Overkills and loot destruction

[JFSOCC]

lockpicking wouldn't be useless, if the ability to force a lock itself was a specialisation for combat classes.

Besides, I sincerely doubt the use of a class is limited to one ability such as lockpicking.

So I will choose a lockpicking rogue, I don't mind if there are fighters who could do the same with a different feature. All in all, maybe that will grant players more freedom, rather than less, in deciding who to bring in their party. I know several people have stated they don't like rogues.

 

I don't see this as something I need to hog to one class.

A chance that some items are damaged for the lock forcing skill seems an interesting trade-off, especially as higher ranks in that skill might mean you have a lower chance for that.

IF there is loot damage, please, break less useful items first, more useful items later. otherwise it's pointless to use a force lock skill for looting chests.

 

Hell, it might be interesting if a rogue could pick either ability. when lock-picking fails, but you still want to open the container, you can risk it for a biscuit.

[Osvir]

Yes! I've been advocating this idea in several threads already, but I guess I'll throw the thoughts in here as well.

I personally think that most of the loot the enemies are wearing should break often, 75% out 100% type thing, except rare/magical/epic/legendary items. Weapons wouldn't break as easily but Armor related gear could.

Copper, Silver, Gold~Low Drop, where "Gold" would be Treasure more so than "Income". Copper & Silver more common. 

If the enemy chops of a piece of my armor, I'd like to have something that compensate for the loss. Now I obliterated his armor and cleaved it in half, and it's probably not going to fulfill a function anymore, but hey! maybe I can repair my own armor with the guy's broken armor so it's all good. Or I can save the salvaged parts, get to town and sell it as vendor trash and get repairs/upgrades from the Blacksmith.

Perhaps even the Blacksmith can make more stuff if I sell it to him?

Loot loot loot....

About chests! I really like the idea that bashing destroys items, but at the same time I don't like it. I don't like it when I can't bash a chest and/or when I break items in the chest, but I like it that the game allows just that. Enjoyment in frustration kind of.

"Open damn you!!!" *bash bash bash* "Come on!!!" *bash bash bash* "Okok I'll walk away.. who am I kidding!? Just one more time!!" *bash bash bash*

If I'm ever going to be able to open it, I suspect that fragile items in there would be broken and if gear could break in a fight (I utterly destroyed the Bandit's Leather Armor) then I am going to advocate that the Leather Armor in the chest should be obliterated as well.

[TRX850]

If we can potentially end up with a whole cart-load of broken (read "repairable") items, then I'd also like the opportunity to own or rent storage space in the nearest town so that I can store all my stuff while I work out how to pay for the repairs and then sell the items on.

[Nonek]

I like the idea, in fact i'd have armour and such destroyed by normal combat. Add to this a very limited carrying capacity, and it might just make us a little less dependant on the tyranny of loot for our material gains, and so make quest rewards, stealing and other opportunities all the more valuable. I don't particularly like having to play as a peddler, hauling miscellenia from one end of the land to the other. Clearing out vendor trash to be honest I find distasteful and a little insultive, I can understand the reliance of people who see an inventory full of meaningless tat to be an achievement of some sort, but personally i'd just prefer useful and valuable items or coin.

 

Might go against the spirit of the Infinity engine games however.

Edited January 18, 2013 by Nonek

[Osvir]

@TRX850:
First: You have an infinite stash in P:E so you wouldn't need the storage. Oh, and Stronghold.

Second, that's a good point, cleaved 2 Bandit's in half, putting their armors together and repairing them gives me some shoddy or decent product that I could sell for more. But how many of these semi-decent products would the Blacksmith want?

Man, keep coming back to the shopkeepers.

Loot+Crafting+Shopkeepers+Equipment are really tied together close. Balance one and you un-balance another one etc.etc.you gotta think about the different aspects and then try to bake a cake with that "What are the ingredients?" as well as "Multi-Layered Rainbow Cake or a Simple Sweet Cake?".... and all of this is then related to Economy, which can dominate a game in a bad way or a good way. I don't know which is which btw, Baldur's Gate does it fairly good imo.

Loot (has several sub-divisions by itself)
- Treasure
- Crafting Loot**
- Vendor Trash?
- Equipment
- Money
* Anything else?

Crafting Loot** (I have no idea what kinds of loot):
- ####
- ####
- ####
- ####
- ####

* Anything else? xD

Component Loot/Equipment/Maintenance: 
- You'd break your gear enough, lose durability enough, that'd you wouldn't be able to make "300 Repaired Full Plate Mails" and then sell them. Instead I would like to propose that in a fight you lose 25%-50% durability and items/components that you find after the battle repairs 30%-40%. This way you could repair some extra gear and sell it to a Blacksmith, but it might be better to keep it as a backup mail.

