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By modifying Assembly-CSharp.dll one can achieve with ease many frequently requested things that are otherwise not possible or very difficult. I have decided to make this tutorial instead of mods since mods for Assembly-CSharp.dll have some drawbacks (see below). Difficulties with Assembly-CSharp.dll modding - A modified Assembly-CSharp.dll won't be properly recognized by patches. So one has to use the BACKUP and patch the game or reinstall it. After that one has to redo all modifications to the new Assembly-CSharp.dll. It helps if one keeps track of the changes in a text file. - Assembly-CSharp mods are incompatible with any other mod that modifies Assembly-CSharp.dll Getting started - Assembly-CSharp.dll is located in "...\PillarsOfEternityII_Data\Managed". - MAKE A BACKUP of Assembly-CSharp.dll !!!!! - To modify the dll you need a de/compiler like dnspy. - Launch up dnspy and open Assembly-CSharp.dll. The rest should be self explanatory for everyone with little programming skills (else leave your hands out of it!!! and learn programming). What can be done? 1. Helms for godlike 2. Does "waiting" from the rest menu take to long? 3. XP Gain. You dislike PoE2 xp system? The lines you need to edit are under "Partymanager" "AddPartySizeBonusXP" and "AssignXPToInactiveParty" I prefer no party size and no inactive penalty (changes for that below). This lines can also be modified to have a difficult scaling. 4. Difficulty scaling under "DifficultyScaling" "public class ScaleData" right click on the token and chose "edit class" this things can be changed... CreatureAttributeBonus CreatureLevelMult = 1f; DetectableDifficultyMult = 1f; DisarmDifficultyMult = 1f; TrapEffectMult = 1f; TrapDamageMult = 1f; SkillCheckMult = 1f;

How come my companions don't have the same XP, preferably the same XP as me, regardless of wether they're in the party or not? I was "encouraged" to bring along Tekehu for a romp through The Gullet, and he changed places with Aloth. After going through that area and a few more side-quests, I wanted to switch back to Aloth - only to find him a couple of thousands of XP lower than my existing party and missing a level to boot. Why? I'm hard pressed to see any benefit to this, though I see a lot of con's. Con's - It discourages trying out companions you're not instantly loving - It discourages switching out party members to try out new tactics - It discourages switching out party members to get a feel for how different NPC's get along - Being "encouraged" to bring certain characters for certain parts of the game feels like the game is intentionally shoving stones into my shoe to irk me. - It's just plain annoying - I really hate it Pro's? - Making me want to play with a locked in party from start to finish probaby increases the chance I'll play it twice. Wohoo I guess? I simply fail to see any reason why it's like this... at all. It would be much much better if the entire party simply had the same XP and were at the same level at all times.

My ship crew has been stuck at 4 stars for ages now while the captain keeps gaining. Had me wondering. Is there a cap to how good the crew can get? Crew members are about to hit 110 xp and they've been at 4 stars (either 4 for one job or a mix 3+1 etc) for a very long time. The only exception I found was at brass citadel. There's a 5 star (3+1+1) recruitable member there but she's not getting any better since I got her either. Edit: Just to answer my own question after completing the game, yes 4 stars is the most they get (with one exception at brass citadel) at 25 crew xp iirc. If you want a 4 star deckhand for example, you need to grab one that ONLY has deckhand star and nothing else.

Hello, I increased the Dexterity of Merisiel to d12 + 1 and the hand size of Valeros to 5 cards. When I try to start a new game with these characters, if I click “load existing character,” the system says the character is already in a game. If I click “make new character,” the character’s are available, but without the experience level-ups that I mentioned. How do I play the game with characters who have experience level-ups? Thanks, Paolo

I'd love it if the design team could address this question at some point. I'm not in the habit of using message boards, so apologies if I'm missing some of the etiquette or if this is addressed elsewhere (But I don't think it has been). If a veteran of RPGs plays PoE 1 with all the latest updates and expansions on the highest difficulty level, its entirely possible for them to advance levels very quickly relative to the core game content, particularly if they seek out and pursue lots of challenging side content. This is paradoxically offset by the frustration of *not getting XP* for kills, either because they hit the XP cap for monsters very quickly (as there are so many enemies on Path of the Damned) or because they out-level hostile NPCs. The main drawback of this is that it means a large handful of encounters become unchallenging for experienced players. Is this going to be addressed in PoE 2? Obviously its a relatively complex design issue; but, for example, probably the simplest solution would be to add an option that makes you level up more slowly (i.e. by requiring more XP). I'd love to ask this question directly of someone on the design team; I understand it's only relevant to a small group of veteran players but I just wanted to get this out there publicly. So excited for PoE 2! Edit: The title of this post should be: "Question about Making the Game Challenging" but I forgot the "M" and don't know how to fix it!

Well, I know this is quite trivial and that I can easily test it, but perhaps I can get a quick answer here. So, during the Council of Stars quest you pray to the gods and you have to tell them the right words, or else they summon monsters to attack you. Either way your praying conversation continues and the quest progresses. My question is, does it benefit me to answer correctly or not? Do I get more xp perhaps? I'd like to kill more monsters instead, for xp, for loot, for fun... But I am not sure about the potential rewards xp-wise. What's the difference in those two approaches then, anyone knows?

I made a review of PoE recently after I finished it for the first time (http://forums.obsidian.net/topic/92610-my-late-review-of-poe/). In it, I mentioned that PoE1 v3.05 had, personally, two major issues to be fixed: 1 - Encounter design and the limiting nature of combat mode, 2 - The leveling up system. As for n.1, I have reasons to believe it will be quite improved in PoE2. We already have sneak peeks showing us exploding kegs and difficult terrains, we know that Maia's bird will be able to scout and adding to the bigger number of ability options with the new subclasses and multiclassing, I am very optimistic about the combat experience in PoE2. The leveling up still worries me though, and here's why: It was clearly unbalanced in PoE1. You didn't have to be a completionist to become overpowered in the second half of the game and go through every encounter like pie. The level scalling option in the expansion and Twin Elms helped a little bit, but it was more like plugging holes with cement. The increased level cap to 20 in PoE2 only makes me more worried, since it will make the characters level up faster in a game that will be about the same size as PoE1. The leveling up system needs a more permanent solution in my opinion, and I would like to open the discussion in this thread for suggestions and thoughts. My suggestion: In addition to the fast paced leveling (I got to level 4 in the blink of an eye in the game), the main reasons that make the game too easy after a while is the big difference between high-level and mid-level accuracy and defenses and the lack of challenging combat design. For me, the linear increase in accuracy and defenses could be replaced by a curve-like increase (ex: +5 per level until 10, than +3 until 15, +1 from there on), or the increases could be tuned down... or maybe both. Realistically, it makes sense that a high-level character would hit or crit a regular xaurip easier, just because now he/she gathered enough combat experience for that, but that doesn't mean that a well organized tribe of xaurips shouldn't prove a challenge for a high-level party (too bad that doesn't happen in PoE1). The game tries to improve difficulty introducing new harder enemies and that's also a good strategy. The problem is that without dynamic level scalling, it is hard to balance encounter difficulty in a non-linear game. Say, if the game's beggining and end are fairly linear and the middle portion has branching story, with monsters with similar levels in each branch, if the player can choose which monsters to kill first, than the later will become easier by consequence (in that middle non-linear portion of the game). This is where a curve progression of accuracy and defenses becomes a good strategy, as it generates a plateau of stats in higher levels, preventing the player to become over-powered after a number of levels. The difference in high-levels, specially for the late portion of the game, could then be expressed by the widening of the ability options (ex: the per-encounter abilities for vancian casters is a nice touch). I was never a big fan of high-level, or "legendary" adventures, so my opinion might be a little biased. But I really think the game could benefit from an anti-overpowering approach on leveling up. It also fits with PoE's more realistic setting, where having a demi-god warrior killing thousands of enemies with single punches just feels out-of-place (unless you're Waidwen). Other obvious suggestions would be: - Dynamic level scalling, where the number of monsters in every encounter throughout the game always scale with your level, - Just forget about the 20 level cap stretch goal and slow down the level gaining.

Right now I have my character (Rogue) and 4 companion characters (Wizard, Priest, Fighter, and Chanter) all Level 4 doing the Temple right now on Hard difficulty. I would love to hire a 6th character (a fighter that is a tank so I have 2 tanks) but I'm afraid that the hired character will steal experience from my other characters and I only plan on using him until I gain one more companion.

For version 1.03.530: I found the hexcode change for modifying the experience requirement per level formula. 1. Go to your game folder: ...\Pillars of Eternity\PillarsOfEternity_Data\Managed 2. make a backup copy of Assembly-CSharp.dll 3. open the original Assembly-CSharp.dll in your favorite hex editor (I like HxD found here: http://mh-nexus.de/e...hp?product=HxD) 4. Search for the following hex code: 07 6F F2 02 00 0A 26 38 0D 00 00 00 02 7B 0C 05 00 04 07 09 6F F3 02 00 0A 12 02 28 F4 02 00 0A 3A B1 FF FF FF DD 0C 00 00 00 08 8C 7F 00 00 1B 6F 1A 00 00 0A DC 2A 00 41 1C 00 00 02 00 00 00 29 00 00 00 59 00 00 00 82 00 00 00 0C 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 32 02 02 17 58 5A 20 F4 01 00 00 5A 2A 00 00 00 32 02 17 59 02 5A 20 5. The hex code immediately following the above should look like: F4 01 00 00 5A 2A 00 00 00 13 30 07 00 14 00 00 00 48 00 00 11 02 6F 12 00 00 2B 0A 06 6F 58 07 00 06 03 28 08 00 00 0A 2A 13 30 07 00 27 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 02 28 04 00 00 0A 39 0C 00 00 00 02 6F 0C 00 00 0A 28 DC 06 00 06 2A 72 B9 1F 00 70 28 42 00 00 0A 72 A1 1F 00 70 2A 00 13 30 0D 00 45 00 00 00 Note1: You're only interested in changing the underlined hex code above. Note2: Alternatively, you can search for and find the FOURTH instance of F4 01 00 00 (starting from the top of the file). Note3: This is at hex location 2D88B for me. 6. Change the F4 01 00 00 (which is a little-endian 32-bit integer for 500) to whatever you want (use a programming calculator -- the one that comes with windows works fine for this) For example, changing it to E8 03 00 00 (which is the little-endian integer 1000) will double the xp required per level. 7. Save your changes (obviously). Notes: 1) I use IE mod, which replaces Assembly-CSharp.dll, so this may or may not work for you if not using the IE mod. 2) I'm on Windows, so this may or may not work for you on linux and/or mac. 3) The change isn't retro-active -- it only affects experience needed for your next level. A full restart would be required if you want to see how this affects gameplay. 4) XP formula is: ((currentLevel * (currentLevel + 1)) * 500)

