My first impressions

[Mathuzzz]

Minor spoilers ahead!

 

Hi all,

 

after a long wait I finally began playing this game, the game I was observing from the very beginning and, as a hardcore player of the BG/IWD games, I was full of enthusiasm for the game which I hoped would bring back the feelings those gems evoked. 

 

Before I go into details, let me say, that PoE managed to bring these types of games into attention again and was successful, but there are a few aspects, which holds it somewhat lower and even though I´m trying to play it without constant comparison to those games, sometimes the thought of how would BG made it better hits me.

 

First of all, I´m not finished with the game. I´m in the second act and have bigger part of the game ahead of me, so my impressions may change.

 

I have seen a lot of complains about various restrictions/changes of the game mechanics, namely resting restrictions, endurance/health... I actually find these mechanics as improvements over BG/IWD, where you could nearly always rest after every battle and assault could be easily cheated by reloading, and in later parts of BG the resurrection spells and items became so frequent that the death was not really an issue.

 

The game is a bit smaller compared to BG, probably because of rather limited budget. By smaller I mean fewer NPCs, encounters, voice acting, no cinematics, nerfed rogue (ability wise, no combat).

 

Music is OK, while I preferred BG music, it´s not about nostalgia. I simply prefer the music of BG because it has...I don´t understand music theory, so I don´t really know how to explain it, but BG music has more sound layers, more instruments, while PoE is more Jeremy Soule oriented, with single lead melody.

 

I find graphics varied. While all the interiors looks absolutely gorgeous, cities/villages and objects as well, environment areas are lacking. I was eager to lose myself in deep forests, windy mountains and misty swamps, however all the areas I have seen so far are generic and visually a bit flat.

How could we have this, 13-15 years ago:

http://games.thehawkonline.com/infinity/iwd/maps/iwd1-valeofshadows.png

 

http://www.sorcerers.net/Games/IWD2/Walkthrough/maps/shaengarne_river.jpg

 

http://www.sorcerers.net/Games/BG2/Walkthrough2/images/maps/chapter-6/forest-of-tethir.jpg

 

And now we have this:

http://game-maps.com/PoE/img/Map-Woodend-Plains.jpg

 

Not want sound rude towards game designers, I just expected the places to be more varied. Here, all the places are rather random, lacking character, which leads to my biggest complain...atmosphere.

 

I find depth and atmosphere the biggest downfall of PoE. In BG/IWD every place had it´s own distinct sound ambiance, creating unique character for each place. Here you can hear a lot less ambient sounds and most of them are rather generic and repeating everywhere. Most notable were taverns. So far I visited like 5 taverns and no matter whether it was in noble part of the city or some backwater village, it has precisely the same sounds and music used. In BG, Copper Coronet, Sea´s Bounty or more noble taverns in Promenade. They all seemed...different. This applies to other areas as well. When you walked in the wood areas in later parts of BG, you could totally feel the forest, in IWD2, you could feel those icy planes and the main reason is the audio work and function of the place. The difference here can be seen mostly in cities/villages which have large, spacious but empty spaces. Most of the Defiance Bay districts so far are giant, empty streets. In First Fires you could at least made those beautiful buildings more visible instead of stretching those streets. When I first arrived to Dyrford and saw the map I was totally eager to explore it. After seeing empty streets and tavern with same old music/sounds and only non-interesting villagers of Eora with their haemorrhoids preventing them from sitting down. Why is everybody just standing?! Was it that resource consuming to make a single sitting animation? No day-time routines or something interesting can be seen in the streets. Very quickly the eagerness degraded into chore. So many encounters could have filled these empty places. BG had so many, often funny encounters, which added to the world. Also, the places does not change. There is no day/night cycle. Well, the one we see is just change of colour tone, without any impact on anything. In BG, shops closed, people went sleep and the streets filled various hideous individuals, black market sellers, courtesans. You actually wanted to travel during the day because the night was more dangerous to travel, with vampires in BG2 or bandits in BG1, etc... In PoE the place is still the same. And making a permanent weather effect, specifically continual rain in Gilded Vale was not a good idea. It created the initial melancholic feeling but later became irritating. This game has a wast amount of lore but with so little detial in the function of the places and no that great audio work, the world seem more flat. Everything is very serious here, no occasional funny weird stuff like Larry, Darryl and Darryl or Neeber or the most famous dart thrower, drunks, etc...To make a game mature does not mean you remove funny or silly elements, Planescape Torment was full of it after all. This goes for recruitable NPCs as well. Their stories/chat may have something into it but it just screams for some more drama/romance. And by romance I do not necessarily mean dating simulator we see in modern Bioware games. Larger part of the chat is just...uninteresting. I guess many of you are eager to explain me for a millionth time that we do not want some silly stupid Minsc, silly stupid Bioware writing. But that´s not true. BG has very good writing, both silly and mature and it has other, more cleverly written NPCs. So far, the best part of the game was Raedric's Hold. From design of the place/quest, to audio and solution possibilities with various ways of entering and infiltration, reminding me of Thief game. It really was a great quest and if the entire game was made this way it could have been serious rival/respectable successor to BG. This is my biggest complain for the game, one which lowers the game from pure enjoyment to something I will probably forgot in time.

