Common pitfalls of CRPG games to avoid

[aluminiumtrioxid]

 

Think of every fantasy character and their weapon. Anduril. Twinkle. Sword of Truth. Etc...

they are all found relatively early and the hero sticks with them. 

 

That's why I like the 4E approach: certain artifacts get stronger with you, assuming they like you. (This was also present in Earthdawn, by the way.) I doubt PoE will have such items, though.

[TrashMan]

But do they NEED to become stronger? If they are already strong. Do they have to be the greatest weapon ever?

 

If the strongest weapon in the game is a +3 and the sword you found and customized is a +2, used it, and made a name for it (maybe even NPCs may recognize it) -  will you throw it away?

 

The out of control level/power inflation is the bane of most RPG's settings

[Sarex]

Would make for a boring game? Only if you are obessed with loot.

 

There are plenty of games where characters have limited inventories/weapons or games where they even can't take anything new. In some games you can't even carry weapons at all. In some you are limited to only two. In some there are only a dozen weapons in the whole game.

Are those games boring? No.

 

As long as the game gives you stuff to do, it won't be boring. Collecting items has more in common with jiggling shniy keys than actual good gameplay. It's a distraction more than a necessary element.

 

I think it is you who is obsessed. One of the great things about BG2 is that it had great variety in loot and you are the first person I heard complain about it, in fact what people complained about was the lack of good non-sword weapons, so in fact people want more variety.

 

As for there being plenty of games that have limited loot, well those aren't IE games and they aren't what people singed up for.

 

So why can't it have lots of loot and give you interesting stuff to do, and you can pick up a regular sword through out the whole game. I think you are in a minority here as far as loot goes.

Edited February 6, 2014 by Sarex

[Sherr]

 

I fail to see the problem. You are rewarded for finding a great swrod early andnow your character can carry it and make it his.

Think of every fantasy character and their weapon. Anduril. Twinkle. Sword of Truth. Etc...

they are all found relatively early and the hero sticks with them. Noone of those weapons are found at hte very end of hte story. None of those weapons are replacable throw-aways. The heroes in those stories dont' go trough 100 weapons beore settling on that one.

 

      Because games and stories works in different ways. It is more easy and interesting way to develop a character if u familiar with his weapon. Thats why heroes in stories ussually getting the strongest weapon on the start (Excalibur, Agies-fang etc) and stick with it, rather than change noname weapon after each fight.

      But in games, especially rpg, "dress the Barbie" was always one of the most interesting part of gameplay. 

 

 

Make the weapon part of the character. Give the player the ability to mark/customize it. For NPC to recongnize it. Give it presence. Give a bonus to familiarty because of long use. It only makes sense.

 

 

Boooring - almost nobody wants to stick with 1 weapon for whole game, so why should they cripple their game for 99 people just to please one.

 

 

I found BG1 to be almost right. Magis should be magical. Rare. Finding a magic item should be a moment of awe. ToB was horribel in that regard, given that it was raining +5 items left and right.

 

 

Its because BG1 was capped on ~7th level, and according to DnD rools its is something like avarenge middle-age adventurer, so you couldnt possible get some epic items.

 

 

 

You really shouldn't be able to have EVERY SINGLE SLOT ON EVERY CHARACTER filled with magical gear. It's jsut immersion breaking to have your character have more magical items than any person in history.

 

 

U certainly should. And not one item in every slot, but few in each, so u can make choices during game - "ok, i will encounter dragon next, so i should change this ring for fire protaction one". Or should play with vorpal sword with low dmg but with nice onehit abillity, or should i pick this with greater basic damage, or maybe i should pick this with improve haste ability ... etc.

[FlintlockJazz]

 

Would make for a boring game? Only if you are obessed with loot.

 

There are plenty of games where characters have limited inventories/weapons or games where they even can't take anything new. In some games you can't even carry weapons at all. In some you are limited to only two. In some there are only a dozen weapons in the whole game.

Are those games boring? No.

 

As long as the game gives you stuff to do, it won't be boring. Collecting items has more in common with jiggling shniy keys than actual good gameplay. It's a distraction more than a necessary element.

 

I think it is you who is obsessed. One of the great things about BG2 is that it had great variety in loot and you are the first person I heard complain about it, in fact what people complained about was the lack of good non-sword weapons, so in fact people want more variety.

 

As for there being plenty of games that have limited loot, well those aren't IE games and they aren't what people singed up for.

