This FAQ addendum contains answers given from the September 27
Original Sin Twitch TV Q&A.
Rough Transcript of questions and answers follows (in the order they were asked):
How many Weather types?
Right now just rain, no rain, and day and night, and that’s already quite a lot of work, because of all the interactivity they want. No rain of frogs yet.
(New!) There is now a pool of blood surface that you can get from killing enemies (more if it’s a kill done in an especially gory way) that you can use in combination with magic, probably similar to or identical to the water surface.
Are there systems that encourage roleplaying? Are there mechanics that will guide players to make smart in-character decisions?
Yes, every quest has multiple solutions and different solutions, not just your regular solution via a different method. At least one will be dependent on which character you’re playing. The Charm/Reason/Intimidation options will help determine which way you’re going to go – if you haven’t got the stats to intimidate somebody, then that’s not going to work.
There is no difference in dialogue options if you put character A’s intelligence high, and character B’s intelligence low, they both get the same stuff.
When will Kickstarter backers of certain tiers get to give their input on designing X and Y?
First, make sure that you create an account on the
Larian Vault and link it to your Kickstarter account. They’ll automatically know what rewards and such you are entitled to, and you can fill in the design X and Y things. There are some things you can fill in, there are other things that Larian still needs to get the parameters of from their design team.
Seen from the outside, will it be possible to make houses that are several stories high (7, 11, 16), depending on the whim of the level editor, or are there only models for certain heights (2,3,4 stories) and no others?
He thinks that you can chain as much as you want, but there’s going to be a problem with the roofs. It’s not that you can build an apartment building in Original Sin, but there are multiple stories. They still have an issue with the roofs that they haven’t solved yet. He’ll have to ask the artists.
How similar are the modding tools to those of other games like Shadowrun Returns, for example?
Original Sin’s modding tool is pretty free in that you can import stuff and attach all kinds of properties to it. You can script pretty much anything you can think of. There are Item scripts that allow for procedures on items.
How concentrated are you towards ease of combat/ What is the game’s complexity level?
David and Farhang are going over several varieties of the same combat situations over and over trying different things, seeing if different party combinations and tactics can survive. They’re going more for the RPG player that can think about it, look at the strengths and weaknesses of the enemy, and plan carefully. If you do that, it should take you only one or two tries to survive.
The stats and systems have been redesigned so you can design many different characters. At the start it’s overwhelming, but Fallout fans won’t be overwhelmed, it will seem more familiar to them. It takes about 5 minutes to comprehend. For the next 5 months David and Farghang will be going over every single combat encounter in the game. Yikes! There are 4 pages of stats, including the primary stats.
How deep is the combination of elemental magic in battle?
Quite deep, but he’s not telling anyone yet.
Are there polymorph spell and items?
Polymorph abilities are present in the game, and you can make scripts in the editor to polymorph people in the game. They’re not telling if there are skills or spells yet. (But the answer basically gives away that it’s a yes).
Do you need at least one other party member?
You always have at least two characters, if you want to survive you will have to get companions. It will probably be harder to play with only the primary two, but more will make it easier.
How will elemental magic affect other schools of magic (summoning, necromancy, divine, temporal)?
They don’t have that many schools of magic. They do have summoning and magic that could be called Divine magic, but no temporal magic. The system is inspired by Fallout, what Fallout calls skills, Larian calls Abilities you can put points into things like Fire Magic, Leadership, Pickpocketing, Crafting, Sneaking, and those stats are used when you’re using certain abilities in the game. Lots of stuff. This propagates through every single spell or special action or warrior move, etcetera.
Sneak system and some other things will be shown off next week at the Russian equivalent of E3.
How does pausing work in co-op?
We don’t have pausing. If I pause my game, his character will be standing still, the other guy will roam around freely. Combat is turn-based, so you can leave and come back later, still in combat. This isn’t a game you play with strangers.
The game will be on Linux.
Porting work is in progress.
Will finishing the game unlock higher difficulty levels, like Diablo?
No, this is really not like a Diablo game.
Vampires, werewolves, and other Fantasy monsters, like Zombie Jake?
Zombie Jake is Master Jake and you’re coming to Cyseal because of something Master Jake wants.
Companions – how chatty will they be in the game? Will they occasionally have something to say for certain quests unrelated to them, will they comment on certain events you stumble into wandering the world?
Right now, your main partner doesn’t shut up. Your companions will be slightly less chatty, but not by a lot. They’ll talk a lot.
Will the Linux/Mac release be simultaneous with the PC release?
It depends on if they’re ready or not. They are being developed in sync with the PC development.
What is the Main story/ side quest length?
