Combat is now mostly a dull chore

[ThacoBell]

All of that sounds frustrating and unfun.

[cokane]

All of that sounds frustrating and unfun.

If you don't want a game that ever frustrates you, play story mode. Deadfire has plenty of options for players who merely want to march through the game without resistance. But what is universally acknowledged, is that the high level difficulty isn't difficult. This is acknowledged even by the developers. I don't understand why you've insisted in participating in this thread in an entirely negative way about game changes that are unlikely to affect or affect significantly the level you enjoy playing at.

[Katarack21]

 

All of that sounds frustrating and unfun.

If you don't want a game that ever frustrates you, play story mode. Deadfire has plenty of options for players who merely want to march through the game without resistance. But what is universally acknowledged, is that the high level difficulty isn't difficult. This is acknowledged even by the developers. I don't understand why you've insisted in participating in this thread in an entirely negative way about game changes that are unlikely to affect or affect significantly the level you enjoy playing at.

 

There is a difference between challenge and difficulty and frustration. One is good; the other is bad. They are to some degree subjective, but that's why you work with large sources of data (like telemetry from beta testers) and make choices based on large portions of your fan base.

 

Literally everything you posted does not sound difficult and challenging, it sounds annoying and frustrating. That's just my opinion, of course.

[Multihog]

 

 

I find the combat to be a marked improvement. Now the combat in PoE1, THAT was dull and a chore.

Could you elaborate? I can perhaps see the "chore" part, as combat required more of the player's attention in the original. But, since most fights in Deadfire do not reward or punish the player for paying attention and actually using tactics, I'm failing to see how most combats are actually interesting in Deadfire?

 

 

POE2 combat seems to require more micro something I really enjoy. POE1 really did not.

 

Uh, PoE1 did require a lot of micro, at least on Path of the Damned. 

[ThacoBell]

 

 

All of that sounds frustrating and unfun.

If you don't want a game that ever frustrates you, play story mode. Deadfire has plenty of options for players who merely want to march through the game without resistance. But what is universally acknowledged, is that the high level difficulty isn't difficult. This is acknowledged even by the developers. I don't understand why you've insisted in participating in this thread in an entirely negative way about game changes that are unlikely to affect or affect significantly the level you enjoy playing at.

 

There is a difference between challenge and difficulty and frustration. One is good; the other is bad. They are to some degree subjective, but that's why you work with large sources of data (like telemetry from beta testers) and make choices based on large portions of your fan base.

 

Literally everything you posted does not sound difficult and challenging, it sounds annoying and frustrating. That's just my opinion, of course.

 

Exactly. Challenge is good, frustration is bad. I also like where the difficulty currently is for standard difficulties. I am being challenged by Normal level.  I don't want "fake difficulty" being added in for the sake of sating some players need for masochism.

[Purudaya]

 

 

I find the combat to be a marked improvement. Now the combat in PoE1, THAT was dull and a chore.

Could you elaborate? I can perhaps see the "chore" part, as combat required more of the player's attention in the original. But, since most fights in Deadfire do not reward or punish the player for paying attention and actually using tactics, I'm failing to see how most combats are actually interesting in Deadfire?

 

 

POE2 combat seems to require more micro something I really enjoy. POE1 really did not.

 

 

Agreed. One benefit of PoE2's per-encounter system is that it encourages you to make liberal use of a variety of abilities - which, once difficulty is fixed, will probably make encounters more strategic/fun in the long run. In PoE1 there was a LOT of auto-attacking.

[cokane]

 

 

All of that sounds frustrating and unfun.

If you don't want a game that ever frustrates you, play story mode. Deadfire has plenty of options for players who merely want to march through the game without resistance. But what is universally acknowledged, is that the high level difficulty isn't difficult. This is acknowledged even by the developers. I don't understand why you've insisted in participating in this thread in an entirely negative way about game changes that are unlikely to affect or affect significantly the level you enjoy playing at.

 

There is a difference between challenge and difficulty and frustration. One is good; the other is bad. They are to some degree subjective, but that's why you work with large sources of data (like telemetry from beta testers) and make choices based on large portions of your fan base.

 

Literally everything you posted does not sound difficult and challenging, it sounds annoying and frustrating. That's just my opinion, of course.

 

Except the two of you have merely posted assertions and not actual arguments. You haven't articulated in any way how my suggestions would be "frustrating" and "not challenging".

[demeisen]

Nothing could ever be more boring than having to run back through multiple load screens to go get more camping supplies.