 

So why can't it have lots of loot and give you interesting stuff to do, and you can pick up a regular sword through out the whole game. I think you are in a minority here as far as loot goes.

 

I can't see where TrashMan has complained about the variety of loot in BG2.  He showed a preference to BG1, but didn't even mention BG2 at all.  People have complained about too much loot in Throne of Bhaal though, its overabundance of 'trash' magical items has been criticised often before.  What many of us don't want is for it to become a Diablo-esque loot whore game, wherein you find a magical weapon, use it for a bit, then drop it for the next weapon you find that has an extra +1, especially since those remove choice from the game since you need to keep grabbing the latest loot to keep competitive with the enemies, dropping a weapon that you may have liked and wanted to keep using because it no longer is of any use.  Diablo games use the loot thing to create an addiction in the players, not to provide enjoyment, the 'need' to keep getting better loot, creating a false sense of progression. 

 

I think what the IE games worked best was giving unique magical items that had a sense of history and character, even if it was just an interesting paragraph of history in the description.  I carried Lilarcor all through the game just because I got so attached to him, along with the Sword of Chaos which due to it's history felt personally important to my character. 

[Sarex]

I can't see where TrashMan has complained about the variety of loot in BG2.  He showed a preference to BG1, but didn't even mention BG2 at all.  People have complained about too much loot in Throne of Bhaal though, its overabundance of 'trash' magical items has been criticised often before.  What many of us don't want is for it to become a Diablo-esque loot whore game, wherein you find a magical weapon, use it for a bit, then drop it for the next weapon you find that has an extra +1, especially since those remove choice from the game since you need to keep grabbing the latest loot to keep competitive with the enemies, dropping a weapon that you may have liked and wanted to keep using because it no longer is of any use.  Diablo games use the loot thing to create an addiction in the players, not to provide enjoyment, the 'need' to keep getting better loot, creating a false sense of progression. 

 

I think what the IE games worked best was giving unique magical items that had a sense of history and character, even if it was just an interesting paragraph of history in the description.  I carried Lilarcor all through the game just because I got so attached to him, along with the Sword of Chaos which due to it's history felt personally important to my character.

 

Let me help you with that. If he likes BG1 loot variety, then he dislikes BG2 loot variety. Do you understand now? Throne of Bhaal is a high level expansion, no one went in to it below lvl 20. That is a problem you run in to when your enemies and you are that high of a level. They need weapons that can harm you and that means they need to be magical(or + weapons). I don't think that any of the IE games were ever in danger of being on a Diablo level loot wise, simply because there weren't any item sets and there wasn't any need to hunt down the items to complete said set.

 

I agree I also didn't sell those items, or any of the items I forged, but that doesn't stop PoE from having loot variety.

Edited February 6, 2014 by Sarex

[Hiro Protagonist II]

 

I can't see where TrashMan has complained about the variety of loot in BG2.  He showed a preference to BG1, but didn't even mention BG2 at all.  People have complained about too much loot in Throne of Bhaal though, its overabundance of 'trash' magical items has been criticised often before.  What many of us don't want is for it to become a Diablo-esque loot whore game, wherein you find a magical weapon, use it for a bit, then drop it for the next weapon you find that has an extra +1, especially since those remove choice from the game since you need to keep grabbing the latest loot to keep competitive with the enemies, dropping a weapon that you may have liked and wanted to keep using because it no longer is of any use.  Diablo games use the loot thing to create an addiction in the players, not to provide enjoyment, the 'need' to keep getting better loot, creating a false sense of progression. 

 

I think what the IE games worked best was giving unique magical items that had a sense of history and character, even if it was just an interesting paragraph of history in the description.  I carried Lilarcor all through the game just because I got so attached to him, along with the Sword of Chaos which due to it's history felt personally important to my character. 

 

 

You also have some people complaining about SoA and not just ToB. And that didn't really happen that much in SoA. Also, a lot of the good weapons that you started near the beginning of the game, you also had at the end of the game. And these were either +2 or +3 weapons. eg. Scimitars, Slings. However, Trashman is complaining about magic items being discarded every five minutes which is a nonsense.

 

BG1 had +2 and +3 weapons. SoA had a +1 weapon that you upgraded to +2 and I would say the majority of players kept at the end of SoA. eg. Mace of Disruption. The majority of weapons would be +3 which is only +1 better or the same as BG1. Scimitars are the exception with only being +2 in BG2. However, in BG1, you could get +3 Scimitars. Same with a +3 Staff. I believe you couldn't keep Drizzt's scimitars in BG2. So you had weapons in BG1 like scimitars that were better than in BG2.

