No buffing outside of combat, why?

[Stun]

A Priest, a Chanter and a Paladin in your group will massively increase your effectiveness. Even just one will provide substantial group bonuses. This feels very different from IE-era stuff to me. (That's a good thing.) Buffs may be far shorter and you can't pre-buff, but those buffs are REALLY useful during actual combat.

Say what?

 

Are we playing different games? We must be. There is not a SINGLE buff in PoE that bestows anything more than a minor adjustment to a party's stats. This is Josh Sawyer's baby, lest we've forgotten. Sawyer is a disciple of the power-via-10,000-baby-steps school of game design. There are no hard counters in this game. None. Instead, the system in place is designed to allow for infinite bonus stacking. And good players can eventually stack enough minor bonuses upon themselves to make a noticeable difference. I see the appeal of such a design, but I see it for what it IS. It's the spreadsheet nerd's Ideal. But Lets not pretend that any individual buff is REALLY powerful in capital letters.

 

...Or that it even comes close to the IE games in terms of being game changing.

 

-In BG1, your 5th level Mage can cast Haste, which doubles the number of attacks everyone in your party (including your summons) get per round....for an extended period of time. While in PoE, your 5th level Wizard's Haste spell (deleterious alacrity of motion) lasts about 15 seconds and simply reduces the action recovery time by a couple of seconds.... OF ONE PERSON.

 

-In the IE games, your Cleric can cast Chaotic Commands, which makes its recipient IMMUNE to all mind effecting spells, like domination, fear charm, confusion, stun, paralysis etc...for minutes at a time. While in PoE your priest can.... not? There is no all-encompassing mind protection spell in PoE. Instead, once your priest reaches about 11th friggin level, he gets access to a spell that reduces the duration of charm and domination effects by a couple of seconds and gives you a +something bonus to save against such spells.

 

-In the IE games, Your mage can cast a single spell that makes him IMMUNE to the first 5 physical attacks that hit him. In PoE your Wizard can, at best, cast a spell that gives him a deflection bonus that expires the first time someone scores a hit on him.

 

-in the IE games, you've got Mass invisibility. A spell that makes everyone in your party totally invisible. Totally undetectable. In PoE, there's no such buff. Not even partially.

 

-In the IE games, there's a 1st level cleric spell that makes your entire party (and your summons) IMMUNE to fear, for an extended period of time. In PoE, I think there might 5th level priest spell that bestows a moderate bonus to your saves against fear... to everyone in a 2 meter radius.

Edited April 14, 2015 by Stun

[tinderbox]

I don't want pre-buffing; it was one of the most tedious facets of IE games (up there with making umpteen journeys to get that heavy ankheg shell to somewhere to sell).

 

Still, I do like the idea of a sequencer or contingency slot. I think that would add some tactical depth without trasforming pre-battle into a tiresome process select-spell, activate, rinse-repeat process. I think this could work as a compromise.

 

And yes, limiting buffing to battle does force harder choices. It's all about opportunity cost of an action within the battle itself. If I forgo the opportunity to attack in order to apply a buff (or heal) there is a cost -- the damage to the enemy that I forgo. Plus in the meantime, the enemy gets a chance to wail on me and do its own damage.

 

This is all just basic economic theory in action applied to your use of time inside battle. 

[Hiro Protagonist II]

This is really part of the probem. Not only is the system obtuse (I didn't even know this myself until this very day), but you don't even need to pay attention to it. You can just sorta bumble your way forward. Does the Cipher start with 100%, 50% or 33%? Doesn't matter, there's points, I'll do some stuff, oh look, success.

 

One of the biggest problems (and there are many) with this game is the rules system. The percentages, the decimals, the chaotic system of information. Here are some examples:

 

1. Action Speed

 

Comparing Eder and Durance. Action Speed and Recovery Time - are they the same thing? Who knows.

 

 

 

Action Speed

 

Eder has +3% and Durance has -3% Action Speed.

 

What are these percentages based on? Is it how fast they hit in a turn? Is it based on recovery time? And how much is that in seconds? Is Eder 6% faster than Durance? eg. for the sake of trying to understand this, lets substitute the % with seconds. Eder is 3 seconds faster than normal (0) and Durance is 3 seconds slower than normal (0). Therefore Eder would be 6 seconds faster than Durance.

 

But with these percentages, I have no idea what it's based on. Is Eder 1 second faster than Durance? 2 seconds faster? I have no idea what 3% is in real time. If I watch a 100m dash, I don't say that person is 3% faster than the next person. It makes no sense to me. I need actual times so I can understand. And the game should convert the % into seconds so I can make an informed decision on the fly instead of getting out my calculator. 

 

 

 

 

Recovery Time

 

We now have armour with -50% Recovery time. What does this affect? Obviously it affects recovery time, but how much recovery time in seconds? I have no idea. The game doesn't tell me in the character screen.

 

With the Armour unequipped, the only thing that doesn't show is the Damage Reduction.

