Gromnir

these is the guys that made ps:t. chrisA did some stoopid things in ps:t. why no swords? was a good reason for lack o' swords? no, but chrisA were tired o' seeing magic swords in crpgs. lack o' swords didn't bother Gromnir, but there were never a good reason to exclude. again, these is the guys that made ps;t, and for anybody that followed the ps:t boards, they can tell you that people complained that there were no dwarves and elves and there were complaints that the protagonist was fixed and could not be a dwarf or elf... or female. chrisA were a bit immature when he made ps:t. he were tired o' seeing stuff in crpgs, so he did not include such stuff. the thing is, the people playing ps:t were not tired o' such stuff. would ps:t have been a worse game if it had elves, dwarves and swords? 'course not. the planescape setting included the aforementioned without any difficulty. the obsidian developers has no doubt learned that giving people the largely trivial stuff they want is a good idea. if the developers got a good reason to exclude popular stuff, then they should exclude... and will exclude. nevertheless, inclusion of elves does not necessarily make a game good or bad. how elves and dwarves gets implemented IS important, but bare-naked existence is a non-factor save that it makes a majority o' potential players happy. HA! Good Fun!

alignment is stoopid. really. as a game mechanic, it is just asinine to be including. please reference more than a decade of such threads on interplay/bis/obsidian message boards. paladins and priests... am personally not a fan of such as we thinks tangible expressions o' divine power ruin a meaningful and unexplored crpg theme: faith. that being said, the only way we would be complete happy with priest and paladin implementation in a god realized world is if a deity-specific code were being included for such classes. gonna get divine powers? then you gotta follow code. a 'good' god of war is gonna have different tenants and prohibitions than will a god of agriculture... and a goodly dwarven god o' war might have different prohibitions than a similar human or elven deity with a similar portfolio. ... the thing is, from a practical pov, we know that having a deity-specific code for each god or godling is... impractical? dunno. in a pnp game, a dm or gm typically forces the player to follow a code of conduct to retain status as a repository o' divine powhaz. gm subtly or explicit guides player so that they is knowing what sort of actions will attract divine wrath and repudiation. is easy in pnp, but am not seeing a good way to implement in a crpg. oh, and once again, alignment is stoopid. HA! Good Fun!

pong-- no developer story, but it created loads o' gameplay hours. we like story, but smarty developers know that a game with good gameplay can be engaging regardless o' story quality. reverse is not necessarily true. bad gameplay can ruin game. not matter how good writing is if gameplay sux. HA! Good Fun!

as much as we loathe the fanboi mentality, we suspect that such nonsense has very little impact on game quality. can fanboi's, with tacit support of the developer, chill debate on message boards? sure. if you is the seemingly lone voice o' criticism on a board and you is attacked and insulted by the TRUE minions of Cain or Bioware or Lucas, the average person will leave rather than endure abuse. am thinking that the bioware fanboi's were a bit amazed and appalled when the developers actually showed acceptance (and maybe even approval) of Gromnir's harsh criticisms of bg and bg fanbois. 'course that were a long time ago and the culture at bio changed. we got banned 'cause we wouldn't stop criticizing the mass effect dialogue wheel. go figure. nevertheless, to suggest that bioware game quality diminished in anyway because o' the absence o' more heated board debates would be a bit narcissistic and altogether myopic. reality check: message boards is more a cheap advertising option for developers and publishers than they is 'bout being an integral part of the game development process. message boards help build anticipation for games and they is a natural incubator for growing a diehard fanbase. message boards is far less expensive than tv commercials, but they help sell games. fanbois is a cancer on message boards (maybe call'em a Caincer as is nothing worse than a cain fanboi) but ultimately, a cancer-ridden message board does not necessarily result in a diseased game. a diseased message board that helps sell games is still a Win for developers and publishers. HA! Good Fun!

why "cleric?" rpg cleric is a d&d oddity. a priest (gender-neutral) that can be casting spells and can't use swords? is the kinda thing that probable gets a special chapter in the malleus maleficarum. am suggesting that obsidian drop the link 'tween priests and healing magic... and the repelling o' undead and demons. exorcist ain't some kinda sacrament either-- is a lay occupation. want healing mages or alchemists or arcane scienists? why not, but don't limit to priests... and definitely don't limit to "cleric." HA! Good Fun!

