Max Level

[kryadan]

So I was watching the videos in a seperate thread (http://forums.obsidian.net/topic/70742-here-is-my-first-video-of-a-series-of-video-of-the-backer-beta-for-those-wo-bb-access/) and the narrator mentioned all skills up to level 12. 

 

I assume that is the max during the beta, so any idea what the max is for the released version? How far in are you Beta players getting into the game ?

[Leferd]

It's 12.

[Heijoushin]

Hoping for something higher? I'm pretty sure this was discussed somewhere else, but basically the leveling up pace is a little slower, like older D&D games. 

[kryadan]

Oh okay. Well I did just fine with BG etc I just don't remember the leveling back then and in Guild Wars it stopped at 20 heh.

 

Thanks!

[TrueMenace]

So I was watching the videos in a seperate thread (http://forums.obsidian.net/topic/70742-here-is-my-first-video-of-a-series-of-video-of-the-backer-beta-for-those-wo-bb-access/) and the narrator mentioned all skills up to level 12. 

 

I assume that is the max during the beta, so any idea what the max is for the released version? How far in are you Beta players getting into the game ?

Thanks for watching my videos

 

Max level in the final game will be 12. I just used a cheat in the beta to get there for demonstration purposes. 

 

It's actually not a low number for these reasons.

 

Your not just leveling 1 party member. You are leveling your companions/adventurers (6 total!). Leveling is a slow process, and each time you level, you gain A LOT of power (new talents to explore, new abilities, higher skill's so you can tackle harder areas). And that is multiplied by 6 for each character in your party! So don't fret, although the game is massive, the leveling process I believe is intelligently handled and lets you feel like you are getting more powerful when you hit that shiny + button on your portrait

 

Games like Dragon Age Inquisition are terrible because you don't feel any powerful the level before you. The leveling system is "diluted" and all you really care about is that one skill point to put towards a dumb tree. (sorry I hated that game). But you get my point

[Stun]

^ Plus the level itself (12th) hits that ideal sweet spot. Speaking from the perspective of the IE games, it's the Icewind Dale middle ground, which I particularly loved.

 

BG1 capped your party at around 8-9 (10 for rogues) - Which was ok, I guess, but it often times felt so boxed in and limited. Then came Bg2, which went crazy with the high teens early 20s for the base game (and up to 40th level(!) with throne of Bhaal.) So the experience went from "boxed in" to "totally out of control munchkin-fest".

 

Icewind Dale did it right. With a party of 6, you ended the vanilla game at around 12-13th level. It felt perfect. If you built your party right you entered the last chapter of the game feeling authentically powerful, but without that "We are GODS!" feeling that comes from having more skills than you would ever need or bother to use.

Edited March 7, 2015 by Stun

[hajlife]

It would be great if the game offered something that's just a little *more*. I don't mean that the level 12 cap is too low, not at all. What i would like to see however is something along the lines "if you squeeze out everything from the game, all the side quests, all bestiary entries, etc. you can reach that one level higher" 

[TrueMenace]

It would be great if the game offered something that's just a little *more*. I don't mean that the level 12 cap is too low, not at all. What i would like to see however is something along the lines "if you squeeze out everything from the game, all the side quests, all bestiary entries, etc. you can reach that one level higher" 

Keep in mind, there are most likely going to be quests in the game that grant us rare talents that otherwise could not be found. Also, the expansion will add lots more levels, new talents, and abilities. I mean, take a look at the grimoire book. There are spell levels beyond 6th level spells! Obsidian already prepping for dat expansion!

[Osvir]

 

It would be great if the game offered something that's just a little *more*. I don't mean that the level 12 cap is too low, not at all. What i would like to see however is something along the lines "if you squeeze out everything from the game, all the side quests, all bestiary entries, etc. you can reach that one level higher" 

Keep in mind, there are most likely going to be quests in the game that grant us rare talents that otherwise could not be found. Also, the expansion will add lots more levels, new talents, and abilities. I mean, take a look at the grimoire book. There are spell levels beyond 6th level spells! Obsidian already prepping for dat expansion!

Underline = In need of clarification. I haven't heard/read anything like that...

 

But if it's genuine then I would believe maybe +1, tops +2, levels (capping at 13-14). Because adding more levels means (most likely) more abilities, adding more abilities means (most likely) new enemies, new VFX, new balancing. Plus there's supposedly going to be more areas, which needs to be filled with some sort of content, quests, NPC's, enemies, exploration, design and so on. Adding +3 to +4 levels (which I would call "A lot"), would be like creating/adding 1/4th or 1/3rd of the full game.

 

Then again, Obsidian said they wanted to make it an Expansion like it used to be so maybe it isn't too far-fetched to say +3 to +4 levels.

