The Outer Worlds Pre-Release Thread [GO TO NEW THREAD]

[Space Satan]

Within a wekk everyone will discover most worthless flaws and take them to take best perks in turn. It's like taking "easily addicted" in a game run where you never take any drugs

 

[Infinitron]

Here's a way you could make the Flaws system less immersion-breaking.

Instead of giving the player the option to select his Flaw immediately upon triggering the relevant condition (like having fought your Nth spider or whatever), you could have the option to select the Flaw appear at the character's next level-up screen after the condition has been triggered. It would be like a perk that you have to have met a certain special requirement to unlock.

 

[A horse of course]

I have nothing against Infinitron but Zep keeps rating your poasts retarded so I felt I had to join in out of respect.

 

[ciox]

I don't mind the system as much as the fact they keep pushing it in media, like it's all they have that stands out in the game's design so far, hopefully that's not the case.

 

[HarveyBirdman]

Well okay, but how often do you suddenly gain the ability to pick more advanced locks after you've killed enough monsters. "Retroactive character building" isn't actually that unusual in RPGs - this is just a more unusual frame for it.

You could say that in a certain sense, your character was ALWAYS a master lockpicker or always afraid of spiders, but you had to play until a certain point before the game allowed you to "reveal" it.

Never, which is why TES-style skill improvements (ignoring all the other flaws in their leveling system) are a smarter idea than spendable skill points. That is, unless you can come up with a good lore reason as to why that would happen, like in Dark Souls.

Retroactive character building is great. I'm a big fan of using classes as nothing more than a fluid starting point, and allowing gameplay to mold your character. There are better ways to retroactively add traits.

- Cybernetic implants that give new skills or buffs, but come with downsides. For example, a tech-hand that can hack computers well above your hacking skill, but that makes you less accurate with guns or slows your reload speed -- a skin implant that increases natural damage resistance, but makes your body stiff and slightly slower.
- medical conditions: get a virus that permanently decreases health by some degree, but makes you resistant to most other illnesses -- break your arm a bunch of times so it gets crippled more easily, but compensate by getting more used to pain, thus reducing crippling rate of other body parts
- Reputation. Pretty obvious and probably going to happen. Get in good with one group of people -> cut off access to other group of people

 

[Duraframe300]

Here's a way you could make the Flaws system less immersion-breaking.

Instead of giving the player the option to select his Flaw immediately upon triggering the relevant condition (like having fought your Nth spider or whatever), you could have the option to select the Flaw appear at the character's next level-up screen after the condition has been triggered. It would be like a perk that you have to have met a certain special requirement to unlock.

That would be more immersion breaking for me. Why should my charachter developing a phobia have a delayed effect?

Me personally, I like the system. They also said already that they are discussing having flaws be forced as a permanent modifier without the ability to refuse and so on. The only concern I have is that the flaws will be too lenient even on higher difficulties, however that seems to be easily fixable on the modding side.

 

[AwesomeButton]

Here's a way you could make the Flaws system less immersion-breaking.

Instead of giving the player the option to select his Flaw immediately upon triggering the relevant condition (like having fought your Nth spider or whatever), you could have the option to select the Flaw appear at the character's next level-up screen after the condition has been triggered. It would be like a perk that you have to have met a certain special requirement to unlock.

Like an anti-achievement?

I have nothing against Infinitron but Zep keeps rating your poasts retarded so I felt I had to join in out of respect.

Why would you respect Zep?

 

[Sannom]

I don't mind the system as much as the fact they keep pushing it in media, like it's all they have that stands out in the game's design so far, hopefully that's not the case.

To be fair, they don't "keep pushing it", they've pushed it once and now it's spreading among all the media.

 

[Drax]

I think my main issue is with the generic reward rather than the trigger.

 

[HarveyBirdman]

Oh, and another thing: the fear system is clearly a holdover from turn-based combat and has no place in a popamole.

In a turn-based game, you always have time to think tactically. There isn't any adrenaline. The combat focus is on how well you can manage your resources and abilities to overcome the computer's resources and abilities. You, the player (not the character) never feel fear. Thus a system that places fear mechanics on your character can simulate the effects of live combat.

In a popamole, you don't have much time. Your thinking is on the fly. Here, developers have an opportunity to create real fear -- "oh shit, four fucking deathclaws are rushing me, I have to act now, what do I do!?" The combat focus is on immersing the player into action and the feelings that the action evokes. A 1st person popamole places an even greater emphasis on putting the player in the character's shoes.