​

​You never had to do that in POE1.  Camping supplies were found in excess: there was literally no need to keep running back.  On PotD you could only carry two at a time, yet I didn't even pick up 80% of the ones I found since I simply couldn't carry any more.  Heck, after the early levels, I hardly used the ones scattered around at all.

​​

​There were issues with the POE1 resting system, but "having to run back" was not one of them.  If you're going to rest-spam, that's on you, not on the game, and it was never a reason to abandon all aspects of long term management that made the game feel like... an actual RPG.

​

The OP hit the nail on the head: the vast majority of the combats in DF simply no longer matter, and that destroys the very essence of a CRPG.  The consequences of playing a fight poorly have been largely removed.  The need to improvise has been largely removed, because I never start a fight with some weird combination of little used abilities.  I get everything back each and every time.

​

It's maddening.  ​It was a terrible choice, and that's a shame because there's so much else about Deadfire that is truly excellent.

​

​

[demeisen]

Important point that think needs be made is POE 1 was more for the tactical thinker and the casual player could tone level down to play. POE 2 more for causal player cause having no real limits and no progression in one fight to next you can throw everything then rest if need and throw everything in next fight no tactics no thought needed.

 

​Agreed.  I think you hit on a key part of the problem: DF has been tailored for more casual players, and non-casual players coming from an "action" background where each combat stands alone.

​

And that is a much larger market than what you call the "tactical thinker" genre, so I understand why they'd move that direction.  The unit of attention is now dramatically shorter, which really saps the fun out of the thing for people who like to manage a party over a longer time span than a fight at a time.

​

​For me it also causes problems trying to "lose myself" in the game.  I don't feel like it's a journey any more: it's just a series of independent little combats.  There's no more satisfaction in beating a dungeon, because that concept no longer exists.

​

[Katarack21]

 

 

 

All of that sounds frustrating and unfun.

If you don't want a game that ever frustrates you, play story mode. Deadfire has plenty of options for players who merely want to march through the game without resistance. But what is universally acknowledged, is that the high level difficulty isn't difficult. This is acknowledged even by the developers. I don't understand why you've insisted in participating in this thread in an entirely negative way about game changes that are unlikely to affect or affect significantly the level you enjoy playing at.

 

There is a difference between challenge and difficulty and frustration. One is good; the other is bad. They are to some degree subjective, but that's why you work with large sources of data (like telemetry from beta testers) and make choices based on large portions of your fan base.

 

Literally everything you posted does not sound difficult and challenging, it sounds annoying and frustrating. That's just my opinion, of course.

 

Except the two of you have merely posted assertions and not actual arguments. You haven't articulated in any way how my suggestions would be "frustrating" and "not challenging".

 

Because it's a subjective opinion. It's frustrating because micromanaging inane crap *frustrates* me, and for no other reason. Limited, expensive food limiting my rest options and *forcing* me to fight with injuries etc sounds super annoying and I don't want it.

 

I don't like attrition systems. They piss me off, annoy me, and frustrate me. I don't like systems that limit my choice and force me into playing the game in a pre-determined manner. This doesn't mean I don't like challenge or difficulty, it means I don't enjoy those types of systems. If you do, that's fine. There's plenty of games that cater to your desire. This doesn't appear to be one of them.

 

You're not advocating for increased difficulty in the upper difficulty levels. You're arguing for a specific *type* of difficulty and gameplay based around limited resources and attrition, and that gameplay *sucks*. I'm glad they got rid of and I don't want it back.

[ThacoBell]

 

 

 

All of that sounds frustrating and unfun.

If you don't want a game that ever frustrates you, play story mode. Deadfire has plenty of options for players who merely want to march through the game without resistance. But what is universally acknowledged, is that the high level difficulty isn't difficult. This is acknowledged even by the developers. I don't understand why you've insisted in participating in this thread in an entirely negative way about game changes that are unlikely to affect or affect significantly the level you enjoy playing at.

 

There is a difference between challenge and difficulty and frustration. One is good; the other is bad. They are to some degree subjective, but that's why you work with large sources of data (like telemetry from beta testers) and make choices based on large portions of your fan base.

 

Literally everything you posted does not sound difficult and challenging, it sounds annoying and frustrating. That's just my opinion, of course.

 

Except the two of you have merely posted assertions and not actual arguments. You haven't articulated in any way how my suggestions would be "frustrating" and "not challenging".