1) crap ending interplay/black isle/obsidian has been consistent world-beaters in one category. is not storytelling, game stability or engaging game mechanics. nope. the obsidian guys tends to do lousy endings. really. the only game from these guys in which we had a genuine satisfying conclusion were, oddly enough, iwd. now, perhaps we can blame publishers for the way kotor 2 were concluded, but most o' the rest o' their catalog is equally anti-climactic. so... avoid craptacular endings. number 1. biggie. 2) dove/visas mar is some obsinatie npcs that is just written gawd offal. is as if the writers come up with the quirky concept, and then quit. even worse, they tries to add depth by adding pseudo-philosophizing dialogue. for eternity, make characters that DO compelling rather than say compelling... 'cause the stuff obsinaties sometimes has their characters say is just terrible. don't need characters that is actually a highly sophisticated clockwork, or is some kinda colony o' slime molds that has take human form... not if they is gonna spout fortune cookie dialogue. 3) +3 greatswords that do electrical damage & stun iwd had this nifty random weapon drop, and it were freaking ridiculously unbalanced. were hardly the only weapon that were unbalanced in that game. am s'posing that as guys who likes to play games, the developers wanna make kewl weapons as much as we want to find kewl weapons. the thing is, a kewl weapon can seriously mess up game balance. fo:nv had a couple such weapons, so is not as if the obsinaties has left this obstacle in their rear-view mirror. as nifty as ultimate weapons may seem to be, please make'em a bit less nifty in eternity. obvious best weapons that everybody wants, should be avoided. 4) end boss with nine lives is not necessarily an obsidian thing (not solely) but am not sure when it became popular for developers to make bosses with multiple lives. gotta kill material form, then energy form, then spiritual form... or some such nonsense. no respawning from stasis cocoons, or using corpses to reanimate self or anything remotely similar. 5) eating is an exercise in the tedious. make us carry food and occasionally eat is just a waste o' game time. same with drinking. am pretty sure such stuff were optional in fo:nv. were considered hard-mode or ironman or somesuch. *snort* we had quick travel, so what were the point? even so, at least in fo:nv it were an optional thing, so if you includes such silliness in eternity, make it optional. ... gonna stop at 5 for now... much more and we might seem like we is grumpy. HA! Good Fun!

am not liking the call of the question. is tragedy more dramatic than... what? need context. ... am s'posing it is ultimately irrelevant. given the setting and genre, we will assume that eternity gots a heroic tale... just as did bg, iwd, ps:t, fallout and all other games from which eternity is 'posedley drawing inspiration. the Real question, in our opinion, is whether or not eternity story will involve sacrifice. heroism and sacrifice is necessarily intertwined. am guessing that some folks will debate that point, but for the nonce we will assume that it is axiomatic. regardless, game mechanics makes some heroic sacrifices far less meaningful. run into burning building to save a child is heroic 'cause the hero is placing his own life in the balance, but in a game with reload, we know that the hero won't genuine die. is much more difficult to makes for meaningful sacrifice when you gots functional immortal heroes. am recalling discussing this point in the context of the, "dragon age will be more mature and dark" threads over at bioware boards. we were genuinely shocked by the feedback we were seeing. Gromnir suggested that to be mature, dark, and meaningful heroic, the writers would be necessarily forcing the players to make hard choices with no obvious easy win options. we further suggested that such choices would needs have genuine costs that would not just be borne by the character, but by the Player. we were stunned at the numbers and volume of dissenters to our way o' thinking. maybe not a majority, but something close to 50%, were not wanting any hard choices in DA, and they sure as heck didn't want any meaningful sacrifices. we were informed, quite forcibly, that da were a Game. games were 'posed to be fun... escapism from real world hardships. rare is Gromnir shocked by fan feedback, but we were genuine shocked at the response to DA claims o' dark & mature. so, leaving aside the near impossibility o' finding a generally accepted definition o' dark or mature, we instead focus on sacrifice. heroic tale need heroic sacrifice. those sacrifices should be considerable fuel for Drama, but the real question is whether or not the eternity fanbase is the same as the da fanbase: do you actually want hard choices and sacrifice? well, do you? HA! Good Fun!

see, the thing is, the romances really is that shallow. they is optional. they is tangential. they is necessarily brief. we got no idea why folks like them... but that doesn't change the fact that people do like them. while they seem like a horrible waste o' resources that will, at best, result in a childish and immature romantic side-quest, as long as they remain optional, we will not complain too much. HA! Good Fun!

