Cantousent

My goodness, many thanks, Sand. I appreciate the fact that you saw the distinction. It's a christian's right to peacefully protest this candy. On the other hand, it's candy. I wouldn't think too much of it. However, we MUST acknowledge the difference between voicing outrage in a peaceful manner and burning down embassies. The six-foot sculpture was the victim of "a strong-arming from people who haven't seen the show, seen what we're doing," Semler said. "They jumped to conclusions completely contrary to our intentions." Ha! better to be so called "strong armed" by people able to muster public support than to be killed. Christians have a right to respond just as much as someone has the right to create a candy Christians find offensive.

I kind of got a little lost on that particular discussion, but I have to admit that Fallout sounds great either in Europe or North America. There are plenty of opportunities for sequels within the United States, but as long the core elements are there, I would love a good Fallout game set just about anywhere.

You want the whole list or just the top ten?

Yeah, your level 1 character will just have to think of a way of killing that dragon. personally, I think players should be killed if they take on battles that are clearly out of their league. Or should we start using the Oblivion scaling system?

I could see playing the game. Of course, there'd have to be more to it. It sure as hell beats Gromnir's Thundarr universe.

Calax, you're a WoWser also? What realm, man?

I guess my point is that we are violent in our agreement. Tigranes, Tale, you, and most folks agree that the npcs and players should follow the same ruleset. There are arguments to be made for breaking the ruleset for NPCs. Some folks have made legitimate arguments to do so. However, at it's most basic, we can follow the ruleset and make a battle unwinnable. What Tigranes has done is shown various ways of making that battle unwinnable but still enjoyable to the player. Hell, I cited some ideas for this myself in the other thread. I will repost it here: The idea of having an impossible battle has real potential. I don't see it as something simple like a battle the PC cannot win. Instead, I see it as a battle the PC cannot win but his decisions prior to and during the battle have "meaningful consequences." Will, he cut and run early? Will he, knowing that everything hinges on his survival, make sure he gets out alive? Will he selfishly insist on being the last one to leave? Must someone be sacrificed? ...And, if so, who? Will he take on the role of Captain Ahab and fight unto destruction... not only his own, but of his cause as well?

One quick thought, even following the same rules for pcs and npcs alike, a dm can always make unwinnable battles. Designing a good module usually entails making sure the battles are winnable. For this reason, I don't understand why this is an issue. I'm not saying we should make the enemy impervious to harm. The idea, at least for me, isn't that we make the enemy invulnerable, only that the player cannot win. There is a difference. Oh, and to keep true to the sand variant, the player does have a chance. If he rolls all 20s and the enemy rolls all 1 for several hours, the pc could somehow win. Hell, face low level characters with an ancient dragon and, unless the world has gone mad, the battle is unwinnable.

many tnanks, friend. I hope to collect my thoughts and respond to some of these views.

I thought you made some excellent points, Tigranes. I just didn't want to keep derailing the thread. A bunch of you have made great points for and against unwinnable battles and how we they might be implemented in a game. In fact, I'm afraid that some of the other members won't have seen the larger discussiong because of the Mass Effect title. That's too bad, because some folks would undoubtedly have additional views we haven't yet expressed.

I would love to see a W40K RPG. That's just so I can play an eldar, of course, but I'd still love it.

What realm, kirottu?

Damn it, I'm so easily confused.

