Why Is Resting/Injuries and Maybe Even Supplies, Still In At All?

[Crucis]

Alternatively, make the resting system matter. Don't make it a one click cure all. Make characters rest, by all means. But make it have impact. Force the character to sit out the next couple of quests if they have an injury (following the old "stronghold turn" system from PoE1 for instance, so you can't bypass it by waiting). Make the player shuffle up a party composition, try new stuff, new gear, new abilities, adapt to changing circumstances. Getting someone injured would suddenly be a thing you care about instead of a meaningless, minor resource dump. It would draw on another resource the game never uses, that being your character roster (how often do you really reach into your character roster unless you're completing a companion quest? my parties stay the same from start to finish outside of that). And it would be a different thing to different people. Some would try to avoid injuries at all costs, making combat more tense, while others might actually welcome the incentive to try a new party composition, and wouldn't mind injuries at all. And for those who fall in neither camp, nothing stops you from creating a custom back-up character just in case your Mechanics guy ends up with an ouchie on his face.

 

I'd much prefer the game commits rather than trivialise the already trivial system even further.

 

I'd like to see resting matter too.  But I wouldn't go with the old "stronghold turn".  I'd just require each type of injury to have a certain number of required days of  rest, same as is done for members of your crew.  The game is already tracking days for crew injuries.  Why not do the same for party members who you put in your reserve to rest up?  I think that if you put them into your reserve for rest, they could be considered "busy", or unavailable for action (other than perhaps for defending the ship during boarding actions). 

 

And like you imply, this would be a good way to force players to mix up their party comps using reserve members.  At the same time, say that Eder is injured during your action in some battle on a distant island, but your party perseveres and completes that areas and heads back to the ship.  He might have time to fully recover during your voyage back to Nekataka or wherever. 

 

Also, the presence of a ship's surgeon should have an impact on how quickly the injuries heal.  And the presence of medical supplies should matter too.  You put Eder into your reserve for a voyage home on your ship, but you're out of medical supplies and don't have a ship's surgeon, then that injury should take the maximum time to heal.  But with a skilled ship's surgeon and proper medical supplies, maybe Eder will be back in action far more quickly.

[Crucis]

 

....

"Where every fight is a big fight" put another way "where every fight is the same"

 

Yeah because auto attacking 80% of the game and having "trash mobs" for the majority of combat totally didn't make most fights the same. Using mostly low stuff then the same big things on the same big fights was totally not the same either.

 

But you're right - it would make every fight the same - except for you know, the different offense/defense stats you need to work with each fight (reflex/deflection/resolve/will), the different phys damage and armor types, different mag damage and armor types, target priority (melee/ranged/caster) and positioning as well as the awesome depth and variety of subclass + multiclass and extended pure class and debuffs/buffs/DoTs/healing, concentration/interruption and priorities of whatever else, that varies from fight to fight.

 

But aside from those minor things, every fight is totally the same just because they're all challenging.

 

More of the afore mentioned "willfully ignorant die-hard fans of attrition based gameplay" from my original post.

 

If you can't handle proper challenge, if you need to resort to an archaic system where you can just save your big stuff to blow on anything with a semblance of challenge, instead of being challenged every fight - maybe you should just play on lower difficulties.

 

 

"the game system caters to the lazy"

 

You call it lazy, i call it not wanting challenge to come from being restricted from the gameplay and just being able to save big stuff for big fights to faceroll. I guess we're weird like that.

 

 

I do not feel like this is an accurate characterization of how combats went down in PoE1 at all. I also think it might hint at why some of the same players on this board seem to rely on two criticisms of the original game.

 

1. "80% of the game" was auto attack fights.

2. Limited camping meant you had to go back to town alot.

 

These things are related, and I think they demonstrate that certain players are simply not interested in exploring the wealth of options for optimizing your gameplay in the original. It's simply not true that 80% of the fights in PoE1 were just attack-move fights. It's likely not even 50%. Most fights and most areas actually wanted you to use SOME spells and SOME per encounter abilities in nearly every single fight. Yes there were a few lone trolls or lone shadows, but those were there to introduce monsters to the player.

 

I think that the people who complained that "limited camping supplies meant you had to back to town a lot" probably were ones who were spamming their per-rest spells and abilities like crazy, rather than rationing their use and using the unlimited combat abilities of their physical combatants to carry a much larger share of the load in combat.    I rarely had to spam camping in PoE1 because I rationed my pre-rest spell usage and relied on my physical combatants to do most of the work.  And I usually used spells that assisted them in doing that  more effectively, rather than using, say, my wizard to try to win the battle all by himself by nuking the enemy into oblivion.

[lMarcusl]

I'd like to see resting matter too.  But I wouldn't go with the old "stronghold turn".  I'd just require each type of injury to have a certain number of required days of  rest, same as is done for members of your crew.  The game is already tracking days for crew injuries.  Why not do the same for party members who you put in your reserve to rest up?  I think that if you put them into your reserve for rest, they could be considered "busy", or unavailable for action (other than perhaps for defending the ship during boarding actions). 

 

And like you imply, this would be a good way to force players to mix up their party comps using reserve members.  At the same time, say that Eder is injured during your action in some battle on a distant island, but your party perseveres and completes that areas and heads back to the ship.  He might have time to fully recover during your voyage back to Nekataka or wherever. 

