go easy on the special effects please...

[mickeym]

You know that games like NWN2 and BGII could be absolutely saturated in spell effects (firestorm + teleport field + cleric buffing spells + globe of invulnerability... etc...) and this wasn't really a big problem in the early game. but get into epic levels where you'd fight some of the "the five" bhallspawn leaders from throne of bhaal? ****, I'm positive that I spent more time in pause mode squinting at the battles in a vain effort to figure out where the baddies were and what the **** they were doing in pause mode than actually playing. Actually I'm pretty sure that all of the infinity engine games are guilty of this, as well as Neverwinter Nights. If you artists could figure out a way to disown that particular bit of **** ****ery from this project eternity spiritual successor of IE, I'll owe you a beer.

[rjshae]

I disagree. It's like gunpowder smoke on a battlefield; a lot of energetic spell effects are going to make it more difficult to see. But the visibility issue should be reflected in the ranged targeting odds.

[PsychoBlonde]

I hate persistent visible spell effects, especially when they're godawful ugly and obtrusive like they were in NwN2. I do not need some giant floating geometric multicolored bubble-thing to surround my character for every single buff they put up.

 

By all means, let's have special effects for instantaneous effects. Yeah, bring it on. But not for persistent effects. PLEASE.

[Osvir]

I disagree. It's like gunpowder smoke on a battlefield; a lot of energetic spell effects are going to make it more difficult to see. But the visibility issue should be reflected in the ranged targeting odds.

 

I'd love to see the gunpowder smoke float through the air, but I wouldn't want either a magical explosion that shoots a doomball from the gun that sucks everything it hits into an abysmal void...

 

Nevermind I want that too! But I get what OP is saying. Spells that are clunky, funky and artistically fugly (i.e. outdated). Seeing the invisible force push itself as my Wizard holds up one hand to create a Fireball, with open palm shaking and shockwaves gathering til the Fireball appears out of "nowhere" out from the build up of the spell.

 

I guess that's the short explanation: I want more build up special effects leading to the spell special effect and finally with a damaging/attacking/defensive special effect.

 

Likewise I would like to have more control of my Magic:

1 - Call on the spell/incantation

2 - Have the spell (fireball)

3 - Attack with spell

 

In Baldur's Gate I would choose the area where I want to throw my Fireball and toward the Mage will cast it after incantation. What if I could get the spell Fireball in my characters palm and "load it" or "charge it" for a while (and being able to walk with it)? Could it even be a tactical choice to prolong casting?

 

1 - Summon Spell

2 - Maintain Spell

3 - Cast/Release Spell or Cancel it and get some "Soul" or "Mana" back from not casting it.

Edited November 12, 2012 by Osvir

[Pshaw]

I don't really remember this bothering me much in BG or NWN. However it is currently driving me crazy in borderlands 2 where I can't see the enemies past my floating electric death balls so I need to take cover until they fade away. So feeling that pain I support this. While I like a flashy spell effect now and again they shouldn't need to dominate the screen. Each spell or ability needs to simply be visually distinct from one another. Look to your action RPGs for examples of flashy effects that don't strictly interfere with your visual information. I rarely find that while playing Diablo I can't see incoming enemies due to my constant spamming of abilities.

[Aldereth]

NWN is pretty bad at these spell effect thing. I think the MMO with 10+ player going at it is the worse culprit. This is what I found most annoying about magic in recent cRPG. I wanted to say implement some kind of spell interaction if there are too much magic on screen but then again, that's just adding even more spell effect on screen. So dev, give an option to press a key and the spell effect would be temporary not displayed.

[Archmage Silver]

I'd be fine with something like the Icewind Dale series spell fx, they weren't that overdone. BG II had great stuff there as well, but I'd stay away from some of the Throne of Bhaal spells, those reflect the power of a Bhaalspawn more than anything else.

[Shevek]

I do think some effort should be put in to avoid going overboard with effects. The battle is more visually impressive when you can actually see whats going rather than being bombarded by a bunch of bright lights and smoke.

 

That being said, effects are fine so long as they are toned down. For example, I would like if effects like stoneskin, barkskin, etc just made the character skin look like stone/bark/etc and not his armor or clothing.

[High Octane 881]

I agree and disagree. Some spells certainly should be subtle at most. Shevek's Stoneskin I think is an excellent example of this. In previous games your entire sprite looked like a boulder and glow... couple this with the half dozen other defensive spells that would be up at a time and your mage would look like a walking blur of effects. Granted a lot of this could be blamed on current technological capabilities. Subtlety in an Isometric game at the time would be a lot to ask for.

 

On the flip side of the coin...if I'm bringing down hell with some earth shattering spell, I want to see that portrayed on screen with an equally awesome effect.

[Hellfell]

Well, if a spell is called Firestorm, i expect a freaking firestorm and nothing else. However, we dont need over the top effects for simple spells like bless or fire arrow. Keep it appropriate i say.

[Hormalakh]

There has got to be a way to show magic effects without cluttering up the screen, somehow... because I also don't like the constant cluttering of the screen. The design people have got to know of innovative ways to deal with this. Make it beautiful, but make it visible so that it actually performs well on its dual roles of being aesthetically pleasing and providing tactical information.

Edited November 13, 2012 by Hormalakh

[Kecaw]

Like people said when a fire storm spell is thrown i want to see a fire storm but yeah over effects on some spell look like a neverending explosion of fireworks on your character, this i don't want so i would ask to simplifie the effects on them it should be the type of "oh yeah i have this spell thrown on me, looks cool" NOT " LOOK AT MAH ENERGO BALL OF ZAPPING" and then you could be called the "walking disco ball" special effect: everyone around you start's to rave

[jivex5k]

the "walking disco ball" special effect: everyone around you start's to rave

This needs to make it in the game.

