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In some universes, such as call of cthulhu , berserk anime, demon souls , etc. demonic alien figures created the Universe. what if there was a plot twist in pillars that the deities were created by the engwithians to block these entities from influencing the universe ? i think it could be an interesting twist story-wise (but perhaps too dark for pillars of eternity) . it could also explain the existence of skaen, who could be a weaker form of these entities that did a pact with the gods to keep existing in the pantheon and acting as a diplomat between the gods and the entitites while the engwithians extingued most of the cult of the demonic cosmic entities.

So both Pillars Of Eternity and Deadfire reviewed very well and were (so far for deadfire) well received by players too. However I do remember hearing a lot about how the story for POE was slow, boring , "dry" ect especially at the start. I've looked at a few reviews for this game and I am noticing that although it is reviewing very well some of the critics are saying the story is bad, they couldn't get into it and it's slow at the start. Now I don't think the story of Pillars Of Eternity is like the best story I have ever played in a video game or anything. I have plenty of criticisms of it but then I have plenty of criticisms of the story in many games. Compared to other games though I really don't get why it got these comments and although I am still pretty early on in Deadfire I feel the same about this game. What is it about the way these stories are told that is putting people off? Where as a relatively simplistic story like in the Divinity OS games does not seem to be getting this kind of response (and I am not bashing those games I loved those too). The "slow at the start" comments especially are odd as this is pretty standard for this kind of rpg and a lot of people who are making these arguments should know this.

Alright, so I backed Pillars on Kickstarter, watched in joy as it was developed and run, enjoyed the dev commentary, appreciated the race and class previews, and I thought it all looked great. And I started playing and noticed few problems (aside from the bloody Kickstarter NPCs whom I ignored), but more and more built up as the game progressed. Finally, I came to a terrible conclusion as I attempted a second playthrough: This writing is dreadful. Not the dialogue, no, that's fine. Purple sometimes, but generally pretty good. What sucks is the epilogue and the player 'choices' made in-game, as well as the marginalization of classes in gameplay/story integration. For starters, I played a Monk. Yeah, I remembered Monks being lame in DnD, but I assumed that in Pillars, based on the previews, it'd be fun. And it was fun, until every encounter became slogging it out with broad-sword wielding thugs in plate or Elder High Mega Dragons, or Invisible Deathtouch Demons or what have you. Monks lack the durability, dodging power and damage to be fantastic PCs... but what annoyed me the most was the supposition that every class would have something interesting to contribute to the story. For example, if I were say, a follower of Eothas, I could go to the temple or talk to Edir or do all sorts of things and get a little snippet in relation to the plot at large or just giving more insight into the characters and the world around them. Priests, Paladins, Cyphers, Wizards, all of them get little extra options and such they can choose. Oh, except the Monk. The class that doesn't even get an NPC partymember. The only five Monks in the game outside of the waves of cannonfodder I carved through are one dying messenger who was mauled to death by a mountain lion, and his four brothers who waited patiently in a tavern while their companion was mauled to death by a mountain lion. Speaking of that tavern, I have words for that as well. There's no real plot important reason to go into that place. You can just saunter past it accidentally, as I did three times. I did the Monk Scroll quest and then left, assuming nothing more. SPOILER ALERT: If you don't talk to one ordinary looking man named "Frightened Man", the entire city of Gilded Vale is exterminated in the epilogue. Whoopsy. The village I went on a long, epic quest to save, defeating an entire castle of badasses over is now dead. Oh well. Sometimes a random NPC just spontaneously returns to life and invalidates all your work. If they'd wanted to live they'd have given a messenger five gold to actually deliver the message instead of relying on gossip, right? Well, then there's the other problem of the people of the Dyrwood. They're all horribly monstrous, evil scumbags barring maybe ten individuals and the Glanfathans. Cultists of Skaen, Cultists of Woedica, the Volunteer Anti-Cypher Nazis, the Knights, one cruel, decadent, evil group after another. And then, then, after you bend over backwards and ensure that everything is perfect to make sure the Soul Arts get a fair trial? DIDN'T MATTER! An evil reincarnating wizard jumps into the body of the defendant lightnings to death the entire city aristocracy, causing a mass riot to break out and destroy everything, including murdering all the Soul Doctors. If you switch off the evil machine in the Northwest of the city instead of blowing it up? OOPS! NO ONE STUDIED IT! SOMEONE SWITCHED IT ON AGAIN AND IT KILLED EVERYONE! So you understand why I think the "Choice" system is overhyped and doesn't really matter. It's either "Do what the lead writer wants or 100% of the population dies" or it doesn't matter at all because Woedica Ninjas jump out of a closet and murder 100% of the population. Why would I want to play in this setting? Hell, why would I want to save the Dyrwood? Apparently EVERYONE is evil and stupid! So yeah. It's a game with POTENTIAL for a good series, but it has little to no replay value. ...Also I played it when it first came out so it was pretty dang buggy too, but honestly they weren't really that bad for me. If pressed for a rating I'd say Pillars was an above average game, but it could have been excellent with more writing and polish and... well, MORE in general.

