[Merged] Cooldown Thread

[Shevek]

Wail of the Banshee.. I loved that spell in BG2. Still, I also had to cast Greater Malison before its use and found that even then it was only useful for taking out large groups of mid level mobs. The spell was not OP at all considering the spell level and the fact you needed save debuff on the mobs for it to be worth a damn.

[andreisiadi]

I have a legitimate question Josh. Now I know I have been rather rude to you in this thread but bare with me. First I apologize. It's great that you actually take the time to have a conversation with us fans.

 

Second - the question :

 

Seeing how this whole cooldown thing has garnered such a strong reaction on all sides, does that mean you guys will have a brainstorming meeting or something to take every angle into consideration ?

[Lv99Wizard]

The idea of spell regen after every encounter would eliminate the feeling of peril found in the IE games. It would not reward scouting the area and preparing tactics for what you encounter and would not be have the same atmosphere as the IE experience. It would not reward the player understand the system and optimising/creating their own unique strategies. For example, in Dragon's eye I started by sneaking my thief around the place. Then I had my 2 mages stocked on Agannazzar's scorcher. They'd flank the rest of the melee characters who would lure and engage a pack of enemies in some chokepoint (bridge etc). The fighters would keep the pack in place while the mages cast, dealing damage to multiple enemies - thus optimising my spells and making them go much further. There wouldn't be any incentive to find such strategies without limiting spell casting.

Isn't the incentive that the fight goes much easier when you scout and select your spells prior to engaging the enemy? Whether you're going to get AS back immediately after the fight or as soon as you can/choose to rest, the enjoyment comes from having AS before you start the fight and using it in a tactically excellent way. Scouting is what gives you the buffer of safety to make those preparations.

 

 

My spells weren't initially tailored like this. This evolved due to economising a scarce resource. I found that I could use AS to hit multiple enemies and this behaviour lead me to go further in the game. By the time dragon's eye came about, I had increased the amount of times I could use this strategy. If I could cast whatever spells I wanted, I'm not sure it would have led me to this tactic.

 

The scarcity of spells necessitates a deep consideration of a player's strategy. Which spells are best to keep at lvl 1, 2, 3 etc? How can I build redundancy for something I don't expect? (eg.Trolls need acid to kill, where can I add that in?) Within a cooldown mechanism, none of this matters.

 

The incentive is also to push as far as I can before needing to risk resting inside the dungeon. (And also finding a suitably defensible position so my melee characters can screen the vulnerable mages). This again creates a feeling of progression. The player sees how much more powerful their party is becoming. It also has the effect that no fight is trivial. Every spell cast is important. It requires the player to consider whether the fighters can deal with the current weak threat to conserve spells or if having your party at full health is more important.

[JediMB]

So, yeah, I'm just going to trust that the Project Eternity team know what they're doing, what with their experience and all, and save criticism of game mechanics until their implementation can be seen in the beta testing.

[BobbinThreadbare]

This is an interesting question but the basis of the "experience of walking back" being redundant assumes that the campsite and encounters are poorly placed via inept level design. The final point that everything is killed between you and the campsite lends me to believe you aren't thinking creatively about how to solve this at all, which is not encouraging.

I was describing circumstances that occur constantly in IE games.

 

Dark Souls is an excellent game, but it also solves the problem in the opposite direction. It respawns creatures after rest, not on your way back to the campfire. This is also acceptable within the fiction of Dark Souls because it is quite close to being a world full of monsters and undead. This is not always the kind of area population that the BG/IWD games had.

Yeah, the resting mechanics in IE games were messed up.

 

I'm just not sure the solution is to give the player all his spells back with no downside after each encounter.

 

There should be a mechanic in place that encourages players to push their characters to their limit, being just about out of spells and health and just barely making it. Those are the times I remember from IE (even if I didn't do it for every dungeon).

[J.E. Sawyer]

Well not directly but they are at least as bad if not worse like some of the save or die and if you survive then worse; get nerfed variety. But we are diverting. The point is that the wizard can then no longer have any spell which will be meta-effect like hold since that will always mean instawin with spam since you would have many such spells (unless the decision is to cut spell variety so that player can't use them). To avoid that and introduce some challenge I can see that you will have to force nerfed damage spells. Which are fine in my book as long as the combat is balanced, right?

 

EDIT: And I must bid good night! Thanks for your time. I hope it was well spent.

Why would you be able to instawin by spamming? A theoretical 12th level wizard in PE will probably have about the same number of 5th level spell slots as an equivalent wizard in D&D. Let's say that's 2 or 3. In IWD, you could cast Hold Monster your two or three times in a row and then you'd be done casting 5th level spells for the fight. It would work the same way in PE. The main mechanical difference that I'm considering is when/how you regain your 5th level spells following the fight.