Don’t know, the game isn’t finished yet. They used to say 20, 30, 40 hour game, not now. It depends on how long you play the game and want to do everything. They’ll only know once it’s done.
What is the density of the world?
Very dense. Every couple of screens you’ll find something to do.
Will elevation do something in combat?
Maybe Yes, they’re talking to the programmers.
Will add-ons be possible via the Larian Vault?
They’ll have to have an internal discussion. They’re swamped with work atm.
Can individual spells and skills be combined with other individuals spells and skills?
There’s party-based dialogue, party-based combat, party-based questing. There’s a bunch of things you can do to help each other depending on what skill you have and what the other guy has. Fire spell combining with the sword of your partner? Possibly, they want to make sure it can be done before they announce it.
Potion brewing?
Yes, that’s one of the crafting mechanics. You can make your own food and the types will have different effects.
Can you re-make other games using the editor?
Other than the real-time combat, it is possible to remake Sacred in the editor.
Will there be Minion spawning boss types?
Probably.
Will there be an in-game bug reporter in Original Sin?
Yes, even though they didn’t have it in Dragon Commander. They actually had it for Divine Divinity. They’ll also have to improve their bug tracking systems.
Will all combos and crafting take place just in the inventory, or can you also interact with things in the world to craft/combo?
You can combine things from your inventory to things in the world, it’s not just all in-inventory combination.
Will crafting cost money?
No, it won’t cost money. Most of the time it’s better to craft something yourself, you can get things better than what you can buy/find, and you can sell other neat things.
What’s the maximum party size?
The max size of the party will be larger than the number of companions you can have at one time because sometimes the story will dump other characters onto you who automatically join, or you might have summoned creatures, and such, so your max size you can put in is 4, but you can have up to 7 guys or so in a party at the same time.
Will the dialogue be the same for all gender combinations?
Gender recognition is in, certain dialogues are different. Quests are mostly the same, there are some quests that have gender recognition.
Does experience get shared between party members?
Currently, yes. If you are fighting a group of enemies who have a total of 1000 XP, a party of 2 fighting will get 500 XP each after it ends, and a party of 4 would get 250 XP each.
Will you see Bellegar in D:OS?
Yes, you’ll even see the Bellegarettes. There are multiple Bellegar Encounters because of Facebook likes.
Is D:OS a roguelike?
No, although you’ll die probably a comparable amount of times to a roguelike.
Will companions react to other companions?
He doesn’t want to answer that. The idea is yes, but that’s not implemented so they aren’t sure if that’ll be in, it is complex.
Have you done object overload tests?
Yes, and discovered that in one area wouldn’t work on Windows XP systems because it exceeded 3GB of stuff in total. Everything you see in the game is an object in itself and has an object reference. This includes the walls and other things are counted as objects, but the programmers are considered combining all the non0interactive stuff like that into one big object. This is not optimized yet, though.
Has Kirill started recording with his orchestra?
Not yet. They’ll update us later.
What sort of character build options will there be besides magic?
You can specialize in certain weapon types, you can specialize in armour.
Is there some way to pause or accelerate time?
You can pause to move time forward while the party sleeps, but the entire party has to be together. If one party member is on the other side of the world, you can’t sleep.
Are all the original races from Divinity 1 present?
No, not all the races from Divine Divinity are in the game.
If you buy one version of the game, will you get access the versions of the other platforms?
Yes, If you bought a version for one platform (windows, Linux, Mac), it’s for all versions.
Will Maxos, Zandalor and/or Bellegar be in the game?
No, yes, yes.
How are physics playing a role? Will there be puzzles implementing those behavious?
Yes. Not only puzzles, but the physics are also becoming interesting in combat.
Without a lot of scripting experience, can you script in the game?
You’ll have to learn, obviously. You’ll need to learn the language and such (which isn’t that hard). The scripting is very powerful, but it’s complex, so it’ll help to know how to script before.
Will there be another game like Divinity 2?
Third person and such, real time combat? Honestly, they’ll finish D:OS and figure it out next.
Importing custom 3D models?
It’s planned.
Will there be an in-game store?
You can barter in the game, like Divine Divinity. If you mean microtransactions, then no.
What are your favorite, most exciting parts of the game?
David: Discovering the new things that have been added over the last two months.
Swen: He’s looking extremely forward to playing the game with his girlfriend, the world has the density he always wanted in an RPG.
Will there be an organized way to post mods and new adventures
They’re still working on the logistics of that, but yes.
Will you lose equipment if you die?
Not forever. If you die (not the entire party), they’re adding a mechanic that if party dies you go to shelter plane at end of time and go back to last waypoint.
