Thoughts about POE and IE-like games in general

[yorname]

Personally, I really like the attempts obsidian made in POE. The thing I can never get used to about d20 system is how much things depends on luck, in the end you just stack stats through the roof to be secure. The miss - graze - hit - crit model is great, there's always some improvement when I increase accuracy, and graze significantly reduces the case where it's either a miss or losing half HP to one single hit.

 

Class design also changed a few things I don't enjoy in DnD and Pathfinder CRPGs. Universal accuracy is pretty neat. To be fair it does make PER mandatory for anything offensive, but still, multi-ing with ranger to get more reliable spells is quite unique. It's less of a clear "this class is martial, that class is caster, don't mix them up" case. Wizards are even better suited for full plates than many martial classes, and they don't suffer from things like low BAB to be usable martial characters to begin with.

 

Last but not least, it's freaking real-time logic. IE games existed to adopt TB tabletop rules, but that's not necessary and can create confusion. PF: WotR was successful and I enjoyed it, still, the RTwP mode took me a while to figure out with those swift, move, standard action just thrown in without fine adjustments.

 

POE2 and WotR are probably the only "big" successors to the IE bloodline today. After playing both I had mixed feelings. POE2's combat is something I'd expect after 2 decades, but overall plot and level-design feels dated and disappointing. On the other hand WotR just packed all the classes in it, I had most fun making builds but always give up when the build actually comes online. Outside of combat they did try something new with the progress of the game, so that the first couple of runs were quite refreshing even though I'm familiar with the genre. I just felt neither really belonged to 2020s, but could have been if combined.

 

It's very likely I'm simply wrong though. It seems more people are just indifferent about RTwP party games and PF titles were successful because of adopting a tabletop ruleset. DOS2 and BG3 are the future.

[thelee]

for all its flaws with PF:K and PF:WOTR (and I have a lot of beefs especially with kingmaker), Owlcat deserves credit for holding the banner of IE games/RTwP into the current day even as Deadfire sales floundered.

that being said, Owlcat's next game is something else entirely (it's a turn-based warhammer game) it really seems like RTwP is a niche genre that not a lot of players are actively demanding. a pity, I still turn on Deadfire because it's the only game that can really scratch the RTwP itch (and despite being older and with a shorter dev cycle, isn't nearly as buggy as WoTR).

Owlcat had a user survey and found the majority of its players use RTwP mode. Rather than speaking about a huge demand for RTwP, it might have just meant that RTwP players don't really have much of a choice, so they all are crowding into this one game. So yeah, unfortunately I agree DOS2 and BG3 are the future. I'll just have to wait a decade for the next IE/RTwP nostalgia revival.

Edited December 5, 2022 by thelee

[yorname]

There's the opinion that RTwP hits an awkward position in terms of simulating reality. PnP rpg had to use turns because it's probably the only practical way, but unless this exact type of combat is what people seek, on PC or console modern 3A title kind of experience is just too far ahead of isometric RTwP, to the point that turn-based isn't affected as much because it's abstract enough. It's really hard to imagine a new player today would choose RTwP over basically any other modern rpg or action game. To be honest if I don't throw up after 2 minutes into any first or third person game I'd have joined them.

 

WotR feels weird for me because it's supposed to be designed for RTwP but RTwP gameplay is boring af, just full buff and steamrolling unfair. TB is more fun (at least according to more vocal players) then tavern defense in act 1 can last more than 30 minutes. I guess they're just not experienced enough at designing this kind of things.

Edited December 6, 2022 by yorname

[thelee]

i think the big thing for me is there aren't really a lot of party-based real-time RPG experiences. The last one I played that was AAA was dragon age inquisition (which it self was very RTwP, even if it wasn't IE style), and I haven't heard of anything like it since.

I love F:NV and Outer Worlds and elder scrolls-style games, they just don't have the tactical/strategic depth of a party-based game though

 

[yorname]

I forgot to mention DA series, DAO was "isometric" enough for me to enjoy without suffering from motion sickness but later titles force players to lean to 3rd person viewpoint and I often felt I didn't have enough control over my party, it's worse in Inquisition as the camera was even lower. Maybe there's a way to effectively play it but that was beyond me, I had to give up about 2/3 through the game.

[Boeroer]

DA:O had very simplistic class and ability "trees" and therefore limited potential for multiple different builds - which would have motivated me to play it several times more (like I did with PoE/Deadfire). But I enjoyed it still.

What was quite nice was the ability to combine spell effects (from one or multiple casters) into "secret special spells" that you could discover by simply trying it out. I played a guy who specialized on that sigil-combo that pushed enemies around like ragdolls, which was fun because afair there was no defense against it. And two casters (one Morrigan, the other I don't remember) went on to unlock "Storm of the Century" which was not only very powerful (see Great Maelstrom) but also looked and sounded awesome. 

I haven't played an RPG since then where you could do the same. 

Edited December 7, 2022 by Boeroer

[kanisatha]

22 hours ago, thelee said:

i think the big thing for me is there aren't really a lot of party-based real-time RPG experiences. The last one I played that was AAA was dragon age inquisition (which it self was very RTwP, even if it wasn't IE style), and I haven't heard of anything like it since.

I love F:NV and Outer Worlds and elder scrolls-style games, they just don't have the tactical/strategic depth of a party-based game though

 

Dragon Age: Dreadwolf is now well past alpha and on track for late '23 or early '24 release. Plus if it doesn't need to be AAA then you also have the two Pathfinder games and Black Geyser.

[thelee]

4 hours ago, Boeroer said:

DA:O had a very simplistic class and ability "trees" and therefore limited potential for multiple different builds - which would have motivated me to play it several times more (like I did with PoE/Deadfire). But I enjoyed it still.

What was quite nice was the ability to combine spell effects (from one or multiple casters) into "secret special spells" that you could discover by simply trying it out. I played a guy who specialized on that sigil-combo that pushed enemies around like ragdolls, which was fun because afair there was no defense against it. And two casters (one Morrigan, the other I don't remember) went on to unlock "Storm of the Century" which was not only very powerful (see Great Maelstrom) but also looked and sounded awesome. 

I haven't played an RPG since then where you could do the same. 

Tyranny came the closest but still pretty far off, but I agree the combo mechanic that Bioware (and only Bioware it seems) did in DA and also to an extent in Mass Effect was a pretty neat way to mix up the party RPG formula.

[Boeroer]

Yes, Tyranny also had a nice system with the spell building - but afair it wasn't combining spells/spell effects that where already cast on the ground (or in the air or onto enemies) into greater spell effects.
In DA:O you didn't craft a spell from differnet effects and then cast that new spell - but you cast spell 1, then somebody else or you cast spell 2 (and 3 eventually) on the same spot (or enemy) and the effects would "hook into other" and create a new, much more powerful effect. Like you could cast some sigils on the floor which weren't too powerful by themselves - but if you cast two of them on on top of the other suddenly a new sigil would form that was the best CC effect in the game iirc.

But the general approach of Tyranny on how to "craft" spells from different effects was nice, yeah. What totally killed it for me though was the cooldown mechanic then. "Cannot concentrate on a few spells, must create a ton of spells to prevent downtime..." - gahh! Well - I ranted about that multiple times now so I will let it rest today.  

Edited December 7, 2022 by Boeroer

[thelee]

what i meant was that in tyranny, mainchar and party members can combine to create combo effects as special abilities (and different ones get unlocked based on your reputation with party members). it's not like DA or ME where you cast one spell and then another spell on the same target to trigger a new effect, but it's still something that required you to have specific party members together.

[Boeroer]

Ah yes, you are right. I totally forgot about that to be honest.