Game News Age of Decadence Post-Release Update #1: 10,000 copies sold, upcoming updates and future projects

[Stompa]

Spoiler

The scenes with Galath feature him being directly recruited by Magi, not by a shifty commander looking to sweep his mistake under the rug. Him being an imperial soldier does nothing to discredit the theory that three of the vessels were unwarded. I agree with you in regards to the Qantari.

Spoiler

Galath was on Empire's side during the war though, so obviously he must've come from the replacements sent by Corvus. Wards don't factor into the 4:3 split at all since everyone had them, might be a red herring on VD's part. The way it went seems to be that Balzaar went rogue first and others went along since he's the big shot in the void, while Agathoth, pursuing his own goals, managed to convince Galathazor and Hassatur to stay.

 

[Smashing Axe]

Spoiler

Galath was on Empire's side during the war though, so obviously he must've come from the replacements sent by Corvus. Wards don't factor into the 4:3 split at all since everyone had them, might be a red herring on VD's part. The way it went seems to be that Balzaar went rogue first and others went along since he's the big shot in the void, while Agathoth, pursuing his own goals, managed to convince Galathazor and Hassatur to stay.

Spoiler

I thought they were all imbued at the same time, there's six others in Galath's vision, and certainly enough sarchopaghi to suggest the god imbuing was far from sequential. What is there to suggest that everyone had the wards at the time of the imbuing? Remember that if the commander scenario is true that the magi may be entirely ignorant of the replacements and their condition

 

[Stompa]

Spoiler

I thought they were all imbued at the same time, there's six others in Galath's vision, and certainly enough sarchopaghi to suggest the god imbuing was far from sequential. What is there to suggest that everyone had the wards at the time of the imbuing? Remember that if the commander scenario is true that the magi may be entirely ignorant of the replacements and their condition

Spoiler

I didn't mean that their ascension was sequential, but their treachery was. Crassus' logs from Zamedi say that after they lost two more, the split became 4 against 3, which can only mean that 2 more gods joined Balzaar's side at the time of writing. Also come on, you said it yourself that High Magi approached Galath, that certainly implies replacements were inspected somewhat.

 

[Smashing Axe]

Spoiler

I didn't mean that their ascension was sequential, but their treachery was. Crassus' logs from Zamedi say that after they lost two more, the split became 4 against 3, which can only mean that 2 more gods joined Balzaar's side at the time of writing.

If their treachery was sequential, then couldn't it be that the first three were not warded (due to the coverup replacement), with the others only weakening the wards over time? Two joining one is hardly surprising considering Balzaar's the leader of the pantheon

Also come on, you said it yourself that High Magi approached Galath, that certainly implies replacements were inspected somewhat.

That only would be relevant if you subscribe to Galath being one of the replacements, which I assert he is not. I don't see how the commander could have convinced the magi to redo the wards on his replacements while keeping the entire thing secret. (I thought the wards were bone deep anyway, with nothing on the skin besides scars)

 

[Zeriel]

Spoiler

I think you guys are forgetting that the wards do not prevent the gods from changing their bodies. This was the one thing Hadad overlooked, the Ordu even have a legend about his foolishness in this regard. He was able to use the wards to diminish and weaken them when they rebelled (remember the tale about Balzaar confronting Hadad outside Maadoran and Hadad making his body crush itself with a gesture), and the wards keep them imprisoned in their bodies, but the changes they made to themselves were never meant or able to be stopped by the wards, that's not a weakening, just a design flaw. When shit hit the fan, the magi reversed the ritual entirely, expelling the gods back into the ether.

I suppose it's possible the Ordu tale is a corruption of facts and the Qantari were responsible for altering the wards in this way and that originally the wards prevented them from changing their bodies. That's a stretch of an interpretation, though. All we have are these distorted narratives.

 

[Tommy Wiseau]

AoD dialogue system has two main flaws:

- it's passive, you either have the skill or you don't
- you do nothing but level up and select lines that match your highest skill; the other lines are flavor, basically.

So to improve we need to:
- give you the tools to modify the checks by paying attention to what the man says and actually thinking of what to "say"
- use the skills to modify the checks (not to pass them) and get rid of tags. Basically, first you talk and learn more about your "opponent". Stats and skills can help you unlock more topics to learn more. Then you "make your case" and select whichever lines you think would make a stronger case. The outcomes will be modified by what you said before (we tried that in AoD to get a feel of how it works, like talking to the praetor investigating Senna's murder) and your skills, thus it can differ from one playthrough to the next.

It does make sense in theory, whether or not it will actually work remains to be seen.

Vinney, the answer to your conundrum is a lot more straightforward, you need to give players more choices that aren't stat-based.

 

[LusciousPear]

I've spent 8 hours just screwing around in the first town. What a brilliant game. Not without flaws, but it's def my fav RPG since Modded New Vegas.

 

[Tigranes]

Details?


So far we're looking at 5 members max. PC+1 at CHA4, PC+2 at CHA6, etc.


It worked better in MotB but I'd prefer to see more reaction checks along the way. Quick example, if the freemen want you to do something for them and you put together a team, promising them that you're just using the freemen to get what you need but then side with them anyway, there should be a strong reaction, not at the end of the game but at the end of the quest (maybe even sooner, the moment it becomes clear that you're full of shit).