Hello everyone ! I create this topic because I have a problem with my quests. I did the whole Sanatorium Main Quest and spoke with the statue at the end to finish it (after : "SPOIL SPOIL" : Choosing Azo fate "END OF SPOIL"). I received no XP, so I checked my journal to discover that the quest was finished. I reloaded my quick save (I just did one before talking the the statue) to check the XP on my characters and retried it. The XP didn't changed after the quest ended. On the wiki it says it's a quest with a Major Experience Type and an Experience level of 4. My characters are level 8 and 7. Is it normal ? Do they have a too high level ? Should I speak to a NPC again ? Or is it a bug ? "SPOIL SPOIL" : And I think I received no XP with the quest where I saved the little girl who lost her family (they became ghouls) too. "END OF SPOIL". If someone knows that problem and has a solution or an explanation, i'll be grateful to hear it !

First, let me start off and note that there is most likely going to be some spoilers mentioned as I write this. The reason I'm still posting it in General Discussion is because this is a very general topic, but if someone is feeling particularly stingy today, a mod can feel free to move this thread to Character Builds, Strategies & the Unity Engine, despite the thread likely having nothing to do with any of that. Second, before I start, I expect to get some flak on at least some of the points, or possibly because of the entire thread, because I'm overly critical, and maybe some accusations of me hating the game. Nothing could be further from the truth; Pillars of Eternity is an amazing game in many regards. Much of the art is second to none, the areas are absolutely beautiful, many of the apparent design goals are great, the open-ended approach to characters is amazing, the writing is largely superb, and many of the characters are some of the best I've experienced (I especially love Edér and Durance) and even those I did not expect to like at all are quite good (Kana Rua, Hiravias). It feels unfair to many of the developers that we often end up focusing on the issues, but it is the fact of life that we rarely take time to discuss that which has no problems. If this was a speech, this is where I'd ask for a round of applause before I continue. It is an amazing effort and despite questionable decisions, whether along the road or more recently, it bears repeating; Pillars of Eternity is an amazing game in many regards, and even those of us that insist on finding issues, examining them, pick them apart, beating the system with a wrench and suggest solutions are - by and large - looking forward to where all of this will take us in the future, whether in expansions or sequels. It's all still a little bit up in the air. Now, as for those issues, written mostly straight from memory, these are some of the clearest issues as I see them, and some thoughts related to them. The Attributes. By now, I think that most people have acknowledged that the Attributes are.. lopsided, to say the least. When the current set of Attribute modifiers were introduced in BBv435, they were a considerable departure from the previous set of modifiers. What is notable here is that before BBv435, damage calculations were extremely off, with the result being that Accuracy was far more valuable than it is now, leading to Perception, which gave +2 Accuracy, was the undisputed king of everything. BBv435 thus did a "double-whammy" in that when fixing that issue, Accuracy was (rightfully) devalued, but the Attribute modifiers were still changed considerably to deal with an issue that may not even have been as pronounced any more. Also, with BBv435, many beta testers pointed out some obvious issues, but were unable to truly test the setup, because BBv435 was also broken in that the Dexterity bonus, +3% Action Speed, worked in reverse (so lower Dexterity was better) and Interrupt calculations were broken (meaning you could put enemies into stunlocks by having high Perception. Despite this, it was said that this setup was supposedly feeling like "the most balanced yet", a statement that in hindsight should be taken with a bowl of salt. Despite the issues being pointed out by sheer theorycrafting alone, the Attributes did not change with BBv480, which was released very shortly before release, and then finally, the Attributes were still not changed on release. For references: Really Old Modifiers (Removed after BBv392): MGT: +3% Damage & Healing, +2 Fortitude. CON: +2% Endurance & Health, +2 Fortitude. DEX: +3% Action Spd, +2 Reflex. PER: +2 Accuracy, +5% Range, +2 Reflex. INT: +6% AoE, +2 Deflection, +2 Will. RES: +3% Concentration, +5% Duration, +2 Will. Current Modifiers (BBv435 to 1.03): MGT: ±3% Damage & Healing, ±2 Fortitude. CON: ±3 Endurance & Health, ±2 Fortitude. DEX: ±3% Action Speed, ±2 Reflex. PER: ±3 Interrupt, ±1 Deflection, ±2 Reflex. INT: ±6% Area of Effect, ±5% Duration, ±2 Will. RES: ±3 Concentration, ±1 Deflection, ±2 Will.This current setup favours heavy specialization, which I find somewhat infuriating. Min/maxing is greatly encouraged, not even by class like in the Infinity Engine games (which also had pronounced issues with this, but at least the min/maxing was different for each class) but by build itself - boiling it down to two, DPS and Tank. Tanks want PER/RES, while DPS wants DEX/MGT. This ties into somewhat with the issues of the armour system, with Dexterity being virtually useless for anyone in armour, because the DPS/Tank dichotomy carries over into that, but that's another point. INT is useful for almost everyone, and is a completely consolidated caster attribute, increasing both Duration% and Area of Effect% at the same time. CON is largely useless, because it adds much more for High-Endurance Classes than for Low-Endurance Classes. The Low-Endurance Classes are very unlikely to serve as tanks, and if they can be considered needing of an Endurance boost, they will actually receive very little, and certainly not to the point where it will make a real difference; if they get caught taking damage consistently, they will die consistently whether they have a relatively small +% boost or not. The opposite is true for High-Endurance Classes; if they are serving as tanks, they will be good or bad tanks based on factors far beyond their Endurance pool, and while they get more Endurance than a Low-Endurance Class, they also need the boost far less. So CON doesn't help those that need it, and it's not necessary for those that it could help. For ranged DPS, the situation is slightly worse, because they can even get away with dumping CON; not only are they likely to already have very low Endurance, meaning that they don't take as big of an impact as a High-Endurance class reducing their CON, but they are also out of harms way, meaning that they should never be consistently hit outside of fringe cases (Shadows, etc). The goal of the Attribute System as a whole is truly admirable. The goal that each of the Attributes should affect everyone equally, and be reasonably viable to some degree, allowing different builds to be different yet competative - a high-Perception Wizard being comparable to a high-Dexterity wizard, just with relatively different play-styles. But it falls woefully short of that mark. Furthermore, the modifiers are largely unintuitive. For example, all of the best barbarian builds all use Intellect, which I definitely think should be doable, but it should not be the default, intuitive assumption. Likewise, any Paladin that isn't specifically a tank should never taken Resolve, despite Resolve being what you'd expect to be a primary Attribute for Paladins. Gruff and violent fighters clad in heavy armour are not the first ones you think of when you think Perception and Resolve, yet it is exactly the thing you'd want. All casters will want Might as at least a secondary Attribute, and although it was conceptualized as a general Attribute signifying inner strength, it tends to revolve more around physical prowess in play, which is the opposite of every wizardly archetype ever. What is more worrysome is that Obsidian has already acknowledge this as an issue. In 1.03, the CNPC Attributes were overhauled, likely in the response to overwhelming commentary regarding the truly gimp Attribute Spreads that CNPC:s had. For example, Aloth had major scores in Intellect and Perception, the latter which is completely dead weight for him. The Attributes were moved around for most of the CNPC:s to give them objectively better Attributes. Instead of using the realization that the Attributes were bad for the CNPC:s to change the Attribute system, they instead acknowledged the issue and decided to change the CNPC:s to make them better, compromising the Attribute/Character Concept foundation that shaped those decisions to begin with. Pallegina, the literally bird-eyed Avianlike lost Perception for Resolve. Hiravias, the wood-born tough-as-nails had-eye-gouged-out-and-ear-ripped-off Wild Orlan lost two points of Constiution and Dexterity in favour of Intellect. Durance, the crazy old firebrand of a soldier that is burned and battered to the bone and hates hesitation or needless discussion lost Constitution and gained Intellect. Edér, the contemplative and clever ex-soldier that questions whether his god even exists, lost all his Intellect and instead gained Perception and Resolve. All of these changes were clearly specifically to make the CNPC:s better within the confines of an Attribute system that can only be described as broken, and it clearly acknowledges that Obsidian knows this, or the change wouldn't even have been considered necessary. Doubly so since it clearly compromises who these characters are supposed to be on a personal level. Instead of doing that, the Attribute Modifiers need to be changed. And while doing so, the characters' Attribute-Concept consistencies restored. Now, I am by no means an expert, but as many know, this has been one of my biggest pet-peeves since BBv435, and I've tried to repeatedly suggest an alternate set. Whether it is perfect or not is extremely debatable - I certainly think it isn't, myself - but it is certainly better. Suggested Modifiers: MGT: ±3% Damage & Healing, ±2 Interrupt, ±2 Fortitude. CON: ±1 Endurance, ±3% Endurance, ±2% Armour Recovery Penalty, ±2 Concentration, ±2 Fortitude. DEX: +3% Action Speed, +2 Deflection +2 Reflex. PER: +1 Accuracy, +4 Interrupt, +2 Reflex. INT: +6% Duration, +2 Deflection, +2 Will. RES: +6% AoE, +6 Concentration, +2 Will.This has several advantages to the current system. There would be a greater synergy between some of the Attributes, for focused builds, such as an interrupter (Interrupt) that hits hard (MGT) and precise (PER) with every blow, the intelligent (INT) and nimble (DEX) warrior playing on his defensive strengths (Deflection), or a focused (RES) and athletic (CON) man that pushes through no matter how hard he's hit (Concentration. Intellect would no longer be a consolidated caster attribute and a one-stop-shop for spell/ability modifiers, and Intellect would be an option for the intelligent defensive warrior. Resolve reaffirms it's position as the Attribute that represents a character's power (or wish) to influence the world and not be influenced by it, affecting a character's ability to direct his soul or the powers associated with it. Constitution is no longer largely meaningless, and slightly less of a dump stat. A small but significant boost, but mostly conceptually. Assuming a Constitution of 20 ("fully maxed") the flat modifier to Health & Endurance is equal to over one extra level's worth for Wizards (10/level) but not nearly as much for Barbarians (16/level). Furthermore, given that Endurance by itself is of questionable value, it also affects the effects of wearing armour, reducing the Armour Recovery Penalty by percentage. For example, let's say a base Plate Armour has a penalty of -50%, with a fully pumped, 20 Constitution (10*3%) it would be reduced by 20%, to -35%. These changes makes Constitution more desirable to both low-Endurance characters with little armour and tanks that do not need the endurance but are woefully gimped by their superheavy armour. Do note that the examples given are extremes. It might not even be a bad idea to scrap the percentage modifier to Endurance completely, although I'm hesitant to suggest it myself. Perception may appear overvalued again, but do note that the bonus to Interrupt have been cut in half. Accuracy is not nearly as valuable anymore, and even if you fully min/max to get Perception, it still only provides a maximum of +10 Accuracy. The fact that this is a blanket bonus makes Perception a good choice for casters, but would still be a choice made at the expense of not taking other Attributes that are now of equal or greater worth. The Lack of Individual Stealth & No Stealthing in Combat. This is a big one to me. In the game, everyone Stealths or no-one Stealths, by going into "Scouting Mode". Once combat starts, Stealth is broken for everyone at the same time, regardless of individual Stealth skill, Class, Abilities, Attributes or Talents. Nothing matters; Combat is flagged, everyone is bumped out, no ifs, buts or maybes. This completely neuters the idea of tactical deployment of troops. You can't sneak around the enemy and tie them up with your main group and then run in and surprise them with a string of backstabs. You can't Disengage, run away, and then come back from around a corner somewhere else, and surprise the enemy. You can't keep your rogue in the shadows and then wait until they move past you, and then attack. And forget about lining up a backstab to initiate combat - if you do, you will be immediately Engaged, and because of the Engagement system and the targeting AI, utterly destroyed by the enemy before you can even think of getting your tank in there. The way you could backstab someone and then run away in the IE games simply isn't viable in PoE because of Engagement. You want to hold off and attack at an opportune time, but with the current Scouting Mode, you can't. Interestingly, it seems that in some way - although I may be wrong how this works under the hood of the engine - this restriction doesn't apply to enemies. I've seen phantoms or shadows show up en masse only after an encounter have begun. This is likely done in-engine by means of some invisibility effect, rather than "real" Stealth, or maybe they are simply summoned, and didn't exist before the fact. Maybe it's a bug. But never once have I seen this happen to me like it sometimes happened in the Infinity Engine games, with stealthed rogues showing up behind my lines - aside from the aforementioned phantoms/shadows that can teleport all over the place, which is not what I'm talking about. Characters need to be able to stealth individually and engage individually, based on their own skills, so that they can be held back or deployed when prudent. I would be fine if it became progressively harder to Stealth as a battle goes on, to represent the enemy looking for you or being alert, and I think that characters definitely should have directional detection (something I do not think is in the game right now at all) and if everyone else is dead, turn around in the area for a while to try to find "the one that got away"; or things to that effect. But the whole "all or nothing"-idea of Stealth needs to go. Combat shouldn't automatically break Stealth, and characters should be measured by their skill individually, and choosing when to do what should be a tactical or strategic decision. Experience is ubiquitous & inconsistent. Experience is currently so broken it's not even funny. The game is capped at level 12, something I think is perfectly fine - I honestly would probably have preferred an even lower level cap, but done is done, and level 12 is fine. What isn't fine, however, is that you basically skyrocket through the levels. There are many people that have reached the level cap of 12 before even reaching Twin Elms. Experience is awarded right, left and centre. I get the feeling that Obsidian never really understood the fundamental argument in favour of Goal-Oriented Experience. The reason people wanted Goal-Oriented Experience was because it would give the developers the freedom to build encounters and situations that can be solved in a range of ways that rewarded the player independent of solution. Deus Ex is a great example of how this was done, and should be compulsory playing for any games developer. Yet we still have Lockpicking Experience, which makes it more beneficial to actually lockpick doors than to find the key. We have Trap-Disarm Experience, which means that you'll never want to solve traps in any other way than to manually disarm all of them. The traps in the prologue temple? Yep, I went back there; it was a ton of experience, just sitting there on the floor, why would I possibly pass those by? And we still.. actually.. have murder-experience. We call it Bestiary Experience, but it's practically the same thing, with the exception that it's capped, which doesn't actually mean anything, because as far as I know, no enemies respawn anyway, so you'd be limited in the amount of experience either way. The question is why. It is as if Obsidian never saw the argument, only that a lot of people didn't want Murderhobo Experience "for some