Your RPG system sucks!

[Nanakamado]

I only wanted to say: I like the system It's so much better than D&D.  And I like the combat it is not to hard, maybe sometimes there is to many creatures for game where there is no combat exp.

But I prefer  cRPG with easy fights and good story

[Maydawn]

Sawyer says that you can easily ruing a character in D&D by not specing it properly. Well how is this any different? I can't make a basic class worth a damn with this stupid system you guys devised, just gimmick builds.

 

How does this game not force you into play styles? You basically always have to sneak into battle. You pretty much have to crawl around sneaking everywhere, which is a PITA.

 

I don't sneak into battle, unless I accidentally stumble into enemies when looking for traps, and ended up having Durance as my sneak / mechanics guy

 

Your non-tanks are beyond squishy. Monks have to get hit in order to use their skills/powers? That's ****ing stupid beyond belief! Almost every fight my rogue/monk/wizard get dropped. The tanks can't hold aggro. It's just bad design all around. Yet again, this shows the major problem with paid betas when its the fanboys telling the devs what they want to hear instead of giving them the criticism they need to hear.

 

A wizard is supposed to be squishy. Design and use a formation that puts your more squishy members at the rear. Aggro is an MMORPG term. If this was "Real" no way in hell I'd stay and fight a full plate fighter with a shield instead of going on a flimsy wizard.

 

And trying to manage a party of 6 in real-time combat is patently absurd - even at slow speed. All it does is result in spamming the space bar pauses. DOS is infinitely better with its turn-based combat.

 

The spell system and spells themselves are terrible. Fights happen so fast that de/buffs are basically pointless because the fight is over by the time the spell is cast. It also makes most food/potions/scrolls useless in that regard as well. The spell times should be instant - seeing as you get so few spells to actually cast anyway and mana doesn't play a factor. And durations on all that stuff should be upped by a factor of 10 at least. I should be able to have those buffs going for an entire map. Otherwise, it's just camping after every encounter - and that's way too expensive at low levels.

 

The spell system is fine. Fighting "trash mobs" isn't supposed to take a long time. I try to RP, and avoid using spells unless they are per encounter, or I really need to and the fight is hard. That way, you don't end up having to rest after each silly fight. Having buffs going for an entire map ? Are you serious ? what's the point of that ? go lolbuffed into battle and faceroll everything ? you're supposed to use tactics to fight. positions your party properly, and use the limited spells in as smart and as effective way as possible.

 

There are so many things I *hate* about the system you designed. Why did you try and reinvent the wheel? Yes, D&D is far from perfect but it's a damn sight better than this rubbish. And that's the real shame of it just completely takes the fun out of the game and destroys all the hard work that was put into the beautiful artwork and excellent writing. I've loved most all of Obsidian's work - and Black Isle before that - down through the years, but this is really just awful, awful stuff.

 

I hope you guys can do a follow-up for Fallout 4 a la FNV. I'll at least look forward to that - so long as it doesn't use this crappy system.

 

I replied with Italics. I have to say tho, I don't think the game balance is perfect, far from it. I'd love it if they upped the endurance on mobs and party by roughly 50% across the board, to make them a bit less short. Monks are in a bad shape at the moment, the wounds mechanics isn't working, atleast when you try to RP and not have him wear full plate. I run with a Cipher, and they are too strong. Everything just melts with a couple of Mind Blades per fight.

 

This game really does need tweaking, and balancing. But do not expect this to be a single-player MMORPG experience with pause/real time mechanics. Aggro doesn't and shouldn't exist. Buffs shouldn't last an hour / entire map.

 

Just to note where my game experience comes from: I play as a Cipher, not power played. Balanced stats, no 3 INT / 3 resolve / max might nonsense. I play on hard, close to finishing Defiance Bay. I run with Eder, Aloth, Durance, ranger girl, and kana.

[aspikbardamu]

I do not get one thing,

 

If you are not able to manage this system that you criticize so much,

There is an EASY difficulty level for people like you so JUST USE IT and no need to sneak or think!!

Majority of people complaining about micro management just want to look cool doing the game on normal or hard so they prefer that developers will change how the system is built for their little conveniences when majority of people are asking and enjoying the MICRO MANAGEMENT PART, sneaking or not is not the question.
How people would complain about BG2 and the fact you need to pause all the time in hard difficulty?
No one would do it at this time...
the new generation or even the old one getting so much used of this assistance that a little challenge cannot be handled anymore.