 

 

When I equip the Armour, the only thing that shows is Damage Reduction below. So where is the -50% Recovery time? And does that stack with Action Speed? So is it now -53% Action/Recovery Speed (-3% Action Speed plus -50% Recovery time)? Do they even correlate? And if they do, how much is that in seconds?

 

How much in seconds is Plate compared to mail or leather? Is Plate 3 seconds, mail 2 seconds and leather 1 second on Durance? I have no idea. The game doesn't tell me. It doesn't convert the percentages in real time, in actual seconds, in how armour affects my characters. And the game should tell me if I have plate equipped and compare to mail, it should tell me the actual seconds, not percentages. Is Mail the same time as Plate in seconds and leather 1 second slower? if it is, then I'll sticked with plate for the higher deflection bonus.

 

Then I can make an easy informed decision if I want to put mail on Durance or stick with Plate because the game should tell me how many seconds difference it is or if there's no seconds between the different armour types.

 

 

 

 

 

 

2. Equipping Shield on Eder. -8 from Shield = -20 Accuracy. Also, having a sword and shield confers a +2 to accuracy than without any weapons or shields equipped - I don't even know how to explain that last one.

 

 

 

Eder has no weapons equipped. His bare fists give 51 Accuracy. The sword says +4 Accuracy. It doesn't say anything about giving any bonuses if single wielding the sword.

 

 

 

Eder now equips his sword but doesn't have his shield equipped. 73 Accuracy. The character screen or item doesn't explain this.

 

 

Looking at his Shield, it has a -8% Accuracy. Doesn't seem too bad.

 

 

But when you now look at his Accuracy, it's now 20 less from 73 and now at 53. And 53 is 2 more in accuracy than 51 without a weapon and shield. How is this even possible to have 2 more in accuracy than a bare fisted fighter? It doesn't make sense to me.

 

 

 

 

 

3. Items. And I'll only list two but this can be applied to hundreds of items in the game.

 

Crossbow

 

 

 

Speed: Slow. How slow? 1 second? 2 seconds? Who knows.

Interrupt: 0.75 sec (Strong). What does this do? Does it interrupt the enemy for 0.75 seconds? And the enemy stands there for 0.75 seconds? Is it similar to a stun attack where the enemy has been interrupted and the enemy can't do anything for 0.75 seconds?

 

Now I have the crossbow in both Durance's and my Rogue's inventory and you'll notice both say the same base value and x1.15 Damage.

 

But they have different damage figures. Durance is 23-34 and my PC Rogue has 27-38. I have to go out of my inventory and look at my character's Might stats which are in percentages (Durance has +15% and I have +33%). It's not as easy as to work out what the damage of a crossbow will be because it's all derived on a tangled web of criss-cross percentages based on different stats.

 

The IE games were easier to understand with +1 Crossbow, +2 Crossbow, +1 Crossbow bolts, +2 crossbow bolts with additional +2 cold damage, etc.

 

Single integers are easier to understand. Tangled web of percentages are not.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Rabbit Fur Gloves

 

 

 

+10% Crit multiplier bonus.

 

What's this based on? What is my crit multiplier? Does it change for different characters like other items with the crossbow example with Durance and my PC Rogue? Does stats from any of my characters affect the Crit Multiplier Bonus? No idea.

 

+0.1 to Crit damage multiplier. Similar to above with what is this based on? But also, how much damage does this translate to? 1 damage? 50 damage? No idea if it's worthless or a good item. Is the decimal 0.1 = 10% ???

 

It's all percentages and decimals!!!! If it was Obsidian's goal to create a system that doesn't give you meaningful information, then Obsidian have succeeded in their goal.

 

 

 

 

 

[Stun]

^the vagueness of PoE's rule system was something absolutely, and plainly, and obviously and repeatedly pointed out to the developers for 6 straight months of the Beta process.

 

But they did not address it. They did not alter it. They did not even acknowledge it as a problem. in fact, they did the Opposite. People like Josh Sawyer bragged about how, Unlike the IE games, PoE would have an easier, more intuitive learning curve.

 

It does NOT. At all. Instead, PoE skirts the learning curve issue outright by making so that learning is optional. You don't NEED to know what a "+.5 critical multiplier" means, for example, because it's not relevant to success or failure. Combat is designed to be totally resolvable without combat knowledge. Ie. it's dumb-dumb centric. PoE can be completed...casually.

Edited April 14, 2015 by Stun

[tinderbox]

^the vagueness of PoE's rule system was something absolutely, and plainly, and obviously and repeatedly pointed out to the developers for 6 straight months of the Beta process.

 

But they did not address it. They did not alter it. They did not even acknowledge it as a problem. in fact, they did the Opposite. People like Josh Sawyer bragged about how, Unlike the IE games, PoE would have an easier, more intuitive learning curve.

 

It does NOT. At all. Instead, PoE skirts the learning curve issue outright by making so that learning is optional. You don't NEED to know what a "x.5 critical multiplier" means, for example, because it's not relevant to success or failure. Combat is designed to be totally resolvable without combat knowledge. Ie. it's dumb-dumb centric.

