Amentep

I always thought it weird to see a flail used the same way as a sword. And didn't the IE games have spears with a chopping motion?

Right. They're seperate skills. So why were you suggesting it was okay to bluff an intimidation - "[bluff]I'll rip your head off"? This gets back to the whole original point, for the two skills to be distinct, you can't overlap their use. Overlapping their use or application means they aren't distinct, in which case there isn't an argument for the existence of both skills. Which is why evdk said that the above example shouldn't happen.

Maybe the curse was placed after it was created? Guy makes Stabby +12 stabbing sword and his Arch-Evil foe sneaks in, steals the weapon, curses it, sneaks it back and now its Stabby +12 stabbing sword cursed with Beserker rage that causes guy to go all stabby on his family. Or maybe the +5 Holy Sword picked up a taint (in the form of the curse) when heroic long dead guy defeated some ginormous demon ages past? Or maybe there was magical interference? God interference? A minor miscalculation? A person with a really bad sense for practical magical jokes?

Because if they're not distinct, what's the purpose of having them be separate? if as you say "usually a character is only going to have one of them anyway or at least be proficient in only one" but Intimidate and Bluff can be used interchangeably...then wouldn't the character be able to get through any situation with only one of the skills? In which case why have two? The gameplay isn't treating them as unique so what purpose do two unique skills serve? You'd also end up with situations where - remember the skills are interchangeable - where you'd have "[intimidate]Why yes, I am *the* Rifrat the Writer who wrote 'All things between here and there' " and have it make sense. So what you seem to be arguing is I should be able to [bluff] an intimidation but not vice-versa...so why would anyone invest in intimidation when Bluff is more useful? Well the answer is to make them distinct and not let people make a [bluff] check for an [intimidate] check - or to make a higher level concept that combines all the speechy stuff into one skill.

I'd like to think that there's no "one" way for a curse to be applied. It'd probably also be needed to define what the curse is in PE before deciding mechanics to enforce it. But one example, lets say you pick up a sword and equip it. Its a longsword 1-8 damage. It has a penalty to hit %. Because I equipped it, I'm cursed. The point is that I have to do something to remedy the curse so they could very easily devise the "nature" of curses to be such that a cursed item "bestows" a curse on the equipper(s) as opposed to being unremovable (in this case to penalty to hit would remain regardless of what sword I used).

The example was exaggeration for effect, not intended to be an indicator of real gameplay. The point is, ultimately, if you're going to define [intimidate] and [bluff] as distinct skills there has to be some sense in how they're applied that makes them distinct. That doesn't mean they're not closely related, only that for game purposes they still have to have a unique role, or else there's no point to separate them out as distinct concepts. You could have a [pursuade] skill, for example that covered any attempt to alter the actions of another via dialogue and it could cover bluff, intimidate, diplomacy or whatever. But if you create [bluff], [intimidate], and [Diplomacy] there needs to be a reason for them to be distinct; else you're not creating different skills but needlessly subdividing things where an all-inclusive skill would be more useful to your intent. 3.5 D&D, IIRC, makes bluff and intimidate seperate (so they have to be distinct) but allows +2 synergy checks on either with high scores in the other.

Why would you insist on keeping a party of incompatible characters forcing one to run off? What a bad party-leader you are. I kid, I kid. But it seems to me enforcing some logic with your NPCs would be a good thing (and more particular would need a system that doesn't devolve party reputation into "donate to a church / whack a villager to keep neutral alignment and most everyone happy") Particularly given that PE isn't going to have an alignment system so there can be a lot more freedom of character opinion.

