MrBrown

DA is buggy in the romances. I had a male character who I tried to court Leliana with, and I ended up triggering relationship related banter from Morrigan (not so surprising) and Alistair (shouldn't even be possible) as well.

I played FF13 through a few weeks back, still got side-stuff to play. The combat system is great. It's basically a better version of FF12's system. Like all the reviews say, the game is more linear than the previous, meaning it has alot less sidequests and other stuff to do besides the main plot, and most of it comes late in the game. Still liked it though, probably for the combat system. The story is your typical character centric melodrama, so if that isn't your thing, skip all the cutscenes. And by the gods, thanks for the skip function... and they didn't add that until FF12. I used to leave FF10 running and go do something else while the teen-drama was going on.

Reading about the death mechanics almost made me give up playing it, but I'll probably give it a chance soon. How necessary are rogue-skills or arcane magic stuff in SoZ?

Hmm. While I liked party management ala BG and IWD, NWN2's UI doesn't really seem suited for it. Hopefully it'll be modified for this.

The Koreans and their vassals (the Japanese and the Babylonians) as well as the Egyptians only acquired Gunpowder a few turns ago, so I doubt they'd pose much threat even 4vs1. Elizabeth and Zara also dislike each other, so it might be wise to make them fight, or at least cut all deals, at some point. They're the biggest enemies, really.

I'm done. I'll report by topic rather than by turn. I researched Assembly Line and Fascism. I also got a Great Scientist, which I used to create an Academy at Crossroads Keep, the second highest commerce city. Traded for Scientific Method and Democracy from Elizabeth. I'd research Steel next, as that way we'd get Cannons instead of Trebuchets. Changed civics to Universal Suffrage and Emancipation. Also got the great general from Fascism, hasn't been used yet. Started building the Pentagon in Irvine, as I figured it'd be good for our future war efforts. Which we should be doing, since that's our best chance to win, besides score. Built Dikes all over the place, with the help of Universal Suffrage. They're just too good. Anyway, regarding the war effort... Messed up a couple of times. Hammurabi originally had only sligtly more defenses than in his last city, so it was just a question of how fast I could get my Trebuchets there. He tried to circle around with a Knight and a War Elephant, but no big deal. But I had forgotten about the 2nd explorer, which Hammurabi promptly killed, and got a Great General for it. It just delayed the inevitable anyway, and I razed Akkad... But not before he capitulated to Wang Kong, who declared war on me, along with his other vassal, Tokugawa. Not that they had much to attack with (2 Knights and 1 Galleon)... I eventually made peace with them, as I figured the distance from the Obsidian lands would make the war effort rather pointless. It'd be better to attack Egypt first. I placed the attack pile next to DOOM, near the Egyptian border. I also made a new city, to the place Enoch recommended. There were a couple of events, but nothing big. Anyway, the big question... City specialization. Geez, what a mess. Here's what I'd recommend doing with the cities, and what some of them are actually already doing: Irvine & Crossroads Keep - Commerce->Science. Cottages and Windmills (Windmills with Electricity give +2 commerce, +1 with Financial). Oxford and Wall Street should go to these cities, slightly depending on whether you'll be continuing with Bureucracy. DOOM - Commerce, and science if you're going to play with more than 50% of commerce going into it. Port Avellone - Specialists. Farms. Peragus & Meatytown - Hammers->Armies. The other cities aren't that specialized yet, I think. So, anything to ask? Or did I mess up anything? GodEmperorFeargusAD_1750.zip

Okay, will do in 3-4 hours.

I'll take a shot at it, if there are no objections?

Actually, they revamped the AI for BtS, so it should be exactly the opposite... and I have been finding it such as well. Maybe you've been playing against AI with personalities that don't trade much? Also, Noble is the default, average, difficulty setting... I have no idea why everyone seems to prefer Prince though. I might also be interested in playing Civ4, but not a succession game. Pvp for me.

Transmutation.

Inferior in stats, but their hair options are just too funny to not try one.

Apparently not... IIRC some dev said so at the Bio boards. It's different from PnP. Basically... BAB's at level 30: High PnP: 25/20/15/10 MotB: 30/25/20/15/10/5 Medium: PnP: 20/15/10 MotB: 22/17/12/7/2 Low: PnP: 15/10 MotB: 15/10/5 So, it's a rather big boost to warrior-types, with little change for others. Well, all in all, it does come down to what Gromnir says; the fixed range for randomization means it just doesn't work with the huge level range. EDIT: I don't care one way or another myself, really. I think a CRPG is going the wrong way from the point it starts trying to implement a PnP set literally anyway.

