Split Party

[siril_dana]

My topic is ignore, maybe because of my lack of comunication skills in english lenguage.

In previous IE games you could go to a house or some taverns or indoors with one character leaving the others outside to roam free or do other stuff, such as go to other places, I mean you could split the party, that doesn't seem to work in PoE. What's up with that?

[Shdy314]

In the BG's you could not do this. Area transitions required the whole party. The games are infamous for reminding you of this. I do not recall if PS:T or IWD did let you.

[Sarex]

In the BG's you could not do this. Area transitions required the whole party. The games are infamous for reminding you of this. I do not recall if PS:T or IWD did let you.

 

He is not talking about area transition, he is talking about going in to houses(as an example) with only one character.

[Shdy314]

Ah I see. Perhaps a limitation of the unity engine? A good question for the devs.

 

I think it is because every map is being treated as a discrete area while in the IE games interiors were loaded with the map. That is a total guess on my part.

Edited August 20, 2014 by Shdy314

[siril_dana]

Lets say that I want to explore a town, you send your party to diferent areas of this town, one to the top, another to the middle and so on. There is no way to make a fast center on a character you want with hotkeys, assuming that you use the default, if you press namber one two times (one to select the character, a second time to go where he is) in your keyboard it should center the screen in your main character. You can't do this as it is right now. Lets say that you are in the edge of the town already explore and you want to go to the other side, so you click the destination, you have to follow your characters manualy with the mouse or arrow keys, my sugestion is that if you press and hold the key of the character you want to follow, the camera automatically follows that char. Also, a repeated thing that bugs me: when one character visits the inn, other go to a shop and so on (currently you can't, if you enter a building everybody must go with in), please revisit this!

[Zansatsu]

"You must gather your party before venturing forth."

 

I like the idea of centering the camera. Anytime you will need to load you will need all your party members. That probably won't change.

[Silent Winter]

I found this useful in places like Baldur's ship on werewolf island - sending an invisible character up first to scout and maybe disarm traps, or to draw the enemy down into an ambush.  Anywhere with an area that was very small and it would be hard to maneuvre the party for best defense once the battle started.  (also BG had a nasty habit of putting your mage in the front-lines when you went through a door like that.

[bigsun123]

I also found it useful for thieving, I recall there's a quest in BG1 where you have to steal from a house and it's a whole lot easier to move one thief without getting caught than an entire party, especially before the Flaming Fist arrives to kill everything because you looked at a bookshelf.

[siril_dana]

I hope the do something about it.

[siril_dana]

Maybe the engine can't handle it, but since the IE could, I don't know why this is not in UE. Maybe a dev can answer this to me if its not too much to ask.

[siril_dana]

Care about this!

[Silent Winter]

^we do, but until a dev pops in with a 'yay' or 'nay' , there's not much to add to the discussion.

Splittable parties are a good idea.

Nobody disagreeing = thread not active.

[Caerdon]

You must gather your party before venturing upstairs.

[siril_dana]

^we do, but until a dev pops in with a 'yay' or 'nay' , there's not much to add to the discussion.

Splittable parties are a good idea.

Nobody disagreeing = thread not active.

I see.

[Silent Winter]

^maybe if there were a poll, more people would venture their opinion.  Forumites like polls

[siril_dana]

I don't even know how to make one! I'm a lame forum user
Thanks for the tip though!

[Silent Winter]

I think there's an option if you start a new thread but once the OP is locked (uneditable) I don't think you can add one.

Yep - on the right side as you start new topic there's a 'manage poll' button - you need to add Q's to make the poll

[constantine]

I too agree with the idea to be able to split your party.

 

 

After all, it's only natural to do so !

[siril_dana]

I hope the take notice on this, the devs.

[bon007]

I was also pissed off that like enter into the house is automatically follow me the rest of the team. This makes it very difficult explorations of the city

[Crowseye]

I support the capability to split the party on a given primary map.   It gives the player numerous additional role-playing options without requiring any writing or quest design on the developers' part.  The player's rogue can head out into the night while the party is "resting" at the inn and steal from the locals (and might be forced to confront them himself if he gets caught).  Characters can be set to stand guard when an NPC is being confronted by the rest of the party.  A paladin in the party can make a heroic sacrifice to hold off the attackers while the rest of the party escapes (this can be a fitting way to dump a character from the party "in story").  And so on.  This type of player-driven gameplay is completely in the spirit of the role-playing experience and should be permitted here IMO.

 

I do those types of things when playing the IE games, so I don't consider the suggestion one of those "It sounds cool, but players don't really play like that" things, which do come up often in game design.

[siril_dana]

I support the capability to split the party on a given primary map.   It gives the player numerous additional role-playing options without requiring any writing or quest design on the developers' part.  The player's rogue can head out into the night while the party is "resting" at the inn and steal from the locals (and might be forced to confront them himself if he gets caught).  Characters can be set to stand guard when an NPC is being confronted by the rest of the party.  A paladin in the party can make a heroic sacrifice to hold off the attackers while the rest of the party escapes (this can be a fitting way to dump a character from the party "in story").  And so on.  This type of player-driven gameplay is completely in the spirit of the role-playing experience and should be permitted here IMO.

 

I do those types of things when playing the IE games, so I don't consider the suggestion one of those "It sounds cool, but players don't really play like that" things, which do come up often in game design.

I like the way you explain it.