Dear Jesus, don't make me quote myself: Sorry thats just silly... intimidate is a skill - a skill is a game mechanic - when it's used the game performs some function with it - the game doesn't know it's a threat it just knows it's a skill that requires some function to determine if it is successful or not. bluff is a skill - a skill is a game mechanic - when it's used the game performs some function with it - the game doesn't know it's a threat it just knows it's a skill that requires some function to determine if it is successful or not. The fact that you don't think a threat should be bluffed in this context is irrelevant to all but you... A threat shouldn't be bluffed, that's his point. Lets say you're charismatic and have a high bluff skill. Lets say you're also 100 lbs when soaking wet and have arms that look weaker then cooked pasta noodles. You have low [intimidate] [bluff]Do this or I rip your arms off! Why would it ever succeed? You're asking the person to believe something that their vision tells them otherwise. In essence, your desire to [bluff] is overridden by the fact you can't [intimidate] indicating intimidate was the correct skill all along.

I actually thought that - first time I played DAO - that there was going to be risk involved in getting the Circle's help to save the kid (instead of the options available when you first get to that point). In fact, since I hadn't cleared the wizard tower I was sure it was going to fail because of the time it'd take to clear. While I'm not crazy about timed main quest objectives, this would have been a situation where I'd have really appreciated a timer on it. What's not to stop the player from saving before every dialogue, before every choice, before doing anything. I think you can't prevent this kind of thing. I'm not sure applying a certain degree of consequences would naturally lead people to gambling on reloads (ie I'm not sure it encourages the behavior anymore than any other choice/consequence in the game). *ring ring* "Hello?" ... "Hey its Backgammon, Dungeons and Dragons and Craps calling, they want to have a word."

Trading was a pain in any of the games from what little I MPed the IE games. It seemed to take a long, long time to do.

There's nothing wrong with stating that you're using a skill in P&P games. The problem, I think isn't in the theoretical, but in the practical. Lets use your example. You burst into a pirate's den who have stolen the mystic whozits from some random dude the next town over who promised you GOLD if you got his whozits back for him. [intimidate]I'll rip your arms off if you don't tell me what I want to know! Tell me what I want to know and I won't be forced to kill the remaining 100 people in this building. Hi there, I'm wondering if you've heard the Good News? I have a pamphlet here... Alms? Oh sorry, I seem to have broken down the wrong door. [bluff]I'm Bob, your new Pirate Apprentice from Pirate-Temps. Now lets say that you use Intimidate what are the options - Special dialogue (success or failure) Same dialogue as primary non-intimidate skill response If it is the second option, what's the point of creating a separate special [intimidate] option? If its the first lets look closely at that - First, for it to work almost every social situation should have a stat skill attached to it. But here's the thing you can't do that from a practical perspective (unless you're doing a generic [speech] skill where you don't have to worry about intent as much, only whether success chances are raised). You also can't really describe all of the possible imitation options that a P&P character would have. Typically you're going to look like a brutish thug; but intimidation can be more than that, a person could be intimidated by fear (arm ripping) or a sense of awe (OMG you're that adventurer who just killed Krogrok the Deadly. I'm you're biggest fan!) or just plain surprise (I didn't realize there was a door there!). So that means you're now at three intimidate possibilities to each dialogue (probably more). Otherwise you're just scripting special results for special situations - which is where we are now. But is this the best use of these skills? Then, because the skills are utilitarian they now have to give some positive effect to the user. So the solution is to make the [intimidate] tag something that for the player will always be successful. And thus the PC knows that whenever their [skill tag] comes up - it is the superior dialogue to take. One way to get around this is to apply skills to any dialogue where it might possibly make sense, thus allowing the scripter to only worry about skill successes and not skill use. But you couldn't do that and have the [intimidate] tag.

I'm looking forward to Obsidian's information on this race. But I don't have any strong particulars for what I want other than for them to be interesting to play.

Faerun was always a mishmash of places, AFAIK because it was created from...a bunch of different places. But frankly I can say I've never cared much about practical geography. So there's a rain forest on both sides of the mountain...can't say it ever bothered me much.

I think IWD probably made the most sense, but the BG games were horrible (IMO) multiplayer because of the heavy PC centric story. I tried playing it with a friend and it took us multiple sessions to get through the opening of the game. Anyhow out of the scope of what they're looking for in this game.

