Experience point system in the beta and onwards

[Zombra]

Find the contradiction. I. explained. the. benefit. And this explanation did not deviate one iota even 5 posts later.

You then proceeded to jump down my throat when I said they didn't do it because it was good for the game (according to you).

 

If resource management was the only reason they went with this system, then they did not go with this system because they thought it would be good for the final product.  Therefore according to you this is a subpar system which was only done because it was quick & easy, not because they believe in it.  That's fine if that's your point of view, but ... it's stupid.  The reward system is central to how this game is going to play.  They didn't just throw this together because they didn't want to bother doing it like in the IE games.  They wouldn't deliberately half-bake their own product like that.  And honestly kill XP would have been piss easy to implement if they'd wanted to.

 

 

 But for someone like you who sees kill XP as a roadblock to role playing, removing it does not sub-par the system at all. It apparently does the opposite: makes it better.

Yeah - someone like me, and someone like Josh Sawyer.  That's why they did it.

Edited August 25, 2014 by Zombra

[Stun]

If resource management was the only reason they went with this system, then they did not go with this system because they thought it would be good for the final product.

Sure they did. Being able to inexpensively control level advancement pace in an open world game is, to some people (like Josh "Balance" Sawyer), good for the final product.

 

Have you not been listening even to what your side has been saying in these half-dozen or so 20+ page threads?

Edited August 25, 2014 by Stun

[RedSocialKnight]

 

Why are you liking that post 

 

I guess I was misunderstanding his point..? 

 

I... I thought you liked me...

 

But actually I don't think we do disagree, or not much. The option I picked on the poll was quest XP plus significant objectives. It really does seem weird to have entire mini-dungeons like that shade lair providing no XP at all.

 

So much so that I suspect it may just be something that hasn't yet been completely implemented. An eleaborate location like that should have a sidequest associated.

Edited August 25, 2014 by RedSocialKnight

[Ganrich]

That dungeon has sections completely cut off for beta purposes.  I am guessing it is of a spoiler-y (to the core story in the game) nature.  So, we cannot finish it, and thus cannot get XP for it.

[BrokenMask]

That dungeon has sections completely cut off for beta purposes.  I am guessing it is of a spoiler-y (to the core story in the game) nature.  So, we cannot finish it, and thus cannot get XP for it.

I thought the dungeon was just bugged?

[Ganrich]

I have heard both ways. Trying to find where I read it was sectioned off. I will link it if I can find it.

 

Edit: ignore the previous post. I can't find where I read it, and a bug is equally, if not more so, likely.

Edited August 25, 2014 by Ganrich

[IndiraLightfoot]

With over 200 votes in the poll now, the standings are like this:

-44% wishes to see combat xp or very fine-grained xp (per encounter, per successful action)

-29% wants quest xp or at least wide-berth objective xp

-27% are sticking to some middle-ground, with exploration xp and objective xp per dungeon and such.

[Azrael Ultima]

With over 200 votes in the poll now, the standings are like this:

-44% wishes to see combat xp or very fine-grained xp (per encounter, per successful action)

-29% wants quest xp or at least wide-berth objective xp

-27% are sticking to some middle-ground, with exploration xp and objective xp per dungeon and such.

You could also read that as ~89% of participants aren't happy with only quest xp.

 

Problem is that this poll isn't representative. Mind, this doesn't just mean number of participants, but also criteria for how they are selected(which for this poll, isn't happening at all).

[IndiraLightfoot]

Azrael: Absolutely. I was just dropping some feedback on it. It has no real merit as far as statistical analysis goes.

[Msxyz]

 

With over 200 votes in the poll now, the standings are like this:

-44% wishes to see combat xp or very fine-grained xp (per encounter, per successful action)

-29% wants quest xp or at least wide-berth objective xp

-27% are sticking to some middle-ground, with exploration xp and objective xp per dungeon and such.

You could also read that as ~89% of participants aren't happy with only quest xp.

 

Problem is that this poll isn't representative. Mind, this doesn't just mean number of participants, but also criteria for how they are selected(which for this poll, isn't happening at all).

 

I think it is quite representative. Eve if it's only ~250 persons who voted out of the 71000 backers, the sampled population is composed of persons who care enough about this game to follow the forums and that probably also pledged quite a hefty amount of money to access, among other things, the beta.

 

The general opinion outside this forum about Pillars of Eternity it's either: "Pillars of what?!?" or "it will be like BG2 in a different setting".

[Immortalis]

 

With over 200 votes in the poll now, the standings are like this:

-44% wishes to see combat xp or very fine-grained xp (per encounter, per successful action)

-29% wants quest xp or at least wide-berth objective xp

-27% are sticking to some middle-ground, with exploration xp and objective xp per dungeon and such.