 

What's the Max Level in Icewind Dale adding it together with Heart of Winter? (Because I've read the max level for IWD is Level 30, but you won't get there). In Baldur's Gate I've read it is Level 40, but to get there it'd be a massive grind.

[Sonntam]

It would be great if the game offered something that's just a little *more*. I don't mean that the level 12 cap is too low, not at all. What i would like to see however is something along the lines "if you squeeze out everything from the game, all the side quests, all bestiary entries, etc. you can reach that one level higher" 

 

I do think that level 12 can only be reached if you do all the side quests. Otherwise you would finish the game being like level 10.

[Sock]

It would be great if the game offered something that's just a little *more*. I don't mean that the level 12 cap is too low, not at all. What i would like to see however is something along the lines "if you squeeze out everything from the game, all the side quests, all bestiary entries, etc. you can reach that one level higher" 

 

Do you mean numerically one level higher, or more like "a unique talent learned through a quest" being more than just level 12?

 

Cause personally, I'd love little things like that more. Like in BG1, you'd get those special abilities based on alignment from going through the main quest. 

[ISC]

 

It would be great if the game offered something that's just a little *more*. I don't mean that the level 12 cap is too low, not at all. What i would like to see however is something along the lines "if you squeeze out everything from the game, all the side quests, all bestiary entries, etc. you can reach that one level higher" 

 

I do think that level 12 can only be reached if you do all the side quests. Otherwise you would finish the game being like level 10.

 

 

yeah, we've been told at least that level 12 is only for completionist runs. I don't know about level 10 or where you'd end up but there you go That's prob a good thing, it would be incredibly annoying if you hit 12 with a lot of content left.

[Sedrefilos]

I believe Josh said it's around 8 if you go mostly critical path and 12 (lvl cap) if you go exploring.

[Sedrefilos]

I believe 12 lvls is not that bad in a party-based game 'cause you split skills and abilities between paty members. If it was a single character game, maybe you'd want more levels.

[Giantevilhead]

Leveling in PoE is probably going to be much more significant than in the Infinity Engine games. In those games, you don't even get to choose many abilities for most classes when you level. Mages get new spells and thieves get their skills but for all the other classes, all you get are some weapon proficiencies every few levels. You don't get to make many important choices when you level until you start getting epic level abilities.

[Luckmann]

I believe Josh said it's around 8 if you go mostly critical path and 12 (lvl cap) if you go exploring.

This is also my recollection. Level 12 is the level cap, but it depends on how much and what you do in the game. If you just go through the game, you'll get to level 8. If you're a completionist, you'll reach the cap.

 

Leveling in PoE is probably going to be much more significant than in the Infinity Engine games. In those games, you don't even get to choose many abilities for most classes when you level. Mages get new spells and thieves get their skills but for all the other classes, all you get are some weapon proficiencies every few levels. You don't get to make many important choices when you level until you start getting epic level abilities.

Many of the levelups for many of the classes in PoE is pretty much just "Click levelup, save skillpoints for next level, done", though.

Edited March 7, 2015 by Luckmann

[Sedrefilos]

Yeah, IE games had the most boring lvl ups ever unless you were a mage, sorcerer, druid or cleric so you could at least slect spells and stuff. Then it was semi-boring

PoE has numerous stuff at each lvl up.

[ryukenden]

I find leveling in bg1 very boring. It was slow and spells weren't cool until you reach level 3 wizard or something. Bg2 was amazing in terms of progression. Perfect balance.

 

Throne of baal ruined it. Great story but levels are out of control. I call it the Blizzard Entertainment effect. Both in WoW and D3, the scale is so different from vanilla. going from 60 to 61, the stats are nearly double from previous levels. It made previous progress worthless.

[Emerwyn]

Also from what I've been reading around, you can extend your party's power beyond the level cap by finding rare gear and enchanting it to the max. Level 12 might be the hard cap for the party's skill progression, but it's definitely not the power cap and I expect a fresh level 12 to differ much in terms of power from a level 12 that went through every optional/tough area, dungeon and encounter.

[Ineth]

I don't like level caps that you can easily hit before the game is over.

Because character progression is an important part of the RPG experience, and it's demotivating when it simply stops happening for the rest of the game.

 

Also, some of the replayability value of, say, Icewind Dale, imo comes from the fact that you can level faster and reach higher levels if you play with a smaller party or on higher difficulty. So battles play out differently compared to a "normal" playthrough, since you'll have better spells, but less of them per round. For some battles that makes things easier, for others harder. But it's different (in an interesting way), hence replayability.

 

I'm not sure why Sawyer/Obsidian feel the need to control the player's progression through this game so tightly, what with

• low level cap
• smaller parties getting hardly any extra XP per character
• no kill/trap/lock XP
• etc.

 

I realize it's easier to develop a game that plays out pretty much the same for every player (or every playthrough), and difficult to design a game where different playthroughs are allowed to diverge considerably and yet are all fun. But that's what should be expected of an RPG, otherwise it could've been made as an adventure game instead.