 

Also, the presence of a ship's surgeon should have an impact on how quickly the injuries heal.  And the presence of medical supplies should matter too.  You put Eder into your reserve for a voyage home on your ship, but you're out of medical supplies and don't have a ship's surgeon, then that injury should take the maximum time to heal.  But with a skilled ship's surgeon and proper medical supplies, maybe Eder will be back in action far more quickly.

 

 

The reason I'd tie it to a separate turn system is the introduction of the Wait mechanic. Instead of the rest button, you'd just be pressing the Wait button, except now you don't even need to consume food. The intent of tying it to a turn system that only ticks over during quest progress, like Stronghold Turns used to do, is so that when you're forced to change your party composition due to injuries, you actually have to USE that composition for something, achieve something with them, instead of waiting an arbitrary amount of time so that you can go back to the comp you were using the whole time. The only hole in that plot that I can see is that the Watcher would have to be excluded from that system and have a separate one all of their own, since, you know, you can't actually put the Watcher on the bench and take on someone else as the leader.

[gkathellar]

 

...

 

The actual combat becomes the challenge (when they get round to balancing it post-release..) where every fight is a big fight, instead of it just being about how well you can hoard and restrict yourself from the gameplay (lol) auto-attacking the majority of combat on "trash mobs" while saving and using the big stuff to roll the big fights, before resting and repeating.

 

It's going to be great.

 

"Where every fight is a big fight" put another way "where every fight is the same". That does not sound like a good recipe for a lengthy, open-world RPG.

That's one possible outcome, and it's a bad one, but bear in mind that "every encounter requires 100% of your resources" is pretty much exactly as monotonous as the "every encounter requires exactly 25%" of your resources" that per-rest systems can promote.

 

Per-rest systems shine in games where skilled play allows you to carve through simpler fights quickly and avoid resting as a result. In the IE games, for instance, the ability to manage resources becomes an indicator for how much difficulty you're having. However, games that do this need a fairly low minimum complexity for combat, so that it's possible to glide through trivial fights without them becoming a chore. PoE1 had a problem with this at times, especially in Act 3, but the White March's increased level cap helped to alleviate it somewhat.

 

What's far better, in my opinion, is to remove "trash mobs" from the game entirely, and build every fight to be a unique set piece with specific terrain/tactical challenges and/or relevant story beats. This experience more closely resembles a good session of a tabletop RPG, where combat is often lengthy and complex and so demands that one avoid filler. A setup of this type is where a per-encounter system shines.

[jomoroon]

Spell wise - per Rest mechanics were defined as a way to control the top tier spells and abilities. It prevented repetitive and over-liberal use of these spells which would wreck combat balance and weaken the game's experience.

In my my eyes there are two comparable scenarios:

 

A) the fight does not need the most powerful abilities to succeed (insignificant fights largely) and,

B) the fight requires usage of powerful abilities to succeed.

 

In A, the per rest mechanic is irrelevant. In B however, the way of recovering ability 'charges', was to camp somewhere or return home, before doubling back to wherever your journey was headed prior. Camping supplies were capped, forcing you to go back if you ran out. In other words you either had to go back (and not spend supplies), or spend supplies then eventually go back. Regardless, both ways are just time sinks that didn't really contribute to the combat at all. Having it converted to per encounter streamlined this issue and I think was the best choice going forward.

 

Injury and health wise however it adds more depth to the roleplay aspect of the game, rather than the mechanics side. A) and B) could simply be swapped with needing to be full health for a fight, or not. So I think making it depend on camping produces rather the same droll effect. Having buffs from staying at nice inns etc... has a nice roleplay appeal, but it should simply stay at that for the same reason that camping and injuries are looking to be redundant.

 

Complexity needs to be integrated in a way that is not deemed tedious, or integrated in a way to simply take up more time. Yes it is part of a resource management mechanic, but that resource is solved by time which isn't dynamic at all. 

Edited May 22, 2018 by jomoroon

[whiskiz]

 

....

"Where every fight is a big fight" put another way "where every fight is the same"

 

Yeah because auto attacking 80% of the game and having "trash mobs" for the majority of combat totally didn't make most fights the same. Using mostly low stuff then the same big things on the same big fights was totally not the same either.

 

But you're right - it would make every fight the same - except for you know, the different offense/defense stats you need to work with each fight (reflex/deflection/resolve/will), the different phys damage and armor types, different mag damage and armor types, target priority (melee/ranged/caster) and positioning as well as the awesome depth and variety of subclass + multiclass and extended pure class and debuffs/buffs/DoTs/healing, concentration/interruption and priorities of whatever else, that varies from fight to fight.

 

But aside from those minor things, every fight is totally the same just because they're all challenging.

 

More of the afore mentioned "willfully ignorant die-hard fans of attrition based gameplay" from my original post.

 

If you can't handle proper challenge, if you need to resort to an archaic system where you can just save your big stuff to blow on anything with a semblance of challenge, instead of being challenged every fight - maybe you should just play on lower difficulties.

 

 

"the game system caters to the lazy"

 

You call it lazy, i call it not wanting challenge to come from being restricted from the gameplay and just being able to save big stuff for big fights to faceroll. I guess we're weird like that.