 

Actually, it feels as though decision-making is meant to run on "gut feeling". I'm fairly detail-driven, but I have a lot of CBF as well so i tend to go for near-enough-is-good-enough options rather than hardcore optimisation. In the end it doesn't bother me so much. But there is a startling lack of clarity what the outcomes of equipping your character with a particular set of items is. It took me ages to work out that shield thing Hiro brought up -- i thought it was a bug for quite a while.

 

It's very much a case of muddling through to gain a rough understanding of how stuff meshes together.

[Hiro Protagonist II]

I'm sure someone will come on and explain all the mathematics, the formulas and everything else. You know what? I'm not here for a math lesson. I don't want to come home from work and learn math. I want to chill out and play a game. And also to have a fairly easy understandable system than a convoluted tangled web of decimals and percentages.

Edited April 14, 2015 by Hiro Protagonist II

[Horrorscope]

I'm sure someone will come on and explain all the mathematics, the formulas and everything else. You know what? I'm not here for a math lesson. I don't want to come home from work and learn math. I want to chill out and play a game. And also to have a fairly easy understandable system than a convoluted tangled web of decimals and percentages.

 

Yes so taking screen shots above about recovey speed etc. Know that +3% is better than -3%, by a full 6%! It means exactly that.

[Stun]

Yes so taking screen shots above about recovey speed etc. Know that +3% is better than -3%, by a full 6%! It means exactly that.

Not really. Because "better" doesn't answer the question. If Eder is attacking with an Arbalest, and Durance is attacking with a mace, Eder's recovery speed will be slower, despite the fact that his recovery speed is 6% better. Edited April 14, 2015 by Stun

[Luckmann]

 

^the vagueness of PoE's rule system was something absolutely, and plainly, and obviously and repeatedly pointed out to the developers for 6 straight months of the Beta process.

 

But they did not address it. They did not alter it. They did not even acknowledge it as a problem. in fact, they did the Opposite. People like Josh Sawyer bragged about how, Unlike the IE games, PoE would have an easier, more intuitive learning curve.

 

It does NOT. At all. Instead, PoE skirts the learning curve issue outright by making so that learning is optional. You don't NEED to know what a "x.5 critical multiplier" means, for example, because it's not relevant to success or failure. Combat is designed to be totally resolvable without combat knowledge. Ie. it's dumb-dumb centric.

 

Actually, it feels as though decision-making is meant to run on "gut feeling". I'm fairly detail-driven, but I have a lot of CBF as well so i tend to go for near-enough-is-good-enough options rather than hardcore optimisation. In the end it doesn't bother me so much. But there is a startling lack of clarity what the outcomes of equipping your character with a particular set of items is. It took me ages to work out that shield thing Hiro brought up -- i thought it was a bug for quite a while.

 

It's very much a case of muddling through to gain a rough understanding of how stuff meshes together.

 

I agree. It does feel like decision-making is meant to run on gut feelings, but that intent, as a design goal, has lead to an obtusive rules system where decisions doesn't really matter much at all. I, like you, do not mind going after near-enough-is-good-enough option, and I frequently play deliberately under-optimized characters.

 

But I'd like to be able to figure things out regardless, with clarity of rules, and be forced to actually think of what I'm doing, especially if I'm playing something under-optimized. Intuitiveness may have been the intent of the design, but I don't think there's anything intuitive at all with "Combat Only" flags that artificially restrict me from doing things that are intuitive and reasonable, and oozes that can be blinded, skeletons that can be feared, or dragons that can be knocked down.

 

The intent misses the mark completely, and furthermore, the intent have run counter to good design.

 

 

Yes so taking screen shots above about recovey speed etc. Know that +3% is better than -3%, by a full 6%! It means exactly that.

Not really. Because "better" doesn't answer the question. If Eder is attacking with an Arbalest, and Durance is attacking with a mace, Eder's recovery speed will be slower, despite the fact that his recovery speed is 6% better.

 

What you just said made no sense to me. I know you're right, because you're Stun, and I trust you, because you're you, but the fact is that the game has not equipped me with the knowledge needed to understand what you mean. Basic, fundamental mechanics.

 

I can assume that it has to do with the reload speeds affected by the action/recovery speed bonus from Dexterity, and the relative speeds of the weapons, but the game doesn't actually explain the meaning of these things in any meaningful capacity.

 

Which is, of course, part of the entire issue.

 

And we keep constantly running into these arguments about mechanics based on people's understanding of the mechanics being wrong. How many people know that firearms (or rather, all weapons with reload) is affected by Action Speed more than other weapons? How many people know the actual speed of weapons? How many people keep bringing up detection, on the assumption that it's based on Perception - when it is in fact based on Mechanics, of all the things in the world.

 

How many people keep bringing up Medium Armour as balanced because they have no idea how the Action Recovery Penalty actually affects them, or how DR (DT) actually works? Or how relative DR adjustments on individual armour types work (by percentage based on the modified base DR of the armour)? How many times have we had to tell people that no, the DR is the base DR for everything, the extra, listed values are the exceptions?