 

The majority of the ammunition was the same as BG1. The majority of Rings, Cloaks, Amulets were the same as BG1. The Helm of Balduran was the same. Even some of the Armour was slightly better than BG1. eg. Red Dragon Scale was -1 AC and in BG1 you could get Full Plate at 0 AC. In BG1, you could even make Full Plate that had an AC 1 with the Cloak/Ring of Protection +2 into a -1 AC Armour, similar to Armour Class of gear in BG2. You also had Balduran's Cloak in BG1 to make your AC better. Yes, there was +4 weapons in SoA and even +5 with such gems as Carsomyr, but only 1 class could use Carsomyr. And even in ToB, it was upgraded with a +1 to it. And it's not like people discarded these items. The Flail of Ages was upgraded to +5 and people would have kept it.

 

ToB had a lot of loot, but the expansion was also very small. So of course it's going to look like it's raining +5 and +6 weapons. But look closely at the items in ToB. The Armour, Amulets, Rings, Cloaks, Helms, Ioun Stones, etc  were similar to SoA. A lot of the ammunition was the same with the Bag of Plenty +1 and the Quiver of Plenty +1 upgraded to +2 ammunition. In fact the ammunition for those bags are the same bullets and arrows as BG1. Let's think about that for a second. There are items in ToB which is Epic Tier that are the same items in BG1.

 

You have to consider ToB is Epic Tier. The sort of weapons you would expect in Epic Tier is +5 and +6 items. Even in pnp, you're using +3 and +4 weapons near the mid-end of Paragon tier. The biggest problem for me with ToB is not the loot per se, it's the small expansion + items for all classes = Loot raining from the sky. And a lot of those items were only slightly better than items in SoA and a lot of them I sold, because the SoA items were still good. If the expansion was a lot bigger and less linear, then the loot could have been spaced out better. So this argument of discarding items every five minutes is a little exaggerated.

 

If you look at the BG games. BG1 is Heroic Tier. SoA is Paragon Tier. ToB should have been renamed something else and a small expansion with a few new areas in the same style as TotSC. BG3 should have been a totally new game called Throne of Bhaal and all about Epic Tier and your way to godhood (if you so choose) and the loot would have been spread over that game. What happened was the expansion became Epic Tier and everything was crammed in which is why I don't particularly like ToB because it's way too short. It's not the loot I dislike in ToB, it's that Epic Tier was crammed into an expansion when it should have been a game on its own. imo.

 

Note: When I say SoA, I'm not including Watcher's Keep as I consider that part of ToB.

Edited February 6, 2014 by Hiro Protagonist II

[FlintlockJazz]

 

I can't see where TrashMan has complained about the variety of loot in BG2.  He showed a preference to BG1, but didn't even mention BG2 at all.  People have complained about too much loot in Throne of Bhaal though, its overabundance of 'trash' magical items has been criticised often before.  What many of us don't want is for it to become a Diablo-esque loot whore game, wherein you find a magical weapon, use it for a bit, then drop it for the next weapon you find that has an extra +1, especially since those remove choice from the game since you need to keep grabbing the latest loot to keep competitive with the enemies, dropping a weapon that you may have liked and wanted to keep using because it no longer is of any use.  Diablo games use the loot thing to create an addiction in the players, not to provide enjoyment, the 'need' to keep getting better loot, creating a false sense of progression. 

 

I think what the IE games worked best was giving unique magical items that had a sense of history and character, even if it was just an interesting paragraph of history in the description.  I carried Lilarcor all through the game just because I got so attached to him, along with the Sword of Chaos which due to it's history felt personally important to my character.

 

Let me help you with that. If he likes BG1 loot variety, then he dislikes BG2 loot variety. Do you understand now? Throne of Bhaal is a high level expansion, no one went in to it below lvl 20. That is a problem you run in to when your enemies and you are that high of a level. They need weapons that can harm you and that means they need to be magical(or + weapons). I don't think that any of the IE games were ever in danger of being on a Diablo level loot wise, simply because there weren't any item sets and there wasn't any need to hunt down the items to complete said set.

 

I agree I also didn't sell those items, or any of the items I forged, but that doesn't stop PoE from having loot variety.