 

 

I do not feel like this is an accurate characterization of how combats went down in PoE1 at all. I also think it might hint at why some of the same players on this board seem to rely on two criticisms of the original game.

 

1. "80% of the game" was auto attack fights.

2. Limited camping meant you had to go back to town alot.

 

These things are related, and I think they demonstrate that certain players are simply not interested in exploring the wealth of options for optimizing your gameplay in the original. It's simply not true that 80% of the fights in PoE1 were just attack-move fights. It's likely not even 50%. Most fights and most areas actually wanted you to use SOME spells and SOME per encounter abilities in nearly every single fight. Yes there were a few lone trolls or lone shadows, but those were there to introduce monsters to the player.

 

The Temple of Eothas below the first town is a perfect example of this. It doesn't actually have "the big fight where you blow all your abilities" instead it has a series of fights that, if done strategically and with SOME spell usage in EACH fight, allow the player to coast through the dungeon without needing to go back to town. Instead of just casting the same max abilities you use in every fight, you are judicious and focus on specific casts, i.e. fire damage for the spirits. But, if you just attack-moved every fight, yeah, you would run out of health very quickly.

 

If folks were just auto-attacking for 80% of the fights in the original game, it's no wonder that those same folks had to go back to town regularly due to limited resting supplies.

 

 

The majority of combat is definitely "trash mobs" and the majority of those trash mobs is definitely auto attacking. While i don't have hard stats, the majority would mean 50% of combat at the very least. Sure some of it is a spell or 2 here or spell or 2 there, but i'm talking majorities.

 

Ok sure your Eothas example - no big fights - need to keep using your stuff but sparingly.

 

That early you can what, use first level spells twice and second level twice? Maybe.

 

You can have maybe 3 diff spellcasters with that use (priest druid wizard) and in one go on PotD, before needing to rest, maybe 5 fights or so due to health/endurance if nothing else. The thing is though, in those 5 fights you used a couple spells from each character here or there.

 

This isn't to point out the majority auto attacking still, this is to say you then barely used your characters, barely engaged with the combat each fight and for what, some amazing and fulfilling system of saving your stuff, like it's some big achievement or some great challenge that no other system could rival?

 

Death by 1000 (boring) cuts?

 

Is engaging with each fight minimally really that rewarding? You see it as "man, i cleared that dungeon with only needing to rest once or twice, i saved the **** out of my abilities" while i see it as "Ok, i barely did anything most fights cause i had to stretch my stuff out and i still got through it all pretty easily, lol, kinda boring but what's next"

 

You see the potential disconnect of a restrictive attrition system? You aren't thinking "how can i engage with this combat best? Take advantage of all the depth and diversity and strengths and weaknesses of friend and foe alike, what kinda fun can i have?" Instead you're being left to think "How can i end this fight as quickly and efficiently as i can, because i have another 10 - 15 before i clear this dungeon"

 

Unless of course, you were brought up on said systems and it's all you know and want to know....

 

Edit: When the challenge is "how much can i not play the game, not engage with the depth, variety and strategy of combat to make sure i can go the mile" then you know there is a big design flaw, oldschool fan favorite system or not.

Edited June 2, 2018 by whiskiz

[cokane]

 

Is engaging with each fight minimally really that rewarding? You see it as "man, i cleared that dungeon with only needing to rest once or twice, i saved the **** out of my abilities" while i see it as "Ok, i barely did anything most fights cause i had to save my stuff and i still got through it all pretty easily, lol, kinda boring but what's next"

 

You see the potential disconnect of a restrictive attrition system?

 

Unless of course, you were brought up on said systems and it's all you know and want to know....

 

Edit: When the challenge is "how much can i not play the game, not engage with the depth, variety and strategy of combat to make sure i can go the mile" then you know there is a big design flaw, oldschool fan favorite system or not.

 

 

If we're going to talk about the original game honestly, I think it's important to pay attention to our language here. Engaging a fight "minimally" AND using one or two spells per fight are mutually exclusive descriptions of fights in the original game. This is doubly true for the low level fights we're talking about where your casters only have about five spells per rest.

 

I would agree with you if the original's dungeon design was always similar to the temple. But it wasn't. This is the important point you and some other folks are missing or choosing to ignore.

 

The original game allowed for DIVERSITY. Dungeons with a series of medium-sized fights, dungeons with trash mobs leading up to one big baddie, dungeons with nearly max fights at every step! I think Raedric's Hold is a good example of this last one. There's nearly zero "trash mobs" in there for a party at levels 3-4. Almost all of the fights require significant spell use, or you're going to run out of health fast. By the way, this strongly encourages the player to consider non-violent solutions for at least some of it. Because you have to pay a price for fighting. (This is an additional weakness of Deadfire, there isn't much of a price for just slashing your way thru everything).

Edited May 22, 2018 by cokane

[whiskiz]

 

 

Is engaging with each fight minimally really that rewarding? You see it as "man, i cleared that dungeon with only needing to rest once or twice, i saved the **** out of my abilities" while i see it as "Ok, i barely did anything most fights cause i had to save my stuff and i still got through it all pretty easily, lol, kinda boring but what's next"

 

You see the potential disconnect of a restrictive attrition system?

 

Unless of course, you were brought up on said systems and it's all you know and want to know....

 

Edit: When the challenge is "how much can i not play the game, not engage with the depth, variety and strategy of combat to make sure i can go the mile" then you know there is a big design flaw, oldschool fan favorite system or not.

