Shevek

I disagree on that Brenda Brathwaite has a really long history with Wizardry (though she mainly designed/wrote on Wizardry 8 and was a writer on Jagged Alliance 2). Tom Hall is a widely respected game developer and Anarchranox counts as an extraordinary rpg (and one of the most creative) of all time. Both actually have a longer game development experience than Sawyer or Avellone. Ya, but they are not a company with a long history.

I think its easier to reduce a Paladin with respect to this game because his main thing is largely tied to a roleplayed code which he can fall from. The code is entirely alignment based and there is no alignment in this game. Devs have stated they will avoid truly "good" or "evil" choices and instead present us with the soup of moral relativism. How the heck can you have a Paladin who falls when he does "bad" things with that design? It just doesn't work. The player's motivation could compelling be stated to "find" good in the sea of grey but I don't buy it. It would completely trivialize this game's direction with respect to alignment to have some Paladin sit on his high horse declaring this holy and that blasphemy. Ultimately, the code must go in PE. If you take away the code (and therefore the chance to fall), all you have is a fighter cleric that has a glowy aura. Honestly, even with the code, the viabilty of the Paladin class is, I think, debateable. Without it, there is just no point at all whatsoever for the class. It does not fit the setting one iota.

My 2 Cents: Bards:I am cool with BARDIC SKILLS anyone could learn.. If you wanna strum a lyre outside of combat, go for it. You wanna have a bunch of lore, cool. In combat, put away the maracas and pull out a sword. Paladins: They are just fighter clerics. Sorry, its true. If they do not want to put in multiclasses, I am fine with them being put in. I would rather have multiclasses though. Honestly, any class can be a "Paladin." Look at Mazzy in BG2. She was just a fighter but, honestly, she was a paladin. Create an in game order of X god. Do quests for said order and you are in and the god likes you. Do stuff X god wouldn't like and you are out.

The question is badly written. It should state, "should time and funds be spent to include X class?" They do not wave a wand and magically a class appears.

PE is made by a proven RPG company with a long storied history in making these kind of games. I trust them. No disrespect but I don't trust those other folks.

I was commencting on the sound of it. Cipher sounds less modern than psionic. I guess they could have gone with something like "Mentalist" or what not. But cipher sounds good to me.

Never played a psionicist. What exactly do they play like?

I like asian kung fu monks. Saying asian kung fu monks are over done is like saying european knights in armor are over done.

Distro89: Don't use the adventurer's hall if you don't like it. Use it if you do.

Paladins really are just lawful good fighter clerics with lay on hands. Then again, rangers are just fighter druids and they made it in. Maybe paladins wouldn't work because paladins need to be able to fall and this game doesn't have an alignment system. Either way, mechanically, they aren't that special. Frankly, I only used inquisitors in bg2 because their dispel was op.

Adventurer's Hall! Awesome!

No one else's PnP experience has replicated anyone else's PnP experience either. That is a poor comparison.

Then make it more like resting in a PnP session. Ah here we go. The thing is, you can't. CRPG can not duplicate PnP. They can adapt and try to mimic PnP environments and habits, but in the end (unless playing a co-op campaign) they are solitary experiences. You will not be arguing with your friends about who is watching first, who is cooking, who is going to investigation the spooky amusement park and so on. Games have done what you say they haven't.