Edited March 7, 2015 by Ineth

[Ineth]

Then came Bg2, which went crazy with the high teens early 20s for the base game (and up to 40th level(!) with throne of Bhaal.) So the experience went from "boxed in" to "totally out of control munchkin-fest".

 

Out of control munchkin-fest? You make it sound like people got bored and CLUAConsole'd in a series of dragons just to see which two party members could kill them the fastest (while the other party members waited off screen)...

 

 

That, err, never happened!!!

[Stun]

 

Leveling in PoE is probably going to be much more significant than in the Infinity Engine games. In those games, you don't even get to choose many abilities for most classes when you level. Mages get new spells and thieves get their skills but for all the other classes, all you get are some weapon proficiencies every few levels. You don't get to make many important choices when you level until you start getting epic level abilities.

Many of the levelups for many of the classes in PoE is pretty much just "Click levelup, save skillpoints for next level, done", though.

 

Indeed. In fact, I'd argue that the only worthwhile difference between the IE games and PoE here is that PoE gives you access to "non class" talents every other level or so.

 

Lets not understate the significance of Level ups in the IE games. As mentioned, Mages got more spells and more spell castings. And thieves get points to put in their thieving skills. But that's hardly everything. Clerics get More spells, and more spell castings, and their fighting skills increase, and their turn undead ability gets more powerful. Druids get more spells and more spell castings, their fighting skills increase, and in the case of the Icewind Dales, they get shapeshift forms.

 

Bards get thieving skills, songs, more spells, and more spell castings. Paladins get more instances of their detect evil ability, their Lay on Hands gets more powerful, they get more spells and more spell castings, and their fighting skills improve. Rangers get more spells, more spell castings, their fighting skills improve, and their stealth increases. Fighters get better fighting skills and their HP improves *drastically* in comparison to other classes. Berserkers get what fighters get plus more instances of their berserker rages. Barbarians get what fighters get, plus more instances of their Barbarian rages. And Monks? Monks are a case study on "1 thousands steps to power". Their fighting skills improves, they do more damage with their fists, their AC decreases, their thieving skills increase, their movement speed increases, their magic resistance increases, they get quivering palm, they get more stunning blows, they get various immunities....etc.

 

And, of course none of this takes Icewind Dale 2 into account. IWD2 uses the 3e rule set, which does the same thing that PoE does with its talents and skills in addition to all of the above.

Edited March 7, 2015 by Stun

[anameforobsidian]

I don't like level caps that you can easily hit before the game is over.

Because character progression is an important part of the RPG experience, and it's demotivating when it simply stops happening for the rest of the game.

 

Also, some of the replayability value of, say, Icewind Dale, imo comes from the fact that you can level faster and reach higher levels if you play with a smaller party or on higher difficulty. So battles play out differently compared to a "normal" playthrough, since you'll have better spells, but less of them per round. For some battles that makes things easier, for others harder. But it's different (in an interesting way), hence replayability.

 

I'm not sure why Sawyer/Obsidian feel the need to control the player's progression through this game so tightly, what with

• low level cap
• smaller parties getting hardly any extra XP per character
• no kill/trap/lock XP
• etc.

 

I realize it's easier to develop a game that plays out pretty much the same for every player (or every playthrough), and difficult to design a game where different playthroughs are allowed to diverge considerably and yet are all fun. But that's what should be expected of an RPG, otherwise it could've been made as an adventure game instead.

 

This post is bizarrely negative and inaccurate:

1.  Low level cap?  It's higher than BG1 after the expansion, and this is having an expansion that raises the cap!

2.  Smaller parties get an extra 10% xp per character, that's not inconsiderable.

3.  There's de facto kill xp from the bestiary.  There's definitely trap xp because people keep complaining about it being in the game on the forums.

 

A game progression where you can end 50% higher in level and most of the content is sidequests is hardly a tightly controlled experience.  And level caps, though not my favorite, make sense given development realities.  It would suck to be playing a level 25 mage who stopped getting new spells at level 12.

[Luckmann]

I hadn't even heard of the "smaller parties gets extra experience"; that sounds odd and arbitrary as all hell. If it's 10% per character past the first, that means that soloing nets you an insane 50% experience increase.

 

That means it's going to be wonky beyond belief to balance in regards to available experience and the level 12 cap, for something that doesn't even make sense nor is warranted.

[Namutree]

I hadn't even heard of the "smaller parties gets extra experience"; that sounds odd and arbitrary as all hell. If it's 10% per character past the first, that means that soloing nets you an insane 50% experience increase.

 

That means it's going to be wonky beyond belief to balance in regards to available experience and the level 12 cap, for something that doesn't even make sense nor is warranted.

Considering in the IE games your experience is divided between each party member this new xp system is pretty tame.