Drunk girl rambles

[Iucounu]

Yeahh... lemme see if I can recap the main points (my head hurts ferociously right now  ):

I don't want to know how long the original post was.

 

What reason, then, is there to say "since I can now do things that happen to level me up before facing this tough boss, it would somehow be a crime to prevent me from using my new-found doing-various-amounts-of-stuff-before-taking-on-this-boss powers to put myself above that boss in level."? There is none, that I can think of. So, my point of emphasis is this: The ability to change your standing relative to specific combat challenges in the game is not inherently owed to you as a component of expansive story/path choices. 

Ah, now I understand what you mean. Basically, I think you're right. However, I wouldn't put getting stronger by questing/fighting on a level with turning difficulty down. In the former case, at least you did something to earn your greater power.

 

And why must he sit there and block a gate while you somehow fight wolves and bandits until you're easily better than him, doing absolutely nothing to improve his own power, which was apparently only a few days' worth of questing above your own?

Ehrm, yes. That is interwoven with the question, how you can become super-strong within a few weeks/months, in a universe where becoming powerful usually requires years of training, education and training from youth on. I tend to block out those questions, as it would break immersion for me if I thought too much about it. 

 

Basically, I don't think I'd mind level-scaling at all if it would be somehow explained through the inner logic of the game's world, rather than just being a tool  for game-designers to adjust difficulty.

 

This however, is not that easy to achieve. Of course you could make it so that everybody can raise his power considerably within just a few days, just as your PCs. But that would lead to other problems. For example, there is a 40 year old boss, who is level 7 if you confront him fast, and level 10 if you come a few days later because of other quests. If this guy can become so much stronger within a few days, what has he done the last 25 years?

You could argue that a world where only PCs progress is also logical flawed. But I can't help it, the latter scenario feels even weirder to me, as it affects the whole world. If only your PCs progress that fast, you can at least assume that they are a special case, because of the density of their adventure, or whatever. 

 

There might be cases, where this storydriven scaling makes sense. For example there is a bunch of noobs that receive special training and are half decent fighters if you come a few days later. Although I'd rather see such progress dependent on the time you need to get to them, rather than your level. 

 

 

Encounter scaling can be barely visible. At first you're accosted by robbers at lower levels in the cities back alley, as you get more powerful the robbers wise up and leave you alone, however, you've surely attracted the attention of a powerful antagonist by now, and he's sending assassins on his way to deal with you, or keep you busy as he progresses his evil plans.

 

Or in the wilderness, you still come across those pesky enemies you did at first, but now their brood queen and soldiers are nearby as well.

 

If you mix this up with "normal" unscaled encounters, you won't get the feeling that you're not making progress, because there's still those little creatures which you can now slaughter as an afterthought, it's just the world has adapted to your presence.

I'm not against subtle encounter-scaling. Even though I'd like to avoid it, if possible. But if I have to choose between encounter- and level-scaling, I take encounter-scaling. 

Edited April 16, 2013 by Iucounu

[Lephys]

I don't want to know how long the original post was.

 

Heh. I swear to you... if I could somehow make my brain compress its thought processes, I would. I try my best. It's just not my strong suit.

 

Ah, now I understand what you mean. Basically, I think you're right. However, I wouldn't put getting stronger by questing/fighting on a level with turning difficulty down. In the former case, at least you did something to earn your greater power.

 

Not at all. My only point with the difficulty is specifically in response to the notion that there is a problem with some enemy still being tough, simply because you should've been able to make them not-tough. In other words, because of level-scaling, this foe is "too tough." Hence the comparison to non-level-scaling systems still presenting you with tough enemies no matter what. Regardless of how you got there, the result is the same. That was the only point of that comparison. Not "All of level-scaling is the same thing as difficulty options" or anything.

 

Ehrm, yes. That is interwoven with the question, how you can become super-strong within a few weeks/months, in a universe where becoming powerful usually requires years of training, education and training from youth on. I tend to block out those questions, as it would break immersion for me if I thought too much about it.

