Colony Ship update #32 - The Skills & Learn By Using

[Trashos]

I'm happy as a player to say to myself "with this game, I'll just make my choices and see what my character ends up as, instead of planning what he/she is at the beginning."

Exactly.

Yeah, but that is going to fun ONCE (or, say, twice), while metagaming and carefully designing your character is fun forever (... after the 1st playthrough).

 

[MF]

You gain 10lp every time you pick a tagged line (the points go to the skill matching the tag) plus 100 bonus points if you solve a quest with diplomacy. This way a pure talker would have much higher dialogue skills than a chatty killer (a man who clicks on all dialogue options first to gain all LP, then kills everyone anyway).

I like that solution, and I like the term 'chatty killer'. It would be funny if a successful line from a 'chatty killer' weakens an enemy's resolve in combat somehow. It gives powergamers a role to play. Come to think of it, the villain exposition trope is a manifestation of a 'chatty killer'.

"No, Mr. Bond, I expect you to die.", uttered to practice quips.

 

[Vault Dweller]

You gain 10lp every time you pick a tagged line (the points go to the skill matching the tag) plus 100 bonus points if you solve a quest with diplomacy. This way a pure talker would have much higher dialogue skills than a chatty killer (a man who clicks on all dialogue options first to gain all LP, then kills everyone anyway).

I like that solution, and I like the term 'chatty killer'. It would be funny if a successful line from a 'chatty killer' weakens an enemy's resolve in combat somehow.

Not sure about resolve yet (although we can easily do by giving various penalties, like we did in several fights in AoD: if you kill Antidas in that palace fight, it weakens his men's resolve and the fight gets a bit easier), but we'll definitely do what we did in DR - some enemies walking away or switching sides.

 

[vota DC]

Multiple chatty characters in party have sense? They could do multiple taunt for debuff the enemy.

 

[MF]

Not sure about resolve yet (although we can easily do by giving various penalties, like we did in several fights in AoD: if you kill Antidas in that palace fight, it weakens his men's resolve and the fight gets a bit easier), but we'll definitely do what we did in DR - some enemies walking away or switching sides.

Yeah, those scripted events were cool. Having a resolve stat to govern those things can make it easier to implement it in more places, not to mention having people leave or switch sides unfold organically and gradually, but I guess it does take narrative control away from you as a writer if you do it that way.

 

[Vault Dweller]

Multiple chatty characters in party have sense? They could do multiple taunt for debuff the enemy.

Right now, only your character (the party leader) can talk, meaning present you with dialogue options reflecting your character's abilities. You can ask your party members to step in and handle something, similar to how you can let Virgil handle the assassin in Arcanum's intro, but you don't control the manner in which they handle it or the outcome.

 

[AbounI]

but we'll definitely do what we did in DR - some enemies walking away or switching sides.

But this time, with speech skills or only CHA based?

 

[The Wall]

Multiple chatty characters in party have sense? They could do multiple taunt for debuff the enemy.

Right now, only your character (the party leader) can talk, meaning present you with dialogue options reflecting your character's abilities. You can ask your party members to step in and handle something, similar to how you can let Virgil handle the assassin in Arcanum's intro, but you don't control the manner in which they handle it or the outcome.

When you say "right now" does that imply that it might change in future or you can't give an answer to it right now? If you answer this does that lvls up my persuasion skill or perception? Can you lvl up more then one skill/stat with single action?

If you pass the narrative's wheel (aka allow others to inject themselves into ongoing conversation) to one of your companions with goblinistic view of loyalty, will game ever make you regret such decision? In other words, can your party members betray you mid conversation with third party cause they know each other from before, struck a deal behind your back or they're just cunts?

 

[Vault Dweller]

but we'll definitely do what we did in DR - some enemies walking away or switching sides.

But this time, with speech skills or only CHA based?

Speech skills only. Charisma is a modifier now.

Multiple chatty characters in party have sense? They could do multiple taunt for debuff the enemy.

Right now, only your character (the party leader) can talk, meaning present you with dialogue options reflecting your character's abilities. You can ask your party members to step in and handle something, similar to how you can let Virgil handle the assassin in Arcanum's intro, but you don't control the manner in which they handle it or the outcome.

When you say "right now" does that imply that it might change in future or you can't give an answer to it right now? If you answer this does that lvls up my persuasion skill or perception? Can you lvl up more then one skill/stat with single action?

Might change in the future when we start implementing and testing quests. Technically, yes, but that's fine tuning and we won't know about testing to see what feels right.

If you pass the narrative's wheel (aka allow others to inject themselves into ongoing conversation) to one of your companions with goblinistic view of loyalty, will game ever make you regret such decision?

I certainly hope so.

In other words, can your party members betray you mid conversation with third party cause they know each other from before, struck a deal behind your back or they're just cunts?

:why not both:

 

[Alex]

(...snip)
You gain 10lp every time you pick a tagged line (the points go to the skill matching the tag) plus 100 bonus points if you solve a quest with diplomacy. This way a pure talker would have much higher dialogue skills than a chatty killer (a man who clicks on all dialogue options first to gain all LP, then kills everyone anyway).

http://www.irontowerstudio.com/forum/index.php/topic,7664.0.html

Can't you kill everyone after the quest is completed?