 

And that's just on these boards. There's thousands of players that have never set their foot in here and goes through the entire game, bumbling like drunkards from encounter to encounter, without even knowing the most basic mechanical aspects.

 

This is not a ****ing victory, people. It's a ****ing travesty of mechanical design. The "I don't care I just want to get through the story", well that's what Easy is for, you can do that in any game. On normal, you should be expected to learn the basics of the game to know when to push button A, B or C. And on Hard you should be expected to have an understanding of how everything ties together.

 

But in PoE? Hurf durf I punch it with my hands until it dies. There was a guy in a thread that was talking about his rogue dressed in heavy armour, wondering what he was doing wrong, feeling that there was no point in lower-DR armour because he needed the armour to survive the encounters. Seriously, what the ****? Not only is the game clearly not intuitive if he feels that need, but the rules are clearly also not transparent enough for him to reach the conclusion that that is a really terrible decision.

 

And before anyone calls me a PoE hater again; I don't. I like many parts of it. I think that it has a tremendous potential. I think a lot of the design goals were great. I love the modular nature of weapons and armour and attributes, that it's all "equal" in most regards, affecting all equally. There are really good things in the game. But it's got some serious issues that needs to be addressed and almost all of the serious issues are mysteriously centred around J.E. Sawyers pet crusades, and clearly not the result of playtesting or internal design arguments, or even open debate.

 

I have the feeling that we're just running around the forum, putting out fires based on misconceptions about the rules, and repeatedly re-educating people on issues that they haven't realized yet, but that have been covered extensively fifteen times or more. The worst part being that I was one of these idiots when I came to the forum that was all like "I like Engagement, hurf durf, I think it sounds like a good idea and makes sense", even though it in practice worked out pretty terribly.

 

God damn I should've been put down with a bullet.

 

 

This is really part of the probem. Not only is the system obtuse (I didn't even know this myself until this very day), but you don't even need to pay attention to it. You can just sorta bumble your way forward. Does the Cipher start with 100%, 50% or 33%? Doesn't matter, there's points, I'll do some stuff, oh look, success.

One of the biggest problems (and there are many) with this game is the rules system. The percentages, the decimals, the chaotic system of information. Here are some examples:

 

1. Action Speed

 

Comparing Eder and Durance. Action Speed and Recovery Time - are they the same thing? Who knows.

 

 

 

Action Speed

 

Eder has +3% and Durance has -3% Action Speed.

 

What are these percentages based on? Is it how fast they hit in a turn? Is it based on recovery time? And how much is that in seconds? Is Eder 6% faster than Durance? eg. for the sake of trying to understand this, lets substitute the % with seconds. Eder is 3 seconds faster than normal (0) and Durance is 3 seconds slower than normal (0). Therefore Eder would be 6 seconds faster than Durance.

 

But with these percentages, I have no idea what it's based on. Is Eder 1 second faster than Durance? 2 seconds faster? I have no idea what 3% is in real time. If I watch a 100m dash, I don't say that person is 3% faster than the next person. It makes no sense to me. I need actual times so I can understand. And the game should convert the % into seconds so I can make an informed decision on the fly instead of getting out my calculator.

 

 

 

 

Recovery Time

 

We now have armour with -50% Recovery time. What does this affect? Obviously it affects recovery time, but how much recovery time in seconds? I have no idea. The game doesn't tell me in the character screen.

 

With the Armour unequipped, the only thing that doesn't show is the Damage Reduction.

 

 

When I equip the Armour, the only thing that shows is Damage Reduction below. So where is the -50% Recovery time? And does that stack with Action Speed? So is it now -53% Action/Recovery Speed (-3% Action Speed plus -50% Recovery time)? Do they even correlate? And if they do, how much is that in seconds?

 

How much in seconds is Plate compared to mail or leather? Is Plate 3 seconds, mail 2 seconds and leather 1 second on Durance? I have no idea. The game doesn't tell me. It doesn't convert the percentages in real time, in actual seconds, in how armour affects my characters. And the game should tell me if I have plate equipped and compare to mail, it should tell me the actual seconds, not percentages. Is Mail the same time as Plate in seconds and leather 1 second slower? if it is, then I'll sticked with plate for the higher deflection bonus.

 

Then I can make an easy informed decision if I want to put mail on Durance or stick with Plate because the game should tell me how many seconds difference it is or if there's no seconds between the different armour types.

 

 

 

 

 

 

2. Equipping Shield on Eder. -8 from Shield = -20 Accuracy. Also, having a sword and shield confers a +2 to accuracy than without any weapons or shields equipped - I don't even know how to explain that last one.

 

 

 

Eder has no weapons equipped. His bare fists give 51 Accuracy. The sword says +4 Accuracy. It doesn't say anything about giving any bonuses if single wielding the sword.

 

 

 

Eder now equips his sword but doesn't have his shield equipped. 73 Accuracy. The character screen or item doesn't explain this.

 

 

Looking at his Shield, it has a -8% Accuracy. Doesn't seem too bad.

 

 

But when you now look at his Accuracy, it's now 20 less from 73 and now at 53. And 53 is 2 more in accuracy than 51 without a weapon and shield. How is this even possible to have 2 more in accuracy than a bare fisted fighter? It doesn't make sense to me.