 

That's called a false dichotomy, 'if you're not with me you're against me'.  Just because he likes BG1 does not mean he doesn't like BG2, he might prefer BG1 but still find BG2 fine.  Do you want more help understanding that concept?  Throne of Bhaal was a high level expansion but that was no reason for it to break with the loot paradigm of earlier games.  Requiring all opponents to have magical weapons to hurt you is either an example of bad design at that level or that you should not have been facing trash mobs at epic level anyway, since there shouldn't be enough epic level characters running around to be mere mobs.  So either ToB should not have given you such unbalancing powers as immunity to normal weapons or they should not have thrown trash mobs at you.  Bad design, which happens at epic levels since it's so hard to do.  And it's beside the point, the point was that many people DID complain about the overabundance of magical items and felt that detracted from the game, which is the point of the discussion here.

 

Oh, and you are wrong about the minimum level of ToB by the way.  If you started ToB with a new character you would enter it with a level 14 character, and even playing through SoA you could still get through it and start it quite low, level 18 being fairly common, so you didn't have to be level 20 to start it.

 

Dragon Age Origins was no Diablo and yet it had a loot system that forced you to upgrade and removed choice still.  Even the unique items were 'leveled' to your level when you found them, which meant that you had to then ditch the weapon eventually as it would be outmatched by the later weapons you found.  This removed choice, as it meant you just used the weapons as you found them.  The bonuses became meaningless as more powerful weapons had exponentially greater stats. 

 

Loot variety is good, no one is denying that, it's the abundance that is questioned, and the rate and power you get them.  Constant gaining of phat loot or picking up unique items you use with characters for the length of the game.

 

EDIT:  Correction, it's 2 million xp you start with in Throne of Bhaal new game, which puts you at level 16 for fighters, monks, clerics and barbarians, level 15 for mages and sorcerers, and level 19 for thieves and bards, and paladins, rangers and druids start at level 14.

Edited February 6, 2014 by FlintlockJazz

[Sarex]

Dude, you are intentionally being obtuse. Fine, let's do it like this. TrashMan did you like how loot was handled in BG2? Ok, so it was bad design, going overboard, whatever you want to call it, PoE is going to be a low level game so it isn't going to be a problem. So you missed the point of the discussion, like many other things.

 

Majority of the people who played the BG series at least imported from BG2>ToB. But ok you have proven me wrong, they didn't all start at a very very high level, some started at a very high level. Doesn't change the fact that you still need high level gear on your enemies. But again this is besides the point, PoE is going to be a low level game.

 

Good thing this is a "spiritual successor" of the IE games, and the enemies aren't going to scale.

 

So I will say it again, TrashMan was talking about not wanting the end game loot being magical, not just the quantity of the loot, I responded that it would be a bad idea. BG2 hit the sweet spot with the loot, what it failed at was that so much of the end game loot were swords, IWD2 did this much better.

[teknoman2]

the thing is not to put certain items on the main path of the game. the "legendary sword of ultimate destruction" should be in a place far off the beaten path, where you have to shed sweat, blood and tears to get to... not in the hands of an enemy you have to face for the main quest. or even worse, have him hold a normal sword and have this in his chest

you cant have the item description say "this item was used by a hero 1000 years ago and it disappeared with him at the end of his quest, never to be seen again..." and the item to be sold in a shop like it's nothing important

[Silent Winter]

I don't want to be upgrading my weapons/armour every few fights, but I do like finding special gear.

A nice variety of magical weapons (so not just swords) is good - not just +1/+2/+3 which becomes a no-brainer, but different weapons with their own advantage.   E.g: This sword has a 25% chance to inflict additional lightning damage, but this flail has a 40% chance to slow opponents or something.

[Sarex]

the thing is not to put certain items on the main path of the game. the "legendary sword of ultimate destruction" should be in a place far off the beaten path, where you have to shed sweat, blood and tears to get to... not in the hands of an enemy you have to face for the main quest. or even worse, have him hold a normal sword and have this in his chest

you cant have the item description say "this item was used by a hero 1000 years ago and it disappeared with him at the end of his quest, never to be seen again..." and the item to be sold in a shop like it's nothing important

I don't want to be upgrading my weapons/armour every few fights, but I do like finding special gear.

A nice variety of magical weapons (so not just swords) is good - not just +1/+2/+3 which becomes a no-brainer, but different weapons with their own advantage.   E.g: This sword has a 25% chance to inflict additional lightning damage, but this flail has a 40% chance to slow opponents or something.