 

 

If we're going to talk about the original game honestly, I think it's important to pay attention to our language here. Engaging a fight "minimally" AND using one or two spells per fight are mutually exclusive descriptions of fights in the original game. This is doubly true for the low level fights we're talking about where your casters only have about five spells per rest.

 

I would agree with you if the original's dungeon design was always similar to the temple. But it wasn't. This is the important point you and some other folks are missing or choosing to ignore.

 

The original game allowed for DIVERSITY. Dungeons with a series of medium-sized fights, dungeons with trash mobs leading up to one big baddie, dungeons with nearly max fights at every step! I think Raedric's Hold is a good example of this last one. There's nearly zero "trash mobs" in there for a party at levels 3-4. Almost all of the fights require significant spell use, or you're going to run out of health fast. By the way, this strongly encourages the player to consider non-violent solutions for at least some of it. Because you have to pay a price for fighting. (This is an additional weakness of Deadfire, there isn't much of a price for just slashing your way thru everything).

 

 

The design of the specific dungeon is irrelevant.

 

The strategy, system, outcome and so problem is always the same.

 

Get through any trash as quickly and efficiently as possible, use bigger stuff here or there on any bigger fights, blow everything on any boss fights. Try to get through stuff as quickly, efficiently and minimally as possible, and much progression such wow i saved the **** out of my abilities in that dungeon, best gameplay evar!

 

I wasn't missing any points made, i went off the only example you provided, if anything you basically replied with the one thing which is of no real consequence - while disregarding very valid points and examples i happened to make, in turn.

 

You're trying to sound like you have a valid point, without having a valid point

Edited May 22, 2018 by whiskiz

[PIP-Clownboy]

Also why does food give better boni than a power level 8/9 6 second cast buff

[Katarack21]

 

 

Is engaging with each fight minimally really that rewarding? You see it as "man, i cleared that dungeon with only needing to rest once or twice, i saved the **** out of my abilities" while i see it as "Ok, i barely did anything most fights cause i had to save my stuff and i still got through it all pretty easily, lol, kinda boring but what's next"

 

You see the potential disconnect of a restrictive attrition system?

 

Unless of course, you were brought up on said systems and it's all you know and want to know....

 

Edit: When the challenge is "how much can i not play the game, not engage with the depth, variety and strategy of combat to make sure i can go the mile" then you know there is a big design flaw, oldschool fan favorite system or not.

 

 

 I think Raedric's Hold is a good example of this last one. There's nearly zero "trash mobs" in there for a party at levels 3-4. Almost all of the fights require significant spell use, or you're going to run out of health fast.

Not if you go in through the dungeon. Other than the animancer and her guards, that whole place is basically just full of trash. Now going in swinging through the front door...yeah, that ****s hard.

[lMarcusl]

I think there is a middle ground to be found between per rest's "I never use any of my per rest abilities unless I have to or until I have Masteries" and per encounter's "I got a full per encounter arsenal ****ed and ready, let's go blow up planets". Every player is different and everyone tackles each system in their own way, but I'm one of the guys who, even with decent amount of experience in PoE1 still barely ever uses per rest abilities because "what if". What if a fight gives me more trouble than expected and I don't have a full arsenal ready to go? Is it going to happen? Likely not, I know the given area decently well and I'm at the right level for it. But I still can't make myself use that stuff. Cause what if...

 

On the other hand, having a 5 spell queue already set up for all characters on the first unpause every encounter is about as engaging as autoattack fights. Well, it's a bit more flashy but yeah, gets repetitive after a while and it takes acquiring a new level for things to change. Funnily enough, I don't feel the same way in ARPGs even though most of the game my character has access to the exact same arsenal that they can liberally use. But the difference is, things are very dynamic in ARPGs, they change, you have to react to them, enemies are varied in abilities, resistances, quantities...so even if you are doing mostly the same stuff, putting the stuff in different contexts makes all the difference. If you throw a spanner in the works, make the player change up the routine, per encounter can be much better than per rest because your characters and their abilities aren't a hindrance (or time sink for repeated camping), they're an asset, as they should be. But that requires a much deeper, varied encounter design, more pronounced strengths and weaknesses and tactics (charging your backline, teleporting, cc, flat out immunities or extreme resistances, etc.). What we got, though, is pretty much what we had in PoE1. That would have been fine for PoE1's systems. It's not fine for per encounter.

 

I guess what I'm saying, to get back on topic, is that forced camping by ability restriction or health limitations was, in its consequences, actually significantly worse than the current injury system, as it was similarly meaningless for the survival of the characters in reality. It doesn't matter if you consume plentiful food to heal or consume cheap and plentiful camping supplies to heal and recover abilities, you have unlimited access to both camping resources, per rest just makes people be more careful because it wastes time to restock, not because the system itself is good, the incentive for resting as little as possible is twisted. But per rest had the added effect of causing certain types of players to engage with the combat system way less than was actually necessary in reality. It required the player to estimate just how little they should indulge in their abilities, which requires either guesswork or prior experience.