 

About the combat, I think everything was said million times before. It is...crazy fast. I play all the battles on slow mode, I would vote for toggle to automatically switch to slow mode in combat. Game with solo character can afford such fast combat, but not a game where you are to manage 6 characters with different abilities. No matter the pause button, I often don´t push it early enough.

 

I hope it did not sound too harsh, it was not my intention, so some more encouraging words at the end.

 

When I say that BG is better, that does not mean this game is bad. This game is really good, better than any other AAA atempt to recreate BG so far. So in my rating scheme, where 0 is lowest and 10 is highest, where BG has 9.5 and Neverwinter Nights 2, Dragon Age, Drakensang has 5.0, PoE gets 7,5.

 

I would much rather pay for the next expansion, if it instead of adding a new adventure, enrich all the existing places, adding encounters, quests, etc... but that will most likely not happen.

Edited November 7, 2015 by Mathuzzz

[Zenbane]

Heeeyyy, NO SPOILERS!! GEEZE!!

 

Fair review though. I can agree with the 7 rating. Oh and I love that IceWind Dale map! Brought back some seriously great memories. For me, IWD is a perfect 10.

 

Cheers!

[Michael_Galt]

I am pretty much in complete agreement.  I mentioned how it was just "too serious" in a thread devoted to that, and even had a poll, to see if I was just crazy.  I appears that I am, indeed, and in the minority (with you as well).  Most people didn't think it was "serious enough" or it was "just right".  No kidding- check it out.

 

http://forums.obsidian.net/topic/80064-dark-and-gritty-fantasy-settings/

 

That boggles my mind.  There is literally almost nothing light-hearted in the entire game.  Not the quests, not the NPCs, not the environments- almost everything is tense, or brooding, or grey.  BG always managed to balance it.  There were certainly dark, and forboding areas.  Going into the vampire lairs was always terrifying, because level drain is no joke, and they were always full of undead and just scary stuff.  But, there were also areas where you could go that were cheerful, and had bright colors and things were "good" there. 

 

I'm not motivated to replay POE because it is just kinda depressing.  Why do I want to save people, when I don't really get rewarded for that?  There were sequences in BG where people erected statues of you, or held ceremonies, or gave you particularly powerful or useful treasures.  If you cleared an area of "evil", it might literally get a "makeover".  Meaning, it would get brighter colors.  More people would be in the streets.  The ambient sounds would change.  You could literally SEE the difference.  I really don't recall that ever happening in POE.  In POE, you can remove a certain despot, and, what happens?  You literally see no difference to anything.  Nothing improves.

 

It's just bs when people say that there is no such thing as "good and evil" and everything is just kinda grey.  Go to the Netherlands, and tell me what your general impression is.  It's got great, friendly people.  It's a fun place, where you can find lots of different things to do.  Then, go to Iraq or Syria.  Tell me how that is?  Everyone is tense, and frightened, afraid they might not live another day.  People get tortured to death in public areas on a routine basis.  That is a good approximation of what "good" and "evil" are.  Happiness versus misery.  Freedom versus oppression.  In POE, it is just a misery and oppression fest. 

