You have been waylaid by enemies, and must defend yourself

[jasonwclark]

I miss this... Random combats to interrupt resting or world map travel. Not having any risks attached to camping in the middle of dungeons or out on the main road in full view of everyone, or when making a journey that takes days on end, was kind of a missed opportunity.

 

I think the line could also have been used in a brothel somewhere. "You have been way laid by enemies and must defend yourself"

 

Sure it's annoying when you need to catch 8 hours and didn't plan to get skull crushed by bandits, but that's kind of the point.

 

In any case, it'd be simple enough to include an off toggle, for those who don't go in for this sort of thing.

[Raven Darkholme]

I always feel super cheap if I step slightly out of range from enemies and rest.

[JerekKruger]

Apart from the few unique random encounters that could spawn in Baldur's Gate II (there was a slaver one, and one with the poisoned Harper) I don't miss them in PoE. Personally I prefer combat to be rarer but more challenging and interesting, with fewer trash fights. For me at least, the supply mechanic in PoE solved any problem with immersion breaking rest spamming.

 

That said, if there's a toggle option I wouldn't object to them being in PoE2.

[Ser Pontonnier]

I remember that random encounters tended to happen a lot, and were always the same in BG II. Good first time, but boring after. I prefer the scenarized encounters.

 

About resting in dungeon, I agree it's odd to sleep just a few meters away of dangerous monsters that attack you on sight. There's should be a chance of night attack on your camp on such occasions. after all, in reality, it's always when you sleep that pests raid your skin without mercy.

[sp3cw4r]

I'd welcome this to return for PoE2!   

[anameforobsidian]

I wouldn't mind them if they were rare and related to sidequests. Like running across the Morton gangs in Fallout 2, or occasionally pissing off a faction and having them send hit squads. The assassins were a weird version of this, because they would occasionally kill allied NPCs.

[evilcat]

Random Stronghold fights ware some of most annoying things in PoE, being in middle of some cool exploration and get message to guard some settlements, could kick out of tempo.

Everything devs do need to have purpose, camp fights cant be very challenging since we are not prepared, and cant be very story driven since they are random, so there is a challenge to give them more than just existence.

[AeonsLegend]

I remember that random encounters tended to happen a lot, and were always the same in BG II. Good first time, but boring after. I prefer the scenarized encounters.

 

About resting in dungeon, I agree it's odd to sleep just a few meters away of dangerous monsters that attack you on sight. There's should be a chance of night attack on your camp on such occasions. after all, in reality, it's always when you sleep that pests raid your skin without mercy.

 

Uh yea, I remember having sex with Aerie right outside Firkraag's arena in BGII. That was really... awkward.

[evilcat]

 

I remember that random encounters tended to happen a lot, and were always the same in BG II. Good first time, but boring after. I prefer the scenarized encounters.

 

About resting in dungeon, I agree it's odd to sleep just a few meters away of dangerous monsters that attack you on sight. There's should be a chance of night attack on your camp on such occasions. after all, in reality, it's always when you sleep that pests raid your skin without mercy.

 

Uh yea, I remember having sex with Aerie right outside Firkraag's arena in BGII. That was really... awkward.

 

That was f...ing close to death.

Games need to simplify some things in the name of general fun experience.

[JerekKruger]

Random Stronghold fights ware some of most annoying things in PoE, being in middle of some cool exploration and get message to guard some settlements, could kick out of tempo.

 

Agreed, I would have preferred the game without them, especially given how generic they were.

 

Everything devs do need to have purpose, camp fights cant be very challenging since we are not prepared, and cant be very story driven since they are random, so there is a challenge to give them more than just existence.

 

 

That tends to be my view as well. They'll be an annoyance after a while and most players will get into the habit of saving and reloading to avoid them, wasting time and leading to frustration the few times a player forgets. Sure, perhaps it's more realistic to have camping be risky, but there are an awful lot of other realistic features that we don't include because they're not fun. Of course, if there's a simple option to turn them off I don't really mind them being included.

 

Now, having a quest initiated by such an event is a different matter, and could be quite fun. The problem is when they become routine and purposeless.