"Finally, I should probably talk about the twin gorillas in the closet. I'm sure there's a correct analogy in there somewhere, but that's what came to mind. Anyway, I'm speaking of the KotOR3 and Fallout gorillas. Both of those are games that I and everyone else here at Obsidian would love to make. I don't know if we will ever get the chance, but I do continue to talk with LucasArts about what might be going on with KotOR3. As for Fallout, like I said, I'm not sure if we'll ever get the chance, but I know that I'd love to make another Fallout - plus, I think Avellone's already designed the next 12 of them." Not only am I happy to hear that Obsidz is still actively looking into the issue of sequels to a couple of my favorite series, but the following little tidbit really perked my interest. "I know a lot of people around here love 40K, so I was thinking of talking to THQ at some point about whether they would like to a 40K game that is more RPG than RTS." I consider all that good news. http://forums.obsidianent.com/index.php?showtopic=41584

No matter what, I'm just glad it ended like it did. I sure as hell didn't want to see war between US/UK and Iran. I'm not going to praise Iran over the incident, however. I refuse to pin a medal on the chest of a thief just because he decides to return the goods after the robbery. I'm quite relieved.

So... tale... are you the dog in the picture? hahaha just kidding. seriously, if I bought this, I'd have to ebay it myself within a few days. There is simply no more room in this house.

I love that game so much. But, I never picked up the expansion. What game is that? Looks to be FEAR. I enjoyed both the original and the expansion.

I've become more and more intrigued with the idea of the hopeless battle. What I see as the biggest obstacle is that the majority of players would not catch the idea that it is impossible to win the battle and therefore would end the game at that spot because they could not finish it. However, we do have something of a precedent in PS:T. There are areas that the player cannot access unless he allows tNO to die. In fact, if I recall correctly, access one such area is necessary to finish the game. PS:T had a disclaimer saying that the PC would die during the game and not to be freaked out by it. If the design team could do something similar, then it might actually work. Moreover, lost battles might make for more interesting games. I'd prepared a longer statement, but I'm starting to feel a bit guilty about taking up the space in a thread ostensibly dedicated to MassEffect. It looks to be a charming game, but I'm more interested in talking about the design aspect in general. If the mods feel it's necessary, they can split the thread. If someone else wants to create a new thread dedicated to yet another discussion of freedom, meaningful choices, and lost battles, I'd be thrilled. In any event, I'll stop cluttering this thread.

I've managed to do a few missions around the beginning area. The open feel of the game is quite astounding. it has aspects of a CRPG, but the gameplay is FPS all the way. In a lot of ways, it's clunky and dated with dialogue that ranges between bad to outright silly to utterly perplexing. Still, I've been having fun. It won't break into my favorite games list at this rate, but I've enjoyed the experience. For less than $40 bought and paid for, I'm not complaining in the least. BTW: This is my second Direct2Drive title and I have to say I'm quite happy with it. No packaging cluttering the house.

I never knew that. I learn the damnedest thing on this message board.

"shoulda' seen what happened when we suggested that not all crpg battles should be winable." Or that the characters should only get objective/quest experience and none for creature kills. I agree whole-heartedly as regards the devil v deep blue sea thing. Well, as much as I can. I didn't really get the reference, but I take it from context that you mean that not every decision should evoke a grand internal struggle. If every decision did, then the net effect would be to inure the player to the struggle in the first place. I don't think the aim should be baby steps in the long run, although baby steps might be the only way to move forward as of now. But I don

Aw, it's not so bad. I'll just make up my own dialogue as I go along. I do that half the time anyhow. In Oblivion, I had to supply the whole backstory as I played.

Okay, Crashgirl, you've convinced me. I'm downloading it now as I type this. Direct2Drive decided it wanted to work after all.

Oh my goodness, that was funny. I don't know whether I would really like a game I've described, but I also know that I have, for the sake of (wait, don't cringe) role-playing, I have taken options that were not beneficial to me in any way. I've had to decide whether attacking a neutral creature in world of warcraft is a bad thing to do. I decided, even though it had potential for good treasure, that my character wouldn't go out of her way to kill something just to get some loot. ...But that's the best I can do with WoW. For the medium to mature, these themes must be handled differently. It's funny, the term agony has it's roots in the Greek word for struggle, from which we also get pro and antagonist. It's hard enough to get the PC and the NPCs right in a CRPG. It's apparently impossible to depict any real internal struggle, let alone evoke such a struggle in the player himself.