance) and keep all other combat mechanics from d&d the same. obsidian has an opportunity to do whatever they want with combat mechanics. as such, am doubting they go with a d&d-esque ac model. 'course that doesn't exactly shed light on obsidian's chosen alternative. we would like to hear obsidian's thoughts. is a square-one issue. HA! Good Fun!