 

 

 

 

 

3. Items. And I'll only list two but this can be applied to hundreds of items in the game.

 

Crossbow

 

 

 

Speed: Slow. How slow? 1 second? 2 seconds? Who knows.

Interrupt: 0.75 sec (Strong). What does this do? Does it interrupt the enemy for 0.75 seconds? And the enemy stands there for 0.75 seconds? Is it similar to a stun attack where the enemy has been interrupted and the enemy can't do anything for 0.75 seconds?

 

Now I have the crossbow in both Durance's and my Rogue's inventory and you'll notice both say the same base value and x1.15 Damage.

 

But they have different damage figures. Durance is 23-34 and my PC Rogue has 27-38. I have to go out of my inventory and look at my character's Might stats which are in percentages (Durance has +15% and I have +33%). It's not as easy as to work out what the damage of a crossbow will be because it's all derived on a tangled web of criss-cross percentages based on different stats.

 

The IE games were easier to understand with +1 Crossbow, +2 Crossbow, +1 Crossbow bolts, +2 crossbow bolts with additional +2 cold damage, etc.

 

Single integers are easier to understand. Tangled web of percentages are not.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Rabbit Fur Gloves

 

 

 

+10% Crit multiplier bonus.

 

What's this based on? What is my crit multiplier? Does it change for different characters like other items with the crossbow example with Durance and my PC Rogue? Does stats from any of my characters affect the Crit Multiplier Bonus? No idea.

 

+0.1 to Crit damage multiplier. Similar to above with what is this based on? But also, how much damage does this translate to? 1 damage? 50 damage? No idea if it's worthless or a good item. Is the decimal 0.1 = 10% ???

 

It's all percentages and decimals!!!! If it was Obsidian's goal to create a system that doesn't give you meaningful information, then Obsidian have succeeded in their goal.

 

 

 

 

 

I only have one complaint; speeds should be conveyed to you in frames, not seconds. Seconds will vary, and in many cases it could end up showing you times (assuming meaningful displays of auto-calculations) in multiple decimals. It should tell you in frames, and then tell you on average how many frames there are per second. It would give you the chance to actually compare numbers in a meaningful manner, it would tell you exactly what changes happen and where, and with the simple knowledge of how many frames there are per second, you could easily work out the value yourself.

 

It is like the numbers listed in the IE games. They really mean nothing. But they don't need to inform you exactly how fast a speed of "1" is in seconds, it just needs to inform you in a manner that allows you to meaningfully compare modifiers and stats. PoE doesn't do that at all.

 

But even just informing you at a rounded number in seconds would be acceptable, as long as you could see the real number somewhere, I guess, and it would probably be easier for many to understand.

 

Also, related to the post, I really hate the way Enchantments are basically called what they are. "Of Crit Multiplier Bonus +10%: +0.1 to Crit Damage multiplier"? What hell? Why not just call it "Minor Tearing: +10% to all Critical Damage"? Suddenly rules clarity became so important you're repeating it in the most thematically ridiculous way imaginabe?

 

As for the issue with Edér and his shield, if it's a genuine question, it's because he's not getting the +12 Accuracy Bonus from wielding a single one-handed weapon anymore, and then gets a -8 to his Accuracy from the Shield, for a difference of -20 Accuracy in total. Where is this explained? Don't be silly. Nowhere, of course. It took me quite some time to realize what was going on, because in the pre-release version, One-Handed Accuracy Bonus was dropped to +8 from +10, but then in the release version, was upped again to +12.

Edited April 14, 2015 by Luckmann

[Hiro Protagonist II]

As for the issue with Edér and his shield, if it's a genuine question, it's because he's not getting the +12 Accuracy Bonus from wielding a single one-handed weapon anymore, and then gets a -8 to his Accuracy from the Shield, for a difference of -20 Accuracy in total. Where is this explained? Don't be silly. Nowhere, of course. It took me quite some time to realize what was going on, because in the pre-release version, One-Handed Accuracy Bonus was dropped to +8 from +10, but then in the release version, was upped again to +12.

 

Okay, lets try and work this out.

 

Eder has a base 51 Accuracy with no weapon and shield.

 

Eder has 73 Accuracy with a sword only. (+12 single weapon + 4 Fine Sword + 6 from ????) Where does the other 6 come from? Eder is not wearing any items that gives a +6 bonus.

 

Eder has 53 Accuracy with sword and shield. (73 - 12 from single weapon - 8 from shield = 53). So I lose the +12 bonus from single weapon and the shield says -8. I assume I'm getting the +4 bonus weapon bonus and a mysterious +6 bonus and then it's subtracting -8 from the shield giving me an overall +2 bonus. But it doesn't tell me where this +6 is coming from.

 

This is why I don't understand the rules system. It's not clear and defined.

Edited April 14, 2015 by Hiro Protagonist II

[1varangian]

Buffing has always been a boring mechanic in IE and DnD (up to 3.5e) games that easily throws balance out of whack when you can just stack 6 protective spells on someone.