[Mathuzzz]

It's just bs when people say that there is no such thing as "good and evil" and everything is just kinda grey.  Go to the Netherlands, and tell me what your general impression is.  It's got great, friendly people.  It's a fun place, where you can find lots of different things to do.  Then, go to Iraq or Syria.  Tell me how that is?  Everyone is tense, and frightened, afraid they might not live another day.  People get tortured to death in public areas on a routine basis.  That is a good approximation of what "good" and "evil" are.  Happiness versus misery.  Freedom versus oppression.  In POE, it is just a misery and oppression fest. 

 

Exactly. I think most people don´t get the "shades of grey" term. It´s not about everything being always grey. It is more like:not always good or evil.

[Mathuzzz]

Heeeyyy, NO SPOILERS!! GEEZE!!

 

 

Sorry about the spoiler thing.

[Cantousent]

There are two issues that people have reported. One is spoilers. I'm going to move this thread to an appropriate forum for spoilers. The other is real world references. The game is somewhat analogous to real world history and events. I understand some folks think drawing comparisons to the real world is bad, but the solution is simply to ignore those portions. If someone goes beyond the pale in such comparisons or draws the discussion from the game to a purely political or off topic discussion, the thread or portions thereof may be moved to WoT. Otherwise, people can keep making comparisons between the game and real world history and events.

 

I'm not saying that I agree with either side in this. ...But I don't want to create a purely sterile environment. I want folks to have some leeway to discuss things. If, on the other hand, folks level personal attacks on one another or attack other cultures or religions, such discussion will either be moved or removed.

[Katarack21]

That's not really a fair comparison on the maps.

15 years ago, you also had this:

 

And now you have this:

 

 

My point being, the maps vary in quality as is normal for a game like this. Most of them, IMHO, are gorgeous and very nice.

[Fenixp]

This is a screenshot from White March, for the sake of snowy balance:

I am pretty much in complete agreement.  I mentioned how it was just "too serious" in a thread devoted to that, and even had a poll, to see if I was just crazy.  I appears that I am, indeed, and in the minority (with you as well).  Most people didn't think it was "serious enough" or it was "just right".  No kidding- check it out.

 

http://forums.obsidian.net/topic/80064-dark-and-gritty-fantasy-settings/

Actually, that's not what you asked at all. You asked whether the game is too grimdark, and it's not. On the other hand, it is a bit too serious. These are two distinct questions - you can have a very grimdark setting with a lot of humor, see Fallout.

 

It's just bs when people say that there is no such thing as "good and evil" and everything is just kinda grey.  Go to the Netherlands, and tell me what your general impression is.  It's got great, friendly people.  It's a fun place, where you can find lots of different things to do.

Absolutely, Netherlands is an entirely friendly and nice place. Shades of grey mean that we're dealing with issues which do not have boundaries of morality clearly set - Pillars tackles a varied array of social issues, some more grim, some less, some not at all. I understand why it would be undesirable in your escapist fantasy for you personally, but it's definitely not an objective point against the game itself.

 

I think most people don´t get the "shades of grey" term. It´s not about everything being always grey. It is more like:not always good or evil.

Which is exactly what Pillars of Eternity is. Edited November 7, 2015 by Fenixp

[Mathuzzz]

My point being, the maps vary in quality as is normal for a game like this. Most of them, IMHO, are gorgeous and very nice.

I did not want to say those maps are ugly. Most of the places, like the example you posted, are beautiful. I just think they should have been more varied. With those various mist effects they use, some thick forest could have looked really great.