Please Obsidian/Paradox stay as you are and do the next episode following the same rules just adding a bit more classes/spells/items.

[JRRNeiklot]

 

 

 

 

 

1. Having a front-line to hold back enemies while your remaining party members support has been a standard choice for table-top and CRPG games for years.

 

Sure, but your damage output didn't scale inversely to your ability to TAKE damage.  The fighter has always been the best damage dealer, outside of AOE effects.  Now my fghter has to just sit there and take it up the ass while some squishy that dies from a spitball gets all the glory.  May as well be playing WoW.

 

What? No, that's crazy. Magic (and psionic users) have been out-damaging fighters and barbarians at max level for decades in D&D, both AoE and single target, and it holds true in a large chunk of western RPG's that are based on a Tolkien/D&D style setting. It's actually part of the reason 4th Ed ended up like it did; they were trying to undo decades of screwing the physical combatants and make them actually worthwhile all the way through to level 20.

 

http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/LinearWarriorsQuadraticWizards

 

Really?  A first level fighter with a long sword and an 18 strength in D&D does 1d8+2 damage.  A wizard does 1d4+1 with a magic missile.  At 7th level, the fighter gets an extra attack, for a possible 2d8+2, the wizard can do 4d4+4, about even, but the wizard  can only keep that up a  maximum of 4 times a day.  The fighter can double that output with a decent dex.  You make me laugh.  Until 3e, magic users were NEVER king of the hill.  Sure, they have meteor swarm, but it took 2 rounds to cast and a three year old with a rock could interrupt it.  I've seen that trope, and while it's humorous, it's a spheric cow.  In a vacuum, wizard are very powerful, but in reality most of their spells take too long to cast to be that useful in combat.   3e did away with casting times and 4e just turned every one into a magic user. 

 

Yeah this isn't how you play D&D.  And there's quite a bit of middle ground between meteors and a level one magic missile spell.... like, oh say fireball.  At 7th level like your fighter it's a whopping 7d6 damage in a 40' diameter sphere.  In 2e Wizards were gods.

 

And how many times can your wizard cast said fireball?  Also, a sword swing cannot be interrupted.  Come play in my game.  Wizards are excellent, but very far from gods, even at high levels. 

[Monte Carlo]

 

Yet again, this shows the major problem with paid betas when its the fanboys telling the devs what they want to hear instead of giving them the criticism they need to hear.

 

There was a lot of criticism in the beta.

 

 

And much of it was pretty savage. Then there were guys like Sensuki who basically became a one-man QA juggernaut.

 

Srsly, there were some people who liked the system but there were plenty who didn't. I have my own views, some mixed, but of all the places to point blame the BB ain't one of them.

[Arsene Lupin]

I remember the same sort of thing in Divinity: Original Sin. I'd see someone posting, "This game is terrible because it forces you to play like X," and I'd go, "Huh, I've never even tried to play that way in 50+ hours."

 

It's like... some gamers can't quite think properly.

[Hatred]

This thread is less fun than that "other thread" everyone is posting in. I am having fun with this forum game but I kind of want to stop being in stupid arguments too. Oh well.

My 2 cents which I am typing in everywhere in the forums is that the XP gain is a bit off. Its too easy to out level stuff. If they fixed this and made the AI a weee bit smarter about not all just doing a dance around your tank in a circle I would be a happy man again.

Ok that last bit was a lie but I would stop complaining about this game at all.

[Monte Carlo]

^ this game needs a level 15 cap.

[Hatred]

tbh from my perspective they need to scale the leveling speed down. If they let you get to 15 they would certainly need to increase the challenge a fair amount. I've spent the last two days playing the forums because the game got so boring.

[RedSocialKnight]

 fanboys telling the devs what they want to hear instead of giving them the criticism they need to hear.

 

Really? I saw a lot of critical response to the Beta -- particularly to the attribute system, combat XP etc. Sawyer stuck to his guns in many cases, and made modifications in others.

 

One point of agreement: yes, perpetually speed-sneaking is a little irritating. Really I don't she why trap detection shouldn't just be a constant passive for those with sufficient skill. There's no meaningful in-game trade-off to having it on or off other than player convenience.

