Divinity Divinity: Original Sin 2 - Definitive Edition

[Kyl Von Kull]

Why the hell didn't anyone step in? Swen should've seen how fucking awful this thinking is from a mile away.

Swen is not a systems guy, systems designers are very rare, let alone good ones.

He might not be a systems guy, but as project director he should be able to tell if the systems are shit or not, something that even the average Codexer is capable of.

Swen also loves the item fever, which is why you have to upgrade your fucking gear almost every level. TBH if he likes item fever that much then he should make a Diablo clone and not a CRPG.

He already kind of did: Beyond Divinity was way too close to Diablo for comfort.

 

[Darth Roxor]

i just tried to launch the game again

played for some 15 minutes before the overwhelming banality forced me to quit

this is dos2

pure, distilled banality

Actually, Darth Roxor's final thoughts on DOS2 before finally giving up and uninstalling:

I honestly and sincerely think it's worse than vanilla PoE and you can quote me on this.

 

[Black]

I honestly and sincerely think it's worse than vanilla PoE and you can quote me on this.

 

[Perkel]

Like i said i started again this time completely solo and i turned down difficulty to explorer (along with vitality scaling mod)
In 1,5 hours i already can kill alexander in second turn but usually ghasts get me in first turn. I am lvl 4 he is 9 so there is some difficulty involved. I just need some better gear now to survive to 2nd turn and maybe better crossbow so i can definitely kill him in second turn. Also i think necromancy spell which makes characters unable to heal should be good for this. Once you got alexander that worm shows up so you just cameleon spell and together with escapism talent means i will just watch on side how both sides rip each other apart and then i will just swoop in and deal with them.

So far so good.

I also wonder how game will deal with me skipping seekers quest line and dealing with alexander first.

 

[Perkel]

Fucking lol.
So get this. If you equip weapon that has higher level than you it automatically get -20% per over level to accuracy.
So i have good crossbow and i could kill Alexander in just one turn BUT my crossbow has only like 60% accuracy which makes it non starter.

Fucking why ? Either way you have total enemy absurd hp bloat just one level above you let alone two. Then why the fuck you even implement such a thing in first place.

So not only you are required to change gear constantly but you can't actually change to better gear faster.

edit:

managed to deal with it.

 

[Iznaliu]

• Had an unfounded and autistic dislike of perceived "randomness".

I believe this unfounded distaste that you mentioned is prevalent throughout the entire world of mainstream gaming; it was almost inevitable that it would find its way into D:OS2, which was clearly designed to capture a more mainstream audience, as shown by the way Larian promoted it. It really comes down to people not understanding how to strategically manage anything that involves probabilities; this deficiency results, in its most extreme form, in them seeing anything with the slightest random element as a clusterfuck and thus developing a distaste for it. This is evident by people complaining about D:OS1's systems in mainstream gaming forums, with them saying that "they would be perfect if there was much less of a RNG". With all of that in mind, it is clear why "randomness" was made the primary target of D:OS2's changes to the system.

 

[Black]

wtf I had 95% to hit how is to possible it missed

 

[Luckmann]

• Had an unfounded and autistic dislike of perceived "randomness".

I believe this unfounded distaste that you mentioned is prevalent throughout the entire world of mainstream gaming; it was almost inevitable that it would find its way into D:OS2, which was clearly designed to capture a more mainstream audience, as shown by the way Larian promoted it. It really comes down to people not understanding how to strategically manage anything that involves probabilities; this deficiency results, in its most extreme form, in them seeing anything with the slightest random element as a clusterfuck and thus developing a distaste for it. This is evident by people complaining about D:OS1's systems in mainstream gaming forums, with them saying that "they would be perfect if there was much less of a RNG". With all of that in mind, it is clear why "randomness" was made the primary target of D:OS2's changes to the system.

That's just it, though; it's not a mainstream gaming thing at all. It's about a widespread misunderstanding about the perceived issues of "randomness". People think that the randomness is the issue and that it's bad, but in actuality, hitting the delta of randomness is practically a necessity, and people bitching about how mad they get when they miss a 95% shot are actually part of what makes the system work and what makes it ultimately enjoyable, and despite that bitching, they'll keep on playing and have a more enjoyable experience than they would've had without that element of randomness.

It's a counter-intuitive aspect of human nature and games of chance, and taking advantage of it is entry-grade system design whether we're talking about a board game, a tabletop RPG, a computer game, or even gambling.

Not understanding this is acceptable when coming from the average paste-eater, and may even be forgivable with people with zero knowledge or interest in system or game design on even a cursory level (as has been demonstrated earlier in this thread).