 

I say those things are un-fun, because I find them un-fun. I'm not going to argue about whether I find something fun or not. That's insipid.

[NegativeEdge]

can i ask the people who insist POE1 'forces' you to backtrack for camping supplies: why do you unload your spellbooks on every single encounter? don't you think the per-rest system incentivises and rewards, by design, judicious use of lower and higher spells and abilities over a period of time?

Do you just barge into the temple of Eothas at level 2 w/ Aloth & Eder, get 3 rooms in then hump it back, over and over until the temple is clear? and never think 'there has to be a better way?' cos that's funny as **** tbh

[Katarack21]

can i ask the people who insist POE1 'forces' you to backtrack for camping supplies: why do you unload your spellbooks on every single encounter? don't you think the per-rest system incentivises and rewards, by design, judicious use of lower and higher spells and abilities over a period of time?

Do you just barge into the temple of Eothas at level 2 w/ Aloth & Eder, get 3 rooms in then hump it back, over and over until the temple is clear? and never think 'there has to be a better way?' cos that's funny as **** tbh

There is an option between "clear Temple three rooms at a time while backtracking for camping supplies" and "slowly work your way through the temple over the course of two hours by autoattacking 60% of the time and only using abilities when needed".

 

What I do is pick up Aloth, Eder, and Durance, make a mercenary for a second tank, and then just clear the place in one go. It's honestly not even hard.

[Answermancer]

I want to thank everyone for adding some really insightful comments on this thread. I'd especially call out the long Marcus post on page 7 as worth the time it took to read.

 

I do think the roots of a strategic layer exist in Deadfire that could, if tweaked, bring back some of the challenge that the original had. So I wanted to throw out some suggestions. Some of these might only be applicable on the higher difficulty settings. These are just some thoughts after continuing on in Deadfire but also after taking up a session of the original game recently.

 

1. Encounters and enemy AI really needs to focus on scoring knockdowns. If this happened at a pretty frequent rate, it would make the wounds system superior to the original's health system. An across the board damage increase or a nerfing of healing options could help here.

 

2. Food needs a redesign. Food should be more expensive but also more limited in curing injuries. Perhaps the solution is to have only recipe foods cure injuries. And you can't rest unless you feed everyone at least something. Players might be extra loathe to squander certain bonuses from the food to cure just one injury in the party, for example.

 

3. Ship crew wages should be greatly increased and should be charged more often. This will help create a tension between resting alot to cure injuries and wanting to wrap up a dungeon or island crawl ASAP.  Right now this is a nominal, nearly meaningless fee.

 

4. The high seas should be more dangerous. There would have to be a certain grace period after the first island before this kicks in. But something needs to be there to motivate the player to spend money on their ship and crew so that changes in 2 and 3 have more bite. These above changes would really change the dynamic of setting out from Neketaka in a cool, immersive way, imo. Player would have to plan ahead for their dangerous voyages and would regularly return to the game world's hub as a place of refuge to restock for the next adventure.

 

5. Empowers need a tweak. I'm not smart enough to give specific advice here. But something should happen that motivates players to use empowers more frequently. Perhaps give them more diverse uses. But as they are essentially Deadfire's "per rest" ability, the game will benefit greatly if players are using them more frequently and thus treating them the way they did high-level "per rest" spells and abilities in the original. Right now I'm only using these as emergency party wipe avoidance. It's possible this last point becomes moot if encounters are redesigned to be more dangerous in general.

 

I'll reiterate, some of these suggestions might only work for players on the higher difficulties.

 

Those suggestions are not really the sort that they could apply to separate difficulties, especially things like making the ship minigame more difficult and exhausting on your resources.

 

They're not gonna maintain a version of the game where that stuff is vastly more difficult, so if anything they'd apply to everyone.

 

Also personally I think they would suck even if you're looking for difficulty, but that's just me.

 

All of that sounds frustrating and unfun.

 

Agreed.

 

 

 

All of that sounds frustrating and unfun.

If you don't want a game that ever frustrates you, play story mode. Deadfire has plenty of options for players who merely want to march through the game without resistance. But what is universally acknowledged, is that the high level difficulty isn't difficult. This is acknowledged even by the developers. I don't understand why you've insisted in participating in this thread in an entirely negative way about game changes that are unlikely to affect or affect significantly the level you enjoy playing at.

 

There is a difference between challenge and difficulty and frustration. One is good; the other is bad. They are to some degree subjective, but that's why you work with large sources of data (like telemetry from beta testers) and make choices based on large portions of your fan base.

