Level cap and pacing

[Lephys]

A level cap is necessarily, most of all, because an un-level cap could fall off your character's head.

 

 

Okay okay, seriously... I have a feeling that, while your level is going to play a big part in things, the vast majority of difficulty in the game is going to come from the player's dynamic use of the resources at hand to tackle a given obstacle.

 

Kinda like FTL gameplay. Even if you go 2 sectors without finding a store, you can use what you DO have in other ways to compensate for what you've yet to procure (be it weapons, or new ship systems, etc.). Not always, but heavily so. Not the absolute best example, I know, because there's quite a bit of luck involved in FTL, depending on which ship you use, etc.

 

But, yeah, I think only the combats pushing the absolute ceiling of your current capabilities are going to change so much from a sheer level gain. For instance, a given encounter might be unbeatable by your party at level 10, but beatable at level 11. But, it's probably not going to go from "unbeatable" to "piece of cake! 8D!". Or, it might be beatable, but pretty tough (lots of clever, precision micromanagement and specific effort on your part) at level 10, then not-so-bad at level 11.

 

Long story short, I think the main deciding factor is going to be how you handle your tools, more so than what level your tools are (which will still be a factor, as sometimes you don't even have certain tools -- spells and abilities and talents -- without that certain level).

[Hassat Hunter]

@ Osvir;

Most likely they will do an auto-save before boss-fight ala Baldur's Gate II.

I cannot expect a RPG that's storydriven, with sequels and expansions coming, to continue on after the endgame.

Just too many variables will need to be changed. All those people giving information about the end need to acknowledge you did kill the main baddy, etc. etc.

 

with an objective based xp and with no xp for individual kills, it's possible. you cannot grind xp... there is a limited amount in the game and is hand placed. so if the target level is 12. you can put in just enough xp to make a character reach it with about 80-85% of the game's content explored, and if you want you may allow someone who completed 100% of the game except for the final boss, to be lv13

Yes, it's definitely possible.

The question, however, is it WISE to do so. To super-balance and number tweak yourself in a corner. To me, it would be not. It would limit yourself on pacing, balancing, side-quests, bonusses.

The kind of planning required, the potential balance and pacing bumps; It just seems to me a pure cap allows you a much better handle on those, than a "there can only be xxxx XP given in the entire game, take your piece of the pie".

Imagine there's an infinite XP bug in launch (not an unlikely scenario)... you're screwed with your plan. Imagine some XP boosts might be bugged, and the player cannot even reach lvl 12 normally.

A cap would just allow "you get this much XP with the MQ" and then give out XP as desired on side-quests, not confined to the rigid inherence limits of "Max XP - Main Quest XP"

 

Yes, I heavily support Objective XP over kill XP, but I think this would kind of take it a step too far.

[rjshae]

A level cap is necessarily, most of all, because an un-level cap could fall off your character's head.

 

 

Tip of the hat, sir.

[kanisatha]

 

 

I haven't really been following this too closely but is it a hard cap?

 

They're going with a Baldur's Gate formula from what I understood: hard cap with different level caps unlocked by eventual expansions or sequels. I personally don't mind, I prefer low level D&D anyway and a huge amount of levels could either make the "numbers" grow out of control or simply devalue levelling itself.

 

 

I agree with this.  I would much prefer less levels in the game as you get more power gain from each level.  In the IE and NWN games you would level, and be ready to get into combat to try that new spell you got from getting level 3 spells unlocked, or to try that new feat out, or to see if you can go back and finally unlock that chest.  In most modern games with leveling systems that are higher, like Skyrim, you level up and you are barely any more powerful than before (woopity doo!!!  I do 3% more damage with power attacks!) so it feels like the same thing it did 5 minutes ago.  Although, Skyrim's Feat system made this a little better than some IMHO, but only when the Feat in question made a significant change like the 2 handed casting feats or the feat where healing restored stamina.  Certain feats made you feel powerful others though... yawn.

 

I want leveling to matter.  It is a very gratifying experience to feel more powerful immediately after leveling, and many games throw this out of the window for a higher number for the sake of a higher number.