[K Galen B]

I missed them. Definitely missed them. Sure, they were annoying in BG but the world seems a little less organic without them.

 

That doesn't mean they'd have to work like they did in BG. You could pacify areas after certain quests are complete - particularly suitable as a ruler of the area. Encounters could be limited to 1 or less per transition/rest period instead of completely random (no reloading a save because 2 random encounters in a row with no health or spells left for the second one). Encounters could be tied in with factions... in such a way that you can kick someone's teeth in and make them stop. There's lots of stuff you could do with random encounters that wouldn't make them seem out of place.

 

I don't mind a certain number of trash fights at all, personally. They add tension to important battles by contrast, make your characters feel as if they're actually growing stronger, keep you on your toes a bit, and if done right make the world feel real.

Edited October 26, 2016 by K Galen B

[Reshy]

I would rather random encounters for travel instead of Resting.  Because, frankly, if they did that then they'd have to compensate by giving more generous uses of rest abilities.  Not to mention it already is mitigated because in most cases you can just walk to the entrance (which has already been cleared out) and run to town to rest with bonuses.

[Sedrefilos]

Random encounters by spawning random trash enemies to beat up is an annoying thing of the past and it should stay there. Now, random scripted encouters (I mean chosen randomly by a pool of events) could be something good if they have some interesting side story or whatever (something creative, like "superman's parents" in Dragon Age or whatever - I leave it to the devs ) I wouldn't object.

Edited October 26, 2016 by Sedrefilos

[jsaving]

Random trash enemies work great in games like BG/BG2/IWD when you are allowed or even encouraged to generate as much XP/treasure as you like by spam-resting.  But in PoE resting is something you earn rather than something you can spam, which eliminates the need to make it risky.  Also, BG1/BG2 gives the player a lot of flexibility to level up fast through "rest abuse" whereas your xp path in PoE s supposed to be tightly controlled so the devs will know your likely level at any given point in the game (which admittedly didn't work out all that well but is still worth mentioning). 

 

I don't have anything against random encounters, personally, but some thinking would need to be done if they were to be brought into PoE/PoE2 when resting. 

Edited October 27, 2016 by jsaving

[JerekKruger]

Random encounters by spawning random trash enemies to beat up is an annoying thing of the past and it should stay there.

 

Agreed. They were lifted straight from tabletop, where they were a tool available to the GM to stop players from unrealistically resting after every fight. Given that in CRPGs fights are much more prevalent and save/load scumming is available they're just an annoying carryover from the games tabletop roots (and before anyone complains, I am a tabletop role-player, but ultimately single player CRPGs as a medium are different to tabletop and short of genuine AI they always will be).

 

Random trash enemies work great in games like BG/BG2/IWD when you are allowed or even encouraged to generate as much XP/treasure as you like by spam-resting.  

 

People did that? In BG2 I was always overflowing with money and the random loot dropped by such encounters paled when compared to unique loot found by actually questing. Moreover the amount of time needed to level this way would surely make it less efficient than simply playing the game. Most on-rest encounters were pretty trivial and therefore low xp.

[Fenixp]

Now, random scripted encouters (I mean chosen randomly by a pool of events) could be something good if they have some interesting side story or whatever (something creative, like "superman's parents" in Dragon Age or whatever - I leave it to the devs ) I wouldn't object.

Yeah, absolutely. Adding encounters that actually contribute to the story would be fantastic, just as adding some minor ones which quite simply offer more ways of resolution. That's how you make the world feel more alieve, not by having random creatures attack travelers on the road.

[JerekKruger]

Yeah, absolutely. Adding encounters that actually contribute to the story would be fantastic, just as adding some minor ones which quite simply offer more ways of resolution. That's how you make the world feel more alieve, not by having random creatures attack travelers on the road.

 

 

This, a thousand times this. If there's a quest which starts after a random chance encounter* that's great. Having a bunch of Hobgoblins spawn with a 10% when I sleep, forcing me to either waste time reloading, or waste time auto-attacking them to death, that doesn't improve the game or the experience.

 

*make sure the chance isn't too low and/or guarantee it after a certain number of failed chances.