... there is clearly some kinda disconnect at work here, yes? does anybody argue that ad hoc xp award schemes is more simple than quest-based xp? no, right? after all, there is no need to add up every little award. there is no need to balance awards so that one style of gameplay is not given the lion's share of awards. no need to worry 'bout players exploiting monster spawns or re-locking chests to get credit for re-opening, or any number o' other exploits. sure, every game that has had quest awards has seemingly had infinite xp exploits, but it ain't like ad hoc schemes won't have quest-based awards as well. ps:t had some memorable infinite xp bugs from quest awards such as the coffin maker and the private sensory stones. nevertheless, bug hunting is much more simple if you not have all the ad hoc awards to be checking, right? am not certain why josh has been silent on this issue given that he has, in the past, been such a vocal advocate o' quest-based schemes. maybe we should just wait and let him chastise folks who continue with their unreasonable advocation o' a bassackwards approach to xp awards. after all, josh tends to be even less diplomatic than Gromnir... as hard as that is to believe. HA! Good Fun!

Some of us, including me, enjoy the borders and definitions classes endow us with, as a focus for our characters. I wouldn't call it a holdover from DnD either; there are many, many systems with classes & careers. so, playing a spellcaster that you build using customization features, a spellcaster that can hurl fireballs whilst wearing inexplicable dressing gowns/bath robes, is less enjoyable than playing one that is crafted by the developers? am baffled. am believing you, 'cause many people seem to be big fans o' classes, but am still baffled. opportunities to customize your character is a good thing, no? everybody likes customization ops, right? so why not maximize? if through customization features you can get your ideal spellcatser, how is that less satisfying to play than the hard-coded mage? am hopeful this is one feature that the obsinaties choose to ignore the fans regarding. HA! Good Fun!

Technically PS:T did have an antagonist, but your confrontation was not with him, but with the world and with yourself. you could say that just about any story wherein a protagonist must ultimately confront an antagonist. "you know, like the UBG is a metaphor for the hero's fear of death-- or maybe it is the hero's fear of turtles. regardless, it was brilliant how the author..." etc. *snort* the more you like, the more you will read-in pretentious stuff to give more depth. ps:t, like most interplayblackisleobsidian games, were not having a particularly well-crafted conclusion. sure, we liked where we is stuck walking into the blood war, but the fortress o' regrets felt incomplete and ultimately unsatisfying. ravel, and to a lesser extent trias, were far more interesting than the transcendent one. so we fight a bunch o' meaningless battles with shadow critters to get to a potential final confrontation with a rather underwhelming ubg. disappointing. regardless, ps:t did have a villain... metaphor and allegory nonsense notwithstanding. is just unfortunate that self-as-villain stuff were not near as well-crafted as ravel/ei-vene/mebbeth. eternity won't have a fixed protagonist such as ps:t, so it will be even more dependent on a villain to give story focus. ... again, this is a Game story we is talking about, so there will ultimately need be a gameplay resolution that the story must accommodate... is not the other way around, yes? you will confront the ubg at the end of game, and as many players will have built combat characters, you will necessarily have an opportunity to do some fighting at the end. such a confrontation will be climax. so, you gotta make villain compelling, or your climax is... anti-climactic.this is not movie, novel or short story. gameplay is unavoidable and should remain the focus. chrisA knows this... but he seems to have lapses when it comes to actual writing o' conclusions. HA! Good Fun!

So if my party happens to kill a mummy in a random isolated crypt that is 5 levels above us, but is not tied to any quest or "objective" ... we'd get no XP, even if we barely survived. But if my party talks a peasant (2 dialogue clicks, 2 skill distribution clicks) into saving a cat from a tree (talk skills!!) ... we'd get XP. That's neat... Not. ... if your argument was that ridiculous quests such as clearing rats from tavern basements or saving cats from trees should be avoided in eternity, we would agree, but apparently you chose to beat the stuffing out of a strawman to make some kinda point about quest-based xp awards. most puzzling. HA! Good Fun!

pants. is a pair o' pants too much to ask for? HA! Good Fun! ps we dont want a mage class. let any character choose spellcasting abilities... and pants

we won't discuss what makes a good game romance. wont discuss the level o' lasciviousness appropriate. wont discuss same-sex romance. we told somebody that we wouldn't be responding to the romance threads, but we will make one observation that we will no doubt needs repeat a few thousand times: romance is Not fodder for a tangential side-quest. we are not anti-romance. many o' the bestest stories is romances. we is not necessarily a romantic, but we likes a good romance. at the same time, we not want romance forced 'pon us. the thing is, we gets a bit queasy when we consider the notion o' an optional and tangential romantic side-quest. is invariably rushed as you gots very limited number o' dialog encounters to complete a full romance arc. am not seeing a way to reconcile our desire for romance to be optional with our recognition that romance is not viable in a tangential vignette. HA! Good Fun!

well, the antler helm don't look much more practical than a dunce cap, but am largely in agreement with mc. at the very least, we would like to have the option to be giving our spellcaster some freaking pants. HA! Good Fun!

if obsidian needs add the anachronism o' classes, then keep them as few and as simple as possible. Less class-specific abilities and More customization. HA! Good Fun!