 

I am glad Obsidian is going for a lower number here.  It will also mean we won't have to reboot our character every sequel (crosses fingers) to the game like the ME series.  That was something that truly irritated me from the very beginning of ME2.  Although, at least ME2 tried to explain it through the story.  ME3 just did it and didn't care if it made sense.

 

This.

 

Leveling should be for players to make some conscious choices about the direction of their characters and not merely for automatic increases of points in some aspects of characters (hit points, attributes, saves, etc.). Fewer but meaningful level-ups is better than many empty level-ups (like in the later stages of the DA games).

[Osvir]

@ Osvir;

Most likely they will do an auto-save before boss-fight ala Baldur's Gate II.

I cannot expect a RPG that's storydriven, with sequels and expansions coming, to continue on after the endgame.

Just too many variables will need to be changed. All those people giving information about the end need to acknowledge you did kill the main baddy, etc. etc.

 

I agree, I don't expect the game to continue after "it ended". What I am speaking about is fan-content, quests, NPCs, items, you name it. In the context of custom content, post-ending could be a good place to put it. What I'm asking about is whether or not Obsidian will allow us to unlock an open ending in the game files/scripts or whatnot. There could be some [end game now] code that could be overrided. 

 

Here's some examples:~ concepts~

 

1. Original game content

||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||| - Ending

 

2. Modding - Overriding Ending ~continued custom Story (made by fans/

||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||

 

3. Baldur's Gate Modded:

||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||

 

Of course, 2 & 3 could be combined. Furthermore, #2 is a longer game but #3 is simply a fatter game.

[Osvir]

And of course, how could I forget as appropriate to the thread:

I am speaking about adjusting the level cap. To be able to modify the value and end up with a level 20 level cap. A bit of a repetition but:

If the original game has 12 levels worth of content, then modifying the level cap to 20, you'd need 8 levels more worth of content. Where would it make most sense to be able to insert more content if you could go to level 20? Post-ending in my opinion. There are other variations to it as well, you could insert lots of content during the game and make your character go to level 20, and simply modify the last boss to scale better against a level 20 party and such.

The simplest method though, is (I think) to allow modders to "unlock" an end-game post-ending where content could be inserted.. this is all level cap thoughts~

[J.E. Sawyer]

 

Will the game be beatable without reaching max level? Will the game be too easy if you do reach max level?

 

Usually a concern of mine. It's difficult to find a balance between ensuring non-completionist players can still finish the game (perhaps with difficulty) but still challenge players who have done it all and are as strong as they can be.

 

Yes, the game should be beatable without reaching max level.  We're unlikely to tune the ending up for higher level characters, but we do have side content that is going to be tuned for characters at the upper limit of advancement and gear.

[Hassat Hunter]

@ Osvir; And for the x-pack, sequel then? What if you got a hacked up char who didn't progress as the actual gameprogression went "officially"?

[Bryy]

Haven't we discussed this before? Not that it matters, I suppose.

 

Let's say 40-80 hours of play time and twelve levels; that's one level up per ~3-6 hours of play. Seems fine.

I'm prolly gonna do my usual first playthrough as my "F Around" playthrough.

 

Second playthrough will be my "Set Up For PoE 2" playthrough.

[Aedrin]

I dislike level caps in more recent RPGs for the reason that I become more conscious of breaking my character than actually immersing myself. Especially when there are only so many perks, feats or what not to go around but a wealth of playing options. I feel like Elder Scrolls games are the worst culprits in this regard.

Having said that, I felt that BG, in my decade old memories at least, didn't offer much in way of compelling development when you levelled up. Often it was 'Level Up', no new points to assign, 'Click to Finish'. I would like some choices at regular intervals but none that could potentially harm your ability to finish the game, if that makes sense?

[darthdraken]

A very low level cap..... 12. A major off put is the caps.

 

I like developing my character.

Maybes many moons from now a person would mod the game.

[Allvaldr]

 

I hope a rather flat rate, but am not super happy there's a level cap to begin with.

There's optional content and I'd guess that optional content also yields XP, more or less.

 

So either 1.) the game is set so, you'll hit the cap only when doing all the optional content,

or 2.) you'll hit the cap not doing any of the optional stuff and doing the optional stuff makes you hit the cap midgame.