reason", and decided to implemented based on argumentum ad populum alone. And then they started to compromise, leaving the basis of the original argument altogether. As a side note, bounties have insane experience doleouts. They're optional content, but in my opinion, if you want to reach the level cap, you should have to do almost all optional content. Even a single bounty can reward upwards 11k of experience, completely throwing off any general indication of experience values or measurements. At this point, I honestly think that the reason for not having Murderhobo Experience in the game is completely gone, because the original argument simply isn't applicable to the actual state of the game anymore. This is not to say that I support adding Murderhobo Experience back in. Quite the opposite. Getting experience from Lockpicking, Trap Disarming and killing enemies needs to be removed. Experience should be rewarded for finding secrets, solving problems, being inventive, doing the unexpected, and finishing quests. And to reconnect to the original issue of experience being ubiquitous, the experience needed for each subsequent level needs to be increased, my proposal being by 3-5% per additional level, starting at level 1. This would mean that at lower levels, the difference will be very small, but rise exponentially at higher levels, hopefully resulting in more difficulty to actually cap out, as well as slowing level-up pacing as characters increase in level. It should be really hard to reach the level cap in the base game. Right now you take a casual stroll down the peripheries of the main questline and you drown in experience, doled out at every turn and promoting contrived, degenerate, gameplay. Murderhoboing for fun and profit / Inventory & Stash Issues. This very much ties into the previous issue. Because PoE has a lot of mechanics in how the inventory and game economy works, and it has some far-reaching implications. There is no Encumbrance, there is an Infinite Stash that can be accessed from anywhere, merchants have infinite gold, and every enemy drops something that is either gold by any other name, or of incalculable value due to enchanting. By themselves, each of these mechanics are not necessarily bad. But taken together, the result is... less than stellar. First of all, it promotes the aforementioned Murderhoboing, whether it awards experience or not. In many other games, the Infinity Engine games included, the acquisition of resources are restricted - if not directly, then at least by means of "hassle". Yes, I could loot all those individual soldiers in the Oasis in Throne of Bhaal, but why would I go through that hassle? Yes, I could throw every last piece of equipment into my Bag of Holding, but why would it be worth my time? These are hassles, but those hassles by themselves are enough to discourage the situation. The situation being that I will never pass on loot. Never ever. Why would I? I have a Area-Loot Mechanic that saves me from the hassle of even having to individually click the corpses, and I have an infinite stash that can carry all of it, and I don't have to worry about how much I can carry, because there is no encumbrance, and I have merchants with an infinite amount of gold that will happily buy all of it at once. And every last opponent contributes to this. If they don't contribute to my wealth directly, they give me Enchanting supplies. Even without experience rewards, why would I pass on enemies, ever, under those circumstances? I won't, obviously, why would I, that's just crazy-talk. All of this taken together undermines the previous point of avoiding Murderhobo Experience and removes the choices as to what you will take with you, what is worth your time, and how you choose to approach the game. Some can argue that they don't want the "hassle" of X, Y or Z, and that such things interfere with the "gameplay", but I would argue that such things add to the gameplay by being reasonable choices you would have to make, and incentivizes finding alternate solutions to approaches, because you don't *want* to be saddled with carting off someone's armour and pawn off their sword at the merchant. This is not a cry for simulationism, but a real issue of choice and incentives. With the current setup, we might as well convert non-essential loot to gold on the spot and auto-pickup everything, with a little clink-clink wound and a floating "+5 gold" over the heads of killed opponents. It would mechanically serve the same purpose. Exactly how restrictive vs. hassle-free things should be is entirely debatable, but I would personally not be opposed to restricting the Stash to merchants, Inns and the Stronghold, adding Encumbrance, and adding gold caps to the vendors. But I realize that some of that may be overboard - but something needs to be done and the situation reconsidered. Because the current system incentivizes the exact form of gameplay that Murderhobo Experience does, and turns virtually all loot straight into gold coins, with no trade-offs whatsoever, and every non-humanoid is a loot-pinata of bodyparts for the mortar and pestle of enchanting. "Combat Only" needs to die in a fire. This is related to the entire conversation on pre-buffing, but I actually consider the issue largely separate. "Combat Only" feels utterly contrived and out of place, like an artificial limiter that jerks me out of the gameplay, and it is entirely inconsistent. For example, the Zealous Charge aura of the Paladin is "Combat Only". But Zealous Focus aura isn't. Why? There are plenty of examples of this throughout the game and the various classes. One of the earlier explanations we have been given on this issue was that Sawyer focused on eliminating things that felt like really repetative actions that didn't necessarily make the game more fun. Reading that comment, it somewhat stands out as largely being.. non-applicable to the state of PoE. The "opportunity cost" is already built into the game. Using any spell costs you a valuable and finite amount of time (the very short duration of the spell), effort (the fact that you are expending time to do this is in itself a limiter, you may simply not think it's worth your time, most of the time) and multiple limited resources (the limited number of spells themselves, as well as the camping supplies that will need to be expended to keep excessive spellcasting up). That's the costs. Time, effort and resources. He also mentions tactical decisions and choices. However, any choice you make before the start of a battle could be just as strategically important as any made during the course of a battle. By expending your limited resources beforehand, you are unable to change it later, which to me is the very definition of a meaningful choice - the choice of how to approach a given scenario. Combat in PoE is already largely free of reactivity, and depend on pre-encounter positioning and the general approach to combat. The "Combat Only" state leads to contrived situations where the player has to almost literally fight the system in order to do things anyone would consider reasonable. Not only does the presented argument fall rather flat in practice, but one also have to ask oneself if that even if it would have some very limited merit to it, would that small amount of merit warrant such a hard cap on doing what anyone would consider rather reasonable? Would it warrant the limitation of choice on part of the player, his choice on how to approach combat, because "Pre-Buffing is boring"? It just makes me think of badwrongfun-logic. There are many ways I would consider boring ways to play the game, yet I would not restrict those ways to play the game based on my own idea of how to play it "right". And add to that the point that largely, "arguments" in favour of the "Combat Only" restrictions are based on how specifically buffing worked in the Infinity Engine games, suggesting that there is a strong dichotomy between "Long-term no-brained buffs with no tradeoffs" and "No pre-buffing whatsoever achtung", whilst nothing could be further from the truth. Buffs in PoE already have reasonable limiters on them, not just in regards to effort (which is minor) and resources, but primarily in time. The vast majority of buffs in PoE does not even last longer than 60 seconds, even if you min/max your caster into high Intellect. The idea of standing several minutes and have several casters juggle several buffs around is completely alien, even if we disregard the fact that it would be a reasonable decision on part of the player to make if this was not true. And even if they would be able to buff themselves, these short durations would mean that the buffs would disappear before the battle is over, and that every second spent before initiating confrontation would essentially be "wasted" from a buffing perspective - in a game where positioning is so important, to boot. I often spend more time working out positioning in PoE, and getting the initiation of an encounter right, than I ever spent on pre-buffing in the IE games, save large, important encounters, where, indeed, pre-buffing was a boring, tedious process - but that is again beside the point, because there are other, reasonable, clear limitations that possible to have in play before you go to such draconian lengths as to completely restrict the usage of abilities, spells and powers outside of combat. The second, latter argument we have seen, was that the balance reasons are minor compared to the save issues. That the game has had troubles restoring saves because buffs were not retained properly. In the context of the finished game, this must be considered poppy****. This may have been true at some point, and I do not think that Brennecke is lying, and it may not even be that long ago that it could have been true, but there are many, many different forms of buffs in the game, and there have been no major trouble with saves and loads with them that I know of. Food items are technically buffs. They have no issues in this regard. Resting bonuses are technically buffs, they have no issues in this regard. Paladin auras are technically buffs, yet Zealous Focus is not restricted, but Zealous Charge is; is that because Zealous Focus works fine with saves and loads, but Zealous Charge is somehow broken? I find that very, very hard to believe. Instead of moving away from this restriction, we've seen them adding it to previously free abilities that, again, had no issue with saving or loading. The only possible issue with it's removal would arguably be related to the Per-Encounter Spellcasting of high-level Casters, but that is a separate point, because that needs to be addressed too, if they intend to keep using this system and iterate on it. There is a treasure trove of problems with the "Combat Only" restriction on abilities, and the entire mechanic needs to die in a fire; be punted off the cliffs of Mt. Doom and subjected to orbital bombardment. Not only would it's removal be largely beneficial to the game, and promote strategic and tactical gameplay, but the original issues for which it was implemented are not even present. The Armour System is missing the mark completely. This is a hairy one. The fundamentals of the armour system is good. Really good. The idea has concrete merits and is fundamentally good, in my opinion. The fact that armour scales "naturally", has different values vs. different forms of damage, and applies equally to all characters independent of class and so on is really, really good. But it completely misses the mark. In fact, all it does is reinforce - although I would say truly cement - the Tank vs. DPS dichotomy that was mentioned earlier. This is a problem Attributes already contributes to, but it is the current Armour system that really cements it, aided in party by the Engagement system. If you have any idea what you are doing in the game, there is no point in wearing anything between Cloth (No Armour) and Full Plate (Heavy Armour). Common criticism levied against the D&D system in the Infinity Engine games was that "you always wear the highest and that's it". Which was a fair point. But at least the highest armour you used depended on your class, in fact, you were restricted to do so. But in Pillars of Eternity, everyone, no matter what class, will invariably be best off wearing either no armour, or heavy armour. It has largely replaced one "no-brainer" choice with two "no-brainer" choices, not based on class, but on the two different builds possible. Why is that? Well, first of all, tanking is a very strong role in PoE, that you will likely commit to entirely or not at all, because of how the combat resolution system works (you want High Deflection, or it will not really matter if you have a little) and how divided the Attribute system is between the two roles. There is not really such a thing as a middle road. And added to that is the Engagement system and the combat AI, which when all is taken together means that the Tank will soak up damage (or rather, avoid taking damage at all), while the others are unlikely to take any damage. In fact, if they know what they're doing, they'll take no damage at all, or at least not take damage consistently. All armour comes with a penalty to Recovery Speed. This means that even wearing Robes (which do not count as Cloth, for some indecipherable reason) comes at a -15% Recovery Speed Penalty. This reduces the speed at which a non-Tank can do damage, and killing opponents is the most efficient way to not take damage; when an opponent has been killed, they will no longer deal any damage, obviously. And since non-Tank characters will not be tanking or taking damage consistently, any reduction of killing speed is increasing the time it takes to end the encounter and make the nasty people stop hurting your tank (or the rest of your people, even if at a severely limited rate compared to the Tank). But then, someone says, what about the various modifiers? The Damage Resistance of all armour is not equal! Fair point. The issue is that it doesn't matter. While for example Mail armour has higher Slash DT than Crush DT (Mail is DT 9, but has 14 DT vs. Slash and 5 DT vs. Crush) it is not nearly enough to matter. No-one is going to change their armour when facing a certain enemy, as long as the difference is not enough to warrant it, nevermind the fact that most people are unlikely to even want to juggle their armours around. This ties into the issue of weapons simply not having a large enough of an impact, and although you will do less damage with a Sabre against an enemy dressed in Mail, you will still be doing "close enough" for it to not matter enough to actually have a Warhammer on hand. There is no accounting for personal preference. You might want to wear Mail simply because you like how it looks. That's fine. But that's completely beside the point, and hardly an argument in favour of the armours being balanced. If the best arguments you can come up with are "I can still finish the game" or "I still use it because I like how it look", you're not only understanding the issue, but also have basically conceded that there's a problem, it's just that you chose not to care about it. And that's alright. You can choose not to care. But then why get involved at all? You'd do that whether the armour system was rebalanced or not anyway, and the issue being solved would likely do nothing to dissuade you from playing that way anyway. Either way, my suggestions are the following: First of all, all the effects of armours should be "upped", so there'd be more meaningful and clear differentiation between them, instead of just No/Robe/Light/Medium/Heavy armour (as it is now, despite the obvious attempt to get away from it). This could be done by drastically upping the effects of armours vs. different weapons. As an interesting side-effect, this would also mean that there'd be a meaningful differentiation between the various weapons used against humanoid opponents, and you'd probably want to switch weapons more often. Second, I'd like to see Talents to support the use of various armours, with interesting effects, to discourage the constant swapping of armours between that the previous addition might encourage, and encourage specialization on a per-character basis. This would mean that it wouldn't be a bust to use Medium Armours, if, for example, a medium armour filled that niche that was good against crushing weapons, and had a talent that made you move faster, and Plate Mail would be good against Slashing, with a Talent that turns a percentage of incoming Hits into Grazes. The benefit of these two is that the game is already structured largely in this manner; the dial just need to be turned up to 11 to make it matter. Thirdly, I maintain that the game has a rather simplistic system (albeit needlessly obtuse) and could stand to have more modifiers in terms of defences. I think it was a mistake to remove the percentage-based Damage Resistance system (for those that did not know, during much of the Backer Beta, Armour had both Damage Resistance (%) and Damage Threshold (Integer-based Soak; this is what we have now) modifiers), and should play up the penalties (or bonuses) of armours, whether it's reducing Reflex Defence or even adding Deflection with on heavier armour, or introducing a Dodge mechanic to complement Deflection. I still find it odd as hell that