 

Literally everything you posted does not sound difficult and challenging, it sounds annoying and frustrating. That's just my opinion, of course.

 

 

Agreed, there's a massive difference between difficulty and wasting the player's time.

 

Because it's a subjective opinion. It's frustrating because micromanaging inane crap *frustrates* me, and for no other reason. Limited, expensive food limiting my rest options and *forcing* me to fight with injuries etc sounds super annoying and I don't want it.

I don't like attrition systems. They piss me off, annoy me, and frustrate me. I don't like systems that limit my choice and force me into playing the game in a pre-determined manner. This doesn't mean I don't like challenge or difficulty, it means I don't enjoy those types of systems. If you do, that's fine. There's plenty of games that cater to your desire. This doesn't appear to be one of them.

 

You're not advocating for increased difficulty in the upper difficulty levels. You're arguing for a specific *type* of difficulty and gameplay based around limited resources and attrition, and that gameplay *sucks*. I'm glad they got rid of and I don't want it back.

 

Well said, I agree.

 

I would like the encounters to be more difficult.

 

I would absolutely not like them to add more time wasting busy work outside of combat to make that happen.

[NegativeEdge]

OK I've been thinking about this.

To put it in terms a modern audience might understand: The Eothasian temple is Twitter, the spirits are Trump supporters and you wanna be slaying and dragging all day but you only have three Concelhaut's clapbacks, two Llengrath's lesser sassy gifs, and one Crowns of the Sanctimonious. you wanna be here for it all day don't you? so you gotta pace yourself. ~man pointing at head meme~

[Answermancer]

I mean, a large number of them DO. I've wiped on several regular encounters on Normal difficulty. I also don't want EVERY battle to be life or death, that gets EXTREMELY TEDIOUS if I have to treat every battle like a boss encounter.

 

Truth. There's a rhythm that I want out of combat, where I feel like a badass but then have to push or challenge myself.

 

I wanna highlight these two posts because I think they're important, and this point always gets lost when people talk about difficulty, since it tends to be the most hardcore players who engage in the talk, and I don't think that's representative of most people.

 

I personally agree that combat should have a rhythm and pacing with the difficulty varying a lot between encounters. Although I do like being challenged in many encounters, I also like feeling completely OP and one-shotting a group of dudes occasionally. What's the point of playing a game with increasing stats like an RPG if you never feel like those stats/levels made you powerful?

 

Sure, currently the game skews too much in the direction of one-shotting everyone, but my point is it shouldn't skew too far in the direction of every fight being a boss fight either, certainly not outside of PotD (I play on Veteran/Hard personally, and if those were tuned so that every encounter was life or death I'd be annoyed).

 

I think having every encounter be one or the other is bad, and a game where every encounter requires you to use all your skill and resources is just as bad as a game where everything is trivial, unless being super demanding is literally the point of the game, like Dark Souls, and that's the kind of game it sells itself as.

[Multihog]

The OP hit the nail on the head: the vast majority of the combats in DF simply no longer matter, and that destroys the very essence of a CRPG.  The consequences of playing a fight poorly have been largely removed.  The need to improvise has been largely removed, because I never start a fight with some weird combination of little used abilities. 

Then I suppose most cRPG's don't have this "essence" you speak of because they either impose no resting limit, have no limit to casting spells other than cooldown, are per encounter-based like PoE 2, or just have no penalty for dying (other than game over)

 

- All the Infinity Engine games have unlimited resting, BG1/2, IWD1/2, PS:T. You can spam healing/resting freely until your health is full. Spells are refreshed. Occasionally, mobs will spawn when you rest, but they're easily stomped.

- Neverwinter Nights only has a short waiting time as a penalty for resting, no real limits. Spells are refreshed for free. No attrition.

- Divinity: Original Sin 1 has no resting, but you have unlimited healing and spells are per encounter, so there's no attrition of any kind.

- Divinity: Original Sin 2 is fully per encounter with automatic healing post-combat (if I remember correctly.)

- Dragon Age: Origins is per encounter, like D:OS2. Yeah, you get some injuries if party members die, but injury kits are overabundant.

- KOTOR barely has any consequence for dying iirc. You just have to use some medkits, of which I always had more than enough on the hardest difficulty, and/or spam the healing force power for free. If the game doesn't consider the area you're in a "dangerous area" (mostly only applied to underground areas, as far as I can remember) you can instantly teleport to your hideout and back with full health. 