 

That is exactly how it was in BG2, so I don't see what the big deal is.

[Hiro Protagonist II]

 

That is exactly how it was in BG2, so I don't see what the big deal is.

 

I agree. A lot of the best items in the game were off the beaten track. They were not on the main quest line and you had to do a lot of optional side quests to track down these items or components. It was the same in BG1. There were a lot of great magical items that you would never have found. I didn't find a lot of these items in BG1 until I read a walkthrough after completing the game. I can understand people's concerns but really don't understand the continual argument since PoE is also going to be a low level game.

[Gorbag]

I found BG1 to be almost right. Magis should be magical. Rare. Finding a magic item should be a moment of awe. ToB was horribel in that regard, given that it was raining +5 items left and right.

I think you are half right. Magic should be magical - in a low level campaign. But magic stops being magical when your characters gain enough levels to be able to stop time and summon planetars out the wazoo. And if you don't get to play around with such high-level abilities near the end of the saga, then you don't really progress and everything stays the same. Maybe abilities shouldn't go this crazy, but that's a different thing. What I mean is that it's just normal in-game evolution - you go from being awe-struck by a +2 weapon to being godlike 20 levels later. So I agree with Hiro Protagonist II about ToB - the loot is fine for a full-sized high-level campaign, it's just that ToB shouldn't have been an expansion. As it is, it hits you with everything it's got way too fast and it's over before you get to try out much of it.

To be clear, I like how the loot is handled in all three (yep three) Baldur's Gate games. And since PoE would be a low level campaign, I wouldn't mind seeing something in the vein of BG1 at the beginning and going just below BG2 in the mid-late game (i.e. BG1 with a bit more variety in the latter part of the game, when your characters' abilities build up a bit).

[teknoman2]

the design and placement of the items should be made in a way that makes you consider one over the other and allows you at the same time to just go on with what you have if you think it's the right thing for you, without presenting things that make what you have (or whatever else you may find) look obsolete

and as for the fantasy book/movie example where the heroes find a magical weapon and stick with it, if you take the hobit and lord of the rings, how many actual magical weapons are there in it? the swords of the nazgul, anduril, the sting, maybe the bow of legolas and the staffs of Gandalf and Saruman... when every weapon around is normal, you stick to the one magical you happen to find.

[Lephys]

In a way, I think a good idea might be to (not exclusively, mind you, but generally) have the spiffy, found "upgrade"-type equipment loot simply be augmentative components, kind of like materia in FFVII. Basically, you COULD just find better relics/magical artifacts that you could then "socket" into your weapon to improve it or grant it strategically useful capabilities (give it water damage in an area heavily populated by fire-type enemies, to use a horribly simple example), etc.

 

You still wouldn't want to find them every 5 feet or anything (Diablo/Borderlands style). But, the whole aspect of finding unique magical power (versus a mundane item) would be separated (mostly) from the finding of weapons and such, in general. And, you could still have reasons to use a different weapon, at some point, without having a flat-out weapon progression (dagger -- dirk -- kris -- DEATHKNIFE).

 

Anywho, I'm just observing the potential use of that aspect. Not any particular quantity frequency (as can easily come to mind from other games' implementations). I think that's kind of how Torment: Tides of Numenera is doing it (with a lot of your most powerful stuff being constructed out of lesser relics/devices/items).

[Sarex]

the design and placement of the items should be made in a way that makes you consider one over the other and allows you at the same time to just go on with what you have if you think it's the right thing for you, without presenting things that make what you have (or whatever else you may find) look obsolete

and as for the fantasy book/movie example where the heroes find a magical weapon and stick with it, if you take the hobit and lord of the rings, how many actual magical weapons are there in it? the swords of the nazgul, anduril, the sting, maybe the bow of legolas and the staffs of Gandalf and Saruman... when every weapon around is normal, you stick to the one magical you happen to find.

 

So does that mean that we should model the magic system around LoTR too. That means almost no wizards, and magic being used rarely, ie. no fireballs and flashy stuff. In LoTR magic is used rarely because every time you use it there are consequences to it, while in PoE magic is flung around constantly. For every world there is a chosen setting, so I don't really see a problem in there being lots of magical items in PoE.