The story suggests us several ideas about the soul : if it cannot leave the cycle it returns to a new body on birth or to a weak body controlled by a weak mind the soul itself is a mixture of many souls the soul itself continues over many centuries of cycles and has the feeling of a new life only because it lost all the memories of its past lifes THE AWAKENING The explosion, biawac, machine and Thaos seem to have awoken a long forgotten memory that was inside your soul. As death seems to take you, you find life rekindled inside of you - life that has a different purpose and demands answers to a long forgotten question. It is at this point that you have the same vision that you will see at the end of the game - it suggests us that you were murdered after confronting Thaos that day; leaving you restless with no closure. ALOTH The same analogy seems to be true for Aloth himself - in his story we find out that he was beaten to darkness by his father only to be saved by either a memory within his soul or another smaller soul that took over to save him. His awakening was traumatic as well, and as we find out his life changed dramatically - the major difference between your 2 awakenings is that yours demands closure to a rekindled memory, while his simply embodies fire of a certain kind - willpower and decision making. Yours also enables you to become a Watcher - suggesting that indeed you roamed around a long time ago, and many cycles so far - you recognize other souls and their patterns and the more you come to understand the way they work the more this power grows - essentially, this memory becomes a completely new identity - contrary to what others make you believe - that you are here on a limited time, as a memory eventually ends its story. THE ENDLESS PATH OF BUILDERS We learn from the endless path that the Builders, the greatest civilization to walk amongst the other races, were highly advanced and developed. Other, lesser races, thought of them as gods and the term Builders tells us that they were Creators of many things. As chaotic events of life would have it, the King's son dies. We learn that there was conflict between them - the son was not intelligent, clever or strong enough to become the future King - a struggle for the father. Their conflict eventually made the son run away and die in doing so. The King then uses all available geniuses and technologies of his people to find the source of life and return his son. He tells us that it doesn't matter if he wasn't able to impress him, all that he wishes is to see him live. A noble quest began - the search for life itself; the quest of souls. Alas, time became their biggest enemy; something that the King promised they would be victorious against if their mission were to succeed. As their research grew and people joined up, time would grow its seeds as well. Conspiracies, conflicts, whispers. The closer they were the more mad the situation became. It would be at the very end that his people would betray him - knowledge of the soul was gained, but the end was not be achieved at this place anymore. An enemy arose in the last layer beneath them and the King would not recognize the trouble. His people split, taking the knowledge while abandoning him. He was no longer King, no longer a guidance, no longer a beacon of their people. They realized that the knowledge they found was gained through his will; by his power; by his guidance. But, how can a mortal preserve these characteristics? When does the mind begin to decline? When does the flesh become a rotten burden? Surely, they could come up with a better solution, now that they knew how to control souls. THE TRUE GODS They spent years coming up with systems and projects that would ensure this guidance. Their people were slowly becoming history themselves. The race became not important anymore, the knew they conquered that quest - it was winning the cycle and life itself that seemed to be the only true purpose. The other races were