Planescape: Torment begs to differ. So does Mask of the Betrayer. The story is the story. A villain may be a device serving to drive the story--to create motivation, but there are many, many potential motivations other than "kill that dude!" eh? you don't think that ps:t and motb had primary antagonists? regardless, one o' the big flaws o' motb were that most folks did not give a damn 'bout the antagonist. and please note that ps:t had a specific protagonist... which were a frequent complaint btw. "story is the story" is... meaningless. make observation that eternity is a game that will have a story is far more significant. as a game, you necessarily needs to accommodate gameplay, yes? this is why there is almost invariably a confrontation with the UBG (ultimate bad guy) that allows player to overcome via gameplay. ask chrisA... he has noted that story takes a backseat to gameplay on more than one occasion. doesnt matter if you talking donkey kong or ps:t 'cause you is still finding yourself leaping over barrels/obstacles to reach a final confrontation with the ubg. HA! Good Fun!

classes is unnecessary... and evil. HA! Good Fun!

the villain IS the story. eternity will not be "a clean, well-lighted place" or "the dead." there will be an obvious antagonist. the protagonist need be vague and general enough to support any number o' player choices and preferences, so it is the villain who will define the story... unless obsidian writers is complete nuts. HA! Good Fun!

1 obvious class o' antagonist obsidian needs to avoid: faceless/nameless evil. grendel. sauron, perfect storm... whatever. is scary and terrible 'cause is unfathomable. sauron is never seen. he is an Evil as imagined by the reader and not as illustrated by author. is kinda obvious why faceless opponents do not work in a visual game, but chrisA and company didnt seem to realize the hurdles in making such an antagonist when they tried to makes nihilus work in kotor2. we listened to a post mortem from chrisA in which he describes nihilus as a success. ... really? mush-mouth with the skull mask were laughable as an antagonist. no need for audience imagination = no dread. sooooo, avoid faceless. on the other hand, obsidian/bis best antagonist... wasn't. ravel/mebbeth/kreia/etc has all been variations of the same character, and all has been the player's protector and guide as much as an antagonist. bestest obsidian/bis character has appeared in all their games, and we hope this continues with eternity. doesn't need be main antagonist.... but it wouldn't be a bad idea neither. HA! Good Fun!

... didn't read thread, but "finishing moves" sounds like an anime trope. am thinking we ain't the target demographic for such a "feature." HA! Good Fun!

are you complete insane? silly question. look, combat is gonna be prevalent in the game. duh. in a moronic and bassackwards system o' xp awards, it will not be difficult to find occasions to be awarding xp for combat.... but what about sneaky or diplomacy or... whatever. instead of the complex job o' trying to give different players equivalent xp opportunities ('cause if you don't, people will reasonably feel as if playing non-combatant focused is an xp punishment,) the developers need only give uniform quest xp to be guaranteeing that nobody gets slighted. complex and easily broken calculus so that vol gets a warm-fuzzy every time he kills an ork or opens a lock, versus the simplicity and elegance o' quest-based rewards? really folks, this is a no-brainer. let the developers spend their efforts developing gameplay content instead of wasting a second on ad hoc models o' xp award/ HA! Good Fun!

the game will not be complete non-linear... and you complete miss the point. if you got loads of xp awards for combat, but less opportunities for other activities, then you gotta grind much longer and harder as a sneaky player or diplomatic player to get relative similar power. you create a whole new level o' frustration for players. you is being ridiculous, as usual. HA! Good Fun!

luckily the developers is a bit brighter. we asked for a solution that makes developer job easier, and you want harder 'cause with imbalanced ad hoc you now you gots key plot-point encounters that potentially is being faced by players with significantly different power levels. HA! Good Fun!

this is just getting silly. ... different tack. for those who object to quest xp rewards, offer us a similarly simple and intuitive system that will result in players getting equal xp regardless o' their play style. sure, "balance" is often ridiculed in these parts, but shouldn't the sneaky player or the diplomat get as much xp awarded to them as does the combat player? get halfway through game and the sneakers has 1/2 as much xp as the combat players would be bad, no? quest rewards ignores complexity o' trying to balance rewards for disparate activities. now some folks like vol needs a digital pat on the noggin for every action they is successfully completing, but is that really an efficient use of developer time and effort? quest xp is inherently balanced and simple to implement... which means developers can spend time actual developing game content 'stead of trying to achieve balanced xp awards in an action-based system. tell us your alternative. give us a simple way to implement. HA! Good Fun!