You could also read that as ~89% of participants aren't happy with only quest xp.

 

Problem is that this poll isn't representative. Mind, this doesn't just mean number of participants, but also criteria for how they are selected(which for this poll, isn't happening at all).

 

 

We sort of thought of the poll last minute.. although I think it does represent a problem with the current system.. the in's and out's of the poll are not exact. (To be honest any forum poll is questionable at best.. we don't know how many voters are actually legitamate people OR how many of those people even played the beta.)

 

It was just a visual key to show if people were happy or not in broad strokes.. looking for anything deeper then that isn't gonna happen.

 

Also a lot of votes are being skewed by bugs which is honeslty stupid.. I think a lot of people like a system and when it doesn't work out it was easy to blame bugs and still sit in that camp.

 

On the other side maybe people thought the current system sucked because it wasn't working correctly also due to bugs... although this has largely been stated as not the case by Skeeter.

Edited August 25, 2014 by Immortalis

[Immortalis]

 

 

With over 200 votes in the poll now, the standings are like this:

-44% wishes to see combat xp or very fine-grained xp (per encounter, per successful action)

-29% wants quest xp or at least wide-berth objective xp

-27% are sticking to some middle-ground, with exploration xp and objective xp per dungeon and such.

You could also read that as ~89% of participants aren't happy with only quest xp.

 

Problem is that this poll isn't representative. Mind, this doesn't just mean number of participants, but also criteria for how they are selected(which for this poll, isn't happening at all).

 

I think it is quite representative. Eve if it's only ~250 persons who voted out of the 71000 backers, the sampled population is composed of persons who care enough about this game to follow the forums and that probably also pledged quite a hefty amount of money to access, among other things, the beta.

 

The general opinion outside this forum about Pillars of Eternity it's either: "Pillars of what?!?" or "it will be like BG2 in a different setting".

 

 

Althought I don't 100% agree because we don't know that every voter was also a backer.. I will say based on some comments in this thread that you are mostly right.

 

A lot of people assumed that the game will be like IE.. then played the beta then showed up in this thread confused wtf was happening. (those people were gold level backers)

Edited August 25, 2014 by Immortalis

[Mayama]

 

Althought I don't 100% agree because we don't know that every voter was also a backer.. I will say based on some comments in this thread that you are mostly right.

 

A lot of people assumed that the game will be like IE.. then played the beta then showed up in this thread confused wtf was happening. (those people were gold level backers)

 

 

I would assume that gold level backers are really interested in the game. So it makes me wonder why they did not found that out earlier, reading the blog, interviews and watching videos would have made it clear in which direction the developer want to go.

[Immortalis]

 

 

Althought I don't 100% agree because we don't know that every voter was also a backer.. I will say based on some comments in this thread that you are mostly right.

 

A lot of people assumed that the game will be like IE.. then played the beta then showed up in this thread confused wtf was happening. (those people were gold level backers)

 

 

I would assume that gold level backers are really interested in the game. So it makes me wonder why they did not found that out earlier, reading the blog, interviews and watching videos would have made it clear in which direction the developer want to go.

 

 

As I already said.. people avoid this type of stuff because of spoilers.. Beta may be many peoples first look at what Obsidians defination of an IE inspired game looks like.

 

I personally would not be here if I hadn't stumbled across Tim Cains interview.. I have avoided almost all gameplay videos.. I don't want ANY spoilers.. unfortunately hearing about the xp system made me want to get involved.

 

Of course the minute you said assume you had to know you couldn't possibly assume anything..

Edited August 25, 2014 by Immortalis

[IndiraLightfoot]

Then you had people like Silent Winter, me and many others that took "objective xp" to mean a more fine-meshed, sensitive and complex system, instead of the way it turned out to work in the beta (no blogs, no heads-up, about that - i.e., what dev Sking described sternly as "quest xp only" in a passing post in another thread.

Edited August 25, 2014 by IndiraLightfoot

[Mayama]

 

Of course the minute you said assume you had to know you couldn't possibly assume anything..

 

and thats the problem,  everyone thinks that the IE experience means something different

Edited August 25, 2014 by Mayama

[Immortalis]

 

 

 

 

Of course the minute you said assume you had to know you couldn't possibly assume anything..

 

and thats the problem,  everyone thinks that the IE experience means something different

 

 

Wait what? You just totally changed the meaning of that quote.. I also have no idea what you mean..