 

I think most buffs should be modal with only 1 active at a time. That would end the pre-buffing debate as well. PoE Priests are effective but ultimately boring to play, spamming their buffs and debuffs that only last a few seconds.

 

Giving numerical boosts to stats.. could there be anything less exciting? Obtrusive vfx just throws it from bad to worse.

 

I hope they will fine tune magic to be less buff-centric in PoE, especially for Priests. Priests should have fewer powers that are more fun to play and more focused on their faith.

[Ondb]

Pre-buffing is only problem if there is really no cost and there is too many options (too many of pre-buff spells).

 

For example:

i will alter Stoneskin spell to be long pre-buff with following effect:

+10 DR, 20% recovery penalty

 

Would you automatically use this pre-buff ? Maybe you would only pick it for Shadows,Shades enemies. Maybe somebody else have different style of playing and will use such a spell all the time.

 

Pre-buffing is not automatically wrong or good. What really matters how its implemented.

However i feel that easy solutions (removing all pre-buffs from the game) are bad in the end. 

[KDubya]

 

As for the issue with Edér and his shield, if it's a genuine question, it's because he's not getting the +12 Accuracy Bonus from wielding a single one-handed weapon anymore, and then gets a -8 to his Accuracy from the Shield, for a difference of -20 Accuracy in total. Where is this explained? Don't be silly. Nowhere, of course. It took me quite some time to realize what was going on, because in the pre-release version, One-Handed Accuracy Bonus was dropped to +8 from +10, but then in the release version, was upped again to +12.

 

Okay, lets try and work this out.

 

Eder has a base 51 Accuracy with no weapon and shield.

 

Eder has 73 Accuracy with a sword only. (+12 single weapon + 4 Fine Sword + 6 from ????) Where does the other 6 come from? Eder is not wearing any items that gives a +6 bonus.

 

Eder has 53 Accuracy with sword and shield. (73 - 12 from single weapon - 8 from shield = 53). So I lose the +12 bonus from single weapon and the shield says -8. I assume I'm getting the +4 bonus weapon bonus and a mysterious +6 bonus and then it's subtracting -8 from the shield giving me an overall +2 bonus. But it doesn't tell me where this +6 is coming from.

 

This is why I don't understand the rules system. It's not clear and defined.

 

 

Eder's +6 accuracy using the sabre is from his weapon focus Ruffian talent/ability.

 

I like the percentage increases as it allows for small adjustments, being stuck to only whole numbers greatly diminishes how to affect the total. Currently an increase in one point of might gets you +3%, with whole numbers you'd have a +1. This would cause either massive inflation in all damage numbers, or stepped increase levels where odd levels in a stat gets you nothing.

 

A conversion of 3% = +1 would then cause serious issues with weapon speeds and DPS with heavily enchanted, high might using daggers. In a real time combat a flat +10 to a fast dagger is much more powerful than a flat +10 to a slow greatsword. The whole number approach only works and is balanced in a turn based system where both the sword and the dagger get one attack per turn.

 

All of these issues are avoided by using % based increases that affect the base weapon damage. To balance the current system you just need to adjust base weapon damage and base weapon speed.

 

I would like a display called attack speed or attacks per second that takes into account your armor recovery penalty, dexterity bonus or malus and your weapon speed including reloads. 

[yaggaz]

Indeed, it makes zero difference in the end for balance, but makes the game more fun. If you were able to prebuff, then the devs would HAVE TO balance with that in mind, which would mean the enemies are tougher, and so the challenge would ultimately remain the same. By eliminating prebuffing, you simply eliminate the tedious routine of casting the same damn spells before every damn fight. It's a win/win, and one of the best improvements they made over IE games.

 

Oh no, let's not burden the poor devs with making an RPG as good as Baldur's Gate.  Let's go this new lazy warped route for "Balance" reasons.

[superluccix]

I've read a couple pages of this thread and it seems like both sides are debating under different game scenarios.

 

 

The Pro Pre Buffing crowd is under the game scenario of "You have limited spell slots. Lets say 5. 1 of those slots will be used for a buff, while the other 4 are offensive spell related" This means you lose the ability of having the 5th offensive spell which might have made an encounter easier. Who knows, but the point is that choosing to buff or not to buff has a cost. And that cost is a spell slot, which may or may not be optimal for w/e encounter you are on.

 

 

The Anti Pre Buffing crowd is under the game scenario of "There are no spell slots. All spells you have learned can be used. Therefore Pre Buffing is a no brainer decision because it doesnt come at any cost, (Time isnt a valid one) and you would be gimping yourself otherwise, and encounters would have to be designed around players buffing, because why woulnt you when it comes at no cost"

 

 

Since we are talking about Pillars of Eternity which uses the limited spell slots mechanics, obviously choosing to buff comes at a cost. You have 1 less spell slot to use. Thereby making this a strategic choice.

Edited April 17, 2015 by superluccix

[Zug]

I hate buffing in IE games with passion. Probably my main gripe against the combat system in these games.

I'm so glad it's gone.