[Vorad]

Regarding the main topic, when it comes to the atmosphere of the game itself, as soon as you reach the first habitable place(after facing a murderous raid and a soul-storm of sorts where you are the lone survivor) you face a special tree with special fruits hanging from it, the entire atmosphere is bleak and dark and it serves a purpose. It informs the player on what kind of crap-hole he has set foot on. A place where children are born soulless. I don't know about you guys but I don't really think that we should ask for more cheerful and happy circus in such kind of place. Then when you reach Defiance Bay there are some glimpses of hope, apart from the neo-dozzens attacking refugees and any other person they consider degenerate, you also have people actually participating in theaters out in the street, acting for purely entertainment purpose(that comes with a catch but...), you get to meet some kids who are still whole that aspire to be knights one day(that is something at least... kids do still dream in this part of the world), people still do have the appetite for some fun and pleasurable moments take a look at the "Salty Mast"... etc etc. Generally speaking I believe the place is as it should be it's not supposed to be a kindergarten. It's a place ravaged by death, disease, soulless children, mixed with tribal rivalry between the civilized and the tribesmen, surrounded by greedy neighboring nations/countries... to be honest I was expecting the backgrounds/graphics to be even more bleak and dark in some places. But then again aesthetics are purely subjective.

 

Overall in comparison to the quality of background/graphics atmosphere I think it's unfair to devalue PoE they have offered a high quality and polished product(BG was more buggy when it released oh and still is by the way unless you install mods who were created by the fans). Technology has advanced so much now of course and back then they didn't have unity so perhaps comparing PoE to BG it's unfair. In comparison to the stuff being published nowadays and passed on the market as "rpg" I think PoE deserves more praise and support especially since they are trying to revive a genre many of us were longing for... for quite some time now.

 

Oh by the way when it comes to paying attention to detail and the graphics, in the beginning I liked to zoom out as much as possible for better tactical management but lately I find myself zooming in at least half way so I can see even the tiny details.

 

 Why do I want to save people, when I don't really get rewarded for that?  

Theoretically you don't have to. It depends purely on the role you are impersonating whether you want to help them or not after all this is an rpg. Also if you choose to save them it can be because of two reasons either for some kind of material profit or simply because you are "honest" and "benevolent" and the game reflects this. If you actually do help them you do gain major friendly points with the faction they represent and then you become for example Champion of Defiance Bay it's far from being a statue but still.

 

As for  the good and evil in game and the parallelization of these "ideas" in our modern world there have been hundreds of wise men through the centuries since early antiquity up to modern times trying to define what is what. There is also something else beyond good and evil known as hypocrisy. Both good and bad people are subject to hypocrisy for different reasons. The art of the society pretending everything is cool and we are all cheerful and happy... lets not start pointing fingers now.

 

PS: It's indeed too serious, especially since last time they made an attempt to a joke they got cyber-bullied so hard... but the lovely community didn't support them so much in that aspect back then.

Edited November 7, 2015 by Vorad

[Michael_Galt]

I never, ever, said the word "grimdark".  In fact, I hate that term, because it isn't even a real word.  I said, literally, "dark and gritty".  I'm going to post the antonyms for dark, so maybe you can better understand what I mean:

 

Antonyms

1. lighted. 2. bright. 8. cheerful. 9. pleasant. 12. clear.

 

For POE to NOT be a "dark" setting, it would have to have lighted, bright, cheerful, or pleasant settings.  So, my challenge to you, is to name me those settings in POE?  I don't remember ANY.

 

Or, I can go to Wikipedia, for their definition of "dark fantasy", which is what POE is.

 

"Dark fantasy is a subgenre of fantasy which can refer to literary, artistic, and cinematic works that incorporates darker and frightening themes of fantasy. It also often combines fantasy with elements of horror. The term can be used broadly to refer to fantastical works that have a dark, gloomy atmosphere or a sense of horror and dread.^[1]"

 

^{https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dark_fantasy}

 

There is quite a lot of that in POE.  Rulers randomly killing large numbers of their subjects and displaying them to the public to cow the population.  Secret groups kidnapping, torturing and murdering innocent people.  Schizophrenic people because they have __ (not explaining because of spoilers).  Incest.  People killing their children.  Entire districts getting eaten by undead.  People locked underground, starving to death, and commiting cannabalism.  Ritual human sacrifice.  Fratricide.  I could keep going.  That all sounds pretty dark to me.  There are plenty of horrific elements there.

 

All of these points are 100% objective.  If you have a color palate, and you only use cool or dark colors, it is a dark painting.  If all of your settings, or even, over 50% of them, are not cheerful, pleasant, or bright, that makes it a dark setting.  That isn't opinion, that is fact.

 

Let's go to the 2nd word I used, "gritty". 