 

Personally, I do always sneak into fights, but there's no reason parties have to be built that way -- you mention that you have a rogue, and obviously sneak attacks are a style of play suited to rogues. But a party that had (for example) a front line of two fighters and a paladin, and a back row of two ciphers and a priest should have very little trouble just rolling into combat without too much maneuvering beforehand. The design of the game does make control of the battlefield central one way or another -- and that's a feature I like a lot.

 

The rest of what you're saying I just can't agree with at all. The magic system is great. I rely on buffs, debuffs, and CC constantly -- I don't know how I'd get through fights without them. And my offensive spellcasters, Aloth and a PC cipher, are according to stats my primary damage dealers by a comfortable margin.

[Bayzent]

<**** I agree with>

 

And trying to manage a party of 6 in real-time combat is patently absurd - even at slow speed. <More **** I agree with>

 

The game is Real Time with Pause, meaning you are supposed to pause every X number of actions and select the orders, doing some micromanagement.

 

About the rest of the post, I agree with most of it so no issues there. You get used to the Magic and skills system, but it is obscure as ****, at least to me...completely unintuitive compared to AD&D or 3.5e (Which is what I played back in the day)...

[Eggnog]

I, for one, look forward to Halsy's musings and rants.  I don't often know what he's on about, or why, but he's at least amusing so there's that.

[Brimsurfer]

Except that the game can't be managed in real time, I agree with everything else OP has mentioned.

 

Specially non-tank characters are horrible.

[Katarack21]

[Nenaraz]

I registered here out of a revolt to the topic. 

Why would you hate this beautiful game? In a sea of overused, overpriced bullcrap games and so few PC titles nowadays which are completely Indie-based spawns, you bash on it's best attribute - the system. 


You know, the writing is so amazing that I didn't even think about the System itself until you wrote about it, but here I am, registered and wanting to say that it's absolutely fluid in regards to a game like this. 

Art-wise it reminds me of Sacred Gold games, that particular feat alone is amazing. I got so happy to actually play this wonderful game where people with talent actually DID something great for the "ol skul" enthusiasts and here you are - bragging NOT about how the game wants you to think and use Stealthy actions, but in fact how the ENTIRE RPG SYSTEM sucks. Obvious troll, but still gets me revolted. Joking around with this is what I'd consider vaguely banal and immature to the point of disappointment.  
I started playing it on Easy. 

First thing - I like the level of freedom. Instant-reminder of Temple of Elemental Evil that I so enjoy. BIG +
As for the Pause system, it doesn't give you 29348679356193864 commands to execute for each member, you have to use your skills proportionally. It's very nicely done to the point where it feels like a simple, yet complex cRPG. 
Different mechanics for damage types, nice. Mathematics work, yep yep yep. Rogue looks amazing, probably is going to be OP with the given mechanics but then again I choose a Wizard. It's exactly how I wanted him to be.

NO RUSHING, enjoying each moment of the game. Slowly moving behind a tree in the dark, feeling the atmosphere, immersing myself into the story. YES, THIS IS cRPG! IT FEELS GOOD. 

And then the writing comes. Oh, yes, the writing is one of the best I've seen in YEARS. Instantaneously got me reminded of Lone Wolf series followed by the amazing eloquence used in Legacy of Kain series, and more. Gave me so much inspiration and energy. Do you know what new game can accomplish that? There's no such a game.

I consider myself having some pretty high demands for a game for it to be called "A VIDEO GAME" by me and this falls into a category of a VIDEO-GAME. It has aesthetics, it has a character, it has its own place on a cRPG pedestal, it's a classic already and I'm going to give it to anyone who's even remotely interested in books, fantasy novels, epic fantasy in all honesty and so much more. 

Then the replayability comes to my mind, so many different options which DON'T FEEL like forced railroading as seen in, I don't know, games like Vampire the Masquerade? I don't want to feel like my actions will lead to a very scripted and already evident course of action. I mean, I started talking to a bandit leader about LORE and HISTORY, telling about the religion and its ways and in such a despair I could sense that he got angry for me ruining his traditional and blindfolded convictions where he did what was a precipice of his life - attack me and die violently by a stab of a Rogue I just saved. 