 

All of these games suffer from the same "problem" if you scrutinize them. What consequence is there from fights in these games other than maybe having a couple healing potions less? You either get wiped, or the fight had next to no consequence. DA:O has an injury system, but I always found it extremely trivial and was swimming in injury kits, which were also inexpensive. I guess the Infinity Engine games MAY have some consequence to dying if you aren't high enough level yet to cast Raise Dead (or whatever the priest resurrection spell was called). In BG2 you may have to use charges of your resurrection rod, and in others you may need to use temples to resurrect people, which is quite substantial due to having to walk there, actually. So yeah, there's something in the early game, I guess. 

 

But Jagged Alliance 2 is like the only RPG with significant, potentially devastating, and lasting consequences for having a bad fight—injuries that can take weeks in game to heal and may have caused temporary or permanent stat loss, having to use lots of medical supplies and time for healing, permanent deaths, destroyed armor and other gear, wasted ammo, etc—but it's not really a cRPG in the same sense.

 

EDIT: Actually, the Infinity Engine games have one very severe consequence for party members dying: having to pick up all your gear from the ground and re-equip it. That's a major inconvenience but hardly by design a punishment for dying. It's more of a silly design choice the devs made for whatever reason. 

Edited May 22, 2018 by Multihog

[Crucis]

 

 

 

 

I find the combat to be a marked improvement. Now the combat in PoE1, THAT was dull and a chore.

Could you elaborate? I can perhaps see the "chore" part, as combat required more of the player's attention in the original. But, since most fights in Deadfire do not reward or punish the player for paying attention and actually using tactics, I'm failing to see how most combats are actually interesting in Deadfire?

 

With abilities and health regen between fights, individual encounters can be more dangerous. Because of this system, I try to punch above my weight far more often, seeking out red skull fights and seeing if I can pull them off. It also means I don't have ot conserve abilities as a resource, so I can comfortably steamroll trash mobs quickly. All the fights in PoE1 felt like they just dragged on. Resource management isn't fun. Playing with abilities and spells to solve an encounter is.

 

 

I see it 180^o differently.  Having to manage your health resources was a challenge and that's what made it more fun.  Seeing how long you could push into a dungeon before you were forced to fall back and rest.  What you describe as "fun" is completely mindlessness.  About the only resource you have to worry about is the 3 injuries before death.  Big whup. 

 

As for going for those "red skull" fights, you could do that too, in PoE1.  It's called reloading, for crying out loud! 

 

It was a challenge, but any joy that could've possibly come out of that challenge was marred by the fact that running out of camping supplies meant you'd have to suffer through numerous lengthy loading screens (despite having the game on SSD.) Fortunately, PoE2 loads much faster, so it wouldn't an issue this time around. 

 

 

I'm sorry, but I actually found that to be a challenge too.  One of the most fun and challenging things that happened to me in my first run of PoE1 was in the Endless Paths when you could go down/fall a hole from something like level 3 to level 6 (the one with the drake that barred your way from going deeper into the dungeon), was trying to fight my way back up through 3 levels with a fixed amount of camping supplies and a fixed amount of endurance.  THAT was a serious challenge, because I had to get past that Ogre level which with my relatively weak party and my own personal inexperience with the game was very difficult.

 

It seems to me that as much as people are complaining about the fights being too easy in PoE2, what they really want is no REAL challenges.  They want it all handed to them on a silver platter.

[Katarack21]

 

 

 

 

 

I find the combat to be a marked improvement. Now the combat in PoE1, THAT was dull and a chore.

Could you elaborate? I can perhaps see the "chore" part, as combat required more of the player's attention in the original. But, since most fights in Deadfire do not reward or punish the player for paying attention and actually using tactics, I'm failing to see how most combats are actually interesting in Deadfire?

 

With abilities and health regen between fights, individual encounters can be more dangerous. Because of this system, I try to punch above my weight far more often, seeking out red skull fights and seeing if I can pull them off. It also means I don't have ot conserve abilities as a resource, so I can comfortably steamroll trash mobs quickly. All the fights in PoE1 felt like they just dragged on. Resource management isn't fun. Playing with abilities and spells to solve an encounter is.

 

 

I see it 180^o differently.  Having to manage your health resources was a challenge and that's what made it more fun.  Seeing how long you could push into a dungeon before you were forced to fall back and rest.  What you describe as "fun" is completely mindlessness.  About the only resource you have to worry about is the 3 injuries before death.  Big whup. 