Edited April 17, 2015 by Zug

[Stun]

I hate buffing in IE games with passion. Probably my main gripe against the combat system in these games.

I'm so glad it's gone.

Except Buffing is not gone. It's a humongous part of PoE. Roughly 50% of the Priest class's spell list is buffing spells. The Paladin class is designed around them being a battery of Buffing. The Most powerful skill set a chanter has is Buffing. Half the potions in this game are buffs, as are half the scrolls and ALL the food. etc.

 

What you mean to say is that you hate pre-buffing, even though the only difference between prebuffing and buffing is that you do the former a bit earlier than the latter. But hey, enough of the pedantics. Lets just embrace the Absurdity: We "hate" a system that gives you a choice when you can buff, and we "love" a system that f*cking doesn't.

 

You people blow my mind.

Edited April 17, 2015 by Stun

[Prime-Mover]

 

Except Buffing is not gone. It's a humongous part of PoE. Roughly 50% of the Priest class's spell list is buffing spells. The Paladin class is designed around them being a battery of Buffing. The Most powerful skill set a chanter has is Buffing. Half the potions in this game are buffs, as are half the scrolls and ALL the food. etc.

 

What you mean to say is that you hate pre-buffing, even though the only difference between prebuffing and buffing is that you do the former a bit earlier than the latter. But lets embrace the Absurdity: We "hate" a system that gives you a choice when you can buff, but we "love" a system that f*cking doesn't.

 

There's nothing absurd in the notion that more choice doesn't necessarily = better, as has been argued several times in this thread. It's the same thing as with the narrow doorways. It's just an option to block the corridor with your tank, but the fact that it's clearly the optimal strategy, makes not taking advantage of it, the same as deliberately gimping oneself. The same can be argued with regards to pre-buffing.

[endolex]

If anyone's main argument against being able to cast all spells anytime is 'I hate buffing' -> just don't take classes in your party whose main strength is all about buffs. Problem solved.

[endolex]

 

 

Except Buffing is not gone. It's a humongous part of PoE. Roughly 50% of the Priest class's spell list is buffing spells. The Paladin class is designed around them being a battery of Buffing. The Most powerful skill set a chanter has is Buffing. Half the potions in this game are buffs, as are half the scrolls and ALL the food. etc.

 

What you mean to say is that you hate pre-buffing, even though the only difference between prebuffing and buffing is that you do the former a bit earlier than the latter. But lets embrace the Absurdity: We "hate" a system that gives you a choice when you can buff, but we "love" a system that f*cking doesn't.

 

There's nothing absurd in the notion that more choice doesn't necessarily = better, as has been argued several times in this thread. It's the same thing as with the narrow doorways. It's just an option to block the corridor with your tank, but the fact that it's clearly the optimal strategy, makes not taking advantage of it, the same as deliberately gimping oneself. The same can be argued with regards to pre-buffing.

 

 

Exactly. Buffing in general, be it combat only or not, is NOT MANDATORY. You can play a party without Paladins or Priests or Chanter and do fine.

[Namutree]

 

 

Except Buffing is not gone. It's a humongous part of PoE. Roughly 50% of the Priest class's spell list is buffing spells. The Paladin class is designed around them being a battery of Buffing. The Most powerful skill set a chanter has is Buffing. Half the potions in this game are buffs, as are half the scrolls and ALL the food. etc.

 

What you mean to say is that you hate pre-buffing, even though the only difference between prebuffing and buffing is that you do the former a bit earlier than the latter. But lets embrace the Absurdity: We "hate" a system that gives you a choice when you can buff, but we "love" a system that f*cking doesn't.

 

There's nothing absurd in the notion that more choice doesn't necessarily = better, as has been argued several times in this thread. It's the same thing as with the narrow doorways. It's just an option to block the corridor with your tank, but the fact that it's clearly the optimal strategy, makes not taking advantage of it, the same as deliberately gimping oneself. The same can be argued with regards to pre-buffing.

 

Except that wouldn't be the case in PoE. Pre-buffing wouldn't be better than buffing in battle for reasons I'm sure you already know if you've been following the thread.

 

 

If anyone's main argument against being able to cast all spells anytime is 'I hate buffing' -> just don't take classes in your party whose main strength is all about buffs. Problem solved.

Different classes for different playing style!!!??? You sir, must be a grognard. All the classes are supposed to play the same! How dare you even consider the notion that players should be able to control the experience of playing PoE by having any of the classes play different. I mean, what if some one wanted to play a wizard, but the wizard didn't play like a cipher!? IT WOULD BE CHAOS!!!

Edited April 17, 2015 by Namutree

[Jimmysdabestcop]

Prebuffing would completely change combat. Not only would the party be buffed but so would the enemy.

 

The difference from BG1 to BG2 is that all of casters have all of their buffs and defenses up. And it becomes a chess match. With the player having to memorize spells that will counter act enemy buffs/defenses before they wipe out the party.

 

Plus some of those buffs and defenses lasted not only in game hours but real life hours. Iron Skin, Stone skin, the emotion spells etc. Where as at most in PoE we are talking 60 seconds real life.