Shopkeepers:
- How do they address loot? What do they buy and what do they sell? Does factions have banners on their armor? Will the Blacksmith buy gear that is bloodied and damaged from your onslaught? Are the Shopkeepers in P:E Businessmen who just wants to grab all of your money and will trick you to do so, or are they placed there for the Player to feel pimp?

Edited January 18, 2013 by Osvir

[Jobby]

If we can potentially end up with a whole cart-load of broken (read "repairable") items, then I'd also like the opportunity to own or rent storage space in the nearest town so that I can store all my stuff while I work out how to pay for the repairs and then sell the items on.

Sounds like scrapheap challenge lol

 

Seriously though, does your equipment breaking really add anything to the game other than annoyance? I'm all for crafting and other non-combat skills but in a game like P.E. where you could be on level 14 of the 15 level dungeon only for your sword to break and with nothing to repair it with you have trek back to the surface.

 

Point is, i can understand it in a sandbox game like FONV where you have relatively small dungeons and a fast travel mechanic but i really hope they don't put it in this game.

Edited January 18, 2013 by Jobby

[TRX850]

 

If we can potentially end up with a whole cart-load of broken (read "repairable") items, then I'd also like the opportunity to own or rent storage space in the nearest town so that I can store all my stuff while I work out how to pay for the repairs and then sell the items on.

Sounds like scrapheap challenge lol

 

Well, given that there's been some discussion on background feats, if there was an option to choose "Armourer" or "Bladesmith" or "Fletcher" or "Jeweller", then I'd like an opportunity to repair Plate Mail, Greatswords, Composite Long Bows, and Gold Necklaces and sell them for a profit.

 

This game is begging for something like this.

[IndiraLightfoot]

I like the idea, in fact i'd have armour and such destroyed by normal combat. Add to this a very limited carrying capacity, and it might just make us a little less dependant on the tyranny of loot for our material gains, and so make quest rewards, stealing and other opportunities all the more valuable. I don't particularly like having to play as a peddler, hauling miscellenia from one end of the land to the other. Clearing out vendor trash to be honest I find distasteful and a little insultive, I can understand the reliance of people who see an inventory full of meaningless tat to be an achievement of some sort, but personally i'd just prefer useful and valuable items or coin.

 

Might go against the spirit of the Infinity engine games however.

Nonek has a very valid point here, or rather two.

I think a bit of wear and tear and repair to our armours and weapons is to be preferred, and yes please to less hauling and less unnecessary stuff. Both of these things I think Fallout New Vegas addressed pretty well. The repairing felt important and sometimes urgent, but it was still an easy system. Likewise with the DT-thing and ammo penetrating armour etc. All items should have some use or be some kind of currency or another. Yes folks, this means I wouldn't like to see a system where we get to pick everyhting we see on NPCs and enemies up. It would be inventory hell and quite boring. Better to hold our horses and use NWN2's design of hand-placed loot in reasonable amounts, it can be married a bit with FNV's more "you get to keep the dress"-style.

[JFSOCC]

I found I was nodding along with your arguments about damaging armour and items

But then I remembered all those games I played with item degradation, and I thought "when has item degradation EVER been a good idea?"

in my opinion never.

So. here's the compromise I'm willing to make: No random item degradation nor through use.

But, hostile action might damage them. that I am OK with, because then it's all about how you play which determines whether or not you need to invest in crafting or find an armourer every 5 quests.

Edited January 18, 2013 by JFSOCC

[IndiraLightfoot]

JFSOCC: An interesting compromise. I do like it to some extent, at least if it is a simple system. But even simple can suck big time. Diablo 3's repair system comes to mind, it was but a tax that Blizzard could regulate their economy with. So weird.

[Nonek]

Betrayal at Krondor used that system, of armour and weapons only being damaged in combat, and I for one found it to be pleasingly simple. Depending on your skill levels you could even repair your own arms and armour, with the (quite reasonably priced) purchase of a whetstone and an armourers hammer. Made the skills worthwhile and the equipment all the more precious, the wise adventurer stocked up on such essential items before undertaking his travails.

[Gavinfoxx]

How about a slider that lets you turn off the item repair and degredation thing in the options?  IE, it's a player choice if they want that...

[Lephys]

What if item degradation were one of those things abstractly tied to resting? For lack of better terms, it would almost be like debuffs (but there would be various ones with various detriments, and they'd ONLY be tied to something rare, like criticals, or very certain abilities, or what-have-you).

