Some points Obsidian should consider.

[fdel71]

 

 

I think what OP asks for is a different game with and different mentality, goal and design philosophy. I am afraid that procedural "Rogue-like" elements won't mesh welll with handcrafted nature of PoE. Prerendered locations don't allow for much variation, character design tends to be tied to who they are. The encounteres you have are a way of storytelling as well. Ideally, the depth of player interactions with the world will be more fleshed out in Deadfire, and you can get desired replayibility from the way you interact with the world. I would rather have more possibilities of role playing, rather than game throwing new, shallow scenarios on multiple play through.

Partially wrong or right, whatever.

 

Yes i ask for changes. More specifically modernization. 

Getting stale in the past just because  a "path" must be followed. Path that was set due to old technical limitations ain t good.

Things must be sorted out, what is tecnhical militation and what is core.

 

Main tale with good story telling with possible moral choices that cast doubts and if possible interwined side quest with the main is core.

Having an interesting way to create characters, which sometimes is the part i most like in games, is also core. 

 

 

- Now having ever the same non related sidequests was a limitation, and breaking this with a pool of side quests could show you even more diverses facts and atitude present in the world.

 - Would also allow to give a tool so comunity can share fan made missions, this is also quite mainstrean and was present in Neverwinternight, nothing new here. 

- Having slides instead of a "roling world" (or part of it) was a limitation, that is no more, it so true, they are adjusting. 

- Not start as a zero on the left, to rise as a god, is a mental limitation in RPG mindset that few have ever tried to break. (i would like to see a point system were you can buy level or skills habilities fame or LVLs, would be a trade off , let s say you could start up to LVL 5 instead of level 0, but doing, so you would lessen other kinds of benefits. Game would adjust some crucial places in accordance. Non relevant missions would stay the same. 

- If your party is being wipped (this may have been fixed) you can abandon it and flee with the survivors, instead of a live all die all approach.  Or it could be an option.

- Its not because a dungeon switches place and aquire a diferent X,Y  on a 2D map that the games is fundamentally changed. But keeping surprises high and repetitive stuff at minimal keeping the core of it intact is a move that i spell as improvement.

 

If evolution wasn t part of it we would still be playing 2d games like Curse of the azure bonds, or Pool of radiance, which by the way were excelents, and i REALLY miss. Would be an instant buyer.

FPS would still be 2d

strategic games would still be merely symbols.

 

Do not confound real advance with those who use modernization as an excuse to lower the quality bar. And there s alot, since by modernization they usually mean better FX at the expanse of interesting gameplay.

 

I love the kind of game PoE is, i just think it could shake some dusty features off not essencially going to the makeup artist. 

 

Now if someone could muster the courage and leave the D&D and give a go to Rolemaster kind of combat and world...

Shadow World would be a blast. Dirty, gritty, dusty evil, gods, avatars, sernants, walking as mere creatures/kith, but yet some hope.. Tyrrany is a good step toward this kind of setting but a bit still too festy in design, it lacks dirt, grits and exposed guts.

But this require a hugue step.

Giving community modding tools is not a modernisation but a creative decision. "What is our experience designed to be?" To create a modable engine you have to create an engine for that very purpose. In case of PoE that would mean completely changing how the game plays and looks - instead of handcrafted prerendered backgrounds you create 3D assets which can be easily used and reused. Games become modular.

 

NWN is a good example. To some it was step forward, but to me it was a disaster. Campaign was dull and unengaging, gameplay a step backward from IE. But it allowed for multiplayer and custom campaign. I don't care much for user created background. Obsidian has many talented writiers, artists and designers on their team and I am more interested in their work than a fan fiction of some random bloke.

 

POE is a bit vintage but that is what it is supposed to be. It's a successor to EI games. It values handcrafted locations, class based combat, well written prose. And they modernise it where they see the need.

 

You continue with that idea that predrawn stuff is incompatible with a bit of randomness. 

Maybe you like things ever on the same place, easely predictable and redo ever the same stuff. Nothing agaisn t it.

I prefer things a bit diferent if possible when i replay a game, so i actually don t ask myself after some time, why am i replaying this? i know exactly what will happen.

 

As for campaign being good or not is highly subjective. The first time i ve run the game, after act 3 i was absolutely fed up of the game (bugs saves disapearing didn t help the mood), the story had gotten linearily dull, too black and white... i just forced forward, to know the end of the book, but ended up too early in lvl to win the final boss. And didn t look at it until this now, even byying the 2 expansions at cristmass sales i think. 

World (wilderness) presented in slides, too much fetching, lack of freedom, MMO feeling, can abandon fallen ones for the sake of the group. Maybe i ve been spoiled by games that gives the player freedom to do whatever they want the main quest or otherwise in no absolute order and i wish a bit of it replicated here.

 

But still i like the kind of game, just wish it doesn t stay frozen in the past.

I like classed character

I like the handrawn, which doesn t mean much since most of the game are handrawn anyway by 3d artist

I like the main quest that are epic

 

But getting old:

I like large diferenciation inside the same class so i really feeling i playing a fighter diferent than this other fighter i ve done before.

I find that "mapped" wilderness win over "handdrawn" when it come to pure exploration

I like the main quest being no so black and white, when the writter are able to implant incertainty, i am really on the right path? Should i kick ass or see the world take fire? PoE hadd some good moment for that but it lacked a bit in the end. (maybe there s a diferent end when you can ally to the bad guy or some cranky god, or destroy the gods and blacmail them so you have a place among them or whatever. I wonder if for example with some end the epilogue comes but with one choice there s some more missions.)