 

Ehhh... A) Nothing dicates that your RPG actions and progress must be reduced to some miniscule duration of time (Look at Fallout 1... just the water chip quest could take, what, 100 days or something?). And B) Nothing says you have to become SUPER strong from starting out as sucking. Don't get me wrong, I understand what you're saying. I just want to emphasize that it's not "short-duration nooblet-to-deity transition or nothing at all!" I agree with you that that kind of thing is rather problematic and detrimental to immersion.

 

But, an excellent example is what you've said here:

 

There might be cases, where this storydriven scaling makes sense. For example there is a bunch of noobs that receive special training and are half decent fighters if you come a few days later. Although I'd rather see such progress dependent on the time you need to get to them, rather than your level.

 

See, with something like a bear, it's probably not going to get better. So, if there's a cave to explore, where bears live, then you wouldn't explain an alteration in bear-power with "Well, it's been hunting and sleeping a lot, so it's gained some levels!". BUT, IF there was some reason to scale this cave (if, perhaps, it was core content or something), you could have younger bears there (adult, but not fully-grown, experienced-at-survival-and-defending-their-territory bears) to present an appropriate challenge for greener player characters, and simply "replace" them (they don't ever exist in any form until you actually get to the cave) with 10-year-old bears that are larger, stronger, and more ferocious and have held their own for many years at that cave. And who's to say it's not happenstance, which bears and how many you find in that cave the one time per-playthrough that you go to it? I mean, that cave and those bears never even existed in the first place, until some developer said "Hey, here's a place this character could go at a given point, and so it's not going to be level 1 or level 99, but instead some at least halfway-decently-appropriate challenge level for the player at the point at which he reaches it." It's not as if they were just designing the game, and went "Oh hey, a naturally-occurring cave of virtual bears! Ooooh, I'm going to unnaturally SCALE these already-existent bears according to my will! MUAHAHAHA!"

 

It works much more easily with sapient things like bandits, since they ACTIVELY try to improve their effectiveness at banditry (be it through skill, numbers, equipment quality, etc.) so that they can bandit-ize larger and larger hauls of valuables and do even more of whatever-the-hell-they-want.

 

Also, you say you'd rather see it dependent upon time, rather than your level. But, all your level progression takes time, correct? So, that fits naturally into a world where time passes everywhere, and not just where you are. Did you do 10 sidequests before you got to this scaled core content, or did you do 5? If you did 5, then the amount of time it WOULD'VE taken you to go off and complete those other 5 hasn't passed yet. Boom. Instant time-basis.

 

See, there are ways of doing it that are far more elegant than Oblivion, yet talk of the potential for doing it elegantly and intelligently gets met with so much "BUT WHAT ABOUT HOW HORRIBLY YOU COULD DO IT, LIKE IN OBLIVION?!!! AND THEREFORE I WANT TO SAY IT CAN'T BE DONE WELL!" And I know you're not saying that, I'm just commenting on the fact that this discussion is always so taxing, because it takes like 90 posts to get people to actually become open-minded.

 

You have been quite open-minded about it, and I appreciate it. And I apologize for my lengthy posts. I just don't like to leave holes of vagueness, which are only going to prompt 17 more back-and-forth posts of questions and answers, anyway.

 

My aim is pretty much to elaborate on exactly why the announcement of the use of level-scaling doesn't frighten me into thinking the game's going to definitely suffer because of it, and to, perhaps, alleviate those fears in other people.

Edited April 16, 2013 by Lephys

[Iucounu]

Ehhh... A) Nothing dicates that your RPG actions and progress must be reduced to some miniscule duration of time (Look at Fallout 1... just the water chip quest could take, what, 100 days or something?). 

If the game takes several years in-game-time to complete, and the potential time difference between story-branches is long enough, I'm ok with scaling bosses (to a reasonable extent of course). If the bosses are rather young, like Sarevok, the time-frame can be shorter.

However, I doubt that the in-game-time will be particularly long. Obsidian never really bothered about that in their games, so why should they with P:E?

 And B) Nothing says you have to become SUPER strong from starting out as sucking.

Yeah. But on the other hand, the less your power changes, the less you need your enemies scaled. 