Can you create a temporaral paradox and kill Janus?
… no comment.
What’s the save system like?
You can save at any time, probably even in combat.
Will it be possible to make a mod for permadeath for party members that deletes them from the game after death?
Probably not, modding only goes so far. They’d have to check.
Can I change equipment quickly or slowly?
Changing equipment in combat will cost action points. More AP for larger things, like changing a breastplate instead of a sword for a dagger.
How much animal variety is there?
There is, but they haven’t been added yet, even though a lot of the animations are done.
Do monsters give fixed XP, or does it scale based on your level?
XP is fixed, no scaling.
Can you customize the mouse cursor?
The cursor changes , but you can’t customize it.
What determines the level of a summoned creature?
A summoned creatures level depends on the level of your summoning skill. They don’t level. A level 10 character that can summon level 1 creatures will only be level 1.
Will there be Dragons in Original Sin?
Who said there would be?
Can you change the portraits for your party members?
Yes, but that’s not in yet.
Can you steal a chair and put it in your home?
Yes you can do that. But there are reactions to make theft a complicated thing.
Will there be pop culture references in Original Sin?
Yes, but you’ll have to figure out what they are for yourself.
Will there be destructible terrain?
No.
Can you sheathe your weapon?
Yes, and characters will react to the fact that you have it drawn or not.
Will there be a brothel somewhere in the D:OS world?
There was one, but they’re redesigning part of the world and it’s gone for the moment, he had to make room for something else. A church, in fact.
Can you write your own journals?
Books that rewrite themselves during the game are implemented.
Can mods be released as a commercial product?
Maybe. There will be come kind of agreement that will let you sell your game if you want to, but details are still up in the air. They’ll be finalized before the editor is shipped.
Is the HUD scalable or moveable without modding?
Yes? They’ll see, not yet.
Why aren’t there all the races?
The game world can’t include all the races because it’s not big enough
Do you need to be careful when you sleep in certain places?
No, Swen is not a fan of surprise encounters in the night. Probably not, but you could mod it in.
Will there be a Collectors Edition?
I guess so.
Will it be possible to troll friends by having characters fall in love against the will of another person? Yes, and no. That kind of trolling is possible… in a mod, but not in the main storyline. You can also force guys to do things against your will .
Can you customize your lair?
You can redesign parts of the shelter plane at the end of time. There’s quite a lot you can do.
There are similarities between the Engineer, Original Sin’s Engineer and Dragon Commander’s Architect. Would it be wrong to assume that all these Engineers and Architects are related somehow?
No it would not be wrong, you will be discovering some relation.
Is there a good/evil system that changes the outcome of the game?
There are a lot of situations where you can change things, you have a lot of permutations, including total Armageddon, although the ending is pretty much fixed, because a thing needs to happen.
Have you shown new content to the Youtube guys?
Not yet, but they will be showing youtube guys things closer to the alpha period.
Can you rotate objects?
You can’t yet. But you will be able to.
Are weresheep part of the main story line
Weresheep not part of the main storyline, but have a protoyped quest and such.
Are there any DLC’s planned for Original Sin?
No DLC’s are planned, at least not paid stuff – unless that’s the only way to keep the company afloat. There won’t be any microtransaction-like things, certainly not paid. But there might be expansions with loads of content.
Have you worked out the Charm/Intimidate/Reason changes?
If there’s a disagreement, there’s now a fourth choice. There are three options (charm/intimidate/reason) to try and get your own way, and now a fourth choice to change your mind and agree with your companion. (StabbeyNote: I’m quite glad for that fourth option.)
It used to be Intimidate was derived from your Strength attribute, Charm was derived from Constitution, and Reason was derived from Intelligence, but now they are their own skills, not tied to those attributes.
Can you miss quests and locations depending on your choices?
Yes. There are spots where your choices can cut yourself off from content, the only place that’s guaranteed to not be cut off from is the main quest.
Can we use images in the messages in the woods?
Messages in the woods will be text only, no images. There’s a lot of things to put on that tree.
Can you play with someone else via IP address?
Yes.
Which schools of magic will there be?
They have 4 schools of magic, the elemental schools, and each school has the same types of spells, ranged damage, ranged AoE, surface creating spell, shielding spell, healing spells. They also have other skills that are not magic. You won’t have a neat classified list of spell this, spell that. You’ll discover spells as you explore the game world.
Will be there a Thieves Guild?
There are no guilds in the game (at least, none that you can join).
Is there a hardcore mode?
There will be an extremely casual mode where you can kill things with one click.
Edit: Infinitron complained about the font size so I've indented the text instead.
going to look at it now.