[Tsuga C]

If I had my druthers I'd turn most of the FX off. Subtle effects I'm inclined to like, but garish, neon sign-like persistent spell effects just mess up the screen and limit my ability to see what's going on. Like the OP, I'd just as soon dispense with the clutter, especially since we won't be able to rotate the camera to find a view that's not totally splashed with pulses and sparkles.

[Joukehainen]

I hate persistent visible spell effects, especially when they're godawful ugly and obtrusive like they were in NwN2. I do not need some giant floating geometric multicolored bubble-thing to surround my character for every single buff they put up.

 

By all means, let's have special effects for instantaneous effects. Yeah, bring it on. But not for persistent effects. PLEASE.

 

Oh god, the buff effects in NWN2. *Shudders*

 

There's a reason a mod decreasing or removing the buff effects entirely was one of the top-downloaded mods.

[LadyCrimson]

I don't really remember this bothering me much in BG or NWN. However it is currently driving me crazy in borderlands 2 where I can't see the enemies past my floating electric death balls so I need to take cover until they fade away. So feeling that pain I support this. While I like a flashy spell effect now and again they shouldn't need to dominate the screen. Each spell or ability needs to simply be visually distinct from one another. Look to your action RPGs for examples of flashy effects that don't strictly interfere with your visual information. I rarely find that while playing Diablo I can't see incoming enemies due to my constant spamming of abilities.

Agree with all this. Especially the Borderlands2 part, haha.

 

I like having effects every time I cast a spell or fire a gun and so on, but it doesn't have to be all-encompassing or overly flashy. Just a nice visual indicator that I did something. I don't need a giant nuclear cloud that fills half the screen, and I definitely don't need the whole screen itself to shake, shimmy, be covered in blood spatters like I sprayed ketchup all over my glasses, or have a weird colored, textured filter over the whole screen.

[Ignatius]

[Jarmo]

Nevermind flashy instantaneous stuff, though I'd rather tone those down as well,

but please no long duration discoballs with *tlinglinglingling ling lingg pinggpoing linglingklingkling* going on.

 

Fine to show protection fields and such when they're cast, and then when they actually do their thing (like deflect spell).

Rather not show something like gauntlets of ogre power or berserker rage at all.

 

DA:O was very bad with this. I don't remember exactly what it was, but I did wonder why my fighter is dripping some red goo.

Turns out it was the... dunno, something like power attack activated or something. Thankfully there was a mod to disable those.

[Aoyagi]

I hate persistent visible spell effects, especially when they're godawful ugly and obtrusive like they were in NwN2. I do not need some giant floating geometric multicolored bubble-thing to surround my character for every single buff they put up.

 

By all means, let's have special effects for instantaneous effects. Yeah, bring it on. But not for persistent effects. PLEASE.

See, I don't think it makes much sense to have a person that would survive nuclear strike look the same like a commoner wearing a fancy robe. Personally I was fine with whatever NWN2 showed, but I understand some people might want to tame it a bit.

 

Then again, I don't think this will be an issue due to the nature of PE "view".

[Rabain]

What I'd like to see is some option to tone down graphics without making them go away completely, most options usually don't scale very well and there is a fine line between the setting that is too flashy and non-existent. Some kind of transparency slider might be good so we can set it where we like it.

 

I think BG2 definitely went overboard on graphics, it was like each graphic was accepted on its own visual merit without looking at what a character who had 3 or 4 or more graphics on them at once looked like....walking christmas trees.

[FrostPaw]

There is a simple fix for this.....a Magical Effects slider.

 

Incremental stages x1,2,3,4,5 etc slide it up or down in the game options to decide how many spell effects you want to see on screen at once, priority given to persistent area effect spells or offensive spells directed at the party.

 

For those that want it, you crank that sucker up to 11, for those that don't you drop it down to 1 or 2.

[Aoyagi]

There is a simple fix for this.....a Magical Effects slider.

 

Incremental stages x1,2,3,4,5 etc slide it up or down in the game options to decide how many spell effects you want to see on screen at once, priority given to persistent area effect spells or offensive spells directed at the party.

 

For those that want it, you crank that sucker up to 11, for those that don't you drop it down to 1 or 2.

 

11? How about "all"? A slider / other variable option would be nice, but I don't think it would be exactly easy to make...

 

Then again, I would more prefer "full shiny effects" as were in NWN2, then some "decent effects" which would make shield spell a barely visible ball (maybe just air jittering, something) which would flash a bit when hit. But that would, again, require double the work. Oh and then "No effects except for projectiles" for effect haters

[Osvir]

There is a simple fix for this.....a Magical Effects slider.

 

Incremental stages x1,2,3,4,5 etc slide it up or down in the game options to decide how many spell effects you want to see on screen at once, priority given to persistent area effect spells or offensive spells directed at the party.

 

For those that want it, you crank that sucker up to 11, for those that don't you drop it down to 1 or 2.

 

11? How about "all"? A slider / other variable option would be nice, but I don't think it would be exactly easy to make...

 

Then again, I would more prefer "full shiny effects" as were in NWN2, then some "decent effects" which would make shield spell a barely visible ball (maybe just air jittering, something) which would flash a bit when hit. But that would, again, require double the work. Oh and then "No effects except for projectiles" for effect haters

 

I'd like to see something like this, seen on these shields:

http://www.scguidebook.com/wp-content/uploads/45ec47bc6f336c7.jpg

 

I think the shields on the Immortal "flashes" up differently depending on which angle it gets attack at as well *shrug* would be cool to see.