growing stronger - not so much in knowledge, but in numbers and dedication through their false gods, created by imagination and will of the few. They would not be able to survive this onslaught, but perhaps they would be able to guide them, give them sense and meaning and thus continue their own research and work through them? They finally agreed upon merging their souls into one entity that was able to leave the cycle, the shroud, yet remain above it in seemingly control over it. These entities would become their true gods. They would become gods themselves. Each body represented certain values and philosophies of life and seemed limited in its way and purpose. The pantheon would work in collaboration ensuring guidance and a sensible path for the races. However, one part of the Builders recognized that this division would not lead anywhere - it was a King, one person, that enabled them to grow. One purpose, One will. This division could only cause chaos, the very thing they wanted to evade. Thus, Woudica was born - however, she left behind a prophet whose mission was to collect souls for her to grow; to grow to such a degree where she would be able to control all other entities and thus make sure that the people of the world had proper guidance with one true purpose and will. A King that would never die or go mad. THAOS THE MESSENGER OF THE ONE TRUE GOD The prophet Thaos had to make sure that these souls were pure in their will - in terms of giving themselves for this purpose. A religion had to be created, an organized faith to delude people and to make them abandon life willingly so that the soul could be easier harvested in its purest form. Another source of such easily harvested and pure souls were newborn cycles - souls that were caught while trying to inhabit newborn babies. The prophet also had to make sure that the now developing races were never to achieve this same level of understanding of the soul or technology - for the path of the Builders required many thousands of years to accomplish their understanding of life. Many sacrifices... the death of a whole people. He knew that even though their actions looked ambitious, it would take them thousands of years to get to the level he was - something that could backfire and ruin everything he stood for. On the other hand, it could threaten the mission of his own people - a never ending research of life itself from a position of godlike entities who had a ever-lasting memory. A scientists dream. Essentially, you end this mission and purpose of the Builders, depending on your choices at the very end. However, the god entities still exist - but it would seem that they themselves will lack guidance and thus the Builders are dead; leaving behind them a set of gods, each operating within their own field and limits. And perhaps that is better so, one wonders? Perhaps the Builders are just one of many layers of god entities which are meant to ultimately guide a certain generation of people unto the real path. But, life seems to play strange games as we see that even these god entities created certain alliances - perhaps, one day, they would find real purpose behind their knowledge - something what Thaos and his goddess wanted to ensure. HE DIDN'T LIE! Thaos said - he never lied - the gods existed! And he told the truth. You never asked him who or what created the gods, even though he hints to you that the gods were required to exist in order to have order. STORY REFERENCES The references we see in Pillars of Eternity can actually be found in real life and probably exist as such in a certain way - certain degree - or perhaps are the absolute truth : Daoism - The endless path. Od Nua, The Builders - Anu, god of Annunaki; Bloodline masons are often refered to as the builders - perhaps prophets of such old knowledge themselves The Cube - Kabba Pantheon - Paganism Order out of Chaos, Adra, Soul and its harvesting - Transhumanism, Illumination, Archons Thaos - Theos in greek for God