[K Galen B]

Everything being significant tends to resemble nothing being significant after a while. There is, of course, a balance to be struck between the two - not pointless encounters or battles all the time.

 

Personally I liked being reminded that traveling through the wilderness is dangerous, sleeping in hellhole-of-your-choice unwarily is a terrible idea, and that from time to time monsters make terminal mistakes about how dangerous sleeping adventurers are.

[JerekKruger]

Everything being significant tends to resemble nothing being significant after a while. 

 

I'm not asking for every random encounter to lead to an epic quest culminating in a fight against a dragon. They could be as simple as filling in the of lore or fleshing out NPCs.

 

Personally I liked being reminded that traveling through the wilderness is dangerous, sleeping in hellhole-of-your-choice unwarily is a terrible idea, and that from time to time monsters make terminal mistakes about how dangerous sleeping adventurers are

 

There are countless things that happen which aren't mentioned in good narratives because they're mundane and uninteresting. Imagine if Lord of the Rings had descriptions of how the Fellowship easily fought off a group of roaming Orcs again and again: it would detract from the story. Why would doing the opposite be a good thing in a CRPG. There are plenty of non-tedious methods for reminding the player that travelling in the wilderness is dangerous.

[Reshy]

Random trash enemies work great in games like BG/BG2/IWD when you are allowed or even encouraged to generate as much XP/treasure as you like by spam-resting.  But in PoE you earn the right to rest (which eliminates the need to make it risky) and your xp path is supposed to be tightly controlled so the devs will know your likely level at any given point in the game (which admittedly didn't work out all that well but is still worth mentioning). 

 

I don't have anything against random encounters, personally, but some thinking would need to be done if they were to be brought back when resting. 

 

If you wanted, you could always allow the option to rest *without* the supplies, but you get a random encounter guaranteed.

 

 

 

Yeah, absolutely. Adding encounters that actually contribute to the story would be fantastic, just as adding some minor ones which quite simply offer more ways of resolution. That's how you make the world feel more alieve, not by having random creatures attack travelers on the road.

 

 

This, a thousand times this. If there's a quest which starts after a random chance encounter* that's great. Having a bunch of Hobgoblins spawn with a 10% when I sleep, forcing me to either waste time reloading, or waste time auto-attacking them to death, that doesn't improve the game or the experience.

 

*make sure the chance isn't too low and/or guarantee it after a certain number of failed chances.

 

 

 

Honestly though I'd rather scripted traveling encounters instead.  Personally I liked Dragon Age's version of it, which occasionally had important things going on.  I mean in this game you already have random assassins attacking you at random times, but they don't really add anything to the game.  Having traveling encounters or scripted encounters that happen at certain points of the game (Like you're all alone at night in brighthallow and assassins have drawn your companions away and you have to fight or sneak your way out of traps they have rigged around the area.  But the encounters could also take other forms, like stumbling a cache of items hidden in a long forgotten place.

 

Having encounters happen on travel rather than on rest would make players feel like using camping supplies is more important than saving the coppers and journeying back to brighthallow to rest up for free with buffs.  Because if you make them happen on rest, then there's even less reason to use camping supplies than there already are.

[AeonsLegend]

 

Random trash enemies work great in games like BG/BG2/IWD when you are allowed or even encouraged to generate as much XP/treasure as you like by spam-resting.  But in PoE you earn the right to rest (which eliminates the need to make it risky) and your xp path is supposed to be tightly controlled so the devs will know your likely level at any given point in the game (which admittedly didn't work out all that well but is still worth mentioning). 

 

I don't have anything against random encounters, personally, but some thinking would need to be done if they were to be brought back when resting. 

 

If you wanted, you could always allow the option to rest *without* the supplies, but you get a random encounter guaranteed.

 

The random encounters in the BG series always interrupted your rest. It was implemented to make it "dangerous" to rest in the wilds. If you'd get a random encounter guaranteed with this setup, you'd never be able to rest outside.

[jasonwclark]

I'd be happy with encounters on travel. Part of me just wants to here then line, to scratch that itch.

 

But I agree with others, that an improved encounter system would be preferable to a direct rehash of what we saw in BG.

