Putting the 'role' back in role-playing games since 2002.
Donate to Codex
Good Old Games
  • Welcome to rpgcodex.net, a site dedicated to discussing computer based role-playing games in a free and open fashion. We're less strict than other forums, but please refer to the rules.

    "This message is awaiting moderator approval": All new users must pass through our moderation queue before they will be able to post normally. Until your account has "passed" your posts will only be visible to yourself (and moderators) until they are approved. Give us a week to get around to approving / deleting / ignoring your mundane opinion on crap before hassling us about it. Once you have passed the moderation period (think of it as a test), you will be able to post normally, just like all the other retards.

KickStarter Serpent in the Staglands Thread

Anthony Davis

Blizzard Entertainment
Developer
Joined
Sep 7, 2007
Messages
2,100
Location
California
Awesome! I'm gonna start playing it then.
 

agris

Arcane
Patron
Joined
Apr 16, 2004
Messages
6,761
Something about the goblins riding on chickens makes me chuckle, it's like the devs are saying "yes yes, we needed a goblin-tier creature. You'll kill lots of them in the beginning, but they're riding chickens so it's palatable". I just fought the goblin king and murdered his horde of chicken-riding goblin warriors. Something about it was so bizarre, I think the game has a subtle dark humor to it.
 

agris

Arcane
Patron
Joined
Apr 16, 2004
Messages
6,761
Ah, if only you could slaughter that entire fucking racetrack of chocobos and sell their meat to a KFC competitor, undercutting the normal middle-men. Then you'd get a brofist, oasis789.
 

Anthony Davis

Blizzard Entertainment
Developer
Joined
Sep 7, 2007
Messages
2,100
Location
California
Can someone explain why there are some many strange die rolls written as 5d1 or 2d1? Is that a different convention or something and they actually mean 1d5 and 1d2, or does it literally mean 5 x 0-1 and 2 x 0-1?

THanks!
 

MrBuzzKill

Arcane
Joined
Aug 31, 2013
Messages
650
does it literally mean 5 x 0-1 and 2 x 0-1?
I think that's right, but can you actually get a ZERO on a die roll? that would make a kind of sense because otherwise 5d1 is just 5, 4d1 is just 4 etc.
But then again, if d1 can go to zero, what is the difference between 1d5 and 5d1? Their output is the same, because they both give a random number between 0 and 5.
 

roshan

Arcane
Joined
Apr 7, 2004
Messages
2,426
Can someone explain why there are some many strange die rolls written as 5d1 or 2d1? Is that a different convention or something and they actually mean 1d5 and 1d2, or does it literally mean 5 x 0-1 and 2 x 0-1?

THanks!

I think 5d1 just means 5. Same with 2d1, it just means 2. The game is too fantastically grognardy for simple numbers, everything has to be expressed as a die roll. :)
 

ArchAngel

Arcane
Joined
Mar 16, 2015
Messages
19,885
Whalenought_Joe there might also be something wonky about the persistence of automatically unequipped shields in the inventory. I noticed my round shield gone when I reloaded, and I think it might have disappeared because it was unequipped automatically when I equipped a crossbow. After that it was in the inventory but I think after saving and reloading it disappeared. Not 100% sure about this, but might be something to look into...
I lost all equipped ammo on all characters. Unfortunately I didn't notice it immediately so I don't remember what I did just before it happened.
 

Koschey

Arcane
Joined
Jan 14, 2013
Messages
615
Location
Germany
But then again, if d1 can go to zero, what is the difference between 1d5 and 5d1? Their output is the same, because they both give a random number between 0 and 5.

In that case the distributions would be different, 1d5 being a uniform distribution and 5d1 being a binomial distribution. With 1d5, every outcome is equally likely, whereas with 5d1 for example 5 is less likely than 4: 5 is only achieved by a roll of (1,1,1,1,1), 4 can be achieved by (1,0,0,0,0), (0,1,0,0,0), and so on.
Then again, a dN usually ranges from 1 to N instead of 0 to N, so it should be a uniform distribution and a degenerated distribution (only one outcome - 5 in this example), respectively.
 

ArchAngel

Arcane
Joined
Mar 16, 2015
Messages
19,885
I would be very surprised if 1d1 could produce 0 or 1. Why use standard PnP terminology and then not actually use it as it is used in PnP.
 