 

[Efe]

is a man not entitled to xp of his kill?
No said the man in iron tower, it belongs to speech check

 

[Vault Dweller]

(...snip)
You gain 10lp every time you pick a tagged line (the points go to the skill matching the tag) plus 100 bonus points if you solve a quest with diplomacy. This way a pure talker would have much higher dialogue skills than a chatty killer (a man who clicks on all dialogue options first to gain all LP, then kills everyone anyway).

http://www.irontowerstudio.com/forum/index.php/topic,7664.0.html

Can't you kill everyone after the quest is completed?

No.

 

[Vault Dweller]

To elaborate:

Let's ignore the fact that killing everyone after the quest is completed is munchkinism that goes against the very concept of playing a role. The main problem is that such design requires heavy consequences and a whole lot of extra scripting. So we can either spend months writing, designing, and scripting such consequences to make all NPCs killable or we work on more quests and more consequences for quest solutions.

 

[The Wall]

To elaborate:

Let's ignore the fact that killing everyone after the quest is completed is munchkinism that goes against the very concept of playing a role. The main problem is that such design requires heavy consequences and a whole lot of extra scripting. So we can either spend months writing, designing, and scripting such consequences to make all NPCs killable or we work on more quests and more consequences for quest solutions.

Will we at least be able to pull our guns on anyone at anytime (Fallout style) and face consequence in form of bullets?

 

[Elhoim]

Will we at least be able to pull our guns on anyone at anytime (Fallout style) and face consequence in form of bullets?

AoD has the answer for you.

 

[Black Angel]

Will we at least be able to pull our guns on anyone at anytime (Fallout style) and face consequence in form of bullets?

AoD has the answer for you.

Which means there are only specific areas where you can do that, like the raider camp near Teron?

 

[The Wall]

Will we at least be able to pull our guns on anyone at anytime (Fallout style) and face consequence in form of bullets?

AoD has the answer for you.

Yeah, but I hoped Fallout & Fallout 2 were holding the answer to that question...

 

[Vault Dweller]

To elaborate:

Let's ignore the fact that killing everyone after the quest is completed is munchkinism that goes against the very concept of playing a role. The main problem is that such design requires heavy consequences and a whole lot of extra scripting. So we can either spend months writing, designing, and scripting such consequences to make all NPCs killable or we work on more quests and more consequences for quest solutions.

Will we at least be able to pull our guns on anyone at anytime (Fallout style) and face consequence in form of bullets?

No because it's the same thing. If you die 10 times in a row, we'll face endless complaints. If you die, there is that question about consequences again.

We tried it in AoD (Teron, especially the early version). You could attack anyone and if you start killing people left and right, eventually the guards track you down. If you killed some nobodies, you get off with a warning or pay the blood price. If you killed a notable citizen like Feng you get expelled. You can also fight the guards and if you manage to kill them, you either face an impossible fight where you die or have to flee. This was a very basic setup, yet it caused nothing but misery to the players. First, they made a list of the nobodies that were safe to kill to increase the bodycounts. People who were expelled or had to flee lost a chunk of content and skill points. That's why we didn't do anything of that sort in Maadoran or Ganezzar.

Will we at least be able to pull our guns on anyone at anytime (Fallout style) and face consequence in form of bullets?

AoD has the answer for you.

Yeah, but I hoped Fallout & Fallout 2 were holding the answer to that question...

Well... First, wiping out towns in Fallout felt extremely empty. You killed them, so now what? No reaction, nobody cares. It kinda worked in the desolate post-apoc setting: the towns were far apart and not connected in any way, so there was no reaction because nobody knew what happened. Still, you kill Gizmo and the place remains empty, nobody moves in, iirc, or takes over as the new boss, not even Killian himself.

It wouldn't work as well in AoD and especially CS because everything is connected. If you kill every power player in the Pit, someone else has to move up and bigger powers from the outside would try to move in. We already have it to a certain degree but expanding it further would be a lot more work and I believe we should spend this time adding more quests and content.

 

[Shadenuat]

Shooting the ass who made kids stole for him in the face and looting his corpse didn't feel empty to me, and it wouldn't happen if developers would grab my hand and tell me I'm not supposed to do this because there is no reasonable C&C to this made by them and it ruins their version of immersion.

 

[Vault Dweller]

Shooting the ass who made kids stole for him in the face and looting his corpse didn't feel empty to me, and it wouldn't happen if developers would grab my hand and tell me I'm not supposed to do this because there is no reasonable C&C to this made by them and it ruins their version of immersion.

This is an event not random shooting. You were robbed, you tracked down the man responsible and killed him. It's not random. As I'm sure you know, we had a similar event in AoD and the player could kill them all.

 

[Shadenuat]

The difference is first one was my choice only, possible due to open world and systems, and AoD choice was pre-designed that way.

 

[Sykar]

Developers should refrain from accommodating retarded munchkins imo.

 

[Vault Dweller]

The difference is first one was my choice only, possible due to open world and systems, and AoD choice was pre-designed that way.

All choices are predesigned. The guy was there to be killed or talked to. The only difference is that you could initiate combat manually. Either way, our core design is different and we aren't planning on changing it (I'm saying it to skip a lengthy debate).

 

[Tigranes]

If you want to genocide a town, then you should be allowed to, but the dev shouldnt have to waste any time preparing realistic consequences. If you go full postal and all the quests are broken, too bad.

With the aod/cs design, the only thing that matters is that the game gives me an option to shoot some dude where it makes sense to shoot the dude. I mostly felt that was the case in aod.

 

[Efe]

it would be nice if devs dropped a notice like in morrowind though.. it would suck if you kept playing for hours on an unresolvable game.