See, with something like a bear, it's probably not going to get better. So, if there's a cave to explore, where bears live, then you wouldn't explain an alteration in bear-power with "Well, it's been hunting and sleeping a lot, so it's gained some levels!". BUT, IF there was some reason to scale this cave (if, perhaps, it was core content or something), you could have younger bears there (adult, but not fully-grown, experienced-at-survival-and-defending-their-territory bears) to present an appropriate challenge for greener player characters, and simply "replace" them (they don't ever exist in any form until you actually get to the cave) with 10-year-old bears that are larger, stronger, and more ferocious and have held their own for many years at that cave. And who's to say it's not happenstance, which bears and how many you find in that cave the one time per-playthrough that you go to it? I mean, that cave and those bears never even existed in the first place, until some developer said "Hey, here's a place this character could go at a given point, and so it's not going to be level 1 or level 99, but instead some at least halfway-decently-appropriate challenge level for the player at the point at which he reaches it." It's not as if they were just designing the game, and went "Oh hey, a naturally-occurring cave of virtual bears! Ooooh, I'm going to unnaturally SCALE these already-existent bears according to my will! MUAHAHAHA!"

 

It works much more easily with sapient things like bandits, since they ACTIVELY try to improve their effectiveness at banditry (be it through skill, numbers, equipment quality, etc.) so that they can bandit-ize larger and larger hauls of valuables and do even more of whatever-the-hell-they-want.

If it happens to a reasonable extent (especially the cave thing) I guess I'm ok with that. If in the game it's mentioned that bandits are getting better organized all over the place, that might help too. As long as it doesn't appear artificial, I have nothing to say against it. For me, this goes more into the direction of encounter-scaling anyway. 

Also, you say you'd rather see it dependent upon time, rather than your level. But, all your level progression takes time, correct? So, that fits naturally into a world where time passes everywhere, and not just where you are. Did you do 10 sidequests before you got to this scaled core content, or did you do 5? If you did 5, then the amount of time it WOULD'VE taken you to go off and complete those other 5 hasn't passed yet. Boom. Instant time-basis.

Assuming that travelling between areas takes the most time, time that you can't avoid, it really doesn't matter much (as long as there are not too many fights that you can avoid, which is, well, also a point). In the IE games however, it greatly depended on how often you rested. 

See, there are ways of doing it that are far more elegant than Oblivion, yet talk of the potential for doing it elegantly and intelligently gets met with so much "BUT WHAT ABOUT HOW HORRIBLY YOU COULD DO IT, LIKE IN OBLIVION?!!! AND THEREFORE I WANT TO SAY IT CAN'T BE DONE WELL!" And I know you're not saying that, I'm just commenting on the fact that this discussion is always so taxing, because it takes like 90 posts to get people to actually become open-minded.

The problem is rather that I've never seen a game where I liked level-scaling. 

You have been quite open-minded about it, and I appreciate it. And I apologize for my lengthy posts. I just don't like to leave holes of vagueness, which are only going to prompt 17 more back-and-forth posts of questions and answers, anyway.

No need to apologize. High-quality posts. If my english were a bit better, I'd probably get a lot more enjoyment out of it.

[Lephys]

If the game takes several years in-game-time to complete, and the potential time difference between story-branches is long enough, I'm ok with scaling bosses (to a reasonable extent of course). If the bosses are rather young, like Sarevok, the time-frame can be shorter.

However, I doubt that the in-game-time will be particularly long. Obsidian never really bothered about that in their games, so why should they with P:E?

 

Agreed. But, the range of scaling can be... well, scaled (heh) to whatever range-size they need it to be, depending on how well they represent time. More on time further down.

 

Yeah. But on the other hand, the less your power changes, the less you need your enemies scaled.

 

Also agreed. There's actually another thread about this, that went on for a bit, but, for what it's worth, I personally feel that your skill and experience should progress a lot more than your sheer power. But... at the same time, it's a game. Always balances and compromises, heh. A lot of games just go all out on the power difference, though, between new game and endgame. And that presents a bit of a problem, with things beyond just how to handle potential challenge scaling.

 

If it happens to a reasonable extent (especially the cave thing) I guess I'm ok with that. If in the game it's mentioned that bandits are getting better organized all over the place, that might help too. As long as it doesn't appear artificial, I have nothing to say against it. For me, this goes more into the direction of encounter-scaling anyway.