 

Maybe, if you had "Armorer" and other such background trait choices for characters, you'd get per-rest repairs you could make, on-the-fly, but only fix one problem with each (and they'd be VERY limited). Otherwise, it would just be understood that you take the time, when you make camp (since the idea of camp, as a mechanic in P:E, is tied to safe areas), to sharpen your swords and repair armor straps and such, and fix dents and bends from general combat wear-and-tear.

 

OR, you could even go in the opposite direction. Go farther with the profession-based abilities/traits, and have them IMPROVE your stuff when you camp (sharpen/oil your sword to even greater effect than basic sharpening), and maybe certain things and/or simply use-over-time has these improvements wear back down to a "normal" state. So, at worst, your stuff is always at least functioning at its base level (you never have chain mail providing 0 armor/DT or something crippling), but you might have some chainmail +3 that's only working like chainmail +1 now.

 

I know that, in a way, the math is the same, but the point is that it's an optional, strictly beneficial thing (like lockpicking, where, if you have a master lockpicker, you simply get a greater loot bonus in the form of more containers being opened than if you didn't.)

 

I think that, for item degradation to even POSSIBLY work well, you've got to take out the ongoing penalty. "I KEEP having to spend money JUST to keep this armor functional! Not to mention that, at functional, it's still not as good as some other stuff I could buy, the buying of which gets delayed by my 82 gold I drop every time we get back from combat!"

 

With the improvement-only system, you could forego talent/ability choices in lieu of upgrades to "Armorer" and other such traits, and/or acquire better-quality materials, with which to hone your items every time you rest/camp. Maybe even have it be 2-stage: 50% improvements at camp, 100% if you rest at your stronghold (where you have proper forges, etc.). Or, you know, it might make more since for the stronghold to handle PERMANENT improvements, and the campfire to handle temporary ones.

 

Any suggestions/changes to this are quite welcome.

[TRX850]

Or, you know, it might make more since for the stronghold to handle PERMANENT improvements, and the campfire to handle temporary ones.

 

Any suggestions/changes to this are quite welcome.

 

Something like this, mayhaps?

[Lephys]

 

Something like this, mayhaps?

 

 

Yesssss. I forgot which thread that was, haha. It wasn't my intention to completely rehash that whole system possibility. I was just getting a little overly elaborate in referencing it.

 

I was only trying to say that, even if you use a system like that, or if you use a much simpler system (in which things are either in a non-normal state, or they're in a normal state), I think it would be best to use effectiveness boosts that wear off with time or in response to certain actions/events, rather than detriments that must be repaired back out of the negative with even more resources.

 

The relative math is the same, but it all comes down to the balancing of the rest of the game. If 5 DT is pretty good armor for the enemies you're exposed to at a certain point in the game (basically, 5 DT is the mean, for example's sake), and everyone gets their armor broken and is down to 2 DT, then you're at a disadvantage without spending the time and resources to go repair it. However, if, in the exact same scenario, you still had 5 DT armor (or maybe you got it up to 6, or you just got a boost to defense rolls or something more minor/more easily scalable), and that went away when your armor was damaged, you'd still just be down to 5 DT armor.

 

*shrug*

[Lady Evenstar]

 

I don't think this adds much to the game, honestly. Either it annoys you because you needed that loot, or you don't care. But if it's implemented, I guess I can live with it.

 

But tell me, what positive effect do you think it has?

There is some risk in using powerful spell-like abilities. With enemies that drop little to no loot a spell can make short work of them. Loot-heavy enemies usually need a "gentler" beating.

 

My proposition is not to make quest-items or super rare items destructible. Only consumables and non-magical weapons/armor. If repairing is implemented in the game, I wouldn't mind broken weapons/armor.

So, really, it's just another "make gameplay onerous for folks who like to play wizards" proposal. No, thank you.

 

If hitting too hard with a sword were equally likely to have the same effect I might be more receptive, but I really don't see how it would make the game more fun.

[Osvir]

What about magic and loot?

I burned a guy to ashes, do I still get to loot components or is it just dust?

[Karkarov]

What about magic and loot?

 

I burned a guy to ashes, do I still get to loot components or is it just dust?

Great question, and another reason why this is a bad idea to put in the game.  When realism starts getting in the way of having fun and or simple gameplay like "I have my wizard cast a totally generic fireball, man I hope they don't ash!" then realism has gone too far.   Not that I think Obsidian would ever implement this to begin with. 

 

No to offense to the OP but it is just a bad idea in this type of game.  Maybe if it were less RPG and more action based I could see it.  That isn't what P:E is though.

[TRX850]

Loot, whether in a chest or worn by my about-to-be-barbecued-enemy, is an abstract form of reward, or should be.

 

Otherwise, apart from player aggro, there have to be special rules to ignore magic or plot items (including parchments) from being destroyed, which seems like a rather messy system.