Alright, so, I went into Raedric's Keep and massacred everyone, and I mean everyone. I slaughter ever priest, sellsword and archer in the place, then get stuck at the first locked door. So I leave, level up and pick the lock on the high priest's door, free his friend from the dungeons and come back. He gives me a key he tells me will unlock any door in the place. Great, right? Only I used it once and now it's gone. This isn't exactly game-breaking, since I can once again leave, level up, come back and pick the locks again, but it's really, really inconvenient. Are keys supposed to self-destruct upon using them once? That would explain why half the doors in this place are locked.

Welcome. In many previos games we seen how davs are developing thei games, and how thei are developing thair plots. This thred was made becouse i;ve enchounter opinions that games today are not "linear" and even some that skyrim is not linear becouse it has "sandbox" xD In general you coud progress a story in 3 difrend ways, Linear, halflinear or nonlinear. And i will exmplainf how that work. Linear You play thu pint A to point B next to point C, you have no influence on the story and no decisions, or you influence is reather cosmetical. The funny thing is that Skyrim in this poit of view is one of the most linear game ever made xD The only freedom that you have is "when" you take some quest, witch is reather cosmetical way of "adding nonlinear feeling". You take quest and you go to poin A then to pint B, next to point C, regardless if you are good, bad, mage or a warrior. The only 1 decision that affects skyrim storyline is "Will you join Stormcloaths, imerals or don't join any of them". Ony 1 decision xD and people think that game is non linear, the funny thing is that when you join stormcloath or imerials you mostly do the same thing but from "other perspeciv", you go to the same cript but you are on difrent side, you fight for the same city, but from other point of view, you conqer rival citys. Of course skyrim, is not good example of linear plot, good example was Neverwinter 1, Balfours Gate 1 or easterd Final Fantasy 7, 8 etc. Simplest definicion - 1 ending with at most some "cometical" difrences. Halflinear This type of games, are linear storylines but cut thos some stages in which you make a decision and change the possible "ending" of ech stage. We encounter this in dragon age orgins, Neverwinter nights 2 etc. This element is perfectly shonw on skyrims "Ulfric-Imperial" issu where you may join ulfrik, imperials or none of them, so this makes skyrim something between linear and halflinear xD. In general Halflinears have 2 big issues. 1. Decisions are in best cases, split to "Good", "Neutral" or "Evil" decisions. And regardles of how many possible endings we have they are Good, Neutral or Evil and only diffrence between 1 good ending and second good ending is cosmetical, co at the end we end up with 3 endings that have some cosmetical difrences inside them ... xD 2. Rewords for gridning (taking an decicion base on the "outcome" like xp, gold") reather then roleplaying, in whith some peaple may 1 time save the kitten, then kill whole city and still say "Im tru neutral damit" XD Nonlinear Hardest story line to input. I've never encouter it in any new highly advanced game, only in 2d games with low graphical level and some of game "novels". Nonlinear plot meant that 1 decision leads to andother, then means that if we for example make decision numer 1, all decision that coud be unlocked by taking decision number 2 or number 3 are closed. I will give an example of game of thrones ts series. Stark has a decicion, marry freys daughter or not, marrying her has a big risk becouse frays daughters are mostly ugly but will lead to make powerfull anti-lannister ally, not marring her may lead to freys betreyal and death of young stark xD This how tru nonlinear decision shoud look like, and ant the and we will have 14 compleatly diffrent endings, in many cases that we cound not put to any bag like "evil" "Good" or neutral becouse they whoud be to complexed. This also whoud protect agind "grinding" decision makeing becouse taking decision like "i will save this poor lad from those bandits" whoud look down any decision like "i will help those bandits kill that lad", becouse it whoud be logical, that a person whou whoud "act like a good person" in "rescueing lad from bandits" whoud do the same in other cas or at least be "neutral" and say "i will not put my boot in this goodbye". Not like in 1 decision char acts like total walking evil, but lawfull good and gantle in second xD and still say "Hey, im neutral damit xD" Im, wainting for your opinion xD

Hi! Got this thought in another thread, first of all, what is "Second Wind"? -----------A------------- In Borderlands and Guild Wars 2 this is a feature you can use to "get back in the field", basically it is you fighting with your dying breathe to get back into the game. It makes no sense really because: A, I lost all of my health, yet I can still fight B, When I kill an enemy in this mode, I get "Second Wind" and can return to the battlefield (with a portion of health returned) C, If you fail to kill enemy during the time period you get "Game Over"/"Respawn". D, It is super fun and great design (in other words, it doesn't matter in these action games if it makes sense or not) -----------B------------- As P:E isn't action based like GW2 or Borderlands, and with 6 party members, a "Second Wind" feature gets difficult to "implement". Instead, P:E would benefit from what I like to call a "Narrative Second Wind". What does this mean? A, You entire party got knocked out unconscious by a group of Ogres B, You wake up in another screen, you are in a pot and you are about to get cooked C, Charm your way out of it to escape, or you get "Game Over". D, In a game like P:E, with more depth attached to it, sense would have to play its part more than in an action game. E, With a Narrative approach there are more ways to play with it, sent to Jail, stripped off all of your gear, you become a slave on a boat/camp/mansion, there's no end to the possibilities to what kind of "consequences" failing a Fight could get you thanks to being "Narrative". Perhaps you wake up on the shores of Dyrwood, with a narrative texts saying "You woke up at the bottom of the ocean". Etc. etc. ------------------------ Personally I would like the B approach, but for some encounters (not every single encounter) but in some fights there is some sort of "Second Wind", an ability to win a fight after loosing the fight. Which is pretty much what the concept of Borderlands and Guild Wars 2 is going for (You won the fight whilst going down, never surrender! Which can be pretty epic). Thoughs?