 

Yeah, that's the thing. I think it should all work together. It shouldn't be "Oh, did you use level-scaling here, or did you use encounter-scaling? OR, did you actually have this be pertinent to the story/world?" I say, why not all three, and only to the degree that they're useful?

 

Assuming that travelling between areas takes the most time, time that you can't avoid, it really doesn't matter much (as long as there are not too many fights that you can avoid, which is, well, also a point). In the IE games however, it greatly depended on how often you rested.

 

Well, I think it would just plain make more sense if a lot of those "We ventured off into the forest and across the continent for a whole 3 hours, then explored a huge bunch of ruins for another hour, then made it back by supper" situations took a lot longer. I don't mean active play time, like "You have to make your characters run for 3 ACTUAL hours to get there!" or anything. I just mean, I think, if the world's actually as big as a friggin' world, things should probably take longer than they generally do. That kind of time passage can be handled "off-stage," so-to-speak, by things like fast travel/map travel/area transitions. The Mass Effect Games actually did this pretty well, considering. They never really told you how much time had passed, but, after going off on a mission, the entire "world" progressed as if at least a day or two had passed. Shops got new stock, some people who were waiting on something at a station were gone now, etc. It's like everything actually moved forward whenever you did, rather than sitting around, waiting for you to get to it in a given state. Granted, it didn't affect a whole lot, mechanically, in those games, but it was still quite nice, methinks.

 

The problem is rather that I've never seen a game where I liked level-scaling.

 

Fair enough. I just think that's all the more reason to make one you like, . If I were a developer, it would be one of those "Challenge, ACCEPTED!" moments.

 

No need to apologize. High-quality posts. If my english were a bit better, I'd probably get a lot more enjoyment out of it.

 

Well, I'm glad you find value in them. I just know it's an unfortunate fact that I'm rather wordy, and that my brain was not designed to please and convenience the rest of the world, heh. And, for what it's worth, I appreciate your posts. If not for them, I wouldn't actually get to evaluate this whole thing so much, and gain an even better understanding of it (and think of even more possibilities).

 

Also, I may have said it already, but I couldn't tell from your posts that your English was any lesser than anyone else's.

Edited April 17, 2013 by Lephys

[Iucounu]

Well, I think it would just plain make more sense if a lot of those "We ventured off into the forest and across the continent for a whole 3 hours, then explored a huge bunch of ruins for another hour, then made it back by supper" situations took a lot longer. I don't mean active play time, like "You have to make your characters run for 3 ACTUAL hours to get there!" or anything. I just mean, I think, if the world's actually as big as a friggin' world, things should probably take longer than they generally do. That kind of time passage can be handled "off-stage," so-to-speak, by things like fast travel/map travel/area transitions. The Mass Effect Games actually did this pretty well, considering. They never really told you how much time had passed, but, after going off on a mission, the entire "world" progressed as if at least a day or two had passed. Shops got new stock, some people who were waiting on something at a station were gone now, etc. It's like everything actually moved forward whenever you did, rather than sitting around, waiting for you to get to it in a given state. Granted, it didn't affect a whole lot, mechanically, in those games, but it was still quite nice, methinks.

I think it's a lot of work to make this convincing, especially when a game is supposed to last for several in-game-years. I guess that's why it's not very popular among game-designers to make games with such a long time-span. 

It also has some additional side-effects too. For example, you would think the relationship to party members changes if you travel with them for several years, instead of only a few months. The character of banters would change; especially the "get-to-know-each-other" phase would need to speed up. 

Quests like the Trademeet quest in BG II, could become problematic. If you simply drop them and do nothing for years, than there should be consequences (e.g. Trademeet is destroyed) that can also mean additional work for developers. 

All in all, however, I have no doubt that you can make a good game out of that. 

 

Well, I'm glad you find value in them. I just know it's an unfortunate fact that I'm rather wordy, and that my brain was not designed to please and convenience the rest of the world, heh. And, for what it's worth, I appreciate your posts. If not for them, I wouldn't actually get to evaluate this whole thing so much, and gain an even better understanding of it (and think of even more possibilities).