 

Neither is very appealing, but I'd prefer 1.)

But then there's the talents and no doubt there'll be something way sweet as the talent of last level.

Meaning you better drudge through every damn fetch&carry, 17 thousand rat tails to the blacksmith, no prob.

I'd say it'll actually be 3.) you'll hit cap doing some of the optional stuff.  You won't max doing just the storyline but you won't need to scavenge for every last xp.  I'm fine with this, means I can put some stuff off for other playthroughs and not feel like I am gimping myself, and the low level cap avoids power creep and avoids excessive leveling for what is supposed to be a series of games we are going to be carrying a character forward through.  Better to keep the levels low rather than give us too many levels at the start and then have to top it.  Hell, it's already higher than what was in BG1, that game only really took you to level 9-10 and that is with an expansion pack that increased it!

 

 

System 3 is what I prefer as well. A speed run of only the main quest shouldn't max out your levels IMO, but neither should you have to do every little ratcatching quest just to get there.

 

That said, I prefer to reach level caps at around 80% to latest 90% of the story mode. Because I've got almost no doubt they'll have abilities in game that require max level to use. And unlocking a special ability so late that you're then only allowed to use it once during the final boss fight is a pretty ****ty thing IMO.

[Frenzy-kun]

I prefer 12 levels where on each of them you really earn a substancial boost than 100 levels where you notice the boost every 5 levels. After all, you have 6 team members, which means you will level up 72 times. Once every 2 to 3 hours of game (though it's not uniform).

 

About the level cap, I have contrasted feelings. At first, when you cap before the end of the game, the last part of the game loses a bit of interest. You know you won't be able to keep leveling up, ergo the XP loses it's rewarding value, and you already have your playstyle, that you will keep repeating over and over.

 

On the other hand, I hate when you level up to take out the optional most difficult boss to get the best weapon... which is pointless because you have no need of it anylonger. If the final boss is easier than the optional boss will be a piece of cake.

 

I think most of those issues are solved with a solid postgame. Competitions. PvP and arenas as a way to test your skills. Extra bosses and challenges helps for the people who don't want MP.

[Lephys]

About the level cap, I have contrasted feelings. At first, when you cap before the end of the game, the last part of the game loses a bit of interest. You know you won't be able to keep leveling up, ergo the XP loses it's rewarding value, and you already have your playstyle, that you will keep repeating over and over.

I think the key, as pointed out here, is to make sure the late-game/toughest optional stuff provides good enough reasons to do it in the event that you have reached the level cap and XP no longer functions as a reward.

 

Earlier quests in the game can be heavily "90% of your reward is XP, and 10% is money or loot or something," but, the more likely it is you're going to complete something after you've capped, the more significant the non-XP reward needs to be for it.

[rjshae]

A very low level cap..... 12. A major off put is the caps.

 

I like developing my character.

Maybes many moons from now a person would mod the game.

 

It's entirely a matter of how much you advance at each level. Yes, if you're used to a game like WoW, 12 is pretty low. But this isn't WoW. The early gold box game Pool of Radiance had a level cap of 8. Baldur's Gate had a level cap of 7; then 9 with the Sword Coast expansion. 12 seems pretty decent by comparison, plus we'll be getting the expansion later on.

[juanval]

 

A very low level cap..... 12. A major off put is the caps.

 

I like developing my character.

Maybes many moons from now a person would mod the game.

 

It's entirely a matter of how much you advance at each level. Yes, if you're used to a game like WoW, 12 is pretty low. But this isn't WoW. The early gold box game Pool of Radiance had a level cap of 8. Baldur's Gate had a level cap of 7; then 9 with the Sword Coast expansion. 12 seems pretty decent by comparison, plus we'll be getting the expansion later on.

 

I prefer low level caps for a first game. In my opinion, slow levelling pace is better, because you can taste better any time one member gains a level. I remember Baldur's Gate: I loved the moments when I saw a yellow cross in my characters's portraits . Furthermore, in the PoE expansion we can continue progressing with higher levels.

 

On the other hand, in Icewind Dale 2, there were too many levels that I didn't care if a warrior was at level 18 or 20. The levelling up pace was so high that I didn't enjoy the level-up feature in this game.