How will you balance the dramatic increase in combat capacity with even one extra member? While not quite exponential, 3 party members are often far stronger than 2. I can't remember an RPG where you had such flexibility in # of party members and you weren't hideously overpowered with anything more than the regular number (as opposed to normal party games, where it is balanced for max # and then you can take less as a challenge).

 

[Vault Dweller]

No idea yet. What I said above is the starting point. Where we go from there depends on many factors. We'll try it first in the crawler, see how it works there (assuming we can make it work), what changes need to be made, etc.

While typing it, I thought of two solutions:

a) quality vs quantity. For example, CHA6 can get you either 2 average party members or one with great stats and skills (i.e. "I'd join you but you have too many people" response).
b) XP split. The more people you have the lower everyone's skills are. In some games it's not a factor, in AoD it is. So 4 people can be less effective (hit less often, take too much damage) than 2, for example.

 

[Jaedar]

How will you balance the dramatic increase in combat capacity with even one extra member? While not quite exponential, 3 party members are often far stronger than 2. I can't remember an RPG where you had such flexibility in # of party members and you weren't hideously overpowered with anything more than the regular number (as opposed to normal party games, where it is balanced for max # and then you can take less as a challenge).

I think a potentially cool way to balance it is to make the # of party members more or less fix, but depending on your charisma some of the NPC's might get controlled by the AI some turns. From the perspective that you are playing you, it makes some sense that your allies might decide they know better than you sometimes if you are an unlikeable fellow.

 

[Zorba the Hutt]

I think a potentially cool way to balance it is to make the # of party members more or less fix, but depending on your charisma some of the NPC's might get controlled by the AI some turns. From the perspective that you are playing you, it makes some sense that your allies might decide they know better than you sometimes if you are an unlikeable fellow.

That sounds interesting. In addition to the balancing options above, another option would be to have certain potential recruits (strong willed / stubborn / reluctant) who would only join your party if you have high charisma. So if you dump charisma and improve your other stats instead, the trade off is more limited options in terms of recruits. This could also mean that you take longer to fill your party.

 

[Saduj]

I think a potentially cool way to balance it is to make the # of party members more or less fix, but depending on your charisma some of the NPC's might get controlled by the AI some turns. From the perspective that you are playing you, it makes some sense that your allies might decide they know better than you sometimes if you are an unlikeable fellow.

That's a good idea. Along the same lines, charisma could affect how far npcs are willing to deviate from their own agendas in order to go along with yours. It would affect things like how much shit you can do that they don't like before they leave you, how likely they are to betray you, how much of a share of the loot they demand, whether they abandon you during a particularly tough fight or whether they are willing to participate in a tough fight at all, how long they are willing to wait for you to address their side quests, etc.

 

[Johannes]

No idea yet. What I said above is the starting point. Where we go from there depends on many factors. We'll try it first in the crawler, see how it works there (assuming we can make it work), what changes need to be made, etc.

While typing it, I thought of two solutions:

a) quality vs quantity. For example, CHA6 can get you either 2 average party members or one with great stats and skills (i.e. "I'd join you but you have too many people" response).
b) XP split. The more people you have the lower everyone's skills are. In some games it's not a factor, in AoD it is. So 4 people can be less effective (hit less often, take too much damage) than 2, for example.

How is a) a solution? You still get a huge power increase with more CHA even if you opt to take less but better people with the gains. Otoh if there was just 1 or 2 superb teammates, but only mediocre ones after that, would make the power increase that comes with CHA more diminishing.

b) of course works as evidence by a lot of RPGs, but I find it extremely boring.


Other ways to balance different sizes of teams (whether the teamsize's tied to CHA or not):
Equipment matters more than numbers. If you've got limited number of firearms, extra men will help a p. limited amount, one guy in power armor is worth 5 men without, etc.. Also for non-combat stuff, you've got a two anti-radiation suits that are needed to operate in a given area.
Or logistical consideration in the same vein. The elevator can fit three people (and power armor takes the space of two) and the combat will start right as the doors open. Sneaking gets exponentially harder with more people, even if individual skill was constant.
People cost resources. Like you have to pay your mercs in JA. Could be food or whatever that's scarce there, having a barely useful hang-around in your party is worse than an empty space. Or whatever personal demnds bullshit the people have, the more of there are of them the bigger the hassle. Would also be balanced that the best people don't want to work alongside each other for some reason.
Have some things you really, really want the main PC to do instead of telling a party member to do it (Some things they might just refuse to do, betray you for even asking, or blackmail you afterwards). So that there's a bigger gain from investing in a non-CHA stat.
A bigger party attracts more attention from everyone. This can be a good thing, that people know you have more people behind gives you a position of strength, but might also catch negative attention making you a target, disallowing some subtler methods.

Tying the allowed teamsize to something else than charisma could be more interesting (either it be free for all, or a skill that you can raise, or smth else). It's an interesting idea to me that a you're playing an uncharismatic guy trying to lead a lot of people, but due to the low charisma can't properly control them or make best use of their abilities.

One thing is though, that if your PC is supposed to lead a team in the game, leadership (not the same as charisma, a stand-up comedian is not the same skillset as a CEO or a sergeant) is the most important thing. Specialists in other fields are supposed to be his subordinates.



* I don't know anything about the spaceship game, what will you actually be doing in it.