Thank you too for your accurate posts. Our discussion clarified some things for me, and made me think about my position. I'm still not sure if I'd like level-scaling in certain situations, but I guess in the end, it's also about your mindset and what you're used to. 

[Lephys]

I think it's a lot of work to make this convincing, especially when a game is supposed to last for several in-game-years. I guess that's why it's not very popular among game-designers to make games with such a long time-span. 

It also has some additional side-effects too. For example, you would think the relationship to party members changes if you travel with them for several years, instead of only a few months. The character of banters would change; especially the "get-to-know-each-other" phase would need to speed up. 

Quests like the Trademeet quest in BG II, could become problematic. If you simply drop them and do nothing for years, than there should be consequences (e.g. Trademeet is destroyed) that can also mean additional work for developers. 

All in all, however, I have no doubt that you can make a good game out of that.

Quite true, all of that. The thing is, in a lot of games, it doesn't really say how much time things take. I mean, maybe it does, on a specific quest, or between one story mile-marker and the next (i.e. "Now that you've fled the castle and arrived at Drevenford, it's 1 month later, no matter what all you did in-between"), but it usually just lets you assume, based on the changes and effects upon the rest of the game world, that that bandit outpost in the woods took you, meh... maybe a day or so to clean out? Maybe it took you a week? *shrug*, Either way, unless new quests are available, or developments have been made throughout the rest of the game world, you have no way of knowing. Because, you've got those little abstractions going on everywhere, because of the nature of the player's interaction with a video game. Like the fact that you can generally sleep at an inn to heal up, about 50 times, and yet something that only should've taken a few days to escalate hasn't even changed yet. It's still waiting on you to go trigger it.

 

So, I just think there's a lot of leeway to be had there, before you even get into the "Let's start designing time progression really well throughout this game." Simply making sure its always represented would be a huge start. And I say "always." This is getting a bit off topic, but, while I don't necessarily have anything against a constantly-running clock (things in the game world change and move simply based on your time in the game world, rather than your active progression in the game world), I think the thing that tends to work best is when "doing things" (actually completing quests, or performing any action that actually changes the story/lore/world situation for at least one character) progresses time, appropriately. What I mean is, even if it takes you 17 in-game days of resting and venturing back out to complete that one "go clear out this cave" quest, once you complete the quest, the game world can "unpause" and advance the 2-or-3 days it's supposed to have taken for you to travel to the cave, do what needs doing, then return.

 

Again, that's not the ONLY way to do it, but it tends to work pretty well, as a default idea. BUT, now we're getting into a different discussion, heh, so I'll save that for another thread.

 

All that being said, it is very tricky to make all the elements of your game world work together to represent time well, without causing problems to various systems and mechanics.

Thank you too for your accurate posts. Our discussion clarified some things for me, and made me think about my position. I'm still not sure if I'd like level-scaling in certain situations, but I guess in the end, it's also about your mindset and what you're used to.

If it made you understand your own position and perspective better than you already did, then I am glad, ^_^. Contrary to popular belief, the purpose of discussion isn't to change minds, but simply to develop them.

 

And, for what it's worth, it's my knowledge of Obsidian's expressed intentions and stances on things so far, and the fact that they're only going to use actual level-scaling when they "need" to that doesn't have me worried they'll mess the game up. If, say, the development team for the next Elder Scrolls game announced that they were going to implement level-scaling, I might still discuss it at length in a thread like this, but I wouldn't be re-assuring everyone not to worry because it would probably be a good implementation. It's all about the amount of care you take with the implementation. It is my belief that Obsidian will surprise even those who adamantly hate level-scaling with their skillful and wise implementation of it.

[Iucounu]

I know what you mean, I don't care that much if the passed time is displayed accurately in the game, or only vaguely indicated, as long as the difference between weeks and months and months and years becomes clear. 

 

I'm still unsure how great the level difference through scaling of a boss could be, without feeling weird to me. But then again, this could depend on my current mindset, and if I play some good games and get used to level-scaling, I might get more permissive on that matter. Or perhaps not. No idea.