I'm not crazy about identify spells. I understand their important but it seems to make identification trivial (and only exist as a way to force the player to spend gold on identify scrolls). That said, it'd be interesting if identifying an item might take multiple steps unless someone with a high "lore" skill is involved as in the above unknown/qualified/identified suggestion.

Can't say I've really understood the point of the tags in most games since they do tend to work as optimal dialogue options. I suppose the theory is to give the player an understanding that their investment in "speech" skills carry some investment. Problem with replicating P&P skills is that so much of the P&P context just can't be replicated, so its harder to make their success realized by the player. At first, I had a Crazy alternate idea - dialogue choices also come up with a check box to apply skills to chosen line? Often would not lead to anything, but skill successes might be necessary to get optimal dialogue response; use of wrong skills might lead to dialogue failure or at least confusion (Intimidation + "Hi, how are you?). Benefit: player gets choice in skill use without being able to assume success or benefit of skill dialogue. Can "see" skill choices at work. Downside: extra work on dialogue system probably time/resource intensive. Player may be encourage to always check some skill even in innocuous dialogue and expect special reactions. In that sense, I think something like this may be impractical (even if its a good idea - of which I'm not certain!). After thinking about it further - dialogue is fixed, usually the context is fixed as well. Perhaps just have the game apply skills given the context and only provide feedback when the skill success leads to alternate dialogue paths?

I don't really want any cliche's mocked. I also think, to some degree, the majority of RPG cliches are unavoidable. As long as they can write a strong story and the gameplay works to propel me through that story, I can probably overlook any cliches that may get thrown at me.

The problem with that is that people will be frustrated with the inability to run, even if you set the walking speed to the same level of what you were planning the running speed to be. It's a perception thing. I like to think I'm part of that "people" group and I wouldn't mind it at all. The only time I've ever wanted a running option is when walking is so slow as to be tedious (and there have been some games that think slow walking is the "fun" way to implement movement). My experience has been that a decent walking speed will cause the average player to not care about the ability to run. The only way running makes sense is if there was a tactical need for it (running away, having an archer run to high ground for the first round so they can get better shots second round). And I'm not sure those reasons make sense in real-time w/pause.

I'm all for complex, well thought out quests. So if they've got a good way to do a complex, well thought out conspiracy quest - go for it.

Give me a nice normal walking speed. I'm not really sure a "run" makes sense unless they're planning to have tactical escapes. Otherwise I'd rather just be able to walk around town at a decent gate without looking like I'm running everywhere (or worse HAVE to run everywhere because turtles were passing me at the walk speed).

Is Project Eternity a combat sim? Will the only thing you can do is fight? Will we be fighting in tunnels and sewers and never leaving them, never resting at an inn, never gathering intel at a bar, never traveling multiple days overland? Because only a group of psychopaths would never talk to one another while traveling multiple days overland, I think, and I think if the characters can find the time to talk when not slaying monsters they can find the time to start up relationships. Frodo had Sam though - why'd he need the whores? (I kid, I kid) Also again there's the romance = sex correlation. I'd have no problem - again IF romances are to be included in any game - for a romance not to culminate in sex. Because not everyone falls into bed just because they started a romance. Okay so, to summarize people who have adventures never have romances or sex. Also Aerie = bad. Actually I agree elf-baby inventory item was bad. I dunno, I'm not convinced - as you seem to be - that adventuring couldn't support romance (while not every P&P Role playing game I played had it - some did; depended on the characters in situation). So ultimately that's all I've been advocating for - IF they're going to have NPCs with their own personalities and IF it makes sense for those NPCs and IF it fits the scope of the game and the story then why would I be against it? I know that there are some practical / resource concerns and I'm not for Romances where it isn't practical to include them or so resource intensive that the development of the game would be hampered. And Ouroboros was the first symbol from Project Eternity. Coincidence...or conspiracy? You decide. I'd love for their to be NPC-NPC relationships for interparty characters (like Mazzy and Korgan or Mazzy and Valgyar). I'm also against romance as only failable by PC choice; I think creating an NPC you could flirt with but who'd never seriously consider romancing the PC to be just as valid as an NPC who would romance you - or an NPC who'd stab you in the back the minute you gave them an opening. If I have to complain about romances as they are typically done in games its that they oftentimes don't really take the NPC as a character into account. And I think that's why many see them as fanservice because characterization goes out the window for the NPC to fall under the thrall of the PC losing any sense of their own personality along the way. I'm not a fan of deleting save games (unless in some kind of hardcore mode) but romance ending with PC death is what Bioware did for Mass Effect 2 with Morinth...