 

Word Origin and History for gritty

adj.

1590s, from grit + -y (2). In sense of "unpleasant" (of literature, etc.), from 1882, in reference to the sensation of eating gritty bread. Related: Grittily ; grittiness.

 

http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/gritty

 

realistic, hard-hitting, unsentimental, unromantic

http://www.thefreedictionary.com/gritty

 

That is what POE is.  It is unpleasantly unsentimental or unromantic to ME.  Obviously, that isn't the case for lots of other people.  I've been to both Iraq and Afghanistan.  I've seen some pretty "dark" stuff in real life.  That being said, not everything is oppressive evil.  I used the Netherlands and Iraq as 2 contrasting points of reference.  That being said, you CAN find people that are pleasant and happy, even in Iraq.  You CAN find places that are actually beautiful and peaceful, even there.  Very rarely do you encounter places where almost everything is "gloom and doom". 

 

In POE, that is how I perceived it.  Name me one part of the game that has children playing.  Some musician playing a beautiful song.  Someone walking around, trying to spread "the good news" (not talking about Jesus, but rather, that things are going to improve, that people need to work together, that there is hope in the future).  Even if you CAN identify some of these individual items for me, they are, by and large, in the overwhelming minority of things represented in the game.

 

Reward isn't limited to material goods.  I said as much in what I already wrote.  Change ambient sounds to happier, more light hearted things.  Clean up streets.  Have NPCs actually say thank you.  Put more NPCs out.  Have a celebration.  These things don't happen, therefore I'm not rewarded.  People really do these things, when you help them.  This isn't an "unrealistic" expectation or request. 

[Mathuzzz]

It is not necessary to go into such details in description. I wanted to point out, that the places could have been used better and should have been more believable. I think every RPG with more or less open world, especially the one authors created, wants it to be impressive and catchy for players. Obsidian used mostly lore to make the world more familiar to players, but they could have developed the places a bit more.

 

Also, when we compare dark/bright settings. I don´t think BG was bright or cheerful. It was somewhere in between dark/bright. Bright and cheerful for me is for example World of Warcraft or Drakensang. Dark is original Witcher. 

[Fenixp]

...

I'm continuing this line of argument over in your topic if you don't mind.

 

It is not necessary to go into such details in description. I wanted to point out, that the places could have been used better and should have been more believable. I think every RPG with more or less open world, especially the one authors created, wants it to be impressive and catchy for players. Obsidian used mostly lore to make the world more familiar to players, but they could have developed the places a bit more.

Thing is, places presented in Pillars of Eternity are pretty believable. I suspect that is precisely the issue, real world is kind of mundane and filled with stretches of nothing. However, when compared to the original Baldur's Gate from which Pillars of Eternity draws most of its inspiration for exploration aspects, there's a lot more to be found per map. In BG, there were maps which literally contained nothing save for some enemies (usually one or two types) and perhaps one line of dialogue - maps in Pillars are a lot more interesting than that. It all works with the overall theme of being a down to earth world, you won't make fantastical discoveries like forests consisting of trees larger than buildings in Pillars, but I'm fine with it, I think it works better with how Pillars of Eternity wants to construct its world.

 

Also, when we compare dark/bright settings. I don´t think BG was bright or cheerful. It was somewhere in between dark/bright. Bright and cheerful for me is for example World of Warcraft or Drakensang. Dark is original Witcher.

BG wasn't necessarily cheerful, but it was extremely silly and naive. It broke the fourth wall on numerous occasions, made fun of RPG and pen and paper tropes constantly. This applies a lot more to the original than to BG2.

[Junai]

I just downloaded PoE last week and I'm about ten hours into it. Haven't had time to try it out earlier.

 

I think PoE is very well made. I don't regret backing it, at all. I enjoy the game, but I gotto agree with the OP - it doesn't quite bring back the old IWD feeling. I'm not sure I can pinpoint what it is. A combination of things probably.