[ogrezilla]

I have a legitimate question Josh. Now I know I have been rather rude to you in this thread but bare with me. First I apologize. It's great that you actually take the time to have a conversation with us fans.

 

Second - the question :

 

Seeing how this whole cooldown thing has garnered such a strong reaction on all sides, does that mean you guys will have a brainstorming meeting or something to take every angle into consideration ?

if you do, can you please strongly consider the fact that you guys are a team of professionals who design video games for a living. Please trust your own ideas over ours.

[anek]

Absolutely. Oh, sweet Joss Whedon, yes this.

 

I never use potions or consumables because I'm always worried about running out of them.

 

I do tend to hoard them too, but the situation which Josh described - finding yourself ill prepared for the challenges you're facing (in terms of spell selection) - is exactly the time when I do use up potions and wands and limited-charge items, in order to compensate. They do make a big difference.

[Delterius]

This is an interesting question but the basis of the "experience of walking back" being redundant assumes that the campsite and encounters are poorly placed via inept level design. The final point that everything is killed between you and the campsite lends me to believe you aren't thinking creatively about how to solve this at all, which is not encouraging.

I was describing circumstances that occur constantly in IE games.

 

Dark Souls is an excellent game, but it also solves the problem in the opposite direction. It respawns creatures after rest, not on your way back to the campfire. This is also acceptable within the fiction of Dark Souls because it is quite close to being a world full of monsters and undead. This is not always the kind of area population that the BG/IWD games had.

 

Well, I myself played BG/IWD and currently NwN2 (on blind playthroughs even) without rest spamming and never ran afoul of these circumstances. I could certainly go and rest (or, go back to a supposedly safer zone and rest), but then I wouldn't have to use all of my resources. Such as potions that I bought precisely because your 'inherent resources' (such as a Wizard's spellcasting) are limited throught a entire adventure (should rest be limited).

 

Actually, I always thought that was how designers intended the game to be played. Sure, that would mean they were shy of making rest more punishing, but they sort of 'implied' it with (unfortunately mostly irrelevant) ambushes.

Edited October 3, 2012 by Delterius

[Blackstream]

Seeing how this whole cooldown thing has garnered such a strong reaction on all sides, does that mean you guys will have a brainstorming meeting or something to take every angle into consideration ?

 

Honestly, I'm pretty sure they do this with their game systems already. I'm sure some guy didn't just yell out COOLDOWNS and then everyone nodded in silent approval and they added it to their feature list. I'm sure they have brainstorm meetings already with guys talking about pros and cons of the sawyer's system, and the vancian system, with many of the same arguments that have already been mentioned here, and have been doing so for many other things too. For example, I bet designing the enchanting/crafting system isn't gonna be a simple matter either.

[ogrezilla]

Well not directly but they are at least as bad if not worse like some of the save or die and if you survive then worse; get nerfed variety. But we are diverting. The point is that the wizard can then no longer have any spell which will be meta-effect like hold since that will always mean instawin with spam since you would have many such spells (unless the decision is to cut spell variety so that player can't use them). To avoid that and introduce some challenge I can see that you will have to force nerfed damage spells. Which are fine in my book as long as the combat is balanced, right?

 

EDIT: And I must bid good night! Thanks for your time. I hope it was well spent.

Why would you be able to instawin by spamming? A theoretical 12th level wizard in PE will probably have about the same number of 5th level spell slots as an equivalent wizard in D&D. Let's say that's 2 or 3. In IWD, you could cast Hold Monster your two or three times in a row and then you'd be done casting 5th level spells for the fight. It would work the same way in PE. The main mechanical difference that I'm considering is when/how you regain your 5th level spells following the fight.

I think a lot of us would prefer if we can't cast three level 5 spells in most fights. The difficulty is in finding a happy middle.

[evdk]

Well not directly but they are at least as bad if not worse like some of the save or die and if you survive then worse; get nerfed variety. But we are diverting. The point is that the wizard can then no longer have any spell which will be meta-effect like hold since that will always mean instawin with spam since you would have many such spells (unless the decision is to cut spell variety so that player can't use them). To avoid that and introduce some challenge I can see that you will have to force nerfed damage spells. Which are fine in my book as long as the combat is balanced, right?

 

EDIT: And I must bid good night! Thanks for your time. I hope it was well spent.

Why would you be able to instawin by spamming? A theoretical 12th level wizard in PE will probably have about the same number of 5th level spell slots as an equivalent wizard in D&D. Let's say that's 2 or 3. In IWD, you could cast Hold Monster your two or three times in a row and then you'd be done casting 5th level spells for the fight. It would work the same way in PE. The main mechanical difference that I'm considering is when/how you regain your 5th level spells following the fight.