And if possible i ve learning to like to be surprised ingame during a replay. I fond it fun to try to adapt to what writter or people hrow at you and not just replay the same like rereading a book. 

Edited September 14, 2017 by fdel71

[Lord_Mord]

 

But it would nice to have an option not to be lvl 0 for once in a RPG direct sequel.

 

I totally agree with you. I would like to continue with the same character on the same level. Not only that, I would like part 2 to completely merge into part 1 in the style of the Big World Mod for BG and carry all equipment to part 2. But unless the game is designed to do so, what is the point in leveling up your character?

[Messier-31]

 

 

But it would nice to have an option not to be lvl 0 for once in a RPG direct sequel.

 

I totally agree with you. I would like to continue with the same character on the same level. Not only that, I would like part 2 to completely merge into part 1 in the style of the Big World Mod for BG and carry all equipment to part 2. But unless the game is designed to do so, what is the point in leveling up your character?

 

 

Because:

 

 

I don't see leveling up as a story progress, only a gameplay progress. The story will continue through the strory not through leveling up. I never thought that rpgs struggle with level-ups from a narrative prespective - only players. I'm perfectly fine with starting at level 1 and it won't mess with my story. If they said that my stronghold was at the White that Wends because they wanted their new story to start from there, that would have been annoying, yes.

 

Let that sink in.

Edited September 14, 2017 by Messier-31

[PugPug]

Guys, with all the new abilities, skills, subclasses and multiclasses, you'd be rerolling anyway. You know why RPGs drip-feed you abilities over time? Progression, yes, but it's also to give you practice with them before giving you more. You don't want to start POE2 at level 15.

[injurai]

Guys, with all the new abilities, skills, subclasses and multiclasses, you'd be rerolling anyway. You know why RPGs drip-feed you abilities over time? Progression, yes, but it's also to give you practice with them before giving you more. You don't want to start POE2 at level 15.

 

Priest/Druid spell dumps are wasted on me the first time through, and I'm likely to not roll the same class twice. Sometimes it takes a long time to even find a use for some of your spells when they are so situationally specific. I guess there is an argument in dumping lots of spells though when they are situational. If you only got 2 new spells which are both situational then it feels like you piked them out either too soon or after when they'd be useful.

 

Of course though all the problems with level up dumps becomes worse when you just start at 15.

[Lord_Mord]

 

Let that sink in.

 

I think you didn't get me.

 

I totally understand why it isn't done the way it is done and I'm not thinking that level progress is somehow tied to story progress. I just wanted to say, that I understand (and share) the wish to start at a high level, but that the game is not designed to do so for various reasons. Now the OP wants to start at level 5 eitherway, which I don't understand, because the game just isn't designed for that.

 

My question to the OP was: What would be the point in starting at level 5, even when the game is designed to start at level 1?

Edited September 15, 2017 by Lord_Mord

[algroth]

The best example that comes to mind of a sequel where you conserve the level from the end of the predecessor is Baldur's Gate II, but that is a remarkably different case to that of Pillars. For starters, Baldur's Gate is based on an existing ruleset and the first game only made use of the lower levels of the same, meaning there was room for further growth in a sequel - this is not the case of Pillars, whose ruleset and levelling system was designed specifically for the game's breadth and which by the end of its campaign, and especially having completed the White March DLCs, had the player well within "epic level" territory. But also, levelling up in Baldur's Gate mostly meant an increase in stats, and occasionally unlocking powers that are either passive or don't require introducing anything radically new to a starting player. A player for whom Shadows of Amn was their first foray into the saga and IE/D&D/RPG games in general would more or less be introduced to the same mechanics and gameplay elements starting at lvl 9 than they would have at lvl 1. This isn't really the case for Pillars, where every level requests the player to unlock new passive, modal and active abilities from a variety of choices, each of these presenting new mechanics, rules and so on. The amount of information you'd have to drop on a player new to the franchise from the get-go would be excessive and daunting, and would simply make for bad game design.

[Wormerine]

The best example that comes to mind of a sequel where you conserve the level from the end of the predecessor is Baldur's Gate II, but that is a remarkably different case to that of Pillars. For starters, Baldur's Gate is based on an existing ruleset and the first game only made use of the lower levels of the same, meaning there was room for further growth in a sequel - this is not the case of Pillars, whose ruleset and levelling system was designed specifically for the game's breadth and which by the end of its campaign, and especially having completed the White March DLCs, had the player well within "epic level" territory. But also, levelling up in Baldur's Gate mostly meant an increase in stats, and occasionally unlocking powers that are either passive or don't require introducing anything radically new to a starting player. A player for whom Shadows of Amn was their first foray into the saga and IE/D&D/RPG games in general would more or less be introduced to the same mechanics and gameplay elements starting at lvl 9 than they would have at lvl 1. This isn't really the case for Pillars, where every level requests the player to unlock new passive, modal and active abilities from a variety of choices, each of these presenting new mechanics, rules and so on. The amount of information you'd have to drop on a player new to the franchise from the get-go would be excessive and daunting, and would simply make for bad game design.

As someone for whom BG2 was introduction to D&D and role playing game in general I second that. Well, except Wizards. Sifting through couple levels of spells took time. In most of the classes however, you just picked which weapon you will use, and that was that.

[Mygaffer]

I'm on the fence whether 'aleatory' is a word or not.

At least I can say OP's post taught me something.