 

As for going for those "red skull" fights, you could do that too, in PoE1.  It's called reloading, for crying out loud! 

 

It was a challenge, but any joy that could've possibly come out of that challenge was marred by the fact that running out of camping supplies meant you'd have to suffer through numerous lengthy loading screens (despite having the game on SSD.) Fortunately, PoE2 loads much faster, so it wouldn't an issue this time around. 

 

 

I'm sorry, but I actually found that to be a challenge too.  One of the most fun and challenging things that happened to me in my first run of PoE1 was in the Endless Paths when you could go down/fall a hole from something like level 3 to level 6 (the one with the drake that barred your way from going deeper into the dungeon), was trying to fight my way back up through 3 levels with a fixed amount of camping supplies and a fixed amount of endurance.  THAT was a serious challenge, because I had to get past that Ogre level which with my relatively weak party and my own personal inexperience with the game was very difficult.

 

It seems to me that as much as people are complaining about the fights being too easy in PoE2, what they really want is no REAL challenges.  They want it all handed to them on a silver platter.

 

 

None of what you said had anything to do with the loading screen times, which is what the post you quoted was specifically complaining about.

[whiskiz]

 

 

The OP hit the nail on the head: the vast majority of the combats in DF simply no longer matter, and that destroys the very essence of a CRPG.  The consequences of playing a fight poorly have been largely removed.  The need to improvise has been largely removed, because I never start a fight with some weird combination of little used abilities. 

 

Edited: Um the consequence for playing combat poorly, on a higher difficulty - is losing that combat. (On a lower difficulty - there should be no consequence/penalty and/or the combat should be more and more forgiving, making the failure start of losing/dying harder to achieve.)

 

You know, like almost every other game in every genre ever made, ever.

 

End of story.

 

A half-assed attrition system is hard to balance around, and imposes it's challenge by (severely) restricting gameplay - both very unhealthy game designs.

 

Just need to wait until Obsidian finish working on the balance post-release, cause you know, combat balance/challenge isn't all that important...

Edited May 22, 2018 by whiskiz

[Stephen Unsworth-Mitchell]

Personally I don't see how per encounter will ever be balanced for every players liking.

 

For small amount they want every fight be like boss fight and majority will find that frustrating and in the end obsidian will balance for majority. So for some it will always be walk in park of simply doing right buffs throw the right high level spells and the right abilities for rest , from there rinse and repeat and rest when have 2 injuries.

 

Adding in most ideas will just end up making it frustrating for majority want feel like gods all the time. Therefore most ideas not going end up liked.

 

Therefore still think having choice at start is really important and having both per rest and per encounter style.

 

I think the per rest system if improve on give game more replay value and that small group more likely to hang around and by expansions when most players like to be gods will found there next god fix.

 

I think good few those think the new system once balanced is going be best going find its not as good they thought.

 

As for Obsidian money where the majority of base are but that doesn't mean you only got please them, games can be made that will please the majority and the minorities yes might take longer and require greater thought but if obsidian can do that they will build game that will go down in history and franchise that will last.

 

I think Obsidian's idea of if lot complaint remove is actually counter productive, they should ask why something doesn't work and how can it be changed in positive ways to make it liked by masses.

 

Point strong hold in POE 1 was not well liked they improved it and for second game its gone. What did we get mini game with ships that's as well liked as strong hold from POE 1. No matter how they change it not going be truly loved as its always going be to much of same thing.

 

POE 3 what's plan one gods going destroy our ship in prologue we die again get bought back to life by gods sent on mission by the gods. They try that and start all from 0 again going very franchise killing quickly.

 

Personally I probably visit couple places from POE 1 and POE 2 in the 3rd game let people see how things changed what effects there actions had. This way can keep ship from POE 2 but reduce its needs down, because in POE 2 players actions calm the pirates some what and have few bounties and ships to have combat with for any one wants but, keep it small enough that it can be skipped and those want can simply use ship fast travel between places. Build simple place to store ship in new story with building has few upgrades make building personal, couple small quest that give history place and nice rewards and let place give team some sort bonus depending on how quest is ended.

 

That's the important point all things need reason for been, good story and interesting quest. Even combat needs to be there for good reason and needs some fights that can be sorted without fighting. We should have quest in our logs at all times till we finish main quest as break in having quest in the logs make us mentally think we reached end point.

 

We need per encounter and per rest combat and both need to be improved on. It will give greater replay ability and please larger group of buyers.