 

I found some of the rules to be a bit strange. Dexterity and quickness doesn't matter in combat? A person with great resolve dodges attacks more effectively? Einstein had great resolve. I'm not sure he'd dodge Mike Tyson's jabs. Strength and dexterity doesn't matter when you fight, but the ability to perceive things does? I'm sure a perceptive young child would easily kick Mike Tyson's butt then, eh? I understand they want to break with tradition and all, but just turning old-school rules upside down doesn't make it ground breaking and fun. It's like saying we're gonna eat desert before dinner from now, because we need some change. It's not radical, just.. silly.

 

Why is it that I can't quaff a potion or cast a simple blessing before combat? I wanna move fast so I can run away from the FAM-pyres in case they catch me sneaking around, but I have to let them engage me before I quaff the fleet foot potion? By then I'm dead anyway, cause they'll catch up with me before it's quaffed. 

 

The graphics and animations are great. I'm a minimalist, so I wouldn't mind a bit less of the sparkly spell and enchantment effects. My rogue's bow now glows green and red, and drips with something. And the arrows look like tracer bullets. Avatars are a bit "hunched" forward, but it's not a problem. I wish the fireball would be a bit more beefy and last longer, but the light it casts on the characters when it explodes is really nice. No complaints as far as graphics go really.

 

Storywise PoE it's on Planescape level. Extensive and intricate. Almost a bit much, but it's fine. I understand they want to introduce us to a new universe. If I have to soul search or listen to another mystical occultist with soul and memory problems though, I'm gonna lose it. Was it written by some new age chick? How about some family feuds, political rivalry? Iron Throne, baby!

 

Anyway, this is the first game in years that I've played for more than three minutes. I suppose it's growing on me.

 

J.

[AndreaColombo]

Why do you say Might and Dexterity don't matter in combat? In my experience, they matter quite a bit. The fact that you can get by without is part of Josh's "no helpless builds" policy: All stats are useful; none is indispensable. I also think it makes sense that Perception governs Accuracy: The more perceptive you are, the easier you identify weak spots in your enemies' defensive stance / moves / etc. and can strike an effective blow. The only thing that feels like a stretch is Deflection on Resolve; then again, Deflection had to be somewhere and Resolve had to have some use (contrary to Charisma in AD&D cRPGs.)

 

That said, let us not forget you are allocating stat points for adventurers. They are supposed to relate to their combat abilities because that's what adventurers do. It's not like perception is necessarily only governing Accuracy for all the people in Eora; if you don't fight and are weak, you may still be mentally keen.

 

 

I also do not think the story in PoE is quite on par with Planescape: Torment's; and I don't think it's too intricate. Patrick Rothfuss's novels have an intricate story—and I certainly wouldn't mind some of that in my cRPGs, but I can certainly appreciate the cost it would entail. Planescape: Torment was more original, and its delivery was overall better. I do like the story and writing in PoE a lot, but Planescape: Torment remains unrivaled to date as far as I'm concerned.

Edited November 8, 2015 by AndreaColombo

[Crucis]

Why is it that I can't quaff a potion or cast a simple blessing before combat? I wanna move fast so I can run away from the FAM-pyres in case they catch me sneaking around, but I have to let them engage me before I quaff the fleet foot potion? By then I'm dead anyway, cause they'll catch up with me before it's quaffed. 

 

As I understand it, it was a conscious design decision to get away from the way things were in the old IE games where players would cast a half dozen buffing spells regularly before battles, and it got to the point where it seemed that you had no choice but to do it because the designers back then may have ended up balancing some battles on the assumption of massive pre-battle buffing.

 

Personally,, I really LOVE that pre-battle buffing has largely gone away.  I always found all that pre-battle buffing to be an annoyingly tedious process that got in the way of good game play and fun.

 

And for what it's worth, there are still a few buffs you can do before a battle.  They're largely food and drink consumable items.

[Mathuzzz]

As I stated in the original post, I have no problem with these restrictions PoE introduced. Some of them I actually like. Like mentioned camping supplies. Getting rid of pre-battle buffing was a drastic move, but when you look back at BG/IWD, it was actually cheating. You were wiped out, reloaded and put on yourself crazy amount spells/items. So I think it was not that bad idea. However the speed of the combat and enemy movement makes it complicated to react as fast as to put something on yourself before you got smashed.