Why are they angry about that? It isn't there, basically. BAB continues to progess like in normal levels, by class, and you continue to gain extra attacks. All PrCs have 5 or 10 levels. In PnP terms, there's no epic progression for them.

It's the numpad * The keymap-tab in the options lists it as player mode or something like that.

My "headbutt" specialist.

I'd really rather have BG:DA type combat, really. Beats NWN and the IE game's combat, IMO.

Icewind Dale 3. Or original RPG IP.

I always played IWD with: Paladin Fighter/Druid Cleric/Ranger Fighter/Mage Fighter/Thief Bard Can't really imagined playing it any other way.

Hmm. Well, I'm not Kaftan's teacher, but I can imagine one such thing that would annoy me if I was the creator of a PnP RPG product. Without going into why it is so, alot of RPG players and groups have a very narrowly defined way to play RPGs. That is to say, they consider those ways to be good roleplaying, and while they might agree that other preferences exist and respect them, they don't consider those equal to their way. In other words, to them, all the differences between RPG products are just differences in ways to achieve the same thing. So when they try a new product, they don't try to find new "things" to achieve with it, but rather attempt to employ it for the same thing they did the previous one. I could see how this would be vexing for the creator, if he meant the product for a different "thing". Absolutism over rules is no solution in any case. <_<

Yes, well, turn-based systems involve this "time stop" thing in any case. I think you'd have to look at other advantages in a TB system than plausibility. Such as tactical choices. Obviously, true realtime just doesn't work for PnP games. I think that if you want to go realistic and still retain playability in PnP RPG combat, you'd go with some kind of concurrent action system.

Well, alot of people prefer to have PCs and NPCs work by the same rules because they prefer world consistency or some such; not necessarily because they dislike the GM changing rules on the fly. This is one of the reasons why I'd separate the "same rules for PCs and NPCs" from the "authority over game rules" -discussion.

Yes. You still keep talking about two different things like they were the same. For instance, many RPG systems give the players a metagame resource (Fate, Luck, Void, it has a lot of names) they can use to re-roll dice, exceed their typical creative authority (GM: "The NPC does this..." Player: *Uses Luck point* "No he doesn't"), etc. Many (not all) games that use this kind of mechanics only give it to the players, not the NPCs. This is an example of PCs and NPCs working by different rules, but not necessarily with any GM authority over the rules. #2 without #1, that is. Though, from your posts, it's obvious that your real problem is with #1. I agree with you, and your teacher. I don't see how it matters whether you're playing the "original" game or not, though.

I think you're confusing a couple of things here. First, you say that the GM changing the rules on the fly is bad. Then, to cure this, you say that "all parties must play by the same rules". Basically: 1. GM authority over rules; does it exist? 2. Do the same rules apply to NPCs and PCs? You can very well have a game where the GM has no singular authority to change rules (personally, I'd consider that necessary for any RPGs), but the PCs and NPCs still operate by different rules.

I've found that quickness of getting into play from the "starting point" is more about how far detached the setting is from the real world, and the number of options in character generation, while quickness in actual play is more about how often you have to refer to the rules book. Quickness of the latter kind is often desirable, IMHO. The former depends on more factors, so I'm not so sure. In any case, out of the ones mentioned, d20 is the only one I've actually GMed, and I'd say it's pretty slow on both accords. I don't think it's desirable to have a specific rule for many specific cases. All you get is a rules bloat, which also makes a game alot slower. IMHO, it's better to have a generic resolution system applicable to any situations which aren't covered by other rules. AFAIK, none of the systems mentioned do that. I think there are two kinds of (working) "realism" approaches to RPGs- Systems that focus on one specific situation, and tries to depict that as well as possible. - Systems that create their own kind of "reality", encompassing the whole word in the system. AFAIK, GURPS is of the 2nd kind. EDIT: In any case, I don't think realism itself is very desirable of a rules system, since it doesn't itself include player choice, only the "result" of the system. As a secondary priority, it can work. Does it matter? For innovativeness these days, you'd have to look at indie-RPGs... Whether that means they're also good is up to opinion. Most commercial RPGs basically recreate the same thing, over and over again. I think it's more about actual play than the systems itself. Most (commercial) systems work, if you know how to use them, and what to use them for. I don't think it's about genres, as much as it's about playing styles.

Hmm. I might get them, depending on mod-compatibility. Does the IWD one come with Trials of the Luremaster (or whatever it was called)?