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Going cold turkey on savescumming

Joined
Jun 24, 2019
Messages
694
One day i tried to do a no reload run of Icewind Dale, i ran out of money and soft-locked myself really quickly, like not enough money to revive my characters. CRPGs are designed around savescumming, in a lot of RPGs if you lose one of your characters early on, the game is pretty much over.

So play roguelikes instead if you want high-risk high-reward gameplay.
 
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Dwarvophile

Liturgist
Joined
Dec 1, 2015
Messages
1,430
I like games where failing is almost as fun as winning. Some 4x, simulation or roguelike provides this but I don't remember any cRPGs giving that possibility. In pen and paper, playing a crippled char in Runequest, slowly sinking into insanity in Call of Cthulhu or being betrayed in Paranoia are among the best memories. Also had a low level rogue who became possesed by an evil artifact in AD&D, could murder one of my fellow companions before being killed by the group, it was great fun.
 

Desiderius

Found your egg, Robinett, you sneaky bastard
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Joined
Jul 22, 2019
Messages
14,131
Insert Title Here Pathfinder: Wrath
Pathfinder doesn't have critical failure for skills and the Open Lock use doesn't have any rules for failing by X or more points, so it doesn't make sense to say that the CRPG doesn't include 'critical miss' as if this somehow compensates for the loss of Take 10 or Take 20 AND the batshit introduction of 'you only get one attempt at a lock per level'.

But of course you would defend such a sadistic and nonsensical interpretation of the original rules, because you hate your life or something...

Not only do you get take ten, you get take eleven. I hate sucking so I stop. Why do you enjoy it so much?
 
Joined
Jan 14, 2018
Messages
50,754
Codex Year of the Donut
I agree that "one attempt at a lock per level" is stupid.
When you fail to pick the lock it should just delete all your older saves and make the lock broken forever.
:positive:
 

Desiderius

Found your egg, Robinett, you sneaky bastard
Patron
Joined
Jul 22, 2019
Messages
14,131
Insert Title Here Pathfinder: Wrath
Wrath lockpick mechanics now emulate trap disarm mechanics so you should both be happy. If you suck too badly you can jam the lock forever, whereas if you're within five you get infinite attempts.
 

Carrion

Arcane
Patron
Joined
Jun 30, 2011
Messages
3,648
Location
Lost in Necropolis
Any hope of me not savescumming ever again was ruined by Disco Elysium.
Can't think of anything more degenerate than savescumming in Disco.

As hated as the game is and as much of an exception it is due to its (almost) total lack of combat, it actually does one thing really well: it makes failure a natural part of gameplay, something you're encouraged to live with. Screwing up a skill check might still lead to something funny or entertaining, and it's pretty much guaranteed you'll find some way to progress later on without feeling like you're missing out on content. It's very common to fuck up, but extremely rare to die (never managed to do that on my single playthrough) or run into a situation where you'd need to load an older save. I can only think of one spot where you can accidentally fuck yourself over without knowing it by entering an area without sufficient skills and/or getting some terrible rolls. Ironman is really the only way to go here.
 

Harthwain

Magister
Joined
Dec 13, 2019
Messages
4,689
Can't think of anything more degenerate than savescumming in Disco.

So I agree with your point, but then the dice roll shouldn't be categorized as a "failure"... because it's not.
Don't be retarded. It's a failure, because you fail a skill check. If have you managed to live with it you'd find out that a failure doesn't mean it's the end. Some skills checks can be re-attempted. Some have interesting consequences (and in some cases a failure can even be the optimal result).
 

Oropay

Educated
Joined
May 26, 2021
Messages
73
In general, any game that pushes the player toward save scumming is designed poorly. Old games get a pass

I like games where failing is almost as fun as winning.
The Expeditions games let you fail your way though pivotal combat encounters, which changes the story somewhat. David Cage's latest game, Detroit: Become Human, has a lot of content "hidden" behind relatively intentional failures. There's a stealth section that's so easy that you basically have to try to get the female character caught, but if you do, it opens up a huge section where she's in a concentration camp. I really think RPGs could learn from this, where the player could fail just to create drama or see how the narrative would evolve. This is related to taking an evil path through a game but does not necessarily make the player "evil." To return to D:BH, I kept Conner loyal to his corp and an antagonist to the android revolution and gave him no "human" characteristics like empathy; but I played Marcus in exactly the opposite way. Of course the game will let you play Conner as an ally of the revolution and let Marcus betray his revolution, if you want. Or you can play straight goody two shoes and make both Conner and Marcus touchy feely good guys.
 

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