Infuriating Developer Decisions in RPGs

[Morpheus Kitami]

I'm just so tired of hauling stuff back to the store to sell it every 5 minutes. If you're going to have encumbrance in your game, then don't give me low-quality loot. Just give me money. Don't give me 50 cheap swords so I have to stop what I'm doing, go back and sell them, come back, and try to remember what the hell I was doing in the first place.

I remember doing that in Titan Quest, and eventually I figured out the secret to that, ignore all that trash...because you're not going to have a good time if you play it like that.
Unless the developers are also putting stuff in shops that you actually want and need, in which case, I got nothing.

 

[Adenocaulon]

I do not like the overworld map interaction, I feel this is a waste of time, just give me fast travel.

Other think I do not like is when an RPG is divided in stages or missions, this is common in tactic rpgs. This break the immersion and without the feeling of continuity in the game it is difficult to mantain my interest. If it is a management screen between stages it is definitely not my type of game.

 

[Nos]

I do not like the overworld map interaction, I feel this is a waste of time, just give me fast travel.

I don't mind map interaction when done right, such as the first Fallout games.
The problem with map travel is when there's trash mobs of critters coming at you every 15 seconds, like in Pathfinder...

 

[J1M]

Armor, if it's plate+layers is both deflective (hits) and absorbing (concussion). Without padding metal helmet is deflective, but not very absorbing. So it's all very different depending on armor, context and weapons used.
And player must still be able to easily calculate (predict) results to make decisions. You can't run a mega formula under hood because then player wouldn't understand what can happen and for what reasons, and what decisions and conclusions he's supposed to draw from combat results.

There is literally no such thing as plate without padding outside of Hollywood.

 

[Shadenuat]

There is literally no such thing as plate without padding outside of Hollywood.

You are making a postapoc game, and player finds an old style damaged infantry helmet (a metal bucket basically). Since it's better than nothing, he equips it. Then he gets hit by some blade, or bullet, or a raider tries to bash their head with a stick.

And by the way, padding also varies in quality and design. There is thin padding, and there are very thick padded armors. You can pad the insides of it with cloth or even animal hair afaik. Can be just cloth or well tailored gambeson. But then gambeson can be as low as your knees, or short. A hit in the upper part of leg can meet nothing, or up to say 4 layers of armor (cloth, plate, with padding, and chain over padding on top of it), in different variations.
And then there are other settings than muh medieval europ.

Not everyone in all history was ideally equipped by the guide from the book (including historically correct shoes and ornaments on clothing) or with a personal servant; and neither players would be in the game.

In reality of RPGs though, itemization people loved never was about ac or damage thresholds or any hemafagotry, but about narrative and rarity and unique effects of items, and if players felt they earned to own them; and the element of larping and dressing up of course. Full Plate in BG1 is just banal AC; it still felt like Full Plate due to power level and cost, rarity, weight and strength requirement to wear.

 

[laclongquan]

There is literally no such thing as plate without padding outside of Hollywood.

World War 2 era, metal helmets

Teh only padding is some leather/plastic rope they use to secure the helmet, and incidentally can spare some for padding. Actual real padding is for sissy aka Propaganda boys. Even Elvis doesnt wear padding

I dont know about real, historical, medieval stuffs, because the legacy armors are through the hands of sissies, aka collectors and SMA players. But actual history in recent time show that padding is... practically non existant.

 

[Sykar]

You have the option not to loot it. That's the whole point of having an encumbrance system - to make looting less of a no-brainer. I agree that it works best with breakable equipment though.

Well if Underrail has taught me anything:

 

[rusty_shackleford]

re:AC
The reason AC is a super-stat abstracting tons of different concepts is because D&D is played at a tabletop and you have to do the calculations manually. Of course it sucks when it's ported to computers.
Not to say that there weren't ttRPGs that attempted to be more mechanically heavy, they just were never very popular. Spacemaster will always have a special place in my bookshelf tho.

 

[Shadenuat]

World War 2 era, metal helmets

There are modern helmets with padding I think.