Edited August 25, 2014 by Immortalis

[Gfted1]

Since my beta is bugged to hell I cant even figure out what Im supposed to be seeing wrt XP rewards. I have yet to be able to turn in a single quests (even when Im staring at the Ogre Head and Ogre Blood in my inventory!) so how does it work for those of you that have seen it work? Is it a single XP dump only when you turn in the quest? For example, in the Ogre quest do you only receive XP when youre done and go back to see the farmer or do you get increments during the process of clearing the cave, killing the ogre, killing the spider queen, etc...?

[IndiraLightfoot]

It's the same beta for everyone, heh! After nearly ten hours, and a number of quest items, I have yet to see any xp at all. I have never levelled up. Best thing would be if any of those that have fill us in here.

[PrimeJunta]

Not a single dump, but close. Also it's easy to miss getting XP as it appears to only show up in the combat log. I did get 1500 XP once when entering the ogre cave. I noticed that because I leveled up.

 

The XP rewards are grossly inflated in the BB just so we can level up a few times to get a feel for what it's like.

 

Edit: I made it to level 8 with my Bulbous the Muscle Wizard playthrough. Exploited the bejeezus out of the item duplication bug so I didn't end up naked and grimoire-less, and was super-careful to always load from the main menu so I didn't lose my quests.

 

Am running out of steam a bit with these bugs by now, BTW. Wanted to go back to a barbarian earlier today, but got the "stuck character" bug in the very first fight upstairs of Dracogen, went :headdesk: and quit. Once they've got the worst of those sorted I'll give everything another whirl.

 

Edit edit: Wall of Fire is bugged. No friendly fire, which currently makes it a WIN! button. Reported that too.

Edited August 25, 2014 by PrimeJunta

[Immortalis]

Not a single dump, but close. Also it's easy to miss getting XP as it appears to only show up in the combat log. I did get 1500 XP once when entering the ogre cave. I noticed that because I leveled up.

 

The XP rewards are grossly inflated in the BB just so we can level up a few times to get a feel for what it's like.

 

Edit: I made it to level 8 with my Bulbous the Muscle Wizard playthrough. Exploited the bejeezus out of the item duplication bug so I didn't end up naked and grimoire-less, and was super-careful to always load from the main menu so I didn't lose my quests.

 

Am running out of steam a bit with these bugs by now, BTW. Wanted to go back to a barbarian earlier today, but got the "stuck character" bug in the very first fight upstairs of Dracogen, went :headdesk: and quit. Once they've got the worst of those sorted I'll give everything another whirl.

 

Edit edit: Wall of Fire is bugged. No friendly fire, which currently makes it a WIN! button. Reported that too.

 

Im liking your post because of your patience and bug reporting.. not cause im glad the game is buggy..

[Helm]

 

With over 200 votes in the poll now, the standings are like this:

-44% wishes to see combat xp or very fine-grained xp (per encounter, per successful action)

-29% wants quest xp or at least wide-berth objective xp

-27% are sticking to some middle-ground, with exploration xp and objective xp per dungeon and such.

You could also read that as ~89% of participants aren't happy with only quest xp.

 

Problem is that this poll isn't representative. Mind, this doesn't just mean number of participants, but also criteria for how they are selected(which for this poll, isn't happening at all).

 

Even if every backer voted for "something other than quest only XP" it still wouldn't change anything, because Sawyer thinks this system is perfect.

[BrokenMask]

Even if every backer voted for "something other than quest only XP" it still wouldn't change anything, because Sawyer thinks this system is perfect.

 

<_< How about you cite your sources on that? Both on Sawyer thinking its perfect and that being cause of why it will never be changed?...

[Helm]

 

Even if every backer voted for "something other than quest only XP" it still wouldn't change anything, because Sawyer thinks this system is perfect.

 

<_< How about you cite your sources on that? Both on Sawyer thinking its perfect and that being cause of why it will never be changed?...

 

Does it even matter?

 

There will never be an official vote and Sawyer will never change the xp system either. I hope you enjoyed my hyperbole though.

[Msxyz]

 

 

Even if every backer voted for "something other than quest only XP" it still wouldn't change anything, because Sawyer thinks this system is perfect.

 

<_< How about you cite your sources on that? Both on Sawyer thinking its perfect and that being cause of why it will never be changed?...

 

Does it even matter?

 

There will never be an official vote and Sawyer will never change the xp system either. I hope you enjoyed my hyperbole though.

 

 

I would be very surprised if he will. There is a reason, after all, why some people are now calling PoE Josh's Dream RPG. There are too many things 'out of place' (for a lack of better term) in this game to be called 'a spiritual successor to the IE games'.

 

I will reaffirm this concept again: the lack of combat XP alone doesn't make or break this game... but it's just the tip of the iceberg.