 

And, for what it's worth, it's my knowledge of Obsidian's expressed intentions and stances on things so far, and the fact that they're only going to use actual level-scaling when they "need" to that doesn't have me worried they'll mess the game up. If, say, the development team for the next Elder Scrolls game announced that they were going to implement level-scaling, I might still discuss it at length in a thread like this, but I wouldn't be re-assuring everyone not to worry because it would probably be a good implementation. It's all about the amount of care you take with the implementation. It is my belief that Obsidian will surprise even those who adamantly hate level-scaling with their skillful and wise implementation of it.

In IWD, I didn't even notice that they applied level-scaling, so it will probably not be that bad. P:E however, is probably going to be a lot more dynamic than IWD (not very hard to achieve), so I hope Obsidian don't get dumb ideas because of that. 

[Randomthom]

I've read a lot of this but page 4 of the posts on this thread... geez!

 

Walloftext crits you for 999999999 damage

You die

 

Seriously though, it looks like the main difference in opinion here isn't actually about level scaling at all but rather a point of immersion.

 

One person (the meta-gamer*) sees the game as a series of numbers, "I am level X and you are level Y therefore..."

Another person (the roleplayer*) sees the game as the fantasy story "I'm a warrior with a big f****** sword, I'm going to kill you..."

* Sorry to label them but it makes things easier for explaining, if you don't like the label then please don't attach too much importance to it...

 

The meta gamer sees the level scaling as an injustice. "If it was hard at level X then it should be easier now I'm level X+n!"

The roleplayer sees the level scaling (if he/she sees it at all) as a tool to keep the experience challenging and exciting, as a storytelling device to maintain dramatic tension.

 

Neither is invalid as a way to enjoy the game but because of the two different ways of enjoying the game, you'll probably never agree on level scaling and if it should be in the game or not.

 

I'm not going to say where I sit on this debate because I'm not 100% sure I'm decided and it will somewhat invalidate the attempted neutrality of my post!

[Kjaamor]

I'm not going to say where I sit on this debate because I'm not 100% sure I'm decided and it will somewhat invalidate the attempted neutrality of my post!

 

Sadly that's going to leave both sides thinking you're pro-opposition. Although...

 

 

Sorry to label them but it makes things easier for explaining, if you don't like the label then please don't attach too much importance to it...

 

...such disclaimers/requests aren't going to protect you from calling one set 'roleplayers' (which I think we all consider ourselves as here), and the other 'meta-gamers'.

[Somna]

 

 

I'm not going to say where I sit on this debate because I'm not 100% sure I'm decided and it will somewhat invalidate the attempted neutrality of my post!

 

Sadly that's going to leave both sides thinking you're pro-opposition. Although...

 

 

Sorry to label them but it makes things easier for explaining, if you don't like the label then please don't attach too much importance to it...

 

...such disclaimers/requests aren't going to protect you from calling one set 'roleplayers' (which I think we all consider ourselves as here), and the other 'meta-gamers'.

 

At least he's not calling them "roll players."

[Ffordesoon]

@Randomthom:

 

Good post.

 

I'd say most players, if they're being honest with themselves, are a mix of the two, with one aspect or the other being slightly dominant.

 

Part of that is because cRPGs are single-player experiences and as such have no real penalties for metagaming, whereas you have social pressure put on you to keep to your role in a PnP/tabletop game. I'm never going to feel genuinely bad about subverting an arbitrary rule the designers of a cRPG set up, particularly if I think it's a poor rule, because I don't have to justify my actions to anyone.

 

Conversely, I don't feel any social pressure to roleplay a character who cooperates with the whims of the other players, which affects how I roleplay my character. I can be as good or evil (or lawful, or chaotic, or neutral, or snarky, or what-the-eff-ever) as I want to be, without anyone real (who we will always prioritize over anyone fake) shaming me into compromising for their sake.

 

But people definitely come down on one side or the other in debates like these, partly because of their own preferences, and partly because there are social consequences if they say the "wrong" thing. I would say I'm more of a roleplayer, for example, but I've done my fair share of min/maxing in cRPGs over the years. It's just that my sympathies lie with the roleplayers, and so I tend to argue in favor of their point of view.