 

Per encounter does away with that, and could, in theory, still put just as much emphasis on the player using their abilities in a judicious manner, if only combat encounters were more varied (to force you to use different abilities than your routine), lengthy (to create situations where you run out and start wishing you saved a particular spell tier for later) and challenging (so that which decisions you do and do not make in a given encounter actually even matters). It would matter, then, that my Templar has already used two of his level x Priest spells and can no longer, say, Resurrect or suspend hostile effects, etc. But the circumstances in which that would matter are never there in the first place, because combat is too easy. As is usually the case, the abilities, characteristics, specific behaviours and resistances of enemies only matter when they're threatening. When everything is easy, they might as well be interchangeable. At that point, which meaningless resting system of the two is being used to replenish your resources is an afterthought, as neither can make up for lacking encounter design. Both per rest and per encounter require their own approach to combat, and what we got was a per encounter game but with per rest encounters.

Edited May 22, 2018 by lMarcusl

[Katarack21]

But the difference is, things are very dynamic in ARPGs, they change, you have to react to them, enemies are varied in abilities, resistances, quantities...so even if you are doing mostly the same stuff, putting the stuff in different contexts makes all the difference....It would matter, then, that my Templar has already used two of his level x Priest spells and can no longer, say, Resurrect or suspend hostile effects, etc.

See, here's the thing: that's exactly the experience that I'm having. I think part of the problem is that people are having *very* different experiences on different difficulty levels, and many of the "solutions" that people are offering are very general game changes that would effect *every* difficulty level.

[lMarcusl]

 

But the difference is, things are very dynamic in ARPGs, they change, you have to react to them, enemies are varied in abilities, resistances, quantities...so even if you are doing mostly the same stuff, putting the stuff in different contexts makes all the difference....It would matter, then, that my Templar has already used two of his level x Priest spells and can no longer, say, Resurrect or suspend hostile effects, etc.

See, here's the thing: that's exactly the experience that I'm having. I think part of the problem is that people are having *very* different experiences on different difficulty levels, and many of the "solutions" that people are offering are very general game changes that would effect *every* difficulty level.

 

Well, it might also be the consequence of the game's more open world. Areas no longer follow up on one another in a chessboard-like fashion, so you can end up in vastly different areas at completely different times than other players. Estimating and balancing for such massive disparities is essentially only possible if you just flip on the Scale All switch (with down option active as well) so that you don't end up in ****'s creek without a paddle. I ended up on the side of the spectrum where I smeared my facial area against the wall for a few hours and then completed a massive series of non-combat quests. From that point on, everything was way too easy. Except for the final Eothas fight. That didn't go too well for me.

Edited May 22, 2018 by lMarcusl

[Zinn]

Honestly, I think resting mechanics are pretty bad in video games in general because video games operate on a completely different level than a tabletop experience. You see, there is no DM in a video game, so nothing really stops you from abusing the rest system anyway, rendering it moot and something to be used in an options menu (maybe as a difficulty option?). Basically, why have a Per Rest and Per Encounter ability when I can either hike back to an inn whenever I please or just sit my booty down and camp to fix the problem right away?

 

I know it might get some people up in arms but it's actually really important in terms of game design. Are you just wasting people's time for "realism" in a game where people can just drink a potion or cast a basic spell to deal with literally any other health issue? Did nobody think about inventing the magical equivalent of caffeine since they solved their world's other health problems via potions and magic? As with anything, you could just build something entirely around a resting mechanic but it'll be a damn hard time balancing it so you hit the exact right pixel between "Am I wasting people's time by forcing them to rest constantly?" and "Why even bother resting in a dangerous place since I have enough charges anyway?".

 

Some games have attempted to solve this problem with random encounters on rest but that's pretty terrible for obvious reasons and hasn't been used in ages as far as I'm aware. You rest because you're out of spells/skills/whatever and/or have low health, followed by random monsters ruining your day and wasting your time. This is where a DM comes in to be lenient but a computer has no such distinction, it can only operate within the parameters it's given. So either you get swarmed by enemies or you don't - and god help you if the players figure out some health/spell value to achieve leniency vs harshness.

 

I'm all for it as an optional difficulty or roleplaying option. By all means, rest away if you find it fun and/or realistic but I don't think there's any really good option so far that has straddled the line between realism and wasting your time. I never really rested in the previous game outside town visits because it was lenient with charges and such - only severe screw-ups once or twice in a playthrough which doesn't justify an entire game mechanic. Honestly, I don't really think the mechanic was needed at all unless you did a blind first playthrough on PotD, at which point you're such a small part of the playerbase that it might be worth just relegating it to either be mandatory on PotD with limited resting at inns (maybe by making that absurdly expensive or something) or as an extra option as mentioned before.

 

Basically, this is such a fundamental game mechanic that it's at the point of either going all out and virtually eliminating resting at inns (either thorugh economy or just running around tiny villages where no one will take you in) or you don't bother at all and balance your encounters around having X abilities at Y levels among your party. I can deal with either but I'm not a big fan of this middlepoint we have currently and where video games tend to settle. Either I get to go all out all the time against tougher opponents or I get to optimize my resources and alter my gameplay via party class management and item management. PoE2 seems to tilt quite a bit towards the former option, which I'm okay with, but I can see why D&D traditionalists may not be fans. It's also arguable whether or not the opposition is tough enough but I'm not on PotD yet, as I'm doing my first playthrough on the 2nd highest difficulty.