This fear system is tacked on and out of place. The fact that the devs obviously think it's a big deal is rather disappointing, and reveals they have failed to understand the pros and cons of turn-based vs popamole combat.

 

[Big Wrangle]

If every single popamole had the mechanics of a tactical shooter, I might have agreed.

 

[Space Satan]

This system is super-exploitable and super prone to power-leveling.

 

[Big Wrangle]

Congratulations, you described the average RPG numbers.

 

[rusty_shackleford]

Oh, and another thing: the fear system is clearly a holdover from turn-based combat and has no place in a popamole.

In a turn-based game, you always have time to think tactically. There isn't any adrenaline. The combat focus is on how well you can manage your resources and abilities to overcome the computer's resources and abilities. You, the player (not the character) never feel fear. Thus a system that places fear mechanics on your character can simulate the effects of live combat.

In a popamole, you don't have much time. Your thinking is on the fly. Here, developers have an opportunity to create real fear -- "oh shit, four fucking deathclaws are rushing me, I have to act now, what do I do!?" The combat focus is on immersing the player into action and the feelings that the action evokes. A 1st person popamole places an even greater emphasis on putting the player in the character's shoes.

This fear system is tacked on and out of place. The fact that the devs obviously think it's a big deal is rather disappointing, and reveals they have failed to understand the pros and cons of turn-based vs popamole combat.

Did you skip over the part where you can slow down time in combat?

 

[HarveyBirdman]

Did you skip over the part where you can slow down time in combat?

Bullet time is highly tactical. Preview of future plans. Week one isometric turn based patch a la Deadfire confirmed.

 

[Kyl Von Kull]

guys, there's nothing unreasonable about your character becoming afraid of... things that hurt him/her. If you don't believe me, stick your hand in a fire, then try to do it again.

 

[Zep Zepo]

guys, there's nothing unreasonable about your character becoming afraid of... things that hurt him/her. If you don't believe me, stick your hand in a fire, then try to do it again.

That's retarded logic. What they are saying is, you can make yourself afraid, if you want a perk in something else. A thoroughly retarded concept.

Zep--

 

[LizardWizard]

How about you degenerates stop trying to tell Tim Cain and Leonard Boyarsky how they should design their RPG

 

[user]

How about you degenerates stop trying to tell Tim Cain and Leonard Boyarsky how they should design their RPG

Someone should really warn them about how retarded this system is though :S

 

[fantadomat]

How about you degenerates stop trying to tell Tim Cain and Leonard Boyarsky how they should design their RPG

Will call whoever i like on whatever i want! Now bend the knee and clean my boots!

 

[ciox]

It's a very basic modern concept, the idea that RPG bonuses should come looking for you, and they should come in a simple make-a-quick-choice form with few options so you don't have to think too much, rather than being hidden away in the interface and part of a large list where you have to properly agonize over picking the right advancement.

They're just trying to do something within that established mold and maybe find a way to improve on it, that's why it "feels fake", because having a harmony between mechanics and logic is not the priority.

At the end of the day, the thing gives you a perk point so it still feeds into the base RPG system and decision making process, so it could be a lot worse.

 

[HarveyBirdman]

guys, there's nothing unreasonable about your character becoming afraid of... things that hurt him/her. If you don't believe me, stick your hand in a fire, then try to do it again.

>Puts hand in fire.
>Dyke: "Are you afraid of fire?"
>If yes -- piss your pants every time you see a fire, but also immediately gain 20 pounds of solid muscle mass
>If no -- you'll know better than to touch fire anyway, because you're not a retard and you don't need a tacked-on game mechanic to teach you that fire hurts
>Dyke: finger guns and smirk "You just keep being you!"

 

[Duraframe300]

guys, there's nothing unreasonable about your character becoming afraid of... things that hurt him/her. If you don't believe me, stick your hand in a fire, then try to do it again.

>Puts hand in fire.
>Dyke: "Are you afraid of fire?"
>If yes -- piss your pants every time you see a fire, but also immediately gain 20 pounds of solid muscle mass
>If no -- you'll know better than to touch fire anyway, because you're not a retard and you don't need a tacked-on game mechanic to teach you that fire hurts
>Dyke: finger guns and smirk "You just keep being you!"

You are fully aware that you describe larping here, are you?

 

[Big Wrangle]

That's retarded logic. What they are saying is, you can make yourself afraid, if you want a perk in something else. A thoroughly retarded concept.

You mean like becoming smarter at matters of science and calculation after punching people enough times?

 

[Efe]

knowing you take damage when you touch fire is larping now?
i gues you go around asking "whats a paladin?" cos your character cannot know what that is?