What would the difference be then between spamming rest and putting the game on hold for five minutes waiting for the spells to reset?

Edited October 3, 2012 by evdk

[thracian]

can anyone summarize please?

[ogrezilla]

well youd only have your magic back instead of being fully healed. but your point is still valid.

[Cyn!c]

 

This is not always the kind of area population that the BG/IWD games had.

 

Is it not acceptable when camping in a clearing of a forest/cave/dungeon filled with <insert monster type here> that some of them may regroup?

 

It respawns creatures after rest, not on your way back to the campfire.

 

Again this is a red herring. Why do you focus on the return journey being slightly tedious? It doesn't matter as long as the player can potentially get something enriching out of that return journey. Consider the following scenario

• Party finds a campsite just outside the entrance to a dark cave
  
• Party camps and decides to explore the cave
  
• They get a ways through but run out of spells, while also thinking that maybe they could use some different spells to what they have currently. So they make the decision to go back to the campsite, rest and memorize new spells
  
• On the return journey back to the point in the cave they encounter a rare monster because it's now night time and when they entered the cave previously, it was day. It drops a rare piece of loot.
  
• The player now feels thankful that they went back and rested, not only did they get new spells but they got a shiny treasure too.
  

How in the world would that experience not be fun?

[Infinitron]

Well not directly but they are at least as bad if not worse like some of the save or die and if you survive then worse; get nerfed variety. But we are diverting. The point is that the wizard can then no longer have any spell which will be meta-effect like hold since that will always mean instawin with spam since you would have many such spells (unless the decision is to cut spell variety so that player can't use them). To avoid that and introduce some challenge I can see that you will have to force nerfed damage spells. Which are fine in my book as long as the combat is balanced, right?

 

EDIT: And I must bid good night! Thanks for your time. I hope it was well spent.

Why would you be able to instawin by spamming? A theoretical 12th level wizard in PE will probably have about the same number of 5th level spell slots as an equivalent wizard in D&D. Let's say that's 2 or 3. In IWD, you could cast Hold Monster your two or three times in a row and then you'd be done casting 5th level spells for the fight. It would work the same way in PE. The main mechanical difference that I'm considering is when/how you regain your 5th level spells following the fight.

What would the difference be then between spamming rest and putting the game on hold for five minutes waiting for the spells to reset?

 

I think the difference is, if you'll allow me to be blunt, that your typical ADHD-ridden player will always click the rest button for more spells, but he won't be patient enough to wait for five minutes. So he'll be forced to play the game as intended.

Edited October 3, 2012 by Infinitron

[Delterius]

This is not always the kind of area population that the BG/IWD games had.

 

Is it not acceptable when camping in a clearing of a forest/cave/dungeon filled with <insert monster type here> that some of them may regroup?

 

Well, appearing monsters would be acceptable, I suppose, in most every circumstance where rest is actually relevant. After all, rest would only be relevant when you've got a certain (relatively high) number of encounters - which, I suppose, might as well as imply that the scenery is dangerous.

 

I think the difference is, if you'll allow me to be blunt, that stupid players with ADHD will always click the rest button for more spells, but they aren't patient enough to wait five minutes. So they'll be forced to play the game as intended.

 

I believe you can't blame the players for what was simply bad design. Rest should have been limited in the IE (hell, the D&D games in general) games, period.

 

You can teabag/educate those same players who employ the bethesda line of thought (Vancian is terrible because of the rest spam).

Edited October 3, 2012 by Delterius

[evdk]

 

 

I think the difference is, if you'll allow me to be blunt, that stupid players with ADHD will always click the rest button for more spells, but they aren't patient enough to wait five minutes. So they'll be forced to play the game as intended.

Making design decisions according to the lowest common denominator strikes me as a bit short sighted.

Edited October 3, 2012 by evdk

[Metabot]

There wouldn't be any incentive to find such strategies without limiting spell casting.

 

Yes there would be, such as not dying, but there will be limits on spell casting.

[ogrezilla]

This is not always the kind of area population that the BG/IWD games had.

 

Is it not acceptable when camping in a clearing of a forest/cave/dungeon filled with <insert monster type here> that some of them may regroup?

 

It respawns creatures after rest, not on your way back to the campfire.

 

Again this is a red herring. Why do you focus on the return journey being slightly tedious? It doesn't matter as long as the player can potentially get something enriching out of that return journey. Consider the following scenario

• Party finds a campsite just outside the entrance to a dark cave
  
• Party camps and decides to explore the cave
  
• They get a ways through but run out of spells, while also thinking that maybe they could use some different spells to what they have currently. So they make the decision to go back to the campsite, rest and memorize new spells
  
• On the return journey back to the point in the cave they encounter a rare monster because it's now night time and when they entered the cave previously, it was day. It drops a rare piece of loot.
  