[Fenixp]

I's mostly a matter of getting used to it, Mathuzzz. Don't expect to do anything in real-time - real-time is the bit in which you're watching your orders pan out, pause mode is where you give all the orders. Set your auto-pauses correctly - my game auto-pauses any time one of my dudes finishes a spell, finishes an ability and kills an enemy. Then I pause whenever their endurance or health gets too low. Anything worth noticing happens, game pauses, I don't even play on slow mode anymore - which is another thing you can do, by the way.

[Sarex]

I's mostly a matter of getting used to it, Mathuzzz. Don't expect to do anything in real-time - real-time is the bit in which you're watching your orders pan out, pause mode is where you give all the orders. Set your auto-pauses correctly - my game auto-pauses any time one of my dudes finishes a spell, finishes an ability and kills an enemy. Then I pause whenever their endurance or health gets too low. Anything worth noticing happens, game pauses, I don't even play on slow mode anymore - which is another thing you can do, by the way.

 

That's such a bad way to make a RTwP game play... My will to play this game goes down every time I read posts here...

 

Like there is no point in making it a RTwP game, if you are going down that route then just make it turn based.

Edited November 8, 2015 by Sarex

[Crucis]

Why do you say Might and Dexterity don't matter in combat? In my experience, they matter quite a bit. The fact that you can get by without is part of Josh's "no helpless builds" policy: All stats are useful; none is indispensable. I also think it makes sense that Perception governs Accuracy: The more perceptive you are, the easier you identify weak spots in your enemies' defensive stance / moves / etc. and can strike an effective blow. The only thing that feels like a stretch is Deflection on Resolve; then again, Deflection had to be somewhere and Resolve had to have some use (contrary to Charisma in AD&D cRPGs.)

 

That said, let us not forget you are allocating stat points for adventurers. They are supposed to relate to their combat abilities because that's what adventurers do. It's not like perception is necessarily only governing Accuracy for all the people in Eora; if you don't fight and are weak, you may still be mentally keen.

 

 

Andrea, I think that you misread what Junai said about Dexterity.  What he said about dexterity was a little more subtle (or maybe just poorly communicated) than just assuming that he meant that the DEX stat didn't matter.  IMO, what he was trying to say was along the lines of a complaint that Deflection, i.e. the stat measuring one's ability to avoid being hit, was based on RES rather than on DEX.  IMO, basing DEFL on RES seems incredibly counter-intuitive. It seems to me that there is no logical argument centered on the real life meanings of the words describing the 6 attributes that can justify DEFL being based on one's resolve.  It just seems silly.  The only argument that can be made is one based on game design and balance, etc., which IMO will always leave people looking at that decision and thinking that it was illogical and silly.

 

 

[Crucis]

 

I's mostly a matter of getting used to it, Mathuzzz. Don't expect to do anything in real-time - real-time is the bit in which you're watching your orders pan out, pause mode is where you give all the orders. Set your auto-pauses correctly - my game auto-pauses any time one of my dudes finishes a spell, finishes an ability and kills an enemy. Then I pause whenever their endurance or health gets too low. Anything worth noticing happens, game pauses, I don't even play on slow mode anymore - which is another thing you can do, by the way.

 

That's such a bad way to make a RTwP game play... My will to play this game goes down every time I read posts here...

 

Like there is no point in making it a RTwP game, if you are going down that route then just make it turn based.

 

 

Wellllllll, I sorta agree with you, Sarex.  OTOH, I can see where Fenixp is coming from.  He's just using the game's Pause settings to make his decisions to pause the game for him.  I personally don't have that many auto-pauses set.  I know that I have autopause set for when the enemy is first sighted.  But beyond that, I don't remember if I have any other auto-pauses.

[AndreaColombo]

Like there is no point in making it a RTwP game, if you are going down that route then just make it turn based.

 

Please no. Turn-based combat is so incredibly boring. It would also completely defeat the purpose of action speed and recovery (i.e. a big part of character building and development would disappear.)

[Fenixp]

That's such a bad way to make a RTwP game play... My will to play this game goes down every time I read posts here...

 

Like there is no point in making it a RTwP game, if you are going down that route then just make it turn based.