Edited February 7, 2014 by Sarex

[FlintlockJazz]

Sarex, stop with the strawmanning attempts please.  The title of the thread is Common Pitfalls of cRPGs game to avoid, we are discussing what we consider to be common pitfalls RPGs often make, one of which happens to be that many games often have what people consider an overabundance of magical items.  This does not mean that BG2 had too many magical items, you were the one who made the claim that others were saying that when they did not, but rather whether RPGs in general often do or not.  Some people like having weapons that are more meaningful that they carry through the game without being forced to swap to a weapon or armour they don't like in order to satisfy some sense of 'item progression'.  If you don't like that, if you prefer constant loot upgrades like in Borderlands, then fine, but don't resort to strawman or condescension (which considering the fact that it appears that it's you who doesn't actually understand the people you are arguing with due to your strawmanning it just makes you look like a **** to be honest).

 

Now lets get back to the actual topic instead of going round in circles over this one point.

[Sarex]

Sarex, stop with the strawmanning attempts please.  The title of the thread is Common Pitfalls of cRPGs game to avoid, we are discussing what we consider to be common pitfalls RPGs often make, one of which happens to be that many games often have what people consider an overabundance of magical items.  This does not mean that BG2 had too many magical items, you were the one who made the claim that others were saying that when they did not, but rather whether RPGs in general often do or not.  Some people like having weapons that are more meaningful that they carry through the game without being forced to swap to a weapon or armour they don't like in order to satisfy some sense of 'item progression'.  If you don't like that, if you prefer constant loot upgrades like in Borderlands, then fine, but don't resort to strawman or condescension (which considering the fact that it appears that it's you who doesn't actually understand the people you are arguing with due to your strawmanning it just makes you look like a **** to be honest).

 

Now lets get back to the actual topic instead of going round in circles over this one point.

 

I am trying very hard to stay polite, because I am positive that you can't be that limited of understanding. TrashMan said and I quote "I found BG1 to be almost right.". Now we know that BG1 and BG2 are polar opposite on the loot scale. If you need proof for this I have links with pictures and everything. So that means, and pay careful attention here because this is the important part, that he thinks that BG1 handled the loot a lot better. Also I only replied to other peoples strawmans, so I really don't see any attempts on my part.

Edited February 7, 2014 by Sarex

[Hiro Protagonist II]

This does not mean that BG2 had too many magical items, you were the one who made the claim that others were saying that when they did not,

 

I agree BG2 went too monty haul 

 

 

like in BG2 that you mention

 

Personally, there were items in BG1 that shouldn't have been there at all. But even so, those high level items didn't detract from the game imo. BG:EE made it even worse.

 

[FlintlockJazz]

 

Sarex, stop with the strawmanning attempts please.  The title of the thread is Common Pitfalls of cRPGs game to avoid, we are discussing what we consider to be common pitfalls RPGs often make, one of which happens to be that many games often have what people consider an overabundance of magical items.  This does not mean that BG2 had too many magical items, you were the one who made the claim that others were saying that when they did not, but rather whether RPGs in general often do or not.  Some people like having weapons that are more meaningful that they carry through the game without being forced to swap to a weapon or armour they don't like in order to satisfy some sense of 'item progression'.  If you don't like that, if you prefer constant loot upgrades like in Borderlands, then fine, but don't resort to strawman or condescension (which considering the fact that it appears that it's you who doesn't actually understand the people you are arguing with due to your strawmanning it just makes you look like a **** to be honest).

 

Now lets get back to the actual topic instead of going round in circles over this one point.

 

I am trying very hard to stay polite, because I am positive that you can't be that limited of understanding. TrashMan said and I quote "I found BG1 to be almost right.". Now we know that BG1 and BG2 are polar opposite on the loot scale. If you need proof for this I have links with pictures and everything. So that means, and pay careful attention here because this is the important part, that he think that BG1 handled the loot a lot better. Also I only replied to other peoples strawmans, so I really don't see any attempts on my part.

 

Please don't bull**** me, you are in no way trying to be polite, what with your constant attempts at trying to portray me as lacking understanding when I try to confront your false dichotomy.  BG1 and BG2 are in no way polar opposites on the loot scale and you're the only one to have made that claim in your attempts to strawman.  Diablo, Borderlands, and World of Warcraft would be polar opposites.  Either you are completely ignorant and lack understanding yourself or you are deliberately trying to strawman because you are so invested in this, and I don't believe you are ignorant (you can take that as a compliment) which leads me to conclude that it's sadly the latter, so there's really no point in arguing with you any more.