Perkel

Arcane
Joined
Mar 28, 2014
Messages
15,805
It is done by 2 people ?

Well i feared they had team of 10-15 people and from looking at things they didn't sell that much but with 2 people, word of mouth and usual great RPGs fucking long legs this will be profitable for them.
 

Perkel

Arcane
Joined
Mar 28, 2014
Messages
15,805
Ok got out of first location got two companions. Got killed by two wolves.

Looks like MCA won't like this.


edit:

ok what is going on ? I just reloaded my save after murdering wolf and now i fight with wolf and fox which means that one of my party members is dead...
 
Last edited:

ArchAngel

Arcane
Joined
Mar 16, 2015
Messages
19,885
I have not had as much problems vs wildlife but I don't send unarmed characters to fight them in melee :D

But I get owned by any humans with names I ran into LOL. I just wish the traps I had did damage and not just slowed them.
 

da_rays

Augur
Joined
Jan 23, 2014
Messages
382
Location
Filthy Pub , Quebec City
ok what is going on ? I just reloaded my save after murdering wolf and now i fight with wolf and fox which means that one of my party members is dead...

Wilderness enemies respawn, do not reload in the wilderness, is risky.

Yeah , and random respawn , tou might reload to find yourself surrounded by 4 goblins while you had ,let's say, 2 wolves like you said earlier. Can't deny i've cheese myself out of a few fight with that ( Well , cheese is a hard word , roloading and finding a new ''challenge'') . Safe save is getting your party close to an area entrance/exit , seem to work for now.
 

agris

Arcane
Patron
Joined
Apr 16, 2004
Messages
6,761
does it literally mean 5 x 0-1 and 2 x 0-1?
I think that's right, but can you actually get a ZERO on a die roll? that would make a kind of sense because otherwise 5d1 is just 5, 4d1 is just 4 etc.
But then again, if d1 can go to zero, what is the difference between 1d5 and 5d1? Their output is the same, because they both give a random number between 0 and 5.
0 isn't an option for either scenario in SitS, I believe. 5d1 is just 5, 1d5 is 1 to 5, etc. 5d2 is 5 to 10. Imagine PNP with magic anysided dice. There are some 0dN or Nd0 entries, mostly for rank 0 skills. In my experience the 0 increments to 1, 2, etc based on how many points you've put into the skill. Look at the rank 1 descriptions for some with a 0 die at rank 0, you'll see.
 

MrBuzzKill

Arcane
Joined
Aug 31, 2013
Messages
650
Anyone encountered the annoying bug where you have to de-activate and activate a warbook skill again in order for it to start working? It's most obvious with Quick strike. I checked the character sheet to make sure, and sure enough the AS wasn't reduced until I turned it off and on again.
**
Also it seems my spicers documents got stolen in Orfs bridge. Anybody know how to get them back? It's a bitch to have to pay 100 emerald just to cross.
 
Last edited:

ArchAngel

Arcane
Joined
Mar 16, 2015
Messages
19,885
I have a irritating problem with the game. Whenever I pause during combat there is a tiny delay or like the game freezes for half a second. I don't have SSD, I don't know if it is connected with read/write of data on disk or something else.
I have that new option(because it only showed up 2 patches ago) vsynch on high.
 

roshan

Arcane
Joined
Apr 7, 2004
Messages
2,426
Is it just me, or is 95% of the spell system completely useless? I keep trying to cast, for example, Festering Ooze, but I've never seen it work on anyone except my own characters. Even if it were to work, the spell duration (2 seconds) is so short that is is totally meaningless in battle, when my tank only attacks every 4 seconds or so with an axe. Even the quickest weapons attack only every 2-3 seconds, this is subject yet to penalties due to equipped items and such. Then, on top of that, the radius is so small, and there isn't any way to even tell what the exact radius of the spell is. On top of all this, the spell can actually be dodged. And furthermore, your wizard has to continuously cast it! On top of this again, the spell seems to "proc" every certain number of seconds, I've experimented with moving a character through it, but I don't always get the message that the spell has been dodged, which means that the spell despite appearing to be continuous, can only be triggered at a certain exact time. Once you take all of this into consideration, the spell effectively does absolutely nothing at all.