 

This is no small or simple change to make in either direction, as you need to tweak basically every number in the game from the amount of money you get to how much health you have, plus it impacts your gameplay experience in terms of seeing major cities and such (the devs will have to find a really good answer for you either never visiting cities or never being able to find a bed in one). Interesting topic, though!

 

TL;DR: I write way too much. I'm sorry fam.

[flamesium]

It still serves the purpose of Injury Removal, Buff Application and Per Use Replenishment (which now takes the form of Empower points), so in that sense it hasn't changed that much.

 

It's a pointless mechanic now because resting is effectively unlimited.

 

It was pointless in PoE 1 because resting was effectively unlimited.

 

The only real difference is they've removed the chore of load screens and walking between you and unlimited resting, which is an improvement in my book. If they want to make it an actually meaningful mechanic however -and thereby make injuries and empower points meaningful along with it- they need to limit resting by something other than the player's patience for load screens and walking.

 

That means either having to sacrifice a non-trivial amount of a limited resource (actually limited, not just limited by your patience), or your party having to achieve a goal before being allowed a rest.

 

My preference would be completely ripping up the system and replacing it with something else.

[SonicMage117]

Tradition, if not anything else.

 

I wish we could get rid of resting in Crpg's as a whole and when I say that I know people will probably think "Well we're glad you're not developers"

 

Fear not though, these old systems will become extinct sooner or later. Ancient systems such as these really have no use anymore.

[Crucis]

 

I'd like to see resting matter too.  But I wouldn't go with the old "stronghold turn".  I'd just require each type of injury to have a certain number of required days of  rest, same as is done for members of your crew.  The game is already tracking days for crew injuries.  Why not do the same for party members who you put in your reserve to rest up?  I think that if you put them into your reserve for rest, they could be considered "busy", or unavailable for action (other than perhaps for defending the ship during boarding actions). 

 

And like you imply, this would be a good way to force players to mix up their party comps using reserve members.  At the same time, say that Eder is injured during your action in some battle on a distant island, but your party perseveres and completes that areas and heads back to the ship.  He might have time to fully recover during your voyage back to Nekataka or wherever. 

 

Also, the presence of a ship's surgeon should have an impact on how quickly the injuries heal.  And the presence of medical supplies should matter too.  You put Eder into your reserve for a voyage home on your ship, but you're out of medical supplies and don't have a ship's surgeon, then that injury should take the maximum time to heal.  But with a skilled ship's surgeon and proper medical supplies, maybe Eder will be back in action far more quickly.

 

 

The reason I'd tie it to a separate turn system is the introduction of the Wait mechanic. Instead of the rest button, you'd just be pressing the Wait button, except now you don't even need to consume food. The intent of tying it to a turn system that only ticks over during quest progress, like Stronghold Turns used to do, is so that when you're forced to change your party composition due to injuries, you actually have to USE that composition for something, achieve something with them, instead of waiting an arbitrary amount of time so that you can go back to the comp you were using the whole time. The only hole in that plot that I can see is that the Watcher would have to be excluded from that system and have a separate one all of their own, since, you know, you can't actually put the Watcher on the bench and take on someone else as the leader.

 

 

I hated that stronghold turn mechanic because it didn't have a fixed amount of time.  And that's why I would  strongly oppose it.

 

If someone is determined to not try out different comp mixes of companions and will wait/rest as long as necessary to get back their favorite wounded companion, then so be it.  Also consider too that your main character can get injured too, and it's not like the Lord/Lady of Caed Nua can take a vacation from adventuring and fill the party with companions.  So, just let people sit around if that's what they really want to do while their favorite companion gets better.  It's not going to be any different for the main character, unless the gods deem that the Lord/Lady of Caed Nua heals at a miraculously fast rate.

[Crucis]

 

 

....

"Where every fight is a big fight" put another way "where every fight is the same"

 

Yeah because auto attacking 80% of the game and having "trash mobs" for the majority of combat totally didn't make most fights the same. Using mostly low stuff then the same big things on the same big fights was totally not the same either.

 

But you're right - it would make every fight the same - except for you know, the different offense/defense stats you need to work with each fight (reflex/deflection/resolve/will), the different phys damage and armor types, different mag damage and armor types, target priority (melee/ranged/caster) and positioning as well as the awesome depth and variety of subclass + multiclass and extended pure class and debuffs/buffs/DoTs/healing, concentration/interruption and priorities of whatever else, that varies from fight to fight.

 

But aside from those minor things, every fight is totally the same just because they're all challenging.

 

More of the afore mentioned "willfully ignorant die-hard fans of attrition based gameplay" from my original post.

 

If you can't handle proper challenge, if you need to resort to an archaic system where you can just save your big stuff to blow on anything with a semblance of challenge, instead of being challenged every fight - maybe you should just play on lower difficulties.

 

 

"the game system caters to the lazy"

 

You call it lazy, i call it not wanting challenge to come from being restricted from the gameplay and just being able to save big stuff for big fights to faceroll. I guess we're weird like that.

 

 

I do not feel like this is an accurate characterization of how combats went down in PoE1 at all. I also think it might hint at why some of the same players on this board seem to rely on two criticisms of the original game.

 

1. "80% of the game" was auto attack fights.