• The player now feels thankful that they went back and rested, not only did they get new spells but they got a shiny treasure too.
  

How in the world would that experience not be fun?

and then I spend the rest of the game checking every corner of every dungeon at different times of day because I'm a crazy person haha

[J.E. Sawyer]

Second - the question :

 

Seeing how this whole cooldown thing has garnered such a strong reaction on all sides, does that mean you guys will have a brainstorming meeting or something to take every angle into consideration ?

We do not have a spellcasting system designed. This is not something we have to "change" because the majority of what we have developed for things as complex as the spellcasting system are ideas. It's three weeks into a fundraising campaign to make this project. I cannot tell you what final form the spellcasting system will take, what elements it absolutely will or won't have. All I can tell you is the sort of goals we have and general ideas of things I'd like to see and avoid.

 

I'm trying to create the feeling of strategic spell selection and tactical spell use in D&D while avoiding the constant rest spamming that was so prevalent in the games I made. There are probably a number of ways to solve this problem. I have some ideas on this, but we haven't settled on them. I want to tell people about general ideas and opinions I have, but I don't think spending a day trying to design the system in the forum is going to produce good results.

[Shevek]

Why would you be able to instawin by spamming? A theoretical 12th level wizard in PE will probably have about the same number of 5th level spell slots as an equivalent wizard in D&D. Let's say that's 2 or 3. In IWD, you could cast Hold Monster your two or three times in a row and then you'd be done casting 5th level spells for the fight. It would work the same way in PE. The main mechanical difference that I'm considering is when/how you regain your 5th level spells following the fight.

 

I am interested in hearing where you will go with this. My question would be, what is the design goal? What purpose will small encounters to have as opposed to large encounters? In other words, will you be looking to factor in "attrition" into encounter design or not? Will you want players to be fully loaded for lage encounters or not? Etc etc

 

Edit: You mentioned health earlier as a form of attrition and suggested healing spells would not trivialize health attrition. I am intrigued by this and would love to hear more.

Edited October 3, 2012 by Shevek

[Tigranes]

This is not always the kind of area population that the BG/IWD games had.

 

Is it not acceptable when camping in a clearing of a forest/cave/dungeon filled with <insert monster type here> that some of them may regroup?

 

It respawns creatures after rest, not on your way back to the campfire.

 

Again this is a red herring. Why do you focus on the return journey being slightly tedious? It doesn't matter as long as the player can potentially get something enriching out of that return journey. Consider the following scenario

• Party finds a campsite just outside the entrance to a dark cave
  
• Party camps and decides to explore the cave
  
• They get a ways through but run out of spells, while also thinking that maybe they could use some different spells to what they have currently. So they make the decision to go back to the campsite, rest and memorize new spells
  
• On the return journey back to the point in the cave they encounter a rare monster because it's now night time and when they entered the cave previously, it was day. It drops a rare piece of loot.
  
• The player now feels thankful that they went back and rested, not only did they get new spells but they got a shiny treasure too.
  

How in the world would that experience not be fun?

 

I like the idea in general, but there are ways in which that experience could be unfun. Someone is not very good or is having a bad day combat-wise and needs to rest 2 or 3 times, or risk just not making headway; then it doesn't help that he uses half the spells he just regained fighting that newly spawned monster.

 

The problem with cooldowns post-battle, though, is that it's just like unlimited rest-anywhere, except (1) takes longer, as you have to wait, and (2) is staggered across abilities, which makes it slightly better. It constrains my ability to control the pace at which I might like to play - I might want to smash through this dungeon real quick tonight, and find myself sitting round and waiting, which might eventually add up to even more tedium than running back to rest; or I might want to take my time and scout really slowly, in which case I may find that every battle all the cooldowns reset and I don't feel a sense of progressive challenge.

 

It's hard to see what positive things cooldowns bring to the table, rather than what flaws of resting it avoids.

[Sick]

@J.E. Sawyer

So, one of your solutions for the "back and forth" problem (interpretating what you said some time ago), is to give at the mages, various "spell set" prepared by the player, to allow them to switch to another set (maybe composed by different kind of spells), when one of the pre-made sets is exausted (after combat of course).

 

In this case the mage can go on without the need of rest and, at the same time, utilize different kind of spells.

 

Am I overthinking?

[Nixl]

While I understand complaints over a cooldown system, I do think it is too early to make a judgement of whether it is fitting of the system just yet.

 

Personally, I believe a hybrid approach to cooldowns and resting/memorization systems would have favorable benefits. Let weak spells/abilities have cooldowns, thus allowing weaker spells to still have a purpose or place in the endgame. Meanwhile, strong spells could require memorization and/or rest. I think it strikes a balance of combat flow and tactics.