I agree, but we should ask what is the point is resting as well. Does it serve any useful purpose? Do we miraculously heal multiple head and upper injuries after a good nights sleep? Will there be a rules that will send you into a coma if you rest right after a fight where you received a head injury? Is sleep the only way to regen soul energy, or whatever we use to magic stuff? If we are moving away from a memorization based magic system (and I hope we are), then the point of resting needs to be re-evaluated. Resting because we marching for 12 hours means we have to implement a consistent time passing system in the game. Which means actions and quests will probably have to be timed. I know we all like consequences and choices and such, but will those bandits hold the duke's daughter safe for the 4 weeks it takes you to get there because you hit some random encounters and Bob the Mage's eyeball was knocked out and you had to go to the hedge witch and she needed a shrub for her spell to fix it? I think a fatigue bar might add a fun dimension and off the oppurtunity to think tactically, but I think it needs to be an active pool, that is something that you use to quicken or augment abilities. Making it a pool that drains constantly just doesn't sound fun. Again, it invited rest spamming and meta-gaming approached. The point of resting is as a means of mitigating whatever forms of attrition devs throw at us. Games need attrition as a means of making small encounter worth a damn. They must tire you out in some ways but players should have some means to recouperate at least partially prior to a big fight. In other words, the point of resting is to rest. So long as there is risk involved, rest is good and doesnt devolve into rest spamming, It can serve other purposes too. So, would you rather recover a bunch of fatigue or perhaps spend some time near camp gathering herbs? Who will you have keep watch, if they keep watch, they will not recover as much, etc. If you have no one keep watch, you are likely to be ambushed. What do you do? I would argue they should allow players to swap spells only at camp to prevent cheese like casting a buff or summoning something and then swapping it out and insta regening charges. They do not need to time quests. All they have to do is as time passes in game or as players do things, add to a player's fatigue. Players could mitigate some of that with their constitution score. That is simple. BG 1/2 managed to do it. Also, they could make it so magic does not wipe away disease or poison in the blink of an eye. Some ailments could require curatives that must be gathered and/or applied at camp. This could be pretty great if done well.

I would argue it is best to fix things than remove them. If one simply removed items that were not implemented perfectly, you end up with less features. If you improve things, you end up with more features that are great. I would love to see them implement rest well in this game. It HAS been done well in the past and it could be done well now. They are not going Vancian, but I could see the value of using rest as a mechanic whereby players could use rest to recover morale, fatigue, heal wounds/ailments, gather herbs, hunt and prepare their slate of spells (even if spell uses regen, perhaps spell swapping could be done at camp). The main thing, I think, is to add risk/reward to resting and to severely limit saving since the real culprit, I think, is overuse of save/load ("oops, that rest resulted in my getting ambushed, well, I will just reload...").

Resting has been done very well in some games. The best implementation of resting in a game I have ever played has been in Realms of Arkania: Star Trail. In That one, you set up camp, picked the order or who kept watch, tended to the sick, hunted, gethered herbs, etc. It added quite a bit.

I really like it. It reminds me of oldschool fantasy book art.

This guy is good. Its like Alex Ross for fantasy.

Ohh, I liked Mask of the Betrayer too, the part with the dieing god, good stuff

Best RPG memory.. hmm, I would say Deus Ex... first level (and the rest of the game for that matter), loved the experience. So well done.

As of that last podcast, they stated no mod toolset (http://www.nwnpodcast.com/nwnp/2012/09/29/nwnp-podcast-episode-168-obsidian-entertainment-project-eternity-kickstarter/). I understand they must focus resouces on making a good single player experience this go around but I humbly ask that they make the game easily moddable. In the IE games, you could alter significant game mechanics just by editting text files. It would be awesome if we could do the same here even if they do not release a bunch of user friendly tools. They might also consider tacking mod tools on as a stretch goal. Heck, if people are willing to pay for it...

Yes, thanks again for the dialogue.

I think attrition can be valuable for pacing, but I think it's more interesting to think about party attrition rather than the attrition of a single character's class-based resources. That is interesting. I think if attrition is in there and one cannot subvert it by abusing rest or cooldowns or through some other means, then most here would be quite pleased overall.

I am interested in hearing where you will go with this. My question would be, what is the design goal? What purpose will small encounters to have as opposed to large encounters? In other words, will you be looking to factor in "attrition" into encounter design or not? Will you want players to be fully loaded for lage encounters or not? Etc etc Edit: You mentioned health earlier as a form of attrition and suggested healing spells would not trivialize health attrition. I am intrigued by this and would love to hear more.

I vote all ammo should be limited BUT if they have mobs that cant be hit unless the weapon is of a certain enchantment level, I argue the requirement for the mob getting hit should be based off the bow not the arrow. Having to be stocked on arrows of X enchantment level just to be able to hit a mob was a real hassle.