But from a system designer of a major CRPG and a project lead as well as industry veteran? Fucking mindboggling.

wtf I had 95% to hit how is to possible it missed

First mistake was telling the player they have a 95% chance of hitting. Obfuscate that shit with dice throws and modifiers so it feels more reasonable and is more of a "Aww shucks" instead of "Bullshit! My brain tells me 95% is all but certain!". It also has the potential of feeling more like an even curve, with smaller modifiers - the difference between a 90% shot and a 80% shot isn't actually that big, but people will usually go for the 90% shot, even to their detriment, just because 90% is perceived as being a lot safer than 80%.

But the difference is only like 11-12%.

 

[Elex]

• Had an unfounded and autistic dislike of perceived "randomness".

I believe this unfounded distaste that you mentioned is prevalent throughout the entire world of mainstream gaming; it was almost inevitable that it would find its way into D:OS2, which was clearly designed to capture a more mainstream audience, as shown by the way Larian promoted it. It really comes down to people not understanding how to strategically manage anything that involves probabilities; this deficiency results, in its most extreme form, in them seeing anything with the slightest random element as a clusterfuck and thus developing a distaste for it. This is evident by people complaining about D:OS1's systems in mainstream gaming forums, with them saying that "they would be perfect if there was much less of a RNG". With all of that in mind, it is clear why "randomness" was made the primary target of D:OS2's changes to the system.

but armor sistem don’t remove RNG.

it increase RNG.

because you have to first remove armor with damage (and damage come from gear: RNG gear) that also require a % for hitting.

litterally an extra layer of RNG.

 

[Iznaliu]

and people bitching about how mad they get when they miss a 95% shot are actually part of what makes the system work and what makes it ultimately enjoyable, and despite that bitching, they'll keep on playing and have a more enjoyable experience than they would've had without that element of randomness.

I think some of these people legitimately do not and would never enjoy randomness; these are the same people who play games for the story.

 

[Roguey]

First mistake was telling the player they have a 95% chance of hitting. Obfuscate that shit with dice throws and modifiers so it feels more reasonable and is more of a "Aww shucks" instead of "Bullshit! My brain tells me 95% is all but certain!".

We went from games where you had no idea what your chances of hitting anything were to those that told you (or allowed you to figure it out yourself) because people want to know. Hiding it just leads to "I miss too often, the rng is broken."

 

[Luckmann]

First mistake was telling the player they have a 95% chance of hitting. Obfuscate that shit with dice throws and modifiers so it feels more reasonable and is more of a "Aww shucks" instead of "Bullshit! My brain tells me 95% is all but certain!".

We went from games where you had no idea what your chances of hitting anything were to those that told you (or allowed you to figure it out yourself) because people want to know. Hiding it just leads to "I miss too often, the rng is broken."

People will always bitch, but it still mitigates the issue. Also, completely hiding it is also a mistake, since it leaves the player with absolutely no idea what's going on - at which point you're only reinforcing the (erroneous) belief that "It's just fucking random, it makes no sense".

 

[Fairfax]

IE games did fine in that regard. To hit rolls for those who wanted them, under the hood for everyone else. Savescummers and scrubs will always do their thing, but it's less frustrating for them when there's no "95%" on screen.

 

[Luckmann]

IE games did fine in that regard. To hit rolls for those who wanted them, under the hood for everyone else. Savescummers and scrubs will always do their thing, but it's less frustrating for them when there's no "95%" on screen.

Exactly; you know you have +1, +2 or +Whatever, so there's the satisfaction of doing better, and you can see all the rolls and the modifiers, so you know things are doing their thing, but you don't have a "95%!" in your face that fails for seemingly arcane reasons.

Things should be reasonable random, but it should not feel unreasonably random. Part of that is not showing the player too simplified information, but also convey to the player that things are working as intended, and rewarding them for using that information to their advantage, even if that just amounts to selectively choosing the "Longsword +1" over the "Shortsword +2" depending on circumstance.

 

[Fairfax]

IE games did fine in that regard. To hit rolls for those who wanted them, under the hood for everyone else. Savescummers and scrubs will always do their thing, but it's less frustrating for them when there's no "95%" on screen.

Exactly; you know you have +1, +2 or +Whatever, so there's the satisfaction of doing better, and you can see all the rolls and the modifiers, so you know things are doing their thing, but you don't have a "95%!" in your face that fails for seemingly arcane reasons.

Things should be reasonable random, but it should not feel unreasonably random. Part of that is not showing the player too simplified information, but also convey to the player that things are working as intended, and rewarding them for using that information to their advantage, even if that just amounts to selectively choosing the "Longsword +1" over the "Shortsword +2" depending on circumstance.