Can we please not reduce the plot of this amazing project into "Super Devil wants to dominate the world and creates an eternal dictatorship and we have to stop them"? I have great rejection to plots based on shallow "good vs. evil" line. Maybe it is my history major, summed up with the reading of my old dusty books from AD&D, stuff like Complete Book of Villains, Dungeon Master Guide, specially the part of story creation and motivation, or my many years of DM-ing... well, i just don't like to be caught into moral presumptions of a eternal battle of good vs. evil. It is very annoying to reduce the rich world of possibilities and motivations to "stop the Super Devil" storyline. These are for kids... I want my character dragged into political assassinations, dethrone of legitimate kings, favors in exchange of land, nobles unwilling to accept the new regent while the true king is too young, or priests fighting over the control of the richest church around; a rich businessman that lost his horses to a local arrogant noble and has no one to appeal since the local courts are all nobles in favor of that arrogant prick... The universe of possibilities is tremendous, so, please, do not reduce the plot into a "good vs. evil" shallow.

Hey kid, we have different stories about it. What do you think about building storyline mechanics with respect to different difficulty options? I mean that gameplay would vary not only in difficulty, but in storyline or amount of quests that player receive. It may look like developer have to build handful unique stories and will demand double of money and HR. My idea is to build one complete main plot and set of side stories/quests, and until certain difficulty modes (suppose those 3 special most difficult goals) player wont get all side quests (developers may even randomize offered set) and may be restricted to go through some predefined shortcuts of main story. Another possibility (along with hiding some secondary quests) will just end main plot and propose to continue (or even restart) on full difficulty to see extension of story. P.S.: I know that this may require additional funds, however perhaps not as many compared to the interest shown by players. Many games struggle to attend audience more than once. Such feature may add motivation, and different gaming experience. Instead of single pass, players will become interested to go through the game again. And of course, adding more arbitrariness of gameplay will reduce significance of pass-through "manuals" which will inevitably rise over the internet with time.

While it's becoming clear that souls will play a major part of the plot. It makes sense to make some research how our view of souls have shifted through the early stages of philosophy. i found this great link about the ancient theories of soul . To see our perception shifting through some trade-off between life and dead to the three aspect view from Plato was quite interesting.