a Monk Tank will be running around in Full Plate, focusing on Deflection and Damage Resistance, rather than being all about the Dodging. But either way, the most important is point 1 and 2; the third point may not even be necessary at that point, and would no doubt take a lot more to introduce, even if it would be preferable. The Stronghold / Resting. The Stronghold is really cool. It is. But.. there's just.. something lacking. Yes, part of this will be about "muh immurshun". I cannot wrap my head around how the Stronghold is supposed to work. I can accept a great many things that aren't painted on my nose, chalk it up to things the party did while travelling, or laughing around the campfire, and such things. But the Stronghold feels... empty. The Steward is an odd creature, and it is never settled how that's even supposed to work. Is she tuned into some form of adra-based internet and is running the longest con through a network of contacts and repeat identity thefts? I have no idea. You keep building, but there are never any workers, days pass, and the place is empty, there was supposedly a drunk visiting, but he's nowhere to be seen, and Kana Rua was escorting him off the premises but.. it takes days, what the hell, can't I just throw him in the dungeon or lop his head off? Hell, throw him off the Eastern Barbican. Speaking of which, is repaired instantly, and for free. Which was really the first clue I had that this would probably be pretty shallow. Still, I love the idea of the Stronghold, and as you repair it, it starts to feel more and more like yours, and it's noticeable that a great deal of effort has gone into it. But at the end of the day, despite me liking it, it feels soulless and devoid of emotion, reactive like a sack of rocks. I built the Dungeon, a warden shows up out of nowhere that treats me with due respect. How did he even get hired? Have we met before? What? Finally, resting at the Stronghold. My great Caed Nua, my sweet Brighthollow, why do you treat me so? A loading screen to get to Caed Nua, a loading screen to get into Brighthollow, a third one to get to the second floor, sleep, and then repeat the process in the other direction - more if you were just popping in before continuing down the Endless Paths. Just. No. This ties into both the issues of the Stronghold often not making sense and feeling devoid of life; why are there no people working in the kitchen for me? Why isn't there a caretaker at Brighthollow? Honestly, just skipping that one loading screen to get to the second floor would be a game changer, if I could talk to the caretaker and take a nap. Someone else suggested simply having a "resting button" while you are in the courtyard of Caed Nua, in the Keep, or inside of Brighthollow. I think that's a great idea, even if it does nothing to alleviate the other issues, it would go a long way to make it worth to actually use Brighthollow to sleep, giving you a sense of "home". There's a lack of CNPC:s. Oh yes. I'm covering this too. First of all, let's get this straight: The CNPC:s in the game are amazing. At least most of them. Edér is magnificent. Durance is nothing short of amazing. Grieving Mother is crazy. Hiravias is hilarious and Kana Rua isn't nearly as annoying as I thought his melon-swigging face led me to believe he would be. But it very much has the "gotta catch them all"-syndrome of post-IE Bioware games. An issue that actually started somewhat already in BG2, but at least BG2 didn't seem to operate under the assumption that you'd collect all of them and take them with you like a travelling adventurer troupe of which only 6 people go to town for.. reasons. There's a valid argument in here somewhere about the quality vs. quantity of CNPC:s. Less CNPC:s but with more depth. This is a fair point. But quantity has a quality all of it's own. It is impossible to have anything even resembling themed parties in Pillars of Eternity. You can't be a group of marauders, or a troupe of clever opportunists, or a party of humans only, or a group of people centred around arcane studies. This is just examples, of course, but something as simple as having more than one of the same class is practically out of the question, because the CNPC:s that are in the game right now do not even cover all of the classes that are available. This is not to say that I want some principal "checklist"; quite far from it, I want interesting characters rather than someone that is specifically a Monk, just to compensate for the fact that there's currently no monk. But at the same time, I loved playing BG1 as a Bard, picking up Eldoth and Garrick, for the hilarity of it. Or play as an elf with Kivan, Xan, Viconia and Coran. Or BG2 as a noble-esque party of a Charname Paladin, Anomen, Keldorn, Edwin, Nalia and Imoen. Because lol poor people. Pillars of Eternity has an abysmal 8 CNPC:s, for a party of 6. Accounting for the player, that's less than one full different party's worth of CNPC:s for subsequent playthroughs. Don't get me wrong, I think "muh replayability" is potentially as bad of an argument as the aforementioned "muh immurshun", but it bears mentioning to put it in perspective. Meanwhile, BG2 has 17, more than twice as many, and I still wouldn't consider that nearly enough. But it would still be infinitely better. Even a single, well-integrated, seamlessly introduced CNPC would be a tremendous improvement, but nothing short of approaching 26-ish would come near satisfying the needs. Scaling CNPC:s / Availability. Another CNPC issue. Why the hell does CNPC:s scale? I would be fine with CNPC:s being set to join at level 2, and I believe level 2 would be a good number for the CNPC:s to be properly "fleshed out". But they absolutely shouldn't scale. Why? Because it makes me rush to get them. It makes me wish I could simply spawn them in the second I reach Gilded Vale, only so that they won't be "ruined" beforehand. The fact that I will go through missions that they may have commentary on is enough of a problem; don't make me also fight the game systems themselves. I would really, really, really prefer it if they were stuck at level 2 and then allowed me to level them up once I get them. I'm even willing to accept them not having an equal amount of experience to myself, especially with the very liberal sprinkling of experience throughout the game. Which brings me to another issue; availability. All of the CNPC:s can be had before Act 2 starts... except Pallegina. All of the CNPC:s can be had without going through a side-quest... except Pallegina. I also have the feeling that this ties into the fact that Pallegina is also the only CNPC that cannot be replicated in any way, being an Avianlike Paladin of an Order Paladins cannot even pick. Why is Pallegina not following the format of the other CNPC:s? It almost feels like she's one of those cheesy CNPC:s added by a mod, out of place, and I'm surprised she doesn't have an inordinate amount of dialogue (or, going by how ME2 introduced DLC/Mod-like CNPC:s, any dialogue at all). It feels contrived and inconsistent, from her placement to her introduction, compared to all other CNPC:s currently available. Weapon Focus Groups are.. eh.. Weapon Focus Groups was a good idea. A really good idea. I love the concept. You get a range of weapons that is thematically appropriate, instead of having to specialize in a single weapon that you may or may never get. Kudos. At the same time, though... I think that the balancing went too far. Not only because it meant placing some weapons in groups where it doesn't feel like it belongs, but also because it means you'll really never pick more than one specific Weapon Focus Group, there'd simply be no merit to doing so; each group seems to have been consciously molded as to cover all weapon damage types, whether it makes sense or not. My proposal would be to allow Weapon Focus Groups to break the mould. For example, one thing I feel strongly for would be to switch Stiletto from Ruffian to Noble, and Dagger from Noble to Ruffian. This would leave Noble without a Slashing Type and Ruffian without a Slashing Type. So what? Work with what you have, there are other options, or train further. Perfect balance is a lie, and thinking that the Weapon Focus Groups being so strictly and rigidly broken into weapons of each type on principle will somehow balance the weapons themselves against eachother is a delusion. I say that it is better to aim for specialization, and have Talents that allow you to specialize, while also being more thematically fitting. There is no doubt more examples, but that one is enough for the point. Also, with the aforementioned in mind, I want to see more Weapon Focus Groups. Groups should not stack with eachother, obviously, but it would be nice to have a group that includes all of the firearms, if you want to make a character centred around the use of firearms, rather than having a wide spread of usable weapons. For example: Grenadier; Spear, Pike, Pistol, Blunderbuss, Arquebus. Mystic; Dagger, Stiletto, Scepter, Rod, Wand. Like I said, these shouldn't stack with other Weapon Focus Groups that already have the same type of weapons. So if you have Grenadier and Ruffian, you still only get +6 to Pistol. An interesting choice is better than a "balanced" choice. If the priority is to have a balanced setup so you can change between the weapon types, there are still groups for that; it does not make the specialized or more thematically focused groups any less valid of an option. I miss the Sabre DoT. I just do. I realize why it was changed, and the stacking mechanics can be hard to work out, and balancing it even harder, but changing the DoT effect into a flat +Damage was a really boring move. I liked the idea of cutting up large gashing wounds and stack DoT:s on my enemies with sabres. As has been mentioned before the game also simply does not do enough to encourage the usage of different damage types, making the flat +Damage a "no-brainer" choice from a min/max perspective. The extra flat damage is enough to punch through most (or much) of the DT you'd avoid by using a more "appropriate" weapon anyway. The DoT effect was at least interesting and unique. Now it feels like Sabres are just.. something something plus. Scouting Mode and Mechanics. Detecting Secrets. Mechanics. These two terms should have nothing to do with eachother. In Pillars of Eternity, though, Mechanics is used for both the detection of Secrets and for the Detection of Traps, as well as the disarming of Traps, and Lockpicking, and the setting of traps. Mechanics as the basis for detecting secrets make no sense whatsoever. And since we're on this topic, let's discuss the Scouting Mode as necessary for detecting secrets. As has been pointed out many times on the board by now, this has lead to the situation where the norm to many is to simply enter Scout Mode everywhere and activate Fast Mode to alleviate the painfully slow movement. To detect secrets, you need to have high Mechanics, and Scout everywhere. Some would argue that you don't need to find all secrets. Fair point, but it is akin to the argument that you don't need to do all quests, either, and you don't need to loot all boxes, and you don't need to talk to all named NPC:s, and you don't need to recruit all CNPC:s. But we know you will, anyway, because that's more or less the name of the game. Skulking about in Fast Mode everywhere not only breaks immersion, but is almost textbook degenerate gameplay and about as nofun as possible, yet it seems like it's exactly what the game was built for, in some ways. My suggestions are simple. Mechanics should not be used to detect Secrets, Stealth should be the governing Skill, aided to a small degree by the Perception Attribute, and all Secrets should be detectable outside of Scouting Mode. Detecting Traps should still only be possible while in Scout Mode, and their detection should be possible with either Mechanics or Stealth (whichever is highest). The disarming of traps should still be Mechanics, obviously. The Per-Encounter Spell System of High-Level casters needs to be re-evaluated. This ties into the aforementioned "Combat Only" issues, because the issues of the Per-Encounter Spell System that High-Level casters gain could arguably be exacerbated by the removal of the "Combat Only" flags. That is not the main issue, however. The issue is that if this system is intended to scale towards higher levels as the game expands, let alone the franchise with sequels and so on, the current system of Per-Rest Spells being turned into Per-Encounter Spells once Spellcasters reach a high enough level will completely wreck any semblance of balance whatsoever. Currently, the issue is rather benign, at least if we consider the future: At Level 9, a spellcaster can use his Rank 1 Spells 4 times Per Encounter, instead of Per Rest. At level 11, he can use his Rank 2 Spells 4 times Per Encounter, instead of Per Rest. That's where it stops, because the game has a Level Cap of 12. This is still tremendously powerful. Also consider that if you have the "Bonus #th Level Spell" Talent, that also gets turned into a Per Encounter, for a maximum of 5 Per Encounter Spells Per Spell Rank. That is utterly crazy. Consider all other classes that get "regular" abilities that are Per-Encounter Say, Paladins, who get 2 uses of Flames of Devotion or 1 use of Lay on Hands Per Encounter. Yes, he can get more Abilities as he rises in level, one here, one there, some Per Rest, some Per Encounter, some completely Passive. A Wizard gets to pick 4 1st-rank spells at Level 9 that he gets a minimum of 4 uses of Per Encounter. At level 11, he gets another 4 2nd-rank spells that he can use a minimum of 4 times Per Encounter. Conceivably, conceptually, he should be getting 3rd-rank spells 4 times per encounter at level 13. That is an unprecedented and incomparable jump in power and utility compared to anyone else that is not a caster, and utterly terrifying to even fathom from a balance perspective. And that's still just Wizards - the gimp of the spellcasters, who only can pick 4 spells at a time to enter into his Grimoire. Priests? They get their full 1st-rank of spells to use, 4 times per Encounter, at level 9; it's the same progression. The same goes for Druids. Suck on that for a while. The entire Druid rank 1 spellbook, pick anything in it, 4 times Per Encounter. I'm not sure how this should be balanced. I do think that high-level casters should be able to use a limited number of spells as Per-Encounter abilities at high levels, but the current implementation is completely untenable in the long run, nevermind the issues that could arise if you remove the "Combat Only" flag (since spells would no longer be a limited resource outside of combat; Per Encounter Abilities regenerate instantly if there is no combat going on). And you'd be equally crazy to not remove the Combat Only restrictions in the long run. My basic suggestion would be to allow the Spellcasters to choose one spell at these brackets and that they get that one spell as a Per-Encounter Ability. At level 9, they get a slot that can be filled with a 1st-rank Spell, that can then be used as a Per-Encounter Ability. At level 11, they get another slot that can be filled with a 1st- or 2nd-rank spell, that will from then on be used as a Per-Encounter Ability. And so on. But I'm not sure that's enough. But it desperately needs to be looked over; if not as a necessary precursor to getting rid of the "Combat Only" flags, then for the sanity of players and balance once we start climbing in level. There are two expansions planned, and anyone that thinks that each of them won't increase the level cap by at least 1-2 levels is delusional, which could make the cap anywhere from 14 to 16; potentially unlocking two whole new levels of unmitigated, overpowered and absolute crazy for spellcasters. The +AoE added from Attribute Bonuses (currently Intellect) needs to be fixed. Currently, the +AoE added from Attribute Bonuses does not take the "friendly" area of Friendly-Fire AoE:s into account, which makes Intellect even crazier for spellcasters than it deserves to be, and even if the Attributes are reworked to something more sensible (such as +AoE on Resolve) it would just move the issue around. It really needs to be fixed, so that +AoE actually increases the risk as well as the reward. If the AoE radius is bigger, it should be harder to aim it, simply because it's.. well.. bigger. Maxing +AoE currently gives you an inordinate amount of mobility when it comes to the placement of AoE:s with no tradeoff whatsoever. I realize not everyone likes Friendly Fire, but I consider it an integral part of tactical gameplay, and I would have opposed the "Friendly" zone of AoE:s to begin with, had I been here for those discussions, but it is what it is. Either fix the +AoE issue with the friendly zone, or remove the friendly zone entirely. Alright, I guess that's it for now. I probably have more things that I can't think of right now - Critique of the the Engagement System, the Recovery Movement Penalty, and the war on mobility comes to mind - but I think that this is enough for now, and brings up some of the far bigger issues I'm seeing right now. If you've made it this far, I want to thank you for reading and I hope there was some merit to this because it took a long time to write and put together.