 

One possibility on travel would be an option to flee, and avoid the encounter altogether, perhaps with some alternative consequence. Like you end up somewhere unexpected, or someone falls and twists their ankle in the rush to escape (classic) so you wind up shaken. Or perhaps sometimes there is no option, in the traditional ambush. But an option to auto skip might be interesting for those who just can't stand this stuff.

 

Or in that case, maybe they pepper the events with positive encounters too, so you never know if you're going to be facing foes or friends, until you actually check it out.

 

I like all the ideas mentioned above, about more scripted events that go beyond just a pack of wolves or generic bandits, to include more interesting stuff. I think there are lot of places you could take it, with dialogue and puzzles, special serialized mini quests and the like. Something that turns the world map into an arena, one which makes travel more engaging and suspenseful than just watching a load screen and knowing where you'll end up.

[Sedrefilos]

Another thing I'd like to see (side-topic here) is, when you travel from one place to another, instead of a loading screen, have -Dragon Age style- a line drawn on the map showing the route of the party as they travel. Then if a -random or not- encounter happens, it could be related to the area they are currently in while travelling. More immersive imo.

[Reshy]

 

 

Random trash enemies work great in games like BG/BG2/IWD when you are allowed or even encouraged to generate as much XP/treasure as you like by spam-resting.  But in PoE you earn the right to rest (which eliminates the need to make it risky) and your xp path is supposed to be tightly controlled so the devs will know your likely level at any given point in the game (which admittedly didn't work out all that well but is still worth mentioning). 

 

I don't have anything against random encounters, personally, but some thinking would need to be done if they were to be brought back when resting. 

 

If you wanted, you could always allow the option to rest *without* the supplies, but you get a random encounter guaranteed.

 

The random encounters in the BG series always interrupted your rest. It was implemented to make it "dangerous" to rest in the wilds. If you'd get a random encounter guaranteed with this setup, you'd never be able to rest outside.

 

 

Well you can, but this gives incentives to use camping supplies since camping in the wilds is no longer an infinite use option, it's very limited.  On the flip side, you can easily just travel across the country without ever having to risk being waylaid by brigands or threats.  In PoE I've very rarely actually used the campaigning supplies, less than maybe a dozen times the entire game. 

[AeonsLegend]

 

 

 

Random trash enemies work great in games like BG/BG2/IWD when you are allowed or even encouraged to generate as much XP/treasure as you like by spam-resting.  But in PoE you earn the right to rest (which eliminates the need to make it risky) and your xp path is supposed to be tightly controlled so the devs will know your likely level at any given point in the game (which admittedly didn't work out all that well but is still worth mentioning). 

 

I don't have anything against random encounters, personally, but some thinking would need to be done if they were to be brought back when resting. 

 

If you wanted, you could always allow the option to rest *without* the supplies, but you get a random encounter guaranteed.

 

The random encounters in the BG series always interrupted your rest. It was implemented to make it "dangerous" to rest in the wilds. If you'd get a random encounter guaranteed with this setup, you'd never be able to rest outside.

 

 

Well you can, but this gives incentives to use camping supplies since camping in the wilds is no longer an infinite use option, it's very limited.  On the flip side, you can easily just travel across the country without ever having to risk being waylaid by brigands or threats.  In PoE I've very rarely actually used the campaigning supplies, less than maybe a dozen times the entire game. 

 

 

Oh I see you meant optionally rest without supplies. So have both options available. I misunderstood. I don't see why you'd want to pick the option to rest without supplies if you're guaranteed to get interrupted though. 

 

Camping in PoE also gives bonuses. I've chosen to rest quite a few times before a battle just to have those bonuses. Also on PotD you lose health a lot faster because battles in the beginning take a long time because of the enemy stat boosts. Of course you could always save before a fight and if the fight doesn't go as you wanted reload so you don't need to use supplies, but yeah whatever. I think the system is fine.

 

The "waylaid by enemies" in BG was a random encounter when you travelled from point A to B. I don't think you should be interrupted while resting. If anything the number of areas where you're allowed to rest should be minimized.