But killing Vulpes can be part of ordinary gameplay. When the conversation ends, you can pull out a gun and shoot him. There's no need to make that an explicit option in conversation, and there's no need to make killing Vulpes impossible if you don't happen to choose that explicit option in conversation. They should give us the freedom to act as we see fit within the game's mechanics, rather than writing out specific actions for us and having us choose from a list. Killing Vulpes isn't a dialogue option, what I'm saying is that there is a dialogue option with Vulpes that could explain the PC's motivation but the game can only react to killing Vulpes, not to why I killed Vulpes even if my character gets that dialogue option. Ceaser doesn't care why I did it, only that I did it and must be killed on sight. Maybe the PC did it because of the stated reason in the dialogue. Maybe it wasn't that reason. But what the game does react to is my "choice" to kill Vulpes not the line of thought that got me to the action. This is why many video game RPGs circle on "choice and consequences" not "motivation, action and consequences". Because the game can't assume motive, it can only react to what you "do" in the game - the choice.

Amentep, you aren't being this nitpicky are you? Maybe? I've had to read some of these posts broken up a good deal so apologies if I've lost context. I think we may be talking about the same things but using different terminology. Right, that's railroading and generally bad (unless the entire game railroads so you know going in what to expect).

Eh, well its personal taste (and there's never any accounting for that, definitely not my own! ) However when people can see the spooning skeletons and connect to that, it brings the setting "to life" for them. Or when they can relate to a companion story and fill in the blanks of what wasn't said. Its one more way for story elements to draw players in. However your personal mileage with that may vary! That's a pretty direct comparison to the gutter, yes... I figured it was the easiest to visualize. Problem with print comparisons is that video games belong to the visual media spectrum and I think its harder to make analogies that are easy to grasp when you leave the visual. One of the best examples for visual inferences is from Hitch****. Take a picture of a man grinning, then cut to a baby and back to the man. The audience has a visual story from the pictures (typically of a dad looking at his child or something along those lines - fairly innocuous). Take the SAME picture of a man grinning but inter-cut it with a picture of a sexy, scantily clad woman now gives you a different view of the man's intent. The truth is the pictures may not have anything to do with one another. They may not have been taken in the same place at the same time; juxtaposition of images and the human brain's need to create connections is what creates the narrative.

Actually they have to write the players reactions in dialogue to other dialogue. Otherwise the game wouldn't be responsive in dialogue. So at least one situation you can't take a reaction not given to you by the devs (hence the complaints over certain dialogue systems where the picked choice doesn't match the tone/point of what is said - the devs give the players a reaction choice that they pick because its the closest fit only for it to not fit at all). Arguably there is no player reaction that the game makers didn't allow via creation (either intentionally or unintentionally). To use my FONV example (because I'm tired and don't want to think of another), when Vulpes tells me to kill him if I feel strongly against what they've done to Nipton, the fact that I can pull out a gun and shoot him in the face is part of the games design. They could have made him unkillable, or scripted Vulpes and crew to leave Nipton without the PC reacting. That they didn't allows me to choose that reaction (and subsequently the world will react to that action). What the game makers can't write (and shouldn't assume) is the players motive; my reason for face-shooting Vulpes will always remain my own.