Is the experience cap only 28,000 i.e just hitting level 8 ? if this has been written else where, I did not find it when I did a search. Thought the cap as 12, that i have read, but in the beta (If I can say this here) it was/is currently 8 levels.

Quote from J.E.Sawyer (full post), emphasis added: That part in italics seems misguided, for a very simple reason: Disarming traps and picking locks is a Mechanics skill check. Therefore, reaping all XP rewards will require a Mechanics-focused character in your party. None of the other sources of XP require specific skill focus. Between bestiary, exploration, and quest/objective rewards, together with carefully-designed levels, progression should be plenty frequent without forcing players (or at least "power players") to max Mechanics. That skill's plenty desirable without binding it to an XP pool. What do you guys think? Sign the poll and speak your mind. (I realize there is another thread that touches in this issue, but its survey is broader and its discussion has mostly devolved into yet another combat XP debate. So please, focus discussion on Trap and Lockpick XP, and whether it's good for the game. Thanks!) Edit: To clarify (thank you, wanderon) the problem isn't so much that Trap/XP is bound to Mechanics, it's that the other skills are NOT bound to XP pools. Even Bestiary unlocks are not strictly Lore-gated; low-Lore parties can unlock entries, they just need to fight more of a given beast. Even if each skill had an associated "XP activity", though, we'd have to make the usual-suspects group of rogue, wizard, fighter, etc., or else lose out. You may as well pick a skill for your character on creation and have it auto-level. Why provide multiple skill points per level if you're going to max one?