 

Romance needs be natural romance not please groups. Example what I mean is Xoti and Eder wouldn't work as relationship, maybe as friends but not more then as both strong minded and won't really budge on there beliefs which romantically would cause lot religious issue that would destroy a relationship. Even to people that are good match can find it just doesn't work out simply because just wrong time. No artificial relationships just for sake of relationships.

 

It's most important balance all things to point where its a challenge but not frustrating for majority and add in options where things can be made more challenging for those that need and want greater challenge.

 

Achievements made people want get everyone possible so need please majority that are after achievements or they complain and games be done only please them and there lot that like get achievements and complete hardest level so they can feel they look good. If companies only please them will drive of other fans, as they not really after challenge want be gods in game complete all boast but most kids fit in this they buy lot games through parents.

[lMarcusl]

Just finished the campaign yesterday on Veteran and the conclusion I've arrived at is that the difficulty itself, not necessarily the attrition system behind it, is the real issue. Looking at the way the system of PoE1 could be bypassed by just hauling your butt to the nearest inn/camping supply shop if you were willing to tolerate the load times, its attrition rarely took effect. Having finished a PotD run just before PoE2 came out, there were never really situations where I went into a fight with low health or limited abilities. The abilities just never got used until I got into a fight where I knew I'd have to pull all the stops. That only changed once I got masteries. Health only ever became a problem if I went in with middling health to begin with and over the course of a couple of resurrections, one of my characters got up and could only be healed to like 100 hp. But the reason PoE1 combat felt so satisfying to me was because there was a lot of it and it was extremely varied. There were entire zones where Charms and Dominations were your enemy no. 1, areas where all the characters with Pierce damage became useless (Blights) and you had to improvise with half your team remaining effective, areas where you were faced with meaty tanks protecting really damn powerful spellcasters (Ogre Druids, early encounters with High Level Scaled Forest Lurkers and Pwgra), bounty fights against massive, powerful mercenary companies (Brynlod, Magran's Faithful, the Gleaming Society) and plenty of "dragon taming", with numerous adds in the fight alongside the overgrown lizard. Knockouts were a real thing and by the end of my PotD playthrough, pretty much everyone except my tankiest characters were approaching 20-30 knockouts by the end of the game. Even if the out-of-combat resource management was more of a time-wasting hindrance rather than a real system with real in-game consequences, there were numerous fights where I'd have to redo several times to get it right.

 

Looking back at my PoE2 stats on Veteran...the highest number of knockouts I got on a character is 7. 90% of those happened within the first few levels where health seems to just disapper after a few hits. There were about 3 situations where I had to reload due to combat difficulty, all of which were caused by me being about 3 levels below the content (Old City Ruins required multiple reloads to get out of there, then a random Xaurip + Drake encounter on an island and trying to murderkill Cap Aeldys on our first meeting just cause my character is a Templar and won't deal with criminals...I postponed that one till later). Granted, I have taken the peaceful option against the dragons, so it is likely I robbed myself of some tougher fights, but even the fights that were obviously meant to be hard (Giant Grub, Concelhaut, some of the hidden boss areas such as Ancient Lich, Fampyr cave, Fampyr Island etc.) were all done on the first try. If there was a Camping Supply system, I would have rested maybe 15 times for health and per rest abilities, and would have felt no more satisfied by my experience with the game's combat than I am now. If the injury system was more punishing and I had to manage my resources better, care more about how many injuries I'm accumulating from traps and knockouts because I could, say, only clear one injury per rest...all it would result in is me resting more often, and still being disappointed by the combat. It seems to me, no matter the systems and resources at the out-of-combat layer, the lacking combat difficulty and variety are the main crux of the issue. Maybe if I played with level scaling on, my opinion would be different. Hard to tell when I can't change scaling midway through the game if I find I'm bored by the combat after lvl 6

 

Edit: My guess on the core problem of the encounter design is that they took more or less the same approach they did when designing encounters for PoE1. However, since the player is no longer penalised for using all their abilities (which, let's be honest, we really shouldn't be, otherwise, what are the abilities for?), we can consistently blow all the buffs, debuffs and AoEs every single fight, making the encounters trivial. The difficulty has to be scaled way up to compensate for our newly acquired power, but it seems it took the opposite route. Top difficulty fights on the level of Magran's Faithful and Alpine Dragon aren't there at all, and fights on the level below are tuned for per rest ability usage, not per encounter.