There is also Antiquity & Ancient World, but why would we make RPGs in them instead of another one with muh longbows vs muh french.

 

[rusty_shackleford]

I have a vietnam-era m1 helmet, no idea if ww2 ones were designed differently
It's basically two helmets, the inner one is called the "liner" and it's sorta like a construction hard hat. I assume its purpose is similar to padding.

 

[rusty_shackleford]

Teh only padding is some leather/plastic rope they use to secure the helmet, and incidentally can spare some for padding. Actual real padding is for sissy aka Propaganda boys. Even Elvis doesnt wear padding

that's not the metal part, that's the liner("hard hat" thing I referenced above)
the metal part goes on top of it

most pictures of soldiers wearing these helmets actually don't have the metal top on so I assume it's why people don't seem to be aware of it

 

[vota DC]

When a chainmail bikini enchanted to enhance agility does the exact same thing as hardened mithril armor or plainly raising your dex, your armor system is very one-dimensional.

The agile sword-dancer has a different type of defense than the burly plate armored fighter. One dodges out of the way of any strike, the other gives no fucks about being hit because most attacks glance off his armor.

That's why damage resistance and damage threshold systems like in Fallout and AoD are a lot better than D&D's plain "lol everything is AC".

They should just give avoid and damage resistance and threshold systems. A shield should increase avoid (a little for melee and much for ranged) while armore the other two. I think it makes no sense block system of AOD that make you lose some HP....you aren't blocking some huge orcs attacks but regular people so dodging them, blocking with the shield or parrying with your weapon shouldn't be a big difference. They could make that there are some area attacks (for example the huge mace of an ogre) that bypass your avoid but a dodge is immune to this bypass.

 

[Shadenuat]

I think it makes no sense block system of AOD that make you lose some HP....you aren't blocking some huge orcs attacks but regular people so dodging them, blocking with the shield or parrying with your weapon shouldn't be a big difference. They could make that there are some area attacks (for example the huge mace of an ogre) that bypass your avoid but a dodge is immune to this bypass.

Blocking should reduce stamina with possibility of stagger, unless we're talking just having shield strapped to your side and thus you are already protected a lot.

Maybe losing HP is a balance thing. Dodge & Block in AoD are very powerful skills, maxing them early makes you almost unkillable.

 

[laclongquan]

Teh only padding is some leather/plastic rope they use to secure the helmet, and incidentally can spare some for padding. Actual real padding is for sissy aka Propaganda boys. Even Elvis doesnt wear padding

that's not the metal part, that's the liner("hard hat" thing I referenced above)
the metal part goes on top of it

most pictures of soldiers wearing these helmets actually don't have the metal top on so I assume it's why people don't seem to be aware of it

The liners are important to keep the metal part away from the head, so that is probabbly more important than padding.

But what do you mean dont have metal top??? It's always there. Sure, people may cover web on it for stucking leaves and branches up for camo, but the metal are always there.

 

[rusty_shackleford]

Teh only padding is some leather/plastic rope they use to secure the helmet, and incidentally can spare some for padding. Actual real padding is for sissy aka Propaganda boys. Even Elvis doesnt wear padding

that's not the metal part, that's the liner("hard hat" thing I referenced above)
the metal part goes on top of it

most pictures of soldiers wearing these helmets actually don't have the metal top on so I assume it's why people don't seem to be aware of it

The liners are important to keep the metal part away from the head, so that is probabbly more important than padding.

But what do you mean dont have metal top??? It's always there. Sure, people may cover web on it for stucking leaves and branches up for camo, but the metal are always there.

The liner was purposely designed to reduce impact damage and replaced an earlier form that offered no protection. I'll link to the pdf on the m1 helmet when archives.gov comes back up(?! it's throwing a 503 error atm)

But what do you mean dont have metal top??? It's always there. Sure, people may cover web on it for stucking leaves and branches up for camo, but the metal are always there.