[Lady Evenstar]

It makes just as much sense to say that hitting someone with a sword is likely to break any potion bottles they might be carrying (a +5 sword likely would shatter all loot) ...  but it doesn't really sound like fun to have to constantly refrain from using equipment/abilities because you might damage loot, now does it?

 

I can just imagine my characters chatting around the campfire:  "Did you see what he was carrying?  ... But, no, you just had to use that shiny new sword rather than your starter blade, so no new crystal ball for me."

Edited January 23, 2013 by Lady Evenstar

[Osvir]

Just saying:

I wouldn't mind it, it's not about too much realism, it's about a cool feature and mechanic. I don't know what's so precious about all those Leather Armors, Bastard Swords, Two-Handed Swords that you guys find attractive, but I think playing through Baldur's Gate (PS:T as well) there were a tons of crap that I didn't bother to pick up (and those sorts of items should be able to break and serve some other higher function). Why? Cus I only get 5-15 gold for it and my inventory was packed.

If there will be different types of loot (conceptually):

Minor Loot - Components, potions (destructible in fight) ~other crap stuff~
Major Loot - Some coins, Magical/Mythical (Indestructible in fight)

Similarly, breaking loot would... oh nevermind! I always forget: "Unlimited Stash". Breaking loot would have been a great mechanic side-by-side with a Limited Inventory.

EDIT: Because really, how much of that vendor trash do you pick up in Baldur's Gate midway through the game versus how much do you ignore?

Edited January 23, 2013 by Osvir

[Karkarov]

EDIT: Because really, how much of that vendor trash do you pick up in Baldur's Gate midway through the game versus how much do you ignore?

The vast majority of it.  Heck you could have outfitted your own army with all the leather armor, short swords, and short bows I left on the near endless piles of Hobgoblin corpses.  But that isn't the point.  While I may pass on all that junk every so often there would be a valuable gem, or a healing potion, or some arrows maybe with special effects.  Are they going to be immune to breaking?  Because while I may never loot that short sword I definitely want that potion of minor healing or identify scroll.  There is also no way to tell which generic hobgoblin corpse has these items on them until I go rummaging through their corpses.

 

So unless the rule is "Loot you would never loot anyway (save the very start of the game) can break but everything else is immune." then I won't really like it for this kind of game.  Also it would make the rule pretty pointless to have because it just makes the game harder starting out and has no effect at all long term.

Edited January 23, 2013 by Karkarov

[Osvir]

Well, if the potion breaks, perhaps you are given an advanced component from that cleaved Leather Armor?

Similarly, if the Magical Scroll gets destroyed, would that enchant the components? (If you can use it to upgrade your own Armor).

Breaking items could actually be a benefit in another way~
* Not breaking: You get 1 potion+1 component.
* Breaking: You get an 1 enchanted component.
* Scrolls could work in the same way.
* Could work with a "randomized" loot, or rather, "randomized break" which in turn makes "randomized loot"~

[Hormalakh]

 

There is some risk in using powerful spell-like abilities. With enemies that drop little to no loot a spell can make short work of them. Loot-heavy enemies usually need a "gentler" beating.

 

My proposition is not to make quest-items or super rare items destructible. Only consumables and non-magical weapons/armor. If repairing is implemented in the game, I wouldn't mind broken weapons/armor.

So, really, it's just another "make gameplay onerous for folks who like to play wizards" proposal. No, thank you.

 

If hitting too hard with a sword were equally likely to have the same effect I might be more receptive, but I really don't see how it would make the game more fun.

You cannot into reading? Melee attacks would damage/break weapons and armor. This isn't an attack against "wizards." I usually play wizards the first time through anyway.

Edited January 23, 2013 by Hormalakh

[Karkarov]

Well, if the potion breaks, perhaps you are given an advanced component from that cleaved Leather Armor?

 

Similarly, if the Magical Scroll gets destroyed, would that enchant the components? (If you can use it to upgrade your own Armor).

 

Breaking items could actually be a benefit in another way~

* Not breaking: You get 1 potion+1 component.

* Breaking: You get an 1 enchanted component.

* Scrolls could work in the same way.

* Could work with a "randomized" loot, or rather, "randomized break" which in turn makes "randomized loot"~

 

Even more needlessly complex.  If something breaks into "components" (which at least makes sense) then it should just go straight to the crafting system and have nothing to do with random effects it might have on other things the dude was carrying that didn't break.  While that kinda works I would still prefer rather just getting the already made potion though.  This isn't an mmo, I don't want to have to invest hours into a crafting mechanic unless I choose to. 

 

Also I prefer games that let me loot the item and then if I consider it more valuable as components I can then intentionally break it down.  Like Kingdom's of Amalaur.