[Caerdon]

In BG1, most characters could reach level 8 and you had easily 100 hours worth of content. That's about 14 hours of play for every level-up.

 

That was great.

 

Leveling up every two hours is incredibly lame. Either a single level makes absolutely no difference or you grow way too powerful by the endgame.

[Messier-31]

 

A very low level cap..... 12. A major off put is the caps.

 

I like developing my character.

Maybes many moons from now a person would mod the game.

 

It's entirely a matter of how much you advance at each level. Yes, if you're used to a game like WoW, 12 is pretty low. But this isn't WoW. The early gold box game Pool of Radiance had a level cap of 8. Baldur's Gate had a level cap of 7; then 9 with the Sword Coast expansion. 12 seems pretty decent by comparison, plus we'll be getting the expansion later on.

 

 

The highest level of any character is 12, but on a normal non-completionist playthrough, the characters will not reach 12th level.

 

Source: http://forums.obsidian.net/topic/65074-level-cap-and-pacing/page-2?do=findComment&comment=1421141

Edited March 27, 2014 by Messier-31

[Suburban-Fox]

Personally, I'm hoping for a much slower pacing, and being only able to hit the level cap if you, literally, do absolutely everything possible. I often feel that modern RPGs level you far too quickly, and require you to do very little to level up, which IMO, diminishes the sense of achievement when you do level up.

 

Take the first Neverwinter Nights, for example: by the time you finished the tutorial you were already level 3. Compare that with Baldur's Gate, where you were likely navigating the treacherous corridors of Nashkel's mines while still at "I die as soon as you sneeze on me" level. In my opinion, this increased the level of danger throughout the campaign, and made gaining a level really something to be cherished.

 

I realise that I'm probably alone in this, and the majority don't want levelling to be that slow, but...maybe some middle ground?

 

Also, I have one other request when it comes to levelling: I would prefer it if they don't have us all level at exactly the same rate all the time. I'd much rather have characters levelling sporadically, and I prefer it when everyone's on a different level, and with different amounts of XP. Having everyone always level up simultaneously feels too contrived and artificial, and results in much longer levelling sessions as you have to go through each person all at once. I'm guessing all classes will level at the same XP amounts, but it'd be better if all characters didn't always have exactly the same amount of XP (even if they haven't done anything). XP needs to be earned, not given out because it's convenient, and if you leave Mr Level 1 sitting in a tavern for most of the game, he shouldn't suddenly have the same level of competence as everybody else as soon as you invite him along. I don't know about the rest of you, but I don't mind a bit of a level disparity between characters at all.

 

After all, I wouldn't be struggling to find a job if I could join any organisation and instantly become as competent as the people who have worked there for years. XD

[Mannock]

I realise that I'm probably alone in this, and the majority don't want levelling to be that slow, but...maybe some middle ground?

 

I agree with you do. For me, the pace of leveling is too fast in todays RPGs. It's less of an acomplishment if the levels come too fast.

 

But I have faith in the dev team. In some post, Josh indicated they had the pace of the leveling under consideration.

[BrainMuncher]

I've come to the conclusion over time that the best system of leveling is to have no leveling at all. With unchanging HP numbers characters could learn talents that increase tactical depth rather than increasing raw damage output. This, among other things:

 

- eliminates HP bloat

 

- eliminates the need for tier upon tier of better equipment

 

- eliminates any difficulties of scaling to high levels

 

- abilities, equipment, and monsters never become obsolete

 

- eliminates problems of early levels being disproportionately unforgiving due to low HP

 

- campaigns can be extended almost infinitely without becoming ridiculous

 

- content can be added retroactively to the beginning or middle of a campaign (eg. mods) without skewing the balance of later sections

 

- much easier to create, open, non-linear worlds

 

- a low experience character is still useful in a high-experience party, instead of missing 95% of the time and failing every skill check

 

- a high-experience character in a low-experience party doesn't break the game

 

- static, predictable HP numbers means better overall balance

 

- a god will still be godly no matter how many goblins you defeat

 

- increases in power can be more directly linked with the game world, rather than arbitrarily spaced level ups triggered on random kills. For instance, finding a tome somewhere and learning a new spell from it, as opposed to just suddenly becoming better at magic after killing a wolf

 

 

I would never suggest to remove leveling from PoE, it just... would never be accepted. But i do think that certain types of RPG-like games will (very slowly) move in this direction over time. Ironically, the rest of the world will probably continue moving in the opposite direction, with leveling pervading everything. Especially with the increasing prevalence of free-to-play* games, coupled with the corporate gaming psychology machine having folded the concept of leveling into the cynical "addiction reward loop".