The steel shell part was typically only worn during combat.
https://www.militarytrader.com/militaria-collectibles/wwii-m1-helmet-liners

The liner for the M1 helmet served as the suspension for the steel helmet. It acted as a cushion between the wearer’s head and the steel of the helmet. The liner also served as headwear for ceremonial and official duties where a steel helmet was not necessary, such as a parade, guard, and MP duty in non-combat areas.

e.g., in this picture Patton is only wearing the liner

The shell is kinda heavy so I could see why they wouldn't want to walk around with it on their head all the time.

[edit]
the shine isn't how they normally look obviously. Mine is quite dull, and the others I've looked at online seem to be as well.

and I'm not claiming to be an expert on these or something, I'm just a dude who happens to own one and banged on it pretty hard while it was on my head.

 

[J1M]

When a chainmail bikini enchanted to enhance agility does the exact same thing as hardened mithril armor or plainly raising your dex, your armor system is very one-dimensional.

The agile sword-dancer has a different type of defense than the burly plate armored fighter. One dodges out of the way of any strike, the other gives no fucks about being hit because most attacks glance off his armor.

That's why damage resistance and damage threshold systems like in Fallout and AoD are a lot better than D&D's plain "lol everything is AC".

They should just give avoid and damage resistance and threshold systems. A shield should increase avoid (a little for melee and much for ranged) while armore the other two. I think it makes no sense block system of AOD that make you lose some HP....you aren't blocking some huge orcs attacks but regular people so dodging them, blocking with the shield or parrying with your weapon shouldn't be a big difference. They could make that there are some area attacks (for example the huge mace of an ogre) that bypass your avoid but a dodge is immune to this bypass.

D&D is not a perfect system. The way it handles weapon focus talents is pretty bad, for example. But it has a fair amount of damage reduction items/monsters/abilities.

I believe the other thing you are talking about is called a ranged touch attack.

 

[d1nolore]

When people talk about padding worn for metal helmets in medieval or ancient times it’s for a number of reasons and not all uniform. It is largely to keep the helm in place and make it more comfortable to wear, along with cushioning impacts obviously. Imagine putting a metal helmet on without any “padding” and riding a horse or being active. Exactly the same reasons why modern helmets have strapping, cushioning, padding, whatever inside. That’s obviously not to say they all wore them the same ways.

 

[rusty_shackleford]

The liner was purposely designed to reduce impact damage and replaced an earlier form that offered no protection. I'll link to the pdf on the m1 helmet when archives.gov comes back up(?! it's throwing a 503 error atm)

found it
https://apps.dtic.mil/sti/pdfs/AD0908190.pdf
just search the document for 'liner'
e.g.,

The liner was definitely designed to be protective and seems to have served a very similar function to traditional padding under armor. However, it appears to post-date WW2. I have no idea what they were like in WW2. A bit of searching around seems to imply that there were actually liners made of many different materials in WW2, which when thinking on it makes sense given the situation.

 

[deuxhero]

Note that world war era helmets were meant to stop sharpnel from going through the head, which works quite a bit differently than a melee weapon with constant force behind it. They do stop even reasonably powerful pistol bullets (Bashford Dean did some testing in the interwar) but that was more of a neat extra than the intent.

 

[Old Hans]

That’s obviously not to say they all wore them the same ways.

you just know there was like that one lazy knight back in the 1100's who all lazy and just wore the chainmail without any padding, and all his friends would say "are you fookin' mad, mate? yous a mad lad" this is in England, btw. thats how they talked back then

 

[Jedi Master Radek]

Damage thresholds can lead to funny unrealistic realisms same as AC (ie % reduction of any hit independent of power of said hit looks weird).

That's why you should have a flat amount of damage reduction not %. Helmet that decreases all damage received by 5 doesn't cause mentioned problems.

 

[deuxhero]

Damage thresholds can lead to funny unrealistic realisms same as AC (ie % reduction of any hit independent of power of said hit looks weird).

That's why you should have a flat amount of damage reduction not %. Helmet that decreases all damage received by 5 doesn't cause mentioned problems.