As long as the game isn't lying, the randomness is always "reasonable". The issue is the psychology involved with how the whole thing is presented.

In games with the odds on screen, players are often presented with positive information before their decision: "you have a 95% chance of success". 95% (or even 90%) is such a high probability that the average player takes it for granted in their plan, so when it misses, they take it as a major outlier, so players who aren't willing to accept the outcome just quick load. With a missed attack, the visual feedback jumps from reassuring to very negative with no information on how it happened, which boosts the (obviously wrong) notion that there's something wrong with the rolls. It's even worse in turn-based games, since the player misses the attack, ends their turn, and has to wait for another opportunity with enemy turns in between.

The feedback is slightly different when people roll 1 on a d20. It's the exact same thing, but the player gets a self-evident visual feedback. A lot of people will still savescum and/or complain, of course, but you can change the presentation so that it's a less common reaction. In the IE games, there are multiple barriers to get the actual odds:

1. One must be aware of the option in the first place.
2. The roll is presented after the decision is made.
3. The roll doesn't tell you what your chances were, the player has to do the math.
4. Doing the math requires an understanding of the rolls work in the first place.

In order to know the odds, the player must learn about the game's mechanics, which improves their decision-making and can make the negative outcomes less frustrating, as they know what's going on. It's not perfect, but it's a net positive for the player's experience, unlike D:OS2's dumbed down design.

 

[Perkel]

I think part of the issue is that there is no truly random scripts in computer science.
Depending on what equation you use to create random number it can create different patterns.
Those patterns you can see over long period of outcomes.

Reason why Fallout1/2 95% was obnoxious was that it was not in fact 95%.

People might say that getting chance one out of 20 is still a lot but getting 3 times in a row miss on 1/20 scale is 20 to power of 3. Which is a fucking lot and in standard Fallout play-trough you would hardly have a chance to see it once let alone MULTIPLE TIMES.

In my opinion % calculation like i think Tim said was actually like devs said true, but their script for generating random number created pattern that manifested itself at top end of spectrum which lead us to multiple misses despite 1/20 chance

I think it would be fun thing to do to fire up follout get gun skill at 100% or more and quick save load about 100-150 shots to face at 95%. I am willing to bet that it was not in fact 95% but something like 1/10 or less.

 

[FreeKaner]

People who are against RNG are plebs that do not understand the randomness is not a factor, it's the playfield. You adapt and adjust according to chances, to make them better or to take risks.

Also of course:

 

[LESS T_T]

Here we go. Interview with system designer Nick Pechenin on the armor system: https://www.gamasutra.com/view/news...rnbased_combat_of_Divinity_Original_Sin_2.php

Designing drama into the turn-based combat of Divinity: Original Sin 2

Interesting comments on the article by other game developers:

James Berg

Great article, thanks for sharing. I found this particularly interesting since my experience was completely opposite to this - I enjoyed DOS2, but DOSEE had, imo, a far better combat system, mostly due to armour.

My frustration with the DOS2 system was that it made my AoE spells and consumables feel useless to me most of the time, which had the effect of dramatically lowering the number of good options to take in combat. Items that provided status effects rarely did significant damage to armour (of either type), and therefore only did something once that hit 0. In DOSEE, I'd hurl grenades with abandon, since there'd be a good chance that they'd do status effects to groups, which helped whittle them down. In DOS2, those same grenades would do inconsequential damage and no status effects except to enemies that were about to die regardless.

This applied to my spells as well, which was a bummer. In DOSEE I spent a lot of time engaging in the environmental-combat side of things - setting up combo attacks and inventory juggling to make sure I could carry barrels around In DOS2, that strategy felt far less valuable, since oil+fire just did a bit of damage, rather than the significant amount it did in DOSEE thanks to actually setting enemies on fire.

It also meant that specializing in either physical or magical damage was enormously more effective than splitting the two - hitting an enemy with both effects was highly impractical, so I really just kept magical damage around for times when enemies had dramatically lower magical armour, and I could rain/electric or rain/freeze enemies.

The predictability was also less fun for me as a player. I could pretty easily calculate how many hits it took to get a Knockdown effect for my physical attackers, and almost every enemy in the game died while flat on their back (or having just stood up from a KD) - it was a mechanical, soulless setup, which contrasted with the tension of hurling a Charm Grenade in DOSEE. Combat was certainly less 'balanced' in DOSEE, but that unpredictability also made it more engaging for me.