What you just said makes very little sense. First of all, there is a difference between a real-time game which happens to have a pause function, which is what you seem to be referring to as your preferred playstyle, and a real time WITH PAUSE game. Any game which calls itself RTwP should make pausing a mandatory part of its gameplay, to greater or lesser extent. Pillars chose the path of giving it more importance. It's not an incorrect decision, and it most certainly does not defeat the point of RTwP - on the contrary, it makes real time with pausing that much more meaningful. At any rate, I'm glad I have provided you with information you can use to make an informed purchase decision.

 

The argument that they should have made the game turn-based is of course incredibly silly - but writing up on how does RTwP gameplay differ from turn based gameplay is not really something I'm willing to do right now.

Edited November 8, 2015 by Fenixp

[Sarex]

What you just said makes very little sense. First of all, there is a difference between a real-time game which happens to have a pause function, which is what you seem to be referring to as your preferred playstyle, and a real time WITH PAUSE game. Any game which calls itself RTwP should make pausing a mandatory part of its gameplay, to greater or lesser extent. Pillars chose the path of giving it more importance. It's not an incorrect decision, and it most certainly does not defeat the point of RTwP - on the contrary, it makes real time with pausing that much more meaningful. At any rate, I'm glad I have provided you with information you can use to make an informed purchase decision.

I'm pretty sure what you are saying doesn't make sense... If a game is in real time and has a pause option that let's you do stuff during said pause, it's RTwP. That you are not willing to call them that (or have another category for them) is another matter entirely.

 

 

The argument that they should have made the game turn-based is of course incredibly silly - but writing up on how does RTwP gameplay differ from turn based gameplay is not really something I'm willing to do right now.

 

Nor would I want you to, as I have already played enough games that used both system to have an understanding on what makes them differ and any explanation coming from you would be convoluted to say the least, judging from your posts.

 

If the game forces you to pause after every action, then it's pretty much better to make it turn based. The IE games are the standard of how a RTwP game should play and from what I heard during development and now from other players that played the game, it seems that all that Obs managed to do with PoE combat is make it tedious and bland.

 

I'll probably give it a shot a some point, but I'm not holding my breath.

Edited November 8, 2015 by Sarex

[Fenixp]

I'm pretty sure what you are saying doesn't make sense... If a game is in real time and has a pause option that let's you do stuff during said pause, it's RTwP. That you are not willing to call them that (or have another category for them) is another matter entirely.

"Real-time" is "another category" now? Hm. Okay. Still, fine, I'll give you that, we all have different expectations of different genres. I do believe it's quite reasonable to expect a game which self-identifies as primarily real-time with pause system to be centered around the concept of pausing as opposed to a game which self-identifies as purely real-time.

 

Nor would I want you to, as I have already played enough games that used both system to have an understanding on what makes them differ and any explanation coming from you would be convoluted to say the least, judging from your posts.

Eh... Thank you I guess? I'm not a native, learned English from technical literature and have difficulties expressing myself in a simple fashion, I'm sorry.

 

If the game forces you to pause after every action, then it's pretty much better to make it turn based.

It doesn't. I, personally, pause after every significant action. (Note the key word significant, I don't actually pause after every action) You can hotkey every single activateable and pause a lot less, knock yourself out. The combat is just quite fast and I'm not - judging from Mathuzzz's response, neither is he. I also never issued orders without pausing the game in IE games, or any RTwP games for that matter. Pausing to issue orders every single time is objectively more effective way to play these games, it's as simple as that.

 

I uh... I also played a lot of both turn-based and RTwP games. I hope my e-peen is sufficiently big now to say that no, even if it was mandatory to pause after every action, gameplay is significantly different from turn-based. Even I can make an extremely simple explanation:

 

Turn-based (even simultaneous turns): You commit to your actions, can't immediately react (and if you can, reactions are limited)

Real-time: You can react to every single action enemy does instantly.

 

Explaining the underlying difference doesn't really take that much now that I think about it.

 

The IE games are the standard of how a RTwP game should play and from what I heard during development and now from other players that played the game, it seems that all that Obs managed to do with PoE combat is make it tedious and bland.

I'm not a big fan of how IE games handled combat in general, so... Yeah. Edited November 8, 2015 by Fenixp