Old thread. In the red corner, we have people who want to stick with the tradition of Infinity Engine games. Over in the blue corner, the wide eyed idealists who want fair XP distribution for all players regardless of playstyle. And apparently there's a few people who lept in and started painting another corner yellow advocating for learn-by-doing. Still have plenty of corners in this ring, it's not a triangle. So give your feedback. But I want a nice clean discussion, no low blows or personal attacks.

As I understand they've said they just want combat to be for the fun of it. Taking away experience rewards from enemies just seems like it will leave the combat a bit unrewarding. I feel like I will skip even trying to get in fights because there's not much benefit and mostly detriment. You risk your characters getting hurt/knocked out/killed for what, beating enemies juts for the fun of it? There's always a balance of risk vs. reward in these kinds of games and it seems that balance has been upset. Sure some enemies may drop items, but that'll be the only reward of combat? I think it's a mistake for them not to give any exp. Perhaps cutting the exp gains from enemies down so that you don't gain a ton, but none? That means the only point of the game is to just grind through quests as fast as you can with no reason to kill enemies and skip all unnecessary stuff. It pigeon holes players into playing one specific way. What if players don't want to do many quests? The only way to play if you want to get anywhere is by questing now. There's no just going out and adventuring around killing things as a form of progression. Let's face it, players want to be rewarded and they want to get that reward via the fastest means possible. That means is going to be skipping unnecessary combat and leaves combat in general feeling like a chore that you must do along the path to grinding out these quests. I haven't played the beta myself so this is just as I understand it from what I've heard and read. Just wanted to get my thoughts out about this.

I did a bit of searching, but couldn't find this question anywhere else. Currently I am playing Icewind Dale 2 with a single character in the party - and it's a blast. This is only possible, because experience is split evenly between party members. So the fewer characters you have, the more experience each of them will get, making them stronger. This is the essential mechanic that makes it possible to play such a game with an arbitrary number of characters. For me, this is very likely the greatest replay value factor, also, because of it's implications.

Hello everyone, I'm writing a couple of thoughts after reading this article published on RPS a couple days ago. To be more specific, these lines: So... my doubts follows: The Dungeon will be fully integrated in the main storyline? Or it will have an own story line wich lead you into and out of the dungeon? For such a huge thing like the Dungeon, having to go in and out soon, pausing exploration to level up, won't it be a little distracting from the main quest-line? I mean, the main concerning should be the main quest-line to me. Having that and the Dungeon quest-line do not risk to confuse things and to-do lists? Maybe it's just me, but I was sure the Dungeon was something extra that a player could play after the main campaign was over. Some sort of "Hey you, big bad adventurer, you're so famous now, why not try to solve this big bad problem out there?". And anyway keeping the in&out concept for the main quest-line of the Dungeon that surely helps convincing the player that the Dungeon is not just "a dungeon" but something integrated into the background of the World. Having the Dungeon the best loot and the hardest fight can lead to some problem in my opinion. Knowing the Dungeon has the best loot will lead the player to just level up enough to go down again and loot shinies to easily overwhelm the enemies in the main quest-line. Last but not least if I just ignore the dungeon... how the main campaign will be balanced? I will have anyway a decent gear to finish the game? And again, if I just stop myself before the last boss to go into the dungeon? I'll steamroll everything till the last floors? And when i've completed even the dungeon, with an extremely easy feelings, i'll come back with a huge xp boost, an overflow of powerful items and just steamroll even the final encounter of the main compaign? Honestly this kind of structure and integration of the Dungeon worry me a lot. Sorry for any errors, english is not my first language and i'm just recovering for a laser eye surgery

This isn't a particularly long one, because the title really says it all. In BG, classes had different experience requirements for each level. This meant that those level ups were generally spread around and didn't all occur at the same time. By contrast, in NVN2, experience demands were standardised, and everyone levelled at the same time. Given that levelling up is one of the major gameplay rewards of rpgs, I always felt that the BG system was more rewarding and offered more of a "I'll just play one more hour..." encouragement to keep playing. I understand that exp will be quest driven rather than kill driven (for which I'm glad), but I still feel it would offer more incentive to keep going if party levelling was staggered. Thoughts?

