Game News Wasteland 2 Kickstarter Update #28: Progress Report, Weapon Design

In fairness, it would have been VERY easy for Fallout to solve the energy weapon problem. Torment was a game where the most enjoyable way of playing it was as a mage maxing wisdom, int then charisma first - you got all the important special bits and memories, and you had the awesome in-keeping-with story aspect of starting off relying heavily on Morte and Dakkon to protect you, only to become the near-god/centre-piece of the party around the same part of the game that you find out just how powerful you really are lorewise. Yet PS:T makes a special mention of the fact that despite the benefits of non-combat skills, you WILL need to do a lot of combat, Sigil and the planes being what they are, and you might want to think about preparing for it.

A similar warning in the FO manual that energy weapons are incredibly rare-to-unheard of in smaller settlements, and it might be a wise idea to invest in a secondary weapon skill to get you through until you can find a source of energy weapons, would solve the issue.

 

What makes a skill useful?

 

What about unique abilities? How about a skill that lets you kill immortals or something? Whatever.

My point is, what makes a skill useful in an environment separate from the game-content?

 

In my experiences from the past I enjoyed games with dump stats more than those where all skills were useful for something. Go figure.

 

Gotta tell you, Brotron, Toxic's got my vote here; just from, well, years and years and years (2 goddamn decades) of RPG experience. Not not that you don't have just as much; but it's a preference deep down.

 

That's certainly a very good point.

 

Why is that? Maybe there's one single immortal, but stacking points in your Immortal Slaying skill throughout the entire game only to kick his ass saves you from a lot of trash combat and drastically alters your game and feels rewarding to boot? Maybe the game consists of 4 interlinked campaigns, with one of them heavily infested with immortals and the rest completely devoid of the bastards. It's a situational skill, sure. Not like say, Fishing, which would be equally usable and useless throughout the entire game but still remains a viable skill-choice if catching a Fish is on your agenda. In any case, we're talking content and not mechanics. If you want to streamline mechanics to make up for shitty content and call that a stroke of genius, I'm not going to stop you. Just, don't pull this kind of shit:

Because skills being comprehensible is skills doing what they're supposed to, not seeing an equal amount of usefulness or beating the game for you. That shit isn't even just content, it's also content exposure. That's it, man, I'm out.

 

So dense. I can see why you dislike adventure games, mango.

 

Guess we should've had this debate back before your brain gradually turned to pudding.

 

I'm not getting dragged back into this pointless tirade. My first post has all the information needed to answer all of your queries since then. I've expanded on it for your benefit, but if that's all you can come up with after having read it I am definitely wasting my time here.

 

I'm not mad. I just remember the last time I tried to explain my position and how it turned into a series of pointless, page-long Q&A sessions, and I don't feel like doing a re-run. I'm not even arguing about RPG's here, this goes well beyond that, so maybe the problem isn't two irreconcilable ideals in design but rather an inability to connect.

And I'm not a PnP'er, but I don't have to be to see their point. If the system is a toolkit for crafting out any number of different situations and narratives, it needs to be versatile enough to handle that, but not in the way that a spork is versatile if you catch my drift.

 

Verisimilitude does not mean an idea has to be realistic in our world, but in the world we apply it. It's a very basic concept of creating a good setting for any type of medium.

 

The fuuuck are you talking about Fallout 1 and 2? Other than going for style and "must have big plasma gun" feel, small guns were more than viable. Combat Shotgun, .223 pistol, Sniper Rifle. Fallout 2 had Gauss.

 

Well yeah, but you see, energy weapons are better when you get them. Thus, suddenly, others are not viable anymore. And yet they claim that they don't want everything to be the same.

The big deal was that you don't have energy weapons until late in the game, though, but you can get the skill at the start and apparently that's a problem, because we have to cater for every brain dead shit who will put all of his points in energy weapons even though he doesn't find any.

 

Fallout 2 Energy Weapons Tagged Protagonist:

"Ha ha! FINALLY! I have it at last! A Laser Pistol! I remember the day I first held a Laser Pistol, back at the tribe. Shortly after my 12th nameday, I believe it was. Lying in a strange chest I had dug out of the ground. I always had a good eye for the landscape, you know. It was merely a chance gleam from the sun of the barest corner of said chest in all it's metallic glory, seen from a distance of around a hundred spears. Spears being our way of measuring, you see. After I removed this strange device along with what I didn't know then to be an extra energy cell for ammo, I fumbled about with it, and thankfully the accidental discharge only fired harmlessly into the sky and scared me half-witless. At first I dropped it and ran, yelling apologies to the gods for my transgression. But eventually I slowed. I had heard tales of the 'guns' of raiders and other southlanders, and there were the stories of our Tribe's founder as well of course. This must be something similar. I realized my opportunity.

"Immediately I realized my priority was learning how to use it, as apposed to immediately taking it and conquering my tribe by force because I could incinerate anyone who challenged me. No, to even think of doing that, I needed to increase my skill. So that is what I did. I aimed at rocks and a few lizards out in the deserts to the north, far enough, at least, that my fellow tribesmen would not hear the sound of the weapon, not even the patrols and scouts. I must say I picked it up rather quickly. It was like I was born for these elegant weapons. I even puzzled out the reloading when the ammo was depleted, somehow. In hindsight, I probably should have used the weapon for more, especially after I depleted the first charge. But no, possessed by some demon of youth I rolled and jumped around pretending I was some futuristic warrior blasting at phantom lizard-men. All too soon, the pretty energy blasts were no more.

"I tried to keep the weapon, stowing it back in the chest and burying it as best I could. But a scout ended up finding it, much to my chagrin. I said nothing, fearing I'd be called a fool for keeping it from them. I believe it was later sold by the tribe for a brahmin. I never forgot that laser pistol, though. I dreamt of the days I'd hold one in my hands again. In my mind's eye I practiced with it still, imagined it's smooth contours, it's bright flash, it's pleasing sound of firing. I was a master of that weapon in my heart of hearts. The spears and the knives that would actually keep me alive as a warrior were of no consequence. I just scraped by on those lessons, never able to focus on the use however it was hammered into me.

"And since this...quest, as the Chosen One, I've found my focus on this weapon only deepen. I knew that even as I stabbed with a spear, as I maneuvered my way around the politics of this world, as I bandaged my wounds, as I tried unsuccessfully to adapt to these crude chemically propelled slugthrowers, it was all fueled into *this* gun, this weapon, even this style of weapon. I could feel it in my hands even before this moment...and now it completes me. I am one with the energy that flows from it, to slice into the soft flesh of my enemies, to flare across their face or into their loathsome little eyes. These many years of sacrifice have been worth it, I tell you. I admit I doubted, just as I doubted I was the Chosen One...but no more! Under this sign will I conquer, will I be unstoppable!

"...now come along, Vic. Let's see if you can even fire that pathetic little pistol of yours before I incinerate the very bones and tendons of our adversaries."