Shevek

Awesome

In all fairness, you have no idea what you're talking about. Bags of holding, gem bags, potions cases, scroll cases had a limited amount you could put in them. And I always had to have a couple of scroll cases, gem bags, etc over a few characters to be able to pick up everything and even then I would fill them up. I guess I never ran into that issue considering the amount of space those containers gave, how numerous they were and how they 100% negated item weight issues. I was never of fan of those containers btw and I am not a huge fan of the PoE stash either. However, the notion that BG2 had some kinda meaningfully restrictive inventory system is silly (unless you truly were picking up every single regular battle axe and shortbow that dropped).

In all fairness, BG2 had a defacto infini-inventory once you started getting gem bags, potion cases, ammo bags, scroll cases and (especially) bags of holding. And you use those whenever and wherever.

Gairnulf: I dont mind the endless regular ammo but I do wish we could equip limited stacks of special arrows (fire, poison, dispelling, frost, etc).

Man, I hope we get to play with this on Thanksgiving weekend.

@prodigydancer: IWD has semi-random loot (in chests, but you get my drift).

@Seari: BG2:EE original content is so-so. The vampire NPC was pretty bad but the Wild Mage bits were ok. If they want a crack at BG3 or some such, let 'em. Maybe they can call it "BG: Something Something." Whatever they make would certainly be a more true successor than BG: Dark Alliance and the more of these kinds of games get made the better. As an aside, I am playing a bit of IWD:EE and its pretty good. The performance is much better and its nice to have all the kits/etc and the quick loot ui. You can even disable Sawyer's nerf of Cleric/Rangers just by editing the ini file. That being said, I am still upset that for 20 bucks they can't fix quick weapon slots so you can switch between dual wielding, sword and board and ranged weapon set ups.

"I don't get it. Do people have some kind of OCD where they have to check every dead goblin corpse?" Guilty as charged.

If you read my post rather than jump at the chance to assault me with funny internet pics, you would have noticed that I mentioned the UI. Its not just the loot ui that is an issue. Selling will also be a chore if they adopt a WYSIWYG loot system. I stated such a system could be fine but there would need to be substantive changes to the ui and item icons.

Especially early on as I am desperate for +1 gear, I end up shifting through everything. So, Ill go into Kresselacks and butcher an entire army of undead. I do find a magical sword or two but I need to wade through a ton of crap. Also, if I want the gold, ammo and gems, I have click past tons of garbage. Its clunky.

Damn man. Edit: Can we just let this go and go back to having civil discussion not filled with meme and animated gifs?

If they do this, they will either need to rebalance sell prices so the PC isnt swimming in cash from selling fine items or ensure the npcs drop mostly crap versions of the gear. If enemies drop mostly crap versions of gear, looting will become a chore. It was easy in the IE games to differentiate between the magic stuff that was worth using/selling but in PoE not so much. I always end up grabbing everything and dumping it in the stash. This may end up cluttering that up a bit with items of various quality. Selling will suck... Also, as an aside, even with the quick loot ui from the EE versions, I am finding looting downed enemies in IWD to be kinda cumbersome. The PoE loot ui is less easy to navigate... I must say, they can have OK WYSIWYG loot if they have really clear icons that show which items are regular crap and which ones are worth it. It would also be nice if items could be taggable as junk (ala WL2) and all regular gear got tagged automatically as such. If they had that and a one click sell all junk button at stores, that would make a WYSIWYG system more attractive. To do this right would take a while. Would it be worth it?

@Namutree: I don't think multi-classing is gonna happen at this point (I begged for it after the KS, btw). What they eventually promised is that something akin to M/C would be possible via talents but that is not the case either at the moment as character development is not nearly as open as they suggested. Still, many character classes essentially are designed as pseudo-multiclasses already (one could say that the cipher is basically a fighter/mage and the paladin is basically a marshall or a fighter/bard as it were, etc). I would just be happy if they considered something akin to kits in the xpack or at the very least a drastic increase in class specific ability choices on level up to allow for the creation of various archetypes within individual classes.