I've had some thoughts on experience (most of it gathered up in my wall of text in my signature though) and how I view experience. I am slightly concerned about P:E (as thus far revealed) being tied to Objective Based experience. I like it a lot, but I'm also scratching my head about it; "Are there more ways to improve it?". Now I don't realize to what extent this is going to be implemented and "How", merely just discussing and sharing some thoughts on what I see could be an issue.. to the point: Being rewarded after getting from point A to point G. I experience a lot during the journey between A and G (B, C, D, E, F), but I will only be rewarded at G, when I have fully completed the objective. Which to me feels more like a "temp-work" kind of dealio. I contracted this job and I will only be paid at the end of it. That is what concerns me. My character going through the dungeon, facing enemies, solving mysteries and riddles, finding books, items and equipment making my character slightly stronger, but won't level up until I have finished the dungeon and returned to the surface. I view the "Objective/Quest Experience" as "Character/Player Experience", or even "Spiritual Experience". Life Experience. Insight Experience and so on. I would like to see the Character Experience and the Combat Experience differ, being two different experience tables. What your character does in the world, in terms of quests and objectives, makes your character grow in knowledge, in reputation (how the world sees you), in insight, understanding of the world, exploration and so on. Your character becomes more devoted into their Class, their way of life, as they explore the world. All "Character Experience". It doesn't define any "Physical Aspects" but only the "Mental Aspects". Knowing in theory how to swing a sword will make it easier for you to understand how to swing a sword, but will you swing a sword better because of it if you've never swung a sword before? No. You're going to be a noob like everyone else, you might be a better noob or a worse noob, the point is that you are still going to be a noob with that sword. You might learn faster, or you might learn slower depending on pre-knowledge and research. The concern I have is exactly that, with a Quest based Experience system the issue could become that my character is suddenly a Master Swordsman, regardless of Class. "Poof" like a magical smoke out of nowhere. Drawing a parallel to Baldur's Gate: Baldur's Gate has both, that both defines Character Experience and Combat Experience. It is one pool. What I am suggesting is splitting up the character in 2, but keep the way experience is gained like the IE games. BG: Quest+Combat = Leveling up 1 Experience Pool. The proposal/Suggestion: Quest = Levels up the Character/Class Combat = Levels up Combat skills -------------- Conceptual (Numbers are conceptual as well): In the IE games you take down an enemy to get 15 Experience. Your character has now 15/1000 experience to level up. As proposed, you'd still be at 0/500 experience to level up your character, but have 15/500 on combat aspects. Experience Graph IE: 15/1000 Experience Proposal: 15/500 Combat Exp 0/500 Character Exp P:E (as far I know it): N/A Combat Exp -------------- Likewise, in the IE games, finishing a Quest in those games you get perhaps 450 Experience, adding up with the pool of defeating monsters you would be at 465/1000 Experience to level, whilst as proposed you would have 450/500 experience to level up your Class, and 15/500 experience to level up your weapon. Experience Graph IE: 465/1000 Experience Proposal: 15/500 Combat Exp 450/500 Character Exp P:E (as far as I know it) N/A Combat Exp 450/1000 -------------- Perhaps the level of the Character could decide (accordingly) how fast your Combat experience grows. If you have a Level 4 Sword Experience and a Level 8 Fighter, but you want to play with a Mace instead (and it's level 1), the Mace could grow at x2-x3 times experience up to a certain point (so that Bandit that gave 15 experience is instead giving 30-45 experience). Just to make you be able to catch up with another weapon and specialize in more than one combat aspect. How does this balance the game? More importantly, how does this balance the classes? Your Rogue can be a level 5 Rogue, with specialized Combat making your Rogue a more adept sneaky bastard or a straight out close-combat martial artist. It could even make your level 5 Rogue an Adept in Magic, a Rogzard (Rogue/Wizard). Your Fighter would become a level 5 Fighter, but not at all specialized in close combat, or just so. Perhaps being an excellent tank, or a weak magical buffer. Or heck, even your level 5 Fighter is a Fighter but roleplayingly he could be seen as a Level 5 Paladin Trainee (due to his combat prowess and direction you chose to upgrade/level him).

Brainstorm = Cipher ability Hi I've had some thoughts on a system lately and it's starting to form more and more. The only issues with it (until I get feedback from lovely you ) is the Non-Lethal path (which wouldn't get as much combat skill or armor, not in the same way). First of all I've got thoughts on an Experience gain for more than just the Character and/or Out of Combat (coming soon in another issue of the WoT). Here goes: Growth Weapon Experience Sword Level 1 67/500 to Level Up (Caps at Level 5) So enemies, regular enemies, give experience, but only to the weapon you are wielding when taking down enemies. When you gain a level in the Weapon you could gain an "Ability" or choose between 2 (X-COM style). Having a weapon in your Off-Hand levels both that Weapon and your Off-Hand. In essence this is what the Baldur's Gate "experience" really is. Gain experience when you've taken down an enemy, not by slashing. Off-Hand Experience Off-Hand levels in a way which gives you a better Shield-Arm, or a better Dual-Wielding experience. Magic Tools do not grow in Experience in the same way. Off-Hand can be split up into 3 4 5 6 Sections (you know what? Let's just say "Undecided"). Works just like Weapon Experience in that you "Gain Experience in that you are Wearing". If you choose to have 2 Swords you'll get Dual-Wielding Experience, having a Two-Handed Weapon gives you Two-Handed Experience. You can't get Experience for 2-Handed when you've got a Sword & Board etc. etc. if you get Level 3 with a Sword and Equip a Sword on an Off-Hand would give the Sword Experience on the Off-Hand a Penalty (based on Dual-Wielding). If Dual-Wielding is Level 3 and the Sword is Level 3, no penalties, but if Dual-Wielding is Level 2 and Sword is Level 3, the off-hand Sword becomes Level 2. Simple? Magic Wielding works in the same way differently and covered throughout the post. - One-Handed Experience (One weapon, 1 Sword) - Sword & Board Experience (In Essence Sword & Shield) - Two-Handed Experience (Single Two-Handed Sword, Staff is a Hybrid) - Dual-Wielding Experience (Two Weapons, Sword/Sword) - Magic Wielding Experience (Off-Hand Grimoire/Magic Tool, Staff is a Hybrid) - Unarmed Experience (Fighting with knuckles, a Hybrid with a Grimoire) Spell Experience Is different, and based on your Character Level and resources (finding scrolls/buying scrolls at a merchant/Wizard) as well. A Magic Missile would shoot 2 Missiles at Character Level 3. But! Magic Wielding Experience makes Spells stronger and leveling up Magic Wielding could give you 2 abilities to choose from (X-COM style) to determine Effects of the Spell (Fire Magic Missiles? One Large Magic Missile that is charged longer?). Armor Experience The Armor is purely resource based like Spells. But more like a Skill Tree in your Inventory/Equipment screen. You slay a Bandit, you grab some resources to be able to Upgrade your own armor in your inventory (No "Light Armor, Medium Armor or Heavy Armor Skill" <- Based on Character Level). Some Armor Upgrades must be done by a Craftsman in town, whom you must pay gold to Upgrade your Gear. Armor has no Levels entirely, but that [Tier] Armor would have 3 slots that you can upgrade in 2 different ways each (X-COM style). Unlocking more Armor (Higher Tiers) requires Character Level Growth. Finally, it's not like you are going to be able to strap on that guys armor that you just cleaved in half. Character Level This is purely dependent on Questing, "Experience is only gained at the end of a Journey when you Understand it". This level determines the Armor you can wear (Tier 1, 2... 4) Weapons you use (Tier 1, 2... 4) Spells you can cast (Level 1, 2... 9). General Strength Growth. More Armor slots in your Inventory (Helmet, Gloves) a linear simplified License System (FF12). Progression/Summary You have to take down enemies to get resources, taking down enemies makes you better at wielding your weapon and looting enemies gives you better equipment. To be able to wear more equipment, or better equipment, you have to do Quests to grow in Level. As a Level 1 character you are limited to the gear you are Limited to basically. This system is very combat centric, like every system out there really. Non-Lethal Approach (Feedback and thoughts needed!) Work in progress. This is difficult because from my perspective it is a playstyle, the stealth approach. I would play with 3 party members, max 4, in a stealth approach. Mostly light armor wearing characters, more than that would feel more and more as an "attention" gatherer (Really, 6 party members in a City and specially in a dungeon would gather more attention). Stealth is a difficult matter regardless in a Party-Based game like P:E, Baldur's Gate, Icewind Dale, Planescape: Torment. It is doable of course, but designing an open world with it in consideration I believe is very difficult, it's like building one game inside another games. Magic & Tools Next on the list is Magic and Tools of Magic. How do you use Magic and what are the tools for it? Who can use it? The Grimoire of Dark Arts All Magic, Arcane, Blood, Elemental, Necromancy and so on. Needed for the most powerful ritualistic Magic. These examples below portray the "Main Weapon" Strength, the Grimoire is really the Power tool and the Spells within it. Grimoire+Hand would throw spells from the Grimoire real fast, but it would also be weaker than throwing spells with a Wand. Having a Sword in your Main Hand would allow you to cast spells with the sword at a long range but it would really be weak. You could send your Sword (Force Throw) at enemies, enchant the Sword with powerful Magic and so on. * Hand & Grimoire: Arcane, Fastest & Weakest. * Wand & Grimoire: Arcane, Fast & Weak. * Dagger/Sword & Grimoire: Blood Magic. Weak Arcane Magic. The Crystal of the Mind Mind-Magic/Psionic, a Cipher's tool. Usable by a Wizard too. Holy Scripture and the False Word/Song Paladin, Chanter and Priest. Using a Grimoire on a Paladin/Chanter/Priest makes them "Fallen" or "Corrupted" in the Eyes of their Faith. Poems, Songs, Chants, Partiture The Chanter's tool for singing, a Rogue, Monk and a Priest can use it well too. Staff * The Druid's Tool of choice. Strong Elemental Magic, if Staff's aren't necessarily 2-Handed (putting a sword in an off-hand) the Magic would be weaker but the Wizard/Druid could fight close range better. A Grimoire and a Staff would cast slow strong Magic. Only having a Staff on a Wizard would let him cast the strongest Low-Tier to Mid-Tier as well as some limited High-Tier Magic. Mon, Druid, Wizard and Chanter preference. * A Monk could use the Staff to channel Elemental Magic for close range (Hitting the Earth with the Staff sends an avalanche or a rock slide towards the enemy). This is really interesting (IMO) for a Monk because the Monk doesn't necessarily "strike" the enemy but asks for the aid of the Soul of the Land. A horizontal wavering with the Staff could send a Wind Slash at enemies. * The Wizard would use the Staff as a power tool, whilst the Druid uses it as a Naturalist. Using the Nature in combination with their Faith, giving and taking. A Wizard would only take from the land when using Elemental Magic, without giving anything back (Which could give other consequences). A Druid could very much dislike a Wizard holding a Staff. * Chanters use the Staff to vibrate their voices, as if tuning, enhancing their voices and/or in a way to shatter bones and nerves with a powerful verse of sound, vibration and frequency. Metal Staff's purely. With this list went through, could Items determine the Class? Multi-Classing I've got a Fighter, I go through the first prologue area (take down some enemies along the way) I get slightly better with a Sword & Board (not even close to leveling it up, 1/5th of the first level perhaps), got some better gear from the resources I gathered. I get to town, finish the first initial Quest and I gain 1 Character Level (Now Level 2). I remember Obsidian saying something about "Quick fast early levels". I'm in the first town and I've got some gold so I can upgrade my armor at the Craftsman, maybe there is 1 Companion or 2 in this town that I can recruit as well. As the Equipment Screen is like a "Skill-Tree" I choose to go to the Wizard and upgrade my Off-Hand to a Grimoire instead, so now my Fighter is in essence a Fighter/Wizard. I can keep a Shield in the inventory and switch around for situations between Grimoire and Shield. Likewise, if I make a Wizard and I pick up the Sword I suddenly have a Wizard/Fighter. Using the Grimoire in battle and taking down enemies would not give me Sword & Board experience (as it isn't equipped) but instead experience in Magic Wielding. With Items and Equipment being tied to Classes, you could make a Chanter a Chanter/Druid, or a Druid a Druid/Barbarian and so on and so forth. Being able to upgrade the armor accordingly to your "Build". In Baldur's Gate there is a limited amount of experience that you can get, so choosing a Build early is important for the Growth of your character (Unlike TES, where Experience is Abundant and you could become a Master at Everything). Have a great wonderful day And of course... thoughts?