And instead causes more serious problems of requiring characters eat tons of hits like nothing. It's also really whacky to balance since early armor can't have significant DR which makes it worthless. It only kinda works in games with non-human units where armor is a weight consideration (light, medium, heavy) rather than something that progresses as the game goes on.

 

[deama]

I've been noticing a recent trend of this weird "level scaling" effect in traditional rpgs, e.g. if you play pathfinder WOTR solo and tick the option to suck all the exp for yourself, you'll end up being overleved, which I was fine with, but turns out there's a hidden "level scaling" mechanic as I've encountered mobs that look like low level mobs but for some reason are stronger than any boss I've battled so far in the game. At least they give massive exp, but still, very immersion breaking. Hopefully there's a cap to this.
I understand having to keep the game "challenging", but there's better ways of doing this ffs.

Actually, now that I think about it, progression in general isn't as good as it used to be in rpgs, even oblivion had a better progressive feeling than skyrim.

 

[d1nolore]

Damage thresholds can lead to funny unrealistic realisms same as AC (ie % reduction of any hit independent of power of said hit looks weird).

That's why you should have a flat amount of damage reduction not %. Helmet that decreases all damage received by 5 doesn't cause mentioned problems.

And instead causes more serious problems of requiring characters eat tons of hits like nothing. It's also really whacky to balance since early armor can't have significant DR which makes it worthless. It only kinda works in games with non-human units where armor is a weight consideration (light, medium, heavy) rather than something that progresses as the game goes on.

I don’t see the issue. Light armours restrict movement and agility less, ie bowmen and scouts who can travel or retreat faster and further with less fatigue. Heavier armours are costly and not something adventurers would start with unless coming from wealth or nobility. Then there’s magical enhancements to armours which give you progression. The whole point of armour is to mitigate hits.

aka the D&D AC system is antiquated and painfully unrealistic when used in computer games. A full plate tower shield fighter uses the same armour system as a 30 dex elf in red undies. One would realistically be harder to corner and hit and the other would be much harder to physically damage yet with the AC system they are calculated the same.

 

[deuxhero]

Damage thresholds can lead to funny unrealistic realisms same as AC (ie % reduction of any hit independent of power of said hit looks weird).

That's why you should have a flat amount of damage reduction not %. Helmet that decreases all damage received by 5 doesn't cause mentioned problems.

And instead causes more serious problems of requiring characters eat tons of hits like nothing. It's also really whacky to balance since early armor can't have significant DR which makes it worthless. It only kinda works in games with non-human units where armor is a weight consideration (light, medium, heavy) rather than something that progresses as the game goes on.

I don’t see the issue. Light armours restrict movement and agility less, ie bowmen and scouts who can travel or retreat faster and further with less fatigue. Heavier armours are costly and not something adventurers would start with unless coming from wealth or nobility. Then there’s magical enhancements to armours which give you progression. The whole point of armour is to mitigate hits.

aka the D&D AC system is antiquated and painfully unrealistic when used in computer games. A full plate tower shield fighter uses the same armour system as a 30 dex elf in red undies. One would realistically be harder to corner and hit and the other would be much harder to physically damage yet with the AC system they are calculated the same.

Think about it for a few seconds. How much damage does a single hit do, how much HP does a character have, and how much reduction is needed to make the armor's damage reduction meaningful? Can't be too low or the armor does nothing, can't be too high or armor is everything. Then try working out how you increase the armor's effectivness without breaking that careful balance.

Look at the extreme examples. If an attack does 110 and character typically have 100 HP, that means armor needs to reduce damage by 10% to be worthwhile (turn death into survival), but then any armor value between 10% and ~55% (where it lets you survive 2 hits) is largely wasted (it makes healing easier, but otherwise won't let you live long). On the other hand if an attack does 25 damage and characters have 100 HP, 1% lets a character survive another hit, but the next won't come till over 35% reduction, and the next won't come till even further, and is turning 4 hits till death into 5 hits significant in the first place? Armor as damage reduction requires damage sponges to "work" mathwise.