But then, the stories are written as they go, there's that randomness that doesn't feel forced or sandboxed - wow I said, this really has that dark yet happy sensation I felt when played Silver on Dreamcast. 

You know, bashing on this game is quite possibly the last thing you'd want to do as a PC gamer. A Proper PC gamer. Farewell.

[luzarius]

Sawyer says that you can easily ruing a character in D&D by not specing it properly. Well how is this any different? I can't make a basic class worth a damn with this stupid system you guys devised, just gimmick builds.

 

How does this game not force you into play styles? You basically always have to sneak into battle. You pretty much have to crawl around sneaking everywhere, which is a PITA.

 

Your non-tanks are beyond squishy. Monks have to get hit in order to use their skills/powers? That's ****ing stupid beyond belief! Almost every fight my rogue/monk/wizard get dropped. The tanks can't hold aggro. It's just bad design all around. Yet again, this shows the major problem with paid betas when its the fanboys telling the devs what they want to hear instead of giving them the criticism they need to hear.

 

And trying to manage a party of 6 in real-time combat is patently absurd - even at slow speed. All it does is result in spamming the space bar pauses. DOS is infinitely better with its turn-based combat.

 

The spell system and spells themselves are terrible. Fights happen so fast that de/buffs are basically pointless because the fight is over by the time the spell is cast. It also makes most food/potions/scrolls useless in that regard as well. The spell times should be instant - seeing as you get so few spells to actually cast anyway and mana doesn't play a factor. And durations on all that stuff should be upped by a factor of 10 at least. I should be able to have those buffs going for an entire map. Otherwise, it's just camping after every encounter - and that's way too expensive at low levels.

 

There are so many things I *hate* about the system you designed. Why did you try and reinvent the wheel? Yes, D&D is far from perfect but it's a damn sight better than this rubbish. And that's the real shame of it just completely takes the fun out of the game and destroys all the hard work that was put into the beautiful artwork and excellent writing. I've loved most all of Obsidian's work - and Black Isle before that - down through the years, but this is really just awful, awful stuff.

 

I hope you guys can do a follow-up for Fallout 4 a la FNV. I'll at least look forward to that - so long as it doesn't use this crappy system.

 

I was running into the same exact problems as you.  You're trying to play too fast, you need to slow down.

 

Do this:

 

1. start up a new game

2. set it to normal difficulty + trial of iron (healthy pressure will keep you trying as hard as you can)

 

When exploring unfamiliar territory make sure your entire party is sneaking around. When you find an enemy, start setting up your party members into an ideal position.  Take your time with this and fun setting up.  Then when you're ready have someone make a ranged stealth attack.  The enemies should start coming after you, but they should engage your tank first.

 

Don't let your tank run towards them, just keep him still, let the enemy come towards your tank.  Once your tank is swarmed by a few enemies, have your mages in the back do AOE attacks on the enemy.  GO SLOW and think about it like a chess match.

 

If your mages get enemies attacking them, have the mage cast freeze on the enemy and THEN disengage and run around a corner or something.

 

I see that you like to play in real time, I wouldn't bother with that, the game is far more enjoyable if you pause.

 

Now before you call me a noob, I enjoyed playing kotor 1, mass effect 1-2-3 and dragon age origins in real time, but given how the camera works in this game over looking your entire party, treat it as a tactical chess match. Trust me, you'll have fun.

 

GO SLOW, PLAY SLOW and think while pausing. Just try it.

[Mungri]

There's one major flaw to criticizing development choices and that is that the devs aren't going to listen to you. Its a pointless and futile waste of energy.

 

Its best to just play the game as it is given and work with that. PoE is a perfectly good IE style game and feels fantastic to play, unless you're not into this type of game in which case why aren't you playing Call of Duty?

[broknight]

Well the game does have probs, like spot check available only in stealth mode, enemies with insane attack speed, and other Sawyerisms but you'll just have to work around them until the next game. Like I mentioned in the Diablo3 forums waaay back devs/creators tend to do the opposite of what you want just to prove a point. With that said the only real way to make them listen is to punish them by not buying. I'm currently trying to get the most out of the game as it is.  Its also easy to break stuff in the game like engagement. If you roll a paladin with Zealous Charge you can pull enemies and attack stragglers when they head back to position after you've outrun them.

Edited April 5, 2015 by broknight