@MReed: I guess we will have to agree to disagree on the extent to which engagement could/should be nerfed.

@MReed Providing deflection bonuses to retreating and your proposed implementation of Graceful Retreat would gut the mechanic and subvert design goals. I do still like your idea of a snare and giving the ability of characters to tactically withdraw from single targets. Another idea is to just go with a simpler implementation that wouldn't get muddied by issues related to flanking. The idea of tactical retreating would remain. When a character is engaged with one opponent, it is hit with a 10% snare and engagement attacks have a 40% hit chance when tactically retreating. When a character is engaged with two opponents, it is hit with a 20% snare and engagement attacks have a 60% hit chance when tactically retreating. When a character is engaged with three or more opponents, it is hit with a 30% snare and engagement attacks have a 80% hit chance when tactically retreating. This would make retreating against 1 enemy feasible but still risky and retreating against multiple a bad idea when not using knockdowns, stuns, etc. The player could reduce these penalties by knocking enemies down or stunning them thus reducing the amount of engaged opponents. Graceful Retreat could reduce hit chance of engagement attacks by a flat 30% (snare would remain or maybe be reduced by a flat 10%). The chanter disengagement song can have a lesser effect that would stack (reduce the hit chance of engagement attacks by a flat 15 or 20%) yet similar effect and affect all party members. Bam, stickiness kept, can retreat against single targets especially when built for mobility, running from multiple foes a bad idea (as it should be), and disengagement tactics still useful against multiple opponents (players would be rewarded for knocking a guy down and doing a tactical retreat against the other).

That would make the ability of some combatants have to engage multiple targets almost meaningless.

@MReed I like the snare (I recommended a snare on engaged targets a while ago but this implementation would be better). I like that you still take AoOs from flankers. I would remove the 10% deflection bonus. Also, I think that avoiding AoOs completely right off the bat while backing away seems too good. I would give AoOs a 50% miss chance and up that to 75% to 100% (somewhere around there) with Graceful Retreat when backing away. That way the player has to invest for that mobility. The UI recommendations you made are very good as well.

Thats awfully vague. I just dont see the presence or lack of engagement as being enough to sabotage talent balance. It just sounds like hyperbole to me. That could be addressed via AI or some modest changes to the mechanic. Theyve been listed before and all make more sense than ripping out the mechanic. I trust his first hand opinion.

I think everyone is looking to OE to improve the AI. The disagreement stems from opinions on core combat design mechanics.

On what facts do you base this assertion? I do not see how this is the case. The term overhaul suggests massive systems changes. I do not think that is necessary. I am talking about a few numbers changes mainly. I have not seen anything that suggests such changes would not have a meaningful impact. I will grant you that but he himself stated that he doesnt think casuals will have an issue if they start from level 1.

Lol

"Nothing could be further from the truth" Seriously man, just stop baiting.

Just because it has been abused easily does mot mean it cant be fixed easily. Same issue as A. These are not separate arguments. You are listing things twice. Devs have acknowledged the need for more visible UI feedback. I made similar statements about the need of improved UI feedback across the board (not just for engagement). So, this is not an issue limited to engagement. Opinion. Many talents are traps that have nothing to do with engagement. Talent balancing is a separate issue. Newbs like Waffle have stated they are comfortable with the system and it will be easier for them to get when they start at level 1.

That quote was part of a larger statement where I explained my thinking. You casually ignored my rationale and presented that statement in isolation. Now you are attempting to make a false comparison by equating your one sentence post to a one sentence excerpt for a longer post of mine. This sort of thing does not lead to real discussion. You are once again baiting and looking to derail any and all board discussion about game systems you do not like on a design level.

We can make declarative statements until we are blue in the face but saying something 100x doesnt make it true or add weight to our arguments. Lets have some meaningful discussion folks. We paid cash for beta access and to be a meaningful part of these boards. Lets use our access wisely.