[Bryy]

A very low level cap..... 12. A major off put is the caps.

 

I like developing my character.

Maybes many moons from now a person would mod the game.

Why is that automatically low? It just means the game has been balanced for a low number.

 

And mods would ruin it, since it is at 12 for a reason. Importing a level 30 into PoE2 would most likely screw up.

Edited March 28, 2014 by Bryy

[Suburban-Fox]

I've come to the conclusion over time that the best system of leveling is to have no leveling at all. With unchanging HP numbers characters could learn talents that increase tactical depth rather than increasing raw damage output. This, among other things:

 

- eliminates HP bloat

 

- eliminates the need for tier upon tier of better equipment

 

- eliminates any difficulties of scaling to high levels

 

- abilities, equipment, and monsters never become obsolete

 

- eliminates problems of early levels being disproportionately unforgiving due to low HP

 

- campaigns can be extended almost infinitely without becoming ridiculous

 

- content can be added retroactively to the beginning or middle of a campaign (eg. mods) without skewing the balance of later sections

 

- much easier to create, open, non-linear worlds

 

- a low experience character is still useful in a high-experience party, instead of missing 95% of the time and failing every skill check

 

- a high-experience character in a low-experience party doesn't break the game

 

- static, predictable HP numbers means better overall balance

 

- a god will still be godly no matter how many goblins you defeat

 

- increases in power can be more directly linked with the game world, rather than arbitrarily spaced level ups triggered on random kills. For instance, finding a tome somewhere and learning a new spell from it, as opposed to just suddenly becoming better at magic after killing a wolf

 

 

I would never suggest to remove leveling from PoE, it just... would never be accepted. But i do think that certain types of RPG-like games will (very slowly) move in this direction over time. Ironically, the rest of the world will probably continue moving in the opposite direction, with leveling pervading everything. Especially with the increasing prevalence of free-to-play* games, coupled with the corporate gaming psychology machine having folded the concept of leveling into the cynical "addiction reward loop".

 

I do agree to some extent, actually. There are two main problems with the "levelling up" mechanic:

 

1) hitpoint bloat (as you already stated), however this can be reduced. If you only gained between 1 and 3 hitpoints every time you level up, you'd still get "tougher", so to speak, but not ridiculously so. In fact - and I realise that I may be causing a rift in the space-time continuum by saying this - this is one thing that 4th edition got about right!!   Except you still started with too much HP so as to make early encounters not much of a threat. Part of the fun in BG, in my opinion, was the risk of you getting one-shotted, and the fact that almost all wounds were significant (not like in Dragon Age, where you can shrug off everything until you get to half HP).

 

2) people expect something every time they level up, otherwise they feel cheated. This creates the problem of handing out abilities to the point where they become too numerous to be meaningful. A continuous increase in attack bonus will result in such a ridiculous power disparity between new and veteran characters, and unless defence increases equally proportionally, you'd get to the point where things quite literally never miss, because they're adding 15-20 to each D20 roll, or whatever. A reduced to-hit bonus progression would help this (D&D5e has the right idea here - I think the maximum you can ever get is +5!). Maybe, if combined with a steady increase in defence and damage potential, it might help characters to maintain a steady rate of improvement without causing balance problems at higher levels.

 

Also, there's a Neverwinter Nights 2 server that has an interesting system: once you get to level 6, you gain no more levels, but instead gain additional feats as you level up. Not that I'm suggesting we do this (really, there's no need when Obsidian can pretty much write the levelling system from scratch), but it also helps get rid of HP and AB bloat while still allowing players to feel that they've gotten something in return for their hard work and efforts.