One thing that isn't touched on is the shift from variable action points to everyone-gets-4, which I imagine was done for balancing reasons. That would have been a huuuge challenge for the team on DOSEE - not knowing how many actions characters could actually take, and making +AP stats tremendously valuable

I definitely felt all the ways the team wanted me to, per this article, on defense in DOS2. The AI definitely felt smart, but not as ruthless as I was. Lots of varied combat encounter spaces and situations, and a great mix of enemies in the game kept every fight interesting. I'm always a sucker for starting with nothing and having to build up from sticks and rocks, so things like the Epic Battle Of Crocodiles on the starter island will always stick with me - thanks for that, and many more memories

According to his profile, he is "a Games User Researcher at Electronic Arts, providing playtesting, research, and consulting services for internal EA clients. These include Dragon Age, Mass Effect, FIFA Ultimate Team, UFC, NHL, and many others."

Another one:

Roberto Bruno

Just to reiterate what I said elsewhere, the new armor system was a textbook case of "solution in search of its problem".

It went out of its way to "fix an issue" that was never an issue to begin with (to summarize: "There's some random chances to take into account when applying status effects! Not everyone in a group may be affected!") and replaces it with a system that in all its perfect predictability is remarkably worse.

For one, it takes away from the game any degree of uncertainty ( which is a change for the worse in itself, in my opinion) and in doing so it also makes mixed-up parties a less-than-optimal solution, while also turning some gadgets and abilities EXTREMELY situational and virtually useless most of the times, compared to pure damage.

Also, not really happy about how Larian handled itemization. Both the randomization and the exponential ramp up in power served the game mechanics really poorly.
But this is a lost battle at this point, since they are getting complaints about this since their early days and still deliberately refuse to embrace hand-placed unique items as the way to go in RPGs.

And comment by the lead developer of Consortium series:

Gregory MacMartin

My wife and I have played through the original a few times over, and played DOS2 in early access and then again once fully released. We only just recently got to the end of our first playthrough. We're not really a fan of the ending of the story per se, BUT absolutely LOVED the overall experience/journey. DOS2 is far superior to the original in almost every way.

It was the best co-op RPG gaming experience of our lives, hands down. I've been playing these kind of games since even before the "Gold Box" games, and Larian with DOS 1 and 2 have 100% created the BEST games of this type ever made, imo.

Have to say, after all that gaming, I think the new armor system in DOS2 is genius and leads to the ability to plan out battles more strategically. It added additional depth into what was already a very deep combat system. We played on "Tactician" difficulty, for reference. (as in, bloody insane hard mode). With all of the spells unlocked, you really begin to appreciate having more certainty about when spell/elemental effects will work or not.

Larian were super clever in designing/balancing out the monsters, as well. Some would have really high magic armor but very low physical, for instance. This would enable us to plan out which attacks we're going to use against whom in order to open them up for knockdown, paralyzing, etc effects as fast as possible.

The system also encourages players to keep track of their own magic and physical armor so they can actively and confidently protect their own characters from being affected by said turn losing effects. Even further, some of the environmental effects simply ignored the two armors entirely, making those particularly deadly for both offensive and defensive purposes.

Can't wait for their next game!

 

[Darth Roxor]

a few questions about dos2 muh story since i'm curious, please be into spoilerinos:

- how does the gaem end

- what's the deal with dallis and the mysterious cloaked figure (who are they etc)

- what's the deal with bishop elaxendar and his bad spelling

- who the fuck is muh leidi malady and why is she such a gigantic plot device

- this might be a bit niche, but it's something i was always the most curious about and wanted to see the effect, but alas: when i had bishop bad spelling captive on my ship, i went ahead and killed him in his cell. I heard he comes back later anyway and this doesn't matter in the very least - can anyone confirm?

 

[Luckmann]

- this might be a bit niche, but it's something i was always the most curious about and wanted to see the effect, but alas: when i had bishop bad spelling captive on my ship, i went ahead and killed him in his cell. I heard he comes back later anyway and this doesn't matter in the very least - can anyone confirm?

The plottest of armor. When I first met him, we killed him, and he still showed up on the ship with no explanation. He then proceeded to disappear.

 

[Darth Roxor]

physical armour, magic armour... and the most dreaded of all - the plot armour

 

[Sjukob]

a few questions about dos2 muh story since i'm curious, please be into spoilerinos:

So you haven't seen how everything turns out later in the game .... fuuuuuck. Compared to what comes towards the end, the beggining of the game is relatively sane.

Alright, let's go.

Spoiler

- what's the deal with bishop elaxendar and his bad spelling

- this might be a bit niche, but it's something i was always the most curious about and wanted to see the effect, but alas: when i had bishop bad spelling captive on my ship, i went ahead and killed him in his cell. I heard he comes back later anyway and this doesn't matter in the very least - can anyone confirm?