Okay, I can tell I'm going to make a fool of myself and my limited knowledge of the DnD system used by the games that have inspired Project Eternity, but oh well. Traits and statistics. The qualities and numbers, respectively, that define our characters. What would we like to see in Project Eternity? It might be intuitive to think that Project Eternity will mirror the classic cRPGs in this regard, but there is always room for innovation. ============================================================================= Statistics broadly fall into two categories: basic and derived. Basic statistics tend to be ones that you the player can directly change during character creation or leveling, whereas derived statistics are things like Hit Points, Fatigue, Mana/Magicka, saving throws, and combat statistics like attack/to hit and armor class/defense scores. I'll admit, I'm not an expert on the latter in the DnD system (though I generally find the trifecta of Hit Points, Fatigue, and Mana to be sufficient), and this post is primarily concerned with the former. Among the most commonly used statistics in video games are those concerning fundamental attributes/ability scores; Strength, Dexterity, Constitution, Intelligence, Wisdom, and Charisma in the familiar DnD system. This scheme is tried and true, but there is no reason I see why it cannot be deviated from. It's not as simple as coming up with words that sound nice, though; if one attribute is less utilized than the rest, it will inevitably become a worthless dump stat. The current system works because each ability score is equally integral, and I like to think they can be further broken down to reveal their true essence. Evidently one could probably decompose "attributes" endlessly in this manner ("what is running speed but the combination of leg muscle and reflexes?", etc.), but at some point we must draw a line and ultimately ask whether the groupings are logical. Here is a likely incomplete list of what these actually measure in my opinion, or rather things that an ideal system could possibly measure: Physical: Raw physique (which influences melee damage, ability to perform physically demanding tasks, and maximum encumbrance), endurance (the attrition rate of fatigue), balance, speed (in the form of acceleration and agility), "dexterity" (as I describe manual skill and/or hand-eye coordination), reflexes (reaction speed, dodging), "constitution" (innate resistance versus poison and disease), sensory acuity, and physical attractiveness. Mental: Willpower (volition), concentration (focusing of attention, and I suppose discipline is also related), creativity (use of the imagination), memory (though this is typically not included in video games), reasoning (including all high-level cognitive function), wisdom (for the sage archetype just as reasoning is for the tinkerer), awareness (by which I mean perceptual awareness of surroundings), intuition (which I suppose is social awareness), charisma (persuasive ability), and I suppose something that represents degree of attunement to magic or whatever. Obviously I have just included magic as a mere afterthought, so the system isn't perfect, but I think that touches on quite a few things the DnD system leaves out, or perhaps includes in the form of traits instead of statistics. Is there some way we can better group these characteristics, that will give us more precise control over our character, or open up new possibilities? Do we really need separate derived statistics like saving throws, or can ability scores be rearranged to render them obsolete? Historically, some aspects such as memory and creativity have gone completely ignored, in theory left up to the player I suppose; is that how it should be? Is character movement too neglected, and we should actually add agility separate from manual dexterity (which would still be useful for ranged attack and trade skills). Or perhaps add an Awareness attribute (I can hear the hardcore DnD crowd wincing)? Are balance and concentration best left as passive skills, and sensory acuity best left as trait modifiers? ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- The other predominant form of statistic is the "skill", which can denote combat skills, trade skills, survival skills, social skills, among others. This is one part of the DnD system that I find particularly deficient, with little distinction made between the very different types of skills. Typically, at any rate, these skills contain some kind of ability check (reflecting the above attributes) and are leveled up through experience. So far I believe we know that Project Eternity will contain trade skills unlike some of the other cRPGs we know, but we don't know much else. I'm not going to go into detail regarding which skills I'd like to see as that deserves its own thread and this one is long enough, but there is one thing I wish to harp on with regard to skills. Skills in real life are the result of knowledge and experience. Disappointingly, however, I have yet to see a game really get this right. Many games just forgo knowledge altogether, and ultimately become a game of how quickly you can collect X experience orbs to level your character, or at least their skills. While I can see this for overall leveling, for individual skills it just makes little sense to me; I think leveling all manners of skills should have a knowledge component and experience component. To this end, there should be teachers/trainers throughout the world along with a wealth of books or another medium by which knowledge is transferred, which is just as important to character advancement as grinding. That's something I'd really like to see with Project Eternity. Also with regard to skills, in particular practical skills, I'd like to see some kind of profession/occupation field on the character sheet if the trade skill system is as good as I'm envisioning (which for one thing would be better than vanilla Skyrim's). Most tradeskills should involve multiple steps of transforming raw materials into finished goods, but each of these steps doesn't necessarily need its own skill for leveling. In fact, some steps of the process could have no skill check (yet still give experience), but complexity is immersive. Just as a brief overview, I could see various DnD-esque skills but a wider variety. Individual combat maneuvers (parry, disarm, shield bash), mercantile skills (appraise, haggle, bribe), stealth skills (pickpocket, sneak), various persuasive tactics (bluff, intimidate, charm, deceive, etc.), leadership skills (rally and other things to make up for lack of bards), survival skills, along with trade skills. Perhaps movement skills like swimming, climbing, and jumping, or perhaps those would be best left as derived statistics. ================================================================================== Whereas a statistic is quantitative, a trait is qualitative (though it often has a numerical impact on a relevant statistic). However, traits can range from racial bonuses and penalties to feats, and also conceivably include physical and personality traits. Notably, keenness of the senses has usually been relegated to trait status, which I suppose makes some sense since they can't be readily improved. On a side note, why limit it to race? Perhaps we should choose our characters age, height, and weight during character creation, and those should confer certain physical and mental bonuses and penalties. More importantly, I'd personally like to see the use of traits widened substantially in Project Eternity. I know this would be quite difficult to implement and nigh impossible to perfect, but perhaps have us select from a list of traits in character creation that merely influence what kinds of dialogue options are open to our character? Things like attractiveness (if that doesn't become an attribute), sense of humor, body language, etc. ================================================================================= Even with all the traits and statistics in the world, there are some aspects of characters that can't be captured in numbers or single words (here I maybe reveal that I sort of come from a roleplaying angle), and it would be cool if there were various ways to define one's character and some aspects of their past outside of "We choose your character's story, and you put a name and a face on them". Perhaps things like socioeconomic status, level of education, religious beliefs, etc. or am I asking too much? What character creation/progression system would you like to see in Project Eternity? Does the classic DnD system cut it for you? Should attributes be rearranged? Should skills be grouped in any way, or should they all draw on the same allocation pool? Should skills in Project Eternity reflect both knowledge and experience, or should they stick to experience? Do you wish for more freedom in defining your character's various non-quantifiable traits? Did you actually read this whole post, or did I waste my time writing it?

Is experience inequality, in every situation, always bad? There have been many discussions over the experience mechanics in PE and this question seems to be underlying all debates. Should all choices in a situation give the same or very similar experience? Many people seem to assume yes. I've seen this reason: once people learn the 'most beneficial' way they will always do that. With onreadig this assumes that in every instance diplomacy or combat will offer greater rewards. This is not necessarily true. Potentially, sometimes combat could reward greater than diplomacy and the reverse. What about concurrent play throughs, some might ask? I don't think a game like PE should be designed from the point of restricting power gaming. Are people who want to role play the second run through aos a diplomat going to pick the combat solution because it "gave more rewards" last time? And if a person wants to play a sociopath who will do whatever it takes to get the best rewards, cool! Ultimately to me it doesn't seem logical to say every possible solution to a problem gives the same amount of exp and I don't think it should; so long as throughout the entirety of the game we have enough rewarding options for each 'style' at various points. Sometimes a cunning diplomat -is- going to get more than an uncharasmatic, yet incredibly skilled, thief. Implementing a way for every style to get every reward leads to linear and restricted design. Feel free to disagree with my reasoning and discuss.

A simple question, should experience scale with player level or should experience be static for enemies killed? Example of level scaling experience: At level 1, Billy kills a rat and gains 5 experience. At level 2, Billy kills another rat and only gains 3 experience. At level 5, billy gains no experience for killing rats. At level 10 Billy kills Firkraag, and gains 96,000 experience experience . At level 20 he kills Firkraag again (damned cults, resurrecting evil dragons...) and earns 6,000 exp. I'm a fan of scaling experience myself - I like it because it keeps numbers on the smaller side (no millions and millions of XP to level) and really rewards players when they accomplish more difficult tasks (assuming we can avoid easily cheesed encounters), rather than reinforcing a grinding ethic that having no scaling can lead to where players just plow through all the easy stuff first so they can breeze through things that are actually close to their level of difficulty. Scaling experience also allows players to choose to do difficult tasks but not "lose out" on the experience provided by doing smaller quests or tasks since killing those bandits without having leveled yet will counter any exp lost by not collecting 10 herbs for the merchant and leveling before the fight. Thoughts?

One thing I miss about the Infinity Engine games is the old AD&D Level Progression tables, you get a much more satisfying feeling earning 1000XP for a quest, instead of 100XP (a la 3rd edition, Star Wars, all other games using that d20 model). i really liked the fighter's progression table Level 2: 2,000 Level 3: 4,000 Level 4: 8,000 Level 5: 16,000 Level 6: 32,000 Level 7: 64,000 Level 8: 125,000 Level 9: 250,000 Level 10+: +250,000 XP But yeah larger numbers feels more rewarding (and more of a monolith to obtain). In conjunction quest/monster XP rewards should be high too, for instance, 2,000 XP for defeating a Flesh Golem encounter, instead of say 200. YMMV.