DISCLAIMER: THIS IS JUST A DISCUSSION POST, IT'S NOT MEANT TO DICTATE DEVELOPMENT GUIDELINES TO THE GUYS @ OBSIDIAN. This is an article that appeared on Kotaku abouth three months ago (july 25, 2012). I think it gives some insight about the development process behind Project Eternity. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Chris Avellone Teases Planescape: Torment Successor Like its nameless protagonist, Planescape: Torment might come back from the dead. Speaking to GamesIndustry.biz in an interview posted today, Obsidian co-founder and Planescape: Torment creator Chris Avellone said he's "very tempted" to start a Kickstarter to revive his beloved classic role-playing game. Although he'd ditch the D&D—and maybe even the setting, too. "I think the challenges we've spoken about would all have to be considered and to be honest I don't know if I'd want to do it as a Planescape game - I think a better approach would be to ignore the D&D mechanics and respect what Planescape was trying to do and what the game did and see if you can do what Fallout did when it became the spiritual successor to Wasteland," he said. "I think if you made a game using some of the concepts of Planescape, the metaphysical ideas and the plane travel, without using the D&D mechanics, you could actually come up with a much better game. With Torment, I'd argue that the D&D base actually, in places, got in the way of the experience. It was a lot harder to make a game with those ideas in it with D&D mechanics. So much that we had to break a lot of them. We had to ignore certain spells, change up the class mechanic so that you can switch at any time you like by remembering abilities. "That was stuff that D&D didn't allow for, it was [too] restraining in some respects. If we did do a spiritual successor, then I don't know if we'd use the Planescape licence or attach the mechanics, perhaps something that has a different feel to Torment." If we get characters as awesome as Morte the talking skull, I'm cool with whatever. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- What I want to ask you is: would you like to see the main story elements of Planescape Torment inported into Project Eternity? I mean: to me Planescape was one of the best RPG ever because of its features. I'm talking about the user interface, the possibility to "use objects", the factions system, the variable alignment system, the way stats were used (If you were very intelligent or very stupid you had different dialogue options) and so on. What I didn't like was the PT's narrative thematics and setting. It was a really sad story, set in a strange, violent and unforgiving world that I didn't particularly enjoy. It's just a personal opinion of course, but I think that setting up an entire saga upon those themes would end up being pretty harsh. Reading the article I noticed that what Chris Avellone wants to keep of Planescape Torment are some elements of the plot and the main themes of the setting. He talks about ditching the D&D mechanics and the Planescape setting to better deliver on those themes. What are your thoughts about that? Would you enjoy or hate if PE story was a sad and introspective experience and the classical fantasy themes were set to a bare minimum? I mean: I think that everyone here is pretty sick of playing the hero and of slaughtering hordes of monster just because they are bad. I want Project Eternity to be a more complex story with dark and even sad chapters. But do you think that centering the story around the main character's sorrows is the right think to do? (of coure if it's what the developers are planning to do... we don't know much about that).

I LOVE what I am seeing in the updates. This all sounds fantastic, and I really hope we get the role-playing freedom promised here. What I would love to see is a storyline that really coerces the character to participate. New Vegas had a great (though pretty harsh) opening hook. Arcanum opened well, too; bad guys were after you from the start. Fallout of course was very motivating, although the hard time limit has been hotly debated ever since (I don't think it's necessary). This is a great chance for a CRPG to have a story written from the ground up that can include a temperamentally non-heroic, non-adventuresome protagonist. Obviously I don't know what the real plot is, but let's just say the hero is haunted by a ghost for no apparent reason. The ghost appears periodically, wrecking stuff, perhaps hurting people. The "hero" tries running away, but the ghost just keeps showing up, and consequences maybe keep getting worse. People get killed. Companions are lost. The hero starts taking permanent damage or something. Eventually it will get to the point where even the world's biggest coward will have to start looking for clues to deal with the haunting and face the problem head-on. Of course a braver character might just start off going straight for the evil wizard. I just want to make sure that the story will draw in even a more, well, realistic guy, who doesn't necessarily have the cojones to solve every problem by challenging five guys to a battle to the death right off the bat. Now I know there are some "open world" advocates out there who never want to be rushed. They want to take their time, exploring every outhouse and chicken coop in the game, wandering from place to place without a care in the world. They don't want any consequences to ignoring a bad situation. I can totally appreciate that kind of gameplay ... but in this case I say thee nay! I don't have to be forced down the rails through the entire course of the game - in fact it's great if sometimes I have no idea what I'm supposed to do next - but the story should always be looming, and always making me want to resolve it. Open world, do-whatever-you-want-whenever-you-want games can be great, but not every RPG has to be built on that foundation. In fact many good RPGs would be ruined without the sense of urgency that strong plotting provides.

There are gameplay difficulties, but I think it would be better if the plot is challenging as well :D So, what do you think? For example, Morrowind belongs to "Hard." If you kill plot-important NPCs, you will get a "you should feel bad" message and you can't continue the main plot, therefore "game over." For JRPG players, Persona 3 and 4 also belongs to "Hard"