Alexander is the son of Lucian and he wants to ascend, but Dallis fucks with his head, so he just wastes time instead of achieving anything. Later it's revealed that he is just a clueless retard and Dallis has been using him to achieve her own goals. After the battle on the ship he will mysteriously
disappear to confront you later. By that time he will free of Dallis influence and you can try to reason with him, there will be a conflict about who should be the one to ascend and stuff. About killing him, well you can't really do it before meeting him in the third act, he will always appear there no matter what you do. But after you get there you have plenty of choices: you either strike a deal, work together or just kill him for good. Oh yeah, if you try to kill him and Dallis at the very beggining in Fort Joy Dallis will just turn into a dragon, grab Alexander and fly away.

- what's the deal with dallis and the mysterious cloaked figure (who are they etc)

Cloaked figure is Braccus Rex. Dallis and that emo boy necromancer, you find on the ship, ressurected him so he would help Dallis with her plan. Braccus Rex being himself totaly doesn't care about anybody and plays his own game, he betrays Dallis in the end. Dallis is an eternal and is a daughter of Fane, she wants to help Lucians with his plan. She is also the leader of white magisters. Oh and by the way emo boy totaly doesn't give a damn about Dallis and her plan he won't betray you or anything, so you it's safe to trust him.

- how does the gaem end

A bit of explanation is required before I start describing endings. Once upon a time there was only one race - eternals. They were super cool and shit, masters of source or something. Fane was one of them, while doing some research he found a gigantic amount of source and proceeded to tell their leader - God King about it, he decided that it would be better to not touch the thing, but seven other eternals, known as the gods now, wanted power for themselves. So they took the powers of that gigantic source, became super powerful, overthrew God King, created ingame races and sent opposition onto the other side of the source mass - the void. That's why source and void leaks into the world and sourcerers are associated with voidwoken, there is a breach in a veil. And so, to maintain and increase their power the gods designed the world like this: throughout the life a creature accumulates the source and when it dies the gods consume it's essence. So the world is basicaly a farm for the gods. You don't have to do research to find this out and it's told straight up to you in the game. Also the times are dark and the gods are hungry and they are getting crazy, eventually you will have to kill them because they go absolutely nuts. Lucians figured it out everything before you, and you learn all this information from his notes. He sabotaged the everything that had to with becoming the divine so nobody could challenge him. That's why nobody really knows how to ascend and there weren't new divines.

So, in the end you finaly reach Lucian's tomb and confront Dallis, Lucian and Braccus Rex. Lucian tells you about his plan to get rid of the source completely, so everyone can live happily without being jesters for gods and nuking each other with source, also he has been sucking away the source from gods for a long time, that's why they are hungry and crazy, Dallis wants that too and she was helping him all along, Braccus is just a slave for them they treat him like a dog. You are given a choice to either to side with Lucian or kick his ass. The deal is that purging the source will "kill" all of the sourcerers including you. If you challenge Lucian everyone attacks your group, midfight Braccus finaly turns the tables and summons Kraken, if you side with Lucian he will do that immediately because he doesn't want the veil to be sealed and would rather side with God King. Once you beat everybody you are given 4 choices: Ascend yourself, purge the source as Lucian wanted, give the world to God King or share source with the rest of the world.

1) If you ascend everyone sucks you cock and you become supercool but the threat of the void remains.

2) If you give source to everybody the world goes nuts and people just nuke each other.

3) I guess the God King ending is self explanatory. The voidwoken just come to the world and rape everybody, also you get to be a some sort of a highly privileged person in the new world.

4) And finaly the happiest ending - purging the world of source. The void disappears, the source and it's dangers are gone, the world is united under Lucian's reign and everyone lives in peace. Also Malady saves you and other sourcerers because she is a dumb Mary Sue.

- who the fuck is muh leidi malady and why is she such a gigantic plot device

Not explained. She is a demon if it bothers you, but it doesn't mean much in the game. She saves your ass a couple of times and also contributes to the final battle and the ending where you choose to get rid of the source (see above). Yeah she is super powerful and can do crazy shit.

 

[MadMaxHellfire]

Roberto Bruno

he's not a game dev XD he's a friend of mine. probably one of the most knowledgeable people i've ever met, still no game dev.

 

[Darth Roxor]

Alright, let's go.

hory shiet son

 

[Israfael]

About Malady:

Spoiler

She actually explains her motives right before you go into the 'hospital' and confront Adramahlik - she says that it's basically a bet - if you ascend she expects you to do certain favours. Not sure how she plans to enforce that, but it's what she said. Probably she had a deal with another adramahlik and plans to sell the protagonist to him or w/e. There's no logic in the grim darkness of war