 

That said, I do agree that the roleplayers and the metagamers - to the extent that those two groups can be said to exist - won't ever come to complete agreement in a debate such as this one. The groups disagree too fundamentally for the individuals to reach a consensus, if you follow me.

[Iucounu]

One person (the meta-gamer*) sees the game as a series of numbers, "I am level X and you are level Y therefore..."

Another person (the roleplayer*) sees the game as the fantasy story "I'm a warrior with a big f****** sword, I'm going to kill you..."

* Sorry to label them but it makes things easier for explaining, if you don't like the label then please don't attach too much importance to it...

But, but... I WANT TO BE A ROLEPLAYER!!!! MEEEEEEEEH

 

No seriously, calling things like gauging for power metagaming implies that they're not a part of the actual game. But what I think many people wish for are game mechanics that are more than just a means to an end, like the end to provide challenge. I for one prefer it if they are a more or less accurate model of the game's reality.

 

For example, you could see the term spell-level as just an abstraction for the player, to give the gameplay more structure. Or you could make it so that the concept of spell-level is something the player character is aware of, and is relevant within the game and the lore. Like in the Forgotten Realms, where it's said that Crassus was the only one that could cast level 14 spells, which gave him the status of a god. 

 

I fail to see what this has to do with being a role-player or not being a role-player. It's not necessarily about power-gaming or min-maxing after all. You can emphasize such things and still role-play a character. 

Edited April 27, 2013 by Iucounu

[Randomthom]

Spell level uniquely in D&D is something the characters themselves ARE aware of though it's also an abstraction of sorts in-character too, just one the characters themselves might use.

 

Character level, skill points, hit points etc. though are abstractions for us, not for them.

 

As I expected, people are getting hung up on the labels I gave them despite my warning, I should have just called them player A and player B.

 

I'll defend my use of the term meta-gamer though. Meta gaming is, simply put, using knowledge your character doesn't have (but you do) to alter the way they interface with the world around them. Min-maxing is only one kin of meta gaming. Steering clear of X encounter because you're not high level enough is another (unless you have a clear idea of just how powerful your foe is perhaps). Second playthroughs of these games inevitably have meta-gaming. If your party die & you load a savegame and try again, you now go in with more knowledge than you did, if you act on that knowledge, this is metagaming. So is using a guide.

 

Roleplaying is the antithesis of this. 100% roleplaying means putting yourself in your characters shoes, choosing to ignore all information that you have except that which your character is aware of and reacting according to your character's personality, alignment, gods, peer pressure of the group etc.

 

Just to be clear, metagaming isn't wrong in CRPGs (though it should be discouraged in PnP). We all do it to some degree and many derive their enjoyment in these games through it, I do at least partially. I like to have a clear design path for my character

 

You're also right that we're all something of a mix, it's not simply one or the other, more of a sliding scale.

[Iucounu]

I agree on most points. But I don't see e.g level-scaling as somthing you're either against or pro, depending on your affinity to roleplaying. The whole thing is also about having reasonable power ratios in a game, that make sense, and how accurate power is represented and interwoven with the role you're playing in a game. And this is something both metagamers and roleplayers should be interested in. 

[Randomthom]

I don't think anyone is arguing against having "reasonable power ratios" as you put it.

 

I was just pointing out that the argument is essentially about how you derive your enjoyment from CRPGs. Of course some people don't really care either way (presumably because they find enjoyment in other parts of CRPGs regardless of this subject.

 

Me personally, I'm definitely not in favour of a 1:1 scaling (i.e. I'm lvl 17 so the enemy is too) nor am I entirely happy with the idea that the world doesn't exist outside of my personal sphere of influence and thus every bad guy is just standing around waiting for me to find him.

 

Of course this debate is entirely academic as it appears that obsidian have already chosen which way they are going to go with this.

[mcmanusaur]

Level-scaling is evil. That's all I have to say.

[Lephys]

Level-scaling is evil. That's all I have to say.

This is false. That's all I have to say.

[Ffordesoon]

 

Level-scaling is evil. That's all I have to say.

This is false. That's all I have to say.

Turkey sandwiches are delicious. That's all I have to say.