Another spell, fearful light, is on paper a legitimate hard counter, but again, your mage needs to keep it running, and the area of effect is so tiny (smaller than even Festering Ooze), that enemies will need to walk right by the pillar of light for it to have any chance of affecting them. And again, this depends on the unknown "proc" rate, and again, subject to dodging by the enemies. So another spell that has practically zero chance of being useful in combat.

Apparently there's a second tier spell similar to entangle, but again the area of effect is just absurdly small (perhaps three characters standing side by side) and that too unconfirmed by the spell description. It does only minor damage to the target and slows them down. And I'm guessing this too is subject to the unknown "proc" rate plus even if an enemy were to walk in the exact spot at the exact right time, they will probably still be able to dodge the effect.

This actually really hurts the gameplay, because in the DND games, you could get by every encounter just by picking and using the right spells. In SITS, battles are really difficult. For example, a couple of the set battles in the Lumen Targ wilderness, against a party of four, and against two rogue arbiters, these characters have you outleveled, they already have access to second tier melee abilities such as shield bash when you are just starting out. If the game had proper hard counters, there might be a chance of you being able to pull some tricks and defeat them, but I found after repeatedly trying several different spells that my only option was to go out, get another round of levels for my characters, and return, upon which I found the above battles trivially easy. Now I'm in Lebez, trying to kill the wheelwright, but my 5 level 5 characters can't do anything to him, spells are totally useless, and he hits my tank for over 20 damage sometimes, when my tank Catelina has only around 60 hp (armor is 9), and most of my other characters have around 45 hp with 3-5 armor. So I guess the only solution now would be to grind for XP in other areas and then come back to kill the wheelwright.

The game is really good (feels in many ways more like a spiritual successor to Fallout than BG), but the spells are just so broken. :(
 

ArchAngel

Arcane
Joined
Mar 16, 2015
Messages
19,885
You need to invest into spells and into Perception. That does not mean they are balanced and all useful but you cannot really expect to get much from rank 0 or rank 1 spell.
 

roshan

Arcane
Joined
Apr 7, 2004
Messages
2,426
On the other hand - war book skills seem to be really awesome! I do suggest, based on my (limited) experience so far, that those who play should avoid spellcasting (particularly INT spells) and focus on various cool melee and ranged builds.

You need to invest into spells and into Perception. That does not mean they are balanced and all useful but you cannot really expect to get much from rank 0 or rank 1 spell.

Can you share your experiences with the spell system? Which spells did you invest in, how did you use them, what you found very useful, etc? I might just be an idiot at playing RPGs.
 

Haba

Harbinger of Decline
Patron
Joined
Dec 24, 2008
Messages
1,871,744
Location
Land of Rape & Honey ❤️
Codex 2012 MCA Divinity: Original Sin Project: Eternity Torment: Tides of Numenera Wasteland 2
Yup. And some spells are never useful. Did some tests by dumping 20 points into them and they still weren't viable. You will also need points in the corresponding attribute, blood cocoon at 10 occult is completely useless, for example.

Ironically some of the best spells work just as well with 10 int/occ and 0 points in the spell... It is the direct damage ones that are most useless, really.
 

roshan

Arcane
Joined
Apr 7, 2004
Messages
2,426
Yup. And some spells are never useful. Did some tests by dumping 20 points into them and they still weren't viable. You will also need points in the corresponding attribute, blood cocoon at 10 occult is completely useless, for example.

Ironically some of the best spells work just as well with 10 int/occ and 0 points in the spell... It is the direct damage ones that are most useless, really.

How many points can you put into a single spell? What about a war book ability? I was under the impression that these capped at 5 like the aptitudes.
 

ArchAngel

Arcane
Joined
Mar 16, 2015
Messages
19,885
Yup. And some spells are never useful. Did some tests by dumping 20 points into them and they still weren't viable. You will also need points in the corresponding attribute, blood cocoon at 10 occult is completely useless, for example.

Ironically some of the best spells work just as well with 10 int/occ and 0 points in the spell... It is the direct damage ones that are most useless, really.
Well report that to Devs. They should improve spells that are always useless.
 

As an Amazon Associate, rpgcodex.net earns from qualifying purchases.
Back
Top Bottom