 

BG2 to IWD 1 difference is in IWD there are almost Zero enemy spell casters. So you don't have to bother with a good portion of spells and can focus on straight damage. Then IWD HoF mode you focus on summons and debuffs not damage.

 

But the enemy casters are just weaker in PoE since they aren't prebuffed or have special defenses up already. Unless there are 3+ casters in an encounter the party probably wont get hit with a spell. Exception if there are a dozen enemies and you can't melee the casters and for some reason ranged doesn't have line of sight. Maybe you get hit with a couple spells then. DnD had more spells per level to pick from, spells you could find and buy and more spells per rest though too.

[endolex]

Prebuffing would completely change combat. Not only would the party be buffed but so would the enemy.

 

The difference from BG1 to BG2 is that all of casters have all of their buffs and defenses up. And it becomes a chess match. With the player having to memorize spells that will counter act enemy buffs/defenses before they wipe out the party.

 

Plus some of those buffs and defenses lasted not only in game hours but real life hours. Iron Skin, Stone skin, the emotion spells etc. Where as at most in PoE we are talking 60 seconds real life.

 

BG2 to IWD 1 difference is in IWD there are almost Zero enemy spell casters. So you don't have to bother with a good portion of spells and can focus on straight damage. Then IWD HoF mode you focus on summons and debuffs not damage.

 

But the enemy casters are just weaker in PoE since they aren't prebuffed or have special defenses up already. Unless there are 3+ casters in an encounter the party probably wont get hit with a spell. Exception if there are a dozen enemies and you can't melee the casters and for some reason ranged doesn't have line of sight. Maybe you get hit with a couple spells then. DnD had more spells per level to pick from, spells you could find and buy and more spells per rest though too.

I never cease to be amazed by this strange assumption that being able to cast all spells anytime would somehow immediately need to be 'balanced' by having enemies always buff themselves before combat (how would that even work, buff durations being what they are, and the enemy not knowing when you are going to attack them).

Nothing needs to be balanced there. It should be a player's choice, much like whether to bother using traps or not, when to use potions and when not, and so on.

 

The whole notion that there is 'one true way of playing the game (even just combat-wise) and doing anything else means gimping yourself' in terms of how much you are going to enjoy the game is ridiculous in general. There is no optimal party composition for a good experiencr. If you don't like buffing much, having a priest in the party is not optimal for you. If you don't like summoning, better get rid of that Chanter. But some people seem to be deadbent on viewing PoE (or maybe any game for that matter) as a 'kill stuff, and kill stuff always in a way you kill stuff the fastest, because this is what this game is all about, killing stuff!'-fest.

Edited April 17, 2015 by endolex

[Elerond]

Allow pre-buff or not allow pre-buff I don't really care if game is designed such in mind.

 

But I would say that in PoE as it is now pre-buffing would not work fine as there are several mechanics that cause it to be quite broken (we got taste of this during beginning of beta when you were able to use some of buffing abilities outside of combat because they weren't marked correctly).

 

At least per encounter mechanic system for spells and abilities would cause problems, as it is mechanic that even wizards, priests, and druids have for some of their spells and abilities. This mechanic is allowed by having combat and non-combat states in the game where per encounter abilities return full when game hits in non-combat state, which currently means that if you use per encounter spell or ability out side combat you have per encounter limit full as soon as animation for spell or ability has stopped playing. This means if buff spells were allowed to cast outside combat that 9th level wizards, priest and druids could cast all their first spell level buff so that it don't limit them in anyway in combat and for 11th level they could do same for their second level buffs. And you could do that always with your per encounter buff abilities. Meaning that could be just activated in start of any combat regardless do you need them or not.

 

Stealth state is currently implemented so that it don't end when you use spells or abilities if they target your party members, which would give you ability to pre-buff next to enemies, making it so that it really don't matter that those buffs have short duration. 

 

Non-mechanical issues from allowing pre-buffing that would rise

Allowing pre-buffs would change how useful those classes that can pre-buff are compared to other classes, and as this forums are already full of threads that complain about class balance it is clear that such change in class balance should probably be addressed in some way or it will hinder some at least players enjoyment of the game.

 

There is already lot of threads that complain that encounters in the game are too easy, allowing pre-buffing would probably make this issue even worse than it is now, so it probably would mean that encounters would need re-balancing to take accord such possibility, which probably would cause issue with party combinations that don't have buffing capabilities which would cause need to re-balance them also as it was one design goal to allow any sort of parties without needing any particular class in the party. 

 

There are also items that have per encounter buff abilities and allowing use of those outside of combat would also make those item much better and there probably would need to be at least discussions if such rises their power level too high.

[endolex]

'Being able to cast all spells I have whenever the hell I want to would make the game too easy':

 

Use the difficulty slider. The only way there could be a problem is either when easy is too hard for many, or when Path of the Damned / Trial of Iron with all QoL options turned off is still too easy for most.

 

Otherwise: use the difficulty slider. Change some options. They are there for a reason.

Edited April 17, 2015 by endolex