2. Limited camping meant you had to go back to town alot.

 

These things are related, and I think they demonstrate that certain players are simply not interested in exploring the wealth of options for optimizing your gameplay in the original. It's simply not true that 80% of the fights in PoE1 were just attack-move fights. It's likely not even 50%. Most fights and most areas actually wanted you to use SOME spells and SOME per encounter abilities in nearly every single fight. Yes there were a few lone trolls or lone shadows, but those were there to introduce monsters to the player.

 

The Temple of Eothas below the first town is a perfect example of this. It doesn't actually have "the big fight where you blow all your abilities" instead it has a series of fights that, if done strategically and with SOME spell usage in EACH fight, allow the player to coast through the dungeon without needing to go back to town. Instead of just casting the same max abilities you use in every fight, you are judicious and focus on specific casts, i.e. fire damage for the spirits. But, if you just attack-moved every fight, yeah, you would run out of health very quickly.

 

If folks were just auto-attacking for 80% of the fights in the original game, it's no wonder that those same folks had to go back to town regularly due to limited resting supplies.

 

 

The majority of combat is definitely "trash mobs" and the majority of those trash mobs is definitely auto attacking. While i don't have hard stats, the majority would mean 50% of combat at the very least. Sure some of it is a spell or 2 here or spell or 2 there, but i'm talking majorities.

 

Ok sure your Eothas example - no big fights, need to keep using your stuff, sparingly.

 

That early you can what, use first level spells twice and second level twice? Maybe.

 

You can have maybe 3 diff spellcasters with that use (priest druid wizard) and in one go on PotD, before needing to rest, maybe 5 fights or so due to health/endurance if nothing else. The thing is though, in those 5 fights you used a couple spells from each character here or there.

 

This isn't to point out the majority auto attacking still, this is to say you then barely used your characters, barely engaged with the combat each fight and for what, some amazing and fulfilling system of saving your stuff, like it's some big achievement or some great challenge that no other system could rival?

 

Death by 1000 (boring) cuts?

 

Is engaging with each fight minimally really that rewarding? You see it as "man, i cleared that dungeon with only needing to rest once or twice, i saved the **** out of my abilities" while i see it as "Ok, i barely did anything most fights cause i had to stretch my stuff out and i still got through it all pretty easily, lol, kinda boring but what's next"

 

You see the potential disconnect of a restrictive attrition system? You aren't thinking "how can i engage with this combat best? Take advantage of all the depth and diversity and strengths and weaknesses of friend and foe alike, what kinda fun can i have?" Instead you're being left to think "How can i end this fight as quickly and efficiently as i can, because i have another 10 - 15 just like it coming up"

 

Unless of course, you were brought up on said systems and it's all you know and want to know....

 

Edit: When the challenge is "how much can i not play the game, not engage with the depth, variety and strategy of combat to make sure i can go the mile" then you know there is a big design flaw, oldschool fan favorite system or not.

 

 

I'm sorry, but this is just a pant load of self-entitled excrement. 

 

As I see it, you're seeing through the eyes of a console gamer, while I'm seeing it through the eyes of a computer and PnP gamer! 

 

And explain what you mean by an attrition system.  I have no clue what you're talking about.

 

Regardless, what you're describing is IMO lazy console gaming.  There's no depth to it.  There's no challenge to managing resources.  It's all about the combat and only about the combat.  And that's boring AF.

Edited May 22, 2018 by Crucis

[lMarcusl]

It doesn't have to be an ancient system if they give it meaning and impact like if they adopted the XCOM mechanic of injuries only healing when the character is out of action/out of the party for a mission or two. As it stands though, it might as well not be there. However, I feel there is something to be said for the brutal honesty of the system as it is now. As similarly meaningless as the system was before, in PoE1 they made it such a hassle to go back for camping supplies or inn rest (the load times were awful) that it actually made the player try to do it as little as possible, though in reality they could do it as much as they wanted. Now that the "veil" has been pulled back, and we just rest like it's the snoring olympics, the importance of individual encounters is laid pretty damn bare. Where originally the player had the illusion of being on a long, drawn out campaign where they were saving up resources over a longer series of encounters, in PoE2 the ease of resting smacks you right in the face with how much the emphasis is on one encounter at a time. The interim periods don't matter. Win the fight or lose it, nothing in between is of any consequence. Which, IMO, is the reason why the combat feels so disappointing. It's one thing if combat is easy and you're deceiving yourself into being in it for the long haul. It's another when the game tells you straight to your face that resting is unlimited and injuries don't matter and then throws underpowered trash packs at you until you weep for any semblance of difficulty. With the way the balance currently is, they kinda shot themselves in the foot by making the emphasis on individual encounters instead of whole dungeons so obvious.

[lMarcusl]

 

Also consider too that your main character can get injured too, and it's not like the Lord/Lady of Caed Nua can take a vacation from adventuring and fill the party with companions.

 

That's...exactly what I said. In either system (mine with forced roster rotation and stronghold turns or yours with time requirements), you'd have to have a separate system for the Watcher, cause you cannot afford to cart your main character around with 3 injuries and wait for 9 days before you can finally enter a fight without risking your entire campaign any more than you can realistically put your main character on the bench for 3 stronghold turns and go complete quests with some other main character.

Edited May 23, 2018 by lMarcusl

[Karkarov]

To answer the underlying question.

Resting is still in as a buff mechanic.  You can eat some food on rest to get some good buffs, the end.