[Sarex]

Please don't bull**** me, you are in no way trying to be polite, what with your constant attempts at trying to portray me as lacking understanding when I try to confront your false dichotomy.  BG1 and BG2 are in no way polar opposites on the loot scale and you're the only one to have made that claim in your attempts to strawman.  Diablo, Borderlands, and World of Warcraft would be polar opposites.  Either you are completely ignorant and lack understanding yourself or you are deliberately trying to strawman because you are so invested in this, and I don't believe you are ignorant (you can take that as a compliment) which leads me to conclude that it's sadly the latter, so there's really no point in arguing with you any more.

 

Easy way to sort this problem, ask TrashMan.

 

As for Diablo, Borderlands, and World of Warcraft, why are you even mentioning them? How are they connected to this argument, are they CRPGs? Now that is a strawman argument. Also to illustrate my point because you obviously need pictures, here you go:

BG1:

http://mikesrpgcenter.com/bgate/melee.html

http://mikesrpgcenter.com/bgate/armor.html

http://mikesrpgcenter.com/bgate/ranged.html

http://mikesrpgcenter.com/bgate/wands.html

vs BG2:

http://mikesrpgcenter.com/bgate2/armor

http://mikesrpgcenter.com/bgate2/weapons.html

http://mikesrpgcenter.com/bgate2/wands.html

Edited February 7, 2014 by Sarex

[FlintlockJazz]

I would like to apologise to people in the thread: my intent originally was to just point out that liking BG1 did not mean disliking how the loot was done in BG2, but I allowed Sarex to get to me and my subsequent posts became more aggressive in response to their's.  It's not what I wanted to do, and it probably made the thread take an even worse direction than it was already taking, and it's not the side of me I like, and so I apologise and step back.

 

Sarex, I think your definition of cRPG is wrong but I suspect you already know that and it will be waste of time to further debate this or the links you posted.  If you thought I was attacking you with my first reply then I apologise as that was not my intent at that point.

[teknoman2]

 

the design and placement of the items should be made in a way that makes you consider one over the other and allows you at the same time to just go on with what you have if you think it's the right thing for you, without presenting things that make what you have (or whatever else you may find) look obsolete

and as for the fantasy book/movie example where the heroes find a magical weapon and stick with it, if you take the hobit and lord of the rings, how many actual magical weapons are there in it? the swords of the nazgul, anduril, the sting, maybe the bow of legolas and the staffs of Gandalf and Saruman... when every weapon around is normal, you stick to the one magical you happen to find.

 

So does that mean that we should model the magic system around LoTR too. That means almost no wizards, and magic being used rarely, ie. no fireballs and flashy stuff. In LoTR magic is used rarely because every time you use it there are consequences to it, while in PoE magic is flung around constantly. For every world there is a chosen setting, so I don't really see a problem in there being lots of magical items in PoE.

 

of course not, it would be like asking to feed the dog without opening the bag of dog food. all im saying is that there needs to be a balance on how big the difference in power should be between the items, making various items a viable choice at any given moment, and not the no brainer +3 is better than +2

[Sherr]

 

 

the design and placement of the items should be made in a way that makes you consider one over the other and allows you at the same time to just go on with what you have if you think it's the right thing for you, without presenting things that make what you have (or whatever else you may find) look obsolete

and as for the fantasy book/movie example where the heroes find a magical weapon and stick with it, if you take the hobit and lord of the rings, how many actual magical weapons are there in it? the swords of the nazgul, anduril, the sting, maybe the bow of legolas and the staffs of Gandalf and Saruman... when every weapon around is normal, you stick to the one magical you happen to find.

 

So does that mean that we should model the magic system around LoTR too. That means almost no wizards, and magic being used rarely, ie. no fireballs and flashy stuff. In LoTR magic is used rarely because every time you use it there are consequences to it, while in PoE magic is flung around constantly. For every world there is a chosen setting, so I don't really see a problem in there being lots of magical items in PoE.

 

of course not, it would be like asking to feed the dog without opening the bag of dog food. all im saying is that there needs to be a balance on how big the difference in power should be between the items, making various items a viable choice at any given moment, and not the no brainer +3 is better than +2

 

 

dont u think its pretty obvious? As somebody mention this was already done almost perfectly in SoA (except to many swords maybe). I think point of this tread is to show to devs some problems thats always hitting IE games. Like 1d12 two-hand with 1d10 one hand weapons.