Edited May 22, 2018 by lMarcusl

[tela2k]

@cokane Suggestions 1 and 2 might actually happen. 3 tied to the next suggestion 4 I would like as a optional system, I would use it. 5 I hate the empower mechanic. I'd like to see it completely removed. Unfortunately I believe here I'm in the minority.

Like I could play DF with all kinds of attrition mechanics, but not when they're mild annoyances, that just make the game feel unnecessarily restrictive. If it had a F:NV style hardcore mode I'd probably give it a try, I enjoyed it in that one. Or making some dungeons lock resting until you've finished them or whatever (I mean how can you sleep in a cave full of ghouls, huh?), and you can't leave because door slammed shut or whatever. But there is no way that stuff can be in the core experience, since that stuff only appeals to a nieche group out of an already small audience.

@Multihog
Good post, agreed.
Though I never played Jagged Alliance, but as far as I remember, it's more a 4X/Turn-based strategy game like the two newer XCOMs and not an RPG?
If the injury system works anything like XCOM then it's pretty much impossible to implement in any way into Deadfire. In DF if your guys got injured and were "out" for a certain period of time you could just wait, no hurry, no rush. But the Avatar Project doesn't wait for your favourite ranger to heal up, no sir, it's time for a retaliation mission!
 

@Mr. Unsworth-Mitchell
I kind of missed this before, but now that it was quoted: it seems quite bold naming yourself "a tactical thinker" and calling everyone who disagrees "a casual" on a gaming forum. Maybe you didn't mean it like that, but that's like dressing up in a moose costume and running across a shooting range.

 

@lMarcusl
Agreed, agreed, agreed. I believe in this combat system, they'll fix it and it will be amazing. Although I'm slightly worried about the lack of special encounters. Like the really tough and interesting fights you'll remember ten years down the line.
 

 

[Jawsjam]

OK I've been thinking about this.

To put it in terms a modern audience might understand: The Eothasian temple is Twitter, the spirits are Trump supporters and you wanna be slaying and dragging all day but you only have three Concelhaut's clapbacks, two Llengrath's lesser sassy gifs, and one Crowns of the Sanctimonious. you wanna be here for it all day don't you? so you gotta pace yourself. ~man pointing at head meme~

 

Right, like that was easier to understand...

[lMarcusl]

If the injury system works anything like XCOM then it's pretty much impossible to implement in any way into Deadfire. In DF if your guys got injured and were "out" for a certain period of time you could just wait, no hurry, no rush. But the Avatar Project doesn't wait for your favourite ranger to heal up, no sir, it's time for a retaliation mission!

 

Actually I think you might be on to something there, and it would not be impossible to implement either would be my guess. Looking at the issue as a whole in both PoE1 and PoE2, let's be brutally honest. The health/injury system might as well not be there. They are far too easily bypassed in both games. PoE1 punishes you by time wasted (loading screens to reach the nearest inn/camp supply shop), PoE2 doesn't punish you at all save for losing some bonuses from food you can't craft any more of. The end goal of both systems is to make you play more thoughtfully and carefully but neither achieves that, and outright losing a character requires a serious degree of recklessness on the part of the player.

 

If instead the game took on a similar approach as it does in say XCOM or in DF's ship combat and injuries can be cleared only by sending a given character to sit it out on the bench for a while (at least that's how I think it works in ship combat, didn't too deep into that), you'd not only have an actual reason to avoid injuries to maintain your beloved, optimal party composition, but you'd be forced, one way or another, the take on characters with maybe not the best gear (which makes you utilise a wider range of items, rather than having 18 legendary level uniques just sitting in the stash cause your 5 characters have better ones), change up your tactics, and try different things instead of settling on that one party comp for the rest of the game the moment you got all the characters you need. It would give meaning to what characters you have available in your roster. Maybe for once Pallegina would have to get off her ass and get her hands dirty when she'd otherwise be sitting it all out save for when her character quest comes up. Hell, every time I played PoE1 with custom-made characters, I'd create one extra "just in case I feel like changing things up". The guy would never leave the stronghold screen and would be relegated to running stronghold missions.

 

If PoE2 had a similar system to the "stronghold turns" from PoE1 (it would affect ship injury times too), you'd basically have to play by the system and you'd be unable to bypass it by resting or waiting (resting would be relegated to giving your party bonuses through food). Since stronghold turns only tick when you complete quests (or solve encounters like the ones on the islands), the character would have to be out of your party and you'd be forced to DO stuff with their replacement.