Deadfire dialogue check analysis

[pomenitul]

Fun fact. The Norwegian artist Theodor Kittelsen, best known for his depictions of Scandinavian trolls, drew this thread back in 1883:

 

[aweigh]

One thing I agree with Sherry about is that turning off dialog check requirements does make conversations flow more naturally. Sometimes, if they're turned on, I'll get the urge to pick a dialog choice only for power-gaming (or that I think will get me loot), whereas when they're off I will pick the dialog that I think my character would pick.

 

[Cross]

Bonus fun fact - PS:T only has about 550 dialogue checks. 489 attribute checks, and 60 alignment checks.

https://forums.beamdog.com/discussion/64381/dialogs-stats-checks-analysis

Don't shoot the messenger, but Fallout 3 has over double the amount of dialogue checks than PS:T.

And they put those dialogue checks to such good use:

 

[Sentinel]

Deadfire has 300+ magic spells and Planescape only has 93.

sawyer managed to come up with 300 spells and none of them do anything remotely interesting
impressive

 

[Tenebris]

Interestingly someone on the Obsidian forums pointed out that some of the checks aren't even available to the player. There's apparently one for the Steel Garrote subclass. Makes me wonder how much more there are that's inaccessible.

 

[rogueknight333]

This means Deadfire has more dialogue checks than any RPG ever created.

Actually, I'm not sure about that. From what I'm reading about it, the Swordflight modules for NWN might have more, in total. rogueknight333, can you chime in?

I do not have 5000+ dialogue checks, so POE has me beat there. It is more like PS:T.

 

[aweigh]

poe has 300 spells? seriously? then why does everyone only use Slicken?

SICK BURNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNN

 

[2house2fly]

I don't know if I'd call Planescape Torment a visual novel

 

[Safav Hamon]

Interestingly someone on the Obsidian forums pointed out that some of the checks aren't even available to the player. There's apparently one for the Steel Garrote subclass. Makes me wonder how much more there are that's inaccessible.

I noticed that as well. There are mods that add in the Steel Garrote subclass.

 

[Safav Hamon]

I don't know if I'd call Planescape Torment a visual novel

It hasn't aged well visually.

 

[HeatEXTEND]

top one looks way cooler dumbass

 

[Safav Hamon]

 

[Safav Hamon]

Gorgeous for 1998. It looks like ass 20 years later.

 

[Okagron]

Those screenshots look actually pretty damn cool.

 

[RNGsus]

Those screenshots look actually pretty damn cool.

As if their artists delivered a coherent, working concept of a place. 20 years later, that's still pulling teeth and almost impossibru.

 

[Roguey]

Codex figured out many years ago that they don't care about narrative reactivity/"cosmetic C&C" if they don't care about the narrative itself.

 

[aweigh]

you'd think that'd be obvious, wouldn't you? but for some it isn't.

C&C has little to do with whether or not the game itself is actually good.

EDIT: Although this thread isn't even about "c&c", it's about dialog checks. There can be overlap between these things but they are not interchangeable terminology.

 

[Safav Hamon]

C&C is a great selling point for any RPG. It's not the only important factor, but it's still important.

When it comes to skill checks, reactivity, and reputation systems Obsidian is as strong as they ever were.

 

[Chris Avellone]

Are there metrics for how many responses modify alignment in PST? I was always curious.

The quantity argument is a long one, except I've never considered it a valid metric for a game's quality, esp. word count.

 

[oscar]

The PoE setting is so boring the graphics don't mean all that much.

 

[Safav Hamon]

Obsidian blew most of their budget on dialogue trees and voiceacting, when I think they would of been better off creating more explorable locations and dungeons.

Most people either wont realize the effort they put into the dialogue complexity, or wont care.

 

[Chris Avellone]

Obsidian blew most of their budget on dialogue trees and voiceacting, when I think they would of been better off creating more locations and dungeons.

Most people either wont realize how much effort they put into the dialogue complexity, or wont care.

I think players have asked for more deep dungeon content (if meaningful - Caed Nua in PoE1 I would describe as non-meaningful but I don't think the designers were asked to treat it any other way or didn't have the time to do so - regardless, don't blame the designers).

I believe that Adler's dastardly plan for the 3rd PoE2 DLC is to provide such a dungeon (similar to Durlag's Tower) - the dastardly plan, you know, where you give players what they like. Brandon Adler, you fool - how dare you.

If people don't react to dialogue checks in a meaningful way, sure... but if it's like the Master at the end of Fallout 1, you've done it right, and it's not a lot of work to make you realize how much your skill mattered. The impact of a dialogue choice is how you design it.

 

[Safav Hamon]

The fact that I can play as an Aumaua from the Deadfire Archipelago and get 269 unique dialogues throughout the game is cool as hell. Meaningfulness be damned.

Compare that to a game like Skyrim, where your race gets brought up maybe 5-10 times throughout the entire game. Even if no one else appreciates it, I do.

 

[Chris Avellone]

The fact that I can play as an Aumaua from the Deadfire Archipelago and get 269 unique dialogues throughout the game is cool as hell. Meaningfulness be damned.

Why did you have to add the 2nd sentence? I am so sad right now.

 

[Safav Hamon]

Sometimes quantity > quality

While not every case of reactivity is meaningful by itself, the fact that every NPC reacts to something specific about your character is meaningful.