[JFSOCC]

Humour is Serious business.

[nikolokolus]

The level scaling I witnessed in Fallout New Vegas got it mostly right.  I could tell that certain enemies were changing over time as I leveled, but it was mostly invisible and didn't make me roll my eyes like it did in Oblivion

 

It was really no different in a game like Baldur's Gate really.  The critical path of the game was scaled to your level (mostly) and if you really went off the beaten path you probably stumbled into some vampiric wolves or sirines before you were able to handle them.

[Valorian]

 

To put it another way, all level-scaling (in the implementation Obsidian is using) really does is lessen the relative rate of challenge difference as you progress past a given enemy's lowest encounterable level. So, if, on Normal difficulty, Boss #1 starts at level 5, and can go as high as level 6 (depending on your progression before facing him), and on Easy difficulty, he starts at level 3 and can go as high as level 4, why does anything else need to handle the increased relative difficulty of that boss?

If the difference through level-scaling ends up to be so low, you can just do without it imho, not much of a change. And personally, it really irritates me when opponents adapt to my level, even when it's just a bit. For me, monsters, opponents, especially bosses must be constants in a game. They are the measure of my PC's power. If they aren't, I can't convincingly estimate my power-status within the world, and I can't compare how my PC did compared to PCs from other playthroughs, as everything is distorted through this artificial adaption. 

 

 

 

Good points Iucounu.

Even when it's just a bit, indeed. There is level scaling, or there isn't. There is distortion of enemies' power based around our PC's level, or there isn't.

The scaling-1-level thing is ridiculous, of course.. it's like someone wants to eat a little bit of [insert bad word not allowed on a family friendly forum], because, well.. there's not lots of it, only just a little!

Why would it be there at all in the first place, if it's basically meaningless anyway? Distortion around the PC's level for the sake of distortion.. yay.

If it's more, then we also have a problem, naturally.

 

Also, I applaud you for your.. patience with hyperactive subjects. You responded to copious amounts of usual bewildering nonsense like a boss.

 

 

Oh, and no, the critical path in BG was certainly not scaled, nikolokolus.

[Fearabbit]

Why must everyone always talk in extremes...

Level scaling can mean that an enemy always has the same level as you. It can also mean that an enemy always has level 14 if your character is level 10 or lower, and is level 15 if your character is level 11 or higher.

 

Now don't tell me that these two are the same. One is full-on level scaling, the other is basically no level scaling. Everything in between is also some version of level scaling. So we have a huge spectrum of options, and of all these, one extreme is the only valid choice for you? Even if the one right next to it barely changes anything?

I mean it's fine if you have that opinion, I won't judge you for that. But you can't possibly expect anyone to care about your opinion if it is so narrow-minded.

 

It's not irony if I want level scaling that I barely notice; it just means that I don't live in a world where everything is either-or, where everything's always extreme.

[Valorian]

 

Why must everyone always talk in extremes...

Level scaling can mean that an enemy always has the same level as you. It can also mean that an enemy always has level 14 if your character is level 10 or lower, and is level 15 if your character is level 11 or higher.

 

Now don't tell me that these two are the same.

Why would I now hurt your feelings and say it's the same thing, right? Indeed, a small dose of poison and a lethal dose of poison are not the same thing. Both are unpleasant though, and are best avoided.

 

one extreme is the only valid choice for you?

The "extreme" without level scaling? Yes.

[Ffordesoon]

@Fearabbit:

 

Don't bother responding to him. Guy's a zealot.

 

You know, FYI. Just in case him likening level scaling to drinking poison wasn't enough of a clue.

 

That said, I'm going to ignore my own advice now, because I'm dumb. Which is the part that he's going to quote in response, I assure you.

 

@Valorian:

 

Why do you continue to hammer away at this point? I mean, seriously, why? We all know how you feel about it by now, and you're absolutely not going to get what you want, so why keep at it? What is your objective here? What do you hope to gain?

Edited May 12, 2013 by Ffordesoon

[Randomthom]

A reaction I suspect... do not provide the zealot with more posts to sacrifice upon his altar of circular arguments & deliberately misconstrued quotes.