Injuries are still in because you need some mechanic to determine permanent death, and they don't want to do "knocked out = perma death".

I think the systems flaw is two fold.  It is too easy to get injuries from stupid stuff like scripted encounters and traps, and injuries are too easy to heal off.  To get rid of an injury they should actually implement like a "medic" system where you actually have to go to an NPC in a town to get treated or something along those lines.  Traps should simply inflict long term debuffs that last a day or two, and scripted encounters should do the same or simply cause you to fail for real and make no progress.

That or they need to get rid of injuries, and turn perma death into a simple options toggle where if you go unconscious you dead dead.  You like that?  Toggle it on.  You don't?  It is off by default, you just leave it that way.

Edited May 22, 2018 by Karkarov

[Crucis]

 

 

Also consider too that your main character can get injured too, and it's not like the Lord/Lady of Caed Nua can take a vacation from adventuring and fill the party with companions.

 

That's...exactly what I said. In either system (mine with forced roster rotation and stronghold turns or yours with time requirements), you'd have to have a separate system for the Watcher, cause you cannot afford to cart your main character around with 3 injuries and waiting for 9 days before you can finally enter a fight without risking your entire campaign any more than you can realistically put your main character on the bench for 3 stronghold turns and go complete quests with some other main character.

 

 

Yeah, I know.  My bad.  I didn't happen to notice that you'd said it until after I'd posted this.

[lMarcusl]

I think the systems flaw is two fold.  It is too easy to get injuries from stupid stuff like scripted encounters and traps, and injuries are too easy to heal off.  To get rid of an injury they should actually implement like a "medic" system where you actually have to go to an NPC in a town to get treated or something along those lines.  Traps should simply inflict long term debuffs that last a day or two, and scripted encounters should do the same or simply cause you to fail for real and make no progress.

Damn, I nearly forgot about that. There were so many occasions where I was faced with a stat check, half the characters would pass it and half would not...and nothing. I get past the scripted event, not even an injury to my name... So what you're saying is, half of my party failed to climb the rope across the chasm due to their lacking athletics...but we all made it to the other side? My athletic characters managed to swim through the flooded tunnel to the other end while the rest didn't make it...but we're all here in the cave. I...o-ok. I'm with ya on that.

[Crucis]

It doesn't have to be an ancient system if they give it meaning and impact like if they adopted the XCOM mechanic of injuries only healing when the character is out of action/out of the party for a mission or two. As it stands though, it might as well not be there. However, I feel there is something to be said for the brutal honesty of the system as it is now. As similarly meaningless as the system was before, in PoE1 they made it such a hassle to go back for camping supplies or inn rest (the load times were awful) that it actually made the player try to do it as little as possible, though in reality they could do it as much as they wanted. Now that the "veil" has been pulled back, and we just rest like it's the snoring olympics, the importance of individual encounters is laid pretty damn bare. Where originally the player had the illusion of being on a long, drawn out campaign where they were saving up resources over a longer series of encounters, in PoE2 the ease of resting smacks you right in the face with how much the emphasis is on one encounter at a time. The interim periods don't matter. Win the fight or lose it, nothing in between is of any consequence. Which, IMO, is the reason why the combat feels so disappointing. It's one thing if combat is easy and you're deceiving yourself into being in it for the long haul. It's another when the game tells you straight to your face that resting is unlimited and injuries don't matter and then throws underpowered trash packs at you until you weep for any semblance of difficulty. With the way the balance currently is, they kinda shot themselves in the foot by making the emphasis on individual encounters instead of whole dungeons so obvious.

 

I guess I sort of agree with you.  I still maintain that if one was having to spam rests it was probably because they were spamming their per-rest spells like crazy rather than build a party that was strong on physical combatants who could keep going without any limits on per-rest abilities, as long as they didn't get knocked out.  Personally, I still maintain that while not perfect, the POE1 system was considerably better in this regard.   Managing your limited resources SHOULD matter!  It's part of roleplaying.  cRPG's shouldn't just be an endless string of battles with no limitations or consequences.  Resting should matter.  Managing resources should matter.  Fatigue should matter.  Camping supplies, not so much.  (It's kind of silly to have a stash of unlimited size but then limit the amount of camping supplies you can bring along.)

[Katarack21]

To answer the underlying question.

 

Resting is still in as a buff mechanic.  You can eat some food on rest to get some good buffs, the end.

 

Injuries are still in because you need some mechanic to determine permanent death, and they don't want to do "knocked out = perma death".

 

I think the systems flaw is two fold.  It is too easy to get injuries from stupid stuff like scripted encounters and traps, and injuries are too easy to heal off.  To get rid of an injury they should actually implement like a "medic" system where you actually have to go to an NPC in a town to get treated or something along those lines.  Traps should simply inflict long term debuffs that last a day or two, and scripted encounters should do the same or simply cause you to fail for real and make no progress.

 

That or they need to get rid of injuries, and turn perma death into a simple options toggle where if you go unconscious you dead dead.  You like that?  Toggle it on.  You don't?  It is off by default, you just leave it that way.

I would have went this route. I would have kept the injury system, but I would have used a 5-tier injury system, not a 3 tier, and I would have only tied a small portion of major injuries to a possible death--and made it clear which injuries were minor and which were major while also providing a toggle to turn permanent death on or off.