Update #9: The power of MODES and Godlike Races: Our $2.3M Stretch Goal

[SqueakyCat]

This is fabulous news! Thanks.

[TCJ]

I have a difficult enough time on standard modes, but I think the added difficulty levels will certainly be interesting. Even if I weren't to use any, it's a neat feature for all those who will.

 

On the races, I'm not excited. Call me a vanilla person, but stuff like tieflings and asimaar never interested me. Give me a human and call it a day!

[Infinitron]

Icewind Dale's Heart of Fury mode had exclusive treasure that you could only find in the game if you played with it. It worked pretty well.

[Lohi]

1) I was never a fan of "set difficulty at the start and never change it again" style. This works for ironman mode. But for other modes it always makes me pause. I want to set difficulty up but I don't want to find out it's no fun later on and I have to restart. Ie, like everything is smooth and easy until the final BG2 fight. So it would be nice if we could increase/decrease combat difficulty later on.

 

2) Two types of difficulty sliders: one for combat and one for gameplay. This way you can be in expert mode but also turn down difficulty of fights. Or be in ironman perma-death mode but with easy fights. Or very difficult combat with easy inventory management and infinitely stackable arrows.

[Tigranes]

I'm sure you can adjust combat / standard difficulty, yo ujust can't turn these special modes on and off. Which makes sense, really, for them.

[general_azure]

Heh, that reference to the weighted gold discussion got me laughing. And being able to set options individually instead of just having one almighty slider is always a good idea as far as I'm concerned.

[J.E. Sawyer]

If you are turning on Expert Mode at the beginning of the game, you're permanently (for that game) setting all dials to 11. You don't need to do that, though. If you start a normal game, you can manually turn on/off the options of Expert Mode that you enjoy at any point in the game. If you want combat to be standard but you prefer having companion influence messages turned off, you can just select that feature (and/or other story/dialogue-based elements).

[LadyCrimson]

Trial of Iron, baby. Wicked.

[Piccolo]

1) I was never a fan of "set difficulty at the start and never change it again" style. This works for ironman mode. But for other modes it always makes me pause. I want to set difficulty up but I don't want to find out it's no fun later on and I have to restart. Ie, like everything is smooth and easy until the final BG2 fight. So it would be nice if we could increase/decrease combat difficulty later on.

 

2) Two types of difficulty sliders: one for combat and one for gameplay. This way you can be in expert mode but also turn down difficulty of fights. Or be in ironman perma-death mode but with easy fights. Or very difficult combat with easy inventory management and infinitely stackable arrows.

I'm not a fan of difficulty sliders if they just do simple stuff like inflate/deflate enemy stats. I'd much rather have more complex, well thought out difficulty modes you choose from at the start... even if it means less freedom to adjust mid-game.

 

Edit: Nvm, just read the dev post above. Seems we will have some freedom to play around with the difficulty mid-game.

Edited September 26, 2012 by Piccolo

[Nakia]

snip

Do you think there is still the remote possibility of a stretch goal for official mod tools? If so, I'd definitely increase my pledge.

 

Me too.

[Baudolino05]

Valuable addictions. I especially like sub options and chance to change on the fly. This way you kind find your perfect balance right from the first playthrough....

Edited September 26, 2012 by Baudolino05

[NerdBoner]

One step closer to unique and beautiful snowflake status baby!!!!!

[Moonlight Butterfly]

Woot this is awesome, I hope they make it that far, this is definitely something I want to see! Thanks devs :3

[Inertia]

I love the ideas of all the expert modes and hope to play through them all myself. But the idea of the opposite a "story mode" scares me because doesn't this lead to game design where no gameplay could be present in the story and vice versa?

Edited September 26, 2012 by Inertia

[Pidesco]

Best update so far. Absolutely spot on.

[Shardbearer]

So... Are the god-like races just inhabiting the world or will they be playable?

[J.E. Sawyer]

When we talk about adding races, we mean as races that can be played as the main PC.

[Chippy]

I'd like to be clear that I can't see anyway Obsidian are going to make a game I will feel negative towards, whatever they create will be fantastic. I also don't want to sound like a whiny entitled gamer - as I appreciate working with allocated funds and making realistic, measurable, timebound targets...so here comes the BUT...

 

But I was wondering how much effort would be required to have the game react to the actual race you pick. For example; in DA:O elves were either slaves or a rebel race that were treated with disdain. Yet I never felt an ounce of racism towards my dalish character.

 

I expect that as a stretch goal (at this stage) race reactivity would not recieve as much enthusiasm, and even if it did it's probably too much work to really make the player feel like a Dalish/Drow.

 

But I thought I'd raise it anyway.

[Shardbearer]

Thanks! This update sounds great!

[Archon]

Besides the new race, best thing with this update is the "Make your own mode" part.

"the ability to turn many of their sub-features on and off on an individual level in an ordinary game" is a very smart feature imo.

[FlintlockJazz]

Nice! Look forward to all that! And it sounds they have some very firm ideas on the races (enough to know it's too hard to go into yet) which is good to know.

[Inyourprime]

Enjoyed this update. Very nice.

[J.E. Sawyer]

I love the ideas of all the expert modes and hope to play through them all myself. But the idea of the opposite a "story mode" scares me because doesn't this lead to game design where no gameplay could be present in the story and vice versa?

To be clear: we're making a game in which story, setting (i.e. exploration of the setting), and tactical combat are emphasized in more-or-less equal measure. The options we're talking about are present so you can tune your particular flavor of gameplay elements, but we're not making a game for people who inherently dislike these gameplay elements.

 

E.g. I enjoy some RTS games (especially historical ones). I am not particularly good at them. I really like the gameplay, but I have never been able to reach the level of being even moderately skilled at any of them. I like it when devs give me more forgiving gameplay options so my low-APM brain can complete the scenarios in a way that is still enjoyable and challenging for my skill level. I wouldn't understand the point in giving me options to skip or avoid the scenarios; I'm playing an RTS because I actually enjoy the mechanics.

[FlintlockJazz]

I'd like to be clear that I can't see anyway Obsidian are going to make a game I will feel negative towards, whatever they create will be fantastic. I also don't want to sound like a whiny entitled gamer - as I appreciate working with allocated funds and making realistic, measurable, timebound targets...so here comes the BUT...

 

But I was wondering how much effort would be required to have the game react to the actual race you pick. For example; in DA:O elves were either slaves or a rebel race that were treated with disdain. Yet I never felt an ounce of racism towards my dalish character.

 

I expect that as a stretch goal (at this stage) race reactivity would not recieve as much enthusiasm, and even if it did it's probably too much work to really make the player feel like a Dalish/Drow.

 

But I thought I'd raise it anyway.

 

Yeah I'm with you, would be nice to have people acknowledge and even have some things locked out (and other things unlocked) due to race.

[Killroy]

Great update will be interesting to see how fast we will get to 2.3 Mil.